A Pack of Idiots

A couple of days ago the White House announced that Donald Trump's valet was infected with the coronavirus. Then they announced that Mike Pence's press secretary, Katie Miller, was infected with the coronavirus. Then it was announced that one of Ivanka Trump's aides was infected with the coronavirus, and the FDA commissioner was in quarantine. Then it was announced that 11 Secret Service personnel are infected with the coronavirus, and 60 more are in quarantine.

After all those infections, Trump -- showing how ultimately selfish and stupid he is -- had a photo op with several 95- to 100-year-old WWII vets, vainly and cowardly hoping to steal some of their glory for himself. No one at the ceremony was wearing the masks that could save those men's lives.

Of course, no one in the White House is paying any attention to the guidelines from the CDC, which is why they're all infected. Yes, most of them will be just fine. But that's not the point.

When you get infected you become a vector for the disease, and you infect other people. Like your mom, or the grandma that your mom takes care of. Or 100-year-old WWII vets.

These "pro-life" Republicans don't care how many people die of COVID-19. They just want to keep Trump in office. For what? So Trump can continue to run this country into the ground with more idiotic trade wars? So Trump can talk more people into injecting bleach or killing themselves with hydroxychloroquine? So Trump can fawn over Kim Jong Un like some awestruck middle school girl?

Jesus Christ, these people are so embarrassing.

Katie Miller is the wife of Steven Miller, the architect of Trump's racist anti-immigration strategy. Recently the administration announced more limits on immigration "due to the pandemic." You can't let a good disaster go to waste!

It's incredibly ironic that Miller's own wife and Pence's press secretary is infected, because Trump and his lackeys ignore the best advice of the task force that Pence himself is running!

At this point it seems that Trump's White House is infecting more people than the immigrants Trump wants to keep out.

These people are such arrogant nitwits. Didn't they hear that Boris Johnson, the prime minister of Britain, almost died from COVID-19? (Johnson even named his newborn child after the doctors he credited with saving his life)

What a pack of idiots and clowns, led by an total idiot and clown. Or as numerous former Trump cabinet officers so succinctly put it: What a fucking moron.

Joe Biden and Tara Reade

Joe Biden should have a town hall on women's issues. The panel should be all women. He should invite Donald Trump. Attendees should be women who have issues with his past behavior and he should just listen to what they have to say and talk about how he will change.

Here is an update (as of this AM) about everything we know about the allegations.

If one photo could sum up the right...

I'm not sure who this fuckhole is but he is a perfect representation of what I think about when I imagine right-wing bloggers and commenters.

Angry, white, fat, bearded, armed, racist.

Rachel Bitecofer Spoils the 2020 Election

How do things look for the Dems this fall? Quite good.

Obey (or not)

Sean Hannity's Death Toll

When the coronavirus pandemic started Donald Trump and most of his lackeys at Fox News lied about its severity and said it would go away "like magic." The worst offender at Fox was Sean Hannity. However, Tucker Carlson, another Fox host, realized the serious nature of the coronavirus and warned viewers.

This provided researchers an opportunity to study how news coverage affects transmission of diseases:

The results are stark: greater exposure to Sean Hannity versus Tucker Carlson shows a measurable increase in the number of COVID-19 cases and deaths throughout March and early April. . . .

Carlson began regularly covering the virus in January. During February, he did so with a growing sense of alarm that the United States could experience a heavy death toll—the same month that saw much inaction on the part of the federal government.

By contrast, Hannity gave the virus almost no attention in February. And when he began to discuss the virus at the same frequency as Carlson during the first two weeks of March, it was to minimize the threat compared to the number of annual deaths attributable to car crashes, shootings, or seasonal influenza. Additionally, Hannity also accused the Democratic Party of exaggerating the threat as a way of attacking the president. However, by mid-March, Hannity changed his tune once President Trump declared COVID-19 a national emergency.

The result?

[C]ontrolling for a rich set of county-level demographics (including the local market share of Fox News), greater local viewership of Hannity relative to Tucker Carlson Tonight is associated with a greater number of COVID-19 cases starting in early March and a greater number of deaths resulting from COVID-19 starting in mid-March. In a set of permutation tests across socio-economic, demographic, political, and health-related covariates, as well as across geographical fixed effects to account for unobservable factors, we show that the established relationship is highly robust. Indeed, the estimated effects of exposure become stronger as we control for more factors.

Watching Sean Hannity got people killed. And it's not just abstract statistics. There are actual people we can put names to who died from Covid-19 because Hannity lied about the severity of the disease, like Joe Joyce, a bar owner in Brooklyn.

On March 1, Joe Joyce and his wife, Jane, set sail for Spain on a cruise, flying first to Florida. His adult children — Kevin, Eddie and Kristen Mider — suggested that the impending doom of the coronavirus made this a bad idea. Joe Joyce was 74, a nonsmoker, healthy; four years after he opened his bar he stopped drinking completely. He didn’t see the problem.

“He watched Fox, and believed it was under control,’’ Kristen told me.

Early in March Sean Hannity went on air proclaiming that he didn’t like the way that the American people were getting scared “unnecessarily.’’ He saw it all, he said, “as like, let’s bludgeon Trump with this new hoax.”

Joe Joyce listened to Hannity and then he died:

[His] children were checking in from New York and New Jersey, and on March 27, when Kristen got off the phone with her father, she called an ambulance. He was wheezing. His oxygen level turned out to be a dangerously low 70 percent. On April 9, he died of Covid-19.

It's like Trump and the hydroxychloroquine debacle: he started hawking it like a snake-oil salesman at his briefings before there was any real data about its efficacy. He pushed it hard, stupidly, constantly, and some poor fool and his wife took some and he died. When Anthony Fauci was asked a question about the drug at Trump's daily campaign rally/clown show coronavirus briefing Trump wouldn't let Fauci answer because Trump doesn't want the truth or facts to get in the way of his preening, lies and bluster.

Trump even fired Rick Bright, the guy running the coronavirus vaccine program, because Bright wanted to actually do controlled tests of hydroxychloroquine before handing it out like candy.

Now it turns out that Trump was totally, utterly wrong about hydroxychloroquine according to a study of Veterans Administration data:

In the study of 368 patients, 97 patients who took hydroxychloroquine had a 27.8% death rate. The 158 patients who did not take the drug had an 11.4% death rate. 

"An association of increased overall mortality was identified in patients treated with hydroxychloroquine alone. These findings highlight the importance of awaiting the results of ongoing prospective, randomized, controlled studies before widespread adoption of these drugs," wrote the authors, who work at the Columbia VA Health Care System in South Carolina, the University of South Carolina and the University of Virginia.

Now Trump and his people aren't saying anything about hydroxychloroquine. They're banking on his voters being too stupid to notice how consistently wrong he is about almost everything.

"What have you got to lose?" Trump famously asked.

If you listen to Trump, your life.

Making Scapegoats

Why Is One OK But Not The Other?

Joe Biden Saw It All

Joe Biden has been taking a lot of shit lately about his stutter during his interviews. If that's all his critics have, he's not going to have many problems in the election. Remember what happened in 2016 when people made fun of Trump? People still voted for him.

The recent revelation that Biden posted an Op-Ed in USA Today on January 27 of this year, in which he detailed the mistakes Trump made prior to the Covid-19 outbreak, will add to his margin of victory in the fall election. Here are some choice cuts.

The outbreak of a new coronavirus, which has already infected more than 2,700 people and killed over 80 in China, will get worse before it gets better. Cases have been confirmed in a dozen countries, with at least five in the United States. There will likely be more.

