Bounty, Indeed

NYT story

After groups of governors on the East and West Coasts announced Monday that they planned to work together in regional groups to decide when and how to reopen business, Mr. Trump invoked the film “Mutiny on the Bounty” in a Twitter post, likening the governors to mutineers who took over a ship from a captain they believed was abusing his crew.

I’m just going to point out that in said movie, the captain was, in fact, a nut job who was abusing his crew.

Opinion

Congress needs to stop trying to shove everything in to one bill, hoping that there will be something in there popular enough to make it pass, and just start passing smaller bills that focus on some of the popular things that the country needs right goddamn now.

Reading that a bill to help small businesses failed because Democrats were trying to push for medical supplies and other funding in the same bill just feels so self-defeatist, to me. Yes, we need all those things, but half of something is ALWAYS better than all of nothing. Fight for everything, but take small wins if they’re what you can get, right now. Small business owners are people, and people are who we need to help.

Still Sad

The President has put a temporary travel ban from Europe to the U.S. in order to stem the spread of COVID 19.

wsj.com

It’s already here. I’m feeling like he really doesn’t understand this.

Have it Your Way

Fine, you’re a witch.
I believe that you’re a witch, and that we should hunt you.
Where’s Witchfinder Major Pulsifer?

Rubber and Glue Defense

The “I’m rubber and you’re glue” tactic doesn’t actually work in reality.

Trump says those who gave info to the whistleblower are like spies, reports say

"I want to know who's the person, who's the person who gave the whistleblower the information? Because that’s close to a spy," Trump said, according to The Los Angeles Times. "You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart? Right? The spies and treason, we used to handle it a little differently than we do now."

Oh, no, sir, oh no. You do not get to use those words.

Our President sounds like Tony Soprano. This is crap.

Bad at Crime

Trump Instructs McGahn to Defy Subpoena and Skip House Testimonyw.nytimes.com

The President telling people not to comply with subpoenas just makes it look like he’s not smart enough to protect himself against direct questioning. The smartest, best people should have a cover story, shouldn’t they?

Humans Should All be Held to the Same Standards.

A Partisan Call to Arms

"My family and my name have been totally and permanently destroyed by vicious and false additional accusations," he told the committee in a fiery opening statement.

You know who else's family has borne vicious and false accusations? The Clintons. Ever hear of "Pizzagate"? No? How about Benghazi, or "her emails!"?

High profile life means taking a lot of bad press. I don't know if it's fair, but don't pretend that it's just for you.

Also, I think that you actually did these things. I might have been willing to look past it if you had just admitted that teenagers can be terrible humans. I still believe that people can change. I may even believe that this guy did. His unwillingness to admit flaws, though, it makes me mistrust him.

Insurance Rates Might Go Up For Expensive Sick People

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/trump-administration-takes-another-major-swipe-at-the-affordable-care-act/2018/07/07/0f1ff4c4-821f-11e8-b851-5319c08f7cee_story.html?utm_term=.808764b72127&wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1

I'm very nervous about this. I'm a very expensive customer, these days.

Let Me Explain the Obvious

When someone says, in a very public forum, heard by thousands of people, to punch dissenters in the face, they'll pay the legal bills, or when someone suggests "shooting something up", or killing journalists, I get  very angry.

This is the reason that I get outraged when people casually speak of violence to the masses as a joke. It's because sometimes, other people, whom the original speaker may never see, meet, or even think of,  hear those words out loud, then go and commit the violent acts that weren't a "serious suggestion", and it's horrible.

It's literally the cause of horror.

Words mean things, and they have power, speaking out in public is not the same as having a private conversation with your friends, and people that diminish this idea are not correct. The thousand times someone publicly suggests violence as a joke and nothing happens does not make up for the fact for any single time that something did.

The Cost of Cruelty

This is the article I've been waiting for:

Trump admin's 'tent cities' cost more than keeping migrant kids with parents.

WASHINGTON — The cost of holding migrant children who have been separated from their parents in newly created "tent cities" is $775 per person per night, according to an official at the Department of Health and Human Services — far higher than the cost of keeping children with their parents in detention centers or holding them in more permanent buildings.

...

At those prices, the additional cost to operate a 400-bed temporary structure for one month at capacity would be more than $5 million. The average stay for separated kids is nearly two months.

I've been saying this for days, now. The official numbers of keeping the family in a holding center as a unit is listed as $298, because those shelters already exist.

My point here is that not only is prosecuting all people that enter the country at unauthorized points costing us our souls, it's also costing us a hell of a lot of money.

I mean, that kind of money could be used to start a "Space Force" or something, right?

Weeping Trees

Sigh.

From

EPA whistleblower alleges spending and travel excesses by Scott Pruitt

"John Walke, who directs the clean air program at the advocacy group Natural Resources Defense Council, said that the executive order prescribes measures “intended to allow more air pollution, or abbreviated air quality reviews that risk more air pollution, or both.”"

