Commentators who really are starting to feel the wear and tear of constantly following the Trump Circus are noticing some things about his ... (gestures wildly) ... as Labor Day approaches.

Specifically, given the historical tendency of parties in power in the U.S. with losing seats with the performance of the unified GOPMAGA government to do anything good for anyone except them and their cronies combining to making the midterms look really, REALLY bad for Team Red, the trend said commentators are noticing is how Trump and company are seemingly doing everything they can to make the potential midterm loss be even worse than they could imagine.

Let’s take for simple and direct examples, events yesterday in which Trump is at the center of developments ...

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Yesterday, in response to a lawsuit filed by the National Trust for Historic Preservation to stop the construction of the Trump “ballroom” after his surprise destruction of the East Wing of the White House - and despite public commentary going 95% AGAINST allowing the ballroom to continue to be built - five of the six Federalist Society SCOTUS drones refused to make Trump stop, on the on-its-face asinie idea that the above-listed plaintiff ... did not have standing to file the lawsuit?!

That public opinion is THAT against the ballroom - which by all account Trump and Trump alone wants (and is reportedly so obsessed with its construction in between Natalie feeding him AI slop that Trump simply is not working on anything involving his actual job of being the President of the goddamned United States) - is the first signal that, rather than at least try to get American voters to reconsider the job Trump is doing, he instead seems ready to antagonize voters and citizens even more than he has.

The ballroom case dovetails with Trump mauling other landmarks in DC. As he continues to threaten demolition of the Kennedy Center if another court refuses to let him put his name on it again, workers went around the building and cut down at the tree trunks a set of weeping willow trees that were given to the Center as a tribute to John F. Kennedy, because stop him.

Similarly, over 30 cherry blossom trees - some more than a century old - were sawed to the ground without permission in order for Trump to “renovate” a Federal golf course that, of course, did not need to be renovated.

The country, and DC itself, hate hate HATE what Trump is doing, but as we have seen, he is going to do them anyway, at this point to keep what little brain he has appeased and to try to sate his continuing-to-decline MAGA voting base.

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MAYBE TRUMP REALLY DOES WANT TO DESTROY THE GOP ... (2) MAGA CAN RUN FROM DATA CENTERS ...

A second example: as noted in this Substack several times, AI Data Centers are almost as hated as Donald Trump, and that is a problem because most Republicans have been hardcore cheerleaders for the massive structures and all the problems they entail, both for the centers themselves and for the “work” they produce that may be contributing to a continuing-to-grow employment problem in the country.

The mega data centers are connected to Big Tech, which has also embraced Trump hard (witness SpaceX Lead Schmoo Elon Musk promising to spend another $100M on Red candidates in the midterms) and which, in states like Maine and Michigan, and are also clearly a drag on dozens of candidates.

Many imperiled GOP candidates, including TX Governor Greg Abbbot, FL Governor nominee Byron Donalds, MI Senate nominee Mike Rogers, and OH Governor nominee Vivek Ramaswamy, are trying to distance themselves from previous full-bore support for the data center thingies, and in a normal year with normal-ish people running the parties, they would give local candidates the OK sign to run away from a national policy that is hurting them locally.

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Unfortunately for them, they have Donald Trump at the head of their party - and Donald Trump ADORES data centers. So much so, that after another personal proof-of-life appearance in the Oval Office that he still managed to fall asleep at, Trump went to the social medias to sing the praises of data centers! Trump called the monstrosities “beautiful,” accused communities that have organized to oppose them of being “backwards and poor,” and ended with one of his branding exercises with a slogan “Let Data Reign,” which for MAGA has the added delight of tweaking woke people who remember Martin Luther King’s “Let Freedom Reign” and letting MAGA OWN DA LIBZ!

Because Republicans dare not sneeze without Trump’s approval, they have to work around their work-arounds on this one - and leave it to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to turn the owners’ table around, by making the suggestion that if Trump hearts data centers so much, perhaps he should allow one to be built on his property down in Mar-a-Lago. That way, the water that was part of the flooding of the classified documents he stole could soak those documents in poisonous runoff - win-win, eh?

Sigh ...

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MAYBE TRUMP REALLY DOES WANT TO DESTROY THE GOP ... (3) REMEMBER THAT MEME ABOUT THE MILILTARY NEEDING TO HOLD A BAKE SALE? WELL ...

... we get to Example Three of the last few days of Trump policies lumbering on despite overwhelming opposition to said Trump policies - and this centers around America’s least-favorite drunk, DEFENSE Secretary Pete Hegseth.

While all of the above was going on and we mourned Dolly and (at least some of us) Tim Curry, the Pentagon was being rocked by a series of revelations, all of course denied by the guy who wants WARRIOR ETHOS (”LEMME HEAR YOU SAY YEAH!”) as a buzz word he is still idiotically convinced both means something and instills fear in the rest of the world.

Petey? The world ain’t scared, they’re either laughing or pissed off at us.

For starters, multiple news outlets reported last weekend that the Military is losing money. Literally. Like, as in swapping funding from other parts of the budget meant to restock depleted ammunition to make payroll for soldiers.

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Like, as in most of the non-Trump-appointed Generals filing a report that if, God forbid, the military needed to defend American interests everywhere or anywhere in the world they would have major problems doing so thanks to the Iran attacks and subsequent war being lost by the U.S. How and why? Beats us with this Congress, but with the right November vote, that can change in a hurry.

Which it may need to, as the Iran War ramped up again this weekend and the country continues to hate what is clearly a stupid and woefully mismanaged military conflict. Trump continues to brag about Iran being “DECIMATED!” and “DEAD!,” but Iran somehow keeps responding with drones and missiles to areas where there are American military bases - and it has apparently gotten to the point where Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll has resigned from the Trump White House after essentially telling Hegseth and his boss that their Iran War plans and goals are ass and unattainable and leave this country in danger of a foreign or domestic attack.

Not that a lot of MAGAts hear about it, as another report over the weekend noted that one area Heggy has been able to bolster are right-wing influencers and social media, who have been hired to act as hype feeds to Glorious Military Fighter Trump and Surrogate Son Petey with fluff and, of course, AI slop (like the animation Trump promoted of Kharg Island being destroyed by American forces or another of a soldier holding a giant hamburger on board a ship, with sauce dripping off the six-fingered hand of the disturbingly happily-eating sailor in said picture).

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MAYBE TRUMP REALLY DOES WANT TO DESTROY THE GOP ... (4) OH, CANADA STILL?!

Then there is the continuing war of words with Canada over Trump’s “renaming” of Lake Ontario. No, Trump has not let go of this inanity. No, Canada is also not backing down one iota (and nor should they). No, nobody wants Trump to spend time

In fact, he called outgoing Apple CEO Tim Cook to see if he could get Apple Maps to say what he wants the map to say like those nice people at Google did before Cook’s last day on Monday (as of this writing, Apple has not) - and, again, the world and Canada (and, truth be told, the majority of Americans) DON’T GIVE A FLYING FIG about this, as it is and will still be Lake Ontario. (If you want a way to give it to Google, download the MapQuest app - ever since they told Trump to stick his name change they have become America’s Number One app, while Google Maps has fallen ...)

Nobody likes any of this except Trump - but there is nobody that would dare defy Trump, either. Thus, the stalemate in DC about all of this mess ...

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CLIMATE CHANGE: IT’S STILL REAL

While all of this is going on, Earth and its atmosphere continues to wreak havoc on the life on it that has inflamed it to the point where much of what has been here for centuries continues to crumble and decay and melt, to the danger of those of us who wreaked said havoc.

Much of the recent attention has been focused on Nepal, where a melting glacier led to the catastrophic collapse of a dam whose wave led to the wipeout of many towns in is path, a death toll currently at 1,050, an estimated 3,200 missing, and dozens of brutal videos of buildings and bridges and, sadly, people being swept up in the mud. That has been followed in the United States by flash flooding in the Grand Canyon that have two confirmed deaths and up to 15 missing as of this writing.

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Meanwhile, a lineup of hurricanes and tropical storms are lining up in the Caribbean, with those who love karma looking at the still-building Tropical Storm Dolly, which is lining up behind another Tropical Storm, Edouard, lining up the southern tip of Florida as both build power. Those storms are the first pieces of what many meteorologists warn is a Super El Nino that could be the start of a wild wave of weather around the world - all likely thanks to we humans.

Even here in Chicago, we literally feel the effects. After a relatively quiet August, a tropical wave has rolled into our fair city, bringing a heat index to a summer-high of 108 degrees - pretty much out of nowhere. Some of that is the Midwest, but literally, phew!

With that, actually, it’s best to find a cool place with a cooler beverage to complete reading today’s Update with The Trivias, and chill as best you can. (There IS a holiday coming in, y’know, and if our opponent will self-destruct and take his party down with him, be our guest!)

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is American Chess Day, Acne Positivity Day, Cherry Popover Day, Ginger Cat Appreciation Day, National Little Black Dress Day, National Tofu Day, National No Rhyme or Reason Day, and World Letterwriting Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1864, Confederate forces abandoned Atlanta as Union forces prepared to occupy the city. In 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland, starting World War II. In 1956, Elvis Presley celebrated his career by buying his mother a pink Cadillac. In 1969, Muammar Qaddafi led a military coup in Libya. In 1972, Bobby Fisher defeated Borris Spassky to win the World Chess Championship - the first American to do so.

In 1983, a Soviet jet fighter shot a Korean Airlines flight out of the sky, killing 269. In 1985, the US Navy, while looking for the remains of the nuclear submarine USS Thresher, discovered the remains of the HMS Titanic. In 2004, Chechen rebels seized a school in North Ossetia, Russia, taking 330 people and children hostage. In 2016, Colin Kaepernick knelt during the National Anthem before an NFL preseason game to protest injustice and police brutality in the US.

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DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: The telephone operator (1878), a detective series on television (1949), THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA (1952), REAR WINDOW (1954), a Japanese Major League Baseball player (Masanori Murakami, 1964), THE SONNY AND CHER SHOW (1971), an all-black MLB lineup (Pittsburgh, 1971), SWORDFISHTROMBONES (1983), FLIP YOUR WIG (1985), mandatory airbags (1989), TUBTHUMPER (1997),

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: James Gordon Bennett, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Don Wilson, Richard Farnsworth, Yvonne De Carlo, Rocky Marciano, Art Pepper, George Maharis, Boxcar Willie, Ann Richards, Conway Twitty, Seiji Ozawa, Ron O’Neal, Lily Tomlin, Rico Carty, Archie Bell, Leonard Slatkin, Barry Gibb, Greg Errico, Rep. Al Green, Philip Fulmer, Graham Maby, Phil Hendrie, Billy Blanks, Gloria Estefan, Kenny Mayne, Bam Bam Bigelow, Grant Lee Phillips, Tim Hardaway, Padma Lakshmi, Zach Thomas, Jason Taylor, Clinton Portis, Carlos Sainz Jr., Zendaya, and Jungkook.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Jacques Cartier, William Clark, Ethel Waters, Scoop Jackson, A. Bartlett Giamatti, R.L. Burnside, Jerry Reed, Hal David, Tommy Morrison, Dean Jones, Jon Polito, Shelley Berman, Barbara Ehrenreich, Earnie Shavers, Jimmy Buffett, and Bill Richardson.

FEED THE WORMS: Jeffrey Epstein attorney and underwear-massage-wearing cretin Alan Dershowitz, Trump-humping fake Doctor Phil McGraw, horrible ex-New York Mayor Eric Adams and 9/11 terrorist Mohammad Atta entered Earth on this date. Albert Speer bought it on this date.

THIS DAY IN THE CULTURE: From the album 13 SONGS, release on this date in 1989 ...

The realities of, well, everything – the polling, the foreign policy, the conflicts, even the culture itself – continue to pile on the White House with no subtlety at all. Naturally, the reactions by the handmaidens surrounding Donald Trump (anyone track where Natalie Harp is right now?) are to shield him from that reality at every turn – and to do what Fox News has always been proudest of: creating a counter-factual bubble for its viewers where the right is always mighty, the left is always weak and feckless, the non-white always set for punishment, and above all, Trump as Whatever One Step Up From Demigod Is.

That difference between TrumpReality and real reality is the theme of most of the political updates today. Some may be in my vaunted three-paragraph structure, perhaps others even less – but as we segway into September and the realities continue to overwhelm our sickly but apparently not sickly enough yet leader to the point where he and his inner circle get whackier and perhaps more dangerous, grounding is required to ensure everyone that we are the ones that are grounded, so take a breath and roll from there.

We will start the Reality v. “Reality” with the latest from The Land Up Over US …

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MAPS AND SLOP – THE CANADA UPDATE

The status of the burgeoning Canadian Trade War continues to fester. While both countries are poised to impose 50% STUPIDSTUPID Tariffs on each other’s goods, Canada is far and away the one poised to do what needs to be done to actually win. In announcing his country’s retaliatory actions, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney made it clear that the tariffs will hurt Canadian consumers, while here President Doofus yawnblabs that no, America will WIN and Canada will BEG to become a state and we will see milk and maple syrup flow everywhere! (Notably, Canadians are OK with the tariffs … Americans, not so much …)

Of course, Trump did not make it widely known that right after his big manhood-waive, his team immediately tried to take certain natural minerals and goods America needs from Canada like oil, potash for fertilizer, and other construction- and high-tech minerals Canada has, so already we see tortillas beginning to get warmed up, as is Trump’s wont.

The other area Trump thinks he excels in is taunting via AI-generated slop. That, of course, is ridiculous. Iranian-produced Lego-depicting videos successfully go after Trump on a daily basis (and we know because they are constantly shared online), and in that spirit someone in Canada created a video of an American Eagle with a Trump face and fright wig constantly trying to plant a LAKE AMERICA sign on beaches around Lake Ontario – only to be adorably thwarted by Canadian woodland creatures from beavers to moose to seals. (Because Canadians, amirite?)

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Infuriated, and without anything else like his job to do, Trump / Natalie / the Stephens got on their AI generators to show those canucks a thing or two! To get ready, Trump TeamAI first generated a picture of Trump with Dolly Parton as if they were friends (they were NOT), followed a second post up that laughingly places Trump at the top of a pyramid as the Greatest President Ever (with Biden and Obama at the bottom, duh).

Properly primed, the White House then created two more AI slop videos that likely pleased Grampy at the expense of continued savaging of respect of the office of the rest of us.

In the first, an apparent army of assault weapon-brandishing ducks started waddling on what apparently is some empty part of the Lake Ontario shoreline – each duck also ‘sporting’ a Donald Trump hairdo, thus creating an army of … wait for it … “Donald Ducks.” Get it? GET IT?!?!

The one after that went even lower: it showed Trump knocking over a small Lake Ontario sign and Trump planting a large wood Lake America sign in its place (so it’s already delusional), followed by his standard double-hand-job-to-disguise-another-Depends-fill “dance” behind “his” new lake.

The cringe is off the charts – and it’s not helped by the suck-ups at Google, who have decided to continue to play footsie with the cankle-laden President and are now identifying Lake Ontario with Trump’s idiotic name on Google Maps.

Even that has been clowned by others, with Canadians noting a critical canal that controls all boat traffic into the Great Lakes called the Welland Canal and suggesting it be renamed “The Strait of Our Moose” and others suggesting maybe Lake Huron could be renamed Lake You’re-On-The-Epstein-Files-38,000-Times.

I mean, if you’re going to toy with dissociative reality, be funny about it, as The Land of SCTV and The Kids in The Hall tend to be …

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PEOPLE ARE GETTING INTO TELLING TRUMP “NO”!

A lot of that online garbage is clearly meant to mollify Trump’s alleged dementia (because mollifying is what you do to calm those folks, as those of us who have or have had loved ones with dementia know all too well), but also because, again, in the real world of reality a lot of things Trump is trying to do is being thwarted by individuals and institutions telling him NO.

For example, in the latest round in Trump’s attempt to get the Post Office to purge names it thinks are too colored and Democratic off state voter rolls, there has been a new and clear NO given by a court in Massachusetts to do so.

That court proceeding followed a second Supreme Court ruling on a case examining whether Trump can do that (SPOILER ALERT: No They Can’t No Matter What The Suck-Up Six Say) in which, since no state has apparently been hurt by the demand, a case could not be filed.

But, since MA has their primary this Tuesday, the ruling would affect the primary, so for 14 days the move is denied (this will not likely be able to be done by the USPS for 2026, though it will create confusion, with MAGA is totes cool with). Another court on Friday told him, AGAIN, that YES, he HAD to pay the fine for slandering E. Jean Carroll because 34 FELONY CONVICTIONS, so PAY UP.

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But those aren’t the only NO’s Trump is getting. Last week, the organizers of memorials of the September 11 attacks in New York denied Trump his request to speak at the ceremony, which (holy smokes) happened 25 freaking years ago already.

Anyway, the organizers have a long history of refusing to let the event be politicized in any way, and so Trump – who famously bragged about having the tallest buildings in Manhattan while the remains of the Twin Towers were still billowing toxic smoke and debris – will settle for debasing the event at the Pentagon with his pet DEFENSE Chair Pete Hegseth (who, by the way, is reportedly already planning a 2028 Presidential run, yipes).

And, of course, counter to all his self-inflated hymns to himself of the greatness of him, Trump is also seeing poll after poll after poll tell him NO, you are NOT loved and you are NOT admired and you smell. Some polls are now placing his favorable numbers tantalizingly close to 30% or under, which if it happened before November 3 would be wild indeed.

Trump’s response to those polling numbers, of COUSRE, is to howlgack about “FAKE POLLS,” personally attack MEET THE PRESS host Kristin Welker Todd for reporting it, and threatening to sic Brendan Carr and the FCC on any Legacy Media Inc. outlet that is not sucking him off (CBS) or countersuing (ABC) for daring to make Dear Leader sad.

Wait until we get closer to the RepublicanTrumPalooza “Midterm Convention” in Dallas on the second weekend of September, where the party who would really love to tell him NO but can’t will be forced to see Trump turn the Midterms into a TrumpeReferendum on All Things Trump, where he might set himself up to get the ultimate NO.

Who will Trump blame then? FUNNY YOU SHOULD MENTION THAT, BEE-CAAUSE …

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SCHADE-MILO-LICIOUSNESS

… the other big story creating a cacophony of buzz on social media everywhere were the rapid events this past Friday surrounding one Milo Yiannopoulos. Milo (because I’m not cutting and pasting that last name again) made his bones on the far Right by first being a notorious gay-basher, then talking up conversion therapy (what with Milo being gay, after all) way back in the Trump 1.0 regime.

Milo further burnished his MAGA bonafides by becoming the lead spokesmouth for Trump’s favorite rapper, the odious Kanye West. Most recently, he settled into supporting ICE and their exporting efforts all around the country, because Milo is also a racist bigoted POS.

OH – AND – Milo is not American. He is a British citizen by birth and had been in the United States on a work visa. A work visa that Milo got in 2019 but apparently never bothered to renew. Which made Milo an illegal alien subject to the same treatment and fate as tens of thousands of others who are not nearly as Caucasian as Milo.

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AND SO, this past Friday, while apparently on his way to somewhere at the can-this-karma-get-any-better Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, Milo was arrested by ICE officers, detained, mug shotted (which makes him look like a sad and too-bearded Ben Stiller), and deported – although unlike most other ICE detainees, Milo was taken back to his oome country of England.

To spice things up even further, acting like a terrorist organization who wants to take credit in the minutes after a terrorist attack, noted lunatic Muslim bigot Laura Loomer went on to the garbage scow social media site “X” to take full credit for Milo’s fate, claiming she dropped the dime on Milo.

On the one hand that is entirely possible, because by every account Loomer and Milo truly and passionately hate each other’s guts. On the other, this Substacker has to say that if Loomer did in fact set Milo up, it makes for a VERY dangerous precedent of any MAGAt with the ability to give meat lump Tom Homan a call then anyone really can be thrown out of the country, and THAT IS NOT GOOD if true.

However, after the initial rush and buzz, it seems as if Loomer’s claim is more her rubbing Milo’s nose in the mess not renewing a visa made for him – because in the end, Milo didn’t follow the rules and paid the price. So all in all, we get to say HAHA MILO – YOU BEE-YOTCH! Stay the Hell out of our country – we don’t need you and we don’t want you!

Now let’s see what happens to Andrew and Tristan Tate, whose legal fight to not get extradited to England is to claim in court that their entire lifestyle was one big scam designed to milk sad males who look up to them as symbols of manhood to give them money for the sexual abuse they routinely bragged about …

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CULTURE NOTES: BUTT-HURT AND RESISTANCE AND A WORTHY SUMMER MOVIE SURPRISE

Let’s wrap with a series of quick Cultural Notes, shall we?

- Before crying their eyes out at the fate of ol’ Milo, MAGA Media were spending this week being oh-so-ANNGGRRYY GRRRR! At country singer Jelly Roll. Why? Jelly Roll assumed the Substitute Host seat this week for Jimmy Kimmel and the ex-convict turned Grammy winner proved to be a surprisingly solid host with a series of monologues that were quite funny for their self-effacing wit and (for MAGA) shocking Trump attacks (example: referring to having lost 300 pounds, Jelly Roll noted that “I’ve lost a Trump!” while mentioning that he can now see his Johnson – and maybe that’s what gets Trump grumpy). And I have to say, he was impressive!

- This weekend, the daughter-I-wish-I-had, Olivia Rodrigo, is holding her first (?) Daisy Chain Fields Music Festival in southern California. The all-woman festival with a stellar multi-generational performance list (from Stevie Nicks and Sarah McLachland and Alanis Morisette to Mitski and Doechii and Chappel Roan to Olivia herself) that has raised about $20 million (including a match from Melissa French Gates) to be used for not-for-profits benefitting girls and women’s causes, with Planned Parenthood and birth control organizations at the top of that list. The shows are not being streamed, but two specials about the shows are available through iHeartRadio and its web site and app.

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- The summer movie season is almost over, and just in time – the Summer Surprise Hit has arrived with a Hell of a back story and plot to match! COYOTE VS. ACME will sit just behind the worldwide juggernaut SPIDER-MAN: BRAND NEW DAY (which is approaching a Top Five position on Biggest Grossing Movies Ever) at the box office this weekend, with stellar reviews and word-of-mouth buzz along the way.

- COYOTE VS. ACME was literally almost never seen, as its release by Warner Bros. was cancelled in 2024 to claim a $30 million tax credit in the wake of the flop of BATGIRL that year. But years of angry backlash over the decision and persistence from production company Ketchup Entertainment wound up getting the movie on a release list for a triumphant meta-story of the movie.

- The real-life story of the movie has a weird parallel to the plot of the movie itself, which is a WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT-style animation/live action comedy about Wile E. Coyote, who finally gets fed up with all the defective Acme Enterprises equipment and gets a down-and-out personal injury attorney (Will Forte) to sue Acme for said equipment (and their lead attorney, played by John Cena). Hilarity and a little-guy-fighting-The-Man story emerges (yes, with Wile E. as the hero!). COYOTE VS. ACME is on my list!

With that set up, ON TO THE TRIVIAS!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Beach Day, Frankenstein Day, International Cabernet Sauvignon Day, International Whale Shark Day, National Grief Awareness Day, International Day of The Victims of Enforced Disappearances, Slinky Day, and National Toasted Marshmallow Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1800, the first organized slave rebellion took place outside Richmond, VA. In 1862, Confederate forces won the Second Battle of Bull Run. In 1918, assassins failed to kill Vladimir Lenin despite hitting him with two bullets. In 1963, a hotline was established between the United States and the Kremlin as a fail-safe system to diffuse tensions that could have led to a nuclear exchange.

In 1969, the heavy metal band Earth announced it would be changing its name to Black Sabbath. In 1972, John Lennon performed for the last time live in concert. In 1976, Tom Brokaw took over as anchor of the NBC Evening News. In 1967, Thurgood Marshall was confirmed as the first African-American Supreme Court Justice. In 2021, the last American troops left Afghanistan, ending the attack and occupation that began shortly after the September 11 attacks.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: Ty Cobb in major league baseball (1905), SWEETHEARTS OF THE RODEO (1968), SANTANA (1969), African-Americans in space (1983), THE LATE SHOW WITH DAVID LETTERMAN (1993), East Timor (1999), THE RISING (2002), LATE REGISTRATION (2005).

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Mary Shelley, Raymond Massey, Shirley Booth, Roy Wilkins, Joan Blondell, Fred MacMurray, Ted Williams, Kitty Wells, Geoffrey Beene, Bill Daily, Warren Buffett, Sylvia Earle, Bruce McLaren, John Peel, Jean-Claude Killy, Molly Ivins, Tug McGraw, Peggy Lipton, Fred Hampton, Lewis Black, Robert Parish, David Paymer, TV’s Frank Conniff, Michael Chiklis, Paul Oakenfold, Lars Fredericksen, Cameron Diaz, Lisa Ling, Cliff Lee, and Andy Roddick.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Max Factor, Jean Seberg, Vera-Ellen, Philly Joe Jones, Richard Jordan, Lindsay Anderson, Charles Bronson, Glenn Ford, Walter “Killer” Kowalski, Seamus Heaney, Brad Anderson, Oliver Sacks, Wes Craven, Valerie Harper, John Thompson Jr., and Mikhail Gorbachev.

FEED THE WORMS: Vladimir Putin simp and Belarus dictator Alexander “Please Do Not Take Me Near Any Tall Windows!” Lukashenko entered Earth on this date.

Huey Long, (R )obert Crumb and Thom Tillis were born on this date. You decide if they get Happy Birthdays or if they Feed the Worms.

THIS DAY IN THE CULTURE: The Number One Song in the United States on this date … in 2026, “Choosin’ Texas” by Ella Langley … in 2016, “Closer” by The Chainsmokers featuring Halsey … in 2006, “London Bridge” by Fergie … in 1996, “Macarena” by Los del Rio … in 1986, “Higher Love” by Steve Winwood … and in 1976, “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart” by Elton John and Kiki Dee.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: From the album LAST SPLASH, released on this date in 1993 – and who, as fate would have it, is also performing at the aforementioned Daisy Chain Fields Music Festival!

(STANDS ON SOAPBOX)

Occasionally, I try to describe my mindset in this time of our reality, where the Worst President Ever literally limps along, his ‘popularity’ eroding even among the worst of the worst that still look up to him, while the rest of us just mill around or try to plod through every day amidst the reality that as long as he retains control and those last few who look up to him have the levers of power and influence that they have, survival is the prime directive and goal.

The point has been punched up further the last couple of days with the death of the universally loved icon Dolly Parton (and, to a lesser but no less important extent, Tim Curry and his unique place in many of our lives - SAY IT!) and the outpouring of joy and grief and sadness in the wake of her passing. Dolly has a unique status of only the biggest click-baity jerkwads even daring to mock her death, yet the intensity and the volume of the announcement, it seems to this Substacker, definitely carries more to it than just her art and life example.

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It truly seems to me that, given what he has been doing and the clear and obvious erosion of all his faculties, Dolly’s death gives America a pressure valve that is allowing some of the tensions (and, yes, grief over what too many of us have seen Trump do and to this point get away with) to get expressed while the BIG event that feels and/or seems imminent yet far away is, well, awaiting itself. It is as if the world is on an interminable vigil - one filled with an alien mix of sorrow for the people around him but disdain at best for the central figure for whom the vigil is being held - because the honest emotions that will come out when IT happens are all but assured NOT to be anywhere CLOSE to the sorrowful joy we have for the memory of Dolly Parton.

