Occasional Gnuz

Sorry I’ve been so absent, just too much going on at home and work..

But, here’s the Occasional Gnuz for Twozdae, August 28thish

US court says North Carolina gerrymander is illegal — seeks new congressional map by November
H/T Raw Story
So perhaps there’s hope for this democracy to survive. Courts, judges, the Constitution at work for us as a Nation.

And,
The President Is a White-Nationalist Mob Boss—and His Base Doesn’t Care
H/T The Nation
Nails it. Shut.

Finally,
Trump’s destruction: A neuroscientist explains what happens when a narcissist begins to lose power
H/T Raw Story (Again)
Sorry to scare the living feces out of you, but this is worth digesting.

Open Thread, take the baton hand off and run with it!

RUCerious @TPZoo

TWH; May 10 2017; The Apostatic Creed

After Comey’s firing, White House openly pushes for conclusion of FBI’s Russia investigation

Gripping headline, that one. Made me think that before all this Trump Reign (Trump Rain??) is over, he may declare it mandatory that all of us “skeptics” had better switch tracks and spout our allegiance to the genius and grandeur of our new Führer, the former Orange Shitgibbon, or “It vill be da verse for you.”

So. Here it is. My effort to help each and all of Progressive mindset become the equivalent of a religious Apostate, to offer (at no charge!) the means to demonstrate abandonment and renunciation of those core beliefs, of that Democratic Credo, to substitute the pretense of embracing the contrasting stupidity of, for lack of a better word, Trumpissm.

Please understand the difficulty of the process, how hard it is to spout the pure BS demanded by illiterate ‘strongmen’ such as those who define today’s Republican Party. I know there must be the occasional faux pas embedded, but since only Progressives have the mentality to spot a faux pas in the first place, there’s no need to worry.

Good luck, and remember: this is to make HIM feel good, not you!

******

THE APOSTATIC CREED

I believe!

I believe in the Donald J. Trump!

(May, 2017)

I believe in Donald J. Trump, our almighty  Prophet  Profit who sitteth on the Throne of his Sainted Peter, aka the Throne of Amurkkka!

I believe in the Holy Ghosts of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan! I believe that their collective  dementia  wisdom persisteth through this very day and prospereth well in other equally  hollowed  hallowed minds including (but clearly not limited to) those named Pence, Ryan, McConnell, Bannon, Chaffetz, Nunes, Issa, Cruz, Sessions, DeVos, … the list of Grand Republicans is interminable!

I believe in the Holy Christer Nation called Amurkkka and in her God named Profit! I believe in the rape of the environment for our Profit’s sake! I believe in the oppression of we the people for Profit! I believe in the theft for our Profit of any and all resources public and private! I believe in the mining of wilderness, the logging-off of forests, offshore drilling, and the paving of land anywhere and everywhere when Profit is the reward! I believe in unlimited air and water pollution and in the tailpipes, smokestacks, sewer pipes, and politicians that produce same, all for our Holy Profit! I believe in our Great Profit’s future thanks to the sale of National Parks and wild lands to miners and drillers and developers! I believe that Saint Reagan’s Interior Secretary (and super-fine Republican) James Watt was spot-on correct when he said, “God gave us these things to use! After the last tree is felled, Christ will come back!” Yay!

I believe, too, in other  quasi-religious quackeries  Religious Freedoms, including Intelligent Design, the overturning of Roe v. Wade, the prohibition of Birth Control, all together with a constitutionally-mandated hatred of Homosexuals and Transgenderinos! I believe Public Education is the Work of the Debbil! and must be treated as such! I believe in Junk Science, especially when it disavows global warming or quits protecting endangered species BECAUSE: there’s a lot more Profit to be made when there are no (legal) consequences that get in the way of the process of making money!

