When you put your name on something, you damned well better stand by it. I hope the Trumps are ready to stand by what’s in that bottle with their name on it.
The Trump doesn’t so much have a “nose ” as an unpatriotic pong with acrid notes of corruption and nepotism.
When swirled, the Trump wine didn’t. Swirl. It sat there and insisted it WAS swirling. Strange, I thought, that a wine would lie about something so easily disproven.
There are hints of money laundering and fraud (that are all backed up later). If anything, the nose is Adultery Forward.
The first taste is offputting. Where you expect fruit, you get bullshit – and lots of it. Then fecklessness. Then waves of racism, bigotry and genetic ignorance.
Then one’s taste buds go completely numb. Mine haven’t come back yet. I fear it’s because everything Trump touches dies — including one’s taste buds.
The finish is all treason.
Good thing you get to spit this shit out.
For what it’s worth – Here’s an actual review of Trump wines. They weren’t as bad as colored lighter fluid — but not by much.
Politics is the art of compromise. Republican politics is the art of making compromise unnecessary because the other side is powerless to stop you.
To the GOP’s credit, they saw from a distance that they had a problem and actively did something about it. Post Reagan, as America’s demographics trended with greater rapidity away from old, Christian, white male power, the GOP — the party of old, Christian, white male power — made a conscious decision to undermine the growing majority’s political power.
Behind everything, of course, is The Money. Money always wants to protect itself — and make sure that whatever else happens in the world, IT always “is”. The rich intend to stay rich. To do that, they must retain power. To do that, GOP Money like the Kochs & the Mercers have invested heavily in politicians like Moscow Mitch McConnell. Mitch understands his role completely. If doing everything in HIS power to keep his real constituents IN power means the Republic itself dissolves into an authoritarian hellhole? That’s okay to Mitch.
It’s okay to entire Republican Party — because THEY get to hold onto power forever — regardless of how small a minority they become.
Mitch & the Republican Brain Trust understood that the Executive Branch was probably gone forever — unless the Electoral College could be more fully manipulated. Keep in mind — the whole point of the EC is to over-empower rural (slave-holding, conservative, white Christian) America while under-powering urban, populated, more diverse and therefore more progressive America. Republicans have been working to suppress black and Latino voters forever and ever and ever.
Ask yourself — if all those immigrants fleeing (American-caused) drug violence were reliably future Republican voters, would Republicans oppose their humane treatment as they do now? Of course they wouldn’t! If Republicans thought Puerto Ricans were reliable Republicans, Puerto Rico would have been a state yesterday.
For all the Republicans’ constant hang-wringing about election fraud, the only election fraud going on is perpetrated by Republicans.
Mitch & Team Treason knew — while the Executive Branch could always be within reach (via cheating), they couldn’t count on it.
They also recognized that the Legislative Branch was going to be hard to control. The Senate would be easier because, by design, it’s meant to empower the minority over the majority. Wyoming has the same power in the Senate as California does. That’s stupid. But, again, it was a system designed by white, Christian men who never imagined a modern Republican Party.
The House of Representatives was the Lost Cause. It is, after all, the Peoples’ House. Still, the Republicans had a tool in their belt — GERRYMANDERING. While Democrats also have been guilty (I grew up in Maryland), they’ve never been guilty to the extent the GOP’s been guilty. Not even close.
No, both sides don’t do it — not like this. The whole point of gerrymandering is to undermine the will of the majority by diluting it. That’s why we get districts that look like mindless doodles. They’re not mindless. They’re designed — to over-empower the Republican voters and under-empower the Democrats.
Again, to the GOP’s credit, they did their homework. Back during the Reagan years, they attacked local power structures all over the country. They ran for and won school boards and city council seats and statehouses. It wasn’t so much that they appealed to huge swaths of voters — they didn’t. They appealed to the voters who showed up — theirs. The ones who were motivated to show up — because they had a larger agenda.
The effects of minority rule are insidious. When the majority feels like their votes and their voices don’t matter, they stop voting and voicing their opinions. That’s the point — to make the majority feel powerless.
Republican Politics.
Between gerrymandering, indirect voter suppression (voter ID laws meant to make even getting ID hard) and direct cheating (working with Russia to win 2016), Republicans have taken corruption to places corruption probably never thought it would rise to. To maintain power, they’ve committed to destroying the Republic if that’s what it takes.
