Trump's Plan to Defeat Isis

Donald J Trump, candidate, promised he had a plan to defeat ISIS very quickly.  When asked about details he said he wouldn't share any because "you don't broadcast what you're going to do."  That piece of nonsense allowed him to avoid answering a question which had nothing to do with strategy, after all FDR certainly made no bones about the fact we'd send troops to Europe, and everything to do with really not having an answer.

I say that because, yesterday, we all finally found out what his plan is, he PLANS to ask for a plan.  What a startling revelation!! I'm SOO glad he didn't tip his hand.  So, to sum up, his secret plan was to ask others for a secret plan

And to allow Russia to exterminate all Syrian opposition to the Assad government, ISIS, democratic groups, women, kids.  The rest of his "secret" plan, outside the 'not having a plan part', is to allow a brutal regime to engage in genocide.  Gosh, I'm so glad we're "winning" so much we get tired of winning.  Great Plan, Donald.  I'm HUGELY impressed and I'm tired of winning this way, so feel free to get some adult to make you an actual plan for how to govern.

Happy Chinese New Year!

I love to laugh at the crazy right wingers who insist that NOW that Rump is their temporary president, the other nations of the world are going to 'respect us' (by which they appear to mean fear us).

Yeah.

Not so much.  In fact these morons from the conned-servative ideology cannot name one country or subset of a region that now respects us more.

In the spirit of Chinese New Year, appropriately enough the year of the Rooster, behold the level of mockery with which the conned-servative temporary president is regarded:




Maybe it is just me, but that looks nothing to me like respect.  Rather to me it screams contempt for Rump.

From CNN:

A giant rooster sculpture, sporting the President-elect's signature hairdo and hand gestures, has been erected outside a shopping mall in Taiyuan, in China's northern Shanxi Province.

The sculpture was commissioned by the company that owns the mall and will be its mascot, Cao Mingliang, the deputy director of planning department from N1 ArtWalk Mall, told CNN.

Cao said a series of products and smaller replicas will be available for sale in the future, though some are already being sold on Taobao, the Chinese e-commerce giant owned by Alibaba.

Wei Qing, whose Shenghe Yangtai Business is selling replica roosters, told CNN he thought sculpture was hilarious.

"I think the rooster is very cute and funny, the hairstyle and eyebrows look very much like Donald Trump. I'm sure it will attract a lot of customers," he said.

At least four stores are selling the Trump rooster, with prices starting from $57 to a whopping $1,739 for a statue that's 32 feet tall.

This isn't even the first avian doppleganger Trump has had in China this year.

State-run People's Daily tweeted out an image of a bird sporting a similar hairdo to the President-elect last month.
Trump-related products and gag gifts have proliferated since the real estate mogul announced his candidacy for president.

Rump is a gag gift, a punchline to a colossal joke, President Angry Bird brain. They won't just be eating our nation for lunch in China, they will be eating Rump for lunch. Big negotiator, baloney. Chicken baloney.

The end is near......in a matter of speaking I'm embarrassed by the MN GOP, again

Behold the right in all their glory, from Rump, our temporary president on down the food chain to the despicable MN GOP.

From the latest Wonkette piece on the MN GOP passing health care 'reform' legislation

"Minnesota Republicans Pass Health Insurance ‘Reform’ That Doesn’t Cover Any Actual Medical Stuff"

You betcha: If this thing went into effect, you could buy health insurance in Minnesota that excluded coverage for costly stuff you don’t need. Like diagnostic tests or cancer treatment. Or Emergency services. Or much of anything. In essence, it would allow a return to the good old days of “Junk Insurance” policies that had low premiums, low deductibles, and didn’t cover hardly anything. But they were inexpensive, and by golly, those were the policies you couldn’t keep when Obamacare went into effect. And it’s a preview of the glories of keeping costs down by allowing people to buy insurance policies across state lines — if the bare-bones coverage that this Minnesota bill would provide still cost too much, you could go buy your insurance in some state that doesn’t require insurance policies to cover, say, “doctor visits.” Just think how much you’d save on insurance, unless of course you actually needed insurance!
It’s unclear whether the bill would pass the state Senate, where Republicans only have a one-seat majority, and it would certainly be vetoed by Democratic Gov. Mark Dayton, who just had his own health scare yesterday — he passed out while giving his state of the state address, and while he’s back at work today, he revealed that he was diagnosed with prostate cancer last week. Oh, look at item 22 on the list of things insurance companies wouldn’t have to cover: “Prostate cancer screenings.”