I believe in the Wealthy and in their right to destroy all else in favor of their own comfort! I believe in WAR!! I believe in imperialism, and in the theft of needed resources from any other land on the globe! I believe it’s the Right of the Wealthy to start wars even as it’s their right to avoid fighting in them! I believe it’s the Right of the Wealthy to force the poor and the powerless to fight in their place and to die, to be permanently maimed or driven insane in the process (I mean, who really cares, you know?)! I believe it’s the Right of the Wealthy to enjoy any and all privilege and to deny all others the same through any level of chicanery, legal or illegal! I believe that The Law applies NOT to the Wealthy, only to everybody else!

I believe in massive government Power! I believe in unlimited profligate and wastrel spending, and especially in the Orwellian doublespeak lingo it takes to cover up, to mask, and to always deny the Fascistic Union of Government Power with Corporate Profit! I believe it is the duty of the masses to work always on behalf of Power and Profit for the Few! I believe that unlimited Power of the Few is necessary to promote the unlimited Power of the State both at home and around the globe! I believe that the Power of the State and the Power of the Few are one with Profit, therefore are one with God Hisseff! (He who sits atop his Sainted Peter whilst on the Throne! Damn, that felt good!)!

I believe in the Second Amendment, but not the other twenty-six! Instead, I believe that the Constitution is exactly as Donald J. Trump has said, that “It’s really a bad thing for the country”! I further believe that the constitutionality of the words “high crimes and misdemeanors” (as reasons to impeach a President) refer only to Oval Office blow jobs and have nothing to do with political malfeasance of any kind, including the (warrantless) final and total theft of all liberties and freedoms of Americans everywhere, including taking health care away from its lazy bums!

I believe in the H-Bomb and in Amurkkka’s right to use it (or threaten to) on anyone who pisses us off, especially when those who piss us off ain’t white, and/or when they look like Chinamen! I believe that spending more money on “defense” (i.e. WAR!) than the next dozen nations combined is necessary to keep Amurkkka free and to ensure forever Yuge Profits! And we’re gonna BUILD THAT WALL And keep them Spics out of Amurkkka!

I believe that “thinking” is a left-wing-liberal-pinko plot! I believe in the emergent Teabagger Fascism which requires no “thinking” at all, only obedience: Amurkkka über alles!! (to coin a phrase)! I believe in NASCAR, Christmas, Columbus, and the Super Bowl (so long as some black chick doesn’t sing and dance in front of white folks), but not in Martin Luther King and all the dirt he done! I believe that guns, “quads,” dirt bikes, snowmobiles, and even the “Minutemen” are the greatest Creations in all of history! Gifts from God The Profit! YeeHaw!

I believe! I’m a Trumpisst! I’m a REPUBLICAN, and my slogan is
as Simple as ME:

I Got Mine!! Screw Everybody Else, and . . .

Make Amurkkka Great Again!

Amen!

Whew.

******

OPEN THREAD

Randy Rainbow weighs in on Alternative Facts

This is how I’d like to see the White House Press Corps respond to this administration’s bullshit artists.

The Watering Hole; Th/Fr December 22/23 2016; “Precedent” Elect Trump: A Potentially “Unpresidented” Disaster

“Sorry losers and haters, but my I.Q. is one of the highest –
and you all know it! Please don’t feel so stupid or insecure,
it’s not your fault.”
(Donald J. Trump Verified account
@realDonaldTrump)

One might easily describe the above quote as being “unpresidented” — coming, as it did, from the current “Precedent” Elect of the United States.

******

In four weeks — on Friday January 20 2017 — the occupancy of the White House will be radically changed, as will the tenor of the country. The President will no longer be an educated and highly intelligent Moderate Liberal Progressive; it will be, instead, an Unintelligent and Egomaniacal Narcissist, a Pathological Liar who cares nothing about anything in the world other than the admiration he manages to garner for himself from others, from those of low intelligence to those viewed as rich and/or powerful, from any corner of the earth and anywhere in between. The sad reality remains, however, that Donald J. Trump is little more than a uniquely unqualified stooge of corporate and political interests, both local and global, a thesis supported by his selections of his Cabinet chairs and advisory staff.