Welcome to the new age of darkness. Making money at business is definitively more important than making our air safer to breathe. I suppose I'm glad they're obvious about it. 

I Hope He Was Kidding

...but I worry that he wasn’t, and that reason and tolerance are dying.

Insert Conspiracy Theory Here

I'll Show You Not Relavent

Someone should arrest this guy, if not for refusing a subpoena, for this statement:

Nunberg fired back with a tirade about Sanders to NY1, the New York cable news channel: “If Sarah Huckabee wants to start debasing me, she’s a joke. Okay, fine, yeah, she’s unattractive. She’s a fat slob. Fine. But that’s not relevant. The person she works for has a 30 percent approval rating, okay?”

Seriously, that guy's an ass.

Rich, Yet Woke

In a move I find stunning, Chubb Insurance is eliminating NRA insurance.

People have, in the past, referred to this as “murder insurace”. It’s for people who shoot other people with guns that they bought legally. I understand that if you accidentally shoot someone, that you probably feel bad enough without worrying about going to jail. I also feel strongly that we shouldn’t be doing things in our day-to-day lives where we might accidentally shoot people.

You may wish to defend target practice, or hunting. I’m not even going to argue that. I will argue, though, that no one needs a gun at a barbecue or a football game.

No one needs a gun at a barbecue or a football game.

I am soothed by the idea that it will now be more difficult for rich people to shoot their friends, or strangers, and get away with it. I mean, it won’t be impossible, they’re still rich.

What Big Eyes I Have

Recently, the President tweeted something to the effect of  "If Obama knew that the Russians were interfering in the elections, then why didn't he do anything about it?"

What, you mean like start an investigation, suggest sanctions, and have certain Russian diplomatic personnel ejected from the country? Yeah! Why didn't he do all those things that he did?!

Jesus f#$*ing Christ, already. Just because you say something out loud doesn't make it true, and when those of us who know the truth hear you, we get *really* angry.

If Trump were in the story "The Emperor's New Clothes", we'd get to the part where the kid shouts that he's naked, he'd have the kid silenced, and continue down his parade route telling everyone what high-quality work his tailor does.

Still here

Pretty surprised that I still have a blog.

Harsh Judgment Doesn't Mean Wrong Judgment

From NBC News:

Duggars Say They Feel Like Failures as Parents

Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, whose family is featured on the reality TV show "19 Kids and Counting," said they "felt like failures" when their eldest son, Josh, admitted to molesting young girls more than a decade ago.

Well, there you go. Your job was to try and protect all of your children, and you did not succeed. I'm not saying whose fault this was, I don't know. I wasn't there. I can just tell you that this was 100% not a success.

Hypocrisy is Why I Stopped Writing

Just read a CNN email that the President condemns Russia's move in to the Ukraine as against international law.

President Barack Obama said today that Russia's military moves in Crimea violated international law, adding that "no country has a right to send in troops to another country unprovoked."

Seriously, does no one remember that this is exatly what we did to Iraq? I do. 

The Royal We

What the hell, world? Why would a Pope get to resign, unless he was renouncing his Catholicism? That's a job that ends when you die. If and when you can't do it any more, other people do your work, but you stay Pope. You stay Pope until you're dead.

Same thing with Queen of England. Sure, sure, you can abdicate the throne, but that's renouncing your rights as a Royal. And seriously, does she actually rule anything? I thought that Parliament ran the country. Whatever. If she's too sick to leave the hospital - even if it's for the rest of her time, she stays Queen. She stays Queen until she has passed on, and then Charles will be King.

Why do people think that archaic, ancient positions should be subject to modern sensibilities? That's just crazy talk.

Oh, man...

I have, over the course of this weekend, realized that I am depressed.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not claiming Depression with a capital D, known to be a very serious disease that absolutely needs treatment. No, I mean that a lot of sad things have been going on, and they seem to have gotten me down.

Clue 1) My housemate confronted me about how bitchy and back-stabby I'm being about his peccadilloes. Yes, he's doing the things I complain about, but none of them are a big deal, and I've been moaning about them a LOT.

Clue 2) I stocked up on healthy food and interesting ingredients. I have cooked and/or baked nothing. Instead I've been going to drive-throughs. Instead of pomegranate lamb with herbed couscous, or tarragon chicken with creamed spinach,  I'm eating Wendy's chili and KFC mashed potatoes. Even on the weekends, when I wake up with all sorts of plans for things that I can make and freeze, so that I can re-heat them when I am rushed or tired during the week - even then I do not cook or bake. I stay in my room until noon, doing nothing, and then I sit on my couch until 10 at night, doing nothing.

Clue 3) Doing nothing. I skip parties, and dinners, and workshops. I sit on the couch, sometimes watching Lifetime movies. I go to work, and I go to the gym, and then I go home.

So that's my story. I'm sad, and I've realized it. I'm telling the world, because that's my first step out of the hole. Time to start climbing.