Well, he was certainly right about that, wasn't he?

Trump has blithely tweeted that “it will all work out well.” Yet the steps he has taken as president have only weakened our capacity to respond.

Trump has rolled back much of the progress President Obama and I made to strengthen global health security. He proposed draconian cuts to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Agency for International Development — the very agencies we need to fight this outbreak and prevent future ones. He dismissed the top White House official in charge of global health security and dismantled the entire team. And he has treated with utmost contempt institutions that facilitate international cooperation, thus undermining the global efforts that keep us safe from pandemics and biological attacks.

To be blunt, I am concerned that the Trump administration’s shortsighted policies have left us unprepared for a dangerous epidemic that will come sooner or later.

It's almost as if he knew what was going to happen...like maybe his experience and competence would have saved American lives as opposed to what Trump has done which has cost thousands of American lives.

As president, I will reassert U.S. leadership in global health security. My policies will always uphold science, not fiction or fearmongering. I will ask Congress to beef up the Public Health Emergency Fund and give me the power to use the Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act to declare a disaster if an infectious disease threat merits it.

I will also renew funding — set to expire in May — for the nationwide network of hospitals that can isolate and treat people with infectious diseases, and fully fund the Global Health Security Agenda so the world is ready for the next outbreak. And I will rebuild public trust, make sure we have dedicated resources to help us respond to crises quickly, and better harness the capabilities of the private sector to protect the American people. Our national security requires nothing less.

So, it's clear that Biden (or really anyone, Democratic or Republican), would have done a better job. Heck, even W knew how important this was.

When you allow ideological buffoons to run a nation, people die.

Why People Are Dead, Why Our Economy Sucks

My favorite part is the rally where he mentions the coronavirus and his cult followers boo. These assholes should never be in charge of anything again. Ever. All they do is kill people and destroy our economy.

He is exactly what we said he was going to be and you assholes made fun of us (orange man bad, Trump Derangement Syndrome). Well, got anything to say now, fuckholes?

What Wisconsin Tells Us About the Election in the Fall

The recent primary in Wisconsin tell us that the Trump Party should be shitting themselves and I'm talking explosive diarrhea. The ploy by the GOP to have the election anyway in the middle of a pandemic completely backfired as democratic turnout was massive. Even with only 5 of 108 polling places open in Milwaukee, Jill Karofsky still managed to defeat conservative Justice Daniel Kelly.  So, what does this tell us?

Democrats are fired up, want Trump gone, and won't even let potential death from Covid1-19 stop them. This is exactly what Rachel Bitecofer has been saying. Trump is toast and will get his ass kicked in November...assuming he doesn't quit before then. He's looking awfully shaky these days and really out of it.

Trumpy Orwell

I was reminded of George Orwell's 1984 recently when President Trump yelled, "Check the tape" in a response to a reporter at a recent press briefing. The reporter asked the president what he had done to prevent the outbreak of Covid-19. He claimed that he shut down travel with China.

In reality, he half shut it down and allowed around 40,000 people to still come in. He also allowed travelers from Europe to come in as well which is what likely accelerated the spread of the virus.

Of course, this doesn't even address the fact that he is on tape making fun of the virus and also saying it would magically go away. He further went on to say that we had it under control. All of these statements can be seen in this video.

Right-wing bloggers and commenters are quite fond of accusing the left of the very thing they are doing...who are you going to believe--me or your lying eyes and ears? Call them on it.

Every. Single. Time.

Own It, Assholes

From conservative David Frum

"That the pandemic occurred is not Trump’s fault. The utter unpreparedness of the United States for a pandemic is Trump’s fault. The loss of stockpiled respirators to breakage because the federal government let maintenance contracts lapse in 2018 is Trump’s fault. The failure to store sufficient protective medical gear in the national arsenal is Trump’s fault. That states are bidding against other states for equipment, paying many multiples of the precrisis price for ventilators, is Trump’s fault. Air travelers summoned home and forced to stand for hours in dense airport crowds alongside infected people? That was Trump’s fault too. Ten weeks of insisting that the coronavirus is a harmless flu that would miraculously go away on its own? Trump’s fault again. The refusal of red-state governors to act promptly, the failure to close Florida and Gulf Coast beaches until late March? That fault is more widely shared, but again, responsibility rests with Trump: He could have stopped it, and he did not."


And thus we have the end of "Orange Man Bad" and whining about Trump Derangement Syndrome. We warned you, Trump supporters and apologists. You acted like adolescent assholes and didn't listen. How many people have died from this because Trump didn't take it seriously? How much money has been lost? Whose lives have been destroyed? That's on YOU, assholes!

I've repeatedly explained to the right-wing bloggers and commenters who read this site daily that this would happen. They laughed and pretended like Trump was actually competent. Now, they've gone silent. You fucking assholes aren't anywhere close to comprehending how to run a country. All you have is digital bile that results in American deaths.

I don't know how you can get up in the morning and look at yourselves in the mirror.

Good Riddance, Old Moldy

Between the time I set out to write about the firing of Captain Crozier and the time I was done, this had happened:

Thomas B. Modly, the acting Navy secretary, resigned Tuesday after his bungled response to an outbreak of the novel coronavirus aboard the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt engulfed the Navy in a public relations disaster, Defense Department officials said.

Mr. Modly’s departure is the latest in a string of events that began last week, after The San Francisco Chronicle published a letter in which the Roosevelt’s commander, Capt. Brett E. Crozier, pleaded with the Navy to help contain the virus that had spread rapidly through his ship.

The Navy has announced more than 170 coronavirus cases aboard the Roosevelt since the outbreak started in late March, after the ship had docked in Da Nang, Vietnam.

Mr. Modly fired Captain Crozier on April 2 after accusing him of circumventing the Navy’s traditional chain of command by copying more than 20 people on the emailed letter.

The firing sent shock waves through the crew, which was only exacerbated Monday when Mr. Modly flew to Guam, where the Roosevelt is now docked, and said Captain Crozier was “too naïve or too stupid to be a commanding officer of a ship like this.”

"Too naive or too stupid?" Old Moldy is the naive and stupid one. He claimed Captain Crozier had endangered the operational security of the aircraft carrier by copying so many people on his letter. Crozier was far from naive: he knew his concerns would be completely ignored by Old Moldy if he followed the chain of command, resulting in the needless deaths of sailors aboard his ship.


And endangering OPSEC? What a joke. Numerous reports had already appeared in the news about the outbreak on the TR. Everyone knew about it. What's more, the TR is an aircraft carrier. It is 1,092 feet long and displaces 177,000 tons. This huge ship can visit only a limited number of ports, where there are quite certainly numerous Russian and Chinese spies. And you can see it from orbit.


And it's not like someone can take advantage of this: Russia and China are fighting COVID-19, just like we are, and Iran, the country most likely to cause trouble for us, has half a million cases of the infection.

The thing is, Old Moldy was just doing what Trump wants: fire anyone who expresses the slightest bit of independent thought, courage, honesty, moral fortitude or a desire to do the right thing. Crozier had embarrassed Trump, and he had to go.

But this time Trumpian revenge backfired, exposing Old Moldy and Trump for the vengeful weasels they truly are.