There is but one bottom line to all of this: we do not know just how severe will be the consequences of this, our greatest political blunder in at least the last 100 years. The only thing that we can be assured of is that those consequences will be nasty, possibly even fatal, to our Democratic Republic unless we the people can somehow find the means of curtailing the process, quickly, in each and every instance. Anything short of that and our collective regret will be the equivalent of that once famous “shot heard round the world” redirected, this time, at ourselves.

Over just the last few days, numerous articles on numerous websites have turned up, each and all of which speak to and describe what are perceived to be various consequences of the upcoming Donald J. Trump “presidency.” The essays include detailed discussions of reasons why we find ourselves embedded in our dilemma, plus a handful of suggestions of means to alleviate said dilemma. Below, in no particular order, are a number of links that each discuss varying aspects of the overall question: Why/how Trump? I’ve selected and included a quoted portion of each link to help tweak imaginations, quotes which, taken together, paint a rather dismal picture of America’s new homemade dilemma.

Sunday Roast: Trump Trouble & Debate Live-Blogging

The truly funny part about this video is that it was posted in July.  Randy Rainbow just had a feeling, I guess…but I don’t need to know the details.

Soooo, in a continuation of the Great Emasculation, Hillary Clinton and Donald “Tic Tac” Trump will appear at a town hall style forum in St Louis, MO (6 pm, PT), wherein inexplicably undecided voters will ask questions of the candidates.

Hillary will attempt to behave in a statesman-like manner, while barely containing her giggles and snorts in regard to the state of her opponent’s campaign; and Donald will flop and flail around like a potty-mouthed steelhead landed next to the fish ladder — you almost made it, little guy! — and will probably say something that will cause me to choke on my popcorn within the first 15 minutes.

Join us, whether you’re just hanging out in the comments section, or doing hard-hitting live commentary on the 2016 presidential race (somebody should, I guess), or just pointing and laughing your ass off like the rest of us.

EDIT:  Here’s one of the places you can watch the aforementioned clusterfuck:

This is our daily open thread — Drinking game = Death

The Watering Hole, Monday, August 8th, 2016: Looney-Toons

Okay, just because the American Psychiatric Association doesn’t want their members to publicize ‘armchair’ diagnoses of the Presidential candidates – meaning Donald Trump, of course – doesn’t mean that we non-psychiatrists can’t do it. And, although “Looney-Toons” isn’t the most clinically accurate ‘armchair’ diagnosis, it at least allows for a little humor to start the week.

Herr Trump seems to have been given a lot more unearned medals than just that poor guy’s Purple Heart.

Herr Trump can’t even rule his own hair.

“Hmm..”Victory Thru Herr Hair Hare Power”!?”

“Look at this – my hair’s a mess!  Can’t anyone help me?”

“Can’t you see you’re next?”
“Okay, why not?”

“I’m not sure what’s in this, but if it dissolved that thing on his head, that’s a step in the right direction.”

“Flowers?! Are you kidding? I can’t even comb them over!”

Although it could have been worse, i.e.:
...The blow to his vanity was just too much, pushing him over the edge.  His self-image as “Donald J. Trump, Billionaire” was destroyed. 

He began to dress in a bunny suit, repeating over and over, “My name is Elmer J. Fudd, Millionaire.  I own a mansion and a yacht.”

Longtime friend and co-worker Daffy Duck describes a recent visit:

He “may be crazy, but” he’s not going to the White House!

This is our daily Open Thread. Please feel free to discuss anything you like – or dislike.

Sunday Leftovers: Mocking Trump

I found one of these videos posted in the Raw Story comments by “sam202.”  All the words are Trump’s own, but a genius named Peter Serafinowicz dubbed him to sound all catty and Liberace-like.

I think the dubbed voice is more appropriate for the gossipy content of Trump’s speeches anyway.

This is our totally late — so late we’re down to leftovers — open thread.

The Watering Hole; Thursday August 4 2016; “A time comes when silence is betrayal.”

