So I'm gonna be doing more video stuff, writing, directing, occasionally appearing. Here's the first in what I hope will be a series called Melania Watches.
Secret FBI surveillance (no doubt initiated under Barack Obama) captures what Melania Trump says while watching her husband deliver the commencement address at Liberty University.
Big thanks to Jessica Park for her voice and back and editing skills. And to Jeff Kreisler for production help and craft services.
You can subscribe to the Rude Pundit YouTube channel. Coming soon: Instagram?
6/05/2017
6/02/2017
Ignorant, Friendless, and Uncaring: Trump's Paris Agreement Decision Is a Reflection of Himself
In President Trump's extravagantly stupid speech yesterday announcing that he was pulling the United States out of the Paris Climate Accord, one lie, among the series of lies that he told, stood out. Trump said, "I was elected to represent the citizens of Pittsburgh, not Paris." Put aside the myopic view that Pittsburgh is no less a part of a world affected by climate change than Paris and thus would benefit from mitigating the effects of global warming. Put aside even the thought that Trump seems to think that because the pact was finalized in Paris, it's about Paris.
Instead, focus on the Pittsburgh part. Because, see, if Trump were representing the citizens of that city, who voted overwhelmingly for Hillary Clinton (115,000 to Trump's 32,000), he would have stayed in the agreement. In fact, Trump's ignorance about Pittsburgh goes far, far deeper. It's as if he still thinks that the city is dependent on the steel industry when, in reality, the economy of the city has very little to do with steel anymore. It's a high-tech center, and the health care industry, among other highly-skilled fields, provides far more employment. This is not to mention that Pittsburgh is a leader among cities in moving to clean energy.
In other words, invoking Pittsburgh as an example of a place that he thinks he's helping shows that Trump not only completely misunderstands the Paris agreement, but he doesn't know shit about the United States.
The blizzard of idiocy that Trump spouted yesterday was the ranting of a paranoid, hateful, and profoundly friendless man. Look at what he said: "At what point does America get demeaned? At what point do they start laughing at us as a country? We want fair treatment for its citizens, and we want fair treatment for our taxpayers. We don’t want other leaders and other countries laughing at us anymore. And they won’t be. They won’t be."
Who the fuck is demeaning us? Who the fuck is laughing at us? Give us a single example of a country that is laughing at us for any reason other than, "Holy Jesus fuckballs, did you hear what American's idiot king said today? They are sooo fucked." This is how small and pathetic Trump is. It is better to swat at imaginary laughter than to stand up and act like something matters more than he does. Meanwhile, those allegedly laughing countries are going to lap us in the clean energy industry. And Trump just told them that the United States is not to be trusted.
Everything that came out of his face anus was turd-like. "It is estimated it would only produce a two-tenths of one degree -- think of that; this much -- Celsius reduction in global temperature by the year 2100," he said, which completely misreads the research on that. He said that the United States "can't build...coal plants." Yeah, we can. And as far as jobs, man, there are more jobs in the renewable energy industry than in fossil fuels right now. Those solar jobs need protecting, too. But that doesn't play to his Neanderthal base. What we need to be doing is establishing job retraining programs to help places transition so they can be more like Pittsburgh and less like West Virgina.
Instead of looking forward, Trump is heading back in time. "[T]he current agreement effectively blocks the development of clean coal in America -- which it does [note: no, it doesn't], and the mines are starting to open up," the president blustered. "We’re having a big opening in two weeks. Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, so many places. A big opening of a brand-new mine. It’s unheard of. For many, many years, that hasn’t happened." It's like saying that he's going to invest in ink wells and quill pens because he needs to protect the feather pluckers of Michigan and the vast ink mill workers of Virginia, and the United States will never give up those jobs for your fancy typewriter machines. Pointy metal nibs will make America great again.
Trump seems to think he can negotiate a better deal. I'm not sure what deal is better than "voluntary compliance" and "set your own standards," as the Paris agreement say. Is it that we'll only do it if every country pays us to do it? That seems to be the Trump extortion way.
The Paris Accord was important not because of what it did, since everything in it was voluntary, but because of what it demonstrated. Two hundred nations acknowledged the reality of climate change and said, "Well, shit, we better try something." What the fuck makes the United States so fucking special here? What knowledge do we have that other countries don't? And why aren't countries like India and Greece worried about job loss? Oh, right, because the fuckin' oceans are rising.
It took a decade to negotiate and, even then, it was modified to suit the nutzoids in the U.S. President Obama didn't try to get it ratified in the Senate because the Senate is run by motherfuckers who don't give a shit if their grandkids drown or starve to death. The deal was as much symbolic as anything. It relied on everyone not being a dick, and then we went and elected the prickiest dick ever. Symbolism is important, and Trump took it and pissed on it.
This action is Trump in a nutshell. Greedy, isolated, deranged, and utterly oblivious to consequences beyond silencing the imaginary laughter. That it pisses off that fairy in France and that bitch in Germany and all those traitor liberals is all the more reason to do it. Trump can't imagine that what's good for the rest of the world might be good for us. Look at the man himself. No friends. No charity. Nothing that doesn't profit himself or his odious family of twat mites.
We are living out the fantasies of a delusional megalomaniac. That his interests happen to cross with those of his party merely assures that whatever destruction he brings, no one will try to stop him.
This is what it's like to be alone. Maybe he just wanted us to feel the self-loathing that he feels every second of his miserable, worthless life.
