The USS Diddy

 Some candidates for the renaming of the U.S.S. Harvey Milk Navy ship:

The USS John Wayne

The USS Kate Smith

The USS Pat Boone

Something safe.  Can't send a gay ship into battle.  Read somewhere that one of Trump's political advisors says there's some signs of a little cognitive decline going on and he may not finish out his second term.  However what does it say about the Right these days that they may have been vigorously defending the mutterings of a cognitively declined man all this time?

If we're living in great times I must be missing something. 

Hey big spender

 Musk calls Trump's bloated budget bill "a disgusting abomination. "  Musk vs. Trump.  Never thought I'd be rooting for Musk.  Meanwhile Sec'y Hegesth orders Harvey Milk's name be removed from some old Navy ship.  That's Trump in a nut cares more about some gay Milk than milk in the actual grocery store or butter or eggs or coffee or bread.  Maybe he can issue an executive order against Smokey the Bear one of these days.  Trump navigating this strict rightward course onward towards the midterm shoals.  Still far away but you can kinda spot them.  The Crazy Captain.

Pass the popcorn.

Why Dems pick up the midterms

 Still aways away but closer than you think.  Dems currently in disarray and panic mode but they really don't have to do much if President Trump continues on his present course.  Every time I go to the grocery store it hurts.  Bought a few things today and it came to just under $100.  Didn't even buy cat food.  Trump is focused on other things though.  He changed the name of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.  He's fighting Harvard.  Changing geographical names.  A bloated budget bill with ai deregulation.  Tariffing the world.  Building more ICE centers and a laundry list of other things.  Cultural tangential stuff with no real impact on the average American.  No trans soldiers.  Scale back the Jackie Robinson walks through history.  Just let Trump be Trump.  MAGA becomes a historical footnote.  Maybe a future category on Jeopardy. 

Conservatives got everything they ever dreamed of but didn't know what to do with it.  No focus or narrow pragmatic workable agenda just Righties gone wild.  The freakoff should end around the midterms.  Patience.  They'll blame the immigrants in the end;)

For those of you who can't get enough of the Trump feed

 Should it come to that Trump would consider all of the facts in a potential Diddy pardon.  So says the wire.  Potentially speaking of course as the trial is still going on.  The Framers put this in as a plenary power whatever the logic.  I'm guessing they figured in their founding fatherly wisdom the judicial branch can mess up too.  Don't just dump on Trump about this btw.  All the recent presidents issued their share of controversial pardons.  The question is if Diddy does get convicted but later pardoned by Trump will he celebrate with a freakoff?

The X-rated Diddy trial

 Just talking about it might earn you an NC-17.  If I were to provide verbatim court transcripts this post might come with a warning for sensitive viewers.  Court TV is covering it in their own way of course but so far when I turn Court TV on during primetime they're not discussing Diddy as you'd expect but some other trial.  Court TV is a family show after all where they talk about serial killers and spousal murder.  I myself don't have the money to run freakoffs.  Hey Google didn't correct that word must be in the vernacular now.  I just want to make sure I have enough money to pay my energy bill so ConEd doesn't flicker my lights.

Some people feel he's gonna get off.  Weird sex is not a crime so long as there's consent.  I'm into vinegar.  Been buying tons of it to kill off poison ivy in my backyard.  Diddy likes the baby oil for his hobby.  It's I don't know not making a prediction here but he ain't livin' right.

Trump's First 100 Days in Office - Take a walk on the wild Right

 Arresting judges.  We don't need no Education Dept.  Bomb the Houthis.  Hey hey ho ho DEI has got to go.  You're fired then rehired.  Deporting the wrong people.  DOGE it baby!  Tariffs.  Trade wars.  Funding freezes.  Bibi.  Gaza.  Zelensky.  Putin.  Harvard.  You wanna protest on campus?  STFU.  Have you checked your cat for anti-semitism lately?  Executive orders.  Homan.  Cap'n Crunch.  Food dyes.  Measles.  Gulf of Trump.  Greenland.  Have you caught up on your texts today for maybe secret Yemeni war plans?  Closing USAID.  Who needs to eat?  Scale back the medical research grants already.  Cancer shmancer.  Low polls blame FOX News.  Tell the judges to go fuck off.  Bondi.  Patel.  Lawfare.  Trump vs. trans soldiers.  Canada as the 51st state?

Can Fall Out Boy make a song out of all of this?

Less executive orders mean less tangles with judges

 As a practical matter.  A wise young manager I had once said you have to choose your battles.  This does NOT mean the judges are right on all the issues.  They're not but many see themselves as gods, the most powerful branch of the government but that's a separate post and I've blogged about it.  Trump started his second term like gangbusters with a swagger and a new sheriff in town kind of 'tude.  Practical advice lose the 'tude!  You can't govern for four years on executive orders alone.  You're not a monarch.  If the issue is important enough yes have at it with a judge but you don't have to right every wrong or every perceived wrong in four years.  Leave that to the next guy or gal.  Trans soldiers there can't be that many of them let it go.  DEI I had to google what this meant but it seems to be taking up a huge chunk of the President's time and on and on it goes.  What does it all matter if most people are going to sucky jobs in the morning?

