|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 7:49:16 GMT -8
My wife and I were sitting at a table at my high school reunion, and I kept staring at a drunken lady swigging her drink as she sat alone at a nearby table.
My wife asked, 'Do you know her?' 'Yes,' I sighed, 'She's my old girlfriend.
I understand she took to drinking right after we split up those many years ago, and I hear she hasn't been sober since.'
'My God!' says my wife, 'Who would think a person could go on celebrating that long?'
And then the fight started.....
Previous Guy (PG) Loves OPM
As Donald Trump's legal woes mount, donors and the Republican party have paid millions in dollars of his legal fees.
His newest legal headache saw him and three of his children hit with a fraud lawsuit, which alleges they lied about the value of property "by billions".
Financial data shows that he has already spent more than $1m (£890,000) of donations fighting the case in 2022.
Millions of dollars spent combatting these charges have come from Mr Trump's Save America political action committee (PAC) - which takes donations from Trump supporters across the country - Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings show.
Save America has paid more than $1.12m this year alone to law firms hired to defend Mr Trump in the New York case. As a so-called "Leadership PAC", it can use money to pay for expenses that cannot be funded by campaign committees, such as some personal travel or some leadership expenses.
The website of Save America's Joint Fundraising Committee - which contributes both to Save America and a second Trump PAC, Make America Great Again - makes no mention of legal bills, saying only that "the future of our Country [sic] is at stake and President Trump is calling on all Patriots to join his fight to Save America".
Of the $1.12m spent, more than $942,000 has gone to the firm of Alina Habba, a New Jersey-based attorney who has doubled as a Trump spokeswoman.
Another lawyer, New York-based Alan Futerfas, received nearly $185,000 in July. Mr Futerfas is representing Mr Trump's children - Don Jr, Ivanka, and Eric - in the New York fraud case.
It is unclear how much of his own money Mr Trump has spent on his legal cases. (I have a guess: ZERO.)
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 7:50:45 GMT -8
As Much As I Want to Hate Elon Musk, He Also Does Good Stuff
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has been given the green light by the United States government to activate the satellite internet service Starlink to help Iranians protesting against the death of a woman in police custody.
Access to social media and some content is tightly restricted in Iran and significant internet outages were reported across the country on Saturday, with one of the biggest mobile phone operators disrupted, leaving millions of Iranians offline.
The US Treasury Department on Friday issued guidance expanding internet services available to Iranians despite US sanctions on the country.
The move follows deadly protests around Iran following the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who died after being detained by “morality police” who questioned the way she was wearing her headscarf.
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 7:52:03 GMT -8
Note to the QOP: Jokes Are Supposed to Be Funny
Tudor Dixon, Michigan’s GOP nominee for governor, joked about a 2020 kidnapping plot against rival Gov. Gretchen Whitmer during a pair of campaign events Friday, sparking swift denunciations from Democrats.
“The sad thing is that Gretchen will tie your hands, put a gun to your head and ask if you are ready to talk. For someone so worried about getting kidnapped, Gretchen Whitmer sure is good at taking business hostage and holding it for ransom,” Dixon said at one event.
Later that day, in describing a recent appearance by Whitmer, Dixon said, “The look on her face was like, ‘Oh, my gosh, this is happening. I’d rather be kidnapped by the FBI.”
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 7:54:09 GMT -8
My Wife and I Have Appointments. There are Still 4,000 People Being Hospitalized Every Day
At least 4.4 million people have received an updated Covid booster since the start of the month, according to data released Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That number represents around 1.5% of people currently eligible to receive the shots in the U.S.
The data does not include people who received updated Pfizer-BioNTech boosters in Idaho and Texas, the CDC said, so it is likely an underestimate. The White House estimates the number to be closer to 5 million doses of the new booster, The Associated Press reported.
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 7:57:06 GMT -8
PG Loses and Loses and Loses
Not one document has been sorted, but Donald Trump has already lost everything he gained when Judge Aileen Cannon appointed a “special master.” In the last week, rulings from that special master, Judge Raymond Dearie, and from a three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, have drained the entire process of any value to Trump. That process will continue. But everything Trump hoped to achieve, is gone.
