Your Money or Your Life

The big news around these parts last week was the coup our governor, Larry Hogan (R-MD), pulled off by obtaining 500,000 COVID-19 tests directly from South Korea.

The beautiful part of it is that they kept the deal on the down-low, so the Trump Administration didn’t know anything about it until the goods were in-hand.

From the Baltimore Sun, “Hogan administration officials said they decided to keep the developing operation quiet after Massachusetts reported 3 million masks it ordered were impounded in March at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.”

Naturally, Trump was pissed about getting shown up. He claimed Hogan didn’t know what he was doing, wasted money on an outside resource, and was unaware of federal lab facilities within the state.

Sounds damning, but remember, it’s Trump. His understanding of anything is hazy at best. The biggest issue is that Hogan knew all about the federal labs, and these were the issues:

·        The labs only come into play after you’ve administered the tests! No tests on hand, no use for the labs.

·        Hogan DID inquire about using the labs’ testing facilities and was told it was for federal use only.

I think Trump was just miffed because he lost a chance to commandeer more supplies to lay on his business cronies.

The key was that Hogan’s wife, Yumi, is a 1^st generation immigrant from South Korea, so she acted as interpreter between her husband and the South Korean government. In fact, months earlier, at a reception with America’s governors at the South Korean embassy, Hogan quoted President Moon as saying this about his wife: “He said that Korea was so proud of my wife, and that they considered me a… a ‘son-in-law’ to the Korean people. I considered it an honor for him to say that, but I had no idea just how much it would truly come to mean these two very long months later.”

I’ve briefly sideswiped this before, but I have to say, Governor Hogan is doing a damned good job on pandemic response. He’s a Republican, but more of an old-school Republican. He was a businessman who thought he could do better for the business community in Maryland than the others, so he ran for office.

He’s not a hard-core social conservative, nor a bible-thumper, nor Trump fanboy, and I credit him for that. He doesn’t seem to play the self-destructive games of political “chicken” like so many others do, perhaps because he’s an outlier… a Republican governor of a deep blue state. The last Republican Gov who played that shit got run out after one term.

But while I may disagree with a number of Hogan’s positions, (canceling a new light rail line set up by his predecessor, diverting money and resources from blue Baltimore to the red outer counties), I have to call them like I see them. This guy is doing a stellar job of fighting this pandemic. He closed up the state very quickly (especially for a Republican, but even faster than some Democrats), and has been holding “no-BS” press conferences full of vital information and zero misdirection or puffery.

He’s converting emissions testing sites into COVID testing sites, has commandeered our convention center and a city-run Hilton to turn into extra hospital beds. He gives real stats, like Governor Cuomo (D-NY) and lets the chips fall where they may. He’s been honest about what it will take to reopen state businesses and his guidelines are in step with health officials and experts.

It’s sad anymore that one is surprised when an elected official turns out to be competent.

So, nice job, Gov. No when your term is up, please retire. I’d hate to see the Dems have to run against you in 2024.

Debunkery

The Russian troll farms are working overtime to circulate their bullshit defenses of the Current Occupant.

Not hard at all.

To a Democrat, Obama was a huge success by any measure. I consider him the greatest president of my lifetime. Under his watch we addressed same-sex marriage, got Plan-B contraception to OTC status, set up an agency to keep banks from screwing us or gambling with house money, killed bin Laden, reduced our military footprint in the Middle East, addressed gender-based pay inequity, saved the auto industry and revived the stock market. What the fuck else would we want from the guy?

The economic numbers alone should have made Republicans giddy, but they were too butt-stung to consider giving the man credit. They sure crowed about the (pre-pandemic) numbers when Trump’s administration continued the momentum at a similar pace. The difference was that Obama turned steep downward slide into an upward climb. Trump merely let the momentum carry on unimpeded. (And then blew up the deficit with a massive tax cut for the richest among us.)

Hillary was innocent. I mean, the Republicans launched investigation after investigation looking into her various activities and found exactly jack shit. Not a single chargeable offense, despite desperately trying to find something… anything, to use against her. And after all that, all they have is inference and innuendo.

And for the shit people think she did, it pales to what we know Trump did. But Republicans only care about the law when it applies to someone else.

And as for Biden, we’ll have to find out if he’s a competent president. He was a more than competent Vice President and was an important player in the Obama White House. He probably did more than anyone to move Obama into supporting same-sex marriage. Once he came out publically in favor, the president had to come along.

He’s also a guy who knows how the government (in general) and an Administration (in particular) is supposed to work. Remember when they had to sit Sarah Palin down and teach her about the three branches of government? Hell, they still need to do that with Trump.

So I had all these reasons in mind to debunk this meme when my dad posted something that did it just as well in a fraction of the time.

Mic drop on that topic. And now some short takes:

I’m pretty sure neither Ozzy nor Joe will tell you to inject yourself with disinfectant.

No, we don’t. We consider Greta to be just like us, the people who listen to climate experts because they’ve spent years and careers studying the science and we haven’t.

You wouldn’t argue with a surgeon because Karen on Facebook said you can eliminate an unsightly scar by removing your spleen through your asshole.  You trust the experts. That’s all Greta has been telling us and there is a significant segment of the population who need to hear that.

Who says those big stores CAN open without killing us? But even if we accept that premise, it is plausible to maintain social distancing in a big box store. How are you going to do that in some small-town hardware store or donut shop? And are these small stores going to be able to afford/acquire masks and hand sanitizer?

I think this is just another attempt to minimize the pandemic threat and get the economy going again, despite the risk to our lives. And speaking about the Republican’s alleged concern for human lives:

This is a look at current events through a religious wingnut’s perspective.

First off, I’m going to ignore the thing about “fat acceptance.” Is there even a political “side” that reveres fat acceptance? The writer seems to think it’s the Democrats. But if you look at the red state health data, they tend to be among the country’s highest in obesity.