The other thing this incident points out is the sorry shape the Trump administration is in. Old Moldy was the acting secretary of the Navy. This chaotic dumpster fire of a presidency is in a shambles in large part because of a shockingly high turnover rate and Trump's complete failure to take his responsibilities seriously: no one stays around around long enough to know what the hell they're doing. Trump has had literally hundreds of vacancies and "acting" secretaries and deputies. These people haven't been fully vetted by the FBI and approved by the Senate. Trump likes acting positions because they're easier to threaten and get rid of. And he's just too god-damned lazy and stupid to give a crap about anything other than his ratings among "his voters."

The people in the Trump administration aren't there because they're competent or have any experience in the job they're doing. They're almost to a man clueless idiots whose only qualification is their servile ability to fawn over Trump and tell him what a big boy he is.

These acts of horrendous stupidity, heartless quests for vengeance and gross incompetence will just keep happening until the "only one that matters" is gone: Donald Trump.

More Blood on Trump's Hands

In the middle of the coronavirus pandemic the Trump administration has taken the opportunity to gut air pollution regulations put in place by the Obama administration. Most car companies didn't ask for this, and when four auto manufacturers sided with California Trump retaliated against them.

Now we learn that Trump's changes will mean even more people will die from coronavirus in the future:

Coronavirus patients in areas that had high levels of air pollution before the pandemic are more likely to die from the infection than patients in cleaner parts of the country, according to a new nationwide study that offers the first clear link between long-term exposure to pollution and Covid-19 death rates. 

This makes sense, and explains in part why New York City has been hit so hard: it has some of the highest pollution rates in the country.

Fine particulate pollution -- the kind Trump wants more of -- lodges in the alveoli, the tiny air sacks in the lungs. When you get sick with coronavirus the alveoli get clogged with mucus and blood, and you suffocate. If your alveoli are already filled with pollution particles, your chance of dying increases significantly. (It also emphasizes that everyone should immediately stop smoking and vaping.)

Why does Trump want to do this?

The Trump administration asserts that the new rule will save lives because Americans will buy newer, safer vehicles. But Carper and other critics point out that the agencies' own analysis finds there would be even more premature deaths from increased air pollution.

Trump knows his regulations will kill more people. But he doesn't care, because he thinks that propping up the oil business by gutting pollution regulations will get makers of big, heavy high-profit cars and the oil giants to spend more on his reelection. Though they all may go bust if the price war between the Russians and the Saudis doesn't abate soon.

This is just another example of how Trump is either a complete idiot or a soulless monster completely devoid of empathy or concern for American lives.

Where Is The Middle Ground?

Folks, I have to add to my rant from the other day and it’s something that has built up a seething rage in me. Hopefully, me getting it out will dispel it.

I’ve absolutely fucking had it with the “whoever cancels/shuts down things and does it the farthest out” wins the Most Responsible Government Award. The vilification that is going on with states that haven’t issued stay at home orders needs to be qualified by studying each state’s demographics, how they live their lives, and the rules they already have in place. I have zero problem ripping the leadership in Florida or Georgia, for example, because it’s warranted. They were morons who have literally killed people. But Iowa and Wyoming are different states and their policies won’t have any effect on you unless you live near them. And just because they haven’t officially issued stay at home orders doesn’t mean they are out dancing naked in groups in the street. Different parts of the country are going to be affected differently

The simple fact is that we are just buying time so health systems won’t get overrun. The people who are getting their rocks off in breathlessly relating that we need to be shut down for months aren’t being realistic. Their energy would be better spent demanding a national policy for testing. Because we do have to consider the economic impact of this on people’s lives. No doubt, we have a leader (Trump) who is really doing a poor job in acting on this. Staying at home is a band-aid and short term solution.

And the amount that we don’t know about this virus is enormous. It’s likely that large swaths of our population are immune already to this. Some may have had it, never had symptoms, and are no longer contagious. This is why the only thing people should be screaming about is testing. Screaming about how we all have to hide in our homes until 2021 and if this line of thought isn’t accepted than you are “naive” is fucking nuts.

I get that people are scared but being fatalistic and demanding the same for everyone isn’t helping. Being overly hopeful is just as bad. We must all strive to find a happy medium that at its core relies on action items based on data. If our leaders are doling out big asks, they need to provide us with the big data that led them to that conclusion. That data is going to be different for each area of the country and people need to live with that.

Trump's Body Count

I used to say that President Trump wasn't as bad of a president as our worst presidents because he didn't have a body count. Well, now he does. As I write this, we are nearing 7,000 dead Americans. Consider those families of lost loved ones when you watch this video.




So, how can he fix it? Mandatory testing of every American by May 31. Otherwise, our economy is truly fucked and his presidency is effectively over. Of course, the stalling on testing has another explanation.

He wants the corner market on it.

The blame doesn't just go to Trump, though. I blame all those assholes out there who fetishize small government and blow loads over how neutered it could be. How do you fuckos feel now that our citizens are dying?

The shit response to this back in January by the Trump administration led us to this point. There is zero doubt that Hillary would have done a far better job and fewer people would be dead. But we allowed our irrational feelings about her and liberals to get in the way, didn’t we?

Who Is Essential?

Millions of Americans are staying home from work because they're not deemed essential.

In Minnesota the people still going to work include doctors, nurses, police, and firefighters. But also emergency shelters, child care providers, grocery stores, take-out restaurants, farmers, agricultural workers, news organizations, power, gas and water services, wastewater treatments, sanitation, public works, critical manufacturing, transportation and logistics, construction, and financial services.

What are non-essential services? Stadiums, theaters, hotels, resorts, cruise lines, printers, auto dealers, furniture stores, lawn and garden supplies, shoe stores, jewelry stores, florists, administrative serves and advertising.

That means garbage men, nannies, stock boys, janitors, truck drivers, pilots, flight attendants, cashiers, cooks, electricians, construction workers, reporters, linemen, cable installers, iron miners, etc., are all essential to keep the country running.

It must really suck for Trump that a TV network like CNN is essential, but his hotels and golf resorts are not. It must also suck for him that undocumented farm workers, the people he won the presidency trashing, are deemed essential but real estate tycoons like him are not.

Times like these really put things in perspective.

Most of the people who are absolutely essential for this country to continue functioning get paid very little. You can run a country without any golf courses or fancy five-star hotels and casinos. But you can't run a country without the people who butcher chickens and cows, plant crops and harvest them, prepare the food, transport the packaged food, stock it in the markets and sell it to customers. And you need the janitors, truck drivers, construction and utility workers, etc., that those people need to keep their workplaces functioning.

So why do the people we absolutely need the most constantly get the shaft? They don't get vacations, they don't get sick leave and they make little more than minimum wage. If all the golf course owners, luxury hotel magnates, real estate tycoons and reality show hosts died of the coronavirus no one would bat an eye lash. If all the farm workers died we'd all starve.

Worse, as these essential workers continue to show up on the job they are risking their lives for us: they're constantly being exposed to the virus.

It should be obvious to even someone as dense as Donald Trump that these people should be compensated according to their worth to society. Wages for these people should all be raised to a living wage -- and for a family of four that's something around $30 an hour in a place like Minnesota, and even more for New York and California.

They should also get paid sick leave, and their employers should require them to stay home when they're sick, because we don't them working when they're contagious. Laws should be passed that permanently require this for all companies, instead of the bogus temporary law Trump signed that exempts companies with more than 500 employees.

Those wage increases don't have to increase prices by all that much. Management and owners of companies like Walmart take a huge portion of the profits and stick it in their own pockets. In the past 40 to 50 years management salaries have gone up almost 1000%, and employee salaries have been flat. Companies took the money from Trump's give-away tax cuts and bought their own stock back, driving the stock market into what they thought would be an ever-increasing spiral.

