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I wish I could say with confidence that a headline like that (on Christmas Eve no less!) Matt Gaetz is toast but I’m afraid I just can’t. Even that headline in the Wall St. Journal probably doesn’t hurt his chances of winning office or becoming a Fox star. MAGA loves him. I could easily see him becoming the Governor of Florida. It’s possible that the only thing normal people will get out of this disgraceful episode is Gaetz’s departure from the back bench of the House and some moments like these: Classic Meidas moment pic.twitter.com/xndiBP3fL2 — MeidasTouch (@MeidasTouch) December 24, 2024
Biden’s commutations for 37 of 40 people on death row brought relief for the men and their loved ones.
The post “And I Was Surprised”: On Federal Death Row, They Feared Biden Would Set Up Another Trump Killing Spree appeared first on The Intercept.
Tom and Jerry in The Night Before Christmas (1941)The toys under the tree accurately represent what was available at the time. This is also the first time Tom and Jerry called a truce. If they can do it, maybe we all can.Merry Christmas, everyone. ðŸˆðŸðŸŽ… pic.twitter.com/DMzxFH3b1m — The Sting (@TheStingisBack) December 24, 2024 Tom and Jerry in The Night Before Christmas (1941) The toys under the tree accurately represent what was available at the time. This is also the first time Tom and Jerry called a truce. If they can do it, maybe we all can. Merry Christmas, everyone. — Thanks again, folks, for your generosity. I appreciate it from the bottom of my heart. Here’s hoping you have a lovely Christmas Eve, whether you celebrate with friends and family or are happily solo relaxing and enjoying the long winter night. (Or for those of you in the southern hemisphere, enjoying the beautiful summer weather!” ) Happy Hollandaise! cheers,digby
It’s a bloody battle, fought in the trenches. But the good guys won. All hail Donald Trump, the new baby Jesus.
But it’s not just about mental acuity I’ve been on a rolling rant lately about the age of Democrats in top leadership. I’m not the only one concerned about the gerontocracy. Charlie Sykes comments on the disappearance of Rep. Kay Granger (R-Texas), 81, who seems to have vanished from Congress in July. “Since early September, my health challenges have progressed making frequent travel to Washington both difficult and unpredictable,” Granger said in a statement to Axios this week. She’s now in an assisted living facility. Her son told reporters she’s having “dementia issues.” Sykes writes: Once again, the moral questions of America’s political gerontocracy reveal themselves. This is an especially sensitive subject, because so many of us have loved ones—parents, grandparents, siblings—who are in cognitive decline. They deserve our consideration, compassion, and honesty. That’s also true for members of Congress, Supreme Court justices, and presidents. But the stakes there are much higher, and in those cases, sometimes compassion means being truthful about when it’s time to move on.
Hedges unravels the toxic brew of deindustrialization, corporate greed, and authoritarian religion fueling America’s descent into fascism.
The post Chris Hedges: How Fascism Came appeared first on MintPress News.
Originally published December 23, 2009.
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Day 1
On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me a partridge in a pear tree. Such a thoughtful gift, she knows how much I love fruit. She also knows my building’s pretty strict about pets, so the bird threw me a little. But he is a cute little guy.
Day 2
On the second day of Christmas, my true love gave me two turtle doves. Wow, she’s really into the avian theme this year. Um, thank you? I guess I’ll just put them in the kitchen with the partridge in the pear tree, which suddenly seems a lot bigger than it did yesterday.
Days 3 & 4
On the third and fourth days of Christmas, she gave me three French hens and four calling birds. Funny, I don’t remember telling her my dream was to one day open a chapter of the Audubon Society. Jesus. You know what would have been nice? Some birdseed. I’m out of saltines and things are starting to get weird in here.
Not so fast It’s one of the classic blunders. Not the most famous — “never get involved in a land war in Asia” — nor the most recent — “everything Trump touches dies” — but it’s up there. Men assume their expertise in one area of human endeavor makes them experts in another. (It’s always men, isn’t it?) President Elon Musk and billionaire-dilettante Vivek Ramaswamy are joining the Trump 2.0 administration (1st classic blunder) to operate as his proposed, informal Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Never having worked in government before, the pair mean to “to cut the federal government down to size.” And inflict pain on the little people. Piece of cake. Except. The irony come Jan. 20 is that Trump, the naif in 2016, now brings experience, if not wisdom, to his White House job. Musk and Ramaswamy are the overconfident naifs (2nd classic blunder). MSNBC’s Jen Psaki invited Bob Bauer, former White House Counsel to Barack Obama and Jack Goldsmith, former Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel under George W.
The new Doctor Who: The War Games in Colour 90-minute edit has a new twist in the new regeneration scene that didn't exist in the original.
In the state of nature, if someone does you wrong, it’s up to you and your mates to deal with it. This often means violence.
For most of English history there was no police force. Republican Rome had no police. There was law, but it was often privately enforced and often families and friends would take vengeance for wrongs. This led to rather a lot of violence and death, as well as feuds, where violence would continue long beyond the original offense.
Private justice; private vengeance thus comes with huge downsides, so in many societies we give up our right to use violence to right wrongs. We give that right to government in some form, and we reap the benefits of safety and that, in principle, stronger groups can’t bully those who are too weak to obtain their own justice.
While The Lever team is on holiday break, we’re offering subscribers a selection of our best reporting this year.
A mysterious group linked to Patagonia has been accused of making what appear to be illegal “straw donor” contributions.
The post Patagonia’s Ties to a Dark-Money Operation Bankrolling Democratic Candidates appeared first on The Intercept.
As this year draws to a close, it is an opportune time to highlight and praise some of the best books in Economic Sociology and Political Economy that have been named and recognized by several major associations in our field. These are extraordinary studies, in their empirical innovation and theoretical contribution. Above all, they are […]
This live performance remains unequalled to this day. Jussi Björling — the greatest of them all. As Luciano Pavarotti once said: “Don´t compare me with Jussi Björling. I`m only human.”
Suspending industrial action only gives the government breathing space and prolongs the inevitable showdown with the Minns government.
The post Rail bans suspended for New Year’s Eve, but workers willing to fight first appeared on Solidarity Online.
Curtis Yarvin, darling authoritarian ideologue of many tech billionaires, is back in the news, along with his deep links to J.D. Vance, via Peter Thiel. It’s no secret that plutocrats tend to be off-the-charts economic libertarians, with extreme hostility even to wildly popular programs such as Social Security and Medicare, which cost them nothing. So, […]
For the second year in a row, the Christmas season passes while Gaza remains under genocide. While the entire world bids farewell to 2024 and celebrates the arrival of 2025, Palestinians continue to suffer under Israeli aggression, which kills, starves, and displaces civilians in Gaza with brutal cruelty. In Gaza, candles are not lit for Continue reading »
A new Fed study warns that most expected flood losses are uninsured — and the lack of protection is more acute among Republican locales.
