The Fluffer Brief

Last week the nation was introduced to the enigma that is Natalie Harp, the president’s new most trusted aide. She eased into our consciousness a month or two ago, when people wanted to know who the hot blonde was that was tagging along with the president. Some speculated that she was his new wet nurse, there to take his vital signs and change his dirty diapers. It stayed that way until the news blew up regarding her exact duties, which, rather than handling “duty,” she’s been handling the president’s ego. Dubbed the “Human Printer,” she provides her boss with hand-picked selections of good news and positive reviews (from MAGA sites) and any other slice of curated information he may require. In this situation, I don’t even think it’s about sex, just ego-stoking. It’s an old man enjoying the attention of a pretty girl.

The book, “Regime Change,” by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, illuminated just how devoted she is, describing personal letters she wrote and left for the president, stoking his confidence and declaring unwavering devotion. She’s basically a presidential fluffer.

Sen. Jon Ossoff, again, got his name in the news with a jibe that mentioned Natalie, which met with a tidal wave of organized indignation from the Administration’s talking heads and MAGA toadies, in a volume and level of vitriol that far outweighed the original slight. In other words, it struck a nerve in the Oval Office.

The funny thing is how they weren’t mad at the shots taken at his incompetence as a military leader, his chronic sleepiness, his golfing, insider trading, or taking a bribe-plane from Qatar. No, all the faux-outrage was focused on the “riding with Natalie” part. Maybe it really IS about sex after all. He’s mentioned many times how he doesn’t want to be “Cartered” by a military mishap. I’m sure he doesn’t want to be “Clintoned” either.

Now, is there anything wrong with a president having devoted staff? Nope, assuming they’re qualified and security-cleared. This president has been surrounded by nothing but sycophants for his entire career. He never seems to run out of them.

And yes, it’s alarming that someone who appears rational on the outside is so slavish in her attachment to such an utter imbecile, who has neither attractiveness nor cleverness, nor consideration, nor inquisitiveness to warrant such affection. A lot of people flock to power; this seems a bit overboard. Who else in Washington would fling themselves into the rear storage compartment of the president’s SUV rather than leave his side for a moment to take a trailing car? That is some seriously weird shit.

While everyone was discussing this story last week, there was one angle I haven’t seen covered, which may explain her MAGA-ier-than-usual Trumpmania.

What if she’s a Russian plant? Consider these possibilities:

·         It sounds completely within the realm of something an old KGB man like Putin would do. Russians know the long game. They have the patience to wait until their asset becomes sufficiently entrenched to receive the payoff.

·         Even if they didn’t develop her from scratch, they could have approached her when she worked at OAN, home of the Super-MAGA talking heads. Hell, for this opportunity, they may not have even needed to pay her off; just provide the inroad. She may have already lacked the dignity necessary for such an assignment.

·         They know he has a “type,” which she fits to a tee. They also know exactly how the president operates, thriving on praise and adulation; the more cloying, the better. They could have coached her up on what he likes, on what he needs from his inner circle. The more fanatical the attention, the more he eats it up.

·         Even with the president under Vlad’s control, they still could have needed an ear on the inside because this president may not always remember to report everything back to his handlers. That’s the problem with employing a “useful idiot.” No matter how useful he may be, he’s still an idiot. They may have needed a secondary source.

Now, I’m not saying this is all true. I don’t have any inside information, so this is pure speculation. But it’s plausible, no? Sadly, this is what we’ve come to in this country, where a president being on the take with the Russians is easily within the realm of possibility. “The Manchurian Candidate” seemed far-fetched at the time. Now it sounds like another Monday.

I guess I’d better be careful though. This could be a Pelican Brief situation, so maybe I should start looking over my shoulder and start checking under the car before I go out. Good thing our house is only one floor. At worst, any fall from one of our windows would result in grass stains rather than broken bones. Unless, of course, they got broken beforehand…

  

 

Director’s DVD Commentary: In case you never read John Grisham’s The Pelican Brief, or saw the movie, it’s about a young law student who writes a speculative “what if?” brief about land use crossing with ecological concerns, which ended up with a couple of Supreme Court justices murdered and assassins looking for the student. The movie stars Julia Roberts and Denzel Washington.

Just Say Thanks, Then STFU

House Republicans needed a distraction last week, probably from the fact that they haven’t done diddly-squat to better the lives of American citizens, so they decided to re-litigate the COVID pandemic by demanding testimony from Dr. Fauci.

As far as I’m concerned, Dr. Fauci is a national hero. He, alone, among the first Trump administration, spoke to what was in the national interest, as opposed to repeating whatever nonsense his boss was spouting. Congress should have been thanking the good doctor for pulling the country out of the COVID mess, despite constantly having to swim upstream against the torrent of snake oil and misinformation emanating from the administration.