The issue I have here is the continuing mischaracterization of abortions. “…murders 860,000 infants annually.” Numbers aside, which don’t factor into my point, calling them “infants” is a complete misnomer and the use of emotionally loaded language is meant to sway the reader outside of the truth.

I do not call a grape-sized glob of jelly an “infant.” No rational person does. But those grapes account for over 95% of all abortions. But it doesn’t sound quite as inflammatory as saying the other side is killing infants.

So, in essence, she’s saying that governments (inferred to be blue) are keeping people at home, not to save their lives (which it does) but to control people for some nebulous, nefarious reason. And it has to be nefarious because the same (blue) states don’t condone forcing women to bear children against their will and allow them to terminate a pregnancy consisting of a fingertip-sized ball of genetic material.

This encapsulates what I’ve believed about religious conservatives for years. The GOP platform is to support and enable big business at all costs. They don’t care about things like abortion, not at the top, not where the money is. They USE social issues like abortion to reel in social conservatives who they can rile up with lots of talk about killing infants so that these people vote in the Republicans, who can then go about the very mundane business of enriching themselves.

For all the hue and cry about the “Sanctity of Life,” it’s an afterthought, an illusion, or a mirage. You know how to tell? Look at what’s happening right now. When the Money issue comes into conflict with the Life issue, Republican leadership sides with the money.

Throwing open the doors of businesses in the midst of a pandemic will cost lives. Everyone, even the conservatives, acknowledges that. But do they shrink from putting people, innocent people, in danger? Is their moral compass keeping them up at nights wrestling with the dilemma? Nope. These ghouls talk about how a few lives are expendable in the face of reactivating the economy. Georgia is opening small businesses and beaches. Florida is on its heels. South Dakota never issued a stay at home order and refrains from closing meatpacking facilities that are riddled with the coronavirus. Texas wants old people to volunteer to die for the economy. The red states are itching to get back to business, citizens’ lives be damned.

That’s money vs life, and the 21^st Century GOP is picking the money. Every time.

Final note: Remember how I wondered in my last post about how Trump even let electronic deposits go out because he couldn’t get his name on them? Now I know. We got this in the mail today

He just has to get his name out there, at taxpayer cost, of course. This is just one more piece of evidence that shows how Republicans look at money. It’s perfectly fine to use federal money to advertise and promote the president’s “brand” and next campaign, but when someone else is in charge, there’s no money for anything, not feeding the poor, not roads and bridges, not advocacy bureaus, no money for anything that helps the average non-rich citizen.

The Coronavirus Roundup

Did you get your $1200 check yet? Man, wouldn’t it figure that Trump would hold up the whole production line just to get his name on those checks? And he can’t even have them put in the “From” line; he’s been reduced to a memo. Can’t wait until that time when he’s merely an afterthought.

I’m surprised he let the direct deposits go out at all because there’s no way for him to attach his brand to them. That’s all this is, you know. Branding… the art of smearing your name all over everything, which is what he’s supposed to be a master at. It must work though. Just look at our world. My kingdom for a public surface that doesn’t have a brand scrawled across it.

I’m surprised there hasn’t been a company to pay people to put their logos in their rooftops, for the benefit of airplane passengers and Google Satellite hits. And speaking of, I loved it when I heard there was some dude near the Milwaukee airport who wrote in huge letters on his barn roof, “WELCOME TO CLEVELAND!” just to screw with people. I wish I’d thought of that back when my family lived in an old farmhouse with a barn, near an airport. (And I guarantee if I’d have pitched the idea to my Dad, he’s have been down with it. Dad loves to screw with people, which is no doubt where I got it.)

Pass the KY

I knew it, and I swear I wrote it down somewhere, (that I can’t find) that if Mitch McConnell were to find himself in a tight re-election race, the fix would come in. As we have it, he is running neck and neck with a Democratic challenger and what do we have here? Kentucky just passed a Voter ID law, with an override of the governor’s veto. Now Kentuckians need a government-issued ID to vote.

So that leaves seven months to get one right? WRONG! Kentucky DMV offices are closed due to the pandemic. And I bet most stay closed until the second week of November. Any that open before that will be in affluent areas. If you just moved to Lexington, you’re S.O.L. This is Republican malfeasance at its worst and most cynical. As the Vox article I linked above stated, “the primary form of voter fraud addressed by these laws, impersonation fraud at the polls, is only slightly more common than unicorns.”

Any election law should err on the side of guaranteeing people their chance to vote.

It’s funny how the people who protest and bitch about any perceived assault on their “liberty” take a pass on this issue, where one political party passes laws intended to hinder their opposition from executing their constitutionally-given right to vote. I’m pretty sure if it was the other way around, these “Liberty” people would be back in the streets.

Taking Liberties

Isn’t it funny how conservative news outlets and political mouthpieces are always getting people ginned up about assaults on amorphous things like “liberty” and “freedom?” There’s a reason for that… it’s cheap. It costs them nothing to get people wound up about perceived affronts so that they can be used for political purposes and pursuit of power.

You’ve seen those assholes on TV protesting state offices for daring to “infringe upon their liberty” as a result of the Stay-at-Home orders placed to keep them from dying and taking others with them. I only hope they find a way to use all that extra “liberty” they gained to help them breathe after they pick up The ‘Rona.

I say the state should demand a Government ID to stage these protests. If you’re going to block hospitals and keep medical staff from doing their jobs, then let people know who you are! Then when they inevitably show up at the hospital, they can be shown right to their own private sleeping bag… in an alley behind the hospital dumpster, where they belong.

Just goes to show what I’ve been saying for years. Republicans lack empathy. They seem incapable of viewing the world in any way other than “Me first.” You want to be a rugged individualist? Go fight the alley rats for scraps. Making decisions based on what’s best for the community is a foreign concept, especially if it comes at a personal inconvenience.

It’s 4^th and Long

I’m kind of surprise the Republicans are fighting this hard to stay in power. It would probably be better for them if they just punted on this election cycle and let Biden and the Dems get tasked with putting the country back together.