Instead, focus on the Pittsburgh part. Because, see, if Trump were representing the citizens of that city, who voted overwhelmingly for Hillary Clinton (115,000 to Trump's 32,000), he would have stayed in the agreement. In fact, Trump's ignorance about Pittsburgh goes far, far deeper. It's as if he still thinks that the city is dependent on the steel industry when, in reality, the economy of the city has very little to do with steel anymore. It's a high-tech center, and the health care industry, among other highly-skilled fields, provides far more employment. This is not to mention that Pittsburgh is a leader among cities in moving to clean energy.
In other words, invoking Pittsburgh as an example of a place that he thinks he's helping shows that Trump not only completely misunderstands the Paris agreement, but he doesn't know shit about the United States.
The blizzard of idiocy that Trump spouted yesterday was the ranting of a paranoid, hateful, and profoundly friendless man. Look at what he said: "At what point does America get demeaned? At what point do they start laughing at us as a country? We want fair treatment for its citizens, and we want fair treatment for our taxpayers. We don’t want other leaders and other countries laughing at us anymore. And they won’t be. They won’t be."
Who the fuck is demeaning us? Who the fuck is laughing at us? Give us a single example of a country that is laughing at us for any reason other than, "Holy Jesus fuckballs, did you hear what American's idiot king said today? They are sooo fucked." This is how small and pathetic Trump is. It is better to swat at imaginary laughter than to stand up and act like something matters more than he does. Meanwhile, those allegedly laughing countries are going to lap us in the clean energy industry. And Trump just told them that the United States is not to be trusted.
Everything that came out of his face anus was turd-like. "It is estimated it would only produce a two-tenths of one degree -- think of that; this much -- Celsius reduction in global temperature by the year 2100," he said, which completely misreads the research on that. He said that the United States "can't build...coal plants." Yeah, we can. And as far as jobs, man, there are more jobs in the renewable energy industry than in fossil fuels right now. Those solar jobs need protecting, too. But that doesn't play to his Neanderthal base. What we need to be doing is establishing job retraining programs to help places transition so they can be more like Pittsburgh and less like West Virgina.
Instead of looking forward, Trump is heading back in time. "[T]he current agreement effectively blocks the development of clean coal in America -- which it does [note: no, it doesn't], and the mines are starting to open up," the president blustered. "We’re having a big opening in two weeks. Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, so many places. A big opening of a brand-new mine. It’s unheard of. For many, many years, that hasn’t happened." It's like saying that he's going to invest in ink wells and quill pens because he needs to protect the feather pluckers of Michigan and the vast ink mill workers of Virginia, and the United States will never give up those jobs for your fancy typewriter machines. Pointy metal nibs will make America great again.
Trump seems to think he can negotiate a better deal. I'm not sure what deal is better than "voluntary compliance" and "set your own standards," as the Paris agreement say. Is it that we'll only do it if every country pays us to do it? That seems to be the Trump extortion way.
The Paris Accord was important not because of what it did, since everything in it was voluntary, but because of what it demonstrated. Two hundred nations acknowledged the reality of climate change and said, "Well, shit, we better try something." What the fuck makes the United States so fucking special here? What knowledge do we have that other countries don't? And why aren't countries like India and Greece worried about job loss? Oh, right, because the fuckin' oceans are rising.
It took a decade to negotiate and, even then, it was modified to suit the nutzoids in the U.S. President Obama didn't try to get it ratified in the Senate because the Senate is run by motherfuckers who don't give a shit if their grandkids drown or starve to death. The deal was as much symbolic as anything. It relied on everyone not being a dick, and then we went and elected the prickiest dick ever. Symbolism is important, and Trump took it and pissed on it.
This action is Trump in a nutshell. Greedy, isolated, deranged, and utterly oblivious to consequences beyond silencing the imaginary laughter. That it pisses off that fairy in France and that bitch in Germany and all those traitor liberals is all the more reason to do it. Trump can't imagine that what's good for the rest of the world might be good for us. Look at the man himself. No friends. No charity. Nothing that doesn't profit himself or his odious family of twat mites.
We are living out the fantasies of a delusional megalomaniac. That his interests happen to cross with those of his party merely assures that whatever destruction he brings, no one will try to stop him.
This is what it's like to be alone. Maybe he just wanted us to feel the self-loathing that he feels every second of his miserable, worthless life.
6/01/2017
Let Hillary Clinton Speak (and Listen to Her)
Here's a one-sentence post-mortem that you can use to explain the 2016 election: Emails kept people home while racism got people to the polls.
You can juice it up a bit with the Russian interference or Donald Trump's fanning of xenophobic fires or Hillary Clinton winning the popular vote, but, basically, that's what it came down to. That simple an explanation is not enough for a whole lot of people. "What about Clinton?" they'll ask. "Wasn't she a terrible candidate? Why didn't she campaign in Wisconsin?" And you wouldn't be wrong to ask those questions. Of course, then I'll say, "Take the fake email scandal out of the equation. Who wins?"
(You might also say, "Bernie would have won," which is an assumption that makes me roll my eyes so hard that I see my brainpan.)
Let's not be delusional here. Yes, if Clinton were president, a whole bunch of things wouldn't be threatened right now: the Affordable Care Act, the Paris Climate Agreement, the continued existence of the earth. But you know that, right now, we would be embroiled in an absolutely enraging bunch of congressional hearings over the damned emails, heading towards another completely unwarranted impeachment. And, no doubt, we would be treated to a number of think pieces from presumptive liberals explaining how Clinton made this bed and she shouldn't have had the private server and she should have been forthcoming and she was never really a liberal and all kinds of accusations that add up to something obvious: You don't like Clinton. And that's okay. But you don't have to like someone to be able to say what's fair. And Clinton has been treated incredibly unfairly.