“When I despair, I remember that all through history
the way of truth and love has always won. There have
been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem
invincible but in the end, they always fall –
think of it, always.”
(Mohandas K. (Mahatma) Gandhi)

I suspect it’s no mystery to anyone with a functioning mind that the current Republican Candidate for POTUS — Donald J. Trump —  is little more (or less) than a greedy egomaniacal narcissist, a racist, a bigot, a misogynist, and a largely uninformed xenophobic blowhard. Trump is, in fact, most certainly the most uninformable — therefore the most unpredictable and most dangerous — candidate for POTUS that has ever reached the pinnacle upon which he now roosts.  I suppose I’m in good company when I note that I’ve listened to him, laughed at him, even mocked him from time to time over the last year, but then it happened: the straw(s) that broke my camel’s back rained down as if driven by a lightning bolt. They were, collectively, all those verbal assaults that the Con Man (Trump) tried to use to insult and diminish the most honorable Kahn family, all because Khizr Khan eloquently spoke a haunting Truth at the Democratic National Convention.

My original intent here was to quote and post links to the many insanities Hair Drumpf has spoken over the last year (and especially in the last week), and then address them, each and all, via quotes from people who have, in the past, addressed much the same issues with both intelligence and with that enviable sensitivity that seems so absent in today’s America. But in the shadow of recent political blather, I decided instead to simply post answers — responses — to similar questions/statements uttered by others in past years — responses which continue to stand the test of time, due mainly to the intelligence, the sensitivity, the caring, and the experiences underlying them — all stuff that Drumpf would have nothing to do with no matter the situation.

So — Following are what I consider to be legitimate responses to statements Trump has made in the public eye. As you read them, think Drumpf on stage, with mic (along with bad hair, red tie from China, dark suit from Mexico, etc.), and as you read the responses, imagine Trump’s reaction if said responses were aimed solely at him.

“Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”

“Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism.”

“It is a tragic mix-up when the United States spends $500,000 for every enemy soldier killed, and only $53 annually on the victims of poverty.”

“To ignore evil is to become an accomplice to it.”

“Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man’s sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.”

“We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”

“When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative.”

“The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood.”

“Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time; the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.”

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

“A man who won’t die for something is not fit to live.”

“There is nothing more dangerous than to build a society, with a large segment of people in that society who feel that they have no stake in it; who feel that they have nothing to lose. People who have a stake in their society, protect that society, but when they don’t have it, they unconsciously want to destroy it.”

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

“We must rapidly begin the shift from a “thing-oriented” society to a “person-oriented” society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

“An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.”

“I look forward confidently to the day when all who work for a living will be one with no thought to their separateness as Negroes, Jews, Italians or any other distinctions. This will be the day when we bring into full realization the American dream — a dream yet unfulfilled. A dream of equality of opportunity, of privilege and property widely distributed; a dream of a land where men will not take necessities from the many to give luxuries to the few; a dream of a land where men will not argue that the color of a man’s skin determines the content of his character; a dream of a nation where all our gifts and resources are held not for ourselves alone, but as instruments of service for the rest of humanity; the dream of a country where every man will respect the dignity and worth of the human personality.

“We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence . . . of the good people.”

“Cowardice asks the question – is it safe? Expediency asks the question – is it politic? Vanity asks the question – is it popular? But conscience asks the question – is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular; but one must take it because it is right.”

“True compassion, is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.”

“A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.”

Each and all of those wise answers/responses are the words of one man, the man who also spoke the following, live, to the tens of thousands gathered at the Civil Rights March on Washington DC, August 28, 1963:

“Now, I say to you today my friends, even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: – ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.'” ~Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

That, folks, is NOT at all the way Donald J. Trump sees the world or has EVER seen the world — or his role in it. Try the word ‘opposite’ — it’s a far better fit.

Meanwhile, a summation:

“A time comes when silence is betrayal. Some of us
who have already begun to break the silence of the night
have found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of
agony, but we must speak. We must speak out with all
the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision,
but we must speak.”
(Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.)

