Today's Hawk

• American companies and consumers pay the tariffs
• Trump lied about the 2020 election
• People stormed the US Capitol at Trump's urging
• Trump has ended zero wars

Oy

There can be no greater oxymoron than when somebody from the Trump gang calls together a "panel of experts".

"Don't let anybody tell you there's nothing wrong with vaccines, but let's go ahead and remove all mention of known problems that can be caused by pumping your ass full of hormones."

To be clear, my understanding is that hormone replacement isn't known to cause cancer, but an abundance of (eg) estrogen can feed it, causing an existing cancer to grow faster.

That's a simple non-clinician's take on it - kinda like BKjr not having one fucking bit of clinical background, and then providing guidance according to his crew of fellow Dunning-Kruger subjects.

If you have a medical problem, you don't call me, or a plumber, or a junky roids ranger - you call a real live, honest-to-god, licensed practitioner. You call a fucking doctor.

Overheard

Since 2017, the wealth of billionaires

has increased by 77%

The top 10% of households in America

own 60% of the wealth

The bottom 50% of households in America

own less than 7% of the wealth

Billionaires

are

parasites

Overheard

I met a WW2 veteran, and I asked him: How did you deal with having to load up on benzedrine to keep going in the daytime, and then pop a sleeping pill to get a few hours of sleep so you could start the whole thing over the next day? How did guys face up to having a bad head cold, and then going up to 30,000 feet in their B-17 where they knew their ears would blow out? How could fliers over Japan leave their parachutes behind because they knew they'd be executed almost immediately when they hit the ground?

He answered, "None of that was as bad as it was during the Depression. In the service, we had steak and ice cream once in a while. The folks back home had mostly nothing. We had to do what we did so we could all have something at the end of it."

The greatest generation.

Observation

• We watched The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, and cheered for Jimmy Stewart
• We watched Norma Rae, and cheered for the union
• We watched All The President's Men, and cheered for the underdog reporters
• We watched Star Wars, and cheered for the resistance
• We watched V For Vendetta, and cheered for the resistance
• We watched The Matrix, and cheered for Neo and Trinity and the resistance
• We watched Divergence, and sided with the resistance
• We watched Hunger Games, and cheered for the fucking resistance

Somehow, when it's a movie, we understand - we identify with the plucky band of rebels who fight for justice, or at least to be treated a little better.

But when it's the real thing - like now - we come down on the side of the powerful? The establishment? The boss who schedules a guy for three extra shifts and then tells him there's no budget for overtime? The cops who have no regard for the law? The giant corporations who spend billions buying coin-operated politicians who put laws in place that keep us chained to jobs that don't pay the rent, and wear us down to nothing?

I fight so my son can be a merchant

He fights so his son can be a poet

Where are you, America?

Nothing of real value is ever just handed to us, even as a legacy. Somebody fought for it. Somebody stood up against the odds - went against the grain - against the wind - and fought. They put something on the line - sometimes everything they had, everything they loved, and everything they were. They fought very real battles against very dangerous enemies so we could fight in a different, less deadly way, and go home to sleep safe and warm in our quiet comfortable beds.

That quiet time is gone now.

Break Time

Today's Rich

Leadership is as leadership does.

Don't Go Numb

Take a minute. Step back. Catch your breath. Then get back to it. There's a long way to go, and lots of heavy lifting to do.

embrace the suck

stay in the fight

SCOTUS Gets One Right

I think it would be a really good thing if millions of people never again had to worry that some jerk with a hardon for Jesus might decide to make their marriage disappear.

Supreme Court denies Kim Davis' petition to overturn same-sex marriage ruling

The judges will not revisit the landmark 2015 decision in Obergefell v Hodges.

The Supreme Court on Monday denied a bid from former Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis to appeal her $100,000 damages suit and get the justices to revisit the landmark 2015 decision in Obergefell v Hodges.

The court did not explain its decision.

Davis gained international attention after she refused to issue a marriage license to a gay couple on religious grounds in open defiance of the high court’s ruling and was subsequently jailed for six days. A jury later awarded the couple $100,000 for emotional damages plus $260,000 for attorneys fees.

Supreme Court considers Kim Davis petition to overturn same-sex marriage ruling
In a petition for writ of certiorari filed in August, Davis argued First Amendment protection for free exercise of religion immunizes her from personal liability for the denial of marriage licenses.

She also claimed the court’s decision in Obergefell v Hodges -- which rooted marriage rights for LGBTQ couples in the 14th Amendment’s due process protections -- was "legal fiction."

How Trump’s Supreme Court nominees could save his tariffs: ANALYSIS
Lower courts had dismissed Davis' claims and most legal experts considered her bid a long shot.

Davis' appeal to the Supreme Court comes as conservative opponents of marriage rights for same-sex couples pursue a renewed campaign to reverse legal precedent and allow each state to set its own policy.

Mad As Hell

Great point. When it comes down to expressing and directing my rage, I need to keep in mind the 236 dog-ass Republicans who voted for the Big Bamboozle Bill in the first place.

So I'm pretty pissed, and I'm going to let the Dems have it - I'm just not going to reserve my disgust exclusively for "my own side".

And here they are - in twiXter format:

@SenAngusKing 

@timkaine 

@SenCortezMasto 

@SenFettermanPA 

@SenatorShaheen 

@SenatorDurbin 

@SenatorHassan 

Capitol Switchboard

202-224-3121

Give 'em hell