Since the election, every time Clinton has made an appearance, some on the left and center have reacted with anything from disinterest to revulsion. "Shut the f--- up," wrote Hillary voter Gersh Kuntzman (a name that sounds as filthy as anything I could write here) in the New York Daily News after Clinton spoke at the Women for Women conference. The New Republic seems to put out an article a week on how Clinton is terrible and should go away.
They can't stand that Clinton blames James Comey's letter on her emails, Russian hacking, and misogyny as contributing factors to her win. Never mind that the polls show that Clinton's support took a dive after the Comey letter was leaked. Never mind that, in every case, she is sure to blame herself as harshly as the outside factors. Never mind that, despite losing the presidency due to the United States's archaic electoral system, she's still got a lifetime of experience as an activist and politician that is probably pretty damn valuable.
At a tech conference in Los Angeles yesterday, Clinton said that the Russian government "could not have known how best to weaponize that [hacked] information unless they had been guided." Asked who guided them, Clinton said that "it's pretty hard not to" say it was Trump and his campaign. This is the former Secretary of State accusing her rival of colluding with Russia to affect the outcome of a U.S. election. It's not some crazed real estate mogul tweeting madly in the middle of the night. Why wouldn't you want her out there saying this? The only reason you can view her as less credible on any of these issues is because you buy the conservative spin on her, whether you realize it or not, likely with a bit of sexism mixed in. And, god, yes, it's a temptation to tell those who have been part of our body politick for ages to go into the hinterlands, to disappear.
But I don't want Hillary Clinton to shut up. I want her out there, talking about the issues that matter to her, like Al Gore did with climate change, and that ended up shifting the entire conversation on the issue. I want her to talk about how, if you actually give a damn about elections, you'd demand that the Russian interference be investigated. I want her to get the next generation of Democrats, especially Democratic women, excited and out there and ready to run. I want her to get her revenge on a political machine, aided and abetted by a drooling media cohort, that tasked itself with wrecking her and her husband. Hell, that machine is already gearing up to go after Elizabeth Warren with the same intensity. She didn't win the election, but I want her to be able to stand on the ashes of the Trump administration and laugh that laugh that has annoyed so many.
Clinton should be in the mix, fanning the flames of anti-Trump sentiment, because she knows what we're losing with Trump, with every tweet he makes, with every slight of a world leader, with every promise to the working class broken, with every promise to the wealthy kept. Say what you will about her, decry her hawkish tendencies (I sure have), be angry at the way the DNC tilted towards her, be upset at her Wall Street connections, if you must, but she's walked the walk. And right now, we need all the voices we can muster - Sanders, Warren, Ellison, too - because the noise from the other side is, as ever, overwhelming.
As she said yesterday, "I'm not going anywhere. I have a big stake in what happens in this country. I am very unbowed and unbroken about what happened because I don’t want it to happen to anybody else. I don't want it to happen to the values and the institutions I care about in America." If nothing else, imagine how much strength it takes to suck up the loss, to stand up against every withering body blow she's suffered, and to still want to work for the country. No one would blame her for telling us all to go to hell and live out her life in luxury, far from the carping crowds.
But she won't. And she couldn't. And that should be acknowledged. And respected.
(You'll notice I'm not mentioning conservative attacks on Clinton. That's because there is nothing Clinton can do that would satiate the right's need to constantly try to destroy her. It's been an obsession for 25 years. She was mocked for walking in the woods and going to a bookstore post-election. And Republicans, especially the president, think that any support for Clinton or for an investigation into the Russian interference is about being a sore loser. No, we accept that Trump won. We accept that Clinton lost. We just want to know who Trump's working for.)
You can juice it up a bit with the Russian interference or Donald Trump's fanning of xenophobic fires or Hillary Clinton winning the popular vote, but, basically, that's what it came down to. That simple an explanation is not enough for a whole lot of people. "What about Clinton?" they'll ask. "Wasn't she a terrible candidate? Why didn't she campaign in Wisconsin?" And you wouldn't be wrong to ask those questions. Of course, then I'll say, "Take the fake email scandal out of the equation. Who wins?"
(You might also say, "Bernie would have won," which is an assumption that makes me roll my eyes so hard that I see my brainpan.)
Let's not be delusional here. Yes, if Clinton were president, a whole bunch of things wouldn't be threatened right now: the Affordable Care Act, the Paris Climate Agreement, the continued existence of the earth. But you know that, right now, we would be embroiled in an absolutely enraging bunch of congressional hearings over the damned emails, heading towards another completely unwarranted impeachment. And, no doubt, we would be treated to a number of think pieces from presumptive liberals explaining how Clinton made this bed and she shouldn't have had the private server and she should have been forthcoming and she was never really a liberal and all kinds of accusations that add up to something obvious: You don't like Clinton. And that's okay. But you don't have to like someone to be able to say what's fair. And Clinton has been treated incredibly unfairly.
Since the election, every time Clinton has made an appearance, some on the left and center have reacted with anything from disinterest to revulsion. "Shut the f--- up," wrote Hillary voter Gersh Kuntzman (a name that sounds as filthy as anything I could write here) in the New York Daily News after Clinton spoke at the Women for Women conference. The New Republic seems to put out an article a week on how Clinton is terrible and should go away.
They can't stand that Clinton blames James Comey's letter on her emails, Russian hacking, and misogyny as contributing factors to her win. Never mind that the polls show that Clinton's support took a dive after the Comey letter was leaked. Never mind that, in every case, she is sure to blame herself as harshly as the outside factors. Never mind that, despite losing the presidency due to the United States's archaic electoral system, she's still got a lifetime of experience as an activist and politician that is probably pretty damn valuable.
