Florida Man Made an Announcement

The greatest headline ever, circled in red.

This is when some media have nailed it. The New York Post wrote a news article yesterday regarding a certain Florida retiree making an announcement. The headline is below the fold and cross-references you to turn to page 26 to see the actual article. When you turn there, you see the article referenced, this time with the headline “Been there, Don that” (sic).

This is New York Post publisher Rupert Murdoch doing the ultimate in damning someone with faint praise. The retiree referred to here is apparently an avid golfer and collector of classified documents. He is also senile and is known to throw ketchup at the television. The retiree, a certain Donald J. Trump, is saying he will run for president in 2024. The article, which was not much over 100 words in its entirety, was bylined by “Post staff”.

That day’s issue headlined the wounding of a 3 year-old and another about a crackdown on gangs as the day’s top stories, the usual fare in the Murdoch-owned tabloid daily.

The entire article from start to finish.

Visits: 120

Two bullet point pieces on Trump

Sorry, but there will be a lack of attribution. This is not my own, but is lightly edited:

1. Trump description
  • The “billionaire” who hides his tax returns.
  • The “genius” who hides his college grades.
  • The “businessman” who bankrupted 3 casinos and lost over $1B in 10 years.
  • The “playboy” who pays for sex.
  • The “Christian” who doesn’t go to church.
  • The “philanthropist” who defrauds charity.
  • The “patriot” who dodged the draft. And attacks dead Veterans and their widows.
  • The “innocent man” who refuses to testify.
2. Trump Dictionary
  • Many People have told me = Voices in my head and fictional people have said to me
  • A lot of people don’t know = I just learned something most people already knew
  • Nobody knew = Everyone knew except me
  • Believe me = I just lied
  • In Fact = I’m about to lie
  • He’s a great guy = He is either a foreign dictator or a Klansman
  • MAGA = Making my pockets fatter off the American tax payers
  • Huge = Unimportant to most people except Trump
  • Loser = someone who makes me feel inferior due to their talent or accomplishments, often a government employee guilty of doing their job
  • Policy Briefing = Watching Fox and Friends
  • Liar = Someone telling the truth about me
  • Fake News = News which Trump finds inconvenient
  • Deep state = Gov’t people with experience whom I disagree with

Visits: 82

Self-defeating behaviour during the Covid-19 pandemic

A protestor with no understanding of communism, thinks that it is its opposite, and winds up supporting communism by being against that which separates us from being communal.
  • According to a Google search, a Madison media organ will say that a protest against social distancing back on April 25th will be reported by TV stations if their channels are a multiple of 9. Channels 9, 18, and 27 in Madison have reported that the protests where people had been refused a permit to hold the rally in the first place, and violated social distancing orders have defeated their own object by inadvertently shutting down businesses that would normally be open.
  • There has been a spike in serious illnesses and deaths from people ingesting household cleaners, following a suggestion made by Dr. Donald Trump about a week ago. Emergency hotlines from all over the country are receiving calls asking about ingesting household disinfectants.
  • For their Covid-19 medical stats, some countries are counting as “no longer contagious”, dead people.
  • Among the protestors in Michigan, was a woman who told a reporter that there was nowhere where she could get her hair colored. Another told a reporter that it was now difficult to obtain lawn fertilizer or grass seed, body piercings or tattoo services.
  • Florida governor Ron DeSantis has classified live professional wrestling as an essential service.
  • Missouri, a state which begain the re-opening process on May 3, is suing China for economic losses and suffering.
  • Donald Trump, after bragging about brokering a deal with OPEC, saw the oil prices in the United States become negative (-38 dollars a barrel) by April 20. Oil producers were paying buyers to take oil they couldn’t store.
  • Arkansas, whose state had not issued stay-at-home orders except for schools, has now denied visas to Chinese students who wish to study the sciences.
  • Maybe lawyer and former drug company lobbyist Alex Azar, the head of the U. S. Health and Human Services Department, could have done better than to pick Brian Harrisson, a labradoodle breeder, as head of the Coronavirus Task Force (a position later replaced by Vice President Mike Pence, whose background was as a lawyer and former Congressman). Remember to keep away people with science backgrounds at all times.
  • Florida corrections ordered inmates to manufacture face masks without wearing facemasks themselves, or any other protection, risking contamination to the facemasks they were making for the wardens and guards in the correctional facility.