Then they can sit on the sidelines like they did during the Obama years, obstruct every effort and then carp about how everything isn’t fixed yet and OMG look at the deficit!

We’re going to hear about that A LOT, once the Democrats are in charge. They didn’t give so much as a whimper when this administration ran the debt up out of sight, and that was BEFORE the coronavirus spending.

So when the Democrats want to rebuild the governmental infrastructure at places like the EPA and CFPB, the GOP will cry “poor” and try to kibosh the whole thing, “for the future of our children,” or some shit. Same with spending money on actual physical infrastructure. They had two unfettered years where they could have come up with any number of bills to address crumbling roads, bridges, tunnels, railways, dams, and whatnot. But they didn’t produce a single bill to address infrastructure. Couldn’t afford it after that big tax cut for the 1%. Also, they don’t care. They know the helipads are in good shape.

Phil the Burn

Did you see Dr. Phil step in it last week? Look at this:

I know others have dissected this, but I did too and have had to sit on it for a week. I’ll not be penalized for only posting on Mondays!

What we have here is a simple apples to oranges fallacy, the kind Fox “News” likes to use so much. The thing here is that none of these other comparisons involve a contagion (for which there is no vaccine). Auto accident mortality is addressed and mitigated in a number of ways, like with seat belts, speed limits, vehicle safety features, etc. Cigarettes are already a taboo and there are many laws regulating where they can be smoked, with an eye toward removing the danger to the non-smoking citizens.

The thing with pool deaths; I heard his numbers are way off, but that’s beside the point. Someone drowning or cracking his head off the diving board isn’t going to hurt anyone else.

This coronavirus is a new threat and we just don’t have the tools to fight it yet, other than the prevention of transmission, or social distancing. So we can either keep everything open, run willy-nilly all about the country, and then lose millions of American lives.

Dr. Phil should know better, but it seems he’s turned into another shill for the corporate overlords, who want their next quarter earnings statement turned around, now.

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life

On the other hand, it’s not been ALL doom and gloom.

Sweetpea was talking to someone in the neighborhood while out walking our dog. She mentioned how she hadn’t seen a pack of toilet paper in any store since the middle of March. She said we weren’t out yet but it was becoming a growing concern. Our neighbor said she’d be on the lookout.

Cut to later that week, when we got a knock on the door. It was our neighbor, bearing a big 12-pack of TP. Wouldn’t take a dime for it. Not bad for a “rat-infested mess” of a neighborhood.

In other news, we tackled some true “quality of life” issues over the weekend. First, we brought order to our plastic-ware cabinet. I swear, it’s taken me 10 minutes, sometimes, just to find a container and the correct lid. So after taking out every piece, matching up lids to containers and tossing the leftover pieces, our Tupper-jungle looks like this:

Then after feeling the heady rush of accomplishment, we tackled the dreaded Plastic Bag Cabinet. We had our work cut out for us, believe me.

I didn’t know I married a Bag Lady!

I always considered myself to be pretty stubborn, but my babeh is right up there with me. She went through all of these bags, one by one, and sorted them out. Ones with holes were “Recycle” vs. those without holes were “Save for Re-use.” Our re-use is like 2% small trash can liners and 98% doggy doot bags. You don’t want holes in bags you’re going to use for poop clean up, hence all the sorting.

And when you have a 90-lb eating machine for a dog, you can’t have too many doot bags. Although I can see that once all the localities ban plastic bags, people with dogs will be hoarding them like toilet paper.

Happy 4/20 Day!

The Only Way They Win is by Rigging the Game

Be on the lookout for a coordinated effort by the GOP to enhance their voter suppression efforts. It’s already starting, judging by how many memes like this I’ve been seeing on Facebook. They’re getting the message out to their minions early.

I beg to differ but there are plenty of reasons to be against demanding voter ID.

·        There has never been a statistically significant finding of voter fraud that could have been averted by voter ID. And this is with a Republican-run Justice Dept. out there specifically looking for it, mainly from Democrats. They found nothing (other than random Republican malfeasance, but charging Republicans wasn’t in their charter).

And not for nothing, stealing votes by impersonating voters one by one, in person, is the most inefficient and ineffective way to do it. It just doesn’t happen.

·        The existing voter ID laws are specifically constructed to reduce Democratic voter turnout. The Supreme Court case that ruled against North Carolina showed there was significant, compelling evidence that State Republicans were writing their requirements “with surgical precision” so to prevent as many African-Americans (seen as likely Democratic voters) as possible. They had direct physical evidence that demonstrated how they did it. It was not remotely ambiguous.

Other states use the same or similar criteria to write their voter ID laws; they just haven’t had the bad luck to have their written deliberations aired in public. (In the NC case, the daughter of the guy who designed the bill found and released her father’s emails, which showed how they researched minority voting patterns and what kinds of ID they most often carried.)

And note: The Supreme Court only scrapped the NC law due to a 4-4 tie, which by default, upheld the lower court’s decision. That will not happen again with the current SCOTUS. With the Wisconsin decision, the Roberts Court announced that they are now on board with voter suppression by any means necessary.

·        Republican-run states who demand voter ID are simultaneously closing MVA stations in areas that serve likely Democratic voters. They demand the ID and then make it much harder and more expensive to obtain one. That’s not an accident, that’s a design feature.

They’re also closing voting stations in the same areas, thus intentionally creating lines of prohibitive nature. They WANT it to take up hours to vote, hoping that many will skip out. (And then, in the truly devious part, they purge voter rolls of people who haven’t voted recently.)

What this shows is a pattern of pursuing voter disenfranchisement. It’s laughable to claim that it’s only to deter voter fraud and that all the known “side effects” that prevent US citizens from voting are just a big coincidence. I’d have more respect for them if they just came out and admitted it. LIKE TRUMP DID TWO WEEKS AGO!