Now the market has crashed, and all the gains made since Trump's election and the infamous tax cuts have been lost. And Trump frittered away all the gains Obama made since 2008. All the "Trump gains" were fairy dust and unicorn farts, immediately lost when Trump's lies and spin met with the harsh reality of a pandemic.

Conservatives love to wax nostalgic about the good old days of the 1950s. Let's return CEO pay back to what it was in the 1950s and give their bloated compensations packages to the people who need and really deserve them: American workers.

Blame Trump For This List

From Republican George Conway:

"For Trump supporters, let me make one thing VERY clear!

For the record, NO ONE is blaming the President for the virus. Let me repeat. Coronavirus is not Trump’s fault. 

Here’s a detailed list of what we are blaming him for:

* Trump declined to use the World Health Organization’s test like other nations. Back in January, over a month before the first Co-vid19 case, the Chinese posted a new mysterious virus and within a week, Berlin virologists had produced the first diagnostic test. By the end of February, the WHO had shipped out tests to 60 countries. Oh, but not our government. We declined the test even as a temporary bridge until the CDC could create its own test. The question is why? We don’t know but what to look for is which pharmaceutical company eventually manufactures the test and who owns the stock. Keep tuned.

* In 2018 Trump fired Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossart, whose job was to coordinate a response to global pandemics. He was not replaced.

* In 2018 Dr. Luciana Borio, the NSC director for medical and bio-defense preparedness left the job. Trump did not replace Dr. Borio.

* In 2019 the NSC’s Senior Director for Global Health Security and bio-defense, Tim Ziemer, left the position and Trump did not replace the Rear Admiral.

* Trump shut down the entire Global Health Security and Bio-defense agency. Yes, he did.

* Amid the explosive worldwide outbreak of the virus, Trump proposed a 19% cut to the budget of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention plus a 10% cut to Public Health Services and a 7% cut to Global Health Services. Those happen to be the organizations that respond to public health threats.

* In 2018, at Trump’s direction, the CDC stopped funding epidemic prevention activities in 39 out of 49 countries including China.

* Trump didn’t appoint a doctor to oversee the US response to the pandemic. He appointed Mike Pence.

* Trump has on multiple occasions sowed doubt about the severity of the virus even using the word hoax at events and rallies. He even did it at an event where the virus was being spread. Trump has put out zero useful information concerning the health risks of the virus.

* Trump pretended the virus had been contained.

* Trump left a cruise ship at sea for days, denying them proper hospital care, rather than increase his numbers in America.

Repeat. We do not blame Trump for the virus. We blame him for gutting the nation’s preparations to deal with it. We blame him for bungling testing and allowing it to spread uninhibited. We blame him for wasting taxpayer money on applause lines at his rallies (like The Wall). We blame him for putting his own political life over American human life. I hope this clears things up."

Grab Bag of Irritation

Folks, I’m long overdue for a good old fashion rant. The past few weeks of the global pandemic has brought out some things that have really irritated me to no end. Here they are.

The Action-Adventure Story Teller 

Suddenly every media writer and every social media post is filled up with breathless stories of how they or someone they knew suffered through Covid-19. “My chest was caught in a vice grip” is a line I’ve seen over and over again. Or subheadings like “Day 5, The Worst.” It honestly reminds me of a paperback I’d read in the checkout line at the grocery. I guess trying to be an “influencer” extends to global pandemics too. Not only are these not helpful to people who experience anxiety, but they also incite panic AKA what we don’t need now. Social media is an awful place for something so private. Why do they feel the need to tell their illness stories? How does that help? It really, really doesn’t, assholes.

”We will never be the same again.”

This line has to go away forever. It’s so fucking played and not really special just for this occasion. Isn’t this true of ANY life experience? Or, perhaps, something positive that happens on a worldwide level? Where is the wall to wall coverage of rising life expectancy in the world that has made us “never the same again?”

Insanely Negative People

I had someone tell me the other day that my son won’t get to play baseball for the rest of the year. And that all sports everywhere is done for the year because of how awful this is going to be. First of all, thanks for the positivity, fucknut. Second, how the fuck do you know? No one really knows what’s going to happen so being dire, again, doesn’t help people (like me) who dread excessively. Far too many normally negative people are feeding on this. They love how miserable everyone is. Let’s not let them do that.

Insanely Positive People

Donald Trump is an example of this. This is not going to be done by Easter. It may be that parts of the country are going to shift back to normal but some may need longer amounts of time and testing.

The fucking toilet paper thing

Seriously, why? And I’m also tired of the psychological explanation that “people need to control something and feel comfort.” Barf. This is a great example of how dumb people can be. TP is what you need for this pandemic? Really?

Imperial Declarations of Certainty in Uncertain Times

I’ve seen this a lot from the overly positive and overly negative sides of the issue. Everyone is basically guessing right now how this will play out. You can’t look to Italy and say that it’s going to happen here. Our country is so different and more spread out. Some areas might be the same. I heard one of my favorite pundits say, “By the time this is over, every American will know someone who died from Covid 19.” Really? I don’t know anyone who has died from the flu. I know one person who died in a car accident. Many more fatalities from that over the years, even with the direst predictions.

Gleeful people who “saw this coming.”

I like the U’s, Mike Osterholm. He’s a much-needed epidemiologist that is largely helpful right now. But he seems a little too happy about this. So do some other health care professionals and analysts. So do doomsday preppers. This isn’t “cool,” guys, and you being right makes this a tragedy, not an accomplishment. Osterholm is fond of saying “Hope is not a strategy.” Ok, but can we work on strategies that give us hope?

The doom and gloom from the media

Why aren’t we seeing recoveries listed along with deaths? They are showing this in Minnesota, thankfully, but I don’t see it anywhere else. Many people are recovering. Let’s fucking celebrate that as well as mourn the deaths of those who we have lost.

As we move along through this, more rants could be in the future😎

Trump's Re-Election Bid Even Dimmer

Rachel "The Doc" Bitecofer has released her latest model for the 2020 election and it looks even worse for Donald Trump in November. As Biden locks up the nomination (and promises to pick a woman for his VP), it's hard to see how Trump, who basically drew a straight flush and barely won in 2016, can win in the fall. Why?

As Bitecofer notes in her latest projection and her piece for the New Republic, the last three election cycles have shown that white, educated voters, especially those in the suburbs, have deserted the GOP. One wonders why they elected to ignore their 2008 election post mortem and simply shoot for short term goals by appealing to old, uneducated white voters. Our electorate is becoming more diverse and younger with around 80 million people under the age of 40 set to vote this fall. The one thing they all have in common?

They hate Trump and want him gone.

We know that Republicans always vote and do so at a clip of 83%. They are very reliable voters. But their numbers simply don't match liberals and lean left independents who are very afraid and angry about a second Trump term. Even in 2018 when Republicans turned out in higher numbers than ever to support their guy, the Democrats still claimed 42 seats in the House.

Turnout in primaries has been very high in the states that have gone thus far. The base is energized, despite a worldwide pandemic.

All of these facts seem lost on folks like Kevin Baker and his followers who don't really seem to be paying attention to what's coming. They live in a very strange reality where 2016 will somehow be repeated, there are secret Trump followers everywhere, the election of 2018 never happened, and Virginia (a great indicator of what's to come for them) didn't just turn entirely blue and pass a whole slew of new gun safety laws.