Indeed, just to remind us why, the initial announcement by the White House on Tuesday of Dolly’s death and order to bring all American flags to half-staff for a week was so sober and free of Trumpian self-aggrandizement that that lack of chest-thumping was startling that many of us thought, well this won’t last.

And, it didn’t.

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On Wednesday, Trump popped up on the Glenn Beck program (yes, he still airs shows) and made Dolly’s death about Donald by screechbloviating “She really liked me!” (Sure, Don - that’s why she turned down the Congressional Medal of Freedom twice while you were occupying DC and finally accepted it when Joe Biden was president. Man, that’s gotta buuuuurrrnnnnnn...)

We shall keep playing 9 TO 5 and “Jolene” and even “Sweet Transvestite” and CLUE, and as we do, we recover from some of our emotional distress with the catharsis the passing of Dolly and Tim bring us, even as we now (as too many social media figures have asked) wait to see if fate will be ready for a third 80-year-old (aka “the right 80-year old!”) to leave the premises and finish this everyone-wants-to-leave vigil so we can get on with our LIVES!

Until then ...

(STEPS OFF SOAPBOX)

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DEMOLITION DONNIE?

While the courts have actually done a commendable job of holding off the worst that Trump and his slavish minions are trying to do to this country, the frustration comes because even when Trump is told NO, Trump and company perform the equivalent of throwing every toy against the wall and ending by saying “I STILL WANNA!” before overfilling his diaper again. There is truly no better example of this as the JOHN F. KENNEDY CENTER For the Performing Arts.

Even though the title of the center is not capitalized, as we all know Diaper Donnie has been constantly told over and over and OVER again that NO, even with your handpicked butt remoras on the KENNEDY Arts Center stating that NO, DON, you CANNOT change the name of the Kennedy Center to the Trump Center - no matter how many times you try.

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To Trump, such a statement is a provocation. And so Trump - who went all the way through the Court system to have his name removed from the front of the Kennedy Center, and did so while erecting a scaffolding system in the front of the building to also mask John F. Kennedy’s name - went from fat spoiled b*tch brat to abusive fat spoiled b*tch brat, filing a motion making a total BS claim that the center is structurally unsound and threatening to destroy the Kennedy Center altogether if he does not get what he wants NOW!

And Trump would stamp his wee tiny feet on the ground if they weren’t attached to his now-elephantine ankles and legs thanks to several of the aforementioned ailments and doing so would cause enormous pain - if he had the coordination and strength to do it at all, that is - to emphasize the latest manifestation of how Not Well he is and why we all resume our wait.

But, wait. Alas, there is more ...

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THE CANADIAN TRADE WAR HITS THE TOILETS

In the wake of the end of negotiations with Canada over Trump’s STUPIDSTUPID tariffs and the ignition of another wave of STUPIDSTUPID tariffs ready to go on January 1 (along with a whole flash flood of social safety nets courtesy of Trump’s Big Bill O’Crap), Trump’s acting-out went to a truly ludicrous low - even as the effects of how every American will literally feel this US-Canada contest is becoming clearer.

Trump, as we have discovered, is an atrocious negotiator. His “wins” while running around New York City for decades consists of lawsuits of attrition and, as has been observed by several people, covering up his rampant and obvious corruption with absurdly over-the-top personal and moral scandal that the media happily chases at. So as his asinine demands from Canada were met with an appropriate cross-check to his chest, Trump’s only move is to try to something bullying and showy, in the belief as apparently planted by Natalie Harp that Trump has the same juice in 2026 he sort of had in 1986.

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Rather than make an actual counteroffer like an adult, Trump instead made the “threat” that if Canada did not kiss Trump’s tons of tuckus, Trump would use his powers beset in him by his age and drug use and psychopathies to .. wait for it ... rename Lake Ontario “Lake America!” To further this imbecility, on Thursday afternoon Trump released a photo on social media wherein Trump used one of his Sharpies to scratch out “Lake Ontario” on a map and have “LAKE AMERICA” replacing it, as if that were somehow official.

Naturally, as an international body of water, Trump could just call it Lake Natalie - or, as Ontario Premiere Doug Ford suggested, Canada could rename Lake Michigan as Lake Epstein - and it truly would be laughable. But one thing such dickishness does do is divert a little attention from the actual consequences of a trade war with Canada.

It has been noted before, but Canada is the U.S.’ biggest trade partner, and beside companies that do business in both places going back and forth between the countries to do that business (think car manufacturing and building materials).

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So, from a political angle, a protracted struggle is going to make several already-fraught Senate races even tougher for Republicans to win - think border states like Maine and Michigan, a pretty-much-border state like Ohio, and a not-quite border state that does a ton of business with Canada like Iowa, whose Senate race is quietly moving up the charts as Democrat Josh Turek challenges Trump/MAGA-Endorsed Ashley Hinton in a race getting a lot closer (after all, Iowa did go for Obama twice).

Beyond those races, there is the household angle. There is one commodity that will likely become even more expensive with a Canadian trade war than the first wave of STUPIDSTUPID tariffs has made it: toilet paper. Yep, most TP in this country comes from our friends (and they are still friends) up north - but if retaliatory tariffs actually get imposed, look for even more inflation with a Trump stamp on it, whether Trump recognizes it or not ...

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WHAT IS NATALIE HARP TELLING TRUMP??

... because on one hand, Trump’s ever-fewer interviews with MAGA Media presents a picture of a mighty Trump as a benevolent and well-loved ruler. To literally hear Trump garblestrut, inflation is dead, Iran is defeated, Americans will soon be paid to fill their tanks, and Trump could beat any given Democrat in 2028 by “25%!”

On the other hand ... ah ... no.

In their latest positive/negative survey released this week, The Economist - THE ECONOMIST - revealed that right now, forty-seven out of fifty states have negative approval ratings for Donald Trump. FORTY-SEVEN out of fifty. And of those remaining three states, one - West Virginia - actually has Trump closer to 50% in other surveys. Otherwise, it, along with Idaho and Wyoming, are the only states where Trump has positive approval ratings.

On the ground, those numbers are even shakier. Take for example the issue of data centers, which have become universally reviled but attached at the hard drive to every Republican, who until about three weeks ago continued to tout what a boom massive warehouses of energy-sucking and resource-soiling maxicomputers will have in creating a technology stealing jobs and driving up enshittification for the benefit of cretinous dweebs who also love showering cash on MAGAts across the country. Candidates who can read polls have now started trying to wash their hands of these bytes ...

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... unfortunately for them, though, the leader of their party whom they shall never cross for any reason, remains the one person who unabashedly cheerleads for a data center in every neighborhood. So like it or not, data centers are Trump and MAGA and the GOP. Sucks to be them.

OH - and Trump is also planning to use his imagined mega-popularity to make November 3 a referendum on ... Donald Trump and his greatness ... with a rare “Midterm Convention” in September to do the same thing.

What, as the kids say, could go wrong?

AS THE SUMMER STARTS TO FADE ...

It’s a lot. So yes, listen to some Dolly. Heck, listen to some Tim Curry (find “I Do The Rock,” from a 1979 album he released post-ROCKY HORROR that holds up quite well, IMHO), get a few more rays outside, and as kids settle in to their school schedules (as I do next week) know that, yeah, that feeling is real and, like so many vigils, it seemingly takes forever to get it done - and then, often in a snap, it ends and the pall lifts and we are somewhere new when it does.

Until then, have some Trivias!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Burger Day, International Lottery Day, Crab Soup Day, National Just Because Day, National Petroleum Day (m’kay), and National Post De Creme Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1859, oil was first struck in the United States (in Pennsylvania). In 1883, the Krakatoa volcano in the South Pacific erupted - still one of the most powerful such events in recorded history. In 1896, the Anglo-Zanzibar War was declared - and, 40 minutes after it was declared, ended with a British victory, officially making it the shortest war in world history.

In 1965, Elvis Presley invited The Beatles to hang out with him in California. In 1976, transgender athlete Renee Richards was banned from playing in the U.S. Tennis Open. In 2008, Barack Obama officially became the first African-American to win a major party nomination for President.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: A code of conduct for a military (in Japan, 1232), Iraq (1921), the jet airplane (1939), ROMAN HOLIDAY (1953), MARY POPPINS (1964), Dolly Parton (1969), Pat Benatar on record (1979), WILD PLANET (1980), TEN (1991), ATLiens (1996), “Thrift Shop” (2012).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Theodore Dreiser, Carl Bosch, Katharine McCormick, Charles Rolls, Man Ray, Frank Leahy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Lester Young, Sidney Yates, Martha Raye, Joan Kroc, Ira Levin, Ernie Broglio, Alice Coltrane, Chip Douglas, Daryl Dragon, Bob Kerry, Tuesday Weld, Barbara Bach, Harry Reems, Sgt. Slaughter, Buddy Bell, Paul Reubens, Peter Stormare, Diana Scarwid, Glen Matlock, Bernhard Langer, Kathy Hochul, Mike Maddux, Downtown Julie Brown, Cesar Millan, Jim Thome, Tony Kanal, The Great Khalil, Mase, Sarah Chalke, Aaron Paul, Patrick J. Adams, and Breanna Stewart.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: W.E.B. DuBois, Gracie Allen, Le Corbusier, Brian Epstein, Bennett Cerf, Margaret Bourke-White, Halie Selassie, Lord Mountbatten, Douglas Kenney, Greg Morris, Brandon Tartikoff, Darryl Dawkins, Lute Olson, Pat Corrales, and today, Peter Cullen.

FEED THE WORMS: Ed Gein and Christine O’Donnell entered Earth on this date. The Butcher of Bosnia, Ratko Mladic, bought it today.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Rest in Peace and Rock and Blues, Stevie Ray Vaughan ...

Oh, yeah - doing the same thing over and over and over and expecting different results ...

Hi!

As mentioned, I was taking a weekend to visit family and my old neighborhood in Cleveland, so the Sunday update was tabled. Funny story: as the weekend played out, the above adage unfolded in my hometown with the city’s Cleveland Browns.

There, DeShaun Watson - the quarterback they mortgaged their future on despite having to pay off literally dozens of women with whom he did inappropriate things to while getting massages, with an NFL-record guaranteed contract, only to have him play all of 19 games in four years and only one-half of one of them being any good - was gifted the starting QB position this year despite not only by all accounts sucking during the pre-season (including against third-stringers on Saturday) but then ripping fans who booed him (admittedly they also booed when he blew out his Achilles tendon in 2024) and creating a situation where in any other sport any other franchise would have sent him packing.

But, they are the 21st Century Cleveland Browns, so he will start, because doing the same thing over and over will eventually make him what he was in Houston. Or something.

In other words ... this is an update about the most recent Donald Trump policy and behavioral decisions ...

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CANADA TO TRUMP: TAKE OFF, HOSER

You could throw a stone at where one could start answering the question “What NOW?!”, so why not the collapse of trade talks with what until Trump shartdrooled along, was our most reliable trade partner - Canada. After the first wave of threats to make Canada the 51st state and subsequent elbows being thrown up, a cycle of STUPIDSTUPID tariffs going on then off then on again commenced, until the countries sat down to try to redo some of the deals.

Over the weekend, because with whatever synapses are barely firing in that artificially-haired skull, Trump’s “skills” as “ThE BesT NegOHzeeaYTOrr!” is about screwing the people on the other side of the table before they screw you first. Thus, the US presented a series of ridiculous conditions, many involving exclusivity rights for the US at rates favorable to the US, and apparently expected Canada to go along with it, even tossing tariffs at Canadian products as a technique best described as stick-and-baseball-bat.

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But, again, we see that Trump somehow managed to make the preternatured-to-be-nice Canadians to tell Trump to take off. Prime Minister Mark Carney - an actual trained economist - cut off negotiations and walked away, throwing retaliatory tariffs at American goods knowing that it has been the Canadian actions taken after the first wave of Trumpian “negotiations” that have hurt American industries (just ask the bourbon industry).

This, of course, has made Trump try to intimidate Canada even harder - first by mean words (”They want the benefits of a STATE!”), then threatening even deeper tariffs at the end of the year (maple syrup tacos?), and finally THIS JUST IN: by renaming Lake Ontario ... wait for it ... LAKE AMERICA!

Take THAT, ya moose-lovers!!!

Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results ... ugh.

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WHO ORDERED THE HAMBURGER HELPER?

Next, an update that does have a bit of variation - but not really. You see, going back to the STUPIDSTUPID tariffs - and even Trump 1.0 - the White House has had a habit of imposing policies that gut some of their most inexplicably loyal constituencies at a cost that goes into the pocketbooks of everyday Americans.

Witness, for example, the sale of American beef to China weeks after the COVID outbreak of 2020 despite Trump’s attacks over the virus getting into the U.S. (a controversy that sadly continues with the lunatic attacks against Dr. Anthony Fauci and the weird debate over whether it is a man-made virus or not) (most believe it was not).

Flash forward to Trump 2.0. The STUPIDSTUPID tariffs continue, and now fused with the Trump Iran War Loss driving petroleum products like diesel fuel and fertilizer, beef prices continue to stay brutally high. And I don’t know if you heard, but there’s an election coming up, and elections - especially ones in the middle of a Presidential term - tend to be up-or-down votes on those who have been running things, and polling says that will be a BIG down against him.

What to do? Something substantial and long-lasting like throwing out the STUPIDSTUPID tariffs? Or something symbolic yet likely even more destructive in ways we can’t quite figure out until that symbolic act of derp happens? YOU KNOW WHAT TRUMP WILL DO!

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Last weekend, with big fanfare, Trump announced a massive purchase of ground beef to be splat into the marketplace sometime between now and November 3, because typical American voters love hamburger (or so TrumpBrain thinks). What could possibly go wrong?!

The list of things that likely can and will go wrong include but are not limited to ... admitting the beef is coming from Argentina to bail out Trump-humping wack-haired weirdo Javier Millei ... infuriating the American beef industry who fear seeing cheap beef flood the market and make even more ranchers’ businesses imperiled ... a noticeable lack of controls to make sure said Argentinian beef is not full of chemicals or viruses (because have you met the yutz running Health and Human Services?!) ... or even that what is in that stuff is beef at all (owing to a disturbing story of Trump allowing wild horses in National Parks to be slaughtered because reasons) ... and who knows what else?!

But buying off voters and hoping they will remember the last burger they ate before they vote or hit the terlet - whichever comes first - is primer Trump, hoping to stave off an electoral slaughter that hit them in 2018. The lesson? Know where your meat comes from before buying these next few weeks.

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STOP THAT VOTE! (BUT NOT REALLY ... YET ...)

We now turn to the latest Supreme Court decision, which again is all about the Trumpian sue-and-sue-and-sue-some-more legal “strategy,” and a decision that cause a lot of pha-REEK!-outing that, at this moment, was way overblown ...

As we know, besides “The Same Thing But Dumber and Louder” strategery for November, the only other thing Trump has his classic campaign denialism. Amid pure twaddle about voting irregularities that simply don’t exist (illegal immigrants don’t vote, IDs aren’t necessary because local election boards can identify you, non-white and non-penised people CAN vote), Trump for months has been trying to get the Post Office to Big Brother voting rolls in order to prevent voters from getting ballots because ever since 2020, mail-in voting is now a Democratic advantage.

To that end, two lawsuits to get the White House and Post Office to not do that because the Constitution is pretty clear elections are run by states have worked their way through the courts. That, of course, means our radical right-wing Supreme Court, who have been savagely anti-voting rights to get fewer people to vote - because fewer votes helps the MAGAGOP and what do you expect when 2/3 of the Court are Federalist Society-trained drones?

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So when one of the two cases was ruled on in favor of Trump, the pha-REEK!-ing out on the Left was over the top, excessive, and ... frankly ... wrong - and, in the worst cases, just as fearmongering as MAGA Media.

Simply put, all the Supreme Court did on one of the cases was rule that the case in question, brought by 23 individual states, did not have standing to try to stop Trump from telling the USPS to try to not send ballots to “unqualified” voters. It’s a dumb ruling, but one that did NOT - repeat, DID NOT - green light Trump-directed voter roll fcking.

The second case in question, in fact, specifically BANS Trump from doing that - and that case is still in force. Indeed, nothing is stopping any of the 23 states who brought the first case from trying to stop USPS from doing anything to their voter rolls (and at least two states said they would move to protect their states, one of them California).

SO, while Trump will try to F with the vote, and while as Ketanji Brown Jackson noted in a 23-page rebuttal to the ruling that rulings like yesterday’s don’t help build confidence in the vote (at least in some pockets, the vote is still the vote and we still have it.

So keep working it!

Now, speaking about not being helpful ...

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YOU’RE NOT HELPING, HAKEEM!

... let’s talk about the New York Times story published Sunday revealing that the next potential Speaker of the House, Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, recently took a secret meeting with sterile-yet-slimy Trump in-law Jared Kushner about things that were not revealed in the NYT article.

Needless to say, Democratic commentators already on edge that the overly-verbose-at-times Jeffries, who has in the eyes of some continues to stay way too cozy with Israeli moneyed interests and in others does not exude the FIGHTING stance they want Democrats to be showing 24/7/365, erupted in WTFs at him.

Folks were reminded that Jeffries and Kushner were, at some point in the past, social friends. And to be fair, this Substacker - who has been less infuriated by Jeffries as others - is also not exactly sure what’s going on here.

Jeffries has been pushing back a bit, insisting that the meeting does not signal appeasement or pulling back on what would and should be dozens of investigatory committees erupting should (dare I say when?) Jeffries takes the gavel from Mikey Johnson - but calls for people like Jamie Raskin or Pramila Jayapal or other not-Jeffries Democrats stop Jeffries ascension to become Speaker will not stop.

After all, we can bet that MAGA will dispute every election anyway - not that they can stop a new Congress from starting, as the rules state that when this 119th Congress’ terms end in 2027, that Congress is dissolved and the 120th Congress, with elections certified IN STATES, will convene when it should. Who will lead ... we shall see?

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A GRAB-BAG OF ITEMS

Somewhere short of three paragraphs but still worth noting, here are a few rando items to wrap the newsy portion of today’s Update and build to the Trivias ...

- Rosie O’Donnell’s week-long substitution stint for Jimmy Kimmel was, in a word, boffo! Reviews were stellar, ratings banged, and word is Rosie may be ready to join the late-night talk show wars should she get a chance to do so. That of course won’t be CBS, but with ABC now fighting hard against the White House, it may be worth keeping an eye on ...

- The WNBA, already being rocked by tons of off-court controversy involving MAGA-sympathetic players (Indiana’s Sophie Cunningham) and on-court controversy involving refereeing (this is A Thing throughout sports), finally ruled two grandstanding former NBA scrubs, Royce White and Enes Kanter, will not be ruled transgender and be eligible for the WNBA draft. Kanter in particular is a dickless jackass - he insists his legal name includes “freedom” in it (fk that) and had to be escorted out of a game in Chicago after getting into an argument with players during a game.

He sucked in the NBA too ...

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- The latest in the Trumpian celebration of the Declartion of Independence Trump came Sunday with the shutting down of more DC streets for a poorly-attended and even-more-poorly-designed car race. The idiocy featured a smirking-like-a-five-year-old Trump waiving a green flag to start one of races - but doing it from well within a box so no racers saw it, and at least looking like it hurt those hands while doing it.

- Far more interesting was the appearance over the weekend of “Melania,” both at an event at the White House on Friday and even better in the box in the race on Sunday. Naturally it is likely “Melania” was there to counter the still-building and creepier-by-the-revelation story of the latest blond Ivanka-esque blonde, Natalie Harp, who was within earshot of “Melania” on Sunday. AWK-warrrrd!!!

- Ending on a positive note ... on Friday, a MAGA self-debasing provocateur named Jake Lang showed up in Minneapolis intending, as he has throughout the country, to disrupt events carrying a cross and working to, frankly, create violence - even if it means his ass gets kicked. Happily, Lang’s ass did get kicked, in the best way possible - by a counterprotestor who showed up to the event literally wearing a full Spider-Man costume.

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- Spidey saw Lang, leaped towards him with fist cocked, jumped into Lang’s paper cross, and laid a lick on the side of Lang’s face. Spidey sadly did get arrested - but so did Lang later in the day. Nevertheless, it’s a reminder that super heroes are on OUR side.

And, never piss off your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.

With that ... ON TO THE TRIVIAS!

HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Banana Split Day (tra la la!) (IYKYK), Kiss and Make Up Day, National Park Service Founders Day, National Secondhand Wardrobe Day, and National Whiskey Sour Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1875, Matthew Webb became the first person to swim the English Channel. In 1921, Franklin Roosevelt was diagnosed with polio. In 1944, Allied troops liberated Paris as Nazi officers refused to carry out Adolph Hitler’s order to burn Paris to the ground to prevent it. In 1970, Elton John performed in the United States for the first time (at the Troubadour in Los Angeles). In 1982, American troops were deployed to Lebanon. In 2012, the Voyager 1 became the first human-made space craft (or known object, for that matter) to enter interstellar space.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: The telescope (1609), Uruguay (1825), The National Park Service (1916), THE WIZARD OF OZ (1939), RASHOMON (1950), instant ramen noodles (1958), athletes’ last names on the back of jerseys (1960, by the American Football League), BORN TO RUN (1975), BOSTON (1976), 42nd STREET (1980), Linux (1991), THE MISEDUCATION OF LAURYN HILL (1998), XO (1998), “Wrecking Ball” (2013).

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Michael Rennie, Walt Kelly, Van Johnson, Mel Ferrer, Leonard Bernstein, Monty Hall, Althea Gibson, Graham Jarvis, Sean Connery, Cecil Andrus, Regis Philbin, Tom Skerrit, Wayne Shorter, Hugh Hudson, Frederick Forsyth, John Badham, Marshall Brickman, Anthony Heald, Pat Martino, Rollie Fingers, Mink Stole, John Savage, Martin Amis, Willy DeVille, Rob Halford, Elvis Costello, Tim Burton, Joanne Whaley, Blair Underwood, Jeff Tweedy, Rachael Ray, Claudia Shiffer, Doug Glanville, Crash Holly, Marvin Harrison, Alexander Skarsgard, Bobby Berk, and Blake Lively.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: David Hume, James Watt, Friedrich Nietzche, Edouard Michelin, Alfred Kinsey, Paul Muni, Stan Kenton, Gower Champion, Truman Capote, Samantha Smith, Doug Stegmeyer, Lewis F. Powell Jr., Carl Barks, Aaliyah, Kevin Duckworth, Ted Kennedy, Neil Armstrong, John McCain, Orval Tessier, and Jim Murray.

FEED THE WORMS: Ivan the Terrible, Erich Honecker, Conrad Black, George Wallace, Albert Belle and Michael Cohen entered Earth on this date. Pirate Henry Morgan, John Birch and Art Rooney bought it on this date.

Gene Simmons and Billy Ray Cyrus were born on this date. You decide if they get Happy Birthdays or if they Feed the Worms.

TODAY IN THE CULTURE: The Number One nonfiction book in the country on this date ... in 2026, REGIME CHANGE by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan ... in 2016, a mislabled work of fiction named HILLBILLY ELEGY by Intern JD Vance ... in 2006, MARLEY & ME by John Grogan ... in 1996, THE DILBERT PRINCIPLE by Scott Adams ... in 1986, FATHERHOOD by Bill Cosby (another work of fiction?) ... and in 1976, THE FINAL DAYS by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Still controversial, still stellar, and without which there would be no Vampire Weekend, this is the opening track from the album GRACELAND, released on this date in 1986 ...

… people are going to walk through it!

After the Right Wing Pha-REEK!-Out over taking the bait GA Senator Jon Ossoff laid out by simply noting the apparent fact that Donald Trump sure seems to like traveling with his … aide … Natalie Harp more than doing the job of being President, Legacy Media Inc. (perhaps with some well-timed and spiteful White House leaks?) (KaroLIEne? “Melania?” Stephen Miller?) has been unearthing piles of what sure seems like one weird lady …

For example, her story – and the route she took to be at Trump’s side – includes a series of now-public letters which have the tone of a 10-year-old crushing on a pop star, in which Harp claimed Trump (or the existence of Trump) somehow helped literally cure (through the passage of a law in 2018) Stage 2 bone cancer in 2018. Those letters, as has been noted, were so intense that the Secret Service genuinely considered her a threat.

That fear came to a strange if comic from an angle incident in 2023 during Trump’s New York trial where he was convicted of fraud in connection with his affair with Stormy Daniels. The widely-reported story said Harp – who by then had been retained as an aide for Trump – was part of a “screaming match” in which she was told she would not be allowed to go to court with him. Undeterred, Harp jumped into the trunk of an SUV to go to the appearance. CNN reportedly has a photo to corroborate the story, though they have not published it.

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Harp’s obsession was confirmed by her brother, Preston, who told CNN that the Harp family was taught “American Exceptionalism” (like slavery was OK because everyone did it), that his sister was full-on in favor of that line of thinking, that she had also written to George W. Bush during his Presidency (the letters were never acknowledged), and that the entire obsession, from at least one family member’s perspective, is “unhealthy.” (No duh!)

Oh – and for those who are looking at this and agree that it’s weird but that there might be some innocence or residual survivor adrenaline about it, let me kill that idea for you. The Wall Street Journal added to Harp’s story by mentioning that Natalie found, showed Trump, and got permission to, show the infamous AI video of Barack and Michelle Obama as apes on Trump’s social media feeds. (See “slavery is OK,” above.)

What must be noted is that none of this – NONE of this – would have likely come to light had MAGA decided Ossoff’s remark needed to be addressed or was a convenient diversion from (gestures wildly). Over three DOZEN MAGA Media figures have posted and/or screeched and/or made it known how horrible they thing Ossoff was for making them elevate Natalie Harp into the culture. And as of this writing, they aren’t stopping.

Now, if you are of the belief that no PR is bad PR, then you may think all this Harp stuff is somehow helping Trump and the GOP. The thing is, it clearly is not, as a couple of updates here will illustrate. Now Harp herself is part of the continuing story of Trump’s emotional/mental/physical breakdowns and its affect on everything, up to and especially the prospects of holding power after November 3 and January 3.

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“I’M REALLY GOOD AT TREES!”

Regarding Harp’s actual … duty or job or target of her honey pot or however you want to describe it … with Trump, yesterday was yet another head-shaking episode. Amid continuing reports of the Iran not-a-war trudging on, ever-worsening news on the economy, swirling upset at the mind-blowingly huge chunks of corruption (including the new crypto-only bank that Dear Leader now controls – nothing to worry about THERE, eh?) and him, Grandpa appeared on the White House driveway with all the gravitas of That Neighbor you never want to start a conversation with because he will never let it end … and got into one of those conversations.

With no motivation whatsoever, Trump started to prattle on about the asphalt and concrete under him, being used in his dumbass ballroom (which he boasted was “indestructible!) (there is no such thing as indestructible concrete) and on a helipad that he waddlestaggered over to, and then started droneslurring about a star that was embedded in the concrete on that likely-to-go-after-he-does slab.