At a tech conference in Los Angeles yesterday, Clinton said that the Russian government "could not have known how best to weaponize that [hacked] information unless they had been guided." Asked who guided them, Clinton said that "it's pretty hard not to" say it was Trump and his campaign. This is the former Secretary of State accusing her rival of colluding with Russia to affect the outcome of a U.S. election. It's not some crazed real estate mogul tweeting madly in the middle of the night. Why wouldn't you want her out there saying this? The only reason you can view her as less credible on any of these issues is because you buy the conservative spin on her, whether you realize it or not, likely with a bit of sexism mixed in. And, god, yes, it's a temptation to tell those who have been part of our body politick for ages to go into the hinterlands, to disappear.
But I don't want Hillary Clinton to shut up. I want her out there, talking about the issues that matter to her, like Al Gore did with climate change, and that ended up shifting the entire conversation on the issue. I want her to talk about how, if you actually give a damn about elections, you'd demand that the Russian interference be investigated. I want her to get the next generation of Democrats, especially Democratic women, excited and out there and ready to run. I want her to get her revenge on a political machine, aided and abetted by a drooling media cohort, that tasked itself with wrecking her and her husband. Hell, that machine is already gearing up to go after Elizabeth Warren with the same intensity. She didn't win the election, but I want her to be able to stand on the ashes of the Trump administration and laugh that laugh that has annoyed so many.
Clinton should be in the mix, fanning the flames of anti-Trump sentiment, because she knows what we're losing with Trump, with every tweet he makes, with every slight of a world leader, with every promise to the working class broken, with every promise to the wealthy kept. Say what you will about her, decry her hawkish tendencies (I sure have), be angry at the way the DNC tilted towards her, be upset at her Wall Street connections, if you must, but she's walked the walk. And right now, we need all the voices we can muster - Sanders, Warren, Ellison, too - because the noise from the other side is, as ever, overwhelming.
As she said yesterday, "I'm not going anywhere. I have a big stake in what happens in this country. I am very unbowed and unbroken about what happened because I don’t want it to happen to anybody else. I don't want it to happen to the values and the institutions I care about in America." If nothing else, imagine how much strength it takes to suck up the loss, to stand up against every withering body blow she's suffered, and to still want to work for the country. No one would blame her for telling us all to go to hell and live out her life in luxury, far from the carping crowds.
But she won't. And she couldn't. And that should be acknowledged. And respected.
(You'll notice I'm not mentioning conservative attacks on Clinton. That's because there is nothing Clinton can do that would satiate the right's need to constantly try to destroy her. It's been an obsession for 25 years. She was mocked for walking in the woods and going to a bookstore post-election. And Republicans, especially the president, think that any support for Clinton or for an investigation into the Russian interference is about being a sore loser. No, we accept that Trump won. We accept that Clinton lost. We just want to know who Trump's working for.)
5/30/2017
Let the Nazi Scum Fuckers March in Portland
As a reaction to the Nazi scum fucker who murdered two men and injured another on a train in Portland, Oregon, the mayor of that city in the Nazi-infested northwestern United States has refused permits for a pair of upcoming Nazi scum rallies and asked the federal government to pull the permit for a June 4 event. The rallies are sure to be filled with Nazis of various shades of white, various addictions to meth and/or opiates, various tattoos marking them as dumbfucks who deserve our scorn, and various levels of intelligence from "holy fuck, how do you breathe" all the way up to "good thing Wal-Mart hires," along with one or two parasitic worms who exploit the ignorance of the others. We call them "Richard Spencers."
The reason this is up to the feds is that the marches are scheduled to take place in Schrunk Plaza in downtown Portland, and that is run by the feds. They already granted a permit for the Nazi scum fuckers to have their confusingly-named "Trump Free Speech Rally" on June 4 (Is it free speech for Trump? What the hell?). Then, on June 10, the even stupider "March Against Sharia" is supposed to occur, part of a national event, where, no doubt, dozens of deranged white gobblers of Alex Jones's manly jizz will gather to signal that they don't want something that isn't happening and will never happen to happen. Ironically, it wasn't creeping Sharia that killed those two men in Portland. It was a combination of batshit crazy and Islamophobia.
Mayor Ted Wheeler makes some good points about why the rallies should be cancelled or rescheduled. As he said in a statement released today, "Our City is in mourning, our community’s anger is real, and the timing and subject of these events can only exacerbate an already difficult situation." He even attempts to appeal to the Nazi scum fuckers, acting all polite and shit: "I am appealing to the organizers of the alt-right demonstrations to CANCEL the events they have scheduled on June 4th and June 10th. I urge them to ask their supporters to stay away from Portland." Yeah, fuck "alt-right." It's Nazi. Maybe "white supremacist," if someone's going all Confederate flag and shit.
The problem, of course, is that there's always gonna be someone who thinks the time is wrong for a march or protest. As the good Wonkette bloggerizes, "If you ban the neo-Nazis, then you’ve set a precedent to ban protests after cops kill an unarmed black kid." And the ACLU is being pretty loud and clear about the rights of the Nazi scum fuckers. They have First Amendment guarantees, too. Free speech ain't pretty, but protect it or it'll be gone before you realize you're missing it.
Besides, wouldn't you like to know who these assholes, dicks, and cunts are? They mostly live in the shadows of their online caverns, spitting out stories with headlines like "Heroic Officer Who Put Down Rabid Dog Tamir Rice Railroaded" and "Trump Planning to Trim ‘Get Whitey’ Bureaucracies," jacking off to videos of cops shooting unarmed black men. Let the marches happen and we all get to see just how ridiculous they are, just how sad they are, clinging to Nazis and the Confederacy, just one defeated past or another, believing that the natural movement of populations is "white genocide," huffing hate so hard like they sprayed it into a paper bag. Jesus, they're so dragged down by poverty and so deluded by conspiracy theories, the kind that explain how shitty life is for them because of non-whites, something that's easier to grasp than "Rich white people did this to you."