Just kidding, I still don’t have any respect for him. But he did say this out loud: “They had levels of voting that if you ever agreed to it you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.” He’s talking about mail-in ballots, with which all their hard-earned voter suppression would be circumvented. That’s not a matter of fraud, it’s a matter of not having a platform that the majority of Americans will support.

Trump said the quiet part out loud: if everyone votes, we never win again. And for once, he’s right. That’s the reason for the voter ID laws and closing voting and MVA locations, fighting early voting and on-site registration, clearing voter rolls of hundreds of thousands of names with minimal verification or confirmation, and appointing judges who will bless it all in court.

It’s all about winning the next election. Preventing “voter fraud,” something that has never swung an election in modern history, is nothing but an elaborate and wholly ineffective fig leaf.

The real threats to voting integrity come from hacking and electronic voting machines that lack a paper trail. Voter IDs do not address any of this.

You don’t see Republicans out there trying to sell people on what they actually plan to do. It’s easier to keep people from voting than to convince them that cutting Social Security and privatizing the post office is a good idea. Or that 1% of the people should get 98% of the tax breaks. Or eliminating the effectiveness of the EPA, FEMA, the CDC, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. That’s stuff they have or are still trying to do.

This is how the political arena is supposed to work. There are two (or more) sides and one giant population. Both sides should try to convince the masses why their ideas are better. Those who are the most convincing, as evidenced by the votes of the people, get to govern. Period. But we’ve strayed far from that ideal.

The right (not privilege) to vote is essential to being an American. Republicans, who fight so hard to make the Second Amendment absolute in ways it was never meant to be, abdicate their righteousness when they fail to defend the principle of one person, one vote.

Unless it’s one of their persons, of course. In that case, the more the better.

Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition

This is such a churning cauldron of dysfunction, isn’t it, this Coronavirus situation? People are going every which way, which is ironic, given the lockdown we’re under… well, at least some of us. And because it’s America in the 21^st century, this medical crisis is a political situation because everything turns political, especially once there is money to be scammed, I mean, earned.

I keep seeing a lot of memes like this coming from Republicans: 

Whenever you see Republicans plead for unity come out, it’s a sure thing they just screwed the pooch.

“Nothing to see here, no need to ask about why South Korea handled this so much better than we did. Don’t worry about where all the masks went, I’m sure Amazon will have them back in stock soon. Let’s just concentrate on moving forward! Hey, let’s all go to church!”

Our state of political tribalism is literally going to kill us.

If you want to see a microcosm of the Republican Party, just consider that their priorities are keeping the churches and gun shops open. As far as I’m concerned, keeping both of these open is just going to kill more people.

With the churches, the problem is obviously the crowds (and science denial). A packed church is an incubator of virus transmission. I’m guessing the pastors stop insisting everyone come to church just as soon as they get i-Tithing service online on their webpage. And not a moment before.

I don’t get the guns thing though. I mean, I understand some might be thinking ahead for when their town really goes in the shitter and they want some defense against looters or burglars. But I’m also thinking about how many guns are already out there. Those with the guns certainly don’t need more. I’m pretty sure one can defend his house with a shotgun as well as a .22. They’ll be trying to repel some poor wretch looking for toilet paper, not a horde of zombies.

My problem is with those who don’t already have guns. If they rush out and buy one now, how are they going to get trained to use it properly? The last thing I want is a bunch of freshly minted, untrained Rambos running around looking for trouble and jumping at shadows. If I was a food or package delivery person, I’d be scared shitless that some nimrod who didn’t know his daughter ordered take-out heard a bump in the night and opened fire.

Georgia’s governor Kemp really showed who he was last week, didn’t he? He announced at a press conference that he didn’t know until the previous day, that asymptomatic people could spread the coronavirus. Seriously.

This is slam dunk evidence of one of two things. Either this guy and his entire cabinet are illiterate, ignorant, imbeciles, and haven’t watched major TV coverage of the black plague of the 20s or Kemp just went up there and told a lie of Trumpian proportions. A lie on par with claiming you dumped a couple hundred black thousand people off the voter rolls because you were worried about voter fraud.

I tend to think it’s the latter. Down deep in their reptile brains, that there is that sense of what is needed for survival. It’s human nature to seek information about what’s harmful to you. And it’s not like this information was a closely guarded secret. He knew. They all knew. But they just don’t care.

Governor Kemp wouldn’t care if the whole city of Atlanta dried up and blew away. That would just add to his margin of re-election. And now he’s opening the beaches? Might as well just start calling him Governor Vaughn.

This guy won’t announce a lockdown until a coronavirus swims up and bites him on the ass. Someone better check the Governor’s finances and see how much beachfront property he owns.

Once hell’s broke loose in Georgia and the Devil deals the cards, I’m sure he’ll reconsider. But like with Trump, he’ll never do the right thing until he’s forced into it. And by then, there will be hundreds or thousands of preventable deaths on his hands. But that’s the way it works when you have leaders with no moral compass.

 And now, the rest of the country is at risk because of this grifter and the rest of the Republicans who won’t lock down their states. As if germs hop off when carriers cross the border.

I also see sentiments like this emanating from my conservative friends on Facebook:

I’m not even sure what the real point is. I just know there’s some misleading going on. Because it seems like they think a sickness with a 2% mortality rate is no big deal. (I heard it was 1%, but I won’t quibble.) You have to keep in mind that 2% of our population is no trivial number. There are around 331 million people in this country. Two percent of that is 6.62 million people. Those are holocaust numbers. Just think how much money and heartache we spent over losing under 3000. And one percent would be 3.31 million deaths. So there’s nothing “only” about a 98% survival rate.

That said, there’s definitely something bigger happening, but I don’t think it’s what the purveyors of this meme are talking about. While they may complain about some arts funding or paving the way for mail-in voting (for which the only valid objection is for voter suppression), the religious right is leaping at the chance to put the squeeze on abortions by deeming them unnecessary medical procedures.

