Open Thread – 8/31/2020

Posted by TomCat at 11:30 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Aug 312020

It’s a busy day here in the CatBox. Diana should be here in a few minutes for her routine visit, and WWWendy will be here late this afternoon. The score is now WWWendy 1 to TC 1. I plugged the toilet this morning! ARGH! Oh God, it’s Monday!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:06 (average 4:55). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Trump* Virus Update:

0831TrumpVirusMap

Click for interactive map

US Cases: 6,177,092
US Deaths: 187,248
Plus the thousands of GOP plague murder victims Republicans are hiding from us

Short Takes:

From Alternet: One of the many oddities of the now-terminated Robert Mueller probe into Russian election interference and its links to various members of the Trump campaign and family, and in fact of all known federal probes into Russia’s Trump-related actions, has been the seeming lack of any counterintelligence probe on Donald Trump’s myriad, longstanding financial connections to Russia—and what role those financial ties have played both in the Russian government’s actions on behalf of Trump and their possible leverage over the now-president.

A new story from The New York Times‘ Michael Schmidt reports that that’s because in the first months of the new Trump administration, former deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein shuttered that investigation—then ordered special counsel Robert Mueller to steer clear of it himself. It’s not that the counterintelligence investigation into Trump’s known ties to Russian crime figures, to money laundering, and his family’s stated reliance on Russian cash has been kept closely-held: It never existed. And it still doesn’t.

Assuming that we win in November, the investigation blocked by Rosy Rectum Rosenstein needs to be done, and Trump* needs to be prosecuted, convicted, and incarcerated for the crimes Republicans are hiding. RESIST!!

From Crooks and Liars: Hopped up on Trump rage and Village People music, this white man feels emboldened to walk up to a journalist and verbally abuse and threaten media in New Hampshire.

That is so Republican! RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast of protest): Imagine – John Lennon & The Plastic Ono Band (w the Flux Fiddlers) (official music video HD long v)

Kudos to left wing protestors! RESIST!!

Vote Blue No Matter Who Top to Bottom!!

Dump Barrf!

Posted by TomCat at 11:09 am Politics

Jun 242020

AG Barr, aka Barrf, has been using the DOJ to further the desires of criminal Fuhrer Trump* and the Republican Reich. To do so, he has interfered with legitimate prosecutions and denied the American people the justice that is our right. He should be impeached.

Two prosecutors in the Justice Department will ratchet up the criticism of Attorney General William Barr on Wednesday with remarkable congressional testimony accusing senior Justice Department officials of politicizing DOJ investigations and the sentencing of a friend of President Donald Trump.

Aaron Zelinsky, a prosecutor on former special counsel Robert Mueller’s team, plans to testify that the sentencing recommendation for Trump’s longtime friend and adviser Roger Stone was watered down due to political pressure from the “highest levels” of the Justice Department, according to Zelinsky’s prepared remarked released Tuesday. Zelinsky, who now works in the Maryland US Attorney’s Office, said the pressure came due to Stone’s “relationship with the President.”

John Elias, a career Justice Department prosecutor in the Antitrust Division, accused Barr of ordering investigations into 10 mergers of cannabis companies because he did not like the industry, according to a copy of his testimony. Elias also charged that political leadership in the Antitrust Division pushed an investigation into California’s emissions standards last year following a tweet from the President attacking the state.

Wednesday’s testimony before the House Judiciary Committee comes amid a new flurry of questions surrounding Barr’s decision to fire Geoffrey Berman, the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, which has investigated Trump and his associates. Berman initially refused Barr’s request for his resignation, vowing to remain until the Senate confirmed his replacement sparking a chaotic situation that ended after Trump and Barr fired him and Berman agreed to leave…

Inserted from <CNN>

Barrf is so corrupt that the faculty of the George Washington University School of Law have written a letter asking the university to strip Barrf of his honorary degree, according to above the law. The powers that be are considering it. To read a copy of that letter (PDF), click here.

‘Torching Its Legacy’: DOJ Insider Says AG Barr ‘Should Be Resigning’ After ‘Bombshell’ Allegation

I know, I said that Barrf should be impeached, and I’m right! However, there’s no way in hell that we can ever get a fair trial, let alone a conviction, in the Senate, as long as it is in the fetid grip of Bought Bitch Midnight Moscow Mitch and the Republican Reich. Therefore, we need to keep exposing Barrf’s crimes and educating people about them. Hopefully, in 2021 a Democratic President will appoint a REAL Attorney General, who will have Barrf investigated and indicted. Then the court can tell him, “Go to jail! Go directly to jail! Do NOT pass go! Do NOT collect $200,000,000!” It will be even better, if he meets his beloved criminal Fuhrer Trump* there!