Visits: 82

Why the Democratic race is a joke

The American people face the most serious time in their history. We are observing politicians submitting to a ruler who thinks he “is” the people. Not since the doctrine of the Divine Right of Kings has such a mentality become the ideology of the day. To oppose this nonsense, you would think that the Democrats would put their differences aside and select a politician more committed to the rule of law than by fiat, and the contenders throw their support behind him or her.

What we are getting instead is the same style of nomination process that worked for Donald Trump, with the same thinking in mind: If Bernie Sanders is thought of as such a loony toon (I think he is fine but this is the wrong time for him), why don’t the others forget their ambitions and unite against him? Once again, like the Coronation of Trump, this is appearing to be a coronation of Sanders, which all but hands Trump his second term, and exacerbates any divisions in the country.

The reason it hands the victory to Trump, is because Sanders exactly fits the stereotype of the Democrats that Trump wants to attack. Trump and those in his party stereotype the Democrats as “socialists” and “extremists”, and so on. While none of that has been remotely true for over 50 years, and the Dems have been just as guilty of abandoning the working class over that time (half the reason Trump appealed to those same people in the Rust Belt), they open themselves to the worst attacks, nigtmare scenarios and conspiracy theories that the Republicans can throw at them.

Overall, I actually hope for a Sanders win, with control of the house and senate turned over to the Democrats. I just think that the dems are better off with a more moderate foil to Trump. But this lack of united front seems to be more helpful to Trump, since they thrive on division, and the choice of dems to divide themselves just makes the Republican’s job easier.

Visits: 93

Coverage by the failing New York Times (and nearly everyone else)

While I sip on my Covfefe, I find that the New York Times has already declared that Trump will lose the 2020 race. To be sure, Trump’s popularity is tanking, but that’s also what the press said before the 2016 race. I don’t consider this fake news, just premature news.

Like in the 2016 election, I wonder if this prognostication of Trump’s 2020 demise, albeit based on very real unpopularity, is still premature. I notice that there are not a whole lot of Republican opportunists sensing a vacuum and denouncing Trump to take the leadership for themselves. Why is that happening? I am sensing that Republicans, despite some rumblings, are getting a different message, and are still throwing their support behind Trump despite, as the Times reports, the lowest polling for a sitting president in 70 years or so.

Also, why aren’t more notable opponents running for the leadership of the Democrats?

A whole lot of the media coverage smells funny surrounding Trump, according to an analysis by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR). For example, has anyone read any media reports as to why the figure $5.7 billion is touted as being needed to build the wall/slats/barrier/whatchamacallit along the Tex-Mex border? Why that amount? How are they spending it? Where did that number come from, outside of Trump’s declaration-by-fiat that that is what it will cost? Why was that figure unchanged after Trump changed the material from concrete to steel slats? The media appears silent on all of this. These are not minor questions, these are at the heart of the reason for the longest government shutdown in American history.

For those of us who read this news, it would be a good question to ponder: how does this premature prognostication help the far right?

Exactly how valuable to the Republicans is this “base” they like to appeal to so much? Why is this “base” not being abandoned without a second thought?

Visits: 91

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part XIV

This is the last entry. I would like this to go on forever, but all things must end.

Trump just can't be bothered with laws 
He scoffs the Emoluments Clause 
Though most folks suspect him 
The brain dead protect him 
At most we've got probable cause

Kim Jong Un and Trump should be friends 
Upon them our future depends 
They both have weird hair 
But clearly don't care 
They're focussed on how the world ends

Trump's lawyer makes violent threats 
A ploy that's as wrong as it gets 
He should be on guard 
He could get disbarred 
Then Stormy would have no regrets

Visits: 86

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part XIII

The closer we get to the facts 
The more freakin' guilty Trump acts 
He thinks we're all dumb 
And under his thumb 
I hope that I'm there when he cracks

Trump tries to pretend he's not nuts 
His clan plays along for tax cuts 
And Putin's web trolls 
Still act like assholes 
From far off (cuz they ain’t got no guts)

Trump's guilty of serious crimes 
A fact that's been proved many times 
His fans are insistent: 
It's all non-existent 
"Fake news" as one voice the mob chimes

Visits: 81

Young Trump staffers and their dating troubles

They just had “the talk”.

I think we can agree that Business Insider is not exactly a Leftist online publication. The news item has been echoed on MSNBC, GQ, The Cut, Vice – and possibly many other media (Politico apparently broke the story), and it lays bare a rather painful on-the-job hazard of a Trump Employee or supporter working in the DC area.