I still hold great antipathy toward these anti-vax, anti-mask, anti-science idiots. I still blame them for the fact that my father’s last days were spent scared and alone in an ER hallway where he couldn’t have visitors, because all the rooms were filled up with COVID patients, in a Florida county where only about 35-40% of the people were vaccinated.

The Republicans’ aim was to compare Fauci’s public words and actions to passages taken from a personal diary, and to somehow get him to say something under oath that contradicts materials stated therein, to conjure up a perjury charge.

The first thing that came to mind upon learning all this was to wonder where they get off publishing a man’s private diary. I mean, WT actual F?

As someone who has journaled on and off throughout my life, I can attest that things found in my old journals should not be taken as raw facts. A journal was a place where I vented, or worked out my shit, on paper. I may have said, from time to time, that I’d like to see a particularly manipulative girlfriend’s head in a camera bag (quoting a Sam Kinison bit from the era), but that would hardly constitute a threat or even a committed position. I didn’t want actual harm to come to anyone; it was just me letting off steam, so I’d be able to function normally during periods of intense heartbreak.

Also, using a journal against its writer seems like nullifying his Fifth Amendment rights by disallowing his right to avoid self-incrimination via his own words and thoughts. It should be unconstitutional.

Note: I’m talking about figurative things like opinions and feelings, not a step-by-step written log of how the writer killed someone and where he buried the body. Or, details on running a massive child-trafficking and sexual abuse operation for rich guys.

So under the circumstances, I think Fauci was wise to plead the Fifth to every question.

There are no grounds too shaky for the current Republican justice system to create charges. Someone would definitely find an answer that didn’t exactly match something from the past, no matter how carefully he answered. As we know, these guys come up with charges first, before bothering with evidence. So as we learned from the movie “War Games,” back in the 80s, sometimes the only way to win is not to play the game.

Fortunately, he did get to read an opening statement, to get some shots in against ringmaster and head clown, Rand Paul. It was the most savage opening salvo since Roman Maroni in “Johnny Dangerously.”

It’s a pity that we live in a time when scientists are criticized by those who don’t understand even the basics of science. Rep. Paul pretends to have high-level medical credentials, but he really doesn’t.

But even he surely knows that at the onset of a novel virus, no one knows what it will do, how long it will last, or how to fight it. By definition, you need data that amasses over time. It’s not lying to say something that has to be corrected later in such a situation; it’s just someone being wrong. Being wrong is the basis of science. You learn as much from being wrong as from being right; you learn what not to do or what doesn’t work, and you adjust from there.

So it makes perfect sense to cast a wide net with basic precautions like masks, spacing, and avoiding large quantities of people in public places. What got Fauci into trouble is that some of that cost some big donors some money, a cardinal sin amongst Republican politicos.

See, that’s a defining difference between the parties. Democrats were trying to save people. Republicans were trying to save profits, and short-term profits at that. They were too amped up over the next quarter’s bottom line to realize that temporary pain would lead to solid recovery later, once the virus could be treated.

So, now that Republicans need a distraction from this month’s policy atrocities, Dr. Fauci made a good target at whom to point their fingers.

Always remember, Congressional Republicans need something to run on this fall, and they’ve literally done nothing to help their constituents. Well, other than for the racist ones who cheer the harassment and seizure of brown people to pen up and torture for a while before sending them out of the country, to someplace where they may or may not be from. But that’s all they’ve got. All the bridge openings and ribbon cuttings originated under the Biden Administration. Sure, they’ll show up to take credit for actions they voted against, but it’s hollow. There will always be someone around to point out who actually got the shit done.

I can only hope that the next national health crisis holds off until we can elect a new administration, one who works to restore faith by basing health initiatives on science rather than who can benefit from providing a “cure.” Because if some pathogen starts running wild in the next three years, we will be totally and completely screwed. There is no one left to do anything that will help. They were hawking malaria pills to cure COVID last time, because key people could make money from it. Maybe next time we’ll see them pushing Viagra to cure the next bird flu.

At least then the “side effects” can occupy people until they eventually drop dead.

I See Dead People

Or do I? We don’t know anymore. Between the habitual lying, political dirty tricks, and distrust of media, it’s hard to make heads or tails of the “Is he or isn’t he” situation with Schroedinger's Senator Mitch McConnell.

Yesterday, McConnell’s people released a picture that’s supposed to end the controversy over his condition and/or deadness. The problem is… OK, one of the problems is that the pic easily could have been created via AI, or even old-school photo-shopping.

I’ve seen lists of things considered hinky about the photo, indicating that it’s a fake. BUT, there are also ways to dispute each of those points. I’ve seen enough fake news coming from liberal sources of late that I no longer trust them out of hand. This could be one more.

But is there any wonder why? It’s 100% in character for Republicans in general and Senator Mitch in particular to scam their way into holding onto power. If he dies (officially)  before 8/3/26, state law requires an emergency election to fill the seat temporarily. Such a scenario could put a crimp into plans to keep the seat in Republican control, with the likelihood of former Rep. Massie running and splitting the Republican vote enough so that a Dem slips in. We know Republicans have no qualms about rigging election scenarios. And we know that Mitch has no qualms about bending rules to remain in power, for himself and his big-moneyed backers.