Actual quote: “they’re putting the granite top on. and the granite top says ‘THE seal of— the United States of America. that’s the exact— term. if you look at, uhhh, the SEALS— of the presidents, ‘the Seal of the President of the United States of America,’ meaning— the president is— in the White House. this is for many presidents. this is in for— this is for— many presidents. they will have it for— a long time.”

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From there, Trump then talked about … landscaping … about the flagpoles he put up … and how, yes, how he has picked trees to plant because “I’m really good at trees!” (Flag that, because with all the other idiotic construction going on, another target for Trump is the golf course near Washington – a course that includes cherry blossom trees planted during William Howard Taft’s Presidency that could be destroyed, because that is what Trump does.)

Trump is apparently preparing for the next event of the TrumpClaration 250 “celebration” – an IndyCar race that will be run through the streets of Washington that nobody asked for but Grampy wants, so Grampy is apparently going to get it.

Guess Natalie may be busy this weekend …

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MICKEY FINALLY TELLS TRUMP TO PISS OFF

Earlier I mentioned that the handling of the Natalie Harp story has truly backfired (there is a name for an attempt to hide bad news boomeranging into an even bigger story than it otherwise would have been - the “Streisand effect,” of course) even if the intent was to divert attention from mounds and mounds and mounds of bad news.

You can decide that – but one story that got a little pub deserves more because it could be a good sign of institutions finally deciding they have either had enough of Trump or that his mojo is gone.

On Tuesday, the mighty Disney Corporation made many of us table our complicated relationship with Mickey Mouse when they announced a countersuit against Trump – or more specifically, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The FCC has drawn a big target on the network by attempting to make ABC take Jimmy Kimmel and THE VIEW off the air, then making early challenges to eight ABC-owned stations as a clear retaliatory effort because Jimmy and Whoopi hurts Trump’s fee-fees.

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A year after trying to appease the FCC and their preternaturally aged Chair, Brendan Carr, ABC’s parent company Disney decided they had enough, and filed charges defending those eight affiliates, charging First Amendment violations and bringing in three heavy-hitting attorneys who have extensive experience adjudicating Supreme Court cases. The goal is to get the FCC to back down – and Carr signaled somewhat surprising conciliatory language that at least opens a door towards potentially eating TACOs over the entire incident.

For all the justifiable stress over Trump toady Todd Blanche now having the Department of Justice to file all kinds of harassing lawsuits meant to harass and intimidate (certainly not use the law, as Trump’s lawyers uniformly suck and when cases get to trial Trump invariably loses), the history of Trump shows that if you push back at all, he will back down. Whether that happens here, Disney apparently recognizing their first move to placate Trump didn’t work (DUH!), maybe getting in his grille and holding your breath so you don’t inhale Trump stank is the better option.

Bad news for Trump – BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!!

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THE ALMOST-FINAL PRIMARY UPDATE – BAD NEWS FOR MAGA, WEIRD NEWS FOR DEMOCRATS

Last Tuesday featured the next-to-last primary schedule, and there were more signs that Trump’s grip on MAGA is wavering. In the ever-nutty state of Florida, a number of Trump-endorsed House candidates went down to defeat, most notably Rep. Cory Mills, who is facing harassment charges involving former aides. News was equally bad in Alaska, where the first two slots for the Governors’ race there will be filled by two Democrats (the top four make the November ballot) amid a Senate race that Democrat Mary Peltola has been winning (and that would be a flip).

Worst of all was in South Carolina, where there is a runoff for the seat vacated by the death of Lindsay Graham. Trump’s handpicked successor and Graham sibling Darline debated Rep. Ralph Norman for the GOP nomination – and may have had an all-timer of a gaffe. The experience-free Graham responded to a question about Taiwan by admitting that “National security is not my thing” – an answer that elicited gasps and prompted a drop-in visit on Friday by Trump to salvage the race. The winner faces Dr. Annie Andrews, who will either face a severely-weakened Graham or a man who is two years older than Lindsay was, though she will still be an underdog.

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On the Democratic side, things were also weird – and, again, we go to Florida. In what was arguably the biggest upset of the season, Trump Impeachment I witness Alex Vindmann got soundly beaten by State Representative and Democratic Socialist Angie Nixon. Vindman’s 10-1 spending advantage could not overcome him being a lackluster campaigner who just moved to the state three years ago – particularly against one of the most vocal resistors to the skeevy Ron “Puddin’ Fingaz” DeSantis there is in that state.

Florida being Florida, the so-ironically-named Nixon (who is a Black woman - the Irony-O-Meter blows up) will be a decided underdog - even in a potential Blue Tsunami national atmosphere - against incumbent Trumper senator Ashley Moody.

Further, Florida Democrats being Florida Democrats, the potentially competitive Governors’ race will pit DeSantis/Trump-anointed candidate with ethical and sexual scandal questions bubbling under the surface, Rep. Byron Donald, against former Republican-now-Democrat David Jolly - and that race is competitive. At least as far as Florida goes.

One more round of primaries coming up, including that South Carolina runoff. But, again, the “FULL AND COMPLETE ENDORSEMENT” of the MAGA leader – one so feared within the party that candidates as soon as this cycle were known to leave races without it – may not have what they used to have, particularly with the ever-important “independent” vote out there.

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2028 – THE CONVENTIONS BECKON

Yes, indeedy do, 2028 is truly around the corner. We already know of many, MANY Democrats openly flirting with running for President (Buttigieg, Harris, Newsom, Prizker) and others being much more coy (AOC, Shapiro) or openly saying no for now (Ossoff).

On the GOP side, assuming intern JD Vance hasn’t moved up, similar mechanizations are in place with a gallery of yeah we know (Rubio), OMG (Tucker Carlson) OMG Seriously (Marjorie Taylor Greene) and OMG GTFOH (PETE HEGSETH, who was in Iowa campaigning this week because it’s not like he’s busy as the DEFENSE Secretary or anything).

One thing we know, of course, is that the nominations races end with conventions. This week, Democrats made news by announcing the finalists to host the 2028 shindig – and they are Boston, Denver, and Philadelphia. Atlanta and Chicago were eliminated as semi-finalists. The DNC will take place starting August 7, 2028.

And if you’re wondering, which you may be now that I’ve mentioned it, the Republican/MAGA National Convention will be later in August (the party in power always goes second) and will be held in Houston. Because that’s a nice place to be in August, y’know?

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READY FOR THE TRIVIAS? SURE YOU ARE!

There’s the Updates for today. As previously mentioned, there may not be a Sunday update so I can take a little physical time off – but I am reserving the right to do something quick if there is time and space and inclination. Until then … IT’S THE TRIVIAS!

HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Radio Day, National Bacon Lover’s Day, National Pecan Pie Day, World Mosquito Day, and National Chocolate Pecan Pie Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1619, the first slave ship landed in Jamestown. In 1954, the United States approved of a National Security Council recommendation to support “noncommunist” nations in Southeast Asia. In 1968, Soviet Union-led forces invaded Czechoslovakia to end that country’s Prague Spring protests.

In 1974, Nelson Rockefeller was chosen by Gerald Ford to be his Vice-President. In 1975, the Viking 1 spacecraft launched, heading to Mars. In 1989, Lyle and Erik Menendez murdered their parents, sparking one of the more salacious scandals of the early 21^st century. In 2000, the peregrine falcon was removed from the endangered species list.

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DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: American Unions (the National Labor Union, 1866), the 1812 Overture (1882), the National Football League (1920), the DuMont Television Network (1930), Senegal (1960), SLOW TRAIN COMING (1979), UPSTAIRS AT ERIC’S (1982), the Oslo Peace Accords (1993), A24 (2012).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Benjamin Harrison, H.P. Lovecraft, Jack Teagarden, Al Lopez, Kingsley Davis, Eero Saarinen, Jacqueline Susann, Walter Bernstein, Gloria Parker, Jim Reeves, George J. Mitchell, Dave Brock, Isaac Hayes, Graig Nettles, Connie Chung, James Pankow, Ralf Hutter, Ray Wise, Robert Plant, Phil Lynott, Doug Fieger, John Hiatt, Rudy Gatlin, Al Roker, Quinn Buckner, Joan Allen, David O. Russell, Elizabeth Alda, James Masters, KRS-One, ‘Dimebag’ Darrell Abbott, Ke Huy Quan, Amy Adams, Andrew Garfield, and Demi Lovato.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: William Booth, Thad Jones, George Adamson, Leo Jaffe, Kim Stanley, Gene Upshaw, Stephanie Tubbs Jones, Larry Knechtel, Phyllis Diller, Elmore Leonard, Melody Patterson, Jerry Lewis, Brian Murray, Tom T. Hall, Tom Weiskopf, and Al Attles.

FEED THE WORMS: Slodoban Milosevic, Larry Kudlow and Fred Durst entered Earth on this date. Leona Helmsley bought it on this date.

Don King, Ron Paul and Peter Horton were born on this date. You decide if they get Happy Birthdays or if they Feed the Worms.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday to Ric Olsen, co-founder of 80s rockers Berlin! This, IMHO, is by far their best song …

Hey, readers! I know I missed Sunday, but as many others have noted, every so often all the ... (gestures wildly) ... happening requires a day to just take time off. It was a rather icky weekend in Chicago - gray and humid as F, especially Saturday - so I thought I’d ease off the throttle and come back with some energy. Which I am!

Having said that, note the asterisk. There is prrroooobably not going to be a Sunday update, owing to a weekend getaway to my birth home of Cleveland - aka “The Land” for natives. Not totally ruling something out, but if you don’t see a Sunday update of any kind, that’ll be why.

So with that, let’s get to some things I need to get off my chest, as things continue to wear away - but with absurdist twists and clear and obvious cracks in the already brittle and shallow facade of whatever is left of the supposed MAGA “revolution” (HA!). So let’s GO!

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TOSSING A BOULDER IN THE GLASS COMMIE HOUSE

In case you haven’t notice, in those moments when President Trump is not dozing off, luxuriating in his tasteless orgy of faux gold on everything in his eyesight, pumping the virtual world with ever-dopey fantasies of him and George Washington (like George wouldn’t toss him to the Redcoats or a brig in a heartbeat), or raising massive speculation about why his ass is literally protruding inches from his already obese torso in a weirdly square shape (new speculation: he’s wearing the same kind of suit fighter pilots and astronauts wear to manage his utter inability to (TRIGGER WARNING) control his bowels), he has been using his latest favorite word a LAHT:

COMMUNIST!

While he hasn’t quite gotten to his other favorite thing to say - that the word “dumb” has a “b” in it (yes, he has - multiple times) - the word is being used because his muscle memory says he is a “BrAnDINg GENiuS!” and repeating a word is the best way to make a brand stick, and so he is trying to make the Democrats - oh, no, sorry, the rebrand according to President Best Words is “DUM-o-Crats” (because did you know about the “b” in “dumb?”) - COMMUNISTS as a way to scare his voters to the polls to stave off what right now looks like a padded-arse-whuppin’ of Republicans.

AOC? COMMUNIST! Zohran Mamdani? COMMUNIST! Abdul El-Zayed? MOOSLIM COMMUNIST! Elizabeth Warren? COMMUNIST like all American Indians were! Hell, Trump will throw a COMMUNIST! at Chuck Freaking Schumer - and look, it’s not like Republicans haven’t done this for decades. Never mind that for most people, “Communism” is a distant memory since the Soviet Union collapsed - MAGA and the GOP don’t have any other arguments, so they’ll give it to Grampy and let him roll with it.

Which is fine, if he also didn’t utterly blow the attack to smithereens by his own act of dumbass self-aggrandizement, base vengeance, and the always-ever-been tendency for Trump to take every person and every thing that has ever helped him and stab them in the back without a hint of remorse or emotion.

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THE UNASKED FOR RETURN OF LIL’ KIM (JONG-UN, THAT IS)

Because over the weekend, amid all the other torrents of AI slop, an illustration popped up of Trump with one of his still-existent man-crushes: Kim Jong-Un. Recall all the way back to Trump 1.0 where the notes about letters being exchanged made these two moron monsters look like pen pal villains from SCOOBY-DOO cartoons. Recall also that Kim rules North Korea, one of the very few still-existent old-school COMMUNIST countries out there, and the reminder that Trump still hearts Kim. Oopsie on the “Commie” attacks, not to mention making people wonder why Trump was bringing Kim up at all.

On Sunday evening we found out, as Trump trumpeted his BFF-dum with Lil’ Kim and his pouty ANGRRRR! about the prosperous and super-cool South Korea declining Trump’s demandscreed that they help Trump get out of Trump’s ever-deepening Iran mess by announcing the U.S. would not participate in decades-long military drills with South Korea - drills that have helped keep North and South Korea relatively mellow given that the war between the halves of the country has never been formally ended since it started in 1950.

That Trump has ravaged yet another longtime ally is sadly not surprising. That Trump did so while also coo-cooing next to a guy who has killed his own siblings to stay in power is unsurprising yet enraging. That it serves to undercut what lame-arse argument Trump had for the MAGAGOP will play itself out as the midterm elections hit high gear.

That the episode also re-enforces Trump’s miserable failure and bones the U.S. military is just a day that ends in a -y, especially as the other Iran-connected story continues to escalate ...

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“NOT NEARLY LONG ENOUGH.”

The stories of the misery and danger on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln continue to spill out, many from relatives of some of the 5,000 sailors aboard the carrier. Stories about poor supplies and food started to emerge earlier in the month, now supplemented by direct reporting from CNN and other outlets that reveal facilities clogged and in disrepair, munitions dangerously low, the inability to repair and give sailors desperately-needed relief due to the destruction by Iran of the naval base normally used for such purposes in Bahrain, and reports of sailors possibly trying to jump off the ship.

The reports, naturally, have been met with derision and disbelief from Trump himself. Sure, we should not be surprised that the man who once called soldiers “suckers and losers” in front of a former Secretary of Defense (John Kelly) would berate CNN reporters when asked about the USS Abraham Lincoln as he did yesterday - and that the reporter who asked the question was a woman, to boot - but the full hatred this Commander-in-Chief has of the military he is plowing into the ground was on display Friday.

Then, while heading to another weekend of “golf” with certain companions that we shall discuss next, Trump was asked about the Lincoln’s deployment and announced exit from the Middle East, and whether he thought the deployment - which departed to the Middle East last November - was too long. “NO,” Trump braysmeared in what seemed like another lame attempt at toughness, “Not nearly long enough!”

From there, Trump staggerwaddled away, as stories of demands from him that aircraft carriers retrofit their possibly-already-antiquated ships with steam-driven catapults and command towers that are shorter and closer to the front of the ships because they look better to Commander Grampy (at a cost of you don’t want to know) merged with more wild threats in the Iran mess (”warning” Oman that if they work with Iran on the Straits of Hormuz the US will “Blow the sh*t out of them”) (and remember, Oman is another American ally) and a still-deployed USS Lincoln to add to American’s continuing building fury (a record-low 33% according to Reuters).

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... BUT SHE IS TRAVELING WITH HIM ... OR IS SHE JUST?!?!?

With all that mess and so much more, it cannot be a surprise that the White House and MAGA Media are itching for a distraction of some sort to divert attention to their hordes from all that money they are spending to fill those gas tanks (even if eggs are kind of cheap again). Normally they try to take an obscure thing a Democrat says and blow it up to all kinds of ridiculousness that allows air time to be spent on that non-story rather than important stuff.

It is a prime atmosphere for a mischievous Democrat to plant or taunt a story like that to get the MAGAts all a-tither - and do so in a way to backfire on them by creating a story that actually manages to put a light on an embarrassing story which will reflect badly on the vast majority of non-MAGAts in the voting pool ...

And that is where GA Governor and candidate Jon Ossoff gleefully, yet tactfully, jumped in.

With a comfortable nine-point polling lead and the kind of press that is so positive Ossoff is constantly saying he is NOT going to run for President in 2028, the admittedly good-looking guy (as my Dad would like to say) spoke at a campaign rally in Georgia to rip Trump new ones on Iran and the economy and his lack of mental health ... and in so doing, decided to poke a pointed stick in the bloated midsection of MAGA.

“(Trump) doesn’t want to do the job anymore.” Ossoff started. “He wants to build his ballroom ... and travel with Natalie on their apparently defenseless flying palace gifted by the emir of Qatar.”

POKE!

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“Natalie,” of course, is Natalie Harp, the 35-year-old Ivanka-esque “aide” who is known for her so-obsessed-the-Secret-Service-were-worried obsession with Trump who carries a printer with her to feed Trump all the delusions and flattery she can. Which is a LOT. That is all Ossoff said - that Trump and Natalie sure travel a lot together.

Cue the MAGA Pha-REEK! Out!

Taking the bait and trying to swallow the bait and the pole and the reel and Ossoff’s arm, Trump allies and media types ex-PLO-ded with phony rage, claiming Ossoff was charging Harp and Trump have a far more intimate relationship than Ossoff himself actually said. Ex-Bush strategist Ari Fleischer said Ossoff should be “ashamed!” Lipless MAGA host Hugh Hewitt said Ossoff was “a mean-spirited jerk!”

And never-allowed-on-camera-because-of-his-appearance self-loathing Trump shiteposter Stephen Cheung showed his fifth-grade-level wit, calling Ossoff “Jon Jackoff” (HAHAHA!) and “the biggest cuck loser in politics!” before hearing another fat joke with an offensive Asian accent directed at him by his boss. (ALLEGEDLY) (But probably.)

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In the process, many MAGAts who may not have known about Harp and Trump sure as Hell do now - and that Trump, who has said in public Harp is the most devoted person around him in his life right now, confirmed it with a public appearance that saw Trump use his wee tiny hands to hug and pat Harp on her lower back this past Monday.

Ossoff, for his part, clearly has no intent to apologize for an innocuous statement that managed to trigger MAGA exactly as he clearly intended, doing things that Democrats have been aching to see and hear leaders do to the at-a-minimum Fascist-adjacent party that the GOP pretty much is. That stands in stark contrast to the guy that triggered the latest social media Democratic/Progressive Pha-REEK!-Out over the weekend - one I will use my safe Substack space to defuse as best I can ...

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SORRY, THAT’S NOT QUITE WHAT HAKEEM JEFFRIES SAID ...

Last Sunday, Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries went on MEET THE PRESS clearly ready to fend off the easy-to-anticipate questions from host Kristin Welker Todd about the DEMS IN DISARRAY Legacy Media Inc. story of the day of the “savage” insurgency of the Democratic Socialists on the Democratic Party. That’s claptrap, of course, and when asked about some of the more out-there Democratic Socialist platform planks like elimination of the Senate, Jeffries simply said that those weren’t planks of the Democratic Party.

Welker Todd then asked about planks that Democratic Socialists do share with the Democrats - in particular, bringing single-payer medical care to the U.S., mostly encapsulated by Medicare-for-All. This is where Progressive Social Media has gone ape-dump, insisting Jeffries said that, despite voting for similar measures in the past, that he was now against Medicare-for-All and therefore must be removed from leadership immediately.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but that’s not exactly what Jeffries said.

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What he did say was, it must be admitted, typical of being rhetorically clever by half in a way that reads as centrist and not Progressive and not “A FIGHTER!” as so many people want in leadership. Jeffries’ exact quote (with emphasis mine) was, QUOTE, “(Medicare for All) is not legislation that I am currently co-sponsoring or that I support.”

Clearly, “currently” is doing the work to give him an ability to support such legislation in the future. Like when Democrats control the House AND the Senate AND the Presidency. Which, as leader of the Democrats in the House, he needs to do before even considering sponsoring or passing legislation.

Further, COMMA, when asked what Jeffries’ priorities would be should/when Democrats get the gavel, his answer was Supreme Court and voting reforms. Reforms that many argue (and I would agree) need to be in place BEFOREprogressive legislation LIKE Medicare-for-All is passed so that when said legislation IS passed, it will not be struck down by a lunatic SCOTUS and vicious gerrymandering.

In short, we have the two parties on social media - which of course is not real life - flipping out over what are frankly manufactured-by-them “controversies” to blow off steam over real anxieties centered around the state of the nation and the ever-ongoing battle for power. In the case of Hakeem Jeffries, in my humble opinion this is a nothingburger from a guy who, yes, should be a more direct communicator (he was friends with The Notorious B.I.G., for the love of Pete!), but is doing the right thing and keeping the Democratic caucus unified like his mentor Nancy Pelosi taught.

(Now if we want to talk about Chuck Schumer ...)

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SEE WHAT A DAY OFF DOES?!

Four stories with a lot of things for me to say - PHEW! You have earned the Trivias and so have I - enjoy the rest of the Update and come back for more on Thursday! (Lord knows there will be plenty more to say!)

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Couples Day, National Fajita Day, National Ice Cream Pie Day, National Mail Order Catalog Day (I remember those!), Pinot Noir Day, Never Give Up Day, Serendipity Day, World Breast Cancer Research Day, and Bad Poetry Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1786, Reykjavik became the capital of Iceland. In 1896, Butch Cassidy proposed a “Train Robbers’ Syndicate” at a gathering of 200 outlaws at a town called Brown’s Hole (the gang became known as “The Wild Bunch”). In 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment granting women the right to vote became the law as Tennessee ratified it by one vote.

In 1940, the Battle of Britain was fought over the skies of Britain, with 69 Luftwaffe planes and 68 RAF planes shot down. In 1969, Jimi Hendrix ended the Woodstock Music and Art Fair with a searing version of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” In 1991, a group of hard-liner Communists - real ones - launched what would be a failed coup against then-Soviet Premiere Mikhail Gorbachev. In 1992, Larry Bird retired. In 2008, Pervez Musharaf resigned as President of Pakistan.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: The televised weather map (1926), LOLITA (1958), Ringo Starr as drummer for The Beatles (1962), The Police (the band, 1977), John Tesh as host of ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT (1986).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Antonio Salieri, Meriwether Lewis, Marshall Field, Shelley Winters, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Rosalyn Carter, Rafer Johnson, Roberto Clemente, Vincent Bugliosi, Gail Fisher, Robert Redford, Joe Frank, Matt Snell, Martin Mull, Derryl Cousins, Greg Pruitt, Elayne Boosler, Patrick Swayze, Marvin Isley, Jon “Bermuda” Schwartz, Carole Bouquet, Denis Leary, Bob Woodruff, John Jurkovic, Christian Slater, Edward Norton, Everlast, Masta Killa, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Aphex Twin, Kaitlin Olson, Andy Samberg, and Frances Bean Cobain.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Walter Chrysler, Anita Loos, BF Skinner, John Sturges, Persis Khambatta, Elmer Bernstein, Pervis Jackson, Scott McKenzie, Don Pardo, Bud Yorkin, Louis Stokes, Kofi Annan, Jack Whitaker, Ben Cross, Dale Hawerchuk, Alain Delon, and Phil Donahue.

FEED THE WORMS: Two brutal albums - DEVIL WITHOUT A CAUSE, the biggest hit of Robert Richie, performing as Kid Rock; and Korn’s FOLLOW THE LEADER - were inflicted on Earth on this date in 1998. In addition, Casper Weinberger, Roman Polanski and Louie Gohmert entered Earth on this date. Genghis Khan and Robert Novak bought it on this date.

Marge Schott was born on this date. You decide if she gets a Happy Birthday or if she Feeds the Worms.

THIS DAY IN THE CULTURE: The Number One Nonfiction Book in America on this date ... in 2026, ADVERSARY TO THE VILLAIN by Hannah Nicole Maehrer ... in 2016, BULLSEYE by James Patterson and Michael Ledwidge ... in 2006, JUDGE AND JURY by James Patterson and Andrew Gross ... in 1996, CAUSE OF DEATH by Patricia Cornwell ... in 1986, RED STORM RISING by Tom Clancy ... and in 1976, TRINITY by Leon Uris.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: The first single from the album SLIPPERY WHEN WET, released on this date in 1986 … and do not scoff. Jon Bon Jovi is a legit Good Guy, we have ALL heard it on Karaoke nights, and we ALL sing the chorus in our cars when it hits ...

I have another big stack of items to toss your way - so we’ll keep it tights!

Three paragraphs per update, then the Trivias, then on with the weekend (more Midwest storms permitting)!

So, having flexed a little with one-sentence paragraphs (no, the updates won’t follow THIS model ... at least today), AWAY WE GO!

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DON’T LET THE DOOR WHACK YOU ON YOUR WAY OUT, KAROLIENE

We begin with the latest exit from Team Trump: Lead Slur Producer/Press Secretary KaroLIEne LIEvitt. In a move that kind of tracks with the play-trad-wife that she is (because real trad wives don’t have careers outside of the kitchen), she reportedly “gave” Trump two weeks notice before she goes to take care of her two babies and dad-aged husband - at least until the likely-inevitable MAGA Media pundit gig. (LIEvitt, by the way, is the fifth person who left or was removed from this Trump Cabinet - and WHATTA COINKYDINK, all five (Pam Bondi, Kristi Noem, Tulsi Gabbard and Lori Chavez-DeRumer) have women parts!)

As to why KaroLIEne is leaving now, there is a ton of speculation it spins from the still-percolating story of Trump’s “escape” from Air Force One to a separate plane via food cart when he went on a trip to a NATO summit in Turkye last month. KaroLIEne was one of the many staff members, crew members and press members who still flew on Air Force One and was used as bait for an alleged “legitimate assassination threat” (albeit there is also speculation that the assassination story is a cover so Trump could be treated on a plane that had full medical facilities and up to 18 doctors on it), and LIEvitt may have realized being a sacrificial lamb was not her thing (as was her devotion to a Dear Leader who never, EVER reciprocates).

As for who will replace KaroLIEne, the list is a true Rogue’s Gallery of Lies and Suck. Those mentioned as candidates include the wildly-available-to-MAGA-boyz Katie Miller, disgraced garage attorney Alina Habba, Voice of America chair and camera mask aficionado Kari Lake, and for a little testosterone, CNN shouter Scott Jennings. So while LIEvitt’s Botoxed mouth won’t be missed, the White House press pool will surely remain proudly lied to.

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THE TRUMP/HEGSETH-CREATED CRISIS ON THE USS ABRAHAM LINCOLN

A story that has been in need of confirmation from different reports has been received, and it is an ugly one: the USS Abraham Lincoln, an aircraft carrier that was forwarded to carry out attacks in Iran nine months ago, is in the midst of a severe crisis that starts with the fact that most of the crew has been on ship and on mission with no break or relief and gets far, far worse from there.

Family members have been sharing texts from military members on board that report munitions are dangerously low, rations are low and often spoiled or simply not fresh, requests to superiors to get relief are going unanswered, and mental health issues are erupting through the crew - including at least two verified attempts to jump off the ship in an effort to escape.

These reports are coming as President Trump insanely claims the Iran not-a-war is going “swimmingly” even as every other reputable source confirms Iran is are allowing one tanker a day through the Straits of Hormuz (it was 130 a day before Trump ordered bombings to start) and no longer even trying to negotiate with Trump. Meanwhile, Hegseth was last seen greeting soldiers and, at one point, wiped his nose on his hands and then immediately ran that hand through his hair - and THIS JUST IN: CNN reports the USS Abraham Lincoln will be “replaced” by another carrier in the coming days. So, watch this space for more ...