Obviously, this procedure is “unnecessary” unless you’re the one with an unplanned pregnancy. But that’s their mindset… in a global pandemic of clusterfuckian proportions, it’s better to have a woman carry a baby, visit hospitals under duress for her prenatal care, and bring a baby into a contaminated environment. The woman has no say in this because Republican politicians know what’s best. And this while they work on ending Obamacare and WIC, SNAP, and any other services that would be helpful for a new and financially struggling mother.

The other “bigger thing happening” is that the government just made $500 billion available for whoever they want to give it to, with no strings and no transparency. Just trust them, right? This is the opening of the trough, my friend. Just no holds barred giveaways to the richest among us.

Look at how hard the Republicans fought against the transparency clause. The last thing they wanted is for anyone to know where the money’s going. They learned their lessons with the 2017 tax cut. Too many people knew who was buying back stock and who was paying executive bonuses. Not this time. Now they have deniability, courtesy of the Mitch McConnell and the Trump Administration.

On the home front, I’m entering my 4^th week of quarantine/working from home. The only people I see, outside of Sweetpea, is the girl at the Burger King takeout window.  But it’s all right. I’m happy not to be spending 90 minutes every day commuting. I get an extra hour’s sleep every night.

I do keep running into this same predicament over and over. I use the bathroom, take the opportunity to wash my hands, obviously going a full 20 seconds. Then I dry off, go to leave the bathroom and…

“Dammit.”

It’s decision time. When was the last time we cleaned the doorknob? Do I want to waste a precious commodity by using a few sheets of TP as a buffer? Use a towel? Modern times is hard!

Now, I make it a point to open the door before I wash up. I’ll have to go write that into my emergency pandemic plan.

When They Show You Who They Are, Believe Them

Last week the Republican Senate put their American Values right out there for all to see, when passing the most recent coronavirus relief bill. This says it best:

Eventually, the Democrats were able to get some language added that would provide some accountability and guidance to the $500b corporate slush fund, so whoever received these funds had to be made public and there were restrictions in place to prevent companies from using it for bonuses, stock buy-backs and the like.

Then when the Current Occupant signed it, he issued a signing statement saying he was not going to enforce any of the slush fund restrictions.

You tell me, why is it so important for anonymous companies to receive billions of dollars without restriction or transparency? To be clear, this $500 billion is about half of the entire relief package. And it all goes to companies who can do whatever they want with it and we will never be the wiser.

And those are the same companies who took the giant corporate tax cut savings and used it to pad their bonuses and stock prices, without doing jack for its employees. In other words, they ate their two weeks’ worth of quarantine food on Monday and now they’re complaining about being hungry on Wednesday. Screw’em. They could have strengthened they’re company’s readiness in advance, like many of the big banks did.

After the 2008 recession, major banks were required to have x-amount of dollars tucked away in reserve, to handle future recessions without needing another bailout. Granted they were forced to do that, but it was the right thing to do. Other companies could have done the same, especially after the trough opened up last year with the tax cuts. But they went the route of executive enrichment and a better short-term P&L statement.

In a truly fiendish vein, some Republican politicians and Fox “News” hacks have been pushing the idea that we should let the old people die so to not sink the economy. It’s a good thing. Seriously.

This is where the Family Values people are? Bump off the grandparents so that the 1%ers still get their dividends? That’s so insane. But it shows us exactly what Republican “Family Values” are: To hell with YOUR family, I don’t want MINE to be inconvenienced. The only thing the ruling class Republicans value is the almighty dollar. Everything else (like social issues, racist immigration policy) is just a way to get enough people to vote for them so that they may continue to pursue unrestrained wealth.

I join with a chorus of others, who say, “If you want to sacrifice the old to spare the profits, YOU GO FIRST!

When cruising Facebook on Saturday, I saw someone post a meme about how Congress should forget about the giant anonymous slush fund for corporations and send the people their $1200. Which is fine, but later that same afternoon, I saw the same person post another meme telling people “Come November, remember that Virginia’s two senators voted against the coronavirus relief package.” Which they did because it had that giant, anonymous slush fund for corporations. Unbelievable.

I still see my conservative friends trying to defend the president’s actions regarding the virus. They can’t believe why the media would ask about the gargantuan fuckups from January onward, (“It’s a hoax, it’s not serious, the flu is worse, it’s China’s fault”), before the big U-Turn into “OK, maybe it’s serious.” Completely unnewsworthy. They’re probably just taking their cues from the White House where media criticism continues to flow forth unabated to anyone who dares suggest their hero might have done something an eensy bit better, to prevent the clusterfuck we are now entertaining.

As you can see, there are two opinions, the correct one and the appalling conservative one.

I feel bad for the poor governors he is now quarreling with because they were not grateful enough for his day-late-and-a-dollar-short pandemic response. Like a petulant child, he’s holding up supplies from Michigan, New York and California, who he thinks “hasn’t been nice to him,” and showering Florida with everything they need. Maybe they need to update the White House Application form I unveiled a couple weeks back.

People love to complain about all the non-pandemic-related items ended up in the relief bill, but it seems these people have never seen a bill become law before. You can go back across the last 50 years and find that there are extra items inserted into bills just about every goddamned time. For better or worse, that’s how the sausage gets made.

“You want this, you have to give me that.”

You want a $500 billion slush fund for your rich friends? We need movement on mail-in voting. Pelosi is no dummy. In order to allow the slush fund, she needed something that was just as painful for the Republicans to give up. Regardless that it is an antidote to the danger of massive crowds gathering on voting day, mail-in voting goes against every voter-suppression strategy they’ve rolled out since SCOTUS defanged the Voter’s Rights Act. Today, Trump said it himself on Fox and Friends, “They had levels of voting that if you ever agreed to it you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.”

Our Republican president: Friend of Democracy*

*As long as it’s only well-to-do white people and racists voting.

And what is the Republican answer to so many Americans who don’t like their policies? Do they try to reach out to see what’s important to them? Do they propose things that make their lives better, that they could use to seek their vote? Of course not. They just try to keep them from voting.

