Amy's List

Amy Siskind - the past week's list of shit 45* is pulling:

November 18, 2017 (week 53)

This week the headlines and narrative were dominated by women (and men) sharing their stories of sexual assault and harassment — a historic movement. Stories entered the political domain with accusations against men of both parties, reopening questions about Trump’s sordid past. Trump tweeted himself into the sexual assault discussion, almost as if to be part of the zeitgeist, despite the perilous risks. This is the shortest list in many weeks as Trump was largely absent from the narrative and headlines.

This week the Russia probe entered Trump’s inner-circle, as more lines of direct and indirect communications surfaced, and efforts at cooperation between the Trump campaign and Russia were revealed. A political backlash against Trump continued as a special election in Oklahoma 37, a district Trump comfortably won by 40 points, went to a Democrat — a 26 year-old lesbian whose wife is African American.

Some hi-lites:

2. On Sunday, in response to Trump siding with Putin over US intelligence on Russian interference in Week 52, ex-intelligence chiefs James Clapper and John Brennan said Trump is being “played” by Putin.

6. On Monday, Trump met with controversial leader Duterte. Trump boasted of their “great relationship,” and laughed when Duterte called journalists “spies.” At least 177 Filipino media workers have been killed since 1986.

7. The WH said the two leaders “briefly” discussed human rights, but Duterte’s spokesman denied that the issue was discussed. Tuesday, Trudeau did bring up human rights, which Duterte called an “insult.”

10. On Monday, WAPO reported Jeff Sessions is considering a second special counsel to investigate GOP concerns, including the Clinton Foundation, Uranium One, and Hillary’s emails. Trump has been encouraging this.

11. NYT reported Sessions is shattering longstanding norms by doing so, and so the credibility of any investigation presumably would be called into question since Trump is publicly going after a political rival.

Today's Pix

Sam Bee

Some of the best commentary anywhere.

Full Frontal - Samantha Bee:

And Allana Harken is getting really good:

Worth Another Look

An oldie from College Humor:

Today's GIF

Here's Steve Scalise applauding the latest version of legislation that we can file (as usual) under the heading of I-Got-Mine-So-Fuck-The-Resta-Y'all.

Looking forward to when the stories emerge - about the tactics and threats and promises necessary to get this piece of shit passed.

New GOP Slogan

What would a dick do?

I suspect I'll post this one more than a few times before we get over Cult45.

Today's Pix

Facebook

It's the money, stupid.

Ari Melber's take:

Money is power, and for some folks, power is everything.

Today's Tweet

We've got some pretty low standards here in USAmerica Inc.

Someone at @FoxNews reported the truth and it's making headlines all across America. #MorningJoe

— LisaMarie (@indianaoldsoul) November 15, 2017

 

Today's Life Lesson

Depression is your soul telling you to make a change - but not the kind of change where you get a neck tattoo or decide you'd look good with bangs.

Today's Quote

The difference between a cult and a religion is that the latter is old. Like, stepping into a pile of dogshit makes you curse, but stepping into a pile of dinosaur shit makes you famous. Despite both being crap. 

— Opportunist.

Love Her Hate Her Whatever

Donna Brazile is well known for two things: losing elections, and standing in the wreckage yelling, "We was robbed!"

But she knows things. She had a front row seat last fall. The bit about the Russians (starting about 28:30) is very interesting and way fuckin' scary.



And never mind the fact that she takes a nice big dump on the Press Poodles for being lazy enough to buy into the Follow-The-Popular-Drift bullshit (thank you, Donna). Way too many of the big news outlets here in USAmerica Inc are operating on the Show Biz model, where the coverage is guided by what's trending on social media instead of what's real and/or important.

Flocks of Bots (many, if not most, of which are controlled the Russkies) are practically dictating what we do and where we go - and they're very useful for "winning" elections.

Automated Rapid Response on a hyper-industrialized level.

Closer To The Borg

Science be scary sometimes.

BTW - next year will mark the 200th anniversary of Mary Shelley's novel, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus.

This Week In 45* World

The first couple of 121 items on this week's list.

Amy Siskind:

November 11, 2017

This week started and ended in chaos, with a respite in-between as Trump traveled to Asia and stayed on script. The length of this week’s list is a testament to how broad-based the attacks on and the erosion of norms and our democracy have become — well beyond Trump as the sole actor.

The Resistance that started as Trump took office has grown in both impact and power, as evidenced by Tuesday’s elections, which were a wipe-out for Republicans and an amazing display of diversity. A revolution around sexual assault and harassment is gathering steam, with offenders being outed daily.

All the while, the Mueller probe progresses. This week more ties between the Trump campaign and Russia were exposed, and questions surfaced as to the knowledge and engagement of senior people on the campaign, including Trump.

1) WAPO reported as the winter tourism season kicks in, Trump has secured 70 H-2B visas from the Labor Department to hire cooks, maids, and servers to work at Mar-a-Lago, despite urging the country to hire American.

2) Dallas Morning News reported GOP campaigns for Trump, Mitch McConnell, Marco Rubio, Scott Walker, Lindsey Graham, Kris Kasich, and John McCain took in $7.35 million in donations from Leonard Blavatnik, a Ukrainian oligarch with ties to Putin.

Good Guys Explained

Some slopes are more slippery than others