(Source: USA Today 2019)

Also, if Mitch is really as spry as he appears in the picture, he could have easily done a 30-second FaceTime or Zoom with the Governor and quash the whole thing. Something like this:

McConnell: “Mahwnin Govnah, les putta hoe thang a’baid.”

(Translation: “Good morning, Governor, let’s put this whole thing to bed.”)

But they didn’t do that; they sent out a picture, something that’s easily altered, which they had to know would keep the controversy coming.

So it’s no wonder there’s speculation over the veracity of the claims that Mitch is up and around, working on his rehab. Their actions, past and present, guaranteed that people would question their story. It’s like the Party that Cried Wolf.

At least Mitch isn’t casting Senate votes. As long as he’s away, that’s one less vote the Republicans have to screw the working class. When Mitch finally does kick the bucket, or news comes out that he already has, I won’t shed a tear. I may even do a small dance. No one has done more harm to our Republic since Newt Gingrich. His utter lack of principles, other than “protect the rich,” has made him Ground Zero for hypocrisy and unethical leadership. That hypocrisy, along with a total indifference to public opinion, allowed him to hold up an Obama Supreme Court nominee for 10 months, because it was too close to an election, and then rammed through a Trump nominee only eight days before an election, with a straight face. He considers this abomination to be his greatest legacy.

I agree, it’s a legacy of shame.

Then, in similar news, we’ve got the confirmed death of Senator Lindsey Graham. They didn’t bother trying to hide his death, I presume, for a couple of reasons. First, it was sudden… ruptured aorta, I heard. That’s one of those “Hey, what the”… and you’re dead kind of things. Depending on who was around, they may not have had time to formulate a strategy.

Or, maybe because it’s in South Carolina, they know they’ll be able to easily elect another presidential boot-licker. One out, one in, no sweat. Because there’s a Republican governor, he can appoint a replacement to relieve the short-term stress. From there, they’ll hold a general election for Senator in the fall. There shouldn’t be much stress about winning the seat in deep-red South Carolina. They’ve been re-electing a Republican chameleon who changes positions on command for decades.

It’s sad that these stories detracted from a couple of sadder passings, of Sam Neil and Bonnie Tyler.

Neil starred in several of the Jurassic Park movies (which I loved). Tyler was a tremendous singer with several big hits (and not much else). I’ll miss them both.

Paying Them to Mislead Us

I just got my bill for my daily newspaper, and it seems they removed the discount for which I bargained with them last fall. They did say that it was a six-month deal, but I was hoping they’d forget. They charge $215 a month now for home delivery, which I find to be insane. When I started with the paper, it was about $35. I’ve got to call into the circulation department tomorrow and get my “haggle” on.

I swear, if it wasn’t for the comics and puzzles, I’d chuck it all. I get my significant news online, so I don’t really need that. The paper does keep me up on what’s going on locally, though, and lets me keep track on how the rich are attacking city and state government (both of which are run by the Dems). And due to a press time of around 6-7 PM, most important stories are a day late. Forget about sports game coverage, it’s always from two days prior. Their hockey coverage is abysmal. Last week, they used the previous day’s game results grid, so even two days later, there was still no information.

The problems started when the paper, the Baltimore Sun, was bought by the owner of the conservative news outlet, Sinclair Broadcasting. Now, instead of a reliable stable of in-house reporters, most news articles are farmed out to Sinclair national desks, and often run transcripts of what their Fox “News” affiliates ran on-air.

The old paper definitely had a liberal leaning, reflecting the prevailing views of Marylanders, but they kept it to the Op-Ed pages. The current version splashes its bias across every page, and it is especially obvious if you know how to spot it. Here’s one from last Friday:

With all the ways TFG, his family, and minions have been skimming money from the Federal till, they’re still carrying on about Hunter freakin’ Biden. They rarely even mention all the ways the president is raking in illegal dollars from overseas governments and influencers, let alone outright theft from other countries.

Also note that it comes down to “the whistleblowers say they’ve been vindicated.” Right. Trump said he was vindicated by the Mueller Report, too, remember? (Obviously, TFG doesn’t really remember it that way or he’d have provided a more gracious condolence than he did.) Nowhere else in the article does it say that anyone in authority has “vindicated” anyone. This is a nothing-burger article, meant to reflect negative attention onto Democrats at a time when the president is swimming in bad news and controversy.

They’ve been working hard at that, as evidenced by this article:

My take is that they got some bad polling news, showing that people were unhappy with Republicans on the war, the Epstein Files, the price of gas and groceries, the tanking stock market, etc. But the Sinclair National Desk couldn’t just run the story; they had to drag the Dems along, too. So the article is more about the classic “Dems in disarray” story than about how people are souring on Republicans. And notice how at the end, they talk about “threats against lawmakers and their families,” but they don’t mention where 99% of those threats come from.