Perhaps they should pay more attention to the Doc...:)

Trump Kills Arizona Man

Well, Donald Trump's "I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters" moment has arrived. Someone did what Trump suggested and died:

An Arizona man is dead and his wife was hospitalized after the couple ingested a form of chloroquine, a chemical that has been hailed recently by President Trump as a possible "game changer" in the fight against the novel coronavirus, according to the Phoenix hospital that treated the couple.

Banner Health hospital said in a statement that "the couple, both in their 60s, ingested chloroquine phosphate, an additive commonly used at aquariums to clean fish tanks." The aquarium additive the couple ingested is not the same as the medication that has been used to treat malaria.

Of course these people were idiots for listening to Trump. Anyone who believes a word he says is a sucker. Trump is a puerile moron who lies constantly and says whatever he thinks will make him look good. Of course any medical advice he gives will be terribly wrong: he thinks exercise is bad for you. He also said he didn't know people died from the flu, even though that's what killed his grandfather, and every flu season they tell us to get the flu shot because people die from the flu.

His chloroquine comments have sparked a shortage of the drug, which some people actually need to treat malaria, lupus and arthritis. Which means that even people who don't listen to his nonsensical blather will suffer and potentially die because of him.

Trump is clearly more worried about how the state of the economy will affect his reelection chances than the hundreds of thousands of Americans who will die or suffer permanent lung damage from COVID-19 if he gets his way and "restarts" the economy.

And, again, Trump's huge conflicts of interest prove how unfit he is for the presidency. On Sunday he tweeted "WE CANNOT LET THE CURE BE WORSE THAN THE PROBLEM ITSELF". He just shut down six of his seven major clubs and hotels because of the virus. It's a tossup: is he more worried about getting reelected or his properties losing millions of dollars? Clearly he doesn't care if Americans die.

Estimates of the number of deaths if we follow Trump's "what me worry" strategy range from 200,000 to 1.1 million, and 2.4 million to 21 million could require hospitalization. And people who aren't infected will die because they can't get necessary treatment, such as heart transplants, because the hospitals are totally clogged with coronavirus patients.

Well, Trump, how much is a human life worth? The EPA estimates the value of an American life is $10 million. If a million people die from the coronavirus that's $10 trillion in lost lives. In addition, the cost of treating tens of millions of people for the disease will cost trillions more, and people who suffer permanent lung damage will require untold billions more for treatment every year.

Trump keeps making comparisons to the flu, which is totally wrong because no one has immunity to the coronavirus and there is no vaccine.

The only person in the entire Trump administration with any credibility is Anthony Fauci, and reports are that Trump is growing "impatient" with him. Yes, we all know how much Trump hates people who are smarter than he is, which is why he's fired so many aides and cabinet members. He hates being made to look stupid: if he would just shut up he would only look stupid, instead of opening his filthy gob and proving just how idiotic he really is.

Come on, Republicans! You've got know-nothing Trump and dunces like Rand Paul -- now tested positive for coronavirus -- who knew he had been exposed but still went to the Senate floor to vote and the gym to work out and swim while awaiting his results. And Paul is a doctor!

Apparently this is how Republicans think: money is more important than American lives. Getting reelected is more important than American lives. Getting a morning swim is more important than American lives. The greed and selfishness are appalling.

This is what happens when you put people who hate government in charge of it: sheer incompetence and malfeasance.

He IS That Fucking Bad

People criticize the president because he actually has been that fucking bad on this. Haul out the “orange man bad” troll at your own risk. People are dying because he failed in his job. Here is the evidence in his own words.



I am grateful, however, that he and the rest of the GOP admitted failure in their political and economic ideology and went (once again) to the successful and functional models of stimulus and government intervention.

You’re welcome....again. Maybe next time STFU with your petty, adolescent feelings about government.

COVID-19: The Best Argument for Going Vegan?

First, let us acknowledge how incredibly stupid Donald Trump is. Just yesterday, months into the broadening pandemic, this clown said:

Nobody knew there would be a pandemic or epidemic of this proportion. Nobody has ever seen anything like this before.

Oh, really? What about the Spanish flu from 1918? What about the bubonic plague? No one has ever seen anything like this before? What a moron.

And just last year Trump's own Department of Health and Human services ran a pandemic simulation called "Crimson Contagion" that showed how completely unprepared his administration was for this outbreak.

That was after Trump sacked the people in the National Security Council who track threats exactly like this.

The outbreak is the first real disaster that has hit Trump that was not of his own making, and he has done an absolutely abysmal job. I can't understand why anyone thinks this guy is any more useful than a doorstop.

So what can we learn from this?

The COVID-19 virus appears to have originated in bats and may have been transferred to humans through wild pangolins sold at a market in Wuhan. This article in USA Today shows that many of the epidemics in recent years have been caused by consuming bushmeat, including SARS, HIV and Ebola.

Other diseases have been caused by domesticated animals, included the Spanish flu (Kansas chickens), MERS (camels), Swine flu (hogs), etc.

Finally, repeated E. coli outbreaks from tainted spinach and lettuce are almost always caused by cattle manure spread on fields or E. coli-tainted water used in irrigation.

Conclusions:

In China people eat wild animals because they think they have some kind of mystical properties. This has got to stop.

In Africa people eat wild animals because they are poor. We need to help poor countries feed their own people better.

The USDA needs to clean up factory farms. Instead of just pumping more antibiotics into their animals, they need to give them more living space and keep their enclosures clean. They also need to destroy sick animals, rather than send them off to market anyway.

In the long run we need to encourage development of alternate sources of protein instead of slaughtering animals. And it's not just about disease: growing cattle for beef is ridiculously inefficient, in terms of the resources used and carbon dioxide emitted.

Meat substitutes like Beyond Meat and lab-grown meat are the wave of the future. In the meantime, if most Americans stopped eating Big Macs and Whoppers our collective life expectancy would go up five years through the reduction in obesity...

How To Test For Covid-19

Here is a great piece on how South Korea kicked our ass in Covid-19 testing. Essentially, they took it seriously (unlike our president), were proactive, and weren't hampered by bureaucracy.

During World War II, General Motors turned out a plane an hour 24/7 until we won. This is what we need right now. Every American needs to be tested, especially in the hotter spots. Those hotter spots need to shelter in place now. We must have a clearer picture of this and people need to change their behavior otherwise our hospitals will be overrun.

How Hysteria About The Deep State Has Murdered Americans

Back in 2018, when he took over as National Security Advisor, John Bolton and Donald Trump disbanded the pandemic response team headed by Rear Adm. Timothy Ziemer. This was done because it was too "deep state-y" and cost too much money. Now that Covid-19 is spreading around the United States and likely going to adversely affect our nation for the next few months (at least), this decision was clearly a complete catastrophe.

Worse, it was all done because of that same, irrational ideology we've heard from the right for years. The federal government is evil and can't be trusted to do anything right. They are all plotting against ordinary Americans to take away their guns. Civil service employees are lazy and all bought off due to patronage.

Well, now that fucking insane bullshit is coming home to roost as we can clearly see the damage it has done to this country. Had that team been in place (along with these other programs he cut ), we would have fewer Americans die because of this virus. Instead, the blood (literally) of US citizens is being shed because a collection of adolescents has mommy and daddy issues.

These same idiots are still squawking about how Covid-19 is a hoax, perpetrated by the liberal media and other elites to bring this country down. I heard one such ass hat the other night when I was listening to Coast to Coast AM. If you want to get a good idea of how just cult-like these psychos are, listen to L.A. Marzulli's comment at the start of his segment.