To maintain power, Republicans will do WHATEVER it takes. You can’t GET any more corrupt than that.
No one sees it coming, least of all me. Just like that — political leaders across the world & spectrum get the fates they deserve. The World’s eyes (getting REALLY desperate) turn to me of all people.
“Dude,” the World says, “We’re totally screwed. The ball’s yours if you want. Got anything?”
“Okay,” I say after a long, thoughtful beat. Here’s the deal I want:
My job title: “Benevolent Dictator”. It’s not up for discussion. Now here’s the thing — no one has to call me this. In fact, I’d rather they didn’t. It’s a little OTT. I just need the World to understand that, until my work is finished, that’s who & what I am.
My pay — zero. It ain’t about the money. If I do MY job correctly, money will land in my pocket through a thousand different streams (all of them 100% legit).
What I Want — The End of CRONY CAPITALISM. That’s another non-negotiable point. We need to rethink almost everything about our culture. More exactly, we need to start SEEING our culture for what it is, for what it must be and for what it can never be again. Money is not our problem, GREED is. Greed undermines capitalism more than an army of communists and socialists. Take THAT to the bank.
What I Want (continued) — A return to HUMAN DECENCY as the basis for how we view one another — and more importantly how we treat one another. For starters, we bury the ludicrous notion that America is “a Christian country”. The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are larded with Humanist thought born of the French Enlightenment. There’s far more Jean-Jacques Rousseau in our foundational docs than there is Jeremiah. To that end, we recognize religious texts as literature, not history and definitely not a basis for morality. We have science to cover the “nuts & bolts” of how we got here and CRITICAL THINKING to cover the rest.
What I Want (Continued) — We put every fact we have about Donald Trump & the Republican Party on the table. We admit to ourselves what the Republican Party tried to do to us — install permanent minority rule; even though they hated Donald Trump, they cynically hitched their shit-wagon to him despite knowing he was bought & paid for by Russia — because THEY, too, were bought & paid for by Russia. And Saudi Arabia & the UAE & Israel (and who the hell knows who else).
What I Want (Continued One Last Time) — We retrain our news media as far away from Both Sides Do It journalism as possible. We make selling False Equivalences career suicide. We return critical thinking & especially PERSPECTIVE to all journalism school curriculum.
What I REALLY Want — As quickly as I can, I will remove as many men as possible from positions of power. Those that remain will have to demonstrate that they really do know how to play well with others. That means no unilateral “I alone can fix it” toxic male thinking. Deal breaker. I insist that we hand as much governmental power as they want over to women (African American women especially — if not for them, this Democratic Republic would have been toast years ago). I’m not saying women are perfect — though, as Benevolent Dictator I could — I’m just saying they cannot possibly do worse than men. And to make sure men don’t ruin what women try to do with their unhelpful suggestions — I want to give women the purest shot we can. Once women are ready to rock ‘n roll? I’m handing over the reins of power.
That’s my deal. I’m ready to sign — and get to work — whenever YOU are, World…
I bet Stone’s conviction caused Moscow Mitch’s turtle sphincter to pull so tight he can now see his uvula from his rectum. Mitch knows — Karma’s got him in its sights. And Karma’s gonna be all over Mitch McConnell like a bitch.
Moscow Mitch snubbed at Elijah Cummings memorial service. Just a teeny-tiny taste of the Karma to come, Mitch…
The reason Donald Trump is POTUS to begin with is because Mitch refused – at a September 2016 Gang of Eight meeting convened at the Obama White House to let the American People in on the secret — the reason the Gang of Eight was hastily convened — that our IC had ample PROOF that RUSSIA was actively attacking our election in order to put Trump in the White House.
Mitch refused to let We The People in on it. He threatened Obama that if Obama told America what was really happening, he, Mitch, would insist that Obama was politicizing the intel for political reasons — to help Hillary Clinton win the election. This was bullshit of course. Mitch was betraying We The People on behalf of his Russian paymasters.
Mitch McTreason whined on the senate floor a few weeks ago how being called a “traitor” gave him a turtle sad. His speech gave new meaning to the word “hypocrisy”. Mitch saw to it personally that the sanctions levied against Oleg Deripaska for personally participating in Russia’s assault upon the 2016 election were lifted so that Oleg could drop $200 million and an aluminum factory on Kentucky.