******

OPEN THREAD

The Watering Hole, Saturday, July 23, 2016: Ego

The Oxford English Dictionary’s definition of ego:

Noun:

1.      A person’s sense of self-esteem or self-importance

1.1    Psychoanalysis The part of the mind that mediates between the conscious and the unconscious and is responsible for reality testing and a sense of personal identity

1.2    Philosophy (In metaphysics) a conscious thinking subject.

Synonyms: self-esteem, self-importance, self-worth, self-respect, self-conceit, self-image, self-confidence;

Now, let’s take a brief look at Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump’s ego:

1. Trump’s self-esteem? Off the charts–his self-descriptions include being “the greatest” this, the “best” that, the “most” whatever. Anyone who claims otherwise is just “wrong” or “stupid”, or has some imaginary personal beef against Trump, because in no way will Donald Trump admit to any ignorance, mistake, lie, or out-and-out wrongdoing. Which leads to…

1.1 Trump’s ego cannot “mediate” between the conscious and unconscious. Reality testing?! Trump’s conscious and unconscious create their own reality, and it’s a reality that he seems to feel no need to test. His “reality” is part-and-parcel of his personal identity, and it is impenetrable by truth, facts, and even Trump’s own previous words or deeds.

1.2 While Trump may be “conscious” in the literal sense of the word, he is not a “thinking” subject.

With his penchant for superlatives, Trump might possibly think that he has a “superego“, but the OED’s definition of superego leads me to believe that Trump’s ego vanquished his superego a long time ago:

Noun:
Psychoanalysis The part of a person’s mind that acts as a self-critical conscience, reflecting social standards learned from parents and teachers

“Self-critical”?  Rarely and barely.  Hell, Trump told evangelicals that he didn’t feel the need to go to confession, since he doesn’t think that anything he does is wrong.  And I learned things like manners, respect and intellectual curiosity from my parents and teachers, apparently unlike Trump.

Trump has a dysfunctional relationship with the truth. According to Politifact, only 8.4% of Trump’s statements have been factual.  Their review of Trump’s statements shows that a whopping 70% of Trump’s statements are rated “Mostly False”, “False”, or “Pants on Fire.” Here’s one of the “Pants on Fire” stories:

“The day after the 2016 Republican National Convention, Trump said his vanquished Republican rival, Sen. Ted Cruz, had never denied that his father was in a 1963 photo with Lee Harvey Oswald, who went on to assassinate President John F. Kennedy that November.

Trump said: “All I did is point out the fact that on the cover of the National Enquirer there was a picture of him and crazy Lee Harvey Oswald having breakfast. Now, Ted never denied that it was his father. Instead he said, ‘Donald Trump.’ I had nothing to do with it. This was a magazine that frankly, in many respects, should be very respected.”

[The idea that ‘the National Enquirer should be very respected’ should rate a “Pants on Fire” of its own.]

Politifact gave Trump the “2015 Lie of The Year” award to The Donald.  An excerpt:

“…a little hyperbole never hurts,” Trump wrote in his 1987 best-seller The Art of the Deal. “People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular. I call it truthful hyperbole. It’s an innocent form of exaggeration — and a very effective form of promotion.”

[Ah, and that explains “Trump University.”]

Next, here’s a glib, almost superficial, and often sickeningly fawning article from the Washington Post, by AP “reporter” Nancy Benar, titled “For Trump, it’s about America’s ego — and his own.” Some key excerpts:

“Almost every deal I have ever done has been at least partly for my ego,” the billionaire declared in a 1995 New York Times piece titled, “What My Ego Wants, My Ego Gets.”

“The same assets that excite me in the chase often, once they are acquired, leave me bored,” he told an interviewer in 1990, as his boom years were sliding toward bust. “For me, you see, the important thing is the getting, not the having.”

Trump,[sic] stresses his Ivy League education and revels in juvenile jabs, labeling his adversaries “stupid,” ‘’dumb” and “bad.”

“I know words,” he declared at a December campaign rally where he criticized the Obama administration. “I have the best words. But there’s no better word than stupid, right?”

Wrong, Mr. Trump. As a Presidential candidate, now nominee, some of the “best words” that you should memorize the meanings for are:  honesty, integrity, class, civility, respect, humility and responsibility. I know that these terms and ideas are foreign to you, but you should familiarize yourself with them – there might be a quiz between now and November.