I am assuming the model for this graphic is not temporary president Rump,
because while the overall size and shape are about right, the skin tones are not orange enough
unless, like so many other things, he's only concerned with what shows...

I used to believe, and still do occasionally, that the Republicans were simply clueless as to how to govern.  But they know; they just don't want to do it.

It might be more fundamental, that they don't grasp the proper role of government, which would explain why they keep trying to privatize everything.
But bottom line -- pun intended on the photo -- the right exists to redistribute wealth to the wealthy from the less wealthy, in whatever form they can devise, and the hell with the average citizen or the middle class. Like the soup nazi from friends, if I might slightly paraphrase -- NONE FOR YOU.No medical care. No education. No roads. No libraries. No voting.  No post office. No retirement. No safe and clean environment. No safe drinking water. No food or shelter for the poor.

There is no end to what the right wants to......end, except when it comes to corporate welfare and big bonuses and salaries for the obscenely rich.  Well.........maybe there is one naked end.......goal, that is.

Resistance is not futile. This is what winning looks like.

Beginning with the anti-Trump protests in New York City and Los Angeles:

New York above, LA below"

And representing the middle of the country, protests in Chicago. But don't let us pretend that the only protests were in the largest cities. They were everywhere. But for the sake of brevity I am posting the biggest ones.  And one really really small but significant one too.

Antarctic protest
We stand together in the USA against Trump
We stand together around the world as well.

The Trump Inaugural Route
unprecedented, unpresidentedly empty

Women's March on Washington

This is the swamp being repopulated with worse bad actors.

For those who do nor recognize the Rump nominees by sight, they are the people currently being vetted by Congress without first filing their ethics paperwork, so that they cannot be asked about conflicts of interest.
And since I don't see former Texas Governor Rick Perry, all round dumbass, in the above photo, here is another graphic to illustrate how utterly unqualified are those "best People" with which Rump promised to surround himself.



And for those who don't get this joke, Betsy DeVos, whom Senator Al Franken took to the woodshed in her confirmation hearings, believes we need guns in schools to protect children from bear attacks. Of which we have none on record, with or without guns in schools.

We are fortunate to have Sen. Franken working for us in Washington DC

DeVos, Rump's pick for Sec of Education, has in these hearings stated that there is a need for guns in schools to defend children from grizzly bears, and has stated her purpose in education is to build the Kingdom of God in public schools. That is among her many other failings that have been revealed in these hearings.

She has also admitted that she has not merely given money to Republicans and conservative causes, but that she has done so to purchase influence.  I would hardly characterize this as "draining the swamp".

This should be completely unacceptable. There is ZERO evidence that DeVos appreciates sexual orientation is innate, and she has further stated that it is "premature" to keep LGBT students safe from rape, per the guidelines that after serious examination, were set up for educational entities, and which have worked successfully to reduce assaults and harassment.

This woman, like Trump's other nominees, is utterly unqualified and unsuitable to the position for which she is nominated.

Conned-servatives, Pixie Dust and Unicorn Poop - the issue of Health Care and Government Funding

References to unicorn droppings seems to be a frequent euphemism for unrealistic expectations or ludicrous political promises in the UK.  I have become a big fan of the phrase while reading comments at the BBC web site on a range of topics, including in particular Brexit promises from the right relating to funding the UK National Health Services.

(An aside, gentle readers; be prepared for the unexpected should you choose to google the term Unicorn Poop.)

Similarly we might as well get out the shovels for the unicorn poop when it comes to Donald Rump and his promises of health care and health insurance for everyone, better and cheaper and serving more people than what was provided under the ACA  aka Obamacare.

A recent poll from the Pew Research Fact Tank shows that a sharply increasing number of Americans, including the Conned-servatives who vote Republican, NOW believe that the federal government should ensure Health Care Coverage!  As with the change in public opinion, which the right tends to consistently lag, this reflects a similarly dramatic change which in some respects parallels the shift in public opinion relating to the LGBT community and how they should be treated fairly.  In that regard the shift is both unexpectedly rapid, and likely to be reflected in demands for legislative changes.  This is a dramatic change that the political right would be wise to follow; however they appear hell bent on the opposite.  That doesn't bode well. 