Mitch will insist this is about 600 plus jobs for hard scrabble Kentuckians. That would be bullshit. Yeah, yeah — unemployment in Kentucky, a very poor state. Sorry, but screw them, screw their jobs and screw that factory. The factory itself is a deliberate attempt by Russia to create a beachhead INSIDE our politics. Why in hell’s name would we allow a foreign adversary to create an entity that controls the fate of Americans on American soil? Now they can threaten to pull out their factory if they don’t get what THEY want from our politics.
And whattaya know — a few days ago, Russia approached 8 other states with similar offers of factories or financial assistance. There’s a reason behind the thinking “Don’t shit where you eat”. It’s pretty sound actually.
Mitch just took a giant tortoise-sized dump on American Democracy. It wasn’t Mitch’s first time doing it either.
Mitch thinks it’s “partisan” to NOT let foreign countries undermine our democracy by destroying the integrity of our voting system. I wonder if Mitch thinks that because he’s owned lock, stock & bourbon barrels by Russia — same as every other Republican except even more so. Mitch is even more treason-y because his Wife — Elayne Chao — is as corrupt as he is (and probably just as compromised, she by the Chinese spy agencies).
Mitch NEEDS foreign interference in our election to either 1) get him the results he needs (permanent minority rule) or 2) destroy our ability to verify any future election’s results as free, fair or even valid. This should not be a revelation: Mitch McConnell is one of the biggest (if not THE biggest) villains EVER in American history.
That’s not hyperbole.
Remember — Mitch even went out of his way to keep Russia’s intense partisan involvement in OUR ELECTION a secret from We The People (the ‘Gang Of 8’ meeting at the WH — September 2016 — the IC informs 4 GOP Congressional leaders & 4 Democratic Congressional leaders that Russia is actively trying to swing the election to Donald Trump – and Mitch McConnell says that he won’t tolerate informing the American People – that he’ll insist Obama is ‘politicizing the intelligence’). Mitch insisted WE stay in the dark while his party conspired with a hostile foreign government to pull off a soft coup d’etat.
That’s some pretty awful Karma Mitch has created for himself. Hmmmm… bet it means — when that Karma boomerangs — as Karma always does — that it will fly back at Mitch with a real vengeance.
Now, if I were ‘In Control’ of Karma — and I could create a ‘Karma Tree’ that would guide all of Mitch’s future incarnations — based on what he REALLY deserves — Mitch’s Karma would go something like this…
Mitch dies (hold off on breaking out the champagne — for now). And he comes back as THIS — ‘Mitch McConnell: Toilet Brush‘ —
But here’s the ‘rub’ — ‘MITCH THE TOILET BRUSH‘ lives HERE —
Yeah — even worse than ‘The Worst Toilet In Scotland’…
A lot worse, it turns out — because THIS is the REFUGEE CAMP where Mitch’s Toilet lives — and CHOLERA just broke out all across the camp…
Yeah — CHOLERA.
And there’s already a LINE to use Mitch’s Toilet (and every last person in line has EXPLOSIVE DIARRHEA) —
And that line goes on…
And on…
And on…
And STILL, it gets worse for Mitch — Cos THIS is the creature at the very endof that line…
And it doesn’t make ‘dainty’ piles like THIS —
Nope — it produces an endless stream of foul-smelling poison as toxic as Mitch’s ‘soul’.
And just as Mitch sees how massive and unending that STREAM OF LIQUID SHIT IS—
He wakes up — and realizes it was all in his head — A DAYDREAM!
And that makes Mitch happy (even happier than Koch Money does when it lines his pockets — and that’s a lot of happy).
Everything, Mitch realizes, is back to normal. And he turns to go about what he was doing (before that awful daydream) and he reaches out TO SHAKE THE HAND of THIS MAN —
And the KARMA TREE starts all over again…
Forever and ever and ever…
Hey, Karma — call me — I bet we can work something out to everyone’s mutual satisfaction (and improved Karma)…
Shits N Giggles Karma Bonus Points — Mitch needs to answer why his military records are sealed — and why the word SODOMY makes him uneasy… Hey, Karma: Three, two, one — GO!