Goddamnit, let the Nazi scum out into the sun so we know who to avoid on trains. Because right now, a lot of white men are fucking frightening (and, yes, Ricky Best and Taliesin Namkai Meche, the pair who were killed in Portland, are white men). They are murdering black men and Native Americans randomly, they are planning bombings, and they are beating and killing and harassing Muslims, like one of the two young women on the train in Portland.
Let them march. Let's see their faces so we know. Just so we know.
(By the way, wanna see a bunch of Nazi scum fuckers in Oregon die horribly? Watch The Green Room. Great flick.)
The reason this is up to the feds is that the marches are scheduled to take place in Schrunk Plaza in downtown Portland, and that is run by the feds. They already granted a permit for the Nazi scum fuckers to have their confusingly-named "Trump Free Speech Rally" on June 4 (Is it free speech for Trump? What the hell?). Then, on June 10, the even stupider "March Against Sharia" is supposed to occur, part of a national event, where, no doubt, dozens of deranged white gobblers of Alex Jones's manly jizz will gather to signal that they don't want something that isn't happening and will never happen to happen. Ironically, it wasn't creeping Sharia that killed those two men in Portland. It was a combination of batshit crazy and Islamophobia.
Mayor Ted Wheeler makes some good points about why the rallies should be cancelled or rescheduled. As he said in a statement released today, "Our City is in mourning, our community’s anger is real, and the timing and subject of these events can only exacerbate an already difficult situation." He even attempts to appeal to the Nazi scum fuckers, acting all polite and shit: "I am appealing to the organizers of the alt-right demonstrations to CANCEL the events they have scheduled on June 4th and June 10th. I urge them to ask their supporters to stay away from Portland." Yeah, fuck "alt-right." It's Nazi. Maybe "white supremacist," if someone's going all Confederate flag and shit.
The problem, of course, is that there's always gonna be someone who thinks the time is wrong for a march or protest. As the good Wonkette bloggerizes, "If you ban the neo-Nazis, then you’ve set a precedent to ban protests after cops kill an unarmed black kid." And the ACLU is being pretty loud and clear about the rights of the Nazi scum fuckers. They have First Amendment guarantees, too. Free speech ain't pretty, but protect it or it'll be gone before you realize you're missing it.
Besides, wouldn't you like to know who these assholes, dicks, and cunts are? They mostly live in the shadows of their online caverns, spitting out stories with headlines like "Heroic Officer Who Put Down Rabid Dog Tamir Rice Railroaded" and "Trump Planning to Trim ‘Get Whitey’ Bureaucracies," jacking off to videos of cops shooting unarmed black men. Let the marches happen and we all get to see just how ridiculous they are, just how sad they are, clinging to Nazis and the Confederacy, just one defeated past or another, believing that the natural movement of populations is "white genocide," huffing hate so hard like they sprayed it into a paper bag. Jesus, they're so dragged down by poverty and so deluded by conspiracy theories, the kind that explain how shitty life is for them because of non-whites, something that's easier to grasp than "Rich white people did this to you."
Goddamnit, let the Nazi scum out into the sun so we know who to avoid on trains. Because right now, a lot of white men are fucking frightening (and, yes, Ricky Best and Taliesin Namkai Meche, the pair who were killed in Portland, are white men). They are murdering black men and Native Americans randomly, they are planning bombings, and they are beating and killing and harassing Muslims, like one of the two young women on the train in Portland.
Let them march. Let's see their faces so we know. Just so we know.
(By the way, wanna see a bunch of Nazi scum fuckers in Oregon die horribly? Watch The Green Room. Great flick.)
5/29/2017
A Poem for Memorial Day
"Parade"
by Jennifer Pacanowski
The funeral procession from Syracuse airport to Ithaca NY was over 50 miles long.
Dragging his dead body through town after town of people, families and children waving flags.
The fallen HERO had finally come home.
I wonder how many children who saw this, will someday want to be dead HEROES too.
I did not wave a flag that day or anyway since my return.
I still can't help but think that could have been me, but it wasn’t.
The hero was hit by a suicide bomber on a motorcycle, struggled to live but didn’t make it.
That was not me.
I was missed by IEDs, bullets, mortars, RPGs.
Is it luck?
Was it training?
Was it GOD?
Was it the Devil?
Why did I survive only to come home to a war with an invisible enemy in my own skin?
I live in a dream called my life. Where the good things don't seem real or sustainable.
I live in the nightmares of the past called Iraq and PTSD that never run out of fuel.
Is it better to be a dead hero?
Or a living fucked up, addicted, crazy veteran?
Suicide rates soar, but no one calls them heroes.
So, on this day, I'm going to have a parade for those brave young men and women that killed themselves.
I was not brave enough to follow through and I admire them.
These dead decided they couldn't live with who they became, who they are, accept what happened or find healing.
The barriers and obstacles that they weave through, while carrying the burden of war, consumes them with despair and failure,
And their actions are branded on the soul as reminders of what they did "over there,"
These failures are punishable by death.
To those who were able to escape death in a combat zone like true warriors,
But could not thrive in a society that does not understand them or help them understand themselves.
I wave my motherfucking flag.
The parades run every 80 minutes, blood drips from the small towns to the big cities, the grief consuming millions of miles.
Then I wonder,
WOULD those flag wavers ask...
Why are we there?
Why are we at war?
Why are the soldiers and marines killing themselves at home?
