From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE
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Woman: Honey, what's wrong?
Man: I don't know—I'm just not feeling like myself lately. I keep having these weird thoughts.
Woman: Thoughts?
Man: Like, maybe single-payer healthcare is the right way to go. Maybe we should increase taxes on the rich. Maybe we should keep reproductive issues between a woman and her doctor. Maybe gay marriage won’t destroy the foundation of civilization. Maybe government can solve many of our problems. It feels so…
Woman: …wrong?
Man: Yeah! Like everything in my head is suddenly rational and clear!
Woman: Honey, you're suffering from commonsensivitis.
Man: Commonsensiwhatis???
[Cut to] Doctor in white lab coat: Commonsensivitis is a rare but serious condition that occurs when neurons in the conservative brain figure out how to connect to each other, producing high levels of rationality, reason and, yes, common sense. Junk food and Fox News can help destroy those connections naturally, but for really stubborn cases you need new Screwusall. Just take two Screwusall tablets and you'll be feeling like your usual paranoid, angry, loud, gun-crazy self again!
Man: Defund Planned Parenthood! Kill your Medicare but not mine! Stomp unions into the dirt! Drill here, drill now! Social Security is a Ponzi scheme but don't you dare cut my benefits! Very fine people on both sides! More tax cuts for the rich! Kirk Cameron movies are instant classics! Science is for sissies! Jesus rode a dinosaur!
Woman: Welcome back to the bubble, honey! No more commonsensivitis for you!
Man: Thanks, Screwusall
Announcer: Screwusall—available at fine Republican campaign rallies, GOP-controlled state legislatures, and Mitch McConnell’s candy dish.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Monday, June 10, 2019
Note: The only arms that you are permitted to keep and bear in C&J are limited to those that must be pulled by a team of horses or a locomotive. Thank you for your cooperation, and please mind your step around Big Bertha in the parking lot. —Mgt.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til Canada Day: 21
Days 'til the Southern Maine Pride Parade and festival: 5
Jobs created in May, way below estimates and a black eye for Trump: 75,000
Minimum number of ice cream trucks seized in new York City for hiding behind shell companies to get out of $4.5 million in collective traffic fines: 46
Amount Maine elver (baby eels) fishermen got for their catch this year: $2,100 per pound
Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s current standing in the latest Des Moines Register Democratic primary poll, up from 1 in the previous poll and launching him into 4th place overall: 14%
Estimated number of times you'll flex the joints in your fingers over your lifetime: 24 million
Stanley Cup finals
St. Louis and Boston are tied at 3 games apiece
NBA Finals
Toronto leads Golden State 3 games to 1
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Saved!!!
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CHEERS to High Noon: D.C. Edition. The standoff between Sheriff Jerry Nadler and the White House escalates this week as the House Judiciary Committee chairman takes his finger and unsnaps the leather strap on his holster, then stares all beady-eyed at the Billy Barr gang at the other end of the street. I spec' the womenfolk and children best gather up some cornbread and peaches and hide in the cellar 'til this is over:
House Democrats have officially introduced a resolution to hold Attorney General William Barr and former White House counsel Don McGahn in contempt of Congress for failing to comply with congressional subpoenas.
The contempt resolution allows House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) to go to court to seek civil enforcement of the subpoena for Barr to turn over special counsel Robert Mueller’s unredacted report and underlying evidence, as well as for McGahn to provide documents and public testimony. The House Rules Committee is expected to mark up the resolution to hold Barr and McGahn in contempt on Monday, according to a Democratic congressional aide, and the full House is slated to vote on the resolution Tuesday. […]
[Democratic] aides emphasized that the case could potentially unlock many doors for the investigation if a judge rules the White House cannot assert absolute immunity from its officials testifying.
If they crank up the theme from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly during the floor vote, I'll kick five bucks into the House doughnut fund.
P.S. Watergate whistle-blower John Dean will be the star witness today at a Judiciary subcommittee hearing titled, Lessons on the Mueller Report: Presidential Obstruction and Other Crimes. Spoiler alert: Fox News will slap a “LIVE” chyron over an old Benghazi hearing instead, and then later claim it was “an accident.”
JEERS to the continuing adventures of Crisis Man! After embarrassing America from start-to-finish during his overseas trip (we hear the Queen's therapist is working a double shift this week), criminally-insane President Donald J. Trump turned his attention to Mexico, on whom he'd threatened to slap tariffs, which are really—say it with me—tax increases on Americans. As usual, Paul Krugman of The New York Times isn't buying the dotard's spin:
So…"crisis" averted. Yay, clap-clap-clap,oh happy joy joy he saved our avocado toast, and America is—[Yawn]—great again. Or something.
CHEERS to Meetup Fevuh! For the tenth year in a row, New England Kossacks will be cavorting with nature at the annual summer meetup at Mayim's Maine cottage by the lake about an hour northwest of Portland. It's coming up in a couple weeks on Saturday, June 22 from roughly noon 'til 5 or so. Says the hostess with the mostest:
It's about a scenic hour-long drive northwest from Portland,and maybe three hours from the Boston metro area, depending where you start out and how bad traffic is.