This is our daily Open Thread–feel free to talk about this or any other topic.

The Watering Hole; Friday May 6 2016; Zieg HEIL!! Drumpf Ist Hier!

Trump has nailed down the Republican candidacy for POTUS, and some are more delighted at the prospect of a President Trump than are others.

David Duke Hopes To Get Donald Trump To Embrace Full-Blown Anti-Semitism

Duke said it was high time “to start naming the enemy that’s orchestrating our destruction: If we don’t dispose the Jews, there is no hope for our people.”  . . .

He explained that Jews “control” the media, academia and the political world, “and I think that we’ve really got to start going full bore on that. I’m not saying that Trump has to but we’ve got to and that’s the only way we’re going to move people like Trump more toward doing the things we’ve got to do.”

David Duke Hails Donald Trump For Thwarting The ‘Jewish Supremacists Who Control Our Country’

. . . white nationalist leader David Duke celebrated Donald Trump’s “amazing victory” in the Indiana primary, which allowed him to become the presumptive Republican nominee for president, hailing Trump for terrifying wealthy “Jewish extremists” and exposing the “Jewish supremacists who control our country.” . . .

Duke urged listeners to “make sure that Trump understands that we expect him to follow through on these things and we expect him to be our White Knight, our advocate and our person.”

He said that white nationalists must continue to move the political center to the right in order to make Trump’s ideas more mainstream.

“This is a movement to take America back, and when we say ‘take America back,’ we know exactly what that means,” Duke said, “and I think everybody who says that knows what it means. And if we don’t keep putting that heat, if we don’t keep pushing the envelope over, we’ve got to be so far to the right — maybe that’s the wrong for it, ‘right-wing,’ ‘left-wing,’ doesn’t have much meaning — but so far to the right for our people that Trump seems moderate so that he will have space to move to the right himself because we’ve got to start an evolutionary movement to the right.”

David Duke: Donald Trump Comparisons May Rehabilitate Adolf Hitler’s Image

. . . whatever you want to say about Donald Trump, there’s no way you can say any of this stuff, it’s crazy, but they say this.

The truth is, by the way, they might be rehabilitating that fellow with the mustache back there in Germany, because I saw a commercial against Donald Trump, a really vicious commercial, comparing what Donald Trump said about preserving America and making America great again to Hitler in Germany preserving Germany and making Germany great again and free again and not beholden to these Communists on one side, politically who were trying to destroy their land and their freedom, and the Jewish capitalists on the other, who were ripping off the nation through the banking system. We have the same thing going on here with Goldman Sachs. It was a commercial, I saw that this morning and I was amazed by that commercial. It was a commercial against Trump but I don’t think it’s having the effect that they want it to have. . . .

You know, if you love your country and if you love, or at least what your country is supposed to represent, what it originally represented, because I don’t know if we can everything love our government — we certainly can’t love everything our government is doing today because the leaders of this country, the people who have control over this country, are purposefully wiping … If you’re a European person, the government is purposefully wiping you out and your families and your children and your future. They are purposefully transforming this country into a Third World nation. And if you want to see the direction of this country, just look at a Communist here, Bernie Sanders, running and winning a lot of victories in major states, and who is a former Communist and is a Marxist right now, folks.

And if that’s not enough, there’s this:

‘Hail Emperor Trump!’ White Nationalists Take Victory Lap Following Trump Win

Donald Trump’s presidential campaign has been energizing and electrifying white supremacists, and their excitement is hitting new highs now that he is clearly the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee.

The neo-Nazi site Daily Stormer, which endorsed Trump two weeks after his immigrant-disparaging campaign launch, is filled with posts celebrating the GOP candidate’s victory this morning. “White men in America and across the planet are partying like it’s 1999 following Trump’s decisive victory over the evil enemies of our race,” says one post, which also celebrates that “[t]he Jews are in full-on freak-out mode.”

[. . .]