More Americans say government should ensure health care coverage

As the debate continues over repeal of the Affordable Care Act and what might replace it, a growing share of Americans believe that the federal government has a responsibility to make sure all Americans have health care coverage, according to a new Pew Research Center survey.

Currently, 60% of Americans say the government should be responsible for ensuring health care coverage for all Americans, compared with 38% who say this should not be the government’s responsibility.

Just as there are wide differences between Republicans and Democrats about the 2010 health care law, the survey also finds partisan differences in views on whether it’s the government’s responsibility to make sure all Americans have health care coverage. More than eight-in-ten Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents (85%) say the federal government should be responsible for health care coverage, compared with just 32% of Republicans and Republican leaners. 

...The survey also finds continued differences on this question by race and ethnicity as well as income. A large majority of blacks and Hispanics (85% and 84%, respectively) say the government should be responsible for coverage, while non-Hispanic whites are split on the issue (49% agree, 49% disagree). And while about three-quarters of those with family incomes of less than $30,000 per year (74%) say the government should ensure coverage, only about half (53%) of those with incomes of $75,000 or higher say the same.

Currently, 52% of Republicans with family incomes below $30,000 say the federal government has a responsibility to ensure health coverage for all, up from just 31% last year. There also has been a 20-percentage-point increase among Republicans with incomes of $30,000-$74,999 (34% now, 14% last year). But there has been no significant change among those with incomes of $75,000 or more (18% now, 16% then).

Those who think government should ensure health coverage for all are divided on a follow-up question about whether health insurance should be provided through a mix of private insurance companies and the government (29% of the overall public), or if the government alone should provide insurance (28% of the public).

...Most of those on the other side of the issue – people who say the government does not have a responsibility to ensure health coverage – say on a subsequent question that the government should continue Medicare and Medicaid (32% of the overall public), while just 5% of the public says the government should have no role in health care.

Among Republicans and Republican leaners, most of whom (67%) say the government does not have a responsibility for ensuring health coverage, there is very little support for the government not being involved in health care at all. Just 10% of Republicans favor no government involvement, while 56% say it should continue Medicare and Medicaid.

While Republicans in Congress have already taken the first steps toward repealing the ACA, Americans remain largely divided on what Congress should do with the health care law. Overall, in a Pew Research Center survey in December, 39% said it should be repealed, while an equal share (39%) said the law should be expanded. Just 15% of Americans said the law should be left as is. Although the public is divided on the future of the law, there is bipartisan support for a number of ACA provisions.

It is dispiriting that there are still so many people, particularly among the conned-servatives, who do not know the ACA / Affordable Care Act IS THE SAME THING as Obamacare.  That we should be assured these people were wiser than the rest of us when they elected Don the Con (T)Rump to office or pretty much ANY of the GOP is ludicrous.

Continuing his con, his direct and ludicrous lies, that any human being either over the age of 4 or with an IQ higher in equivalence than a 4 year old would recognize as impossible BS.  Or should I say US2, for United States of Unicorn Scat?

The current crop of Republicans either don't know or don't care, or more likely don't care enough to want to know, what Americans really want from them and from government.  The next election is coming up fast in 2018, and this looks to be a hot issue, one that will likely fracture support for Republicans and Conservatives.  The next presidential election will be in 2020, the same year that the Census mandated by the constitution will raise the issue of gerrymandering and redistricting.

If the right continues to ignore what "we the people" really really want, to borrow a blast from the past phrase from the Spice Girls,  I think we can realistically hope for some change in those elections, and be confident that the interim not-valid president Rump will provide nothing but unicorn poop and rubbish promises.

I've said it before and I will say it again here now; Republicans do not govern well, and do not correctly grasp the proper function and role of government.

It is spelled CONFLICT OF INTEREST

It's Martin Luther King Day, and John Lewis has it right!

A young John Lewis, arrested 41 times for protesting Jim Crow,
with his non-violent civil rights protests

Back in the late 1950s and through the 1960's John Lewis fought for civil rights.  He was a non-violent protester who was severely injured during peaceful protests.