In the case of the documents that Trump stole from the White House and carted off to Mar-a-Lago, Trump has already worked the refs for 21 months of delay. Thanks to Judge Cannon, he expected the special master process to take him safely through the next three months, gliding past the mid-term elections, while the Department of Justice had to sit on their hands.
Except what happened this week not only gutted the value of the special master process, they also anticipated Trump’s next moves.
Trump: "We Will Have So Much Winning If I Get Elected That You May Get Bored With Winning"
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 8:00:59 GMT -8
Meanwhile the UK Is Sinking
Pound tumbles below $1.09 after Kwarteng’s £45bn tax cut package
Kwarteng axes top rate of income tax and reduces basic rate but gilt yields surge on government borrowing fears
The Institute for Fiscal Studies think-tank forecast public borrowing would top £190bn this year, the third-highest peak since the second world war.Kwarteng, in an interview with the Financial Times, vowed to produce a medium-term fiscal plan “in the new year”, as he seeks to reassure markets he has a strategy for cutting debt as a share of gross domestic product.
The government stands accused of introducing a “simply staggering, huge tax cut for richer households” that will leave “the super-wealthy laughing all the way to the actual bank”, while allowing hundreds of thousands of already-struggling families to fall deeper into poverty.
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 8:08:14 GMT -8
How Not to Deliver a MessageWhen you’re the Republicans and are trying to really hard to convince America to give you another shot at being in power, it would be a very good idea to stay far away from anything Russia. Particularly right now. Oops. Is He Quoting Frank Lincoln?As he rolled out the first official Republican Party congressional platform in years, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy fittingly invoked the revered father of the GOP: Abraham Lincoln. At the top of a letter to Republican lawmakers thanking them for their contributions to the “Commitment To America”—the policy agenda they are launching near Pittsburgh on Friday—McCarthy included a quote attributed to Lincoln. “Commitment,” reads the quote, “is what transforms a promise into reality.” For McCarthy’s purposes, it’s a pitch-perfect message. There’s just one problem: there’s no record of Lincoln actually saying it.  It actually came from an 1980s Lehman Brothers TV ad? You remember them—the massive financial services firm that went bankrupt in the 2008 financial crisis. How much more perfect does it get than that? Oops. White Bread is the Prefect ImageHere’s the setting for McCarthy’s video introducing the plan. That’s a lot of white bread.  And here’s where he talks about the devastating effects of Joe Biden’s economy. 
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 8:11:32 GMT -8
He's From PA. That's Park Avenue, Not Pennsylvania
Mehmet Oz tried to question Fetterman's health by releasing a letter from a doctor saying he was very healthy.
One of the first things that many people noticed about Mehmet Oz’s doctor is that he’s based on Fifth Avenue, along Central Park in Manhattan, NYC. Not a great look for a guy that has tried and failed numerous times to pretend he is residing in Pennsylvania.
John Fetterman released a statement decimating this political stunt.
Today Dr. Oz confirmed that he does not actually live in Pennsylvania, because no one who does would have a primary care doctor on 5th Avenue in Manhattan.
We didn’t need to know Dr. Oz’s bone density. We need to know whether he would vote to ban all abortions after 15 weeks. We need to know whether he would vote to raise the minimum wage. We need to know whether he even plans to stay in Pennsylvania after the election.
In June, I released a letter from my doctor where he clearly stated that I am fit to serve. Dr. Oz built his entire career by lying to people about health. I trust my actual doctors over the opinion of a charlatan who played on on TV.
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 8:14:39 GMT -8
Why Waste Money On Cannon Fodder?
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 8:16:47 GMT -8
Herding Cats
A faction of far-right Republicans have all but promised they’ll threaten a government shutdown if the GOP wins back the House of Representatives in the upcoming election, putting leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) in a precarious position.
Members of the Freedom Caucus have said they’ll oppose any government funding bill that expires before the next Congress, when Republicans could control the chamber and have more leverage to make demands.
