Q NOTES No. 1160: Fridazed Short Cut

 A community contributor at Daily Kos offers a suggestion for Joe Biden regarding the debt ceiling crisis. By invoking the 14th amendment, he meets his obligation as president. If, as expected, the MAGA Monkeys in Congress respond by taking their opposition to the supreme (sic) court, the burden of responsibility for potential economic disaster is shifted to the MAGA mooks.

Q NOTES # 725: Fill 'er up.

Gasoline's getting expensive again, after COVID drove pump prices down in the early months of the lockdown. As usual, Trumpunklicans want to blame Joe for the situation, even though war profiteering by the major oil companies is probably responsible for most of the increase. Democrats in Congress are working on a windfall profits tax plan that makes sense. 

All that's needed to make this a better world to live in? If Pisspuddle would simply go away quietly and try to enjoy what's left of his time on earth in silence and solitude. Try to visualize four consecutive weeks without a single mention of anything he's said or done or tried to do.

It won't happen for one reason: The only way Pisspuddle can continue to use his ignorant followers as a steady stream of free money is to dominate their consciousness, such as it is. His latest scam is probably a scheme to finance a new private jet comparable to the one he traveled in when he was still a so-called precedent (sic).  

I defy anyone to list three ways that Trumpunklicans are necessary to the health, happiness, and general welfare of the United States. Coming up with just one is an almost impossible task. Watching them trying to shift gears from being Putin's biggest admirers to being Ukraine's most important allies would be comical if it wasn't so damned sickening.

 With Pisspuddle, it doesn't matter what the question is; the answer is always whatever's on his mind at that particular moment.

Q NOTES # 367

Leave it to RepubliQans to screw up a good deal every single time. A bunch of red state AG's are threatening to sue the federal government if their states aren't allowed to use COVID stimulus subsidies to offset significant tax cuts. The federal funds are meant to protect public services that are in jeopardy due to budget deficits, and any state that doesn't want to use the money for that purpose should be scratched from the list. Let them go ahead with their tax cuts, but don't expect the rest of us to pay for it.

Now that COVID vaccinations are a major story, it figures that Cheez Doodle is eager to be the star of the show. He wants to jump to the front of the line by publicly encouraging all those reluctant snowflakes who are refusing the shots, most of whom voted for him last year, to get with the program. The test now will be to find out if they'll listen to him or not. 

It's unfortunate for religion that depraved lunatics like this Rick Joyner character get so much attention, with their civil war dreams and similar fantasies.

@ Daily Kos ~ Joe & Kamala and the Democratic-controlled Congress are off to a great start. The RepubliQans? Their start is not so hot. The party's essentially controlled by an ignorant, unqualified bozo, and their agenda has been whatever the bozo was tweeting about at any given moment - mostly culture-war crapola or TV reality show fodder.

PS: Decent Americans should be thankful that Cheez Doodle is evil and stupid instead of evil and intelligent. 

Another PS: Transgender teenagers do not offend me at all. The people who are really offensive are RepubliQan politicians in Washington DC and state governments. If I tried hard, I might be able to name some who don't make me want to puke. The ones who are usually in the news are the worst ones. The decent ones rarely get any attention. 

Blame Games

Washington Monthly: If the US economy goes into the shit can, and signs are that it might, Donny Squats is already preparing his list of people to blame. As usual, his own name isn't on it.

If Donny Squats is really the fabulous precedent (sic) he proclaims himself to be, why are the people who donate money to him so nervous about being publicly identified?

The sleaze never ends.

Most of us knew all along that there was a hell of a lot more behind Stink Eye's obsession with erecting a southern border wall than keeping Mexicans out. When trying to figure out what the fat fuck's really up to, just dig around until you find out whose pockets taxpayer dollars will end up in.

On the same subject (Stink Eye sleaze), Daily Kos has more about those multi-billion dollar bailouts to the farmers he's screwing, and where most of that money's going.