I don't know what the guy's doing.

Elon Musk - the Sperminator and his mission to save Humanity

 DC Comics

So I didn't know the full breadth of this.  I knew Elon has like 14 children by 4 different women.  It's also well-known he is pro-higher birth rates.  That's a legit position imo about more in a minute.  What I didn't know is he actually solicits women online to be potential mothers to his future offspring.  He talks about surrogates.  Also didn't know about his compound in TX where such mothers are invited to live.  I'm leading up to something here wait for it.  So this movement for higher birthrates has a name - natalism.  J.D. Vance is a proponent although he's not taking it to another level like Musk.  Don't think Usha would approve.  OK so if your thing is if you think the average American isn't having enough children, that we haven't been reaching the most basic replacement level for a healthy population to sustain itself economically and in all ways then wouldn't you welcome

IMMIGRANTS

legal and otherwise?

It's a little easier than going through life being a sperminator superhero out to save the Planet.  Contradictions and paradoxes within the Trump Administration.  I thank you for your time.

We're proud of our mistakes

 So yeah on occasion the Homan trawlers do pick up the wrong fish, small fry swimming the wrong way.  The gay hairdresser, the Maryland father and who knows who else off to that notorious El Salvadoran prison.  This would be less controversial if the problem were fixed right away.  Say put the wrongly snagged in a hotel room for the night with a flight waiting for them in the morning.  Perhaps throw in a $100 MAGA gift card by way of apology.  Instead we get Trump standing with the Salvadoran dickhead saying they can't do anything about this.  Administrative errors.  Wrongly interpreted tattoos.  A Homan hunch.  Whatever.  MAGA zombies like Megyn Kelly see no problem while Rogan offered only some tepid criticism.  The WH Stepford press secretary.  100 Days of Chaos.

Don'tcha just hate the bureaucracy?

I'll have an LGBTQ hold the mayo

 So far Five Guys haven't changed their name to Five Gays but we do have or had DEI sprinkled throughout society until Trump outlawed them.  He's issued executive orders on everything that annoys him and has even given orders on statues and monuments.  He's taken over the Smithsonian and Kennedy Center why I don't know.  Maybe he wants to hold an awards ceremony for himself.  He's issued tariffs on cars but has said to car makers don't pass the added cost onto prospective car buyers.  Ok no prob DUH.  Nothing yet about the price of eggs or Fancy Feast.  No real bread and butter issues to date just side issues and strange personal obsessions.  BTW can we still honor the memory of Sidney Poitier?

The dork with a chainsaw

 I'm just waiting for some sense of normality from this Administration but we're not getting it.

You gotta be careful with those things.  Musk had a chainsaw at CPAC but I recently bought a polesaw at Lowe's last summer to cut up some dead branches in the backyard.  Dealt with a lot of dead branches down through the years from Yonkers storms.  The polesaw is a version of a chainsaw a handy tool for dealing with unwanted small trees on your property or at least when the limbs pose a problem.  Only used it a couple of times.  Tricky getting the chain tension just right.  Came off a couple of times while testing it out no harm.  I wouldn't hire Musk.  A nerd with a power tool scares me.  Don't know if he even knows how to use a condom.

The weird theater is becoming tiresome.  Will Trump sign off on the House plan to cut Medicaid and break a campaign promise?  Maybe it's time to free himself from Musk.  This bromance can't last forever.

Diddy was going to perform but he couldn't make it

 (Alternative title: Rough Day For Shaw)

Quite a pageant.  The swearing-in ceremony was quite long.  Had a strong religious, Christian flavor.  An all day affair.  Watched Trump's Inaugural Address.  A lot to go through comment accordingly.  Wants to put an American flag on Mars and Musk was ecstatic.  Said in his speech there are only two genders and that he would sign an executive order declaring such.  Who knew such a simple biological fact would be so controversial.  There was the parade and then an address by Steve Witkoff Trump's special envoy to the Middle East who was instrumental in the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas.  Earlier Trump had already signed his first few executive orders back at the office.  These were mostly technical in nature having to do with things like cabinet and sub-cabinet appointments the most notable being going forward all flags will be flown at full-staff on Inauguration Day.  I had hoped to publish something earlier in the day but it was a long wait before he signed a few more executive orders at the Capitol Arena the most notable this time being sending a letter to the UN saying we are withdrawing from the Paris Climate Treaty then it was off to the Oval Office to sign a large number of other executive orders.

A LONG day.  TikTok also back online thanks to Trump at least for the time being.  Sounds like a deal is in the works.

Ah well there's always ice fishing

 MN Governor Tim Walz was "a little surprised" he and Kamala Harris lost the presidential election to Donald Trump.  He feels "I did the best I could."  Not in the VP debate with Vance you didn't you knucklehead.   In his first post-election interview with KSTP a Minnesota news outlet he said "It felt like at the rallies, at the things I was going to, the shops I was going in, that the momentum was going our way."  Rallies can be a lot like rock concerts.  You go to a blink-182 concert and you think the whole world likes blink-182.  So puberty blockers and transgender surgery for minor kids had nothing to do with your loss.  It's really that the rest of the country isn't progressive enough is his take.