RESIST!!

Open Thread–6/21/2020

Posted by TomCat at 10:55 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics, Religion

Jun 212020

It’s a better Sunday, here in the CatBox. My Fentanyl patch has helped my pain level and reduced my use of Oxycodone considerably. Tomorrow I have a morning visit from a Providence Home Health doctor, so how much I publish will depend on how long she is here. Kudos to all Dads.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:18 (average 5:42). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Trump* Virus Update:

0621TrumpVirusMap

Cases: 2,331,673
Deaths: 122,005
Recovered: 973,061

Short Takes:

From Alternet: On Friday night, Attorney General William Barr issued a statement saying that the U. S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Geoffry Berman, had resigned. That was a lie. Not only had Berman not resigned, he had told Barr repeatedly that he would not resign, and had turned down other roles at the Department of Justice. So, about an hour after Barr’s statement, Berman issued a statement of his own, telling Barr to stuff it. Actually, Berman stated that he had been “appointed by the Judges of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York” and that he would only step down “when a presidentially appointed nominee is confirmed by the Senate.” Berman is in the middle of a number of highly sensitive investigations, including an ongoing investigation of Donald Trump’s attorney Rudy Giuliani and his associates in Trump’s Ukraine scandal. So his removal clearly signals that Barr is, once again, placing Trump’s desires far ahead of such arcane ideas as justice, or the nation.

On Saturday afternoon, Barr produced a new statement. He’s given up the pretense that Berman has resigned. Instead Barr says, “I have asked the president to remove you as of today, and he has done so.” According to Barr, this makes assistant U. S. Attorney Audrey Strauss the new acting U. S. Attorney, but considering Barr’s knowledge and application of the law, odds are he’s simply lying again. Hilariously, Barr claims there’s no danger of there being an issue with ongoing cases because … the inspector general will see to that. As everyone knows, Trump and Barr just respect the hell out of inspectors general.

SDNY’s Geoffrey Berman has resigned. Perhaps he’ll have time to testify to Congress now.

Criminal Fuhrer Trump* claims that Barrf did this on his own. He claims he had nothing to do with it. One, or far more likely, both, are lying. Barrf lacks the authority to fire a US Attorney. RESIST!!

From YouTube (John Pavlovitz Channel): 5 THINGS YOU SHOULD NEVER TO SAY TO GRIEVING PEOPLE. How Our Words Can Magnify Other’s Loss

Very well said, by an Authentic Christian (the polar opposite of a Republican pseudo-Christian). I could not agree more! RESIST!!

From YouTube (CNN Channel):Facts don’t support what Trump, Pence say about coronavirus

Trump* Virus is an ongoing disaster, just like criminal Fuhrer Trump and the Republican Reich, who are making it so much worse. Here in Oregon, the most recent spike comes from a Pentecostal Church in Eastern Oregon. There Republican pseudo-Christians (the opposite of real authentic Christians) are practicing Republican guidelines on Sunday and infecting their neighbors Monday through Saturday. RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): “REFLECTIONS OF MY LIFE” THE MARMALADE ~ 1969 – original recording ~ HQ AUDIO

Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue No Matter Who Top to Bottom!!

Open Thread–5/10/2020

Posted by TomCat at 8:33 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

May 102020

It’s a busy day here in the CatBox. WWWendy will be here within the hour. Tomorrow is a chemo infusion day. I have to be in the lobby for the TriMet Lift Bus at 6:22. Happy Holiday!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 2:40 (average 4:51). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Trump* Virus Update:

0510TrumpVirusMap

Cases: 1,349,538
Deaths: 80,098
Recovered: 238,081

To all Moms!:

Short Takes:

From NY Times: “History is written by the winners,” William Barr, the attorney general, said Thursday when asked how he thought future generations would assess his decision to drop all criminal charges against Michael Flynn, President Trump’s former national security adviser, who had pleaded guilty twice to breaking the law. “So it largely depends on who’s writing the history.”

In service to Mr. Trump, Mr. Barr is abusing his power not to write, but to erase, some of the most important lessons of American history.

The Watergate scandal, with its revelations of how dangerous a renegade White House could be, led to reforms meant to ensure an independent Justice Department, one faithful to the law rather than to the Oval Office.

The nation had seen firsthand how much harm a president with no respect for the rule of law could do — particularly when he used the Justice Department, under a compliant attorney general, to protect allies, punish adversaries and cover up wrongdoing.