What have we done?
How cans this stop?
Or would they just duck their heads and wave their flags? For the dead heroes.
by Jennifer Pacanowski
The funeral procession from Syracuse airport to Ithaca NY was over 50 miles long.
Dragging his dead body through town after town of people, families and children waving flags.
The fallen HERO had finally come home.
I wonder how many children who saw this, will someday want to be dead HEROES too.
I did not wave a flag that day or anyway since my return.
I still can't help but think that could have been me, but it wasn’t.
The hero was hit by a suicide bomber on a motorcycle, struggled to live but didn’t make it.
That was not me.
I was missed by IEDs, bullets, mortars, RPGs.
Is it luck?
Was it training?
Was it GOD?
Was it the Devil?
Why did I survive only to come home to a war with an invisible enemy in my own skin?
I live in a dream called my life. Where the good things don't seem real or sustainable.
I live in the nightmares of the past called Iraq and PTSD that never run out of fuel.
Is it better to be a dead hero?
Or a living fucked up, addicted, crazy veteran?
Suicide rates soar, but no one calls them heroes.
So, on this day, I'm going to have a parade for those brave young men and women that killed themselves.
I was not brave enough to follow through and I admire them.
These dead decided they couldn't live with who they became, who they are, accept what happened or find healing.
The barriers and obstacles that they weave through, while carrying the burden of war, consumes them with despair and failure,
And their actions are branded on the soul as reminders of what they did "over there,"
These failures are punishable by death.
To those who were able to escape death in a combat zone like true warriors,
But could not thrive in a society that does not understand them or help them understand themselves.
I wave my motherfucking flag.
The parades run every 80 minutes, blood drips from the small towns to the big cities, the grief consuming millions of miles.
Then I wonder,
WOULD those flag wavers ask...
Why are we there?
Why are we at war?
Why are the soldiers and marines killing themselves at home?
What have we done?
How cans this stop?
Or would they just duck their heads and wave their flags? For the dead heroes.
5/25/2017
American Wreckage: Trump Is Radically Degrading the United States
Donald Trump was standing before one of the holy relics of the 21st-century: a twisted piece of the fallen World Trade Center, destroyed on September 11, 2001. It was a dedication ceremony at the new headquarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and speeches were being made about two memorials, one for the Berlin Wall and one for 9/11 and Article 5 of the treaty, which says that an attack on one NATO country is an attack on all of them. After 9/11, NATO invoked Article 5 for the first time, and, like a Megazord of justice, all the the allied nations in the organization joined with the United States to fight in Afghanistan.
I was in Denmark shortly after 9/11, and I met soldiers there, young Danes, who were on their way, proud to take part in a war on terror, however misguided it may have been, alongside the United States.
Introducing Donald Trump, who, we always remember with the shock and force of a cattle prod, is the president of the United States, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said, "When our open and free societies come under attack, we stand up for our values and our way of life. That is why a strong NATO is good for Europe, and good for North America. The 9/11 and Article 5 Memorial will be a daily reminder of our vital bond."
And then Trump strode over to the lectern, dropped his pants, and shit all over the gathered leaders, shit all over the treaty itself, and, indeed, shit all over the 9/11 wreckage.
It must have been odd for the presidents and prime ministers to think that Trump, a mere few days ago, was standing in a golden palace in Saudi Arabia, praising the repressive, torturing, warmongering, terrorist-supporting Saudi monarchy. And then he stood alongside the barbaric leader of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, and gave him the kind of accolades reserved for saints. Even Angela Merkel, who has experienced firsthand Trump's shallow ignorance, must have just thought, "What the fuck?"
Because, see, Trump started his speech with his usual combination of false sorrow and bullshit bravado. "All people who cherish life must unite in finding, exposing, and removing these killers and extremists -- and, yes, losers," he said, repeating his latest moronic Trumpism. "They are losers." He did observe that the 9/11 attacks led to NATO "invoking for the first time in its history the Article 5 collective defense commitments."
And then shit got weird.
Again, just to remind you, this was a 9/11 memorial dedication ceremony. So when Trump started gushing about Saudi Arabia, where 15 of the hijackers came from, that was kinda fucked up. And then he said, "I spent much time with King Salman, a wise man who wants to see things get much better rapidly."
You know that more than one of the European heads of state wanted to raise a hand and say, "Um, maybe he should start at home. No, like, literally in his house." Or maybe someone wanted to tell Trump, "He's a king. We were all elected. What the fuck is wrong with you?"
And, again, it can't be said enough, this was a ceremony dedicated to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the way that nations came together under Article 5 of the NATO treaty, the T in NATO, to help the U.S. after 9/11, nations that lost soldiers in the war they joined under Article 5. Got it? Because then Trump outright fucking accused the countries represented there of being cheats and cheapskates, even though that's a complete and utter filthy lie. But that never stops our goddamn president.
"23 of the 28 member nations are still not paying what they should be paying and what they’re supposed to be paying for their defense," Trump said, completely ignoring that the member nations have until 2024 to meet that obligation. And, frankly, what the fuck gives this guy, who stiffs small contractors at his casinos, the right to even bring up debts owed, real or fake. But he went on, "This is not fair to the people and taxpayers of the United States. And many of these nations owe massive amounts of money from past years and not paying in those past years." And he kept going, like that douchey friend who doesn't think it's fair to split the restaurant bill evenly because he had water while everyone else got sodas. Fuck you, Don, you should have gotten a Coke.
Was Trump a complete dickhead? Of course, he was. He noted that he was in the new NATO building and said, "I never asked once what the new NATO Headquarters cost. I refuse to do that." It cost about a billion Euros. Yeah, it's expensive. You might wanna talk to some Republicans about the nearly billion dollar American embassy in Iraq for a cost comparison.