Sometimes I think I might be able to handle daily doses of Stink Eye if he was the only filthy Republican gutter trash we were forced to deal with. Sadly, he's rounded up a small army of worthless Republicans assholes and given all of them jobs in the executive branch, and there are another 250 or so in Congress propping him up.

PS @ 11:40 PM: If stupidity was a fatal disease, there wouldn't be many Stink Eye supporters left on earth, and the few who were would soon be gone as well.

PPS @ 12:17 AM: Now Donny wants to investigate people for the crime of investigating Donny's crimes? No shit? What an a-hole.

Trade-offs

The bad news is that Donny Nachos is planning to keep the government shut down for months, maybe years, even though he's been told the damage to the economy will be more significant than originally estimated. It's even possible the shutdown could lead to a recession.

The good news is that wrecking the economy is probably the only thing that might cause voters to throw these GOP motherfuckers out of office next year.

Propped Up?

I don't know how many times I've read reports that Donnie Nachos is getting the benefit of a robust economy, and that his approval rating won't slide below its current level as long as the economy is purring like a happy kitten. Maybe it's time to find out for sure if a little bad economic news will shake some of his support loose.

More Money Matters.

I have no way of knowing for sure, but if Teeny Weenie is ever punished, I think it will be a result of crimes involving misuse of money. That motherfucker will try to sell anything, including access.

Teeny imagined the presidency was one great big get-rich-quick opportunity, so naturally, he took advantage of it. And it worked for a long time.

Privatization

My opinion, based on personal observation and experience, is this: It's almost always a big mistake to transfer government services and functions to businesses that have a primary goal of maximizing profits. Private sector firms seeking easy money always guarantee that the service can be provided, or the function can be performed, much more effectively at a substantially reduced cost to the government. And Republicans always fall for it.

We've already seen the Halliburton money pit in operation in Iraq.

Grand Reopening (Stage One)

According to the liberal blogs, the Senate approved a short-term funding bill that will reopen the federal government temporarily (Stage One). Now the House must pass it (Stage Two), and it's not clear that the lunatic fringe (House Freedom Caucus) will cooperate. If they do, it still needs Donny Trumpery's signature (Stage Three).

It remains to be seen whether the Senate Democrats made a shrewd calculation that will pay dividends. Any time Democrats make an effort to work constructively with steaming fecal matter like Chinless Wonder, Cheese Prince, and Donny Trumpery, nothing can be taken for granted, and failure is definitely an option.

Budget Cuts

It's hard to stomach the news these days, but I've decided that Congress should finance the Tax Freedom for Billionaires bill by just zeroing out the entire defense budget. Frankly, any country that allows itself to be completely taken over by stinking gutter crawlers like Donnie Dogfarts and the current Republican Party isn't worth protecting anymore. 

More about the forthcoming disaster from Digby. Imagine how dangerous Donnie Dogfarts will be after he gets his Big Win by signing the Tax Freedom for Billionaires bill, and all the nastiness included in it becomes the New American Way of Life.

Added 8:27 PM Friday: Here's the latest update from the Senate. I repeat, just zero out the entire DOD budget, and disarm all the existing nukes. That will prevent Deep Doo Doo Donnie from pitching a hissy fit and launching a first strike, and maybe North Korea will use their entire arsenal of ICBM's to take out Alabama, Mississippi and Kentucky.

Added 1:01 PM Saturday: There's an informative piece @ Vox regarding the next step in the process of destroying the United States. The Tax Freedom for Billionaires bill now moves to conference committee, where the Senate and House versions still need to be reconciled. 

Comprehension: Zero

Washington Monthly discusses some reasons why the United States needs a real (not fake) president who understands how the federal government works, rather than a fuckwit like Ass Lube, who has no clue about what's happening in the real world today.

Dropping

The stock market seems to be, like most of America, reacting negatively to the news these days about the loose cannon careening around on the international stage. Remember a few weeks ago, when the so-called precedent (sic) was bragging and taking personal credit for everything positive about the national economy?

