Open Thread–7/21/2020

Posted by TomCat at 9:56 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Jul 212020

It’s another hectic day here in the CatBox. I’m having a telephone visit with my nutritionist this morning, so that will kill my morning nap, and exacerbate my back pain. I guess they’re going to increase my Oxycodone instead of my Fentanyl patch strength. I disagree and will argue it at my next appointment. A patch gives constant pain relief, so increasing the strength lowers my overall pain level. Oxycodone gives yo-yo pain relief, as it is taken only when the pain level has risen, so I suffer needless pain. Please check your outhouse for Republicans. If one is hiding down there, go.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:34 (average 5:18). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Clinton had Lewinski. Putin [R-RU] had Trump*.

Trump* Virus Update:

0721TrumpVirusMap

Click through for interactive map.

US Cases: 3,963,376
US Deaths: 143,889

Short Takes:

From YouTube (CNN Channel): Veteran discusses getting hit by unmarked police in Portland

Our veterans deserve honor, praise, and gratitude from our people and government, but from the Republican Reich and their Nazi Gestapo, our veterans get hate, neglect and violence! RESIST!!

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): GOP Tested As Democrats Call Out Foreign Interference In Election

This is what a President sounds like and acts like. May God grant that we have a President in January, instead of the criminal Fuhrer we have now. May God also grant that the Republican Reich go the way of the Whig Party. But God can’t do it alone. She needs help from YOU! RESIST!!

From YouTube ( a blast from the past and labor): Arlo Guthrie/Alice’s Restaurant

Ah… the memories! Except for unmuzzled Republican Nazi Police Unions, support Labor! RESIST!!

Vote Blue No Matter Who Top to Bottom!!

Open Thread–3/31/2020

Posted by TomCat at 10:53 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Mar 312020

It’s a very tired day here in the CatBox. Yesterday’s trip was a success, but the trip exhausted me. I am Big Time pooped. The doctor and I were on the same page. Since my cancer cells did not react favorably to immunotherapy, and the best chemo regimen would fill my home with Republicosis, I asked her of there was another chemo drug that would not cause such a severe reaction. She had anticipated my request and there is: Docetaxel. They will install an infusion port in my chest and pump me full of chemo goop every two weeks. It will give me nausea, but they have meds to help that. I will lose my hair. If it’s effective, I should have a year. If not, I may make it six months. That’s the plan. Tuesday is flatulence at Republicans day. Ready… Aim… FIRE!!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:05 (average 4:30). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Trump* Virus Update:

0330TrumpVirus

Cases: 164,798
Deaths: 3,178
Recovered: 5,507

Short Takes:

From Daily Kos: Donald Trump called in to Fox & Friends Monday morning and openly admitted that if more people vote, Republicans will lose. Democrats are pushing for vote by mail so that people don’t have to risk coronavirus to exercise their right to vote. Asked about “special interest projects” added to coronavirus relief bills, that is right where Trump’s mind went.

“The things they had in there were crazy,” he said. “They had levels of voting that if you ever agreed to it you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.” You might think it’s amazing to hear a politician in a democracy saying that democracy is bad, but Trump joins a long line of Republicans saying that too much voting is bad.

Criminal Fuhrer Trump* is not the first Republican to voice this sentiment, and he won’t be the last. Republicans want to make the Fifth Reich permanent and establish a National Socialist plutocracy in which elections are only for show, because Republicans control who gets to vote. RESIST!!

From The New Yorker: In a conversation over the weekend that reportedly left the President “shaken,” Dr. Anthony Fauci warned Donald Trump that if everyone in the United States dies, it would adversely affect his television ratings.

Although Fauci was quick to add that the everyone-dying scenario was purely hypothetical, he stressed that, from a medical perspective, alive people were more likely than dead ones to watch television.

According to a source familiar with the conversation, the possible impact of covid-19 fatalities on Trump’s ratings “totally blindsided” the President, who immediately convened an emergency meeting of the White House Coronavirus Task Force.

“It’s time you losers started taking this situation seriously,” Trump reportedly barked. “Especially you, Pence.”

I wondered why criminal Fuhrer Trump flip-flopped to support social distancing. Andy has explained it. RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): Status Quo – Pictures Of Matchstick Men

I hope that those of you who had not heard some of my psychedelic hippie music are enjoying it. Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue No Matter Who Top to Bottom!!

Open Thread–2/8/2020

Posted by TomCat at 10:33 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Feb 082020

I’m having a rough day. Although I haven’t barfed my breakfast, I have severe heartburn, and the Republicosis has returned. Tomorrow is a WWWendy day, so please expect no more than an Open Thread. I hope your weekend is better than mine.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 2:42 (average 4:31). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Short Takes:

From ACLU: Voting should be as easy and convenient as possible, and in many cases it is. But across the U.S., too many politicians are passing measures making it harder to cast a ballot. The goal is to manipulate political outcomes, and the result is a severely compromised democracy that doesn’t reflect the will of the people. Our democracy works best when all eligible voters can participate and have their voices heard.

Suppression efforts range from the seemingly unobstructive, like voter ID laws and cuts to early voting, to mass purges of voter rolls and systemic disenfranchisement. And long before election cycles even begin, legislators can redraw district lines that determine the weight of your vote. Certain communities are particularly susceptible to suppression and in some cases, outright targeted — people of color, students, the elderly, and people with disabilities.

Below, we’ve listed some of the most rampant methods of voter suppression across the country — and the advocacy and litigation efforts aimed at protecting our fundamental right to vote.