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A QUICK AND DIRTY TUESDAY PRIMARY SUMMARY

In the almost-over 2026 Primary Season (Florida is the last biggie next week), the Midwest and South Carolina had their say on Tuesday, and a lot was said! On the Democratic side, the big news was the polling upset in WI, where Milwaukee County executive David Crowley stormed back from a 22-point polling deficit to nip WI House member and Democratic Socialist Francesca Hong by about 3,100 votes. Hong had a strong lead, but several “establishment” candidates dropped out and consolidated behind Crowley combined with a fumbling answer by Hong about a long-ago social media post wanting to see Thanksgiving cancelled apparently being the difference. As happened in MI, Hong has endorsed Crowley and all are at work to unify against Tom Tiffany, a MAGA choad who still thinks Trump won the 2020 Presidential election (which he did not).

In other Tuesday news ... appointed incumbent (and sister of the late Lindsay Graham) Darline Graham will need to go to a runoff against Rep. Ralph Norman to win the GOP nomination for a full term (that despite a TrumpDorsement for Darline) ... progressive champion Peggy Flanagan romped to the Democratic Senate nomination in MN and will face former NFL sideline reporter (and TrumPolgist) Michele Tafoyah ... and outgoing Sen. Amy Klobuchar romped in her primary to replace Tim Walz as MN Governor.

Sadly, however, Klobuchar’s opponent (which she is heavily favored to defeat) will be former MN House Speaker Lisa Demuth. Unfortunate because, in another race where the polling betrayed everyone, Demuth defeated MyPillow founder Mike Lindell, who had been polling strongly and was going to be a massive object of hilarious derision. Lindell will wind up back on the fringes of the fringes as a result - but he is going out in a way only Lindell can go out, by refusing to concede and charging “a couple of anomalies” that stole the win from him. Lindell has yet to get backing from Trump, who did endorse Lindell to, alas and alack, no avail. Sigh. Also, HAR HAR HAR!

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THE TRUMP LEGAL DOCKET REPORT

In legal news, Trump took yet another L this morning when a Judge tossed a case in which Trump tried to claim Harvard University was not protecting Jewish students from antisemitism, basically pointing out that, in legal terms, DoJ had bupkus on Harvard with this charge. There is also an ongoing hearing as this Update was being drafted involving reporter Katie Phang’s demand to see all of the Epstein files to fulfill the law Congress passed demanding now-Attorney General Todd Blanche to do so back in December, with observers thinking Team Phang is having yet another good day in the drive to Release ALL The Epstein Files.

While Trump’s legal losses continue to mount, the losses seem to counterintuitively be driving Trump and his attorneys into even more filings and utter legal nonsense. It was announced last night that hanging-on-by-a-wine-skin DC Attorney General Jeanine Pirro has convened a “Special” Grand Jury for reasons unknown to MAGA or the Left. What they may hear is way up in the air, but a reattempt to indict people for the peeling of the Reflective Pool, gross individual indictments against Dr. Anthony Fauci, even groseer potential indictment against Trump prosecutor Jack Smith, and desperate attempt to stay employed, are all rumored.

But those pale next to two other Trump-mounted grotesqueries. First, DoJ has secured an indictment against Heidi Beirich, an expert on rightwing political extremism who worked with the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) investigating right-wing terrorist organizations in order to arrest, prosecute, and convict those evil leaders, naturally infuriatig MAGA. On top of that, THIS JUST IN: defying the Supreme Court ruling that ONLY CONGRESS gets to change the name of an honored institution, the Trump-suckers on the Kennedy Center Board “voted” to add a line under the name of the Kennedy Center “acknowledging” Trump’s “reconstruction” of the site (which has yet to be “renovated”) becaise Grampybaby DOES NOT TAKE NO FOR AN ANSWER.

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SWELTERING IN MY BONES JUST THINKING ABOUT THE WEATHER ...

What’s the weather by you? That is a fraught discussion this Summer as a series of weather patterns continues to wreak havoc across the globe. Here in Chicago we have yet another day of rain and storms to go with several days of rain and storms and tornadoes that have come in waves over the last several weeks throughout the Midwest. Fortunately the death toll has been low, but the sheer volume and intensity since the Fourth of July have been crazy, and reports of flooding and downed trees are becoming regular.

Meanwhile, Europe continues to swelter from record heat. That pattern began early in the summer with wilting heat that affected the French Open and Tour de France, and the heat in a continent that does not have lots of air conditioning has continued. The Danube River (among others) is at record low levels, and the continent is bracing for what is now the fifth heat wave this summer.

Of COURSE climate change is at issue regardless of everything MAGA says - and unfortunately this may be the start of a sustained spell of intense nasty weather. What is being touted as the largest recorded El Nino has been building in the Pacific Ocean (one map has a super-deep red band that stretches from the Western cost of South America all the way to the South Pacific. This pattern is more like a “Super” El Nino (the first since 1997-98) that could bring drought to Australia and northern South Africa, flooding in the Southern United States, more and intense hurricanes and typhoons, and a potential super-snowy winter up North. (Fun!)

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THE UBER-WHITE GAMES

In closing, in the continued effort to appease Dear Leader amid his ailments and psychopathies, this week one of the grossest events created to steal the 250th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence for Trump’s amusement took place in Ohio: the “Patriot Games.” Billed as a ‘celebration’ of American athleticism, one teenage “boy” and “girl” from every state was designated to compete for adulation and a display of ‘Merican Superiority. What transpired was ... much, much less than that.

The event took place on a private high school gym and field, the participants chosen from Christian academies and home-schooled students and were extraordinarily Caucasian in tone, and featured such respected competitions as ... (checks notes) ... dodgeball and tug-of-war. Trump appeared in a ridiculously-decorated “royal” box and waddledragged across the field amid cheap pyro for cheaper applause accompanied by ESPN host Pat McAffee, and was “broadcast” on ESPN.

Mind you, Trump’s entire appearance lasted all of 18 minutes, still featured the Trump Doze-Off, and wound up with all athletes being forced to take a medal Trump gave them much akin to the kinds of “participation trophies” most of MAGA get MAD ANGRY GRRR! about for being Woke and DEI and Trans and Communist - but is somehow wholesome and American when Trump’s wee tiny hands are involved. Next up: an Indy-style car race through the streets of Washington DC, because ... freedom?

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THE SUMMARY WRAP-UP

That cleared most of my items, save for a note here about MAGA trying to ride Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for her announcement that she was freezing some of her eggs to give her the option of in-vitro fertilization - possibly for a Presidential run in 2028 that, when asked about it on a recent Sunday talk show, she did not categorically rule out (HMMMM ...). So there’s that note!

Now ... (takes notebook and shakes) ... and seeing no other notes popping out, declaring the notebook is momentarily cleared. Kind of like when you get all the dishes done or clothes washed and folded: for that moment, your life is in order and you savor it.

Until stuff gets dirty again, ON TO THE TRIVIAS and whatever weather is to be dodged this weekend!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is Lefthanders Day, National Filet Mignon Day, National Prosecco Day, and Women’s and Family Day! (Sometimes the days with holidays are succinct!)

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1521, Hernan Cortez toppled the Aztec Empire by capturing Tenochtitlan (now Mexico City). In 1898, the United State seized the city of Manila as part of the Spanish-American War. In 1952, Big Mama Thornton records the original “Hound Dog.” In 1961, East German forces began building a wall to bisect the city of Berlin - a wall that stayed in place until 1989. In 1990, an accident on stage in an outdoor concert left Curtis Mayfield paralyzed from the neck down. In 2008, Michael Pehlps won three Gold Medals and set three World Records in one day at the Beijing Olympics.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: The Manhattan Project (1942), BONNIE AND CLYDE (1967), PRONOUNCED LEH-NERD SKIN-NERD (1973), FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH (1982), CYPRESS HILL (1991).

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Annie Oakley, Bert Lahr, Alfred Hitchcock, Ben Hogan, John Facenda, Craig Gilbert, Pat Harrington Jr., Don Ho, Dr. Jocelyn Elders, Jim “Mudcat” Grant, Son Seals, Kevin Tighe, Janet Yellen, Kathleen Battle, Bobby Clarke, Dan Fogelberg, Jeff Altman, Betsy King, Paul Greengrass, David Feherty, Feargal Sharkey, Danny Bonaduce, John Slattery, Sridevi Kapoor, Valerie Plame, Debi Mazar, Jay Buhner, Quinn Cummings, Alan Shearer, Elvis Grbac, Karine Jean-Pierre, Ibram X. Kendi, Sebastian Stan, Shani Davis, and DeMarcus Cousins.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Florence Nightingale, H.G. Wells, King Curtis, W.O. Bentley, Joe E. Ross, Joe Tex, J. Willard Mariott, Edward Bennett Williams, Mickey Mantle, Tom Mees, Julia Child, Brook Astor, Phil Rizzuto, Helen Gurley Brown, Johnny Pesky, Kenny Baker, Joseph Bologna, Jim “The Anvil” Neidhart, Kip Adotta, Nanci Griffith, “Famous” Wally Amos, and Gerry Spence.

FEED THE WORMS: Nepo baby and George W. Bush spokesliar Sarah Huckabee Sanders entered Earth on this date.

Fidel Castro was born on this date. You decide if he gets a Happy Birthday or if he Feeds the Worms.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday to Nigel St. Hubbins, creative force behind Spinal Tap - along with one of their drummers, the late (obviously) Ric Parnell! (This is from Live Earth in 2007, where St. Hubbins leads the world’s largest collection of live bass players on a Tap standard ...)

We start with a bit of asinine real-life farce that, upon second glance, set up what could have been one of the most grotesque tragedies ever directly attributable to an American President. For this, we take you back to Trump’s trip to Turkye and the NATO summit in July.

That was the one where he proudly flew the jet Qatar gifted to him that Trump took because grifty-ass President, and as you may further recall, the story that was told that there was “a credible threat” of an assassination plot sprung by Iran, and as a result the old Air Force One was used for Trump’s exit.

But as the Washington Post reported, it got way more convoluted than even that.

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WaPo reported that yes, Trump shuffleboarded the old Air Force One - but was then hustledragged off that plan using a different door, shovehauled into a motorized catering container (along with suspected Depends-changers Natalie Harp and Walt Nauta, and possibly Pete Hegseth as well), kept his gas passings low enough to not gas those on board or reveal his location, drove to a third plane, and then loadwedged into said third plane to fly to Britain in order to dodge the would-be killers.

So if you are in the Three-Card-Monte for obese world leaders game, Plane One (Air Force TrumQuatar) was empty, Plane Two (AF1) was the Macguffin, and whatever the third plane was ended up being the exit plane. That’s nice and all - but the story is not yet finished ...

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... because as you recall, Air Force One was being boarded, and that plane is the plane that does not just move the President, but most of his staff, family members who are coming along for the ride, media and reporters, and crew. ALL THOSE FOLKS STILL STAYED ON AIR FORCE ONE, and in fact flew its regular route, an apparent clear target made even clearer by the mechanizations to move Trump around.

By all reports, nobody on the plane knew anything about any of this. Trump naturally would not tell them, but he did send a message that everyone on AF1 should “pull down their shades” during the flight. Whether that was a sincere warning or proof that the sadomasochist part of the Trump brain goo is one of the few bits of matter still firing - but what seemed like a bit of derring-do got a blast of torment and reality, as the fact that it sure looked like AF1 was there to be shot at with members of Trump’s staff still on the plane.

Whatta plot. Whatta guy. Whatta we oughta ...

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GRAMPY’S LATEST DUMBSHOW, or NEEDLES AND SHAKES

Trump is back stateside, and yesterday in another proof-of-life (although “life” is doing a lot of work) Oval Office appearance, Dear Leader was stationed behind the Resolute Desk, this time with a new aide: a young brunette woman with shoulder-length hair and bangs, Mar-a-Lago-sculpted lips, and a super-fidgety demeanor that did occasionally sync up with trying to keep Grampy awake in the parts of the event he was not slobberurping.

The event was gross - the signing of another one of this White House’s Proclamations of Ultimate Good for All of America as Decreed by Himself, aka an Executive Order, that is one of the most consequential if people do it.

The order hereby states that children need not get vaccinations based on those ickystinky schedules that DOCTORS have been using for DECADES that actually eliminated dozens of preventable illnesses - but rather to basically let parents be parents, ignore medicine about the most effective ways to get said vaccines, and do whatever, dudes and bros.

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The, ah, “reasoning” was gobsmacking. Smacking gobs all around his gullet, Trump prattledrawled that all that vaccine going into all those little arms were in “vats” of “fluid” that “looks like the size of a bottle of soda and pour(ed) into a little child’s body,” showing Trump not only never saw any of his kids vaccinated, but may inadvertently explain why lesions and cuts have begun appearing on Trump’s forearms to join the bruisings on his hands.

Just to put a bit of rancid icing on all of this, Trump then dozed off (awaken by the new brunette and at least one audible shart) to allow super-whacko HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to use his shakier-than-ever voice to spew idiotic nonsense about autism and vaccines - and did so trying to hold a speech transcript that he was finding incredibly difficult to do because of tremors in his hands that even exceeded the tremors in his voice.

The reporters were hustled out of the Oval Office, and some then noted that while this event was ‘live,’ the swearing-in of Trump ambulance chasing attorney Todd Blanche to become as-permanent-as-Trump-attorneys-can-be Attorney General was completed totally in private, with neither reporters nor recordings made available or public. Blanche’s unpopularity undoubtedly played a role in that choice, but in previous years Trump would have used such appearances for (if nothing else) ego-stroking - and the lack of such a public spectacle was noteworthy.

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TRUMP AND THE COURTS, or LLLLLLLLOSING WITH ACCENTS

Then again for Trump, these days even shame and frustration from sharting and sleeping and AI-slop-hunting is likely way more preferable to watching more and more of his attempts at asserting power and virility and winning keep petering and puttering out in ways both personally righteous and, at times, geopolitically perilous.

For example, the ongoing Iran mess. Amid continued reports of massive munitions shortages and the utter failure of doing any kind of strategic thinking (not to mention the sheer stupidity of it all), Trump insistence that Iran is “days away!” from a settlement have been discarded by Iran’s Mullahs. Negotiations with Oman to allow them to control the Straits of Hormuz - an idea that was utter fantasy until Trump and Hegseth gave them the chance on a gold brocaded platter - continue, and with reports that America’s strategic oil reserves are near empty, that’s an “L” that should be branded on Trump.

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To make matters worse, it now appears Trump may have found someone to stab him in the back before he got to stab first: Benjamin Netanyahu. Last weekend, Trump prattlewaggled that a cease-fire may soon be in place in Gaza, which theoretically could be important when it comes to some kind of non-shooting war in the area now. That, however, was whacked down by Bibi. Seems Trump is not the only person worried about losing power because of a stupid and unwinnable Middle Easter War with an election down the turnpike.

These things often come in threes, and the third overseas “L” in the Trump column comes courtesy of the BBC. You see, Trump and Blanche tossed one of his patented inane lawsuits against an enemy, trying to get ten buh-buh- buh BILLION dollars because of what Trump modestly called “false, defamatory, deceptive, disparaging, inflammatory, and malicious deception” that has done insufferable damage to his reputation.

Said things involved accurate BBC reporting about Trump’s 2020 election loss to Joe Biden - but Team Trump did not factor in the lovely demands of discovery - and the Beeb went and demanded Trump open up ALL the books to prove their claims. Naturally, this made more than Trump wet themselves as a Judge said it was totally cool for the BBC to ask - and so, Team Trump amended their complaint to try to narrow down what they will fight against, or concede that they won’t get anything and it will be better not to keep trying to “punish” the BBC.

Loss Loss Loss! No matter the accent, always good to see to someone who royally deserves every L he can get!

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MAGA UPDATES, or PEDOS R THEM

For those of us who follow social media, one of the steadier regular features for those of us who are on the Left involve posts on Conservative/MAGA/Republican candidates and/or leaders and/or officials who get caught in various charges and delecto flagrantes. We have updates involving two current such officials, both House members.

The first is Max Miller, the Ohio Republican House member whose apparently physically- and mentally-abusive relationship with his now ex-wife (whose father as just so happens is Ohio GOP Senator Bernie Moreno) exploded amid the end of his primary and deadline to stay on the ballot. The first deadline, which was that his name would be printed even if he decided to leave the race, passed last week. On Monday, the second deadline - which locks him in as the MAGAGOP nominee no matter what - passed. And, Miller is still on the ballot.

There was reportedly pressure being exerted by Ohio GOP members who are concerned as top-of-the-ticket polling is starting to break Democratic for the first time in several cycles - but Party Leader Donald Trump, who apparently sees a lot of himself in Miller in every scuzzy way you can think of, reportedly interceded to insist that Max stay in the race. Polling in his race now has Democratic nominee Brian Poindexter with a lead pushing double-digits (if you want to help).

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Meanwhile, we have another GOP House member involved with a potential sexual violence scandal ... and oh, look, it’s our old pal Lauren Boebert in the middle of it. With all the stories circulating about her, we also know she has had issues with family members - and that, alas, is the case here as well.

Boebert’s oldest son Tyler, who is 21, was arrested and charged with felony child sexual exploitation. TRIGGER ALERT - the charge apparently involves a tape with a 17-year-old girl, and he is not the only member of the family that has been involved with sexual scandal and/or crimes. This is not the first time Tyler has been arrested on felony crimes, and was scheduled for sentencing next month involving negligence involving his young son.

We need to clear our minds after that one, and so we shall in a rather counterintuitive way ...

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SOWING WILD OATS, or WHO HIT - AAAH - EEEEEEWWWWWWW!!!

We have read stories about how hard MAGA men are having it in the dating world. Seems like in the general dating pool, most American women are not super-interested in getting involved with super-douchey MAGA men who vote for Trump, follow Tate, believe being ‘Merican MEN means getting a girl who will be barefoot and deferential and pregnant and a lady in the street but a freak in the bed is a birthright - and not getting one keeps them AANNGGRRYY!

Which leads to the question, what kind of women fit that slot? What is a MAGA woman like?

We have gotten a possible answer to those questions ... and they come in the form of one Katie Rose Waldman Miller.

The current wife to Trump Chief of Staff Stephen Miller has already gotten some side eye for being willing to breed with Stevie - but a series of stories dropping this week gave us her history, which is somehow simultaneously grotesque, perfect for her, and morbidly comic all at once.

The catalyst for the revelations revolve around a blog post, confirmed by Katie, that when she was a 22-year-old intern (this was 2014) she was serving as an intern with now-ex-House Member Eric Swalwell, a Democrat. The report revealed that the pair had “a sexual relationship” and that, in fact, that knowledge was part of Katie going after Swalwell, first with an acknowledged relationship between Swalwell and a Chinese spy and later indiscretions that led to Swalwell dropping out of the California Gubernatorial primary.

Why such a rock-ribbed Republican like Katie would be knocking boots with Swalwell is one tangent, but we don’t have time to explore it because BUT WAIT - THERE’S MORE!

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You see, once the Swalwell/Katie belt notch was made public, another report dropped that after Swalwell, Katie went and had another sexual relationship, this time with ... wait for it ... Human Canker Sore Steve Bannon!

Uh-huh, Katie went to Bannon, apparently around 2016-2018, and that was the prelude to Katie and Miller hooking up and putting a ring on it, bearing children and building a podcast list that was a big deal in MAGAville, and setting up their ascension when Trump re-entered the White House in 2025.

THAT, was when Katie went to work in DOGE, and (at least according to the gossip!) was asked along with Stephen to do SOMEthing to get Trump’s momentary BFF Elon Musk away from the old man because of what a dweeb Elon the Schmoo is.

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They did - with some reports indicating (TRIGGER WARNING) the trio entered into a throuple, after which Katie left the White House and went to work with E. She ended that ... work ... relationship and ... had ... in theory ... a new baby with Stephen ... so we think ... ALLEGEDLY. (Head Roll).

See what you’re missing, MAGA men?

See what the rest of decent civilized society is not missing?!

I’ve seen enough. Let’s move on to the Trivias so we can do something calming to get our mind off that story. There’s a ton of violent weather in Chicago these days - that looks like fun!!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is Mountain Day, Son and Daughter Day, Hip Hop Day, National Align Your Teeth Day, National Face Mask Day, National Raspberry Bombe Day, and National Bakewell Tart Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1929, Babe Ruth hit his 500th home run. In 1942, actress Hedy Lamarr co-patented a device that minimized radio signal jamming in torpedo firing systems - a component that became central to satellite and cellular phone technology. In 1965, race riots centering on police abuses erupted in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles.

In 1973, DJ Kool Herc first played two turntables to stretch the rhythm track of one of them to create the first hip-hop breakbeat. In 1984, Carl Lewis won his fourth Gold Medal in the Los Angeles Olympics - the third track star to do so. In 1994, Major League Baseball players went on strike - a strike that led to the cancellation of the rest of the regular season and World Series. In 2003, NATO peacekeeping forces were deployed in Afghanistan.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: The Weimar Republic (1919), Alcatraz Federal Prison (1934), THE LIFE OF EMILE ZOLA (1937), baseball on television in color (1951), “Don’t Be Cruel/Hound Dog” (1956), A HARD DAY’S NIGHT (1964), HELP! (1965), AMERICAN GRAFFITI (1973), Al-Qaeda (1988), The Mall of America (1992).

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Lloyd Nolan, Mike Douglas, Alex Haley, Arlene Dahl, Carl Rowan, Vada Pinson, Elizabeth Holtzman, Otis Taylor, Abigail Folger, Kenny Gamble, Pervez Musharaf, Ian McDiarmid, Eric Carmen, Glenn Jarrett, Steve Wozniak, Jah Wobble, Craig Ehlo, Shinji Mikami, Viola Davis, Charlie Sexton, Ben Gibbard, and Chris Hemsworth.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Edith Wharton, Jean Bugatti, Jackson Pollock, General Anthony McAuliffe, Robert L. May, Alfred A. Knopf, Clara Peller, Anne Ramsey, Peter Cushing, Herb Brooks, Ted “Double Duty” Radcliffe, Mike Douglas, George Furth, Dan Rostenkowski, Jani Lane, Robin Williams, V.S. Naipaul, Sumner Redstone, Trini Lopez, Anne Heche, and today, Zale Perry.

FEED THE WORMS: Suspected wife-murderer Claus von Bulow, evangelist scumbag Jerry Falwell Sr., roid-freak model for Trump’s complexion Hulk Hogan, and roastmaster turned MAGA lunkheaded podcaster Joe Rogan entered Earth on this date.

Andrew Carnegie died on this date. You decide if he Rests in Peace or Feeds the Worms.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday to Denis Payton, saxophone player for the super-coordinated Dave Clark Five!

Amid one significant ‘victory’ these last few days we will dutifully note and snark at, the continuing decay of the MAGAGOP is starting to build at a pace that may catch up with the continuing decay of the MAGAGOP leader, which we also dutifully note and snark at. The primary piece of evidence this Substack wishes to submit as today’s proof: the announcement on Friday of the July unemployment numbers.

In any other era, the fact that the expectation of 80,000 added jobs getting smacked in the face with the reality that 23,000 jobs were lost in July – and further revisions of previous months showing another decay of 100,00 jobs, which means as of this moment the Trump 2.0 regime has, at best, zero job growth – would roil markets, send waves of surrogates to MAGA and Legacy Media, Inc., to try to give hope that the numbers would reverse, and send Maria Bartiromo and Jim Cramer to immediate grief counseling.

Only … that didn’t happen. Instead, the usual dipwad Trump economic-heads of Scott “Trump Sharts Smell BE-U-TI-FUL!” Bessent and Kevin “Scrunch-Face” Hassett, went to the cameras to not only shrug at the numbers, but to defend the numbers as a net positive for the economy?! That defense was continued on the bid-ness cable talk shows, with the aforementioned Bartiromo being (as she is want to be) a cheerleader for anyone with a few bucks.

Because in Trump-MAGA World, lower unemployment numbers are indeed a GOOD thing …

(STANDS ON SOAPBOX)

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THE MAGA TALE OF WHY UNEMPLOYMENT IS WINNING

Sit yourself down and grab a cuppa, we have a three-part story to tell …

Part One of the reason for that is that the White House needs those numbers to act as a bulwark to other fantasies in the administration. For example, several talking number-crunchers noted that many of the job losses came from the government sector.

To us, that’s really really bad, because don’t government workers try to protect us from things like marauding idiot attorneys bringing charges against anyone and everyone, or to make sure packaged leaves don’t make our lower intestines try to expel themselves from our bodies? But to these guys, it means GUBMINT EFISHENZEE (and likely mega-contracts to private organizations they have cash in).

A second fiction the unemployment numbers can be used by the White House are our old never-friends ICE. We know that Stephen Miller especially dreams of a white-only United States, trying to push the insanity that every job by a brown-skinned person means someone is leeching from all the milk and honey the Karens and Kevins of the world should rightfully believe is theirs. Thus, as the number of employed people drop, Miller spins the tale as proof that each job is an expelled non-white-freeloader, and even though Cletus and Lurlene are paying hundreds of dollars for gas for their pickup, abundance is just around the corner!

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The third and final story is an old standby going back to Reaganism: EFFICIENCY! And on this they have a point: manufacturing jobs are leaner because modern manufacturing plants are so robot-filled and automated that, as the inimitable Hal Sparks loves to note, they are basically vending machines that don’t need lots of people to work anymore.

Add to that the whole data center construction boom and AI expansion – which Trump and MAGA, as we all know, LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE – and the bad unemployment numbers are all proof that the Trump-Project 2025 Economy is working as they have been hoping.

NOW, comma, when anyone ever listens to all of these disconnected super-rich douches (and the enablers who love them like Maria Bartiromo) start talking like this, everyone – yes, even MAGAts – can’t help but start to also see visions of garishness, gold, painted and remodeled faces, and voices that sound totally disconnected with what most people are feeling and in the midst of all of their vapid and out-of-touch praise over unemployment. Not to mention the sound of metal and pencils being sharpened …

But these are tales to be told – along with the old (and I do mean OLD) canards of COMMUNISM and MUSLIM TERRISTS that will be the two-prong strategy to hold power (the second prong probably springing post-Election Day) – and as they are told, we should note and work and trust that these people are not only living in a titanium bubble, but that there are cracks they won’t notice until the thing punctures.

(STEPS OFF SOAPBOX)

Don’t believe me? Hold on …

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THE LEAKS IN THE MAGASPHERE – OHIO AND TENNESSEE EDITIONS

Let’s hit the U.S. House of Representatives, where as a reminder the Democrats need only flip three seats to regain control come 2027. Even with the re-re-gerrymandering that Trump ordered, it increasingly seems like it will not be enough for lickspittle House Speaker Mike Johnson to hold the gavel.

We need look no further than that 7^th District seat in Ohio, where as of yesterday it became official: ALLEGED (EYROLL) wife- and child-beating Representative Max Miller is locked in as the Republican nominee for that seat. Sure, technically people might try to get him to not run, but his name will be on the ballot no matter what, and as ugly details of his abuse continue to be released, Miller is now trailing Democratic nominee Brian Poindexter has opened up a double-digit polling lead in the heavily-gerrymandered seat that spins in southwestern Cleveland and further east.