As a result of those peaceful protests, civil rights legislation was passed, and became law with the signature of then-president Lyndon Johnson.  Since the passage of the Voting Rights Act, the conservatives have worked tirelessly to bring back Jim Crow and to undo the provisions that guaranteed voting rights.

This is the shame, the stain, on conservatives and on our history that we let them get away with doing it.  No one understands that better than now-Congressman John Lewis.  Throughout the south, and in places other than the deep south which have Republicans in control of state legislatures we see voter suppression taking root.  This has been reflected in the decreasing voter participation.

I would argue that the lower the voter participation, the less legitimate, the less valid is any government of the people, by the people, or for the people.  To selectively take away the right to vote is not only a racial attack, it is an attack on the very premise of our nation, representative government, by limiting government representation as much as possible to conservative white people.

Nothing could be more in opposition to John Lewis, or to the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

When we have a racist drug policy that disproportionately makes felons of minorities for what were previously not felony crimes, not only imprisoning them in largely for-profit jails which steal their labor for pennies an hour -- sometimes as little as 8 cents an hour.  This is Jim Crow all over again.  To further deny these minorities the restoration of their voting rights has further shifted the participation in voting to white voters, and been part of the rise of white supremacy again in the south.

If anyone doubts that there is still an unrepentant population of white bigots in the US, we have only to look at the polling on those who desire to bring back anti-miscegenation laws which would again prevent intermarrying between people of different "racial" backgrounds.  This reflects not only a desire for racial purity that is synonymous with white supremacy, but also a completely false understanding by ignorant conservatives of race and the characteristics associated with that false understanding of race.

Make no mistake, Trump is himself a racist, and so are those who support him, or at the very least his supporters are tolerant of racism.

Because it is funny

You can't make up this stuff. From If You Only News:

The Company Supplying Portable Toilets To Inauguration Is Called ‘Don’s Johns’ And People Are DYING

Just a few days after news broke that the Russians may or may not have secretly filmed Donald Trump enjoying a urination fetish with Russian prostitutes, inauguration organizers realized to their horror that attendees will have an abundance of giant reminders of that scandal dotted around the capital during the event.
Don’s Johns bills itself as the “the Washington area’s top provider of portable toilet rentals” but it’s name is just a smidge to close to the “Don” about to be sworn in to office. According to the Associated Press, organizers have begun frantically covering up the names on the port-a-potty units in order to avoid the embarrassment.

It’s the great port-a-potty cover-up for President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.

Workers preparing for the inauguration Jan. 20 have taped over the name of the company — “Don’s Johns” — that has long supplied portable restrooms for major outdoor events in the nation’s capital.
Virginia-based Don’s Johns calls itself the Washington area’s top provider of portable toilet rentals. But the name apparently strikes too close to home for inaugural organizers.
Workers have placed blue tape over the company name on dozens of portable restrooms installed near the Capitol for the inauguration.
Hilariously, the blue tape doesn’t really work. You can still see the name underneath.

For many internet users, news that Trump’s team was panicking about being compared to a literal box filled with pee was almost too much to handle.

Friday Fun Day: Schadenfreude Edition

Donald Trump, the man elected by fools "to drain the swamp" has been at the center of too many CREDIBLE scandals post-election in addition to his rapacious appointments/cabinet picks.

And THAT is coming home to roost, sometimes in humorous ways.

While Trump is expending apparently an unprecedented amount of tax payer dollars on his gaudy but tacky inauguration, it is an ongoing thorn in his "not my president" side that major performers, both in the US and outside the US (notably from the UK), have refused Trump.

He has already demeaned the prestige of the office; I cannot recall, before, in my lifetime a performer declining to perform for an incoming president at such a previously important national event.  I do not fault the performers for refusing Trump; he is even more deplorable than the deplorables who voted him into office in a record low voter turnout election.  That low voter turn out above and beyond the polarized low information voters who turned out for Trump make him a less legitimate president.  It is not the candidates, contrary to some pundits claims who are responsible for that low turnout, it is the right wing efforts at voter suppression coming to fruition.

So here is the morning's Schadenfreude for your amusement.  A poseur band performing for a poseur president; all hail mediocrity and Rump.