I hope you run into a nice school of yellow perch.

To prognosticate or not to prognosticate

 Normally I would not prognosticate a presidential election this close but I will although not with supreme confidence as there will be millions of Americans default voting against Trump.  It will come down to the economy as it usually does.  Harris can point to this or that positive economic indicator but what people are paying for groceries is still too high.  Too many people still remember the Trump pre-pandemic economy when a trip to the supermarket was more normal.  This remains an albatross for Kamala Harris.  People also have been paying too much at the pump although I went to the station the other day and the cost took a remarkable dip.  What a coincidence!  Most voters are not academics and don't intellectualize that presidents don't really control the price of oil.  It was the Biden/Harris Administration during this time.  Correlation in the public mind and that's usually enough.  That the polling is still this close shows the defects in Trump's personality have had a negligible impact.  Disposable income trumps Trump you could say.  I want more disposable income to buy cigars.  To the undecideds Harris might be different than Biden but why take the chance?  If you vote wrong that's a long four years.  Trendy issues like climate change and trans issues those are more issues for the Left imo not bread and butter for most folk.  Abortion could have a significant but overall limited impact since people's views run the gamut.  It's the economy stupid.

Trump wins.  Not by a landslide but he comes out on top when the dust settles.  My somewhat shaky prognostication.

Is the pro-abortion vote enough to swing the election?

Complex but in the final analysis I'm gonna say no.  The msm would probably say yes.  So far I've seen only one commercial from Kamala Harris, a short tv ad talking about workers and the economy and protecting reproductive rights.  The pro-abortion vote - I would have to say that demographic is fairly sexually active and as my brother likes to say it's like they plan on having abortions (ok not the best way of putting it but you get the gist).  However there are other people out there, quite a few who are not into abortion, who don't like abortion and you don't have to be an official card-carrying RTL member to feel this way.  Also a large portion of the population go to bed every night in cold sheets.  They'll even say they've had nothing going on for years maybe had a bad marriage.  Abortion may not be uppermost in their minds.  Just a ramble and I'll cap it here.

Is Kamala Harris over-emphasizing the issue?

Random Thoughts On Last Tango In Paris (1972)

Directed by Bernardo Bertolucci.  Widely seen as a landmark in the history of sexual explicitness in cinema.  So where was the explicit sex I must have missed it?  Even the uncut version is not overly graphic.  Many people if the movie is mentioned automatically think of butter.  That's a childish mind.  Some of the scenes that come to my mind is the character of Paul played of course by Marlon Brando talking to his dead wife alone in the room as she's being prepared for burial.  To my mind this is some of the best acting in the history of cinema.  Also the classic ending where Jeanne played by Maria Schneider shoots him.   The ending is so open-ended it called for a sequel but there never was one.  She's rehearsing her lines for when the police will interview her later (he was a lunatic, I never knew him, he tried to rape me) but so many people had already seen them together at the dance hall but the movie simply ends with the sultry music coming on.  My takeaway - she was okay with having a kind of strange even perverse relationship with him.  She kept going back to him in the apartment even though she was engaged to another man yet when Paul wanted a normal loving relationship with her she basically kept saying it's over and killed him.  A cinematic and much discussed enigma.  Although not by any stretch an exemplary character he's been through the mill after his wife's gruesome suicide and this is his fate.  A movie with many layers to it it's worth a watch or a few.  The actress appeared nude in many of the scenes while Brando kept his clothes on except for one brief scene early on where they didn't show much.  Much vulgar language throughout.  So that's my take the movie is worth diving into.

Trumpology

Transgendered people cannot now serve in the U.S. military.  The rationale being to go to the Pat Robertson bbq?

The SCOTUS TX Abortion Decision

I'll be honest I don't much follow the abortion debate  anymore main reason is it's agitating especially right before you go to bed.  A large
part of society practices abortion, always have and always will so that social fact is agitating so I prefer to think of other things.  I'm tangentially aware of the issue though as Justice Kennedy didn't much care for those abortion restrictions down in TX designed to close as many clinics as possible.  Must be my advancing age, my general social irritability as when presented with the need for abortion these days I'm most likely to go had to have sex didn't you?  (Church Lady id)  Those women activists down in TX they act like they won the World Series or the Super Bowl or something.   IMO the Ole Gray Lady's love for abortion and yes it is love is on another level, otherworldly even.  OK agita;)

Where to pee in North Carolina

Personally I prefer a tree in the woods.  You don't have to bring a birth certificate either.

The death of Prince, a break from the Trump cycle

According to the wiki meaning provided by Prince himself Purple Rain means "the end of the world, being with the one you love, letting your faith/god guide you."  Prince was a religious sex symbol and according to one Times writer his sexual orientation was he loves You.  Prince dead at 57.  Why do the world's dictators live such long lives?  Former SS guards live into their 90's, Manson still getting three squares a day?  Prince 1958-2016 RIP