Gonna Start Calling Trump "Chucky," Plus
Sometimes you just wanna be elsewhere, plus
Gonna Start Calling Trump "Chucky"
because he’s a homicidal dummy speaking with Musk’s voice, as per his announcement that South Africa is committing crimes against a certain class of people there so he’s cutting off the minuscule amount of aid we send to the country.
What class could that be? I thought we weren’t doing classes anymore. Sounds suspiciously like an equity complaint.
That’s a minor thing compared to what he and, primarily, Musk are doing to the country with as yet minimal resistance from our elected representatives, but representative of a certain dynamic.
Some of the latter persons are at last showing some spine, though. One of my senators, Brian Schatz, now joined by Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, will be obstructing all of Trump’s diplomatic nominees until control of USAID is retaken from Musk. He can’t completely block them, but he can slow the process to a crawl.
Schatz and some 20 other House and Senate Democratics hied their asses over to the USAID offices, from which employees (and the legislators) are physically blocked while Musk’s baby-faced assassins wreck the joint, and attracted some press by standing out in the cold and speaking forcefully.
The story about Musk’s wrecking crew, including a 19-year-old who called himself “Big Balls” on his now-deleted LinkedIn profile, comes from Wired Magazine, which is an incredibly cheap subscription right now (much better deal than my paid ones, frankly, although subscribing to them won’t keep me in biweekly smoothies, but hey, you can do both!).
As I think I mentioned yesterday—a decade ago in Chuckytime—somebody gave all of these bozos security clearances to access restricted and top secret databases and other government info, something Musk himself has been repeatedly denied because of his drug use and other risks.
Sometimes you just wanna be elsewhere
That photo above is of Mt. Daisen, known locally as Daisen-san, near the city of Yonagao in Tottori Prefecture, Japan. My progeny lives near there, along with my son-in-law who damn near killed me by taking me on a hike to the top of the Yonago Castle ruins to get that picture. I was so embarrassed but it’s a good shot.
I love Hawai’i, but I’m feeling very much as though I’d like to not be in this country for at least a few days, anyway.
Plus, Chucky speaks with forked tongue
Not news, I know.
It was definitely yesterday when I said that with the tariffs not set to take hold until Tuesday, Chucky had a brief window in which to declare victory and call the whole thing off. He has now done so with Mexico, getting pretty much nothing in return. Perhaps he’ll get twice as much when he talks with Justin Trudeau later today.
Plus, okay, I guess?
Democratic senators who damn well better not be voting to confirm Bobby Kennedy jr under any fucking circumstances at all are demanding that if confirmed, he’ll recuse himself from any decisions about vaccines, and that he’ll promise not to profit from any vaccine-related lawsuits.
Regarding the latter, Kennedy has already promised that if he does make any money from one lawsuit in particular, it’ll now go not to him but to that respected charity known as his son Conor, who is an attorney at the firm handling a whole blizzard (hundreds, the NYT says) of vaccine-related and other suits referred by his dad.
The senators lack a lot of leverage over what Kennedy jr will or won’t do if he gets confirmed regardless their support or lack of it, but better to earn his disregard by voting against him than by voting for him with the same result.
One expects they will vote against him, as he is a homicidal, steroid-raddled, brain-addled, and worm-eaten wreck of a human.
Music
Still in comfort music mode, today’s is one of my favorite albums ever: Sound and Color from Alabama Shakes (“Sound and Color” official video).
If you like what I’m doing
let me know by clicking on the little heart, and sharing the newsletter around. I’m also partial to comments of any flavor, and if you haven’t already, you can
Subscribe!
Paid subcriptions get access to the full panoply of benefits, as do free ones minus the satisfaction of keeping me in the occasional bag of good coffee beans, which is the big advanatage to paid ones, except for the overpaid ones which get you a print of one of my photos, which can be pretty good.
Be well; take care.
Okay, you’ve convinced me to give the Shakes another try.
I loved the first Alabama Shakes album, then kinda lost track of them. Nice to hear Brittany Howard's voice again. Very arresting video, too.