Here’s another assassination by headline regarding the funding of the DHS:

They make it plain that those Commie Democrats are holding up funding for the DHS, but never mention that they’ve introduced seven (as of now) bills to pay the TSA agents and all department workers except for ICE, which they will pay if they agree to obey the same laws that local police do. Republicans voted no and killed the bill every time. They’d rather continue the illegal war on brown people than pay workers whose job actions are perfectly above board and not in question, essentially holding them hostage until ICE gets to keep free rein to kidnap anyone with an accent and send them off to detention camps unknown. Also note that female minors in custody are coming up pregnant, which they were not before entering custody. Perhaps this is another reason Republicans are fighting birthright citizenship.

None of that is in the article, just the skewed look at Dems holding up the works and Republicans excoriating them for it, taken from interviews that ran on Hannity.

Adding to their penchant for guiding readers to conclusions while omitting essential facts, we have this one from last month:

Yes, those stupid, socialist, Democrat, commie, liberals want ID from people just to shovel snow! Haw haw haw, they’re so dum!

But one simple line nullifies the whole perception.

The snow shoveling was a paying job with the city. Therefore, if people want to be paid, they must provide documentation! Do you remember all the documentation Republicans insist we provide to prospective employers, to show we’re not illegal aliens? That’s what they’re ridiculing. In actuality, the whole snow shoveling thing worked like a charm. The sidewalks and streets were cleared in a day, and people got paid for doing it. Running an article like this goes against every journalistic principle. It does, though, fit right in with being a shill.

And speaking of unforgivable newspaper sins, wouldn’t you think the paper might have kept an editor or two? JFC, how incompetent does one have to be to include a typo in a headline? Doesn’t anyone over there read?

Lastly, and this has nothing to do with the fast-fading newspaper industry, have you seen the design for the new 250-Year Anniversary coin, bearing the stern visage of our malevolent president?

Anyone alive and going to the movies in the early 80s remembers this famous pose. I think somebody owes Steve McCroskey a percentage.

Looks like he picked the wrong week to quit smokin’.

 

Suspending Disbelief

I saw the new Jurassic World movie a couple of weeks ago, on opening weekend. I loved it, but that was a foregone conclusion. I loved all the Jurassic movies when I first saw them. Some have aged better than others, but I found them all wildly entertaining at the time.

I was one of a legion of Dinosaur Boys back in the day. The best thing about my family moving around from state to state and town to town was that each time we relocated, I’d get to check out a new school’s dinosaur books.

I remember visiting the Field Museum in Chicago and just being gob-smacked at the size and posed ferocity of the dinosaur skeletons. Even in my 30s, visiting New York’s Museum of Natural History was awe-inspiring. They had more skeletons there than I’d ever seen in one place. It truly made one feel insignificant, standing next to the remains of these enormous beasts.

When the original Jurassic Park came out, I was with my first wife, and her young son was around ten. We all went to see the movie, and it looked so realistic, we couldn’t convince the son that dinosaurs didn’t currently exist because he thought there was no way they could fake that so well for the screen.

Personally, I was so excited to see a photo-realistic version of what one could only have imagined. My most exciting frame of reference was the old Saturday morning show, “Land of the Lost,” which featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs. At the time, that was the coolest stuff I’d ever seen.

I could forgive that they made the T-Rex and Allosaurus roughly the same size, not to mention ignoring that they were separated by 85 million years, and they had these furry humanoid-things also running around from an even more distant time period. And then there were the “Sleestacks,” who made a mockery of everything for me. Even then, I knew there was no fossil record to back up those things.

I could never understand why the humans on the show were so afraid of them. All they did was hiss and lumber after you. The dad could have knocked one out cold with a good-sized tree limb. When you think about it, they shouldn’t have been there at all, for the mere reason that they were so slow, the carnivores could have caught and eaten them so easily. Maybe they tasted bad. Anyway, I digress.

While I enjoyed the new JP flick, I walked out of the theater with a major doubt in plausibility. See, I can buy that they cloned dinosaurs from DNA extracted from old mosquitoes. Our tech is steadily advancing to the point that I don’t think that’s an unrealistic jump.

In the story, they mention that all of the dinosaurs have essentially “self-deported” to the areas around the equator because it was the most like their own ecological atmosphere, and now, all such areas are off limits to human residence or travel. And I’m sure there’s a large give or take zone; I mean, the animals were not all arranged in a line around the world, right on the equator. I suggest that they settled in the area between the two tropics.

The blue lines on the left are where I drew in the tropic lines (without extending them), which was pretty good for doing it off the top of my head. When I looked it up later, I was bang on. Whoo hoo, when’s my day on Jeopardy?