Wasteful government spending

The amount of money American taxpayers are spending to keep Fat Daddy in office is starting to add up. We need to figure out how to force him to reimburse us. While we're at it, we should require all these billionaires to pay for their own security. They can afford it.

Added 7:22 PM Saturday 15 April: Politicus USA reports on proposed legislation this country really really needs.

Proceed cautiously

Another azzwhole Congressman from Alabama says that some of his colleagues may be starting to wimp out on the tea party's plan to repeal Obamacare after all those nasty scenes at town hall meetings, etc.

A recent Pew Reasearch poll finds that public support for the ACA is increasing. This may reflect the fact that voters are finally learning that there's really no such thing as Obamacare, just the Affordable Care Act. For years, many voters didn't realize the new health insurance protection they liked pretty well was that horrible, catastrophic liberal disaster the tea party azzwholes were constantly bitching about and trying to abolish. The Pew poll reports that even among those who don't like Obamacare, only 17 percent want it abolished entirely. There will always be 15-20 percent who are totally fucked up beyond any hope of recovery.

As of January, Mo Brooks was one of 30 known members of the so-called House Freedom Caucus, a group of tea party shit asses from a few solid red districts. In the House, seven percent of the 435 members have been pushing around the other 93 percent for too long. That needs to change.

Meanwhile, the so-called secretary of the treasury is rolling out the same old verse of the same old song for the 100,000th time since Reagan was elected in 1980. The goddamned Republicans ran out of fresh new ideas 35 years ago. More tax cuts for billionaires and massive deregulation, and everyone be rich! Hooray! 

Taking the Hit

Now that the bottom-of-the-barrel assholes the so-called president nominated to fill the executive branch are being confirmed, we should face the fact that nearly every person living in the United States is going to feel the pain. The people in the top five percent will have people to do their suffering for them, of course.

Since I'm feeling nasty and mean-spirited, I enjoyed reading that Trump voters are likely to suffer as a result of the economic disaster he's heading into. My hope is that the trumpkins are the first ones hit, that they feel the most pain, and that their misery lasts the longest. If that doesn't get their goddamned attention, nothing ever will. 

Estate Taxes

And the rich keep gettin' richer.

Vets

If veterans think they have problems now, let's see how they feel if the Koch brothers succeed in privatizing the Department of Veteran Affairs.

I'll never buy into the idea that public services can be improved by turning them over to some private sector firm whose main goal is to maximize its profitability. The promise is always "Better service, lower cost."

But somehow, soda pop ends up costing 45 bucks a case.

Why It Matters

An article in Salon today explains why Republicans are desperate to win the White House, so desperate they'll let Mittens get away with just about anything. Hint: It has to do with the national economy and the direction in which it's moving.

Reset

Mitt can't catch a break. Everybody's tweeting about his debate performance, he finally renounced his "47 percent" accusations... and now THIS?

A headline in today's Dallas Morning News says the Republicans see a "reset" opportunity following the first presidential debate this week. 

The Romney campaign is definitely in reset mode alright. Vanished is Tea Party Mitt, and reappearing is Good Old Moderate Massachusetts Mormon Mitt, who wants to work across party lines to compromise with Democrats. What's not to like about THAT guy? He's a human chameleon.

Random Reflections on the Romney Reset:

If Romney believes the Paul Ryan/Tea Party agenda is a winner, why did he spend an entire debate trying to blur the distinctions between himself and Obama? Do you think his internal polls are telling him something?

In the unlikely event that Mittens pulls off a comeback of history-making proportions, he will do it because he won the support of moderates who bought the Moderate Massachusetts Mitt product he's now marketing. Depending strictly on conservative Republicans, Mitt's locked in at 47 percent or less (even in Rasmussen). Assuming he felt any sense of allegiance (questionable), it would probably be to the moderates who got him elected. So the Paul Ryan/Tea Party folks should get accustomed to being cut off at the knees, as they were when Mitts renounced his position on 47 percenters.