I’ll cook some, as well as have beer and assorted non-alcoholic beverages. But life is crazy {a good crazy, but wicked busy!}, so I’m hoping people will bring a dish to share. {One request: no pork or shellfish, please.} It will help with planning if you let me know the general type of dish {appetizer, side, salad, dessert} when you RSVP, as I’ll fill in the gaps.
If anyone wants to spend Friday and/or Saturday night (for fun, or because it's a long drive), I've got room for several, plus some tenting space.
It's a super way to experience the beauty of Maine at the best time of year with the best of friends. Michael and I (and Haley the Wonder Dog with the bionic knees) will be there along with other local Kossacks and we hope you'll be able to join us for what has become an annual DKos summer tradition. For more information/exact directions or to RSVP, email mayim at mainely (dot) genealogy at gmail.com or send her a Kosmail here. As a special bonus, we promise we'll keep the black flies on their leashes and tied to a tree at all times.
CHEERS to hot Joe-on-Joe action. 65 years ago this week, during the Army-McCarthyhearings, attorney Joseph Welch quietly destroyed bedraggled, belligerent Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy (and his little brat lawyer Roy Cohn) with the immortal words: "Have you no sense of decency,sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?"
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Within a couple years McCarthy was dead of alcoholism, and today his grave is guarded by a giant emaciated demon vulture. Birds of a feather.
CHEERS to the leader of the pack. Despite a decade of constant attacks—Tan suit! Mom jeans! Benghazi Benghazi Benghazi!—by the Republican smear machine, Barack Hussein Obama came out on top of Pew Research's new poll of the greatest presidents in Americans' lifetimes. Yes, even St. Ronald Reagan has to play second-fiddle to the sharpest executive branch knife in the drawer, and it's not even close. Here's the breakdown of U.S. adults who say each president was their first choice on the 'greatest of my lifetime' list:
Barack Obama: 31%
Ronald Reagan: 21%
Bill Clinton: 13%
Donald Trump: 10%
John F. Kennedy: 7%
George H.W. Bush: 3%
George W. Bush: 3%
Jimmy Carter: 2%
Quick conclusions: 1) The Kennedy mystique endures, 2) Bush I and Carter were hurt in the legacy department by losing their reelection bids (though Carter would top the list of best ex-presidents, and 3) George W. Bush, with two full-but-miserable terms under his belt, has been tossed into the dustbin of history. Couldn’t happen to a shittier guy. But I'm sure Trump will give him a run for his money.
CHEERS to the “Ha ha!” heard 'round the world. Today is not a national holiday, but perhaps it should be. It was five years ago today that second-most-powerful man in the House, majority leader Eric Cantor, lost his primary in a landslide to an unknown teabagger—a real brat whose name was, um, Dave Brat. (Karma struck four years later as Virginia's blue wave swept Brat out to sea. He lost to Democrat Abigail Spanberger.) Some say Cantor lost because he failed to campaign and took his seat for granted. Others say he lost because of the combined telepathic voter-influencing power of the gays, feminists and pagans. Yeah, let's go with that one.
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Ten years ago in C&J: June 10, 2009
JEERS to playing the world's smallest violin. Pity the poor, poor domestic terrorist. George Tiller's murderer, Scott Roeder, is complaining that his jail cell is too cold. And he needs his sleep apnea machine. And he's lost without his bunny slippers and stuffed Teddy blastocyst (he calls it "Cuddles"). And there was a little too much oregano in his beef stroganoff last night. And it's too drafty. And the blanket isn't hypoallergenic. And the toilet is just sitting there out in the open. And no basic cable! Hey, what can we say, Scott? Club Med was booked.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to the draft. No, not the military draft, silly britches. The 100% free, God-given drafts that turn the turbines that power the homes and factories that populate the country that wants a cleaner planet. And these turbines are part of an offshore wind farm that's the greatest biggest one in all the world, powering nearly 300,000 homes in Britain…and it's just getting started:
Once the farm is fully operational next year, the wind farm will be able to power well over a million UK homes with clean electricity, which is more than twice the energy capacity of the previous wind farm to hold the world record [and] "putting us well on the way to our target of a third of the UK’s electricity coming from offshore wind by 2030.” […]
Morten Holm, Hornsea One’s Head of Operations, said: “Hornsea One changes the game in the way we produce clean electricity around the globe. It’s the first of a new generation of offshore wind farms, that are much bigger than anyone has ever attempted to build before. It’s an exciting moment for me personally, but also for the UK as the world watches the progress with this record-breaking wind farm.”
No blowout preventer failures. No oil slicks. No massive fires belching black smoke. And if there’s ever a wind spill, the company is prepared to mobilize its rapid-response team to...well, sit down for a nice cup of tea with biscuits.
Have a tolerable Monday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
"I don't want to see Bill in Portland Maine splashing in the Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool. I want to see him in prison."
---Speaker Nancy Pelosi
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