They can’t get laid.

Being a Trump staffer or supporter takes a toll on their private lives, apparently. Young staffers going on online dating find that the lifespan of the relationship is cut short soon after they have “the talk” with their partner. “The talk” is when the date comes out of the closet and admits to being a Trump staffer or supporter. It appears you would have better luck admitting that you’re bisexual or that you howl at the moon.

So, you don’t even need to work for him. This is also happening to people who came out of the closet during “the talk” saying they voted for Trump. One of the reasons reported for the impending break-up in this case is that they voted against birth control by voting for Trump. If this “talk” is happening over a text messaging, then it could devolve into the partner screaming in all caps calling the Trump supporter a “RACIST” and a “BIGOT”. One staffer was asked: “Did you rip babies from their mothers and send their parents to Mexico?”

DC. Whether you want to call it the District of Columbia or the District of Calamity, it is one of the most Democratic districts in America. Where coming out the building from work at your Trump-appointed government job at the end of the day means you have to endure getting yelled at, or having people flipping the bird at you.

The coping mechanism for dates has become either evasive, vague answers, or simply lying about their job or support. Looks like dating people who work for a racist, corrupt demagogue is falling out of style these days. Staffers will now be well advised to steer clear of bars where people might heckle them; or in restaruants where protestors might suddenly gather and loudly play recordings of crying babies and toddlers held in detention centres while they are quietly eating Mexican food.

In the end, they may be forced to look at each other for companionship. In fact, they do tend to gather with friends at home rather than go out into the town. But every niche needs to be filled. There are now Trump-friendly dating apps. And rumor has it that there are local bars in the DC area which cater to Trump supporters.

In most of these articles, including Business Insider, the article usually ends up with some kind of equivocal statement about the great career prospects and connections of the Trump staffers more than compensating for a decreased level of popularity.

But there is a deeper question here that is not getting looked at. The divisiveness of Trump’s style of governing is being felt to not too small a degree by his employees. Divisiveness, sustained as it is, is a sign of society devolving.

Visits: 89

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part XII

Trump's doc says he's fit as a fiddle 
But I think he's fudging a little 
No doc talks like that 
Plus Trump's crazy fat 
Too fat for a framework that brittle

All of the president's men 
Run out of mean tricks now and then 
Trump chides them, "You jerks, 
Just go with what works: 
Investigate Clinton again!"

Trump's mindless supporters don't know 
Their hero's tough act's just for show 
He not only cries 
When critics crack wise, 
He pouts when his way things don't go.

Visits: 140

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part XI

Republican voters must wonder 
What sort of a spell are they under? 
Fox News says Trump's cool 
But he's Putin's tool 
Should we have to pay for their blunder?

We can't keep on going this way 
Our plight seems more desperate each day 
I think we all know 
That Trump's got to go 
There's just no time left to delay

Because he was honest and wise, 
George Washington never told lies 
But now Trump's the guy 
And his lies are why 
All over the world he's despised

Visits: 74

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part XI

Stress made Devin Nunes get sick 
Trump told him, "This should do the trick" 
"Hey wait," Devin cried 
"That's pure cyanide!" 
"Don't worry," Trump said, "It works quick."

"Those bastards have me in a fix," 
Trump whined, "Democrats are all dicks 
I'm useless, they say 
'Cause I sleep all day 
Please tramadol 50mg buy move your hand faster, Ms Hicks"

Trump's ass was in trouble, no doubt 
He prayed to his god "Help me out" 
But Trump's god is money 
(and this part is funny) 
It turns out that cash has no clout

Visits: 63

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part X

Stress made Devin Nunes get sick 
Trump told him, "This should do the trick" 
"Hey wait," Devin cried 
"That's pure cyanide!" 
"Don't worry," Trump said, "It works quick."