What’s supposed to be the big deal is the $1200 checks. I just wonder what they’re going to do the next month after the money goes out. It’s not like $1200 is going to go very far. I figure that’s one rent or mortgage payment and some groceries, if that. (Which is heavily depending on where one lives). What about the next month?

I can just hear the Republican Senators bemoaning how the lazy people just squandered their first check so they can ask for more. Again, these guys are ghouls. Racist, country club, fucking ghouls.

At least King Dipshit backed off his Easter Return promises. Someone must have tied him down and forced him to listen to reason. (I’m sure it wasn’t Pence.) But isn’t it funny how he always has to be pushed into doing the obvious “right thing.”  And again, always too late to get the maximum benefit. He’s the poster boy for closing the barn door after the horses have run free.

This is just what happens when your first and strongest instinct is to promote, insulate, and enrich yourself at the cost of millions of others. Millions about whom you don’t give a flying fig.

Life During COVID

“This ain’t no party, this ain’t no disco, this ain’t no foolin’ around…” ~David Byrne~

As we begin our second real week of lockdown, there’s a lot going on.

Congress is working on a “bailout” bill but, of course, who gets bailed out and by how much is a matter of great debate. Both sides are pushing the happy talk of the $1200 checks that are supposed to come out to all eligible Americans. But naturally, the Republicans are pushing for a giant slush fund of taxpayer dough to be set aside for big business. The scary part is that they set up Steve Mnuchin to be the sole distributor of the funds, gave no conditions for which the money can be used, and also included language assuring non-disclosure for six months regarding who receives the funds.

So, all the Republican Party favorites would be sure to get their big fat slice of the pie, to use however they see fit, and no one would know until it was ancient history (AND the election is over). Judging by the previous bounty of tax dollars they received, we can assume that their non-executive employees will see zero benefits, but there will be stock buybacks and executive bonuses. You know, GOP BAU.

The Democratic senators found their backbones and voted the bill down, risking being blamed for holding up the checks. (Which started immediately, with Mitch McConnell accusing them of fiddling around while the country burns.) The balls on that guy…

This may be a way to reduce the payout to working class Americans. You watch, the GOP will exchange the slush fund for a reduction in direct payments to Americans. Then they can claim they tried to help and blame Democrats for the reduced sum. Their dogma just doesn’t allow for handing out money for nothing.

Answer: Just as many as those who took their stock dividends after the Obama Recovery.

Getting back to those checks… I hope there’s a way to use the ACH from past returns to allow for direct deposit. Otherwise, there’s going to be a whole cottage industry of dudes following the mailman around (at a distance) so they can steal the checks as soon as they hit the mailbox. It’s gonna happen. All they have to do is avoid houses with cars in the driveway.

In my case, I get an email every morning with a scan of what mail is coming my way. If I see anything “official-looking,” I’ll be out there in a Haz-Mat suit waiting to greet that mailman personally.

I saw that the Current Occupant* now thinks he’s a “Wartime President.” I swear the first time I saw him say that I thought, “Christ, he’s gonna cancel the elections.” Later I saw a few write-ups on how that’s not legally possible because his term will expire regardless of whether there’s a new guy lined up to take over. But that doesn’t mean he won’t try. After all, he’s got his lackeys on the SCOTUS who will do whatever he says. He’ll figure it’s at least worth a shot. You really can’t see him making the argument that his term should be extended because of a crisis, COVID-19 or whatever else he can drum up?

What they need to do is start working on getting the November elections ready to be 100% mail-in. Not that the Republicans will go along… the more election chaos, long lines, reporting problems, the better for them. Low turnout is the easiest way for them to win. You KNOW the rich districts will have enough voting machines.

I saw on our friend Infidel753’s blog that among the current drugs that are being tested for efficacy against the COVID, is the blood pressure medication, Losartan. It would be quite a stroke of good luck it that’s the one the turns out to be effective. I take that right now and it’s one of the cheapest drugs out there. My 90-day supply (at one pill a day) costs me around $5.00.

Now, the question is, by how much are they going to jack up the price if this comes to pass? And they don’t even have to raise it up to Insulin prices… they could just charge $10 and it would still be considered cheap and they double their profit margin. Of course, that would require a degree of restraint and you know how restrained Big Pharma is. The only thing longer than their history of price gouging is the length of the disclaimer on their TV ads.

I understand the 2020 Census is taking a hit from the virus. No home visits for the time being so they have to use other means. I hope they’re not waiting for help from this administration. Republicans will be thoroughly delighted by a massive undercount of citizens, especially non-homeowners. That’s their best-case scenario. They will not cooperate with any efforts to count up all the likely votes against them.

Here in Chateau Bluz, we’re under informal house quarantine. I’ve been working from home since 3/12 and Sweetpea’s school (where she teaches grade school) has been closed since 3/16. As much as it pains me to say, our Republican Governor, Larry Hogan has been doing a good job of handling the pandemic.

While he’s still a Republican and all about propping up business, he’s neither a religious zealot, gay basher, nor a Trump toady. He’s been taking this thing seriously since early in the year and is not pulling any punches, unlike another prominent Republican leader.

Today he just closed all non-essential businesses and while he’s not ordering an official state of quarantine, he’s recommending we act like there is one. I may criticize him on other things, but not on this. He’s doing a good job.

The big question is what they’re going to do about the schools. They started with a 2-week closure that is scheduled to end this Friday. While I think there’s a zero percent chance of school starting again on Monday, they haven’t announced anything further. I understand this is a tricky situation. If students can’t go back, what do you do with them? Pass them on after only a little over a half year’s instruction? Hold them back? Combination of the two? Start school early next year? And more importantly, do the teachers still get paid?

It’s funny what they characterize as “essential” services. For example, liquor stores are remaining open. Maybe that’s to allow room to close all the bars. Or maybe it’s because he realizes that people need to have something to do when they’re cooped up at home all week.