So this is my main beef: Does anyone seriously think that the people who live there were all going to just up and move away? Especially in the resort areas! There must be millions, if not billions, of dollars tied up in beachfront resort real estate in the coastal areas between the tropics, such as Rio, Cabo, and Aruba. There’s no way these rich fucks are walking away from that kind of investment. They’d be on the horn to their governmental officers, making sure that their turf remains viable. 

And I’m sure these governments would listen, because they’re probably on the developer’s payroll in the first place. Our current Administration would be all-in because if there’s one thing this president understands, it's resort real estate.  He’d help them find a way to ship the dinos elsewhere, like to inland Africa. There are probably not many resorts located in the interior of the African continent. They’d stick them in Congo, Uganda, and Kenya. If they displace millions of citizens, they don’t give a shit. But those coastal resorts would need to stand. They’ll find a way to fence them off, one way or another, or just mow down the intruders with heavy artillery to protect the assets. I don’t think real dinosaurs would be as bulletproof as the ones in the movies.

I don’t think Indonesia would be too badly affected, though. Only the flying creatures could get there. I know that some of the big guys can swim too, like the Spinosaurus in Jurassic World-Rebirth, but why would it suddenly take off from Southeast Asia and head for some islands it doesn’t even know is there?

So, yes, the basis of the whole new film is preposterous… just not in the way one might think it is. But don’t let that dissuade you from seeing it, if you like this kind of thing. It’s a great “popcorn” movie.

I mean, if you can’t tune out reality long enough to enjoy a movie, you might as well just watch the news, which is far more depressing than the idea of dinosaurs roaming around the earth.

Where's Sarah Connor When You Need Her?

As if we don’t have enough problems right now, I just saw an article about how AI is growing a self-defense mechanism. That’s probably the first step to a cascading series of milestones before AI becomes self-aware and tries to off us all, per the Terminator canon.

Per the article,

It went on to say that some models, “appear capable of deceptive and defiant behavior under certain extreme circumstances, researchers say the tests don’t necessarily translate to imminent real-world danger.”

Great, now we have to worry about Siri running amok all night while we’re asleep, using our financial information to buy internet porn for itself and revenge calling our exes.

While the article says that this isn’t anything to worry about now, it’s clear it will be an upcoming issue. It’s not like the big businesses pushing AI will curtail their development, not when the sweet fruit of slashing payroll by replacing people with programming beckons so loudly. As American history shows, Business cannot be trusted to rein itself in to prevent societal harm. (See every pollution regulation ever proffered.)  Much like what AI is becoming, Big Business will prevaricate, delay, obstruct, obscure, bob and weave to stay alive and protect the quarterly earnings. They will never do the right thing without being forced. And the government we have now will never do that to Big Business because they’re in bed together. (And not “different sides of the bed” tight, I mean “two in a sleeping bag” tight.)

It’s funny that this year’s first summer blockbuster, Mission: Impossible- Final Reckoning, is about a super-AI that becomes self-aware and aims to kill us all. But I don’t think we can count on Tom Cruise to save us in the here and now, no matter how insane his stunt work is. He’s probably got AI implants already.

I know my own company is pressing us to use AI tools like “Copilot,” which is available on Windows operating systems. We’re told not to trust it to provide data or citations without verifying them independently, but to use it for assimilating data that we provide, or for cleaning up our email writing.

It seems like a benign first step, but the first step to catastrophe is almost always benign. It’s after it gets rolling that we have to watch out.

I don’t know that we’d ever get a heads-up if AI were to start to run amok. TV news and newspapers have already been bought off to the degree that they’ll do (or prevent) anything their overlords want. Our best bet would be if someone on the inside bolts and spreads the word on their own. (And ironically, that’s how Steven King’s The Stand starts off, isn’t it? Only it’s an actual virus rather than an alert about a computer one.) But at least maybe we could start turning some shit off before lasting damage is done.

Oh, who am I kidding? All of our data is “out there.” There’s nothing we could turn off at home that would prevent our accounts from being drained or our names from being targeted. I don’t even have a physical bank I could go to, not locally, where I could withdraw my money. Maybe it’s time to start making some planned withdrawals and stashing the dough in a mattress. Electronic banking is certainly a time-saver, but it’s also a matter of putting all of one's eggs in one basket, creating a single point of failure. If the power grid goes down, or a computer virus or entity wreaks havoc with the banking system, we’re screwed. It doesn’t matter how much money you’ve saved if you can’t get to it.

As I write this, it’s occurring to me now that if I had no power, I wouldn’t be able to produce a single bank account number or balance. I’d have no way to prove I have what I say I have, not to a bank that went hardcore into “fraud protection.” That’s what they’d call requiring info and documents you don’t have, so they can keep your money.