You know what Trump didn't do in his speech? He had pretty much already shit the bed, having shoved the prime minister of Montenegro aside so he could prance and preen for the camera, and having told the European Union members that Germany is "evil, very evil" for selling so many cars in the United States (which, funny story, they make in U.S. factories with American workers). But he didn't say that he supported Article 5. He didn't say that the United States would honor it, even though he was at an Article 5 memorial dedication. Instead, he implied that, unless the rest of NATO paid a protection fee, America wouldn't live up to its treaty obligations.
In a single meeting, Trump degraded the place of the United States in the world. He went to Brussels and was essentially a drunk businessman, fingering the help and pissing in the fountain. He allied us with dictators, kings, and madmen, and he told our long-time, most reliable allies that there was really going to be a new world order. Trump is a radical without a cause or an ideology. And it's fucking terrifying.
And, as with everything with this petulant, paranoid, petty president, it's an embarrassment.
I was in Denmark shortly after 9/11, and I met soldiers there, young Danes, who were on their way, proud to take part in a war on terror, however misguided it may have been, alongside the United States.
Introducing Donald Trump, who, we always remember with the shock and force of a cattle prod, is the president of the United States, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said, "When our open and free societies come under attack, we stand up for our values and our way of life. That is why a strong NATO is good for Europe, and good for North America. The 9/11 and Article 5 Memorial will be a daily reminder of our vital bond."
And then Trump strode over to the lectern, dropped his pants, and shit all over the gathered leaders, shit all over the treaty itself, and, indeed, shit all over the 9/11 wreckage.
It must have been odd for the presidents and prime ministers to think that Trump, a mere few days ago, was standing in a golden palace in Saudi Arabia, praising the repressive, torturing, warmongering, terrorist-supporting Saudi monarchy. And then he stood alongside the barbaric leader of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, and gave him the kind of accolades reserved for saints. Even Angela Merkel, who has experienced firsthand Trump's shallow ignorance, must have just thought, "What the fuck?"
Because, see, Trump started his speech with his usual combination of false sorrow and bullshit bravado. "All people who cherish life must unite in finding, exposing, and removing these killers and extremists -- and, yes, losers," he said, repeating his latest moronic Trumpism. "They are losers." He did observe that the 9/11 attacks led to NATO "invoking for the first time in its history the Article 5 collective defense commitments."
And then shit got weird.
Again, just to remind you, this was a 9/11 memorial dedication ceremony. So when Trump started gushing about Saudi Arabia, where 15 of the hijackers came from, that was kinda fucked up. And then he said, "I spent much time with King Salman, a wise man who wants to see things get much better rapidly."
You know that more than one of the European heads of state wanted to raise a hand and say, "Um, maybe he should start at home. No, like, literally in his house." Or maybe someone wanted to tell Trump, "He's a king. We were all elected. What the fuck is wrong with you?"
And, again, it can't be said enough, this was a ceremony dedicated to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the way that nations came together under Article 5 of the NATO treaty, the T in NATO, to help the U.S. after 9/11, nations that lost soldiers in the war they joined under Article 5. Got it? Because then Trump outright fucking accused the countries represented there of being cheats and cheapskates, even though that's a complete and utter filthy lie. But that never stops our goddamn president.
"23 of the 28 member nations are still not paying what they should be paying and what they’re supposed to be paying for their defense," Trump said, completely ignoring that the member nations have until 2024 to meet that obligation. And, frankly, what the fuck gives this guy, who stiffs small contractors at his casinos, the right to even bring up debts owed, real or fake. But he went on, "This is not fair to the people and taxpayers of the United States. And many of these nations owe massive amounts of money from past years and not paying in those past years." And he kept going, like that douchey friend who doesn't think it's fair to split the restaurant bill evenly because he had water while everyone else got sodas. Fuck you, Don, you should have gotten a Coke.
Was Trump a complete dickhead? Of course, he was. He noted that he was in the new NATO building and said, "I never asked once what the new NATO Headquarters cost. I refuse to do that." It cost about a billion Euros. Yeah, it's expensive. You might wanna talk to some Republicans about the nearly billion dollar American embassy in Iraq for a cost comparison.
You know what Trump didn't do in his speech? He had pretty much already shit the bed, having shoved the prime minister of Montenegro aside so he could prance and preen for the camera, and having told the European Union members that Germany is "evil, very evil" for selling so many cars in the United States (which, funny story, they make in U.S. factories with American workers). But he didn't say that he supported Article 5. He didn't say that the United States would honor it, even though he was at an Article 5 memorial dedication. Instead, he implied that, unless the rest of NATO paid a protection fee, America wouldn't live up to its treaty obligations.
In a single meeting, Trump degraded the place of the United States in the world. He went to Brussels and was essentially a drunk businessman, fingering the help and pissing in the fountain. He allied us with dictators, kings, and madmen, and he told our long-time, most reliable allies that there was really going to be a new world order. Trump is a radical without a cause or an ideology. And it's fucking terrifying.
And, as with everything with this petulant, paranoid, petty president, it's an embarrassment.
5/24/2017
Government of the Sick Fucks, by the Sick Fucks, and for the Sick Fucks (Part 1: Of)
There is a genre of news story lately that has gotten old really damn fast. It's the "Hey, here's a fucking dumbass who voted for Trump and is now gonna be fucked by him" variety. Essentially, a diligent reporter goes to some shitty place, finds one or more of the aforementioned dumbasses, and gets them to say something along the lines of "Well, Trump's budget and health care plan will leave me dying of cancer in a ditch while my Congress member pisses on me, but I still support my president."