I have two kids. When they were little, they both delighted in connect-the-dots books. They thrilled to the concept that — as they drew (their pencil being guided by the numbers) — a picture would emerge. And all THEY had to do: connect the dots.
That same concept works in and for storytelling. Half the fun of listening to a story is anticipating where we think it’s going to go. Based on the dots already connected for us (by the storyteller), we can anticipate how the dots ahead of us might connect. We’re also hoping for a plot twist that will completely screw with what we anticipated. Then the dots will connect a different way.
But — the point is — they’ll still connect.
If the dots don’t connect — there’s no story. So — in stories, as in life, the dots must (and do) connect. Just like in the connect-the-dot books.
What can possibly explain our Main Stream Media’s inability to do that simple, basic thing?
We sit in the middle of the biggest connect-the-dots puzzle ever imagined. It’s massive, stretching in all sorts of directions. It’s a picture — we can see it already (those of us who can imagine a picture from more than a few hundred feet up) of Massive Corruption — here, in the United States, in Europe, in the Middle east and in Asia. Even Australia’s contributed — contributing a racist murderer to New Zealand. Only Antarctica seems free of political corruption; maybe the scientists who’ve worked there know differently.
What we’ve already eyewitnessed ourselves is staggering in its audacity and criminality. Those of us who see crime for what it is, have always seen crime. Those who easily normalize crime (“He’s a different kind of president”) see normalcy. The only reason they see normalcy is because they cannot connect dots.
There is nothing normal about these here times. Anyone who accepts this as normal has either surrendered (and needs to stop or just get the hell out of everyone else’s way) or is part of the criminal class — and they need to cut it the hell out — and get the hell out of everyone else’s way. There has been a steady stream of clear-cut EVIDENCE that Donald Trump has an “unnatural” relationship with not only Vladimir Putin but a whole host of authoritarian monsters.
There are no coincidences — those are dots connecting.
Of course, it’s hard to see the picture the dots are forming when you obsess on the relationship between two dots. Problem is — while THOSE TWO dots may not connect directly, they’re still part of the same picture. If you don’t see THAT fact — you’re going to miss what the picture looks like. Hell, you’ll probably think they’re TWO DIFFERENT PICTURES. And that, of course, is completely wrong.
Welcome to America’s Main Stream News Media.
Back when Fusion GPS first got hired by the REPUBLICAN Washington Free Beacon (Jeb Bush supporters) to compile oppo research on Donald Trump, they started by doing their “due diligence”. When he testified before Congress on August 22, 2017, Fusion’s founding partner Glenn Simpson (formerly of the Wall Street Journal — not exactly a liberal rag) explained Fusion’s process. They got ahold of every piece of PUBLICLY AVAILABLE material they could on Donald J Trump.
They got books. They got magazine articles. They listened to Trump on radio shows and watched him on TV shows. They bought stuff from Amazon and borrowed it from the public library. Simpson testified that Fusion got its hands on every existing bit of info (available to anyone) that even hinted at Trump. And what they found there, said Simpson, convinced them that Donald Trump had a long, clear criminal history — and that history had a long, clear relationship with Russian mobsters.
Simpson and Fusion GPS knew — Russian mobsters equals the Russian government. You don’t get to be a Russian oligarch (a mobster) without having one particular friend in Moscow: Vlad Putin. Putin’s a spy by nature and training. He thinks like a spy and acts like one. He’s always looking for an in — a way to control you and make you his. If Donald Trump had secrets about Russian mobsters for whom he’d been laundering money — he had secrets about himself and Vladimir Putin.
Understand — the Donald dot does not connect directly to the Vladimir Putin dot. But they do most definitely connect.
They are very definitely part of the same picture.
Oh — before I forget — IF anyone in the Main Stream Media happens to read this — that picture at the top of the post?
I’ve asked this before but haven’t gotten an answer yet… I know what Progressives want to PROGRESS toward: as much equality as possible for as many people as soon as possible. Progressives want to progress in any we they can toward a level playing field where every American has the best possible chance to contribute as much as they possibly can to America while benefiting as much as they can.
Progressives want America to be as diverse as possible because they know that DIVERSITY is what makes America Exceptional.
Progressives want America to PROGRESS — just like it says in our name. We want America to PROGRESS into THE FUTURE.
