Politics Plus

I overslept this morning, because I’m overtired from the winter heat wave.  Starting tomorrow, temperatures will be seasonal for a few days.  I can’t wait for the feeling of snuggling under my covers to stay warm.  I spoke with my PCP yesterday afternoon.  Megan and I agreed to put my fasting labs and routine appointment off for a month, because the end of flu season is running late, it is more virulent than normal, the vaccine missed the target this year, and it’s airborne.  It’s not a good idea for me to expose myself with two routine trips to a place where people with flu routinely hang out.  I will, however, be going for my annual cancer screening at Casey Eye Institute on Monday.  Coverage of the Winter Olympics has started, and I remain a big-time amateur sports fan.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 2:39 (average 4:31).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): White House Staff Secretary Rob Porter Resigns After Abuse Allegations Surface

The White House has known about Porter’s predations for over a year, and didn’t care, even when he could not get his security clearance because of them. Republicans tried to keep Porter indefinitely, even after his resignation, but due to publicity and public outcry, today is his last day. It is a dark day for little Donnie Grabatwat, who depends on Porter to help him develop techniques to abuse women, RESIST!!

From The New Yorker: The Pentagon has turned down Donald J. Trump’s request for a grand military parade in Washington, D.C., citing a sudden outbreak of bone spurs that would prevent men and women in uniform from participating.

Harland Dorrinson, a Pentagon spokesman, said that, within an hour of Trump’s request, more than a hundred thousand military personnel complained that they were suffering from acute cases of bone spurs that would make marching in such a parade a painful ordeal.

“In the history of the U.S. military, we have never experienced a bone-spur epidemic of this magnitude,” the spokesman said. “Regrettably, however, we have no choice but to issue thousands of deferments.”

Dang, Andy! That sounds perfectly reasonable to me. I bet the tanks caught bone spurs too! RESIST!!

From Think Progress: Before Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) became chairman in 2015, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence had a reputation for bipartisanship. With the revelation, reported by CBS News on Thursday, that the committee’s Republican majority staff will soon be separated from the Democratic minority staffers on the committee by a wall — literally, a physical barrier separating public officials from each other — members of both parties are saying Nunes has destroyed any spirit of collaboration the committee once enjoyed.

Is there nothing Nunes won’t do to protect America from the truth about his Fuhrer? RESIST!!

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It’s been something so unusual that it’s almost unheard of here… a thoroughly routine day.  Other than doing my research, the most exciting thing I’ve done is order my groceries from Store to Door.  On the other hand, we received  some very sad news.  Prayers for Nameless and his family, please.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:32 (average 6:51).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): Donald Trump: Dems Not Praising State Of The Union Are Treasonous

Barf Bag Alert!!

To a large extent, I disagree. What we have here is a clear-cut case of projection. The traitor just accused the patriots of treason. RESIST!!

From Washington Post: President Trump and congressional Republicans have spent much of the past year trying to connect a giddy stock market rally with their economic agenda, but stocks’ precipitous plunge in the past five days has delivered a sobering reality: What goes up can come back down — quickly and with little warning.

With Monday’s steep fall, Trump has presided over the biggest stock market drop in U.S. history, when measured by points in the Dow Jones industrial average. The free fall began in earnest Jan. 30 and snowballed Friday and Monday, for a combined loss of almost 2,100 points, or 8 percent of the Dow’s value.

It is also unclear if the past week will amount to a small correction or the beginning of a painful slide that many investors said was overdue.

I suspect it’s a correction. Because the tax cuts for billionaires are raising the debt, the US now needs to borrow more at a higher interest rate. Higher interest rates increase bond returns. That makes bonds a more attractive investment.  When investors move to bonds, they pull money from the stock market, dropping stock prices. RESIST!!

From The New Yorker: After watching it suffer its worst losses since he became President, Donald Trump is “seriously considering” firing the Dow Jones Industrial Average, aides have confirmed.

According to the aides, Trump is “furious” at the D.J.I.A. for going down so precipitously and believes that it has treated him “very unfairly.”

“Increasingly, the President has become convinced that the Dow Jones Industrial Average is not on his team,” one aide said. “Seeing the negative Dow numbers in the corner of the TV screen has been wrecking eleven hours of every day for him.”

Reportedly, Trump is mulling replacing the Dow with a new system, in which Sarah Huckabee Sanders would appear every day at 4 p.m. to announce how high stocks had skyrocketed.

Dang, Andy! I thought he would just blame Little Adam for the drop!! RESIST!!