For instance, on CNN, we meet Barbara Puckett of Beattyville, Kentucky, which is the deepest shithole for white people in the nation. Puckett's got sclerosis and is on Social Security disability and food stamps, both of which are on the cutting board in Donald Trump's savage budget. But she's not abandoning her man: ""I am still happy with President Trump," she said.
AP reporters headed out across the country to talk to a spectrum of people, from white idiots in New York to white morons in Georgia to white dolts in Iowa. They all agree that they couldn't give a happy monkey fuck about the stories about Trump and Russia. It's all lies or bullshit, they say. Or you just ignore it, as one Staten Island hairdresser said, "I didn’t want to be depressed. I don’t want to feel that he’s not doing what he said, so I just choose to not listen." A college student there offered his support by saying, "If you’re wishing for him to fail, you’re basically wishing for the pilot of the plane to crash." To which one could point out that if the pilot doesn't know how to fly the plane, all the wishing in the world ain't gonna help you.
(To be vaguely fair, one of the Staten Islanders did get off a decent joke. When asked if anything could turn him against Trump, a man replied, "If he gases his own people, yeah, I would be against him," which, c'mon, is kind of funny. Well, until Trump starts gassing Brooklyn.)
Back in April, Nicholas Kristof wrote about a whole bunch of Americans who will suffer if even a fraction of Trump's budget were to be passed (which, let's face it, is the goal in putting out such a nut-punchingly vicious document). They include a 70-year-old woman in Tulsa, Oklahoma, who is dependent on a job from the Senior Community Service Employment Program, which Trump has proposed slashing. She voted for the president because "he was talking about getting rid of those illegals," of course. If the program is cut, she said, "I’ll sit home and die."
But like almost everyone in these stories, she says she would vote for Trump in 2020. That's just sick. These are sick fucks who don't care if the god they worship wants to kill them.
The best mark in a con is the kind who doesn't believe they've been conned, even when the con is revealed. Either they are so embarrassed that it's easier just to double down on the delusion or they're that fucking stupid. And, in the end, it doesn't matter because they'll line up to be fleeced again.
Another genre of news story is of the wishful thinking variety. They say things like "Trump's Budget Cuts Target His Voters" or "Wait Until Trump's Supporters See the Size of the Dildo He's Fucking Them With" or "Man, Grandpa's Gonna Be Mad When He Catches Trump Stabbing His Grandkids." And they all posit a fantasy that Trump will cross some line, be it with health care or other cuts, or even in his canoodling with Russia, that will make his followers turn against him.
It's the same sort of hoping without any evidence that got us Trump in the first place. I've said it before: Fuck the dumbasses. The hell with the sick fucks. Don't court them. Don't count on them. Build up the outreach to the people who didn't vote. And then get elected and pass programs that help the dumbasses and everyone else.
For instance, on CNN, we meet Barbara Puckett of Beattyville, Kentucky, which is the deepest shithole for white people in the nation. Puckett's got sclerosis and is on Social Security disability and food stamps, both of which are on the cutting board in Donald Trump's savage budget. But she's not abandoning her man: ""I am still happy with President Trump," she said.
AP reporters headed out across the country to talk to a spectrum of people, from white idiots in New York to white morons in Georgia to white dolts in Iowa. They all agree that they couldn't give a happy monkey fuck about the stories about Trump and Russia. It's all lies or bullshit, they say. Or you just ignore it, as one Staten Island hairdresser said, "I didn’t want to be depressed. I don’t want to feel that he’s not doing what he said, so I just choose to not listen." A college student there offered his support by saying, "If you’re wishing for him to fail, you’re basically wishing for the pilot of the plane to crash." To which one could point out that if the pilot doesn't know how to fly the plane, all the wishing in the world ain't gonna help you.
(To be vaguely fair, one of the Staten Islanders did get off a decent joke. When asked if anything could turn him against Trump, a man replied, "If he gases his own people, yeah, I would be against him," which, c'mon, is kind of funny. Well, until Trump starts gassing Brooklyn.)
Back in April, Nicholas Kristof wrote about a whole bunch of Americans who will suffer if even a fraction of Trump's budget were to be passed (which, let's face it, is the goal in putting out such a nut-punchingly vicious document). They include a 70-year-old woman in Tulsa, Oklahoma, who is dependent on a job from the Senior Community Service Employment Program, which Trump has proposed slashing. She voted for the president because "he was talking about getting rid of those illegals," of course. If the program is cut, she said, "I’ll sit home and die."
But like almost everyone in these stories, she says she would vote for Trump in 2020. That's just sick. These are sick fucks who don't care if the god they worship wants to kill them.
The best mark in a con is the kind who doesn't believe they've been conned, even when the con is revealed. Either they are so embarrassed that it's easier just to double down on the delusion or they're that fucking stupid. And, in the end, it doesn't matter because they'll line up to be fleeced again.
Another genre of news story is of the wishful thinking variety. They say things like "Trump's Budget Cuts Target His Voters" or "Wait Until Trump's Supporters See the Size of the Dildo He's Fucking Them With" or "Man, Grandpa's Gonna Be Mad When He Catches Trump Stabbing His Grandkids." And they all posit a fantasy that Trump will cross some line, be it with health care or other cuts, or even in his canoodling with Russia, that will make his followers turn against him.
It's the same sort of hoping without any evidence that got us Trump in the first place. I've said it before: Fuck the dumbasses. The hell with the sick fucks. Don't court them. Don't count on them. Build up the outreach to the people who didn't vote. And then get elected and pass programs that help the dumbasses and everyone else.
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