From the Rolling Stone:

Bruce Springsteen Cover Band Defends Donald Trump Inauguration Party

"It's got nothing to do with politics whatsoever," says the B-Street Band's Will Forte. "It's really just a New Jersey party" "I've been beaten down. I haven't slept. I've been up all night," says Will Forte, the founder of popular Bruce Springsteen cover group the B-Street Band. The 63-year-old musician tells Rolling Stone that when news broke that his band would play a Donald Trump inauguration party this month, he received a flood of emails excoriating the group.
"We kind of fell into this and never saw it coming," he adds. "I'm only a small fry. I like publicity, but I didn't want this kind of publicity. The last time we had this much publicity is when we almost played the Craigslist Killer's wedding up in Boston."

This is the first I heard of it that the Craigslist Killer had a fiance. I suspect that as much as she (I assume it is she but could be he) was as distressed by their choice of mate as Rump voters are going to be by their choice in president. While not a murderer (that we know of), Rump may very well be a criminal of the rich sort that gets away with his crimes, up until the issue of high crimes and misdemeanors brings him crashing down.

Even conservative artists have bailed on any association with Rump.  Not to mention Trump's bad track record of paying people being a presumed consideration.  Being a deadbeat employer is just one of the many failings coming back to haunt him.  I predict this is a taste of abandonment by the right yet to come, but coming soon.

Also from Rolling Stone:

Why Even Trump-Friendly Artists Won't Perform at His Inauguration

Afraid of media circus, musicians are steering clear of president's swearing in, according to music managers.

Weeks before Donald Trump's presidential inauguration, the subject of securing performances has been contentious. Last night, the president-elect weighed in on the debacle (on Twitter, naturally), saying in his inimitable way that he didn't need "so-called 'A' list celebrities." "I want the PEOPLE!" he tweeted. But according to top music managers, Trump's team has been hustling to secure a high calibre of talent and star-power for the event nonetheless.

"We've gotten calls that almost sound a little bit desperate: 'Does anybody want to perform?'" says Ken Levitan, a top music manager who represents liberal and conservative artists including Kings of Leon, Hank Williams Jr., Lynyrd Skynyrd and Emmylou Harris. "At this point, we haven't had anybody that has any desire to perform at the inauguration.

"Even if you're a Trump supporter, you've got to look at how he plays the media [and] the public, in terms of how he attacks and twists things around. I've got to think there's a fear of talking about things and working with him," Levitan continues. "I do know some of the very conservative [artists] have no desire to do it. ... [They] just don't want to be involved in the circus — it's a media circus, and not necessarily in a good way."
Elton John, Garth Brooks and Celine Dion have reportedly turned down offers.

And in MORE Schadenfreude news, there are only 200 buses that have applied for bus parking during the inaugural on January 20th; for the Women's March on the 21st (not, of course, limited to women participants) has in contrast, applied for 1,200 bus parking permits; the parking location for such events holds a maximum of 1,300 buses.

Mr. Rump, the people appear to be catching on to you, and that doesn't look good.

It's only Thursday, but it's a fun day too

My favorite in the fallout from Goldenshowergate so far:

John Fugelsang

I didn't think #GoldenShowerGate could get any funnier and then Trump accused Buzzfeed of yellow journalism.

MN GOP -- the party that wants to get into your bed room, bathroom, locker room and your pants

While they like to give lip service to being the party of small government, and moan and groan about government over-reach ad nauseum, the GOP is the worst offender for unwarranted intrusion into the lives of citizens minding their own business.  The right is obsessed with controlling our sexual and gender identity, sexual orientation, and reproductive choices, attempting to variously criminalize those decisions, or to make them for us.  These are things which largely cannot be legislated, as gender and sexuality, and individual body autonomy are intrinsic and inherent parts of each human being.

It should be an accepted premise of government that any legislation that interferes with the free will and action of citizens should serve a demonstrated NEED for such legislation.  In the case of the transgender and bathrooms, there have been more instances of Republican politicians arrested for sexual misconduct in bathrooms than there have been documented incidents, much less arrests or convictions, of transgender persons behaving inappropriately or illegally.  One of those GOP pols, Larry Craig, was arrested right here in Minnesota, at the International Airport.