“We should not fund a government that is continuing to allow open borders to endanger the American people,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) said Wednesday on the House floor alongside Freedom Caucus chair Scott Perry (R-Pa.).
It’s an illustration of the challenges that will confront McCarthy, the current House minority leader, if his party prevails in November’s midterms — especially if it wins by a small margin, which seems increasingly possible.
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 8:18:25 GMT -8
DeathSentence Gets Sued. He Seems More Like PG Every Day.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is facing more legal challenges after he participated in a cruel political stunt that involved luring migrants away from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard on false pretenses last week.
Florida state Sen. Jason Pizzo (D) on Thursday sued the Republican governor and other state officials, alleging their actions as part of the scheme broke state law. He aims to ban DeSantis from continuing to transfer migrants.
Pizzo said DeSantis used state funds to help pay for the transportation costs of flying two planes carrying about 50 migrants to Massachusetts.
While there is a provision in the state budget allocating $12 million to “a program to facilitate the transport of unauthorized aliens from this state consistent with federal law,” in this case, the migrants were not in Florida to begin with.
The only time the migrants were in the Sunshine State was when the two planes landed at a Florida airport before taking off again for Massachusetts.
Besides, the migrants are legally allowed to stay in the country while their requests for asylum or other relief are being processed.
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 8:20:54 GMT -8
PG Was At 40% At This Point in His Presidency
President Joe Biden has just hit another high-water mark in his approval rating this year, riding a surge of support from women, according to a new poll.
An Emerson College poll released Friday found that 45% of voters said they approve of Biden’s performance — a 3-percentage-point increase since last month. Forty-nine percent disapprove of his performance, which is a 2-point dip from the last time around.
Biden’s approval increase “appears to be largely driven by women voters,” noted Spencer Kimball, the executive director of Emerson College Polling. Since July, women voters’ approval of Biden has jumped 10 points, from 39% to 49%, Kimball noted.
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 8:22:41 GMT -8
If You Send It, They Will Come
CNN political analyst Maggie Haberman said former President Donald Trump may have inadvertently deviated from the narrative that classified documents found at Mar-a-Lago ended up there accidentally.
In an interview with Fox News' Sean Hannity, Trump made the unfounded claim that Presidents are able to declassify documents simply by "saying: 'It's declassified'" or "even by thinking about it."
"Because you're sending it to Mar-a-Lago, or to wherever you're sending it," Trump told Hannity on Wednesday. "You're the president, you make that decision. So when you send it, it's declassified. I declassified everything," Trump added.
On a Friday episode of CNN New Day, Haberman fixated on Trump's phrase "you're sending it to Mar-a-Lago."
She argued the statement "seemed to indicate that he had intended to send the boxes of materials to his private club and home. Whereas there has been this line from people around him that this was all an accident, things were just shipped out."
|
|
|
|
Post by mhbruin on Sept 24, 2022 8:24:58 GMT -8
What Do You Do When You Are Playing Football Against Bigots?
On Saturday, October 8, the University of Massachusetts football team will host Liberty University. The game would likely have flown under the radar of most college football fans… if not for the fact that UMass announced over the weekend that the Liberty game will coincide with “Pride Day.”
UMass doesn’t have a particularly good football team, but they apparently drafted the finest trolls in the country.
Liberty, of course, has long been one of the most homophobic Christian schools in the country. Campus Pride ranks it among the “Absolute Worst Campuses for LGBTQ Youth,” a fair assessment given that the school will expel anyone in a same-sex relationship. It’s also the former home of Jerry Falwell, Jr. who allegedly enjoyed watching another man have sex with his wife, but whose sex life received a pass until his antics finally caught up with him.
So was the announcement purely coincidental or planned? Sure seems like everyone involved knew what they were doing but there’s no official word that this was done on purpose. (A request for comment from the school’s Assistant Athletic Director for “Marketing, Creative & Digital Strategy” went unanswered as of this writing.)
Was it also coincidental that, two weeks ago, Liberty posted a video on YouTube with the title “Pride Is Our Enemy”?
They Could Have One Hell of a Half-Time Show.
|
|