"Those bastards have me in a fix," 
Trump whined, "Democrats are all dicks 
I'm useless, they say 
'Cause I sleep all day 
Please move your hand faster, Ms Hicks"

Trump's ass was in trouble, no doubt 
He prayed to his god "Help me out" 
But Trump's god is money 
(and this part is funny) 
It turns out that cash has no clout

Visits: 62

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part IX

There once was a VP named Pence 
Whose passion for God was intense 
He called his wife "Mother" 
Had eyes for no other 
And lacked but one thing: common sense

A filthy rich fat guy named Trump 
Saw his pageant beginning to slump 
His beauty queen cried 
Trump took it in stride 
And canned her when she became plump

Trump likes to watch hookers go pee pee 
The sparkle and warmth thrills him deeply 
Some may think it's funny 
To pee pee pee for money 
But most people think it's just creepy

Visits: 64

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part VIII

Our president promised a wall 
The neighbors would pay for it all 
But when it came time 
To show us the dime 
All Trump could do was just stall

A well-to-do nitwit named Trump 
Was a liar, a thief and a chump 
He said "Yes I'm rich, 
The son of a bitch, 
My real name's actually Drumpf

Keebler Elf Jeffy Sessions 
Had style that just begged bad impressions 
In courtroom confusion 
He copped to collusion 
Which led to more heartfelt confessions

Visits: 71

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part VII

While driving his daughter to school 
Trump farted and felt like a fool 
Ivanka said "Dad, 
It really is bad 
I'll just walk from here if that's cool"

What's up with Sean Hannity's hair? 
Did he mean to put his part there? 
The way that it's cut 
It looks like a butt 
I bet little kids point and stare

Some leaders like to educate 
While others just pontificate 
But ol' Trump is sly 
And I'll tell you why 
His secret is to obfuscate

Visits: 66

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part VI

Trump met a young girl named Melania 
They went out to dine on lasagna 
He plied her with liquor 
And told her, "Eat quicker, 
By seven I plan to be on ya"

One evening while roaming the White House 
Trump wondered if he had the right house 
Melania said "Hey, 
If I had my way 
We'd live in an Uglegorsk lighthouse"

"My daughter is gorgeous" Trump said 
"I can't get her out of my head 
That tight, sexy body – 
God damn, she's a hottie! 
And one day I'll get her in bed"

Visits: 64

Oh yeah, and by the way: JFK Documents released

Back on 26 April, what I understand should have been the last of the JFK documents released to the general public and made available for download. Apparently, the deadline to release the last of them has been now moved to 2021.

With all the distractions surrounding Donald Trump, including those distractions Trump made for himself, you could be excused for not hearing about these rather ground-breaking developments, moving toward trying to end over 50 years of speculation and conspiracy theories.

The irony is, you can thank Trump for allowing the release of these documents. You wouldn’t know it from his preoccupation with making angry tweets about the news of the day. This would have actually made him look good, had one of his tweets mentioned it.

Since 24 July 2017, over 54,000 documents were released relating to the JFK assassination, made available largely as PDF scanned copies. A good deal of the early releases are listed as “NBR” or “Not believed relevant” on the Excel spreadsheet I downloaded, which lists the files and their links. There are hundreds of documents that are just plain illegible. I noticed a lot of newspaper clipping among the interviews and transcriptions of what must have been handwritten notes. There are also official correspondences on government letterhead., memos, and so on.

Visits: 66

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part V

Now that the memo's released 
And all of the screaming has ceased 
Those four little pages 
That seemed so outrageous 
Have gone from "the worst" to "the least."

Melania hated her life 
She didn't like being Trump's wife 
To deal with the man 
She thought up a plan 
Involving scotch, roofies and a knife

While styling his coiffure last May 
Trump wondered if he might be gay 
So he stuck his thumb 
Deep into his bum 
And there it remains to this day

Visits: 61

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part IV

Not clapping for Trump is now treason 
A big deal to him for some reason 
He's so full of crap 
Why bother to clap? 
With luck he'll be gone by next season

Republicans say we're unfair 
For laughing at Donald Trump's hair
That orange cotton candy 
He thinks looks so dandy 
Came straight from the New York State Fair

"What sanctions?" Trump asked insincerely 
"The Russians are our allies, clearly 
Obama's just jealous 
Of me and the fellas 
'Cause we love the Motherland dearly"

Visits: 73

Todd Taliaferro’s Trump Limerick series Part III

Of Putin no ill has Trump spoken 
Such words anyway would be token 
As Trump's critics know 
His bluster's for show 
Vlad's end would leave Donald heartbroken

What sort of man needs a parade? 
Is this moron in the fourth grade? 
His hour of fun 
Will cost US a ton 
It won't be his money that's paid

An ass-kissing Fox shill named Hannity 
Takes pleasure in stroking Trump's vanity 
His audience buys 
Each one of Trump's lies
Thus perpetuating insanity

Visits: 66