Okay, conservatives, we showed you ours, now show us yours: What do Conservatives want to CONSERVE? And how will conserving THAT get us anywhere NEAR our FUTURE? To judge by republican policies and Trumpian attitudes, conservatives want to conserve the worst of America: Its racism, its misogyny. Its bigotry and willful ignorance.
Republicans want to conserve White Christian Male Culture.
Now, that’s easy for me to say — a progressive shithead but, for shits n giggles, I recommend finding a conservative friend — if you still have any — and ask them, point blank: “Dude — what is it exactly you’re trying to conserve anyway?” After they try to avoid answering, listen carefully. They won’t say anything logical or even intelligible. That’s the point.
Their simple answer is “How it WAS.” Meaning, ‘How it was when WHITE PEOPLE ruled the world’.
The real joke of it is, White People really do believe the World is ‘far better’ when their Wonder Bread tastes and judgments rule everything and diversity is held at bay. White People think they have a choice regarding the Future — and who ‘peoples’ it.
Shouldn’t someone tell them what happens to people in the MINORITY when the MAJORITY decides to treat them unfairly?
Let’s define our terms first: The reason we’re in this damned mess is that the republican party (uncapitalized because undeserving), seeing a great demographic Black Hole and Extinction in its future, deliberately and knowingly conspired with RUSSIA to seize power from the American Electorate in a soft Coup D’Etat.
Election 2016 was Illegitimate probably from Top to Bottom.
When I say ‘republican party’, of course, what I mean is ‘WHITE, CHRISTIAN MALE CULTURE’ — a ‘culture’ built almost entirely ON BULLSHIT.
White, Christian Male Culture (WCMC) believes that White People are superior to all other people on the planet, that White People are smarter, better looking, better suited to succeed, better athletes, better everything. They believe White Music is better (ever hear a racist rail against jazz?). White Literature (hilarious cos White People don’t read). White Religion.
Especially White Religion. White Religion sits at the core of White Male Culture — the belief not that ‘god’ is White but that each and every White Person is ‘GOD’ themselves and therefore omnipotent. What they say goes.
Problem is, it doesn’t. Because when White People enter an environment that isn’t just ‘Other White People’, they bump into something that disconcerts the hell out of them: DIVERSITY. They find they have to COMPETE with people who haven’t had to compete practically EVER. At least not with people who weren’t White.
America is diverse and has always been diverse. DIVERSITY is what makes America ‘EXCEPTIONAL’. Diversity IS ‘American Exceptionalism’. All other countries evolved over long periods of time with scattered tribes slowly coalescing into a National Tribe with distinct National ‘characteristics’. The French ‘evolved’ into being French, the Germans into being Germans, the Swiss the Swiss, the English the English and so on. In the 1500’s, if you were to step into any of what became those countries, the national character we now think of as those countries was already well-formed enough to be reflected in the historical record.
And, then, all those DIFFERENT national characters started arriving in a ‘Neutral Environment’ — America (made a whole lot more ‘neutral’ via ‘Guns, Germs & Steel’ (to borrow the title of Jared Diamond’s excellent book). None of those peoples who arrived on these shores were ‘American’. They became American by being here — while their Culture met (perhaps for the first time) and mingled with other Cultures and began to ‘cross-breed’ with them.
The result of all that cross-breeding is us — America — and all the dynamism and actual Greatness that flows from us. We are The World mixed together. We’re the lab for what happens genius from one culture meshes with genius from another culture to produce genius from a third (our) culture.
And it works. God-damn, it WORKS!
That, apparently, gives WCMC a sad. It makes it feel scared. Threatened. Unqualified. It isn’t of course — WCMC is no better or worse than any other culture; it, too, has produced great things. It just has the wrong idea of itself — it thinks it’s better than everyone; good thing that’s fixable. Ask Germany.Cult
Donald Trump is the literal FACE of WCMC. It is White-White-White-WHITE. It is Christian — it does not believe a word of the faith it professes (having never read the actual texts their faith is based on) but claims to be among its most ardent followers. It is Male — oh boy, is it Male; nothing makes it happier than waving its dick in your face or, worse, sticking it in you against your will because IT feels ENTITLED to.
So, yeah — Donald Trump IS White, Christian Male ‘Culture’. If you voted for it? You WILL deserve everything that befalls you.
