Today's Quote

Arendt also coined "the banality of evil" - referring to how great atrocities can be traced back to the small seemingly unimportant steps taken by ordinary people who believed that were doing nothing wrong. Kinda like when the Trump transition team (eg) asks for the names of people at the Dept of Energy who attended Climate Change seminars.

We have to maintain an awareness of the Logical Fallacy of The Slippery Slope, but we must also remember that slopes do exist; and they can get pretty fucking slippery in a big fucking hurry.

Let's try to watch what we're doin'.

Once More From The Top

Test for truth:

The presence of Confirming Evidence

--and--

The absence of Conflicting Evidence

Test for bullshit:

The absence of Confirming Evidence

--or--

The presence of Conflicting Evidence

Today's Meme

Be the reason someone smiles today

Or the reason they drink

Whatever works the best for the most

Today's Quote

Not being loved is a simple misfortune. The true fatality is to not know how to love.

--Albert Camus (from a Spanish translation)

Obama's Farewell

Organism

Today's GIF

And here we have a great look at what we laughingly refer to as The Press here in USAmerica Inc, during the Trump Era.

via GIPHY

Today's Tweet

@ResolutePleb2 @jpbrammer Yes. Let's pretend white genocide isn't some shit a white dude made up because his ex likes black dick. 😂😂

— Jetstream Rev (@JetstreamR3V) December 26, 2016

The Trump Charity Thing

Fahrenthold and Rindler have been looking pretty hard for confirmation of Trump's claims to being generous.  Not much has surfaced.

Here are the first few pages of what they've found - the rest can be gandered at WaPo, and they have a nice breakdown of the timeline and various other tasty bits.

And shouldn't we be hearing some slight murmur from the Press Poodles about Trump's tax returns?

Today's Pix

A Silly Thing

Wait for it.

Wait for it... pic.twitter.com/hg68cx390d

— Joe Bloggs (@joebloggs8040) December 24, 2016

Today's Tweet

Just in case you still think Assange is some kind of truth-teller... https://t.co/OP3eCWnIr8 pic.twitter.com/MBdjhAqicJ

— Joshua Holland (@JoshuaHol) December 25, 2016

It seems it's never what it seems. 

Snow Play

Equal Rights Now

hat tip = @rmurwin

Winning At A Very Steep Price

He says near the end of the interview that the best thing the Bushies did was to split and give him the room to get his thing going, so I don't see him doing it, but I'd dig the fuck outa Obama becoming the Troll In Chief, making life miserable for Trump.

Lost Another Good One

I was never a big fan - except for Kissing A Fool (that's one of the all-time great tunes) - but George Michael died yesterday and there just has to be a place on the short list for this one great album from way back in 1990.

PS) The Boomer Death Wave is underway now - we can expect 2 million of us to die every year for the next 10-20 years.

Fuck your bucket list - get out there and do shit.

On Swamps And Alligators

It's hard to miss Gingrich's deft use of the passive voice. He is a master at getting the listener to think he's just talking about stuff in very general non-threatening terms, and that he's far above any of the mundane power-grubbing shenanigans that go on down there in the swamp.

And that's what Trump needs him for - Newt's role is to teach the Trumpkinites all the Media Relations tricks they need to normalize the shit storm.

The point that really stands out for me: Gingrich saying Trump can use a very broad application of the Presidential Pardon in order to get around the fact that he plans on ordering people to do things that're obviously illegal.

Let that one percolate for just a bit.

The bearer has done what was done in the name of the king and for the good of the state. --Richelieu

I guess when Newton Leroy Gingrich read The Three Musketeers, he concluded that Cardinal Richelieu was the good guy(?)

We are so fucked.

Today's GIF

@StreetArt360

Today's Tweet

Playing with my Christmas present. pic.twitter.com/7YcS4WvfD4

— Darth Putin (@DarthPutinKGB) December 25, 2016

Today's Quote

Carl Paladino's 2017 Wish List (partial)

1. Obama catches mad cow disease after being caught having relations with a Herford. He dies before his trial and is buried in a cow pasture next to Valerie Jarret, who died weeks prior, after being convicted of sedition and treason, when a jihady cell mate mistook her for being a nice person and decapitated her.

2. Michelle Obama. I’d like her to return to being a male and let loose in the outback of Zimbabwe where she lives comfortably in a cave with Maxie, the gorilla.

So, I guess that's another shining example of Middle Class Economic Angst that Hillary failed so miserably to address(?)