(QUICK ASIDE: I just found out Max Miller graduated from my alma mater, Cleveland State University. On behalf of myself, my fellow graduates, and everyone else who is a loyal Viking, FK THAT GUY AND WE RENOUNCE THAT A-HOLE. (Now if CSU can please return the student-controlled radio station to students instead of the donor who is whoring the frequency out to a lite jazz station, that would be really cool – thank you for your attention to that matter!)).

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So that seat is likely to flip. But even in safe MAGA seats, the flushing of the toilet is fast-approaching. For that, we move to deep red Tennessee, whose re-redistrict has theoretically removed all Democrats from having a chance to win. They had their primaries on Thursday for some odd reason, and as TN Democratic Hero Justin Pearson is gonna give the regerrymander a good try for an upset, there was another upset that should be noted and celebrated.

That upset is of a creature named Andy Ogles.

Ogles is a piece of work – one of the crudest and loudest anti-Muslim bigots in the chamber (I KNOW, RIGHT?!), Ogles was one of the first to make him and his family pose in front of a Christmas tree by holding assault weapons in angles that one stray dog bark may have resulted in real family tragedy all to OWN DA LIBZ! He was also such a bad and serial liar about everything from actual effects of what he was voting on for his constituents to rampant corruption rumors that even his allies gave him the charming nickname “PinnochiOgles.”

Naturally, Trump gave PinnochiOgles his COMPLETE AND UNEQUIVOCAL ENDORSEMENT – and, on Thursday, Ogles lost his primary. Further, he guy who beat him, former Agricultural Commissioner Charlie Hatchner, ran by saying he wants to go to Congress to “defend” Trump from Democrats – a rather significant rhetorical note that shows that on the ground, with the ninth incumbent losing a primary in Ogles, that even Congressional MAGAs are preparing for a very different environment.

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THE LAST PRIMARIES AWAIT, DON’T’CHA KNOW?

That means that the 2026 primary season is winding down. Two more big states are coming up, and both are in the blue-to-purple states of Minnesota and Wisconsin, with interesting stories and races setting up in each state, albeit for very different reasons.

In Minnesota, super-popular Tim Walz is retiring, as is Senator Tina Smith. Amy Klobuchar is running to replace Waltz, with two popular Democratic women – Rep. Angie Craig and Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan – duking it out for the Senate seat. Whatever these ladies’ strengths or weaknesses, the strengths are being amplified by the Republican side of the state.

There, after a state convention in which the GOP Party came out in full-bore support of the actions of ICE and the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, they are preparing to nominate two complete lunatics for these offices. On the Senate side, former NFL sideline reporter Michele Tafoya is using her celebrity to get frontrunner status while trying to sound like a total Trumpette, and on the Governors side – you’ve heard it before, and it continues to be true – Minnesota Republicans appear poised to put MyPillow founder Mike Lindell against Klobuchar!

Pass the hot dish, as those seat look to be safe blue.

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Down south, the race in Wisconsin is looking trickier. Always notoriously hard, WI Dems appear ready to nominate their Mamdani/El-Sayed-flavored Governors candidate: Francesca Wong, a 38-year-old Assembly member and former chef and restaurant owner with unapologetic ties to the Democratic Socialists of America.

Wong is easily beating a group of more establishment Democrats in a race that has seen two favorites drop out and a third re-enter the race at the behest of outgoing Governor Tony Evers. Cries of “electability” are roaring over Wong, who also has some on-the-record quotes that need defending, the most prominent of which involves a statement she made that Thanksgiving is a “painful” holiday that should be cancelled – a statement she continues to try to walk back.

The Republican nominee is likely to be Tom Tiffany, an aw-shucks looking guy who, like every MAGAt, is a rock-ribbed Trump supporter looking to disguise that as best he can and return the GOP to power, picking up the mantle that The Bastard Scott Walker ran with in the 2010s – and yes, Walker is resurfacing to help Tiffany.

But Trump has also endorsed Tiffany, and combined with the aforementioned disconnect with the economy and love of all data centers, this will likely be a super-close race with 2028 and who gets to count votes in that swing state always an issue these days.

We’re almost in the home stretch, y’all. Hang in there!

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TRUMP’S STILL WANNA!-ISM AND THE ENABLER READY TO HELP HIM

That brings us back to DC, where Trump continued to get more legal losses, as a second Federal Judge told him he cannot continue with the construction of his mega-ballroom that he tore the East Wing of the White House down to do.

With his continued personal physical plant decaying (an event on Friday promoting coal mining with Trump lasted all of 35 minutes, and he is being photographed from longer distances when he is being photographed at all), such losses would normally signal tapping some brakes on some of the actions at the very least.

But the open question about just how much time Trump has is mixing with his no-longer-limited inner brat to simply try to ignore such orders and say “I STILL WANNA!” He did that on Thursday when, despite the Supreme Court saying he couldn’t, he threw another Executive Order to try to erode birthright citizenship on the board. Then, again despite the Supreme Court saying he couldn’t, he again attempted to remove Lisa Cook, a Federal Reserve Board member Trump was specifically told by SCOTUS that he COULD NOT FIRE.

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Late Saturday morning (like 3 am early), however, Trump got help to continue the above nonsense up by getting his personal defense attorney Todd Blanche confirmed as Attorney General.

There was stupid kabuki theatre about maybe Blanche would not get nominated and a speech by outgoing beta cuck simp Senator Bill Cassidy where he shed crocodile tears and said he would approve the nomination, forever tying every bad and stupid thing Blanche has and will do to every one of the worthless Republican Senators that let it happen – and you can bet that includes the two cosmetic NO votes from Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski.

There is no doubt Blanche is a hack attorney – only hack attorneys work with Trump. There is also no doubt 95-98% of the cases the Department of “Justice” will bring will be worthless as law. But the resources to be spent in defense against the sewage that Blanche will continue to spew will be where the cost is payed. This has been the Trump legal strategy ever since he met Roy Cohn, and it will now be the federal MO.

Government by petulance where, as Adam Sewer noted at the start of the first Trump campaign, the cruelty is the point. Not to mention the wear and tear of it all. Who knows – maybe that is a reason that, in a bit of a surprise, Samuel Alito announced he intended to serve out the entire term to come in SCOTUS, raising the chance that he would leave after a Democratic takeover of the Senate. But, Republicans and MAGAts are untrustworthy, so … we shall see …

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A QUOTE TO HEAD OUT OF THE WEEKEND

So, while the creaks and the cracks keep coming, the guy is still in the leadership role. November and its likely aftermath is gonna be big (you can bet Blanche and Meat Lump Tom Homan will concoct something stupid to try to muck the vote-counting up), let us leave you back in Michigan, where the El-Sayed race continues to break both MAGA brains and the brains of a certain sector of Democratic power (coughCARVILLEcoughRAHMcough).

A reporter asked El-Sayed about our classy President claiming the Senate nominee is “full of shite.”

El-Sayed’s response? “At least I don’t let mine go in the middle of the Oval Office.”

With that shot, ON TO THE TRIVIAS!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Book Lovers Day, National Bowling Day, Co-Working Day, Gay Uncles Day, International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, Natinal Hand-Holding Day, National Rice Pudding Day, Veep Day, and Melon Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1173, the construction of what became the Leaning Tower of Pisa began. In 1936, Jesse Owens won his fourth track and field Gold Medal in the Berlin Olympics. In 1942, the Indian flag was raised in Bombay in protest of the arrest of Mahatma Gandhi, sparking the Quit India Movement and advancing the goal of freeing India from British rule.

In 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Nagasaki, Japan. In 1969, actress Sharon Tate and four others – including her unborn child – were murdered by members of Charles Manson’s cult. In 1974, Gerald Ford was sworn in as President in the wake of Richard Nixon’s resignation (sigh). In 1988, Wayne Gretzky was traded from the Edmonton Oilers to the Los Angeles Kings.

In 2010, an airline attendant quit his job on JetBlue airlines as his last flight landed – and sprung the escape slide to exit. In 2012, Usain Bolt became the first sprinter to win the 100m and 200m sprints in consecutive Olympics Games. In 2014, unarmed African American teenager Michael Brown was shot by police in Ferguson, MO, sparking unrest and the Black Lives Matter movement. In 2020, despite only getting 30%-40% of the popular vote, Putin ally Alexander Lukashenko held power in Belarus.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: WALDEN (1854), the diesel engine (1898), Betty Boop (1930), READY, STEADY, GO (1963), Singapore (1965), REVOLVER (1966), PEE-WEE’S BIG ADVENTURE (1985), SHARK TANK (2009), a woman umpire in Major League Baseball (2025).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: John Dryden, Jean Piaget, P.L. Travers, Robert Aldrich, Ralph Houk, Marvin Minsky, Robert Shaw, Bob Cousy, Rod Laver, Claude Osteen, David Steinberg, Jack DeJohnette, Ken Norton, Sam Elliott, Jim Kiick. Bill Campbell, Ted Simmons, Chris Haney, Johhn Cappaletti, Pete Thomas, Melanie Griffith, Kurtis Blow, Michael Kors, Brad Gilbert, John “Hot Rod” Williams, Whitney Houston, Brett Hull, Hoda Kotb, Vinny Del Negro, Deion Sanders, Eric Bana, Gillian Anderson, McG, Divine Brown, Troy Percival, Rod Brind’Amour, Juanes, Derek Fisher, Audrey Tatou, Adewale Ogunleye, Dan Levy, Virginia Giuffre, Anna Kendrick, JaMarcus Russell, Alexa Bliss, and Arlo Parks.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Hieronymus Bosch, Hermann Hesse, Joe Orton, Abigail Folger, Robert Lehman, Dmitri Shostakovich, Walter O’Malley, Gregory Hines, Judith Rossner, Bernie Mac, Ted Stewart, Frank Gifford, Alex Cord, Bob Jenkins, Darryl Hunt, Robbie Robertson, and Susan Wojcicki.

FEED THE WORMS: Gawdaful businessman and MAGA Ohio Gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy entered Earth on this date. Nazi Party member and fashion designer Hugo Boss bought it on this date.

Chris Cuomo was born on this date. You decide if he gets a Happy Birthday or if he Feeds the Worms.

TODAY IN THE CULTURES: The Number One Movie in America on this date … in 2026, SPIDER-MAN: BRAND NEW DAY … in 2016, SUICIDE SQUAD … in 2006, TALLADEGA NIGHTS: THE BALLAD OF RICKY BOBBY … in 1996, A TIME TO KILL … in 1986, ALIENS … and in 1976, SILENT MOVIE.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Rest in Peace, Jerry Garcia.

MAN, do news bits accumulate these days - and this is the alleged “slow period” for news. Or it used to be until ... (gestures wildly) ... and there was even a new breaking story as I settled in to get this started!

SO, let’s clear the books, take a breath, clear the energy, gear up for the summer - insert whatever metaphor you want, as I jump in with a Three-Paragraph Update for your reading and information junkie pleasure.

WITH THAT, let’s jot these ideas down and get to some updatin’ with that breaking story I mentioned as I was settling in ...

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HE’S ... ALIVE?

Mitch McConnell. You remember him. He’s been eulogized all over the place after being rushed to a hospital several months ago and not to be heard from save for a few updates and a photo alleged to be of him and his wive, Elaine Chao, in a hospital room that has been mercilessly memed because, aside from alleged conversations here and there, nobody has actually seen whether he was still, y’know, not yet joined the choir invisible.

Well, THIS JUST IN: McConnell has been released from the hospital he has been in and is now resting at home, not likely to return to the Senate (they don’t need him for anything silly like Attorney General confirmation votes or anything) for the “near future,” which could be the rest of his term in January ... or so claims a news release from his office that has been snark-a-phrased in this paragraph.

Because McConnell has still not been seen, still not been heard from in a recording, still has not been identified by anyone not outside his tightest inner circle, so we should continue to take the statement just issued as not-quite-proof of how alive he actually may or may not be. But at least we got that press release going for us ...

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A THREE-PARAGRAPH MICHIGAN SENATE PRIMARY POST-GAME

We got through the Michigan primary - far tighter than the polling reflected, but the results are still pretty rattling for a certain sector of Democratic power centers. Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, the former Detroit and Wayne County Health Director, edged out U.S. Representative Haley Stevens to win the Democratic nomination for an open Senate seat this November.

This was a brutal primary that became a proxy war between traditional Democrats (represented by Chuck Schumer, who endorsed Stevens early and got center-left Mallory McMorrow to leave the race) and the insurgent progressive-left (represented by early endorsee Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) with stressful debates about “electability” spiked with charges of bigotry, anti-Semitism, and the role of AIPAC. And while all the powers and Democrats - including Stevens and Schumer - have endorsed and lined up behind El-Sayed, make no mistake: whatever else has and will happen from here, at a minimum this is a clear and bold L for the Old Guard in Washington - at least until the general election.

El-Sayed will have an even more bruising battle against proud Republican-MAGAt Mike Rogers, flying in from his home in Florida to battle what is now the sole blue-to-red Senate election on the docket this November. Along with Daddy Trump, Rogers has already unleashed ads attacking El-Sayed’s Muslim heritage, with a giant amount of red-baiting and tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars (including reportedly from AIPAC) soon to come to fear and smear Michiganders into helping Trump cling to power and avoid Congressional investigations. Congratulations and gird your loins, Mr. El-Sayed ...

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MAGA SENATE SHENANIGANS

Speaking of the Senate, Republilcans are doing what they do - avoiding actual work to solve the problems their President worsens by the hour to appease the ever-more-hated Dear Leader and try to divert as much attention as they can from the things making their constituents’ everyday lives harder to massage their nerves to point blame away from them.

The final vote to confirm nimrod-Tom-Hagen, Todd Blanche, into the Attorney General’s chair is now being choreographed. With John Cornyn and Thom Tillis properly re-gelded, work to create the appearance of a tight vote is about done. Concerned and now-losing-in-the-polls Susan Collins announced her no vote - but John Thune can afford to lose two and still get the nomination, so GOP Senators Bill Cassidy and Lisa Murkowski are “taking meetings” and “withholding their vote” until intern JD Vance comes in to tie-break a vote to get Blanche in (my bet: Murkowski will get the second no and that’ll be that).

Meanwhile, you know things are so bad now that MAGA is willing to get people to actually go back to the days of COVID to manufacture distractions. This morning, having failed to get him to perjure himself, Rand Paul got his committee to vote to “recommend” indicting worldwide hero Dr. Anthony Fauci, 85, for contempt of Congress for using his Fifth Amendment rights to not fall for their obvious trap. The recommendation goes to the embattled Jeanine Pirro - but once Blanche gets in, look for a sham indictment as we wonder whether Rand’s neighbor is busy these days ...

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MAGA AND THE WOMEN-HATING THUGS THAT THEY ALWAYS SEEM TO ATTRACT

While Dr. Fauci is being raked over the coals for cheap theatre, MAGAts in the U.S. House of Representatives continue with the women abusers on their side of the aisle. The primary abuser of the moment, Rep. Max Miller, has passed the deadline where his name now be printed on ballots in his Ohio district and make his seat vulnerable as he continues to defend his seat by attacking his ex-wife (and daughter of OH Senator Bernie Moreno), so even if the district were to replace him - and they only have six more days to do it - that replacement would have to use Miller as a proxy.

But, we are duty bound to note that not every woman-abusive MAGAt discovered to be woman-abusive gets to stay in office. In the increasingly purple-to-blue state of North Carolina, two-term Rep. Chuck Edwards announced he will not run for re-election after admitting to “unprofessional and inappropriate conduct” towards two young female aides in his office. The plug pull came after a rare in-house censure of his conduct, and locals are relieved he did the honorable thing left the seat to allow them to continue to keep the seat MAGA in a state where the U.S. Senate seat is looking very much like a red-to-blue flip (see “Tillis re-gelding” above).

That’s one for the Forces of Good ... sorta ... which gives MAGA a way to brag they police their own, all while whistling past the graveyard and torn-up construction site that is 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Speaking of which ...

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OMIGOD - WHAT IS THAT THING ON HIS HEAD?!

... our President stumblecreaked to a microphone in Nevada yesterday. This was interesting because the day before Trump had attended a fundraiser in California and reportedly actually did not speak at it at all, what with ever-increasing reports about his ever-deteriorating emotional, mental, and physical state. Indeed, there are now rumblings that Trump is beginning to reject certain treatments trying to keep him at least slightly more biologically alive than Mitch McConnell. (ALLEGEDLY) (EYEROLL)

Yes, we could talk about the latest can anus spew Trump unleashed - but the thing that really got people talking and social media buzzing was the thing that was on top of his head at the event. True, Trump’s hair pieces are the stuff of deserved derisive attention, but days after wind blowing showed a very open and shiny skull under that previous hair piece, the Vegas appearance had Trump sporting a lighter-colored, texturally-thicker, more square-shaped at the edges, and bolted-on-his-head ... thingy ... on his cranium.

Yes, social media went ape-dump, not only in trying to describe what it looked like (A Small Dog? A Chinchilla? An Early 70s Sears Catalog Model? Temu Andy Travis? Hay Glued Onto a DEVO-do Hair Helmet?) but in in the always-well-earned mockery department (”Hair Force 1,” “Pantene has gone MAGA?!” “Trump now has a gender-affirming hairpiece,” “Trump’s hair has more volume than his approval ratings!”). More substantive criticisms will follow, of course, but this is also something we should jump on - and so we have!

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ANOTHER THING TRUMP SAID OBAMA/BIDEN DID HE SEEMS TO HAVE DONE

Hey - remember back in the campaign days when Trump was comparatively more coherent (low bar, I know) and used to try to claim Obama and Biden so mismanaged the military that they were rationing bullets and how a Trump Military would never, EEEEEVER let that happen? Well ... oopsie. Turns out that Trump - or more accurately, his totally-effed-up Secretary of DEFENSE, Pete “His High-T is from TEQUILA!” Hegesth, has not only so thoroughly mismanaged the already-beyond-stupid idea to attack Iran without also thinking about the Straits of Hormuz, he has done so by shooting so many American missiles that the stockpiles are all but empty.

Heggy’s aching to show off his WARRIOR ETHOS (HIGH-C NOTE SUSTAINED FOR 20 SECONDS WITH THE MIKE STAND HELD ALOFT FOR THE CROWD TO SCREAM ALONG) has a semi-good consequence of hamstringing Trump’s desire to amp up a full invasion of parts of Iran and other excursions, but has really bad impacts ranging from severely weakening U.S. defense capabilities (it might take up to two years to rebuild stock) to not being able to help Ukraine from defending itself from amping-up Russian ballistic attacks on Ukrainian cities (which also of course helps Trump’s one-time BFF Vladimir Putin).

Trump has apparently been awake long enough to actually get mad at Petey, who in turn has tried to pawn off the shortages onto underlings he may already be upset at for their ability to do actual pull-ups while not prancing around like bad RuPaul drag auditionees. Either way, as Iran and Oman negotiate how they will let ships through the Straits thanks to the Trump/Hegseth debacle, we need to note how many ways Trump’s bombs in Iran bombed and will bomb this country long after both are out of power (and they WILL be out of power) ...

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WHAT’S IN TRUMP’S WALLET? SCRUBBED CASH

Okay, we should do something of substance about Trump - and this story broke last week and still has not gotten anywhere near the airplay it deserves, even this modest corner of the Interweb. The story comes from Capital One, who took time from their admittedly fun Charles Barkley/Jennifer Garner/Samuel L. Jackson ads to announce it had pulled the plug on 385 - THREE HUNDRED EIGHTY FIVE - Trump Organization-affiliated accounts.

Trump had claimed, of course, that Capital One did so because he was Trump and they are stupid haters - but when Capital One said that no, all THREE HUNDRED EIGHTY FIVE accounts had substantial evidence that they were used to launder money from various sources. It has fallen to failson Eric “Eric” Trump to file the inevitable no-we-didn’t! countersuits, but you have not likely seen a ton of stories from Legacy Media Inc. about this story, which ... I dunno ... seems like a big deal?

I mean, the number THREE HUNDRED EIGHTY FIVE is a big one even without the capitalizations, isn’t it? Let’s bookmark and dog-ear this story and see what happens to it, either here or anywhere else. Put another way ... would YOU want to piss off Samuel L. Jackson?

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ENOUGH OF THAT URPEEN FOOTBALL - IT’S REAL FOOTBALL SEASON NOW!

All righty, the World Cup is now long gone from the shores of the United States, and while soccer certainly isn’t going away, it doesn’t matter - AMERICAN FOOTBALL 2026-27 BEGINS TONIGHT BAY-BEE!!

Sure, it’s NFL Exhibition Football between a barely-got-there playoff team (Carolina) and a team vying for one of what could be a bumper crop of 2027 NCAA quarterbacks (Arizona), but it is the NFL Hall of Fame Game in the cradle of football, Canton, Ohio - and, with this game, live American games of the NFL and college variety (even pre-season) launches every weekend from now until Super Bowl Sunday, which I don’t have to tell you is Super Bowl LXI and will be on Valentine’s Day at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles.

For many, this is the true start of the calendar year, and I salute those of you who celebrate - like my brother, who will be in Canton as part of the Hall of Fame festivities along with his tailgating buddies and tailgaters from around the world. Hardcore and fun, and as you think of grilled meats and insane fans, it’s a good place to wrap this update and get to The Trivias - WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF!!!!!!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Root Beer Float Day, Finish Your Degree Day, Regatta Day, Balloons to Heaven Day, India Pale Ale Day, National Fresh Breath Day, National Wiggle Your Toes Day, and Farmworkers Appreciation Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1787, the first draft of the Constitution was brought to the floor of the Constitutional Convention and debated. In 1806, the Holy Roman Empire was officially dissolved by Austrian Emperor Francis II. In 1846, a group of settlers led by Jacob and George Donner left an established trail in Wyoming to try to arrive in California by a different route. (It did not end well.)

In 1945, the Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima, Japan. In 1956, the DuMont Television Network signed off. In 1996, the Ramones played their last concert. In 1996, researchers claimed to have found signs of life in a meteorite found in Antarctica (but not The Thing). In 2012, the Curiosity robot landed on Mars and began telecasting images of the planet to Earth. In 2015, Jon Stewart retired as the full-time host of THE DAILY SHOW.

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DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: Bolivia (1825), Execution by electric chair (1890), A woman swimming the English Channel (Gertrude Ederle, 1926), the Venice Film Festival (1932), “The Twist” and the twist (1960), The Voting Rights Act (1965), PINK FLOYD’S THE WALL (1982), the World Wide Web (1991).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Afred Lord Tennyson, Edith Roosevelt, Alexander Fleming, Louella Parsons, Henry Iba, Lucille Ball, Robert Mitchum, Ella Jenkins, Andy Warhol, Diane di Prima, Charlie Haden, Paul Bartel, Peter Bonerz, Dino Bravo, Dorian Harewood, Catherine Hicks, Randy DeBarge, Dale Ellis, Michelle Yeoh, David Robinson, Elliott Smith, Mike Budenholzer, M. Night Shyamalan, Geri Horner, Max Kellerman, Vera Farmiga, and Leslie Odom Jr..

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Ben Jonson, Bix Beiderbecke, Preston Sturges, Everett Sloane, Pope Paul VI, Klaus Nomi, William J. Schroeder, Harry Reasoner, Jack Brickhouse, Rick James, Ibrahim Ferrer, John Hughes, Willy Deville, Marvin Hamlisch, Robert Hughes, Pete Fountain, Darren Daulton, Dirk Locher, Paul Laxalt, Wayne Fontana, Herbert Schlosser, and Eddie Palmieri

FEED THE WORMS: Mobster Dutch Schultz - who entered Earth as Arthur Flegenheimer - entered Earth. Fulgencio Batista bought it on this date.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: From the album OF THE HEART, OF THE SOUL, AND OF THE CROSS: THE UTOPIAN EXPERIENCE, released on this date in 1991 ...

In earlier Substacks, I mentioned that one of the big questions future analysts and historians will be sinking their teeth into about the Trump Era is how in the world such an obvious con man and cretin managed to get so many people to sacrifice so much of their pride and self-esteem on to the altar of such a punk-ass bee-yotch. Events since this last update does yield one such theory that people with far more credentials than me are welcome to play with and explore – and it is a purely personal thesis.

Simply put, as a kid who was ruthlessly bullied in grade school that managed to find his universes of communities and friends that allowed me to say “Bullies suck and to Hell with them!” I was likely never going to be a Trumper because of what a ridiculous bully he has always been. For me it was been there, done that, FK that and FK that idiot out of New York.

But I know others who get bullied never get out of the cycle. They … don’t know anything else but to be bullied. They … would rather fall into familiar patters or never learned there could be alternatives. They … have a thing in their brain that somehow equates bullying with validation, or worse they get their circuitry so misprogrammed that they … like the bullying and can’t live without it.

Again, I am not an clinician or an expert. I’m just spitballing here. But in trying to find some kind of rationality about how so many people are in Trump’s thrall that should know better – especially NOW, with Trump’s political and personal approval numbers plunging so deeply so quickly that Never Trumper analyst Rick Wilson has simply stated it as “America HATES Trump” – it seems that the idea that people follow him because they just like the whole pathology is hard to shake.

Allow me some examples …

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JOHN CORNYN AND THOM TILLIS: BULLY-ACCEPTING FETISHISTS

Let’s start with those two clowns. Senators who are no soon not going to be Senators because of their open moderate defiance of Trump, they still somehow manage, just when they could break the cycle of bullying and being bullied by a guy they will no longer ever need to deal with, to instead grab their lunch money and turn their rear ends to be kicked by Daddy. (At least metaphorically since it’s highly unlikely Trump could neither hold his balance to try to kick them nor deliver a lot of force from his pointy shoes to their keisters.)

Recall about two weeks ago how these two guys made a big show about Trump’s manifestly unfit nominee to be Attorney General, sub-ambulance-chasing Trump rump remora Todd Blanche (who himself sure seems to dig the debasing Trump does to him). Cornyn was all huffy about the slush fund Blanche “negotiated” for Trump that was earmarked to pay off January 6 insurrectionists once Trump wet his beak off the cash and said Blanche’s verbal claims the fund was dead was not enough.

Tillis demanded Blanche have a meeting with survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse – which happened and was, by all accounts, grotesque in Blanche’s sneering at the survivors while continuing to protect the Epstein Files from seeing the light of day.

One might have thought, presuming Cornyn and Tillis were not simps for a guy who, remember, has publicly humiliated both of them repeatedly AND whose popularity continues to freefall, that the line would be drawn with Blanche and they would finally stand up to Trump just once.

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Alas, that was not to be. A “negotiated document” released at midnight Monday that nobody – even likely Cornyn and Tillis – believes will hold any water in the White House (particularly because Trump undercut Blanche’s weak promises by poutspewing that he wants that slush fund no matter what!) was enough of a fig leaf for both Cornyn and Tillis to back off their temporary standing up at the bully. This morning they voted to approve Blanche’s nomination, which will be taken to the floor and likely completed successfully by the end of the week.

To fully finish the bullying, after his vote Cornyn slinked in front of gathered microphones and, when challenged about whether he really believes that document and that it will stop Trump, slouched his already-slouched shoulders and whined, “There’s nothing we could do to rein in the President!” Whereupon he threw on a jersey that said I WAS KICKED BY DONALD TRUMP and slinked out of the Senate chambers.

Okay, he didn’t put a shirt like that on. He didn’t have to.