Click through for the best reference I’ve seen on voter suppression by the Republican Reich! RESIST!!

From YouTube (538 Channel): Who Won The New Hampshire Debate? Buttigieg? Klobuchar? Sanders?

Here’s my take on it. Buttigieg and Sanders ended in a virtual tie. Warren was third, in spite of being sabotaged by ABC news, who virtually ignored her all night. She got less time than Klobuchar, and WAY less time than Biden. Klobuchar was fourth. She seemed a bit desperate. Biden was fifth. He was more forceful, than before but was singularly unimpressive. Steyer is still trying to buy victory, and Yang is still a one trick pony. RESIST!!

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): Witnesses Left Scattered In Wake Of Trump Impeachment Scandal

Criminal Fuhrer Trump* always leaves chaos in his wake, as others bear the consequences of his never-ceasing crimes and incompetence. RESIST!!

Also from YouTube (MSNBC Channel): Secret Service Skipping Reports On Payment To Trump Resorts: WaPo

Meanwhile a Trump* appointed federal judge just ruled that Congress lacks standing to sue Trump* for emoluments violations. RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): The Doors – Hello, I Love You

Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue!!

Samantha Bee: Make Voting Fair Again

Posted by TomCat at 9:04 am Politics

Jan 092020

The Republican Reich is an ever shrinking minority party. They get votes from the voters they represent: billionaires, Corporate Criminals, racists, religious bigots, homophobes, misogynists, fascists, deplorables, white supremacists, and every kind of hate monger I forgot to list. They also get votes from people they do NOT represent but hoodwink into thinking they do. More and more are seeing through their lies. That leaves their party with two choices: they can steal elections, or they can lose elections.

These have not been good times for Democrats wanting a fair shot at representation. The Supreme Court’s 2012 decision to eviscerate the Voting Rights Act was the beginning of a series of rulings rubber-stamping just about every tactic the Republican Party has come up with in its comprehensive war on voting rights, which includes everything from voter ID laws to voter purges to making registering voters all but illegal to partisan gerrymandering.

So when Democrats get any kind of victory in this ongoing battle, as they just did on Tuesday [article from 9/4/2019], it’s a remarkable development. And it shows one path for them to overcome a Supreme Court that is determined to make sure Republicans can continue to rig elections in their favor:…

…Proving the effect of partisan maps, it should be noted, is precisely what the Supreme Court said was impossible to do when it ruled two months ago that the federal courts have no business even trying to judge whether any gerrymander is too partisan, no matter how much it discriminates against voters from one party… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <Washington Post>

Samantha Bee knows!

Full Frontal Rewind: Make Voting Fair Again

I love the way she makes painful truths funny!

There are two other problems that need attention:

First, the Electoral College gives unfair advantage in Presidential elections to rural states with low populations. A voter in Wyoming gets three times the electoral representation that one in California does. But to ratify a Constitutional Amendment to fix it, would require the support of those states that gain unfair advantage from it. The solution is a National Popular Vote.

Second, the plurality takes all voting system makes it virtually impossible for independent and third party candidates to get votes without helping the major candidate with the opposite ideology. For example, Republicans have volunteered for and financed Green Party Presidential candidates (Nader and Stein) on two separate occasions, so that the Democratic Candidate lost enough support in key swing states to allow GW Bush and Trump to steal the White House. The solution is Ranked Choice Voting. It allows people to vote their conscience, and vote strategically too.

RESIST!!

Voting Rights is Dead until 2021

Posted by TomCat at 9:27 am Politics

Dec 072019

I’m pleased that House Democrats, aided by a single,solitary Republican, passed the Voting Rights Enhancement Act. It updates the Voting Rights Act to restore it to its former state, before SCROTUS (Republican Anti-Constitutional VD) allowed the Republican Party to disenfranchise millions of Black, Latino, and other minority voters

On Friday, House Democrats passed the Voting Rights Advancement Act, a bill that would restore and expand the protections of the Voting Rights Act that the Supreme Court’s Republican majority gutted in 2013. The bill passed 228-187 with all 227 Democrats and Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick voting in favor while the other 186 Republicans and Republican-turned-independent Rep. Justin Amash voted against the bill.

The new legislation would establish a new formula to determine which states and localities must “preclear” any proposed changes to election laws and procedures with the Justice Department. The previous preclearance regime, which was struck down in 2013, applied to states and localities—largely in the South—with a history of racial discrimination in their voting laws.

Under the new setup, any state where officials have committed at least 15 voting rights violations over a 25-year period would be required to obtain preclearance for 10 years. If the state itself, rather than localities within the state, is responsible for the violations, it would take only 10 violations to place it under preclearance. In addition, any particular locality could individually be subjected to preclearance if it commits at least three violations.

Based on this formula, the VRAA would put 11 states back under preclearance: Alabama, California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia. While most of these states are still in the South (and also under Republican control), the list also includes the two largest Democratic-leaning states in the country, California and New York…

Inserted from <Daily Kos>

Note that the bill is fair, as it targets areas where there has been some Democratic abuse, in addition to all the areas of extreme Republican abuse today.

Trump immediately threatened to veto it.

Trump WH Threatens To Veto Restored Voting Rights Act

Trump will never get the chance to veto it. Bought Butch Moscow Mitch knows that Republicans cannot win fair elections, so they have to make sure there are no more.

In 2020, we need to keep the House, win the White House, win the Senate, and nuke the Filibastards to make this law!

RESIST!!

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