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?

We are in a state of emergency, folks, and our "dear leader" has failed. Donald Trump has done a terrible job as president, this current health crisis being a great example. He's inept, out of his depth, confused and weak. He was exposed to COVID 19 on at least two occasions and still was shaking hands with people during his press conference yesterday. His ideological view of less government (or at least what he pretends it is) led us to a poor response to the coronavirus outbreak.

Trump supporters, rather than own up to his mistakes, are gaslighting, using the "orange man bad" deflection. Essentially, they are placing the blame for Trump's errors on his critics, pretending (in a very trollish way) that they are the problem, not Trump. This is also known as the "Who you gonna believe, me or your lying eyes?" defense used by Groucho Marx.

It's really simple, folks. He IS that bad. No amount of pretending is going to make this less true. His presidency is over. It's failed. He should quit (along with Pence) and let Nancy Pelosi run the country until the fall election.

It would save lives.

Trump's Coronavirus Conflict of Interest

Even as Donald Trump's campaign has canceled a bus tour due to coronavirus concerns, and four Republican congressmen who attended CPAC are under quarantine, the entire country of Italy has been locked down, and dozens of senior Iranian political figures are sick and several have died, Trump himself is trying to downplay the outbreak. Crazily, he still plans to hold large campaign rallies, even as members of his own party have been exposed to the disease.

His CDC advisors advocated for telling the elderly to not to travel, but Trump refused to do so.

Why? Partly because he wants to pretend that everyone is just fine and life should go on as always so that the economy doesn't tank. The stock market is taking a huge dive, and Trump has been taking credit for the meteoric rise. Now that it's crashing Trump is blaming everyone else, but his lies and deceptions about the outbreak aren't fooling the market -- they're making it worse because this is a problem he can't brag or lie his way out of.

But, again, Trump has tremendous conflicts of interest. He owns or has stakes in many businesses involved in luxury tourism -- hotels, golf courses, etc. If everyone stays home for the spring break vacation season, Trump stands to lose a ton of money.

If Trump cancels his campaign rallies he'll miss out on boatloads of cash these events generate.

What if one of those mouthfoaming conservatives attending a Trump rally has the virus and gives it to everyone there? What if an infectious traveler -- a typhoid Mary that doesn't show any symptoms -- stays at a Trump hotel and all those rich Republicans trying to ingratiate themselves with Donnie are infected?

Trump's greed, selfishness and narcissism are going to get someone killed.

Hmm. Maybe that's why he put Pence in charge of the epidemic response. What do you want to bet that when it blows up in Trump's face, he'll blame it all on Pence, and kick the VP off the ticket?

Election 2020

Rachel Bitecofer was on Bill Maher last night and that made me very happy. Follow her on Twitter for all of her latest analyses. Her model is looking very good for Democrats with Biden as the nominee, especially given the massive turnout on Tuesday.

Of course, the Biden hand wringing has already begun but his deficits (gaffes, Burisma etc) don't really matter. Democrats fear Trump winning three times more than dying so they are going to vote in the fall for Biden. Black voters are going to vote for Biden. The suburban white voter is gone for Republicans and will vote for Biden. And the Bernie voters are going to go for Biden in greater numbers than in 2016 because we live in an age of hyper-partisanship.

The Senate also looks better now that Steve Bullock is in the race for that Montana Senate. Republicans can kiss Maine, Colorado, and Arizona goodbye. That puts us at 50-50. With the Alabama race now at a runoff for the GOP and black voters highly motivated in that state, Doug Jones keeps his state. North Carolina is looking more positive, Iowa is in play, and Mitch McConnell is even looking like he might not make it. Could the Dems flip and make it a 53-47 advantage?

Yes. Yes, they could.

The Fear Chart

Take a look at this chart.

It's fascinating from the standpoint of what drives voters to the polls in the age of hyperpartisanship. No doubt this is a good sign for the Democrats as they will be highly motivated to go to the polls in November.

A deeper analysis shows that conservatives are more concerned with terrorism and high medical bills than I thought. That tells me that Medicare For All might play more significantly with these voters.

Trump Has Made It to 80% Dictator

Back in 2016, Steven M Walt, a Robert and Renée Belfer professor of international relations at Harvard University, put up a post about how you can tell if your leader is a dictator. He recently updated this last week and Trump is "failing" his dictatorship test. By "failing," Walt means that he's only 80% of the way there. He ranks Trump as "Flashing Red Light" on 3 and "Checked" on 5.

Here is the one that bothers me the most.

3. Politicizing the civil service, military, National Guard, or domestic security agencies.

FLASHING RED LIGHT.

Trump has railed against the so-called Deep State ever since he became president, for one simple reason: He objects to any institution that might serve as a check on his own actions. That’s not how presidents behave; it’s what dictators do. Look what happened last year: Following well-established legal procedures, patriotic civil service members brought a case of questionable presidential conduct to light, beginning with the whistleblower’s report about Trump’s attempt to get the government of Ukraine to dig up dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden’s son. This revelation led to Trump’s impeachment, where we learned that he had relieved the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, because she objected to Trump’s politically motivated machinations in that country.

Since his acquittal by Senate Republicans, Trump has launched a vicious campaign of payback. He fired former U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland (whom Trump had appointed) because Sondland reluctantly gave damaging testimony to the House impeachment inquiry. He fired National Security Council staffer (and Purple Heart recipient) Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and then suggested Vindman ought to be disciplined further by the U.S. Army. In proper mafialike fashion, his vengeance also extended to Vindman’s twin brother (also a serving Army officer), even though the latter wasn’t involved in any of these machinations. And let’s not forget his personal interference in the military’s disciplinary proceedings against former Navy SEAL Edward Gallagher, who was accused of serious war crimes by numerous other SEALs and convicted by the military justice system for lesser offenses.

The unifying purpose behind all of these actions is obvious. What matters to Trump is not someone’s expertise, professionalism, loyalty to the country, or dedication to the Constitution. What matters to Trump is whether members of the foreign service, the civil service, or the military are personally loyal to him. That’s the demand he made of former FBI Director James Comey, and when he didn’t get it, Comey was fired, too. Right out of the dictator’s playbook.

Folks, there is no such thing as a “Deep State.” What we have is a president who is actively politicizing the civil service, the military and domestic security agencies and getting push back from it from people that know how wrong this is. We lost a president (Garfield) because of civil service corruption. We passed a law (the Pendleton Act) to prevent exactly what Trump is doing. People need to study this law and how our government actually works as opposed to having irrational and emotional feelings get the better of them. In short, Trump and his supporters are lying (again) about the government.

Don’t believe them.

Trump As A Vessel Of Their Hatred

As it looks increasingly likely that Bernie Sanders is going to get the nomination for the Democratic Ticket, conservatives are in full-on meltdown mode over the prospect of a democratic socialist for president. The problem is that their rage has got them so blinded as to what it all means that all they can see is gulags, re-education camps, and the end of all this holy about America. Holy crap, are they in need of some therapy!

The first thing they need to realize is their hate, anger, and fear at democratic socialism has nothing to do with what they erroneously believe is going to happen when Bernie wins. Like most emotional adolescents, they have worked with themselves up into such a lather that they actually believe that Bernie Sanders, a Jew, is going to start gulags and destroy us all with central planning. What they are actually upset about is being shown to be ideologically wrong and soon, coming to a theater near you, irrelevant. They REALLY hate losing arguments and this will, no doubt, be the ultimate loss.