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JEANINE PIRRO: GIRLS ARE “MEANT” TO BE BULLIED BY GUYS LIKE TRUMP

When Blanche presumably formally gets the title – remember, he’s been an Acting AG for awhile – he may decide to revisit the Lincoln Reflecting Pool debacle. The attempt to prosecute alleged vandals that made the pool’s lining float on the surface, grow massive amounts of algae, and (as THE DAILY SHOW put it) become a Killing Fields for unsuspecting ducks unaware of all the peroxide pumped into it to try to kill the algae, has disintegrated because, well, there was no vandalism of the pool. Incompetent contractors did it.

Ah, but that’s not what Donnie believes. Donnie is absolutely convinced his beautiful blue pool was desecrated by vandals, as he tried to say in another Oval Office event. I say “tried to say” literally – he apparently wanted to say he saw video of machete-wielding Communists laying waste to the pool … only he literally could not recall or say the word “VIDEO” as part of an EIGHT MINUTE diatribe about the entire thing and God knows what else.

Sane people would watch the entire episode and scream for the 25^th Amendment. But Todd Blanche is not sane people – he’s All In on being virtually pantsed by Trump. So he is likely to try to revive a case that has now led to at least four people charged with the “vandalism” to have the charges dropped entirely by the woman who brought the charges, Acting DC AG Jeanine Pirro.

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Which comes to another level of the bullying psychopathy: taking a job while at least giving lip service to realizing that if things go sideways, Trump and the Alpha Boys who are in the White House, will make YOU, the girl, take the heat when something goes awry. (As it always will.)

On Sunday, it was reported that Trump refused to accept Pirro’s admission that there was no case because it was Trump’s incompetence that started the chain of events that led to the reflecting pool’s literal mess. Pirro’s explanation that it was the job of the Department of the Interior to get the job done well did not sit well with Interior Secretary Doug Burgun, who as a buddy of a bully ran to the Big Bully to point at Pirro and say “HER FAULT! HER FAULT! HER FAULT!!”

Naturally, Trump bought Burgun’s line. At his Oval Office thingy, Trump claimed Pirro “folded like an umbrella” in withdrawing the charges (rich coming from a man who was once photographed leaving a fully-open umbrella lying at the door of Air Force One without appearing to know how to close it) – which at the end of the day led to Pirro being seen wheeling out two bankers’ boxes on a cart, a new universal symbol of packing your desk and being escorted out of your office.

Now, there are reports that Pirro offered a resignation that Trump refused to accept, but given Trump’s history and Blanche’s full-on willingness to do anything and everything because he is sure that he will never suffer a wedgie that the bully gets other minions to give – sometimes making people give themselves wedgies for his amusement – let us put Pirro, and Blanche for that matter, on the Scaramucci Watch …

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THE LITERAL BULLY ALMOST READY TO TAKE MAGA WITH HIM

We then go to an actual literal bully: Ohio Congresspunk Max Miller, who has been credibly charged by his ex-wife Emily and father of her daughter of physical and verbal abuse, including physically injuring their 2-year-old daughter and openly claiming his ex-wife is mentally ill. Miller’s ex-wife is the daughter of current Ohio Senator Bernie Moreno, who after a lot of silence finally said it was Miller that needed the therapy and Miller should leave his office.

Miller is not doing so – or at least hasn’t as of this writing. That’s important because if he does not resign by the end of the business day today, his name stays on the ballot on November 3 – and since those allegations and others have become public (another ex of Miller’s, former Trump Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham, got a restraining order against him just this week), Miller’s Democratic opponent is now ahead of him in the heavily-gerrymandered district.

One awful thing about bullies is that often game recognizes game, so when the inevitable question about Miller was floated to the Bully-in-Chief, the Bully-in-Chief (not to mention Abuser-in-Chief) shrugged and slobberpooted about nobody knowing anything, followed by contradictory reports of whether Trump told Miller to quit or if Miller told Trump he would not quit. This makes sense as Miller won the seat in 2024 by sucking up hard for Trump’s endorsement in beating a Democrat and ex-Democratic Congressperson Dennis Kucinich.

As the bullied hordes of MAGA Congresscreatures collectively say nothing out of fear, the question of how many MAGA voters will vote for a wife- and child-abusing jerk whos name does not rhyme with Tonald Dump may soon play out. (Miller’s opponent, should you be so inclined, is Brian Poindexter, an iron worker who is a Councilman in the Clevleand suburb of Brook Park.)

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ATHLETES PICKING UP THE BULLYING OF A KINDLY OLD DOCTOR

One final pocket of bullying to be reported on involves the continued jerkiness of MAGA (and by extension, of course, the Jerk-in-Chief) of Dr. Anthony Fauci at the hands of the Senate on Thursday – and while most people outside of MAGA seem to be rolling their eyes over all of it, there are sports figures that have decided that they want to get in on the belligerence themselves.

It started with Vic Fangio, currently the Defensive Coordinator of the Denver Broncos, who thought it would be HI-LARIOUS to refuse to answer a question about his training camp by saying maybe he’ll plead the Fifth Amendment as Dr. Fauci did, har har har har!

That strand was picked up on by ayahuasca-addled on-his-last-legs Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Aaron Rogers, using the if-you-use-the-fifth-that-much-you-are-probably-guilty trope to add his own RFK Jr.-esque nincompoopery, egged on by one of the new faces of ESPN, former WWE commentator Pat McAfee.

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The wildest pile-on, however, came from ESPN’s Mr. Mouth himself, Stephen A. Smith. Smith – who nearly died from COVID and is now fancying himself to be a political commentator – went out of his way to use the Fauci clown show to say that Smith was ready to forgive one of the most mind-numbingly dumb COVID deniers, Dallas Mavericks Guard Kyrie Irving, over Irving’s dumbassery over COVID. (Irving, by the way, also actually believes the Earth is flat.)

Trump has stayed a bit quiet over the Fauci attacks – which, given how he nearly died of COVID and had to play down the fact that he regularly gets COVID vaccines because perish the thought of having to tell his hordes to get vaccinated – but will clearly not stop them.

Nor, it should be pointed out, will Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, which is especially vile because the diary that was going to be used to try to entrap Fauci on perjury charges revealed that Fauci was incredibly compassionate and helpful of Miller and Miller’s wife Katie, who contracted COVID when pregnant with their first child. But compassion and kindness are the mortal enemies of the bully, and Katie went on the record to denounce Fauci’s help after her testimony, which just goes to show bullies should be shunned for so, so, SO many reasons …

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WRAPPING UP THE BULLYING UPDATE

It’s hard to pull out of all of that with some uplift, I admit – but in my experience, bullies really do wilt when called out. It will forever astonish me that nobody on the Right did it in 2016, particularly as Trump has always, and to this day, continues to always back down when called out on the bullying. Just ask Iran, who gets him to do it on what seems to be a daily basis (albeit with Trump trying to milk the markets in the process).

We will have plenty of regular news on Thursday. Tonight is the second-to-last big primary night, with the savage Democratic Senate primary in Michigan finally coming to an end – and I’ll have a few things to say once we know the results.

Major League Baseball’s insane trading deadline is finally done, and what the rest of the league will do to try to beat the Los Angeles Dodgers – including the owners come season’s end – will now play out itself. The Cubs beat the Dodgers 10-5 last night, but tonight they get to face newest Dodger Tarik Skubal. Joy …

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And just as Christopher Nolan found himself in a pop culture duel in 2023 when OPPENHEIMER and BARBIE became the defining movies of that summer, so it is happening again in 2026, as THE ODYSSEY is now right there with the new SPIDER-MAN movie, with both hitting $1 buh-buh-buh-BILLION in box office receipts as we ease into August and start sifting through the back to school sales.

All that and more. But please – stand up to a bully when you get the chance. You’ll be glad you did, and you’ll prepare yourself for … (gestures wildly).

TO THE TRIVIAS!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day, Assistance Dog Day, Founder’s Day, Hooray for Kids Day, International Clouded Leopard Day, National Night Out, National White Wine Day, Single Working Women’s Day, and … Civic Holiday? (That’s all it says. Don’t ask me …)

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1892, the parents of Lizzie Borden were discovered in their home, murdered by to this date unknown assailant(s). In 1914, Great Britain entered World War I as the United States declared neutrality in the conflict. In 1936, Jesse Owens won the second of his four Gold Medals in the Berlin Olympics, this one for the long jump.

In 1944, Anne Frank and seven others were discovered by the Gestapo and sent to concentration camps. In 1964, the bodies of three men murdered by the Ku Klux Klan while working to register voters were found in Mississippi. In 1987, the FCC ended the Fairness Doctrine. In 2007 the Mars probe Phoenix was launched.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: The Coast Guard (1790), the Billboard Hot 100 (1958), THE PIPER AT THE GATES OF DAWN (1967), SUPER FLY (1972), NEW MISERABLE EXPERIENCE (1992), TALLEDEGA NIGHTS (2006), the Cleveland Sirens of the WNBA (2026).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Percy Bysshe Shelley, Louis Vuitton, Queen Mother Queen Eliazabeth, Louis Armstrong, Clara Peller, Raoul Wallenberg, Warren Avis, Helen Thomas, Maurice Richard, Dallas Green, D.L. Coburn, Frank Vincent, Richard Belzer, Billy Bob Thornton, Gerry Cooney, Meg Whitman, Mary Decker, Barack Obama, Lori Lightfoot, Dennis Lehane, Hakeem Jeffries, Jeff Gordon, Meghan Markle, Greta Gerwig, Cole Sprouse, and Dylan Sprouse.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Hans Christian Andersen, Samue J. Tilden, Marilyn Monroe, Frank Fontaine, Melvyn Douglas, Victor Mature, Lorenzo Music, Little Milton, Lee Hazelwood, Art Donovan, James Brady, J.R. Richard, and Charles Ogletree.

FEED THE WORMS: Trump/MAGA financier Sheldon Adelson, steroid cheat Roger Clemens and Fox News reader Bret Baier entered Earth on this date.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday to Paul Reynolds, guitar player for ultra-80s techno-pop-hair band A Flock of Seagulls!

When Donald Trump’s days in power are over (and they WILL BE) and historians look over it to see how he managed to stay in power as long as he did, one of the areas of analysis will need to focus on the ways in which he found people so willing to subordinate whatever ego or talents they had to subjugate them in his service – often by asking themselves “What would my leader Donald Trump do?” and then doing that thing – only to discover that the only person who could do that thing and even vaguely get away with it is, well, Donald Trump.

We have several examples of this dynamic in action in the last few days. While some of the consequences are not immediate, they will indeed come – especially as, as seems to be the pattern, Trump is spending his weekend at Camp David. By all accounts, Trump hates Camp David – but it has expansive and sophisticated medical facilities topped only by Walter Reed Hospital, so given all the massive bruising (and this weekend, a distinctly yellow pallor to go with his regular blood orange bronzer on his face) it is not hard to think there’s another round of experimental drugs going in and excessive fluids being extracted out.

In the meantime, the kids have to vie for Daddy’s attention, so several tried with varying degress of success. Let us document the atrocities …

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PIRRO PUMPED THE REFLECTING POOL DOWN THE SEWER

We begin with one of those Friday night news dumps that every administration loves to try to bury bad news – and this past Friday there was a beaut. In a court filing, DC District Attorney Jeanine “Box o’Wine” Pirro let the court know that, on second thought, they were not going to prosecute former Olympian David Hearn for “defacing” the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool by pulling out an already-shed piece of lining and paint from the surface of the pool.

In fact, Pirro’s filing admited that, contrary to the blatherings of Daddy and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, there was never any vandalism or large gaping gashes of knives wielded by ANTIFA/DSA/METOO terrorists who then planted algae to deny Dear Leader a gorgeous toilet-shade of blue for the 250^th Trumpversary of the Declaration of Independence – but rather a totally botched rehab job by a Trump-sucking dime-store-Mafiosi lookalike who ran a company that did pool renovations with the legal name of Greenwater Services.

To be clear, what the filing says is that DoJ and the White House always knew that the Reflecting Pool was Dear Leader’s fault for signing off on the no-bid contract and everything else - and baby, David Hearn should be setting up the mother of all defamation suits after all this.

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Because, while Pirro had to legally back off and take the embarrassment of a second grotesquely overcharged nothingburger (remember the guy who threw the sandwich at an ICE agent?), she will now be facing massive heat from a displeased daddy figure.

In between swapping IV bags, Depends changes, and another torrent of AI slop (Trump as George Washington, Trump as Aztec-cape-era Elvis minus the bloat), Trump went to social media to continue to insist the Reflecting Pool was vandalized. Burgoo – I mean Bergum – also chimed in from whichever Dakota he’s from to point blame at the girl,.

This is yet another well-established pattern for Trump and the Alphas. The only people that have been fired during this go-round have all been women – Pam Bondi, Tulsi Gabbard and Kristi Noem. Pirro may need to see if her seat on THE FIVE panel is still warm for her as Trump will now potentially task still-acting-Attorney-General Todd Blanche to swap out Pirro for someone who will try to make his fever dreams real enough for his enemies to spend more money on attorneys, which Trump has done ever since his New York real estate days.

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THE BLANCHE EFFECTS

While we are on the topic of Todd Blanche, his Attorney General confirmation is officially stalled. After both John Cornyn and Thom Tillis demanded Blanche put in writing that his claim Trump was not going to proceed with his $1.8 billion slush fund to pay off January 6 rioters with whatever money was left after Trump pocketed it (ALLEGEDLY) (EYEROLL) (OW – MY EYES!), Trump went and made those claims go kerblooey by saying NUH-UH, that fund is NOT dead and I WANT IT and screw you two losing losers Cornyn and Tillis – I’m not gonna have Blanche confirmed anyway so NEENER NEENER!

Now, there is no indication Blanche would step away from AG even if he were not to get his nomination out of committee. Trump would not likely remove the interim tag, and Trump’s claim that he would resubmit Blanche’s name in 2027 makes the presumption that the Senate will still be Republican come 2027 – a presumption polling is making a shaky bet, even with former Trump BFF Elon Musk claiming he’ll drop another $100 million into races because after Musk’s spends in Wisconsin and Italy and France all those elections tilted to conservatives … oh, wait, this just in, all those races went hard against Musk because he is less popular than algae.

Anyway, Blanche’s nomination is on hold, which is an “L” for Trump no matter how you cut it, and while things Trump may want to do will still have a minion to help him do them, said minion is also less competent than (and way less attractive than) the cute yellow thingies from the movies.

Or Elon Musk, for that matter.

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LET’S TRY TO KNOCK DOWN AN OLD DOCTOR AND MAKE PEOPLE LIKE US FOR DOING IT!

Meanwhile, there are still effects being felt over the brutal and gross “hearing” from last Thursday in which phony optometrist Rand Paul (it’s true – he couldn’t pass a real ophthalmology board exam so he created a board that did) decided to bring Dr. Anthony Fauci to the dais to dredge up Fauci’s diary and try to trap Fauci into committing perjury. Fauci didn’t play their game and so what was left were attempts to relitigate Trump’s atrocious COVID response and generally remind everyone what a horrible time that was under … TRUMP.

The previous update included brutal responses from a number of MAGA Senators, although we will take the time here to isolate Josh Hawley. The Virginia resident who used his sister’s address to beat Claire McCaskill to win a Senate seat in Missouri spent his questioning of Fauci to try to entrap him and, after over 100 invocations of the Fifth Amendment, then tried to flip those 100 invocations to say AH-HA – you don’t use the Fifth Amendment that much and not be guilty!

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(Of course, on MAGA Media there wasn’t one person who dared point out that Hawley’s leader Donald Trump once invoked the Fifth Amendment over FOUR HUNDRED TIMES in various court proceedings, nor did anyone note that Trump failsons Donald “SCHNORT!” Trump Jr. and Eric “Eric” Trump have also Fifth Amendment their way through proceedings hundreds of times in questioning about their ALLEGED financial misdeeds. Because even if they did, they’re Trumps – and Fauci’s no Trump!)

The worst of all of this came this morning on CNN when an out-of-control Robert F. Kennedy Jr. brazenly lied about America’s COVID responses (again without noting who was President at the time), refused to say whether he was doing his job in case there was another outbreak under his watch (like measles or screw worm or diarrhea-generating lettuce?) and attacked host Dana Bash for her pushback on his mania – again putting to the test that if Daddy can, why can’t Brain Worm?

That the calculus seems to be that 2026 is going so poorly that invoking 2020 would actually be better is … quite the calculus … because after all, Trump continues to insist he won the 2020 election, and denying that Trump got beat by Joe Biden in 2020 is the gateway to all things MAGA and All Things Trump Administration …

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THE OUTER LIMIT OF THE ENVELOPE AT LAST?

That brings us to events of this morning. In talking about the Fauci theatre on Thursday, we noted the performance of Ohio Senate choad Bernie Moreno, and how his F-bombing of Fauci was rich given that his daughter’s husband, Ohio Congressman Max Miller, has been credibly charged with physical abuse and threats involving her and their two-year-old daughter to the point that restraining orders are in place – and that Moreno had said boo about Miller, allegedly because of potential blackmail Miller had involving Moreno’s sexual proclivities. Of course.

Over the weekend, Miller called for a live streaming event on Sunday morning, and the buzz seemed to be that Miller would resign his seat to try to keep the seat red in a state (Ohio) that, between ex-Senator now Senate candidate Sherrod Brown was leading in the race to beat Jon Husted and Dr. Amy Acton (who led Ohio’s COVID effort) gaining momentum against non-Ohio MAGAt Vivek Ramaswamy (yes, THAT Vivek Ramaswamy), could be vulnerable.

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But, would Donald Trump do that? Would the Germans surrender after attacking Pearl Harbor? HELL NO! Miller went on and did what Trump did, denying every single charge one by one, claiming there was nothing going on in the marriage other than his wife having mental health issues (“If I had assaulted her, would she have offered to cook me dinner six days later?”) (YES HE SAID THAT), and insisting he was not going to resign and would WIN that Congressional seat! Miller, however, is no Trump, and THIS JUST IN: Miller’s performance was so bad that Moreno finally got off the schneid, charged that Miller needed psychological help, and called on him to resign.

Only Trump can do Trump, Maxy. Y’all about to find the F out …

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THE EVIL BLUE MLB EMPIRE STRIKES AGAIN (FOR THE LAST TIME?!)

Trump has been trotted out to his local golf club to stand in front of a scoreboard and, to keep him happy and stretched out between a few other treatments, was just awarded his 467^th “Club Championship Title” that he is given that acts like a lollipop to the rest of us – so that’s probably plenty of political news for the moment.

But let’s use that sportsball update to pivot to the news that has dominated social media for the last 12 hours: the trade of two-time Cy Young winning pitcher Tarik Skubal to the team that felt inevitable he was going to be traded to, the Los Angeles Dodgers. There is already plenty of debate about who the Tigers got in exchange for the free-agent-to-be, and massive gnashing of millions of teeth that the richest franchise by far in Major League Baseball (their payroll matches the bottom four MLB franchised COMBINED) just got that much richer again.

(Of course, the Dodgers are able to do what they do in large part because their minor league system has consistently been one of the best in all of baseball, so when they go out and get a Shohei Otani or Mookie Betts or, if he signs, Tarik Skubal, they can make trades to get them and then use the money from their media deals to pay their players top and deferred dollar. So, y’know …)

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Anyway, the general feeling is that this specific trade will be Exhibit A in what is now believed to be an inevitable lockout by baseball owners who for decades have tried to exert a hard salary cap on teams like every other professional American sports league has – and in the process break what is generally considered to be the best union that has ever existed, the Major League Baseball Players’ Association by getting most baseball fans pro-salary-cap for the first time ever.

There have been proposals sent out, and to say the sides are worlds apart can’t begin to describe how far apart they are. For example: owners have proposed a complete gutting of minor league baseball by banning the drafting of high school players, demands of a minimum age limit before signing players that would ship player development of Central American and Asian players to those countries, and a two-year college minimum that would essentially try to turn college baseball into the kind of feeder system NCAA football and basketball are to the NFL and NBA.

The MLBPA have already rejected that proposal outright, and so whatever fallout there is from the Skubal trade, it does seem more likely than not that, at the very least, Skubal or no Skubal, enjoy this season while it lasts.

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HEADING OUT OF THE WEEKEND

August is here, the week will bring whatever it will bring (thoughts to Spokane, Washington, where wildfires are putting several neighborhoods in danger), so grab some outside time if you can after finishing today’s update with The Trivias!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Ice Cream Sandwich Day, National Mustard Day, National Sisters Day, National CAD Day, Psychic Day, American Family Day, National Sisters Day, and National Coloring Book Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1776, the Declaration of Independence was signed. In 1790, the first census of the U.S. began. In 1934, Adolph Hitler became the Fuhrer of Germany. In 1939, Albert Einstein wrote a letter to Franklin D. Roosevelt suggesting how uranium could be turned into a weapon. In 1943, the torpedo boat PT-109 – commanded by John F. Kennedy – was sunk by a Japanese destroyer.

In 1961, the Beatles performed at Liverpool’s Cavern Club for the first time. In 1962, Robert Zimmerman legally changed his name to Bob Dylan. In 1990, Saddam Hussein and Iraq invaded Kuwait. In 1992, Jackie Joyner-Kersee became the first woman to win consecutive Olympics Heptathlons. In 2018, Apple became the first American publicly traded company to be valued at $1 trillion.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: Saratoga Racecourse (1864), the Lincoln Penny (1909), Aretha Franklin on national television (1962), IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT (1967), AMERICAN GRAFFITI (1973).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Jack Warner, Myrna Loy, Beatrice Straight, Nehemiah Persoff, Bill Scott, Shimon Peres, Carroll O’Connor, James Baldwin, Lamar Hunt, Peter O’Toole, Billy Cannon, Garth Hudson, Wes Craven, Isabel Allende, Max Wright, Jim Capaldi, Joanna Cassidy, James Fallows, Ken Kutaragi, Andrew Gold, Butch Patrick, Butch Vig, Mojo Nixon, Appolonia, David Yow, Linda Fratianne, Mary-Louise Parker, Tim Wakefield, Tony Amonte, Sam Worthington, Edward Furlong, Grady Sizemore, Davey Boy Smith, Lily Gladstone, Golden Tate, and Kristaps Porzingis.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Horace Mann, Wild Bill Hickok, Enrico Caruso, Alexander Graham Bell, Warren G. Harding, Paul von Hindenburg, Fritz Lang, Totie Fields, Thurman Munson, James Jamerson, Frank Faylen, Raymond Carver, Norman Maclean, Fela Kuti, Shari Lewis, Ron Townson, David Huddleston, James Houghton, Ara Parseghian, and Vin Scully.

FEED THE WORMS: Barely-funny Trumpette Victoria Jackson and Presidential Intern JD Vance entered Earth on this date. Roy Cohn went to Hell on this date.

William S. Burroughs died on this date. You decide if he Rests in Peace or Feeds the Worms. (Or in his case, both?)

ON THIS DAY IN THE CULTURE: The Number One Song in America on this date … in 2026, “Choosin’ Texas” by Ella Langley … in 2016, “Cheap Thrills” by Sia with Sean Paul … in 2006, “Promiscuous” by Nelly Furtado featuring Timbaland … in 1996, “Macarena” (Bayside Boys Mix) by Los del Rio … in 1986, “Glory of Love” by Peter Cetera … and in 1976, “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart” by Elton John and Kiki Dee.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday, Charli XCX! This is from her newest, MUSIC, FASHION, FILM …

… you will likely be a fan of the theme of so many of today’s updates: people thinking they have the juice to try to do something that they probably really should not be doing, and watching as the reactions to what they do hit a combination of backlash, derision, rejection, and (assuming they have the capability of feeling something), embarrassment they even tried to do the thing they tried to do.

These are items that touch on politics, governance, media and sportsball – all in the last two days since our last update! That they are happening at the end of the month makes them feel like some kind of karmic quota is being rushed to be filled, like a patrolman on a freeway or turnpike ticketing anyone going more than 5 miles per hour in front of them (something I am familiar with as a frequent traveler of the Ohio Turnpike).

And, with a lot on the docket, I think I can knock these out in one of my Three-Paragraph Update formats – so we can continue fulfilling our quotas of summer as we flip to August this weekend. So … (cracks knuckles) … AWAY WE GO!

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HOLD ON WITH THAT CONFIRMATION THERE, BLANCHE!

We will start with all the breaking – and kind of surprising – news about the Senate Judiciary Committee’s scheduled vote to advance Trump personal defense attorney Todd “Well, Roy Cohn Is Dead, So You’ll Do” Blanche to be fully-voted-on Attorney General. That breaking news is that what appeared to be kabuki from two outgoing Republican Senators about not voting to confirm him has turned into enough of a roadblock to have the vote, which was to occur on Thursday, postponed.

Outgoing NC Sen. Thom Tillis has been lobbied hard by survivors of Jeffrey Epstein to get Tillis to vote NO because of Blanche’s role in covering up the Epstein Files, and a meeting requested by Tillis of Blanche and a number of Epstein survivors went poorly enough for Tillis to not accept the meeting as the theatre it was set up to be. Meanwhile, the other outward bound Senator, TX’s John Cornyn, continues to demand written assurance that the $1.8 billion slush fud Trump and Blanche want to pay off January 7 insurrectionists, not getting it, and openly saying no deal, no vote.

Surprisingly, Trump today announced that “he” “asked” the committee vote be “postponed” until “later in the year” – odd since those two seats are both polling with Democrats in the lead, but Trump is a sooper-geenius about all things (just ask him!), and he apparently thinks a post-November vote will go his way. That, and Blanche can theoretically keep the job as an ‘interim’ AG. While it is probably a bet that Tillis and Cornyn will flip (because Republicans), it is still a TACO that Trump is eating of his own free will. So we got that going for us.

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RAND PAUL THINKS COVID WERE THE GLORY DAYS …

There is no other reason to explain why, more than six years on from COVID and with the aforementioned polling getting worse by the day for Republicans, the MAGA Senators who are still all-in for Daddy Donny decided the way to spur the unenthused base to think about voting was to hammer one of their biggest sore spots: trying to turn Dr. Anthony Fauci into a MAGA Super-Villain AGAIN.

Using as motive the discovery of Fauci’s diaries that were in the National Archives and found by Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. while he groped for a steroid vial that rolled behind his desk (ALLEGEDLY) (PROVE ME WRONG!), Aquabudda Worshipper Rand Paul demanded Fauci – who has a pardon from President Biden for crapola like this – testify about items in that diary. This was as clear a setup for a perjury trap as anyone watching a pedestrian television courtroom drama can find.

As did Fauci, who came to the hearing and declared that “against my best wishes,” he took the fifth amendment in his opening statement and more than 100 times as some of the biggest numbsculls in MAGAland (Putin-loving Ron Johnson from WI, butt-sniffer extraordinaire Mike Lee of UT, leatherheaded dunce Tommy Tuberville of AL, and Rand Paul as the Beaver) tried and failed to get Fauci to crack, with glowing reviews of ivermectin and attacks on the COVID vaccine throughout. It’s hard to see any of them get a clip for Newsmax or ads or standing out from this goat rodeo – but one guy tried …

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TIME TO BEAT THE CRAP OUT OF BERNIE MORENO, SUPER-CRETIN

The lowlight of a nasty dumbshow came from the literal car salesman-turned-Senator from Ohio, Bernie Moreno, who decided it was his time to shine for all the MAGAts (led by the constantly-grimacing has-been Laura Ingraham, who was in the gallery for the Fauci show). To show what a guy who thinks he is an alpha anti-cuck, Moreno GLARED at Fauci and BELLOWED at him about Fauci wanting to save lives, “Who the F*CK do YOU think YOU WERE FOR DOING THAT?!?!?!!”