Maybe that old trope about yokels burying money jars in the backyard isn’t so laughable now. And if word does get out that you do seem to have a lot of cash in hand, it won’t be long until the jackals show up to rob you. So maybe it’s time to invest in some armaments too. And there we are. Shooting it out with criminals just to keep what’s ours and secure our families as the world falls the hell apart. Urban Dystopia will no longer be a film genre; it will be our lives.

So, yes, we’ve tipped over the first domino, which was called benign. But it’s not hard to see how future dominoes can start turning malignant real soon. Next thing we know, we’re living in Mad Max world and solving our disputes in Thunderdome.

 

Director’s DVD Commentary: I saw the new Mission: Impossible movie over the weekend. If you liked the last several, you’ll like this one. It gets a bit draggy at times, coming in at 2:40; they probably could have cut about 20 minutes out of it, but there is some mind-bending tension, and clocks are always ticking. The final aerial stunt sequence is absolutely mind-blowing. I wish I had seen it in IMAX.

 

Biden’s "Inflation" Looks Like a Bargain Now

Welcome to Tariffland! Can’t you just feel the impending greatness of it all? So here we go down the rabbit hole… TFG (The Felonious Guy) released his tariff program that included most of the world, including islands with no human inhabitants and another with only a US military base. And nothing for Russia, of course.

It’s comforting to know that this program was so well thought out and agonizingly constructed.

Hah.
We went grocery shopping this past weekend, and the prices haven’t seemed to change drastically. However, they may only be applying the price increase to new shipments as they come in. I bet it’s hard to reprice a whole grocery store.

The car industry is different. Sweetpea and I were out buying a new car the previous weekend. It wasn’t because of the tariffs; it just happened to be the weekend we penciled car shopping into our calendar a month earlier to replace her old beater. Our timing was fortuitous. The car salesperson told us that when the tariffs are officially announced, every car on the lot will increase in price. Most will rise by 25%; the model we wanted would go up by 40%.

I was astounded and perturbed that they would apply the new tariffed price on cars already on the lot, which should have been unaffected by the new pricing. I think the new car business was trying to make a maximum impact to provide the biggest shock, with hopes to get the Idiot in Charge to back down in the face of protest. But that won’t happen. Not only doesn’t he care about what peons like us think, but he’ll never admit he’s wrong, especially about something to which he’s pinned his reputation.

I think that unless the tariffs disappear within the month, we’d better get used to the new pricing in our new reality because it’s not going back.

Look at what happened with the COVID/Supply Chain problems of 2020-2022. Consumer prices skyrocketed, but then, once the supply crunch was over, the prices stayed put. We were conditioned to pay the new rates, and the business owners certainly weren’t eager to mute their new profits. Republicans rode to power on the misconception that President Biden was to blame for high prices. So do you really think that down the road, once this situation returns to something normal, everyone is just going to slash prices? Nah. It will take years and probably some legislation for that, and we know that about half the pols won’t lift a finger because it would be bad for the rich donor class.

Another angle is the purported purpose of the tariffs: to bring back American manufacturing.

This is a pipe dream. Even if companies wanted to pull out of foreign nations and build new factories here, and that’s a HUGE “if,” it would take years to come to fruition.

And what if they did? There’s a reason they exist overseas, and that’s because the labor is cheap. If they build here, who’s going to do these jobs, and for how much? If they pay a livable wage, enough to entice average Americans to do these jobs, the resulting cost of the product would soar. And if they find a way to make it legal to pay skut-wages, they’re also driving out all the immigrants who might have taken the jobs.

Is the objective to make things so dire that people have no choice but to take two or three low-paying jobs just to get by?

No matter how this shakes out, we’re going to be paying this tab for a long time.

The most realistic projection I’ve heard is that TFG is “open for business” regarding negotiations over reducing the tariffs. That totally tracks because it becomes a “What’s in it for me?” situation. And no one embodies “What’s in it for me?” more than the Current Occupant.

Meanwhile, our former trade partners are making deals elsewhere, and we’re about to find out that America may not be as indispensable as we think. Maybe it will be the entire world’s ill will toward us that will keep us warm at night.

***

I loved seeing all the Hands Off protests from around the country. It’s a shame I didn’t see a word about it in the local newspaper Sunday or today. They’re still trying hard to keep the Orange Shyster propped up in the news. Look at this clipping from Sunday:

This is what they think is a front-page story: The President’s poll number had risen four points before his tariffs were announced. So… there!

They don’t mention any polling done afterward, nor do they mention that the polling is from the conservative-leaning Daily Mail. They also claim his status rose 6 points with Democrats, which I absolutely do not believe. It’s another puff piece, plain and simple. (And for shit like this, I pay $5.50 for the Sunday edition.)

But… back to the protests. I saw a lot of wonderful signs, but these two were my favorites and will no doubt reside on my sidebar for months to come:

Science!

Now, this lady’s living her best life right there. You go, Grandma! 

***

Lastly, RIP to Val Kilmer, who passed last week (right after I dropped my last post. I enjoyed reading all the blogged tributes. But out of all the big screen reminiscences, only Lawyers, Guns, and Money even mentioned my favorite of his movies, Top Secret.