As noted by the Intellectualist:

According to Media Matters, there haven’t … been any reports of men ‘pretending’ to be transgender to gain access to women’s spaces and commit crimes against them. You know who have been arrested in public bathrooms for sexual misconduct?Republican politicians.
Without even diving too deep, we found three GOP legislators who were picked up for lavatory indiscretions.
Their names: Larry Craig ..., Jon Hinson, and Bob Allen.

We may need laws against GOP politicians using public bathrooms. By contrast, trans people are doing just fine.

It has long been my contention that not only are a number of conned-servatives are controlling, authoritarian hypocrites, but also that many are bigots, (bigotry being defined as "sincerely" believing broadly denigrating and factually false things about a broad group of people in order to in some way demean or discriminate against them). In the case of transgender people, American or otherwise, it is a fact that there have been more Republican members of Congress arrested for illegal sexual conduct in public bathrooms than there have been arrests of transgender people for either sexual assault or sexual harassment, both of which are the justification for transgender bathroom bill legislation.

The most recent example of that is HB 41, a bill introduce by three of the most consistently stupid members of the state legislature since the super star of MN lege stupid, Michele Bachmann, moved on to a larger public platform for embarrassment. Her most recent public embarrassment was the lie that President Obama had extorted foreign governments to walk in gay pride parades.  Because you can't make up stupid, especially dishonest stupid, the way Michele Bachmann can.  Sadly all too often, when the facts are not on the side of conservatives, like Bachmann, like the authors of HB 41, they just make up stuff; worse they come to believe their lies.

From lgbtqnation:

Former Congresswoman Michele Bachmann appeared on the Family Research Council‘s “Washington Watch” radio program late last week to discuss the incoming Trump Administration.
In her appearance, which was captured by RightWingWatch, she denounced the State Department for forcing foreign government ministers to march in gay pride parades. It is unclear what she is referring to.

Financial incentives are withheld from countries unless they advance, for instance, the gay agenda. In a country that doesn’t believe in the gay agenda, the Obama State Department has said, “Look, you have to have a Gay Pride parade. You have to make sure that you can show us that ministers are marching in this Gay Pride parade.” What? The US government is telling another government, “You have to have Gay Pride parades”? That’s unbelievable! “You won’t get your PEPFAR money, you won’t get your USAID money, unless you follow our radical social agenda”?

HB 41 is the latest effort at a bathroom bill, a bill to make life more of a living hell for transgender students.

From OnTop magazine:

Three Republican members of the Minnesota House have introduced a bill that targets transgender students.

The Student Physical Privacy Act (HF 41) seeks to “protect and provide for the privacy and safety of all students enrolled in public schools and to maintain order and dignity in restrooms, locker rooms, changing rooms, showers, and other facilities where students may be in various states of undress in the presence of other students.”

It defines “sex” to mean “the physical condition of being male or female, which is determined by a person's chromosomes and is identified at birth by a person's anatomy.” The bill would designate restrooms, locker rooms, changing rooms and shower rooms for the “exclusive use by students of the male sex only or by the students of the female sex only.”

The bill's authors are Representatives Duanne Quam of Byron, Steve Drazkowski of Mazeppa and Eric Lucero of Dayton.

Introduced on Thursday, the proposed legislation has been referred to the Education Innovation Policy committee.

Reince Priebus on Face the Nation: Failure

On Sunday, January 8th, Reince Priebus apppeared on Face the Nation, an interview which included the statement that we have 25 million uninsured people in the United States.  He further posited that this represented a failure of Obamacare to cover every person. He kept calling Obamacare a failure.

It is in fact a success, a success that is, or was, growing.

I would argue this was a bold faced evil intentioned lie.

The reality is that under Republicans prior to the Democratic sweep of the Senate and White House, there was ZERO effort on the part of Republicans to address health care issues, other than to find new ways to enact wealth redistribution to the wealthy, both corporate and individuals, the life and health of average Americans be damned.

Number of serious or new replacement ideas from the GOP? ZERO.

Number of uninsured Americans the GOP sought to provide health care or insurance coverage? ZERO

THAT is failure. And they are continuing that failure, not learning from it or improving on it.

It was not an exaggeration when then-Congressman Alan Grayson back in 2009 referred to the Republican plan for health care, as "Die. Die Quickly.".