Funny coming from Moreno. You see, late last week, a story came out about his daughter’s ex-husband being a horrific abuser – allegations that included having boiled water thrown at her, having a gun held to her head, and having her two-year-old child’s collarbone broken by her ex. But Moreno has been quiet about her daughter’s ex because her daughter’s ex is Max Miller, and Miller just so happens to be the MAGA Congressman from Ohio’s 7^th House District.

OH, and as SiriusXM’s Michealangelo Signorile pointed out, Moreno also had to respond to claims he posted regularly in a social media site known for gay hookups when Moreno ran for that Senate seat in 2024, AND Miller may have sent texts to Moreno about “secrets (Moreno’s) wife doesn’t know” that were also reported by the Associated Press. SO, Bernie Moreno’s 15 minutes may be on their way for reasons that could set up super karmic payback for Fauci. Here’s hoping!

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THE ELECTORAL MAP KEEPS SEEPING BLUER

There seems to be little doubt that the Fauci hearing and desperation to keep Blanche around enough through November is the continued building of a blue tsunami in November. Trump’s still free-falling approval numbers continue to erode House seats nationally in spite of the re-re-districting MAGA states performed throughout the country to prevent just such a circumstance. Indeed, in a Florida race, a Republican candidate failed to get enough signatures to get on the ballot, rolling the seat over into the Democratic column here in July!

Another wave of Senate polling now show strong Democratic leads for three seats (NC and OH) that would represent flips, and two other seats (ME and TX) showing Democratic leads – and Democrats technically need four seats to change for a mathematical 51-49 Senate flip. That puts races like Montana and Nebraska in play, because in those states Democratic-endorsed candidates announced they will drop out to allow independents (NOT Democratic Socialists!) clear races against vulnerable Republicans, while continuing to put pressure on the Michigan Senate primary, which is looking like the one state Republicans think they can flip if the race goes there way (and exempting John Fetterman, at least for now).

As moves to suppress the vote will undoubtedly amp up (see Blanche, Todd) and now-universally-loathed ketamine addict Elon Musk announcing he will throw $5 million to MAGAts nationally (ignoring both that his name is now toxic when attached to local races – see the WI Supreme Court race he invested in and face planted in and Musk now also being associated with data centers that Republicans are wedded to as data centers are now openly loathed for many mostly good reasons), the reminder to vote, register, help, and pound the pavement is back!

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SO THAT’S WHAT THEY WANT TO DO WITH 60 MINUTES?!?

Meanwhile, in the world of Legacy Media, Inc., the news of a year-long delay in Paramount’s attempt to purchase Warner Bros./Discovery/HBO and CNN pivots the Ellison family to their previous purchase of CBS, which if you think of media companies having the quaint goal of getting as many people watching it as they can, is going very very VERY poorly.

Viewers continue to flee as CBS’s bright moves to gut CBS News, kill the CBS Radio News Network, and replace Stephen Colbert with barely-cable-access-quality standup comedy, new CBS News honcho Bari Weiss got her clutches on the former Tiffany Network’s standard, 60 MINUTES. Anderson Cooper and Scott Pelley have already left amid Weiss’ ridiculous idea to make CBS more like Fox – and the announcement of her big “star” to replace Cooper and Pelley have left observers even more convinced of Weiss’ idiocy.

The Big Get that was announced as a new 60 MINUTES’ correspondent is Ross Douthat, as mediocre a white guy as you can possibly find who failed upward to become a lead columnist at the New York Times with liberal-bashing from a conservative Catholic perspective nobody really cares about, expressed with all the zest of dry cardboard and all the charisma of wet cardboard. How long Weiss will stay may depend on how much money the Ellisons can afford to lose (and as their day job of running Oracle is deeply invested in AI and the CBS deal is heavily leveraged, who knows?!??!) …

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SO THAT’S WHY TRUMP WAS BEING SUCKED UP TO BY THAT FIFA GUY

One of the most mysterious yet vomitous side-stories of the recently-wrapped 2026 Mens’ World Cup is why the hell FIFA President Gianni Infantino did not leave an opportunity to butter up Donald Trump with debasing moves like the “FIFA Peace Prize” and letting Trump steal the first FIFA Club trophy and staying in the photo of Spain’s trophy-raising earlier in July.

WELL, THAT mystery was solved this week, as Infantino announced that FIFA would “explore” the “possibility” of private equity purchasing part of FIFA and thereby give Infantino many more millions from what is openly acknowledged to be one of the most brazenly corrupt organizations of its kind on Earth. Further, as dumb luck and fate would have it, the investors Infantino has in mind for that purchase is – you’re gonna be SHOCKED to find out! – Josh Kushner, the brother of Trump in-law and worldwide negotiator Jared Kushner?! WHA-WHA-WHAAAAAT?!?! NO!!

Wha-wha-wha indeed – because today, both the European and North American branches of FIFA came out not only foursquare against allowing anyone to invest a dime in FIFA, but that if Infantino did, none of the over 80 countries represented by UEFA and CONACAF (the federations that represent those countries in FIFA) would play in any FIFA-sponsored events. Watch this space as money, prestige, and Trumps are gonna fly …

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BTS TELLS THE GRAMMYS TO SUCK ROTTEN KIMCHI

The final story today comes from the world of megapop, and also involves the former kings of pop, Korean superduperultramegagigagroup BTS. For years they sought the ears of the world, particularly in the United States, and some of that wooing involved looking for recognition from the Grammy Awards. Though nominated, they have never won, and their comeback this year was timed in part to crack that code if possible.

At least until this week. Apparently peeved for some reason that the 2025 Grammys were dominated by the awesome but Spanish-speaking Bad Bunny, the awards – which was originally created by the record industry as a counter to the emergence of rock and roll and thus has constantly been battling for cultural relevance – decided to “protect” the big awards by creating a category for K-Pop and basically presenting it to the group to insulate the rest of the big awards.

BTS told them to stuff it. They pulled their music from consideration for any awards at all this year and did so in a press release that was written in Korean just to put a button on the point. The calculation that the Grammys need BTS more than BTS needs the Grammys could not have been made more clearly, and at least for this listener and fan (and I am a fan – their dance routines rival modern dance ensembles and put other boy bands to deserved shame) good on them!

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THE NEWS PORTION OF THE UPDATES COMPLETED …

… we can wrap July with today’s Trivias and wait for the next wave of news to hit.

(And hey, did’ja notice I didn’t have a major story about Him today?)

ON TO THE TRIVIAS – and a three-line, three-paragraph update, too! Yay me!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is International Day of Friendship, National Cheesesteak Day, National Chili Dog Day (Tastee-Freez optional), National Intern Day, National Support Public Education Day, Paperback Book Day, Share a Hug Day, and … well this is awkward given some of our stories today … National Father-in-Law Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1619, the first legislative body in America convened in the colony of Jamestown. In 1930, Uruguay defeated Argentia to win the first Mens’ World Soccer championship. In 1945, a Japanese submarine sunk the USS Indianapolis just after the ship delivered the components of the atomic bomb to an American base, with over 900 men perishing in the sinking.

In 1956, “In God We Trust” was made the official motto of the United States. In 1974, Richard Nixon released the Watergate tapes as three articles of impeachment against him were approved by the House Judiciary Committee. In 1975, Jimmy Hoffa left for a dinner meeting in Bloomfield Hills, MI – and was never seen again. In 2000, the Perseverance rover was launched to Mars.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: Oil tankers (1869), L’Oreal (1909), Insulin (1921), Penguin Books (1935), professional wrestling on television (1948), Medicare and Medicaid (1965), THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT (1999), THE RISING (2002), HAROLD & KUMAR GO TO WHITE CASTLE (2004).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Emily Bronte, Robert R. McCormick, Casey Stengel, Henry W. Bloch, Sid Krofft, Edd Byrnes, Buddy Guy, Peter Bogdanovich, Pat Schroeder, Paul Anka, David Sanborn, Arnold Schwarzenegger, William Atherton, Jean Reno, Otis Taylor, Frank Stallone, Ken Olin, Anita Hill, Delta Burke, Bill Cartwright, Clint Hurdle, Kate Bush, Richard Linklater, Laurence Fishburne, Reggie Roby, Chris Mullen, Lisa Kudrow, Jurgen Klinsmann, Ted Sarandos, Vivica A. Fox, Terry Crews, Christopher Nolan, Tom Green, Hilary Swank, Finneas, Jaime Pressly, and Carlos Arroyo.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: William Penn, George Pickett, Otto von Bismarck, George Szell, Joe Shuster, Claudette Colbert, Buffalo Bob Smith, Sam Phillips, Bill Walsh, Ingmar Bergman, Michaelangelo Antonioni, Maeve Binchy, Lynn Anderson, Nick Buoniconti, Pat Carroll, Nichelle Nichols, and Paul Reubens.

Henry Ford and Bud Selig were born on this date. Herman Cain died on this date. You decide if they get Happy Birthdays/Rests in Peace or if they Feed the Worms.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday, Jimmie Cliff!

Yes, there is a theme for all our updates – appropriate for the calendar day, although as I write the weather has gotten pleasantly cool after two nasty storms on Monday in Chicago. I had two window boxes of plants tumble off my deck railings, and I will wait to see what needs to be replaced as August rolls in – but as it does, we begin our Melt updates with – who else? – our Dear Leader, who continues to muddle and puddle with his every appearance, post, and public waddle.

When last we left Trump, he was leaving the beyond-useless White House Correspondents’ Dinner having bombed harder than a newbie at your local watering hole’s Open Mike Night. To overcompensate, Trump and his handlers went on his social media posting obsession for 2026: AI slop that elevates Fragile Grampy’s teensy-tinsy ego every which way.

Amongst the grotesqueries: showing CNN’s Kaitlin Collins hawking Bud Light beer (a super-dumb callback to the super-dumb ‘controversy’ over a transgendered spokesperson hawking the pseudo-beer), four portraits of Trump at various ages with the caption THE MAN WHO SAVED AMERICA, a provocative war vision of a “STRIKE ON KHARG” (that would be Kharg Island in Iran) and of Trump with a flag on a boat with the caption IT’S OUR TANKER NOW, and a wild vision of Trump catching George Washington on the side of Mount Rushmore with a helicopter flying nearby – because who in Trump’s circle knows history? (More on that in a sec.)

From there, Trump flew to Michigan to hype MAGA candidates because he insists he’s the best asset MAGA has to hold Congress (don’t laugh) – and that trip featured another insult against a female reporter on the plane, a ‘speech’ that showed Trump wired and dripping with sweat, wildly mispronounced his favorite violent street gang (“Tren-der-agua”) and southernmost foreign country (“MEE-he-ho!”), bizarrely claimed transgendered people were about to ruin the NFL (uh … sure) and brayed that “I’VE DONE MORE FOR YOU THAN YOUR PARENTS – OKAY?!”

Phew.

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THE TRUMP COURT MELTS

One reason for the eldercolic is that, while he continues to try to assert dominance he thinks he still has, the courts that don’t include six enabling dopes in Washington continue to whack him down.

For example, Trump continues to try to muck up the voting system since he can’t do it in Congress (and more on that next!) by heading to the courts to see if he can get mail-in voting stymied since he has poisoned the system he has used most of the elections he has bothered voting in. Even SCOTUS told him he can’t – but he tried to appeal to an Appelate Court and got told to kick rocks.

He then appealed to SCOTUS to get on the shadow docket, but that depends on getting a recommendation from the Justice who catches the case – and the winner of that drawing was Ketanji Brown Jackson. So good luck with THAT, tubbo!

Other decisions stopped Trump from not funding previously-allocated funds from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, prevented a decision to cancel federal grants which featured a Trump attorney bragging about not funding emergency grants to states that did not vote for Trump, and stopped the dumbass DOGE from grabbing personal information from federal employees who were unionized.

The best decision came on the QT from one of the most brazen Trump lawsuits: the multi-billion dollar “defamation” suit against the BBC. Not having to give a flying fig about Brendan Carr since the BBC is not under FCC jurisdiction, the BBC has decided to push hard against Trump in the best way possible: by opening up discovery into Trump’s claims of losing money and presige over the Beeb’s factual reporting on things Trump has done. A judge gave the green light to try to demand Trump open his books – and you can imagine how well THAT goes until Trump TACOs on it.

So as you can see, Trump is melting a lot for a lot of good reasons. But he’s not the only one!

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MAGA MELTING IN DC AND BEYOND

We then get to the party who continues to be attached to the President, because what would happen if Daddy wasn’t there anymore? While anxiously await what that looks like, MAGA still has to deal with a heavy anchor to their 2026 midterms.

For proof, Texas provides the big stomach churn for the GOP, with a new Texas Tribune poll showing the GOP attacks on James Talarico’s manhood are not working. Talarico holds a 5% lead over GOP nominee and Texas Screw Worm Look-Alike winner Jim Paxson – with the massive red flag that Talarico may be savaging the core of MAGA by leading Paxson by 9% among voters with high-school educations or less. It’s July, but that’s baaaaaaad for them …

Thus, Trump continues to do whatever he can to get the Senate to finally vote in the SAVE America from Blue States Act – and continues to show that “whatever he can” is ass. Despite dependable Trump toadies like UT Sen. Mike Lee tantruming that the Senate needs to stay until Trump’s voter suppression bill passes, Senate Majority Leader Thune says no because Thune can count votes and Republicans ain’t voting for that damn bill – and even told Trump to find the votes if he can. Which Trump can’t. So, womp womp.

There is even a minor bit of independence being shown today from outgoing TX Senator John Cornyn, who announced today that unless Trump and his Attorney General nominee Todd Blanche put in enforceable writing that the $1.8 billion slush fund Trump wants to pay off the insurrectionists he pardoned, Cornyn will not vote to take Blanche’s nomination out of the Judiciary Committee.

Should that actually happen it likely kills a nomination that should be thrown out on the scruff of its neck anyway, but let’s not hold our breath here. Republicans have a bullying kink after all, and raise your hand if you believe a Trump White House will agree to actually do anything that is written down to stop them.

Still, the melting looks great!

Now if Democrats can poise themselves … to take advantage of … erp.

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THE DEMOCRATIC MELTS OF THE DAY

If we refer back to that Michigan “rally,” they have an open Senate seat that they would love to flip. The MAGAt likely to get that nod in their primary next Tuesday is Mike Rogers, who lost in 2020 and is back on his platform of MAGA MAGA MAGA MAGA! And in a swing state and massive national trend to the Democrats, this should be a defendable seat (that became open when Debbie Stabenow retired).

But as has been noted a couple of times in this Substack, the Democratic fight is knock-down, drag-out, personal, and bitter.

Former Democratic candidate Abdul El-Sayed and current Democratic Representative Haley Stevens had their last debate yesterday, and all the nasty issues of corporate funding, AIPAC, Democratic Socialism, and electability showed their heads. While polling seemed to favor El-Sayed since the race became a two-way battle, a new state poll threw a curve by showing a Stevens-Rogers race shows Stevens with a 2% lead while a Stevens-El Sayed race shows Rogers ahead by 11%. Democrats can grab the Senate, but hoo boy …

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This race is being conducted while on the national end the Democratic National Committee is getting some of the worst press it has gotten in at least a decade. The New York Times reported about meetings full of frustration and phone-throwing, and that was followed up by a Politico report that the DNC was all but broke – so much so they are essentially refinancing their headquarters in order to run daily business.

There is no question donations have not been flowing – a reflection of rank-and-file Democrats angry that the party is not doing absolutely everything they can to fight Trump and not being satisfied at any response, even when doing nothing is actually the better way to fight (see KY, where Gov. Andy Beshear has not aggressively demanded actual proof of life from is-he-or-not Sen. Mitch McConnell despite (a) one less GOP Senate vote is wreaking havoc in their caucus, and (b) by the time Beshear would need to appoint a successor the November election for that seat will be done).

DNC Chair Ken Martin is having a rough go, and he is part of the reason why, having refused to release a “post-mortem” about the 2024 election. For his part, Martin claims fundraising is just fine and the reason for the cash shortage is that it is going into state organizing and ballot protection measures. Still, calls for his resignation continue, from progressive activists frustrated that ex-WI Chair Ben Winkler didn’t get the gig to James “Did I Tell You Lately I Came Up With ‘It’s The Economy, Stupid?!’” Carville croaking that excommunicated activist David Hogg should get the nod.

Legacy Media Inc. can never have enough DEMS IN DISARRAY stories – even when MAGA is holding together about as well as Trump’s reflecting pool liner. But occasionally Democrats do heap on to the pile themselves, especially DC Democrats who are under intense pressure thanks to the success of candidates in the mold of Zohran Mamdani and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, whom they do not like. So, melt melt melt it goes …

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CULTURAL MELTS EVERYWHERE

Amid all that, cultural melting is all over the place as well. MAGA are still angry at THE ODYSSEY and can’t stop yapping about it even as Christopher Nolan’s movie took in a mighty $80 million last weekend in its second weekend in release. At this point, that is simply amusing.

A bit less amusing is what Trump and many of his minions are trying to do with some of the country’s most respected cultural institutions. Having been struck down in defunding museums and taking away leadership, a new push was made over the weekend to literally whitewash American history, with particular focus on The Smithsonian Institution.

Over the weekend, Trump demanded signage be placed outside the National Museum of American History asserting that all that information about slavery and contributions by non-white people is wrong, and AMERICA FK YEAH! Is the true ‘Merican history that should be told. Needless to say, true historians are shoving back hard because truth matters – but the prissiness being shown is indicative of a party really going through some things.

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Then there’s Elon Musk. As his IPO of SpaceX collapses and E is still ticked at The Odyssey, he allowed himself to be interviewed by The Economist – and, because the interview is on video and easy to access and can be heard by everyone just how dippy and loopy Ketamine Boy is, he responded in a post by calling editor Zanny Minton Beddoes (who did the interview) “a traitor to the west.”

That comment got a lot of deserved derision on Trump’s garbage scow social media platform X, including from universally-beloved chef Jose Andres. Why Andres is still there, nobody knows - but the founder of World Central Kitchen logged on X to tell the world’s least-liked apartheid adherent that he “sound(ed) and act(ed) like a tyrant” and should “drink a glass of water” before posting.

Musk responded to Jose Andres – JOSE ANDRES – with “You are an a**shole.”

Which is exactly what you would say if you were an a-hole melting uncontrollably.

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ENDING WITH A MELT WE WILL ALL BE HAPPY ABOUT

Lots of angst out there. Appropriate for the calendar moment. I know that last item is not cool, so let’s get one more ongoing melt that’s happening because it is MAGNIFICENT – and it is, of course, the ongoing melting going on in the Miami prison cell of incel ALLEGED (eyeroll) toxic male choad Andrew Tate!

Now facing a Trump administration that is NOT going to spring him to flee from several jurisdictions for his crimes (and rumblings that reported Tate fan Barron Trump may be asked to testify about it) and facing extradition to Britain before extradition to Romania, somehow tater-head has gotten a phone and continues to post about conditions in jail – and they are GREAT!

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So far, Andrew – who we imagine is probably dressed in something other than Capri pants and a female-tailored purple blouse – has whined about “CANNIBALS!” being in the cell next to him (and brother Tristan), moaned about “DIRTY WATER!” he has to use to try to bathe (you’d think all that Axe body spray would be in his DNA by now), frets about getting harassed by other inmates (that’s because you got a purty mouth!), and is overall clearly shocked that all his f’g around has led to what could be the rest of his life finding out.

HAH! HAH! HAH!!!! Some melts are better than others!

And with THAT, let’s move to The Trivias of the day!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Milk Chocolate Day, World Hepatitis Day, Buffalo Soldiers Day, National Waterpark Day, World Nature Conservation Day, and National Soccer Day (seems a bit late this year, but okay)!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1868, the Fourteenth Amendment was adopted. In 1914, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia over the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, marking the start of World War I. In 1945, a B-25 bomber crashed into the Empire State Building, killing 14 and injuring 26. In 1965, Lyndon Johnson ordered an increase of 50,000 troops into Vietnam. In 2005, the Irish Republican Army announced it would end its use of violence and terrorism.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: Peru (1821), Miami (1896), Zombie movies (WHITE ZOMBIE, 1932), Walt Disney’s ALICE IN WONDERLAND (1951), ON THE WATERFRONT (1954), the American Indian Movement (1968), NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ANIMAL HOUSE (1978), WHAT’S THE 411? (1992).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Beatrix Potter, Lucy Burns, Marcel Duchamp, Joe E. Brown, Charles William Mayo, Rudy Vallee, Frankie Yankovic, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Jacques d’Amboise, Alberto Fujimori, Robert Hughes, Marty Brenneman, Bill Bradley, Mike Bloomfield, Richard Wright, Jim Davis, Sally Struthers, Georgia Engel, Gerald Casale, Vida Blue, Doug Collins, Santiago Calatrava, Carol Higgins Clark, Scott Pelley, Terry Fox, Jonathan Gold, Lori Loughlin, Alexis Arquette, Elizabeth Berkley, Hannah Waddingham, Huma Abedin, Manu Ginobili, Kate Bolduan, DeMeco Ryans, Zach Parise, Soulja Boy, and Harry Kane.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Thomas Cromwell, Cyrano de Bergerac, Antonio Vivaldi, Johann Sebastian Bach, Charles William Mayo, Frank Loesser, Eugene Roche, Reverend Ike, Eileen Brennan, John McNamara, Dusty Hill, Ron Popeil, and Ryne Sandberg.

FEED THE WORMS: Hugo Chavez and Dana White entered Earth on this date.

Liz Cheney was born on this date. Maximilien Robespierre was guillotined on this date. You decide if they get a Happy Birthday or Rest in Power, or if they Feed the Worms.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: The single from the album LIFE’S RICH PAGEANT, released on this date in 1986 …

Remember the White House Correspondents’ Dinner? It was supposed to have happened back in April, and while it is essentially a fund-raiser for a scholarship fund run by the organization that puts it together, it has always been a problematic event (save for the star-making turn that Stephen Colbert turned it into when he hosted it in his COLBERT REPORT persona in 2006).

Sure, Barack Obama had great comic timing when he did the shows, but most of the time the jokes are cringe, the hosts pull their punches (especially after Colbert), and the question of whether reporters allegedly trying to critically cover said White House schmooze with them, dressing like “nerd prom,” as it was once called.

That brings us to Trump, whose entire ascension into (gestures wildly) was spurred by Obama’s skewering of him in 2011 (followed by going to the Situation Room to watch Seal Team Six take out Osama Bin Laden). He had never been at any of the previous events while he was President, and why would he, being the most thin-skinned and profoundly unfunny people on Earth? But for some reason (likely to do with decreasing crowds at his rallies and his handlers needing something to keep PappyBaby occupied) he said he’d go in April.

Unfortunately, a gunman went on a shooting rampage looking for the main stage of the event (and coming quite close), so the event was nixed that night. But for weird reasons, despite the relentless attacks on their jobs from Trump’s cat anus mouth and nuisance-but-expensive-for-citizens court cases brought by Trump defense attorney and Attorney General wannabe Todd Blanche (more on him later, heh heh heh), the White House Correspondents did not want to lose their formal wear deposits, so the entire thing was rescheduled for this past Friday, featuring our President …

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… YEAH … OUCH …

… and somehow, even expecting the worst and lowering all the expectations that can be lowered, Trump still managed to almost turn this year’s WHCD audience to the audience who first witnessed “Springtime for Hitler” in the original THE PRODUCERS movie.

Apparently there were attempts to write jokes for Daddy to tell. But Trump has never read a speech he needed to deliver before delivering it in front of people. That’s Strike One. More than likely, the only people that would write “jokes” for him are the same guys (mostly, you can bet) from Fox News – and they think putting an exclamation point after Greg Gutfeld!’s last name is hilarious. Strike two. Hell, questions about whether Trump can read at all have been legion for decades – so you can see how well this entire enterprise went.

A joke that apparently was supposed to be about how old members of Congress are – a total stitch with one super-senior Senator possibly dead in a hospital room and another ‘younger’ ally having died a few weeks ago – went splat. Another round of fat jokes about still-chubby Chris Christie and not-fat-anymore JB Pritzker went nowhere after Trump noted Pritzker has gotten thin and referring to his own bloat. A third about CNN’s Kaitlin Collins not smiling … oh, Trump was bombing so hard he wasn’t even getting phony laughs from Stephen Miller or Steven Cheung on that one.

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And Trump knew it. Rather than pinning the blame where it belonged – on his inability to get a joke, much less tell one – Dear Leader tore into his “writers” (who hired them, Donnie?), bitched about having deliver the stuff at all, broke down to the petty insults and dementia-language-loop of crap he says on stump speeches he remembers simply out of rote repetition, and ended the entire episode by turning into Carrot Top and busting out a TRUMP 2028 cap, “announcing” his “intention” to run again (because triggering libs ALWAYS sells with the MAGA hordes).

In the end, anyone who endured that misery (no I did not – I relied on clips and commentary, because I RESPECT MYSELF TOO MUCH to endure THAT) could not help but conclude that the WHCD is an event which may be as played out as Trump’s Presidency. When the guy you are trying to mock is too vain and too dumb and too mentally gone to play along, the ethics of the entire event may signal a rethinking of it.

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THE OBLIGATORY REMINDER THAT THE EPSTEIN FILES ARE NOT GOING AWAY

MEANwhile, on Saturday (?!), a Federal judge has decided to kick the don’t-stop-kicking-it cage that may be where Trump and Blanche have hidden the Epstein Files – and that kick helps cause more drama (if nothing else) for a big event later this week.

For those not up on the latest, former MSNBC and current MeidasTouch correspondent (and Substacker) Katie Phang filed a motion in Federal Court to enforce the Jeffrey Epstein Transparency Act and GET THE DAMN FILES PUBLIC already.

Judge Emmet Sullivan – last seen ordering a plane with alleged Guatemalan illegal immigrants to turn around while in flight – has the case, and he has already (as have pretty much ever Federal Judge not housed in a freaky Texas-based court) (of COURSE) excoriated DoJ filings on the case.

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DoJ being the Trump Defense Firm, Trump’s cronies have continued to delay and obfuscate and delay and obfuscate more so as not to turn the files over, period close book. But that is not flying – and, on Saturday, Judge Sullivan went a big and provocative step further. While Sullivan is not yet demanding full disclosure of the files, he did on Saturday give Blanche (the listed defendant) the order to get him – Judge Sullivan – ALL THE UNREDACTED FILES. And to do it by the end of this week.

Now, we can certainly expect that Blanche will work to delay the release of those files with all means necessary. He might even succeed. But even delays can be consequential. For possible proof, keep an eye on the attempt by CBS to take over CNN and HBO and other properties being postponed for at least a year while litigation to stop it is filed and plays out.