Click through for an extensive expose of crimes Barff has committed on behalf of his beloved criminal Fuhrer Trump*. RESIST!!

From YouTube (SNL Channel): Virtual Graduation Cold Open

It’s hard to believe that even one student voted for him. The LiMu Emu would have been a far better choice than Trump*! Where is Booth, when you need him? RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): Wild World

Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue No Matter Who Top to Bottom!!

Open Thread–3/3/2020

Posted by TomCat at 10:22 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Mar 032020

It’s a very busy day here in the CatBox. I had to prepare and send my grocery order. I spent over an hour on the phone trying to line up the oncologist for my cancer treatments. I think I have, but I still have no results from my PET Scan. I’m hoping for a call tomorrow. I’ll keep you posted. I still have to do the prep work for covering Super Tuesday. I am experimenting with mi diet and found that I’m not plugging the passageway as badly, when I eat a soft solid food and goop together. Yesterday for lunch I had a small portion of ground turkey sandwich. That was borderline. For supper, I had chili goop over rice. That worked great. For breakfast, I had New England clam chowder goop with a bite of saltine with each bite of goop. That worked well too. May Liz and Bernie kick ass today!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:36 (average 5:10): To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Short Takes:

From Alternet: A former Justice Department attorney compared her service under President Donald Trump as somewhere in between Nazi Germany and “The Apprentice.”

Erica Newland went to work at the Department of Justice in the summer before the 2016 election, and stayed under Trump because she liked her colleagues and believed she could make a difference — but soon learned an uncomfortable truth about herself, reported The Atlantic.

“I guess I know what kind [of German bureaucrat] I would have been,” Newland said, imagining how she might have served in the 1930s. “I would have stayed in the Nazi administration initially and then fled.”

She lasted in Trump’s government until October 2018, when an anti-Semitic extremist killed 11 worshipers at a Pittsburgh synagogue, and that same week her colleagues at the Office of Legal Counsel were tasked with justifying Trump’s order to refuse all asylum claims at the southern border — mirroring language the gunman had used against foreign “invaders.”

Newland, who is Jewish, recalled an exchange she had with a supervisor who often reminded staffers they worked for the president by saying, “We’re just following orders.

The bureaucrats under Hitler were “just following orders” too. What’s the difference? Fuhrer Hitler’s Nazi Reich was the Third Reich. Criminal Fuhrer Trump’s* Republican Reich is the Fifth Reich. The similarities are undeniable. RESIST!!

From The New Yorker: Representative Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) is under intense pressure to drop out of the 2020 race for the Democratic Presidential nomination, her nine supporters announced on Monday.

The announcement from Gabbard’s nine followers surprised many Democrats, who had been unaware that the Hawaii congresswoman was still running.

In a conference call after the South Carolina primary, the nine members of Team Tulsi concluded that Gabbard’s path to the nomination had grown “dauntingly narrow.”

“We believe that Tulsi would be an amazing President of the United States,” Harland Dorrinson, a spokesman for the other eight Gabbard supporters, said. “But we have regretfully come to the conclusion that this is not her time.”

Andy, is that a good idea? The nine fools stupid enough to vote for Tulsi should still vote for her. That way, they won’t damage the nation by voting for Bloombarf or criminal Fuhrer Trump*. RESIST!!

From YouTube (Robert Reich Channel): What Bernie Skeptics Need to Know Before Super Tuesday

Of course the Reich on the left, Robert Reich, is right, and the Reich on the Right, the evil Republican Reich, in addition to corporate Democrats, have their heads up their asses. 1. Amen! FDR was a democratic socialist. Amen! Trump promised reform and delivered National Socialism. 3. Amen! A Wall Street speculation tax to pay for public needs is far better for America than Republican welfare for billionaires. 4. Amen! Congress will pass progressive legislation, if we get off our asses, flush the Republican Reich, and replace DINOs in the primaries. 5. Amen! Bernie acts younger than Biden. 6. Amen! With criminal Fuhrer Trump* in power, the Democrats will unite behind any candidate, who wins the nomination, as long as they win it fairly! However, if DNC Superdelegates take the nomination from the voters’ choice and land it to another, they will destroy the party and the nation. RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): The Monkees – Last Train To Clarksville 1966

Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue!!

Resign Barrf!

Posted by TomCat at 8:46 am Politics

Feb 172020

Never in the history of the Unites States has there ever been a party so criminal as today’s Republican Reich, under mayhem’s mad maniac, Fuhrer Donald Trump. And never gas there been an Attorney General more corrupt than William Barr, aka Barrf! He truly deserves to be disbarred, or in his case, disBarrfed!