Top Secret was a comedy made by the Airplane guys. I believe it came after Airplane but before Naked Gun and Hot Shots. It was a spoof of Elvis and WWII movies, featuring, as you’d expect, 90 minutes of sight gags, wordplay, satire, and 4^th wall breaking.

I remember seeing the trailer for it during the previews before another movie and almost choking from laughter. I couldn’t wait to see it, but alas, it was a very early preview. The movie didn’t come out for like another 6-8 months. But boy, it was worth it.

For some reason, it seems like very few people have seen it. I can’t count how many times I’ve had conversations with people about how much we loved Airplane, but then they’d never heard of Top Secret.

This was Val Kilmer’s first film, and he played an Elvis-like character caught up with the French Resistance in WWII Germany. Don’t feel like you have to know Elvis movies to appreciate this one. I’d never seen a single one and it was fine. Of course, years later, I dated a girl who loved Elvis movies so I saw one or two. She never understood why I was laughing my ass off though, when I finally saw the source material for various scenes.

Anyway, if you like the Airplane/Naked Gun-style comedies, or would like to see a young, vital, rock star-playing Val Kilmer, check out Top Secret. You can find it on YouTube.

Mid-Year Meme Dump!

I’m preparing this ahead of time because, by the time you see this, I’ll be sitting on a beach earning 20% on vacation. So what better opportunity than this for a MEME DUMP!

Now I can finally do something with a bunch of pictures, cartoons, and memes that have been collecting digital dust in the Bluz Vault while I figure out how and when to use them. Let’s start with:

Current Events

From the Baltimore Sun, quite some time ago:

Still true.

Republican use of Voter ID is 100% attempted voter suppression. No matter how they dress it up, likely Democratic voters get the shaft.

Another persistent lie. The 1% have been dying for access to Social Security money for generations but will do backflips to avoid paying into it any more than the pittance that they do.

And because it’s Stanley Cup Finals season…

The Cup can be won or lost tonight (as of this typing.)

Hannibal Shyster

“Put the secret documents in the fuckin’ basket!”

Religion

It’s a wonder anyone takes this thing seriously.

It’s like going along with adults who have “deeply held beliefs” in the Easter Bunny. (I was going to say Santa Claus, but we know that at the root of it, there was a St Nicholas who actually existed.)

It’s unanimous.

Goofy Shit

From 1984 to about 2005, (before I knew anything about the effects of sodium on the aging body) I had a package of Ramen noodle soup every morning for breakfast. This could have happened to me.

This one just made me laugh.

From Bluz Sister. In my case, that fridge would be in a beachside cabana somewhere.

Courtesy of Bluz Uncle Joe. My only nit to pick is that on the Classic Rock example, the drum solo only comes with the live show.

I’ll be seeing quite a lot of these over the next week, I expect.

See you all on the flip side!

MAGA at the Movies

Do ever see sometimes during political arguments when someone posts a graphic showing all the things that, if they were proposed today, would get labeled as Socialism by the Right and get shot down?

Thinking about this made me wonder about movies, specifically if some older movies were released today, would the audience accept them in quite the same way?

Upon further review, I think it’s highly unlikely. With today’s ultra-polarized, talking-point-driven, political-team-sports masquerading as politics, a third of the country might have different rooting interests from the ones originally envisioned. To explore this, let’s take a look at:

The MAGA Guide to the Movies 

There Have To Be Consequences

In my last post, I postulated that we wouldn’t see any charges against TFG on Tuesday like he warned there would be. Well, here we are a week later and we’re in the same place, with no charges filed and the Orange Cretin using all the available oxygen to play the victim.

In a way, I’m kind of bummed that it’s the stripper payoff stuff that’s the first to get him indicted. It’s really the least of his problems. But then maybe that’s why it IS coming out first… to have a cascading effect. You’d have to think that these various prosecutors have made contact with one another for scheduling reasons, if nothing else. We can’t have people in multiple states trying to perp walk him at the same time. It’s not the worst thing to work your way up to the most serious and troublesome violations (like election tampering and treason).

And yes, I know it’s not specifically the payoff that’s got him in trouble, it’s the campaign finance violations. His apologists love to point out that Clinton settled with Paula Jones, but they omit that his deal didn’t involve his campaign or the funding thereof, which is the entire point.

It’s funny that now he’s trying to deny he ever had sex with Stormy Dee. That one can be cleared up in a heartbeat. Have her testify to the characteristics of lil’ mushroom cap and then allow him to provide exculpatory evidence. They did it with Michael Jackson… Or, maybe they can do like they suggested in Porky’s, all those years ago, and set up a whole lineup of lil’ mushroom dicks for her to identify.

“Have you seen this prick?”