“The fires of nationalism, the fires of identity, the fires of anger against the corrupt establishment are arising all around Europe, all around America, all around the entire world. So we just need to strap in, because the future is gonna definitely be interesting, and I believe we could have a switch in our direction even more…Hail, Emperor Trump! And hail, victory! ”

I have the distinct feeling that if the November election celebration should happen to belong to Trump, the first thing I’ll be reminded of will be the words of André Francois-Poncet, the French Ambassador to Germany who, on the night of Hitler’s rise to power as German Chancellor — January 30 1933 — wrote:

The torches [the marchers] brandished formed a river of fire, a river with hastening, unquenchable waves, a river in spate sweeping with a sovereign rush over the very heart of the city. . . . The onlookers, drawn up on either side of the marching columns, burst into a vast clamor. The river of fire flowed past the french embassy whence with heavy heart and filled with foreboding I watched its luminous wake.

Hitler’s slogans, oft stated, were Germany First! and Make Germany Great Again! The slogan that stuck, however, was different:

Do we really want to go there?

OPEN THREAD

The Watering Hole, Monday, April 11, 2016: I’d Vote For This One

This ad has no demonizing, no demon sheep, no end-of-days predictions if the other candidate wins, and it’s not set to “Il Fortuna.” What’s not to like? One thing’s for sure, I’d vote for the “Generic” candidate over Trump or Cruz any day!