More than 1,100 former federal prosecutors and Justice Department officials called on Attorney General William P. Barr on Sunday to step down after he intervened last week to lower the Justice Department’s sentencing recommendation for President Trump’s longtime friend Roger J. Stone Jr.

They also urged current government employees to report any signs of unethical behavior at the Justice Department to the agency’s inspector general and to Congress.

“Each of us strongly condemns President Trump’s and Attorney General Barr’s interference in the fair administration of justice,” the former Justice Department lawyers, who came from across the political spectrum, wrote in an open letter on Sunday. Those actions, they said, “require Mr. Barr to resign.”… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <NY Times>

I recommend following the link to read the letter.

1,100+ former prosecutors and other DOJ officials call on Attorney General Barr to resign

I’ve never seen anything like this before. However, I think the best we can hope for is to indict, try, convict and jail this vile Republican criminal, after we defeat his Fuhrer and take the White House. Thanks in advance to those prosecutors who blow the whistle on Barrf and/or resign in the face of this Republican perversion of justice.

RESIST!!

Open Thread–2/16/2020

Posted by TomCat at 7:52 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Feb 162020

It’s a busy day here in the CatBox. WWWendy if coming to de-stink the rancid TomCat and help with chores, including the preparation of what I need for my day trip to the hospital on Tuesday. I hope your day is fully Republican-free. If not, flush!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:09 (average 5:05). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Short Takes:

From Daily Kos: Moscow Mitch McConnell went on Fox News to chortle and gloat over the 395 bills the Democratic House has passed in the last year that he’s refusing to consider.

“It is true,” the Senate majority leader said. “They’ve been on full left-wing parade over there, trotting out all of their left-wing solutions that are going to be issues in the fall campaign. They’re right. We’re not going to pass those.” Like making sure state and local governments have enough funding to secure the 2020 election and legislation ensuring that people’s health care is protected. You know, crazy “full left-wing parade,” unlike his Senate that’s cranking out extremist, unqualified judges and voting on forced-birther bills that can’t even pass in the Senate.

At the same time Bought Bitch Midnight Moscow Mitch’s beloved criminal Fuhrer Trump* is whining about how the House of Representatives get nothing done, because they spend all their time persecuting him. The only solution is to dump every Republican dawg catcher, the Nazi Republican Fuhrer, and every Republican in between. Every Republican in office is one Republican too many! RESIST!!

From Raw Story: Appearing in MSNBC’s “AM Joy” former lead prosecutor Glenn Kirschner hammered Attorney General Bill Barr of a pattern of deceit and perjury that began with his Senate confirmation hearings and continues to this day.

Speaking with host Joy Reid about Barr’s ABC interview admission that he is unhappy with Donald Trump’s tweets and that he doesn’t let them influence him, the prosecutor called him out.

“Bill Barr is not to be believed,” Kirschner explained. “You know, from day one, Joy, at his confirmation hearing he lied — he committed perjury. [Sen.] Kamala Harris asked him, did anybody at the White House including the president ask you to open an investigation or suggest you should open an investigation? What did he say? ‘You know, I’m grappling with the word suggest.’”

First, Barrf should be impeached. Then, Barrf should be disbarrfed! RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): The Marcels – Blue Moon

This was the first 45 RPM record I ever owned. Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue!!

Open Thread–2/12/2020

Posted by TomCat at 9:04 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Feb 122020

It’s another sickly day, here in the CatBox. I could not keep breakfast down, but eventually the burn eased off enough for me to work. It’s a WWWendy day, and it’s been so muggy here, that I need de-stinking in the worst way. Happy Hump Day!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 5:08 (average 7:14). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

I made this cartoon when Crawford Caligula was Resident. Republicans are even worse on jobs now.

Short Takes:

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): Entire Roger Stone Prosecution Team Quits Case In Protest

Now that criminal Fuhrer Trump knows he can get away with abusing his power, he’s setting off on a new crime spree. And whenever the AG hears his master’s voice, Barrf Barrfs! Kudos to the prosecutor who quit DOJ! I hope the Democratic President rehires him in Jan. RESIST!!

From YouTube: Bloomberg’s ‘stop-and-frisk’ comments resurface

Even if Bloomberg were not a proven racist, as the tape demonstrates so clearly, he should not be allowed to buy a chance to win the Democratic Nomination. RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): Van Morrison – Brown Eyed Girl (Original Version)

Vote Blue!!

Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

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