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.

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.