 

~~~~~~~

This is our daily Open Thread–go ahead, open up a discussion.

The Watering Hole, Saturday, April 2nd, 2016: A Little Humor

I’ll start with the first of two jokes which one of my co-workers sent me; the second of the two will be at the end. That way we can begin and end with a smile. (Okay, there’ll be humor in the middle, too.)

“A Lexus mechanic was removing a cylinder head from the motor of a LS460 when he spotted a well-known cardiologist in his shop. The cardiologist was there waiting for the service manager to come and take a look at his car when the mechanic shouted across the garage, “Hey Doc, want to take a look at this?” The cardiologist, a bit surprised walked over to where the mechanic was working.

The mechanic straightened up, wiped his hands on a rag and asked, “So Doc, look at this engine. I opened its heart, took the valves out, repaired or replaced anything damaged, and then put everything back in, and when I finished, it worked just like new. So how is it that I make $48,000 a year and you make $1.7M when you and I are doing basically the same work? The cardiologist paused, leaned over, and then whispered to the mechanic. “Try doing it with the engine running.””

Next, a whole bunch of political stuff from a recent Washington Post newsletter called “The Daily Trail”, including but not limited to:

-poll numbers indicating how ‘yugely’ unpopular Donald Trump is among women and other demographics;
-Trump + Reince Priebus = GOP Party Loyalty?
-Ted Cruz pulls out RNC rule book in anti-Kasich move;
-Superpac for Kasich responds with weird Pinocchio-themed anti-Cruz ad (created by the same guy who made what was called the “Demon Sheep” ad.)
-initial Electoral College projections from the University of Virginia show some good news for Democrats;
-will candidates never learn how to eat a slice of New York pizza in a New York pizzeria in the traditional New York manner? (Jon Stewart, I hope you’re not following ANY of this, please, it’s not good for your blood pressure!)
-and more!

Also from the Washington Post, an ‘April Fools’ story (okay, I’m a day behind) about two college professors who “gave up the fight to convince Americans that Africa is not, in fact, a country.”

And now the second of the two jokes:

“While the IRS agent was checking the books he turned to the CFO of the hospital and said, “I notice you buy a lot of bandages. What do you do with the end of the roll when there’s too little left to be of any use? “Good question,” noted the CFO. “We save them up and send them back to the bandage company and every now and then they send us a free box of bandages. “Oh,” replied the auditor, somewhat disappointed that his unusual question had a practical answer.

But on he went, in his obnoxious way. “What about all these plaster purchases? What do you do with what’s left over after setting a cast on a patient? “Ah, yes,” replied the CFO, realizing that the inspector was trying to trap him with an unanswerable question. “We save it and send it back to the manufacturer, and every now and then they send us a free package of plaster.

“I see,” replied the auditor, thinking hard about how he could fluster the know-it-all CFO. “Well,” he went on, “What do you do with all the leftover foreskins from the circumcisions you perform?” Here, too, we do not waste,” answered the CFO. “What we do is save all the little foreskins and send them to the IRS Office, and about once a year they send us a complete dick.” [rim shot]

This is our daily Open Thread – enjoy yourselves!

The Watering Hole; Thursday March 24 2016; Solomon, Sun, and Drumpf

The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be;
and that which is done is that which shall be done:
and there is no new thing under the sun.
(Solomon, in Ecclesiastes, KJV, the Bible)

Solomon was right. There’s nothing new under the sun. Here’s the proof — a handful of ‘old’ quotes that perfectly describe Donald Trump Drumpf, each and all of which were spoken by folks (fortunate and blessed) who had never heard of him. And still they knew. Him. Trump. Drumpf.

“He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I know.” ~Abraham Lincoln

“He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary.” ~ William Faulkner

“He is not only dull himself, he is the cause of dullness in others.” ~Samuel Johnson

“He had delusions of adequacy.” ~Walter Kerr

“They never open their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge.” ~Thomas Brackett Reed

“His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork.” ~Mae West

“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.” ~Oscar Wilde

“He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.” ~Oscar Wilde

“A sheep in sheep’s clothing.” ~Winston Churchill

“He occasionally stumbled over the truth, but hastily picked himself up and hurried on as if nothing had happened.” ~Winston Churchill

“…the dumb ass speaking with man’s voice forbad the madness of the prophet.”
~2nd Peter (‘Two Peter’) 2:16

Not sure I’ve ever seen a more accurate summation of the ‘mental acuity’ of the man who’s become the current ‘sure thing’ Republican nominee for President of the United States. Proof that Solomon was spot-on, that there truly is nothing new under the sun, and never will be. QED.

Proof of thesis doesn’t stop there, however. Below is a 1978 photo I managed to snap of a carved wooden Ki’i (Tiki), one of many that surround and guard the Hale o Keawe at Pu’uhonua o Honaunau, the ancient Hawaiian City of Refuge on the Island of Hawaii’s Kona coast. Last summer as I reviewed all of my photos from Pu’uhonua o Hononaunau, the one thing that caught my eye on this one was the hair on the Ki’i — such a perfect ‘ancient’ rendition of Trump’s Drumpf’s hairdo — the one we see and puzzle over every day that he’s out there on the campaign trail. It was so perfect, in fact, that I decided to use the photo in a Trump Drumpf campaign poster — a poster that would surely draw millions of ‘undecideds’ into the Trump Drumpf camp! Below is my most recent presentation, the one which I do hereby offer free of charge to the Trump Drumpf campaign! Its only flaw is that the size of the Ki’i’s hand(s) is not clearly visible — but then, since there’s nothing new under the sun . . . well, you know. 🙂

So as of today, Trump Drumpf leads Cruz and Kasich, resp., in the primary race to become the Republican candidate for President — even though the response by the so-called Republican “Establishment” has been far less than enthusiastic over that prospect. There is, in fact, a “Stop Trump Drumpf” movement scheduled to be underway — to be formally begun — on April 5 with the Wisconsin Republican Primary. Their ultimate goal is to deny Trump Drumpf the number of primary delegates to confirm his nomination, and then, at the convention, insert an as yet unknown “establishment” candidate in his place. They hope, apparently, that Candidate X can accomplish what they believe to be beyond the reach of Donald Trump Drumpf, i.e. to defeat Clinton or Sanders in the upcoming General Election and thereby ensure the realization of their dream — a totally Republican-controlled government.

Will/can that work? Time will tell, but as of now Doubt rules; remember the Wisdom of Solomon who pointed out that there is no new thing under the sun, and 

He that digeth a pit shall fall into it.
(Solomon, in Ecclesiastes, KJV, the Bible)

OPEN THREAD