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It’s a high holy day in the Church of the Ellipsoid Orb.  The walking rectum likes the Patriots.  Go Eagles!  I’ll be spending the afternoon in meditation.  WWWendy is due in about 45 minutes to destink the TomCat and help with chores, including making a big load of chili.  That way I can cheer the Eagles from one end and Trump’s Patriots from the other.

WWWendy just left and greets you all! The chili will produce a magnificent green cloud!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:20 (average 5:54).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From YouTube (SNL Channel): Fox & Friends Cold Open

I wonder if the SNL crew really understands just how close to the truth they are. I think, yes. RESIST!!

From Washington Post: Longtime televangelist Pat Robertson is recovering after suffering an embolic stroke, according to the Christian Broadcasting Network [hate channel delinked], a Virginia-based television network Robertson founded.

Robertson, 87, was rushed to the nearest stroke center Friday after a family member recognized “the onset of symptoms,” the CBN report says.

“Within minutes of receiving [clot-busting drugs], Dr. Robertson was awake and responsive and able to move all of his limbs,” CBN states. He is expected to make a full recovery.

As much as I cannot stand this Republican Supply-side pseudo-Christian and purveyor of Republican hatred, I would not wish a stroke upon him. However, if he makes a full recovery, but loses the use of his vocal chords, that would be a blessing for the world. RESIST!!

From NY Times: For Republicans in the states, the political warning signs keep mounting: In Virginia, it was an electoral shellacking that nearly snapped their 20-year grip on the State House. In Wisconsin, it was a midwinter rout in a special election for the State Senate, fought in a conservative district.

And in Pennsylvania, it has been an exodus of state legislators from the Philadelphia area, where more than half a dozen Republicans have opted for retirement over a strenuous campaign in 2018.

“It looks like it’s going to be a war zone,” said State Representative Gene DiGirolamo, a moderate Republican, of his native Bucks County, a spacious suburb on the New Jersey border.

As national Republicans dig in to defend their majorities in Congress in the midterm elections, party leaders across the country have grown anxious about losses on a different front: state legislatures. Over the last decade, Republicans have dominated most state capitals, enacting deep tax cuts, imposing new regulations on labor unions and abortion providers, and drawing favorable congressional maps to reinforce their power in Washington.

November can’t come soon enough! RESIST!!

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It’s another very busy day, here in the CatBox.  I scheduled medical appointments and my ride to my labs appointment next week.  I did all my research and some home tasks.  I am about to write the January’s Monthly Report, a prodigious task in itself.  I think that one of the reasons I’ve bees so tired is that I got in the habit of spending a lot of time in bed when I was sick, and too much rest has contributed to not getting enough sleep and a general sense of lethargy, so I’m forcing myself to give up my morning nap time and spend more time on George, to give myself more exercise.  TGIF!!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:10 (average 5:11).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From YouTube (RWW Channel): Gordon Klingenschmitt Says Trump’s Demon-Possessed Critics ‘Are Bringing About The End Of The World’

Barf Bag Alert!!

The answer to "where are the demonic spirits?" is "in the Oval Office". It is Republicans, who reject religious freedom, as they seek to disavow all but Republican Supply-side pseudo-Christians, the exact opposite of real Christians.  RESIST!!

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): Donald Trump Faith Misplaced In Memo Reportedly Focused On Carter Page

Often, when Rachel starts, we have no idea what she’s talking about, but when the lightbulb comes on, the clarity is blinding! I think I’ll start a secret international conspiracy to laugh at Trump with Squatch and Lona. Then Nunes can release a memo on us too.  RESIST!!

From AlterNet: Whiteness is the complexion for the protection — and being white and female can comes with great privileges as well.

According to Wednesday’s New York Times, Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller will interview a former spokesman for Donald Trump’s legal team named Mark Corallo, who resigned last July. Corallo will reportedly tell Mueller that he took part in "a previously undisclosed conference call" with President Trump and White House communications director Hope Hicks:

Mr. Corallo planned to tell investigators that Ms. Hicks said during the call that emails written by Donald Trump Jr. before the [June 2016] Trump Tower meeting — in which the younger Mr. Trump said he was eager to receive political dirt about Mrs. Clinton from the Russians — “will never get out.” That left Mr. Corallo with concerns that Ms. Hicks could be contemplating obstructing justice …

In response to this report, the sentiment has emerged on social media and elsewhere that Hicks — a presidential confidante and senior figure in the Trump administration — is somehow naive or too young or supposedly in over her head, and that she should be given the opportunity to make amends and to move on from the Russian scandal later in life.

Caucasian race and female gender are no defense against charges of criminal IOKIYAR. RESIST!!

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(6 weeks of winter)