I’ve been trying to get myself out the door to go get a haircut for the last month but never broke the household inertia. Now it looks like Sweetpea is going to have to do the honors. I guess if you’re going to submit to an amateur haircut, doing it during a quarantine is the best possible option. There will be plenty of time for it to grow back before anyone else has to look at it.

While we’re not out there panic-buying, we have been going to the store regularly, just to pick up whatever is available. The grocery stores in our area have been carving out a special time for the elderly to shop, between 6:00 and 7:00 AM. The only problem is that the geezens are buying everything up.

Sweetpea went out this morning to find a whole lot of nothing. The cashier said they were trying to enforce quantity limits but the old people were pitching a fit about it while trying to buy 6 packages of hamburger meat.

I told her that next time I’ll go during the old folks’ hour and I’ll dress the part. I’ll mess up my hair, wear socks and sandals, hike up my pants, wear my eye-doctor sunglasses under my regular multi-focal lenses and throw a bag of Werther’s in the cart first thing. I’ll fit right in.

Yeah, but no LGBT, Jews, Muslims or atheists would be allowed to get the test.

Odd Bits - The Cursed Edition

I Swear

Last week there was a minor stir on the campaign trail when Joe Biden told a Michigan auto-worker he was full of shit (in response to having his gun rights position aggressively mischaracterized by the guy.) This immediately brought me back to 1972 and a similar dust-up in Michigan, only with George McGovern.

I was 11 and when I saw the clipping in the paper, I thought it was the funniest thing ever. In fact, I pressed it into a photo album I was making, which I still have and will lovingly display for you here today.

The salient part:

A youth told (McGovern), “He will beat you so bad that you’ll wish you never left South Dakota.”

McGovern said, “I’ve got a secret for you.”

As the youth leaned forward, McGovern whispered in his ear, “Kiss my ass.”

The young man recoiled and said, “He said a profanity!”

Oh, such innocent times.

I hope this the only facet that will be shared by Biden and McGovern. Must be something about Michigan that makes a guy want to swear. (And as a former Ohioan, I have some pretty good ideas about what it could be.)

Republicans can’t make much hay out of this, not with the way their golden boy swears in public. Either way, this is the kind of thing to which I don’t pay any serious mind. It just amuses me. All I care about is what someone is going to do once they’re in office.

Truth Serum

One thing the coronavirus is doing is exposing where politicians’ priorities lie. For the Republicans, it brings their “Big Business” tendencies right to the front. Doesn’t it seem that every remedy the GOP supports is for the top end? And every solution for us working people, they oppose?

Like the payroll tax, for example. Sure, everyone would like a little extra cash in their pocket, but how does this solve the pandemic problem? That “little extra cash” is not going to pay for testing or treatment (IF you can even find testing). And people who are thrown out of work or have their hours slashed are not going to benefit from it at all.

BUT, weakening Social Security IS one of the long-range plans from the GOP, so they can commence with privatizing it and opening the money spigot to Wall Street.

Yes, it’s Still Racism

Did you notice how the conservatives are calling it the China coronavirus? Rahm Emmanuel may have said they should “You never let a serious crisis go to waste*,” but the Republican line might be, “Never pass up a chance to hang a racist smear on the enemy.”

They do this “China” thing the same way they always called him “Barack Hussein Obama.” And the rednecks always hit that “sein” part extra hard, so that you couldn’t miss that they were tagging the President as “Other,” as someone apart from themselves.

Which is right, I suppose. They were nowhere near as smart as he was.

*The oft-omitted rest of the quote: “And what I mean by that it's an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.”

Poll Vaulting

While it’s nice that polling shows that Biden has a comfortable lead over Trump in a prospective matchup, please be aware that it doesn’t mean jack shit. Hillary had a big lead too, but the problem is that national polls are meaningless.

What are important are the state by state polls, because that’s how we elect presidents… state by state through the Electoral College. (Which the Republicans will NEVER give up because it’s their only means of winning the presidency, given demographic trends.)

So take national polls with a grain of salt. It’s nice to hear good things, but the devil is in the details. It’s more important for Biden to be ahead in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Ohio, Florida, or any of the other states that Hillary was supposed to win but didn’t.

Pork Barrel Politics

The spread of the GOP Coronavirus reminds me of all the possible-pandemics that came before, Avian Flu, H1N1, Ebola, SARS, and the lot. Back when we were all worried about the swine flu I found solace in this cute little graphic.

I think it’s getting to the point where hand sanitizer and masks aren’t enough. We have to go full-on Naked Gun.

Debunkery

Speaking of cheap graphics, let’s look at some misguided Facebook memes, shall we?

Oh, how things have changed in just 6 and a half short years. This, from a guy who won’t take responsibility for anything that doesn’t end up in ticker-tape parade in his honor.

Are you fucking kidding me? His whole presidency has been for sale to the highest bidder. He never detached from his hotel business, he just pushed it to his sons for safekeeping until he returns. His administration has been a hallmark of self-enrichment, from foreign governments buying up entire hotel floors (without using them) to repeatedly bringing his whole staff and security entourage to his own golf resorts, spending more time golfing than any president in history, and billing the taxpayers for the whole thing. His daughter is cleaning up on recently granted Chinese trademarks. He pushes tax laws that directly benefit his hotel business.

Hell, Trump can be “bought” just by telling him how great he is. The creator of this meme is so removed from reality he probably thinks Trump’s hair looks good too.

Also, are we still pretending that the “Deep State” is a thing? The “Deep State” is a fever dream whipped up by conservative conspiracy theorists as an excuse/scapegoat for whatever they don’t like. Every administration is made up of staffers who agree and don’t agree with the president. Slapping a name on one set does not make it a thing.

With problems like these, it’s not even worth bringing up spelling mistakes.

So, we’re saying that the taxpayers all have to agree with whatever the government spends money on? Great. Now they’ll never spend another dime because someone will always disagree. Or is it that only their side has to agree?