Of course, even if they are shown to be ideologically wrong, the age of Trump has shown us that pretending to be right is their only answer. How did this come to pass? Well, Trump has become a vessel for all their hatred, anger and fear at all of the things and people they don't like, starting with liberals, elites and smart people trying to accomplish good things for the country. That last bit really sends them into a fit because they take their feelings of inadequacy, insecurity, and inferiority and somehow transform that into Hitler, Stalin and death camps.

I suppose it is a death in a way...a death of hysterical nonsense and a birth of actual solutions to real problems. Sanders won't get all of the things he wants when he is elected but at least someone will be in there to put together a government that is more representative of what the people of this nation want.

In the final analysis, it's their own fault. They threw their lot in with a mentally unstable criminal who was hilariously and easily able to con them into fervently believing cultish beliefs. They will blame everyone but themselves and Trump when they lose both the presidency and the Senate. So, now we are left with a good chunk of our population who simply will not accept facts and reality.

What are we going to do with them?

Blunting Troll Suppression

Hey Russian trolls and other right wing bloggers/commenters, the African American community is on to you. They get that you purposefully discouraged voter turnout in 2016 and they are ready for you this year. And they have the backing of local city councils, as the link notes.

Regardless of who the candidate is, black turnout is going to be at an all time high.

Happy President's Day

Mandatory Vasectomies

Alabama State Rep. Rolanda Hollis has come up with a wonderful way to blunt abortion bills: make the male body responsible too. If a woman's womb is going to be the ward of the state (see also: The Handmaid's Tale), then so should a man's testicles. Ms. Hollis has put forth a bill calling for men to get state sponsored vasectomies after their third child or their 50th birthday...whatever comes first. The howls of derision from the pro life crowd in the comments and tweets made me ROTFALMFAO.

Male reproductive rights must be protected at any cost!

But not female reproductive rights...

This whole kerfuffle has made me reflect, though. What if men were held as responsible as women for pregnancies? And why don't you ever hear anything about that from the pro life crowd?

Comments Are Fully Open

Given our plethora of new readers from Reddit, Quora, Twitter, and other locales, we have decided to open up comments without moderation. Too many people have complained that they don't like having to wait to see what they wrote published and that it takes too long to go through the filter.

I've also decided to allow comments of any kind as this is an election year and it's going to get ugly anyway. Anyone previously banned from posting here is welcome to post again. I challenge those individuals (mostly from Kevin Baker's blog) to make their assertions without personal attacks on me. If they do, so be it, but it pretty much proves that they have nothing of substance to offer and zero convictions.

We will delete any spammy things like product ads or sex stuff. Also, any sort of doxing is a big no-no. People have the right to privacy. My associates in the police department (two of which are fans of this blog and Trump supporters, go figure) regularly monitor my traffic and will be all over anyone who doxxes.

With that, comment away!

The Meme Heard 'Round The World

This morning, I posted this meme on Reddit.

And my karma points exploded. The best comment?

They know. These aren't stupid people, well I guess they are but you know what I'm saying. They would rather be on a sinking ship with an inept captain than admit that they were wrong.

Indeed. Hubris and ego are big problems with the right. I'm certain that some of them really believe that socialism in any form is evil. But most just want to "win" and be "right."

The cognitive dissonance that is going to occur if Bernie is the nominee and wins is going to cause some of these folks to go fucking batshit. They are going to whip themselves up into such a lather that we may have to hold them down as their lives improve. It sort of reminds me of a little kid who doesn't want to take his medicine.

Do these assholes honestly think that people don't travel outside of the country anymore?

The Chest Thumping, Insecure Nonsense of Kevin Baker and His Merry Band of Authoritarians

The Democrats are a near lock to win the electoral college in 2020. How do we know this? Look no further than Rachel "the Doc" Bitcofer.

A recent piece in Politico has elevated her to national recognition and I highly recommend following her on Twitter as well as examining her model for 2020. Bitecofer saw some basic facts in the election of 2016 and was able to correctly predict the outcome of the 2018 election down to the seat. She also predicted Virginia in 2019. Those facts say that for the first time in history, Republicans lost the white, male, college educated voted in 2016. Trump's path to the White House, as she puts it, "which was the political equivalent of getting dealt a Royal Flush in poker, is probably not replicable in 2020 with an agitated Democratic electorate."

There is no such thing as a "swing" voter anymore. Not in this age of hyper-partisan politics. It's all about turnout and any of the top candidates in the Democratic field are going to destroy Trump.

So, when I read the chest thumping, insecure nonsense of Kevin Baker, quoting a likely Russian trollbot, I just shook my head. Projection. Again. Some things never change.

Because the shock is going to be entirely on his side of the aisle when he can't seem to fathom, the day after the election, how Trump lost. And so badly. Likely, he, along with other Trump supporters, will blame the media and the elites and others they are all jealous of but in the final analysis, it's going to come down to the simple fact that there are more of us that are going to vote than there are Trump voters.

Bernie has a fucking army. Young people will turn out for him by the millions. Mayor Pete will turn out moderates and a whole new generation of voters. Amy Klobuchar will pull the Democrats who voted for Trump back into the fold. Bloomberg, even if he isn't the nominee, will spend billions to defeat Trump. Kevin, do you not understand what you are up against?

Kevin et al, I would suggest seeking therapy for your issues with people that are successful, intelligent, accomplished and do things to help people (i.e Democrats and the few Republicans left who aren't Trumpified). You guys have built an entire political ideology around petty insecurity, irrational jealousy, feelings of inferiority and inadequacies, and childish bullying. Your party is fucking done. You just don’t see it yet.

Moreover, your party has become an authoritarian cult and you are cheering it on. History has not been kind to leaders and supporters of such endeavors. I’d recommend changing your tune fairly quickly if you don’t want your life to be miserable.

And I'd recommend following the Doc on Twitter. I realize the cognitive dissonance might be too much for you but it will ease pain of what's coming. It will also help you remember that happened in 2018 and 2019.

What's the Real Reason Parasite Could Win?

There have been dozens of stories in the news about Parasite being the first non-English language film to win the best picture Oscar. Few believed it could win because of an insurmountable hurdle: it's in Korean with subtitles.

I haven't seen this movie, or any of the other nominees for that matter, so I can't comment on the artistic content. But I can address the issue of subtitles.

This prejudice against subtitles has always baffled me. People complain that subtitles and closed captions are bad because they take your eyes away from the action, or the surprise is "spoiled" because the text appears before the actor speaks the words.

I turn on closed captions in English language shows all the time. My hearing is slightly damaged, but I don't want to expose myself to loud sounds because they'll just damage my hearing further. So when there's a background noise, like the dishwasher running, I turn on captions.

And on the completely altruistic side, I turn them on when my wife is sleeping.

Then there are production problems in some shows: sometimes the music or sound effects drown out the dialog and it's impossible to tell what the actors are saying. Sometimes the actors have accents that are difficult to understand -- usually English actors with regional accents in BBC shows.

This prejudice against subtitles gets a little ridiculous. My dad has severe hearing loss but refuses to wear hearing aids. He watches TV with headphones turned up to 11, but won't turn on closed captioning. Which is required by the FCC for people just like him.

(I do have one complaint about closed captioning, however: it's often riddled with errors. They seem to use automatic voice recognition on a lot of shows, and the text produced is often missing words, or misunderstands what was actually said.)

Then there are shows that make creative use of subtitles. The first series I noticed doing this was Heroes, which featured long conversations between two Japanese characters. The subtitles were often deployed inventively in different locations around the screen, almost like speech bubbles in comic books.