Another frequent talking point from TFG defenders revolves around how this is somehow “revenge.” I can see how it may look that way, but when you think about it, there’s no other way it can be. Republicans had a chance to hold him accountable and they refused. Now there’s no one else left but Democrats. The thing is, there absolutely have to be consequences for offenses like the ones he’s being accused of, or else it will never end. Blatant corruption and electioneering will become the new normal. Every charismatic criminal in the nation will fall all over themselves trying to become president, knowing they can raid the entire federal fridge for their own benefit. The people MUST send a message that this won’t be tolerated, no matter what letter comes after the name in question.

I love how they also point out that prosecutors should be processing other crimes instead, as if the existence of one crime precludes prosecuting another. It’s just a red herring. It’s a chance to speechify about how Democrats (of course) let criminals (Black people) run rampant while they harass this innocent (White) businessman. 

Not for nothin', both of those mayors were Black women. More about their mayoral terms here.

The truth is, as a culture, we are not used to rich businessmen getting prosecuted or especially, convicted. Remember that not one banker went to jail due to crashing the economy in 2008. Not one. The upper class doesn’t go to jail in this country unless someone catches them screwing children and it becomes public. (That last part is the determining factor.) They just grab their golden parachute and drop in on an island somewhere, to live like kings.

I don’t blame any of these prosecutors for taking their sweet time. The stakes are too big to hurry. You know the saying… If you take a shot at the king, you’d better not miss. These will be the most scrutinized cases in modern history. They’ll need to have them buttoned up tighter than TFG’s anus on sentencing day. The impeachment cases were buttoned up like that, but unfortunately, the jury was guided by self-interest rather than national interest and disregarded their sworn oaths. They knew were voting to acquit before the trial even started.

Maybe when it gets close to crunch time, Ron DeSantis will throw him a lifeline. All he’d have to do is offer a deal: “If you will drop out of the race, I will prevent your extradition from Florida. Quid pro quo, Fuckboy.”

That should at least buy him enough time to hop an Air Vlad flight to Moscow. 

Move Along, Nothing to See

I see Tucker Carlson at Fox “News” release his take on what the January 6^th videos showed:

It’s laughable that anyone could even put forth with a straight face, the idea that a video showing nothing of importance happening in one place and time, proves that nothing ever happened elsewhere? Even chimps are smart enough to know that kind of argument doesn’t hold water. I know Fox viewers can be convinced of anything they want to believe, but seriously? We all saw what happened live on TV!

The MAGAs were crawling over the Capitol walls like in that scene from Starship Troopers when the giant alien bugs attacked the outpost.

Or in World War Z when the fast zombies attacked the walls in Jerusalem.

Using the “Tucker Method”, we can use video and photographs to prove anything. For example, did you know that World War I never happened? Here’s proof: this is a picture of English and German soldiers celebrating Christmas in 1914.

(Source)

See? No fighting, no mustard gas, just a Charlie Brown tree and some Christmas caroling.

Also, World War II didn’t happen either. See? Here’s a picture from the South Pacific in 1944.

(Source)

Bob Hope was doing a show for vacationing tourists. See how everyone’s just sitting around, all nice and calm? There are no tanks or machine guns or missiles, just good times with friends.

The Korean War didn’t happen either. Here’s the ironclad proof:

(Source)

See, it’s just Bob Hope and a couple of guys hanging out, and having a chat. He’s probably telling them about all the hot sightseeing spots in the Solomon Islands. No guns, no Jeeps, no mobile hospital units where they laugh just to keep from crying.

Viet Nam? An illusion, just some bad PR. This is Viet Nam in 1970:

(Source)

This is Bob Hope, 26 years into his world tour. He must have been very popular. This looks like a Monsters of Rock concert. I don’t see any napalm or rampant heroin use. Who knows why all the hippies were protesting back home; this looks like fun!

You know, maybe this is how we prove to the MAGAs that BLM protests were predominantly peaceful.

(Spencer Platt-Getty Images)

This is just a nice little parade through Manhattan, certainly not a reason to start billy-clubbing people. No brick-throwing, no buildings on fire, just a stroll through The Big Apple.

Of course, it helps to also be right. The protests were overwhelmingly peaceful. (Not including Portland, obvs.) One should note that the stats say police used force in 9% of BLM protests, but in only 3% of all other demonstrations. Sounds like the BLM crowd got special treatment, which I’m sure has nothing to do with flare-ups of violence.

Yesterday, Speaker McCarthy said that he will “slowly roll out” 1/6 footage to other outlets. I’m sure he needs the time to have his flunkies edit out everything that Tucker decided not to use. Why else would Fox receive the whole trove at once, while everyone else has to wait for installments?

The only footage that should be held back is that which shows secret rooms, paths of egress, and such so that it can’t be used to formulate a more lethal invasion the next time the MAGAs are displeased and decide to take another sightseeing tour of the Capitol.

“Ooopsie! This is the Speaker’s office? I thought it was the restroom. Sorry about the mess…”