Look, the government spends billions on things most citizens wouldn’t agree to. For example, I don’t agree to spend money on energy company subsidies, Big Pharma subsidies, or abstinence classes. Why is eliminating student debt such a special area?

My theory is that this meme is designed to provide cover. If they just said, “We shouldn’t eliminate student debt because I’m not getting any of benefit,” it would just sound greedy and selfish from a party that claims to be the true moral center of the country.

Mr. President? Mr. Norris on the Phone and He Sounds Pissed

Radio: And now on with our Easy Eighties Pop Favorites…

Juice Newton: “Just call me Angel of the Morning, baby, just touch my cheek before you leave me…

[Major Cheech n Chong record scratch]

“Not on the face! Not on the face! I know you’re supposed to be an Angel-callin’, cheek-touchin’ leaver, but you’ll have to settle for being an Angel-calling NO-FACE-TOUCHING leaver… I don’t want the COVID!”

Radio: Next up, the Georgia Satellites!

Georgia Satellites: “Don’t hand me no lines and Keep Your Hands to Yourself!”

That’s better!

The quote from the Current Occupant is that he hasn’t touched his face in over two weeks, just because. And NOT because the COVID-19 is serious or anything.

I think that’s something he learned from his new Korean BFF. You know how Kim Jong Il used to promote how he made like 11 holes-in-one in a single round of golf, bowled a perfect “300” game, and Superman crap like that? Trump is just throwing out these ludicrous claims, letting Rush Limbaugh and Fox “News” pass them on, and BANG, he’s a legend. There’s nothing he doesn’t know or can’t do.

I don’t know what the offspring, Kim Jong Un claims to be able to do. From the looks of it, he can claim that every year he wins the Coney Island Hot Dog Eating Contest in the afternoon and then each night goes out for pizza and beer.

Trump’s younger son, Twiddle-Dumber, just claimed 30,000 people heard his Pops speak at a recent rally… at a venue that held 8600. At this point, these people are so full of shit they might as well start repurposing Chuck Norris jokes.

“Donald Trump can get a woman pregnant by pointing a finger at her and saying “Covfefe!”

“Under Donald Trump's elaborate hairdo is another head of hair.”

“Donald Trump doesn’t read books. He stares at them until someone puts on Fox and Friends.”

“Donald Trump shot the sheriff on 5^th Avenue, but he had Michael Cohen threaten the deputy.”

“All those names that appear on the screen after an episode of The Apprentice are not credits, just a list of people who Donald Trump stiffed on the bill for their services.”

“Donald Trump used Monopoly money and a Get Out of Jail Free card to pay off his loans to Deutsche Bank.”

OK, that last one is over the top. Trump doesn’t pay loans back.

Over the last few days, we’ve been treated to more and more bizarre claims from Trump, like contradicting department heads by saying there will be a vaccine in a few months (as opposed to at least 18), that he didn’t want a cruise ship with 21 confirmed cases of the virus to dock because the numbers would (make him) look bad and that no one could have foreseen the spread of this virus (besides all the other countries who have been taking aggressive action for months.)

I made the point last week that it almost seems like he’s trying to spread the virus, as a means of voter suppression, consolidation of goods, and cheap real estate. I just can’t see anyone being so inept and ineffective without it being intentional.

It just seems so bass-ackward. Why exacerbate a health crisis when you’re trying to curtail access to medical coverage? Every time he claims that if it weren’t for Democrats, he’d roll out the best health care plan ever, remember that the Republicans have not put forth a single comprehensive health plan. Their only actions have been to eliminate the portions of the ACA that they can get away with until they can scrap the whole thing. They have nothing to replace it and they’ve had 10 years to come up with something.

It’s kind of like having the stock market crash at the same time you’re talking about cutting Social Security. Republicans have been trying to privatize Social Security for decades. It’s like they can’t stand it that there’s this huge chunk of cash out there that they can’t divert to their Wall Street friends. Privatizing Social Security puts that money into play but then it’s dependent on the whims of the stock market. Which is tanking.

Wouldn't you just love to run into one of those guys who, when arguing politics, just keeps saying, "But how's your 401k doing?" They seem to be hiding out now.

It’s funny that for all the effort to use lies and misdirection to prop up the stock market, it’s falling off the table like Bloomberg’s campaign after his first debate. It’s almost as if people suddenly realized that Trump is out of his depth because a virus doesn’t respond to blustering, manipulating data name-calling, and pointing fingers, it just keeps spreading. Just like TLC reality shows.

Or maybe we just know enough to listen to those who ARE experts in infectious diseases, rather than firing or gagging them.

Maybe if there were still some same voices in the room, our pandemic readiness might have been better. But Trump only hires sycophants and toadies now, who tell him nothing but that which he wants to hear.

Have you seen the new White House employment applications?

Interviews are being held in the cloakroom after 4^th period.

Director’s DVD Commentary 1: In advertising, especially on radio, the “record scratch” sound is ubiquitous. Does anyone under 18 even know what that is or why it’s used? I wonder if they just think it’s some strange artifact from radio-land.

Cheech and Chong had a couple of epic “record scratch” moments on their albums, hence my use as a descriptor. One was when the “father” tries to turn off his son’s music on “Earache My Eye,” eliciting shrieks of protest. The other is the last track of one of their albums where “Man” (Chong’s “hippy dude”) tries to put on the “New Cheech and Chong album” and scratches it up so badly the record ends with a repeated skip.

Director’s DVD Commentary 2: If you’ve never heard of Chuck Norris jokes, I apologize for that middle section of the post. Each of those Trump jokes is based on (what I presumed to be) well-known Chuck Norris jokes. If I presumed wrong, please forgive me. (I suppose I could include the original jokes here, but then once you have to explain a joke, the moment is gone.)

Also, despite this post’s title, Mr. Norris would probably not be pissed about these Trumpian claims. After all, he is a devoted religious-right conservative. He’d probably want a taste of the gate, though.