In the case of non-English language films, some people say they prefer dubbing in English because subtitles are too "distracting." But for me, the mismatch between the words on the audio track and the actors' mouths is far more irritating (like the infamous Godzilla dubs). Frequently the intonation or emotional content of the English language track doesn't match the scene, or is over the top, or the voice actor they chose just doesn't fit the character. Sometimes the English dubbing or translation sounds so stupid that it completely ruins the scene.

In short, I would much rather see the film as the original writer, director, and actor intended it to be seen, without interference from another writer, another director, and another voice actor, all of whom were hired by the studio in what always seems to be a rush job.

There have been many suppositions as to why a film with subtitles was finally able to win an Oscar: it's the Netflix effect (they have a lot of popular non-English shows with subtitles), or the FCC's closed captioning mandate.

Admittedly, there is a downside to subtitles: they don't help slow readers, dyslexics or the illiterate. I wouldn't want to stigmatize people who don't like subtitles, but it's true that captions require a certain facility with the written word.

But I think a large part of it is that the voters in the Academy are like average Americans who are just getting older and harder of hearing, and like me are using closed captioning every day.

How Fascism Continues

The Best Campaign Ad of 2020

Run it over and over again the swing states. The guy is not mentally fit for office.

How To Win A News Cycle

The Age of Donald Trump has brought many lessons to politicians and pundits all across America. One such lesson is how to win a news cycle. Trump does this very well. He knows that if he does something obnoxious, people will either praise him or condemn him. As long as they are talking about him and he is in the news-ALL of the news-it doesn't matter what he did.

Nancy Pelosi has learned this lesson very well. She knew the cameras were on her when she tore up Trump's SOTU speech. Now, everyone is talking about that and not his speech. Fox News has been wall to wall on the Great Pelosi Shredding and their dear leader is nowhere to be found. Even Kevin Baker had to put up a post about it.

More importantly, it seems all right wing news and information outlets do these days is troll liberals (and Mitt Romney now that he grew a pair of balls and chose country over party). I was watching Fox News the other night when I was on the treadmill at the gym and all they did was show clips from CNN and MSNBC. Free air time? Really?

It seems to me that conservatives should put forth their own ideas and convictions...oh wait...sorry...I can't type anymore because I'm ROTF and LMFAO. Conservatives have no ideas anymore and have only one conviction.

Trolling liberals.

What the fuck do you guys even stand for?

The Trump Cult Doesn't Get It

The Trump Cult has one very big tell when it comes to the general election and it's their fall back position on everything.

Trolling.

They think they have liberals pegged as naive about Trump's chances in the general election. They assume that because we all thought Trump would lose in 2016 (as did Trump himself and most conservatives) that our predictions of him getting his ass kicked in the fall by any of the top candidates is the same naivete. It's not and here's why.

Trump barely won in 2016 by roughly 80, 000 votes in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. He squeaked by. The Cult will have you believe that it was some sort of mammoth victory for them but, just like the "millions" that showed up for Trump's inauguration, it's pure fantasy.

Further, The Cult has to have the twice Obama voter go for Trump again this November or it ain't gonna happen. That one really causes some cognitive dissonance for them. They don't get that 2016 was a "fuck you" election and if anyone other than Hillary was the nominee, Trump would be running his own streaming service now and fleecing them for $8.99 a month. 2020 is going to be a different sort of election and not a repeat of 2016.

Any of the top contenders can wipe the floor up with Trump given his how detrimental his words and actions are to those twice Obama voters. They are sick of his bullshit and they will vote for Biden, Mayor Pete, Bernie or Warren. Honestly, they really only need a few votes in the Rust Belt and that's it. All of those candidates bring large constituencies with them and they are going to turn out to vote against Trump.

They did it in 2018. They did it in 2019 in red states. They will do it again this year.

The Very Predictable Iowa Caucus Disaster

Twenty years ago George Bush won the presidency by a single vote on the Supreme Court. Florida had botched the election by using punch cards in the polling booth, requiring voters to poke holes in a card, a card that was easily misaligned. The Court stopped a recount in Florida that would have almost certainly resulted in Al Gore winning the presidency.

It was clear then that there's only one valid way to register votes: on bubble sheets that can be quickly counted by mark-sense readers, or by humans if the machines aren't working, and to audit the machine-read results.

But companies saw a way to make a lot of cash: they sold the idea of using computers at the polls to a lot of states. This was a horrible idea, for dozens of reasons, but the main reason is this: elections only happen every year or two.

These computers are expensive and only get used for one or two days a year (or two weeks, in states that now allow early voting). The software is non-trivial and is only used once every couple of years, is difficult to test under actual conditions, and needs to be modified upon every use. Maintaining the hardware and operating system is a gargantuan job. All those computers are easy targets for hacking, so operational security is difficult at best, and impossible at worst. Worse, in every election since then there have thousands of complaints that the voting machines incorrectly count votes: touchscreens that registered a vote for a Republican when the voter selected a Democrat.

And all this is supposed to happen on city and county budgets, which are constantly hamstrung for cash, especially compared to things that happen on a daily basis, like fixing potholes and paying cops' and firefighters' salaries.

The last presidential election was severely disrupted by Russian hacking, and Donald Trump won because of that hacking.

So what moron decided they should write an app to register votes at the Iowa caucuses? What were they thinking? "Hey, let's give the Russians another chance to hack the election!"

To avoid that, they thought they could keep the app a big secret, and release it just before the caucuses to prevent said Russian hacking. What were they thinking? "Let's have an app that no one's ever seen and that's never been tested under life-like conditions decide who the next Democratic nominee is!"

To be fair, Iowa did have voters fill out presidential preference cards, so they should have a paper backup. But these are all administered in chaotic settings like high-schools gyms and cafeterias, usually by elderly people, so just how reliable is this system?

Then there's the problem with caucuses in the first place. Minnesota, where I live, used to have them for selecting the president, and in 2016 they were a disaster. Everyone wanted to go, and because everyone had to be there at exactly the same time, there wasn't even enough street capacity to accommodate all the cars going to the caucus: I sat in traffic in the same spot for 20 minutes until I finally I gave up and parked several blocks away.

Also, only certain kinds of people attend caucuses: party apparatchiks and driven, single-issue partisans. People just interested in selecting the candidate most likely to win are discouraged from coming.

For all these reasons, caucuses should be dropped in favor of presidential primaries that are run with the same rigor as general elections (rigor that should be improved with bubble-sheet voting). The selection of the next president should not be entrusted to party hacks and rabid pro- or con-abortion partisans browbeating their neighbors at caucus.

Minnesota has adopted such a presidential primary system, and all states should do so.

Republicans are having a field day with the Democrats' botched Iowa caucus. But the Republicans have completely abandoned democracy -- in Minnesota they completely prevented other candidates from running in the Republican primary, so Trump will be the only name on the Republican ballot -- just like the good old Soviet Union.

Minnesota will still have party caucuses to decide other issues and let candidates for local offices talk directly to the voters, but Minnesota Republicans refuse to announce where their caucuses will be, because they don't want anyone coming they don't control to bitch about Trump.

Finally, the idea that Iowa and New Hampshire should always get first shot at selecting the president is utterly bogus: those states do not represent the country in any meaningful way, and they should not get this outsized advantage that results from the extra attention that candidates pay them. There should be six to eight "Super Tuesdays" during primary season, and states should rotate among those every two years.

You Are A Traitor For Questioning It