Plus, Blanche’s AG nomination is scheduled for a committee vote this week – and while the hunch is, sadly, that everything bad about Blanche (which is quite literally everything about him) will not likely stop his endorsement, the vote still hasn’t taken place, so that variable stays in play as well.

I, for one, will not build my hopes up too much. I am always optimistic until I cannot be, but having just gone through the not-worrying-not-worrying-not-DAMMIT cycle of the LeBron James carnival, I can and intend to at least know that Trumpian douchery has taken what is already a fraught confirmation and made it worse. And … who knows? We might finally see why Trump is working so hard to keep those files hidden away …

… tick tock …

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DEMOCRATS START SETTING TABLES

Turning on to some political news, we first can now formally congratulate former Maine Senate President Troy Jackson, who yesterday at a semi-pickup Maine Democratic Convention became the official replacement for scandal-stricken Graham Plattner as that state’s Senate nominee. Jackson in a resounding 566-5 vote.

Jackson combines legit “working class” credentials (he comes to politics after a career as a logger) with decent progressive credentials (he ran the first Bernie Sanders campaign in 2016) and is, in some polls, already leading Concerned Incumbent Sen. Susan Collins in a race Democrats need to regain control of that chamber. Early polls have Jackson performing better than Plattner, meaning for a change Collins’ concern makes sense.

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At the same time, there has been another turn in whiat is easily the most contentious Democratic primary this cycle. Rep. Haley Stevens has received tons of traditional Democratic endorsements, and yesterday she got the biggest such endorsement available, from outgoing Governor Gretchen Whitmer. In her endorsement speech, Whitmer punched hard how she won across the state “twice,” and emphasized her belief that Stevens is far more electable in a tight swing state than Dr. Abul el-Sayed and his Sanders/AOC/Mamdani-esque platform.

Most polling has el-Sayed ahead, and “electability” has been a longstanding argument made by traditional – or, if you prefer the lefty terminology, “establishment” (BOOOOO!) – Democrats, and that is a question Michiganders will need to wrestle with, particularly in an era where more than a few centrists are now looking for far more progressive ideas than they used to.

Along with that is the question Democrats keep slamming their feet in doors over: will the party unify over the nominee whoever the nominee is? In an election where every seat counts and Democrats who want hearings and setting the table for 2028 may need 52 seats to counteract this year’s MancinSinema in John “I Haven’t Seen a Fox Primetime Show Who Doesn’t Like Me – Lucky Me!” Fetterman. That’s the next question as one of the final primaries hits the home stretch (and Democrats enjoy a generic-ballot 11% polling lead – at least as much as Democrats enjoy anything).

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IT’S ALMOST HEEEEE-EEEEERE!

Meanwhile, as we are now exactly 100 days until the 2026 midterms, we are also 835 days until the 2028 Presidential election (YES THERE WILL BE – hush back there!), and the Democratic National Committee has made some interesting decisions as they released their early primary schedule.

Concerned about New Hampshire and Iowa having a bit too much power (read: they sure seem to choose some pale meh candidates), the DNC has announced its first Presidential selection event will be the South Carolina Primary on January 22. That will be followed by the Nevada caucuses on February 1, then New Hampshire on February 8 before moving to New Mexico on February 15, Michigan on February 22, and Virginia on February 29.

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The schedule, as you can see, brings black and Latino voters into the mix early in the process, and that has gotten some to rumble that the schedule is being set to favor 2024 nominee Kamala Harris – although if progressive heroes Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez or Jon Ossoff, candidates from the Governor pool of Pritzker or Gavin Newsom or Josh Shapiro, buzzworthy possibities Pete Buttigieg and Mark Kelly, and OKAY I’LL LIST HIM AGAIN Bernie Sanders (groan) want to run (Ossoff has consistently kept his hat on his head and away from such rings), at least they know the lay of the land.

We’ll deal with the MAGA side later. Yes, we know all the fears of one more clearly unconstitutional Trump candidacy, but that makes a massive presumption about his physical plant. Part of social media was abuzz at a video that appeared to show Trump collapsing as he tried to enter a limousine, and while that was pretty clearly AI-generated, everything observably physically wrong with the guy makes such a possibility more than possible in its potential.

But not yet.

So chill!

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THE LAST DAYS OF THE DOG DAYS ARE HERE

July wraps up this week! Sure, there are court battles we will keep track of (and a friendly reminder that Team Trump continues to get pantsed on a regular basis everywhere they file), baseball’s trade deadline now upon us, and NFL training camps opening up – but we also have no World Cup, no LeBron watch, more steam in the weather, and road construction everywhere you look.

In short, this arguably is the last week of summer that are summer for everyone. Some schools in the South have already opened because what they lack in classroom rigor they make up for with a calendar they can claim means “kids are in school!” but it’s really next week when the Fall starts showing up if not felt. So I’ll do my part today and get to the trivias now so you can get to having whatever hot fun you want to have in this summertime. You’ve earned it, we need it, and we all know if craziness breaks, we’ll all be on it.

But not at this specific moment.

So, until something breaks let’s move on to The Trivias!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Disability Independence Day, National Aunt and Uncle Day, Holistic Therapy Day, National All or Nothing Day, National Bagelfest Day, National Coffee Milkshake Day, National Dog Photography Day, World Mangrove Day, and World Tofu Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1775, Benjamin Franklin created a private mail delivery system that was the seed that became the U.S. Postal Service. In 1948, Harry Truman signed an Executive Order that ended racial segregation in the U.S. military (HEGSETH). In 1956, Abdel Nasser seized control of the Suez Canal for Egypt.

Also in 1956, the Italian passenger liner Andrea Doria sunk after a collision with another liner, killing 51. In 1972, Elvis and Priscilla Presley filed for legal separation. In 2016, Hillary Clinton became the first woman nominated to be the candidate for President in the United States (AAAAAAARRRGGGGHHH!!!!).

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI, 1908), A deadly smog enveloping Los Angeles (1943), The Maldives (1965), The Americans with Disabilities Act (1990), Chance the Rapper as an album artists (2019).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Horatio Gates, George Bernard Shaw, Carl Jung, Aldous Huxley, Gracie Allen, Vivian Vance, Bob Waterfield, Blake Edwards, Hoyt Wilhelm, Jason Robards, Jan Berenstain, Stanley Kubrick, Bob Lilly, Dobie Gray, Mary Jo Kopechne, Darlene Love, Mick Jagger, Peter Hyams, Kiel Martin, Helen Mirren, Roger Taylor, William Shepherd, Susan George, Vitas Gerulaitis, Dorothy Hamill, Gary Cherone, Sandra Bullock, Jeremy Piven, Jason Statham, Kate Beckinsale, Jacinda Ardern, and Delonte West.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Sam Houston, William Jennings Bryan, Robert Todd Lincoln, Winsor McCay, Diane Arbus, Karac Plant, George Gallup, Mary Wells, George Romney, Al Goodman, J.J.Cale, Bobbi Kristina Brown, Miss Cleo, June Foray, Patti Deutsch, Olivia de Havilland, Rick Aiello, Randy Meisner, and Tom Lehrer.

FEED THE WORMS: Kevin Spacey and Liz Truss entered Earth on this date. Eva Peron and mass murderer Ed Gein bought it on this date.

ON THIS DATE IN THE CULTURE: The Number One Non-Fiction Book in the United States on this date … in 2026, REGIME CHANGE by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan … in 2016, CRISIS OF CHARACTER by Gary J. Byrne with Grant M. Schmidt … in 2006, MARLEY & ME by John Grogan … in 1996, THE DILBERT PRINCIPLE by Scott Adams … in 1986, FATHERHOOD by Bill Cosby (fiction?) … and in 1976, THE FINAL DAYS by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Rest in Power, Sinead O’Connor …

Today’s Substack is off my regular Sunday-Tuesday-Thursday cycle thanks to some summer teaching and union work (I adjunct in three Chicago-area colleges and am the President of an adjunct faculty union at one of them), but in the interim since the last Update I have been blessed with an influx of new followers and subscribers, mostly thanks to the awesome YOU’RE OVERTHINKING IT WITH CARRIE KAUFMANN Substack. Grateful!

For those who are new, I write three times a week (more or less), mostly about politics (I am a longtime volunteer of multiple Chicago-area campaigns and have even dabbled in speech coaching some candidates, as that’s one of the subjects I teach) with sports and culture and daily trivia for good measure, all to help sort out the world and not throw bricks through windows. I provide tons of snark and connections, so I hope you enjoy the ride and it helps you do what you need to during this ... (gestures wildly)!

Today’s Substack will be a periodic writing-exercise kind of thing I like to do when lots of items build up in my notebook and I want to empty it out: updates and observations of various sundry items of interest using three paragraphs to do it. So sit down, stretch out, strap it down, get your favorite beverage, and let’s get to it!

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THE GLORY DAYS ARE LONG GONE, DONNY

Inevitably, we need to start with the head of government, whose handlers are doing everything they can to keep as biologically alive as they can. Part of that involves tending his mercurial mood swings and continued frontotemporal decay (ALLEGEDLY) (EYEROLL), so on Tuesday Trump was pumped with various drugs and was staggerstood in front of a ‘crowd’ in Georgia to try to give him that 2015-16 feeling for a few nanoseconds.

It really did not go well. With gobs of sweat turning his normal orange pallor to the sheen of a pot coming out of a kiln, Dear Leader sputtered all over the place. From finding an insane conspiracy theory about ‘the left’ wanting to destroy Mount Rushmore to insisting that “transgenders for everybody” were “ravaging” our cities, and from telling the world not to worry because we don’t need “Hormuz Street” to savagely attacking super-awesome Senator Jon Ossoff by comparing Ossoff three times to “Pinky Herman,” it was another appearance in Why Is Grandpa Walking Around the Driveway Without Pants On Again?

The most interesting part of Trump’s appearance was a man in the crowd right behind him dressed in the signature blue blazer and overlong tie continuously and ruthlessly mocking Trump’s mouth movements and hand gestures - albeit with much longer fingers than Trump’s wee tiny hands flailing and gripping his dais to make sure he did not keel over. With word that Team Trump intends to trundle the OLD old man out there every chance they get to ‘help’ MAGA with their now-11% generic polling deficit behind Democrats to grow that deficit more. Because THIS AIN’T 2016, folks. Act accordingly.

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IRAN AMPS UP AS TRUMP AND HEGSETH SQUIRM

Reports out of the White House are insisting that even Trump in his decayed state is fully understanding of how fkd the country is thanks to the idiotic decision to attack Iran and near-instantaneous loss the country has suffered. What else do you describe a decision literally everyone said would do exactly what has already happened - Iran emboldened, controlling the Straits of Horumuz, American military stockpiles and oil reserved plunging to dangerously low levels, and oil prices now up to $100 a barrel and fears $150 a barrel could be around the corner.

DEFENSE Secretary Pete Hegseth got absolutely savaged in the Senate as Ossoff, Patty Murray and Gary Peters made Petey melt down multiple times as Hegseth tried to justify another $70 billion ask for funding whatever we’re doing in Iran by spewing Fox News talking points so vapid Fox News isn’t even using them anymore. Trump made a rare trip to Dover, DE to watch as some of the remains of soldiers were returned and dishonored them by insisting “every one” of the dead wanted to see Iran not have a nuclear bomb, which is both disgraceful and the roughly 43rd justification Trump has spat out for the mess.

Worst of all, today the DEFENSE Department web site reduced the number of American dead in Iran from 18 to 14, on the hideous claim that four soldiers who were killed were killed during the “cease-fire,” and since that was a cease-fire they should not count in the statistics. With rumblings that Trump and Marco Rubio may want to escalate by invading smaller islands around the petroleum processing plants on Kharg Island - and the casualties that would undoubtedly be incurred if they did - things may, alas, get far worse before they at least not get as worse.

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PROGRESS AMID THE TUMULT IN UKRAINE

Ukraine continues to use drones to attack Russian infrastructure well inside Russia. A major target the last couple of weeks are giant warehouses from a company called Wildberry, which for some of us in Chicago is really weird because that is the name of a group of restaurants known for their most excellent breakfasts and brunches - but in Russia is actually the name of their equivalent of Amazon. At least four of their warehouses have been burned-to-the-ground destroyed, and combined with the attacks on petroleum processing facilities, creating war-level shortages of gas inside Russia.

At the same time as the attacks continue, there has been a pitched battle involving Ukraine’s military and political leadership. That began on July 15 when, apparently as the result of an internal power struggle, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy fired Defense Minister Mykhailo Federov - a figure credited with the shift to drone technologies that have turned the tide in Ukraine’s battles against Vladimir Putin. The problem was, Ukrainians were angered by the decision and marched through the streets in protest (while still also ducking Russian missile attacks in Ukrainian cities) - and Zelenskyy heeded the protests and removed the man he appointed to replace Federov, Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi.

The third man who has led Ukraine’s military in the last two weeks is now Mykhailo Drapatyl, a younger officer more in line with the high tech battlefield. It says a lot that the back-and-forth is not believed to be enough to stop Ukrainian progress, as Zelenskyy wants to continue that and build out Ukrainian capabilities to withstand Russian infrastructure attacks for the upcoming winter. Unless the pressures on Putin create some change there. That’s what we’re hoping for here on this Substack. SLAVA UKRAINI!

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IS AI TEETERING UNDER ITS OWN HYPE? MAYBE!

Polling on Artificial Intelligence is better than polling on Trump, but only slightly. Most people listen to AI’s own hype about eliminating massive numbers of jobs for no real benefit along with the demands of proposals for massive data centers that suck up all the energy and water in a given area and are, not surprisingly, justifiably PO’d. At the same time, OpenAI and Oracle are reporting that all the massive investments are not coming close to turning profits, adding pressure on them and the stock market (which is a popped AI bubble away from really bad things happening) - and MAGA/GOP politicians who are all-in on AI are finding their paths to reelection are not being helped because of their support (watch FL on this issue is all I’m sayin’).

So within this pot, here comes China - who two years ago roiled the entire AI industry with DeepSeek, a good-enough program that did what ChatGPT did at a fraction of the computer power - roiling the industry again by releasing a new AI platform called Kimi K3 that is reportedly the equal of the various AIs now out on the market, and with China essentially making Kimi K3 open source. Meaning, if you wanted to create a small AI platform for a specific purpose, you could use Kimi K3 to do it, not pay OpenAI or Microsoft or Amazon or Ketamine Boy to use their AI platforms, and do it without data farms.

Imagine the impact of all of THAT on all of the companies listed above if their economic models get undercut by a just-as-good product that, in turn, takes AI out of the Big Brother business and turning it into a tool that might actually be useful (if we also take away the whole made-in-China thing, which we really shouldn’t because, y’know, China). AI tech is developing along the faster-smaller-cheaper cycle all computer hardware and software products are, save for the speed at which AI is developing. Hang on and don’t use it for generative slop (as a goosed-up Google, though, it has its uses, is all this Substack is saying).

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LUXURIATE IN MORE MUSK MISERY YES PLEASE!

Let’s double back on Elon Musk, because anytime we can dunk on the Schmoo, we need to. As mentioned, the AI developments in China will have a direct impact on the acknowledged worst AI model out there, Elon’s GROK. So much so that, combined with continued deserved blame-pinning on Elon’s dumbass DOGE-ing of the government and massive overhype, that SpaceX stock continues to plunge. With that, Musk is no longer a trillionaire, which he was for about a second when the SpaceX IPO came out.

Not that he has noticed - or maybe he has and needs a diversion that ketamine just isn’t providing anymore - because Musk continues to obsess over Christopher Nolan’s megahit adaptation of THE ODYSSEY, which Musk is GRRR ANGRY GRRR! with its use of Black actresses and transgender actors as heroes instead of homoerotic blond chiseled white guys. So much so that Musk has announced that he intends to use GROK to create what he mumbled out as a “historically accurate” version of THE ODYSSEY for later in the year. You might be asking how an ancient Greek myth with giants and one-eyed humans and water nymphs can be ‘real,’ but that’s because you aren’t a near-trillionaire like Elon Musk - so what do YOU know, HUH?!

Taking time away, a very spacey and bloated Musk allowed a woman from The Economist, Zanny Minton Beddoes, to interview him this week - and yikes! Trying to claim ‘regret’ for getting involved in politics, Beddoes let Musk rake himself over the coals with a blood feud between him and OpenAI’s Sam Altman, his support for British frog Nigel Farage, slurring about an “Age of Abundance” like the world still thinks of him as a supergenius, and drawing the worst behavioral and physical parallels with the man he helped - somehow - to get back in power. Just goes to show all the things money can’t buy ...

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THE FINAL DECISION?

THIS JUST IN: after luxuriating in the attention as is his wont and getting the NBA super-annoyed at their inability to set their TV schedules, LeBron James has finally decided where his last contract was going to be - and it was a bit of a shock. After the Los Angeles Lakers opted not to sign him, opted not to play with longtime rivals Steph Curry and Draymond Green in Golden State or former home in Miami or former/always home in Cleveland (or nearby Akron) (also, for newbies, I grew up in Cleveland and still cheer for them teams).

Instead, James announced he would sign a two-year deal with … the Philadelphia 76ers? Indeed so - and on paper, the Sixers will be formidable. Trading for former Finals MVP Jaylen Brown (and gutting the Boston Celtics in the process), James will have Brown, emerging superstars VJ Edgecombe and Tyrese Maxey, and a wide-open Eastern Conference that does not include Oklahoma City or Victor Wembanyama to try to get a chance at one more ring.

But games are not played on paper, and the lynchpin to a Sixers run will be Joel Embiid, a super-talented dude that has consistently battled debilitating injuries and an indifferent attitude - not to mention a fandom who could not be more proud of booing Santa Claus off the field that would not hesitate to do the same to a guy who, if those fans turn on him, may ask that he be moved for that last year of his deal. At $4 million, that would be a very moveable contract, so it may be the last contract ... but time will tell if it truly is his last team. (Especially if he can get one more year of drama out of it!)

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THAT’S ALMOST ALL FOR TODAY, FOLKS!

Oh, sure, there are even more bits and pieces out there - Andrew Tate is whining about being in jail while Trump will apparently let him get extradited to Britain (HAHAHA - YAY!), bloggers that had been paid by Putin to shill for him (Laura Loomer, Tim Pool) are now starting to say Ukraine is winning (I’m guessing someone in Moscow’s low on cash?), election denying MAGAts are nominated for state elections in Arizona (HA!) and Mike Lindell is leading polling for the GOP nomination in MN (I don’t have space for all the HAHAHAs that deserves!) - but that’s a lot for the day - but not quite for this Substack!

For all my new subscribers and followers, I like to wrap with fun trivia and a little music for a button. Kind of a reward for everything else since this is a coping mechanism for me and I’m very happy you follow and hopefully continue to. Subscriptions are free but paid subscriptions are cool - and you see Buy Me A Coffee links you can also use if you wish. (I do drink a lot of coffee!)

For my regular followers - thanks always and continuously! Play nicely with the new friends, recommend other Substacks and sources, and let’s keep community-building as we wait for the inevitable, which should and likely will trigger a reconstruction that I am chomping at the bit to begin as soon as events warrant. But for today ... TO THE TRIVIAS!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Tequila Day, National Cousins Day, International Self-Care Day, National Day of Motoring, National Drive-Thru Day, National Thermal Engineer Day, Samaritans Awareness Day, and Tell an Old Joke Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1847, Brigham Young and members of the Mormon Church arrived in what became Salt Lake City, UT. In 1915, the passenger liner SS Eastland capsized while docked in the Chicago River, killing over 840 on board. In 1923, the Treaty of Lausanne was signed, formally ending World War I. In 1945, Harry Truman hinted at a “weapon of unusual destructive force” to Joseph Stalin in a communique. In 1956, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis performed together for the last time as a team. In 1959, Nikita Khruschev and Richard Nixon met in what became known as “the kitchen debate” at an exhibit of American products in Moscow.

In 1967, The Beatles met the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi for the first time. In 1969, the astronauts of Apollo 11 splashed back down to Earth. In 2019, three scientific reports published in NATURE and NATURE GEOSCIENCE re-enforced the reality of global warming and it being caused by we humans. In 2023, Elon Musk renamed Twitter into “X,” and commenced in turning the pioneering social media site into a garbage scow of hate and misinformation.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: Marvin the Martian (1948), HIGH NOON (1952), FULFILLINGNESS’ FIRST FINALE (1974), LA BAMBA (1987), SAVING PRIVATE RYAN (1998), folklore (2020).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Simon Bolivar, Alexandre Dumas, Frederick Law Olmsted Jr., Robert Graves, Amelia Earhart, Chief Dan George, Zelda Fitzgerald, Bella Abzug, Pat Oliphant, Ruth Buzzi, Dan Hedaya, Chris Saradon, Robert Hays, Michael Richards, Lynda Carter, Gus Van Sant, Claire McCaskill, Kevin Butler, Julie Krone, Karl Malone, Kadeem Hardison, Nick Nurse (HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, DUDE!), Kristin Chenoweth, Jennifer Lopez, Rick Fox, Patty Jenkins, Rashida Tlaib, Yulia Navalnaya, Anna Paquin, Elisabeth Moss, Mara Wilson, and Kyle Kuzma.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Martin Van Buren, Mary Church Terrell, Peter Sellers, Isaac Bashevis Singer, James Jordan, William J. Brennan, Jr., Chad Everett, Jackie Mason, and David Warner.

FEED THE WORMS: Notorious gang leader Bill the Butcher and steroid cheat Barry Bonds entered Earth on this date.

Gallagher was born on this date. You decide if he gets a Happy Birthday or if he Feeds the Worms.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: The lead single from the album BLEED AMERICAN, which was released on this date in 2001 ...

When we last left this Substack, the anticipation of the World Cup final was upon us. We can wrap the actual event by saying the 1-0 extra time win by Spain over defending champion Argentina was only tense in that most people wondered whether they would finally score, what with a 20-2 shot differential and 11-10 player advantage in the extra time thanks to a red card against Argentina’s Enzo Fernandez.

We can also wrap the attempt to create a Super Bowl halftime show by noting the highlight was the Muppets’ Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem rocking out to the White Stripes’ stadium standard “Seven Nation Army,” complete with on-field performers doing the Viking Row in honor of Norway and their fans. (The rest of the show was, IMHO, random and scattershot.)

That leaves the dread most Americans and the world had at having to deal with the presence of President Trump, who pre-gamed the eventual result by saying you “can’t bet against (Lionel) Messi,” thereby hanging Argentina with The Trump Curse. From there came a parade of moments we all knew were coming (rafter-roiling BOOS whenever his face appeared, falling asleep during the game) and one or two that were just ick (pawing at the World Cup trophy being held by Trump’s caretaker for the day, FIFA lead skeeze Gianni Infantino).

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But the big cringe moment came after the game, when Trump waddledragged on to the pitch with an even louder set of BOOS for both him and Infantino. After handing players their medals (without pocketing one as he did last year during the FIFA Club World Title match), the time for the traditional trophy pickup by Spain was readied.

Trump, however, slowed to stare at the players and tried to “join” the “celebration” by attempting his two-fisted-beatoff-to-hide-his-defecations (ALLEGEDLY) (EYEBALL) “dance,” then stood at the edge of the stage and thus at the edge of the team photo. Infantino, realizing Grandpa wandered out of the cafeteria into the parking lot, dashed to pull him off – but not quite before the confetti cannons launched, forcing the world to see Trump dopily standing and smirking at what his dead slug brain likely thinking “They cheer me! They like me! THEY LIKE ME!!!”

Within the hour, Spain’s soccer federation had produced a photo of the team’s celebration with the blotchy moldy orange blemish at the side of the photo cleanly and thoroughly erased from it.

Because truly, Everyone Hates Donald.

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NO, REALLY! EVERYONE DOES HATE DONALD!

Besides the latest sportsball mark of doom Trump inflicted, the news continued to get worse and worse for Team Trump. This conclusion is based on a number of stories accumulating recently, including but not limited to …

- Trump’s approval ratings continue to be ensconced in historic low levels. CNN reports Trump’s 36% approval rating puts Trump at the bottom of the totem poll. Trump’s rating on the economy is even worse at 31%, and with national gas prices bumping back over $4/gallon on the average, the economic anxiety is likely to only get worse.

- The gas prices are rising as Trump amps up attacks on Iran again. Three American troops were killed over the weekend, including a soldier attempting to disarm an Iranian drone. That brings the death toll for Trump’s yeah-it-IS-a-war-in-Iran, DUMBARSE to 17, with continued belief that the casualty toll including injuries is being woefully underreported.

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- Trump continues to flog his it’s-already-dead-stop-flogging-the-corpse SAVE America from Blocking All Democratic Election Wins Act through a Congress still technically controlled by MAGA. Attempts by lickspittle House Speaker Mike Johnson are doomed to fail as declared opposition combines with empty seats (MIIIITCH? MIII-IIIIIITCH!) and catastrophic-and-getting-worse midterm polling to make passage of any legislation a total emoji shrug of a proposition.

- Even weather is conspiring to build disdain against Dear Leader. The wildfires in Canada continue to make air quality dicey from the Great Lakes through the Eastern Seaboard, and rather than contribute firefighters and expertise to stop or contain it, Trump instead went to the Intertoobz to bitch about Canada not raking their forests – really! – before imposing another 50% tariff on our friends up north because of the fires. Because Trump is a total hoser, eh?

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WITH FRIENDS LIKE THIS YADDA YADDA YADDA

It’s not like Trump’s Klown Kar Kabinet is helping Trump with those populartity numbers, either. Acting Attorney General Trump defense attorney Todd Blanche made such a perfunctory visit with survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes that the survivors left it with more resolve to kill the nomination than before, though Trump never-Trumper pretend opponents John Cornyn and Thom Tillis are still expected to vote for Blanche when the time comes. Because they are still, first and foremost, Democrats.

Another Trump goon, Border Czar (and MAGA talks about Democrats as loving Communism? Huh.) and Meat Lump Tom Homan responded to increased reports of attacks and violence by ICE agents that are also being revealed to be abusers and toxic men themselves by warning that more ICE murders will happen if people who don’t like ICE murders keep calling ICE murderers ICE murderers. Why, Homan complained he can’t get a quart of milk without being called the head of a band of lawless thugs – so STOP or pay the price!

A third Trump douche, FBI Head Clown Ka$h Patel, oddly announced that this October he will be taking a little junket to Moscow, where presumably KGB agents will keep an eye on Ka$h’s wandering eyes as Ka$h is doing whatever he is going to be doing there. No itinerary has been announced yet for this. And this trip will be taking up so much time that it was announced the FBI and Department of Justice just aren’t gonna have the time to investigate anything ICE does out there in the streets.

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OPERATION HAIL (HATE) MARY

With all of that, the question of how to cling to power to prevent all kinds of investigations into all kinds of corruption taking place in all kinds of governmental departments continues to churn. With the possibility that attempts to overturn or intimidate voters likely harder and harder to successfully pull off (see (gestures wildly) in this Update), Politico came out with an “exclusive” about MAGA’s midterm strategy that is only an exclusive if you never follow any politics at all or have stunted memory.

The strategy is pretty simple: since everyone hates Donald and almost everyone also hates Republicans, make Democrats somehow even more hated than both Donald and the Republican Party put together! That way, the hope is to drive enough Democratic turnout low enough in certain demographics that it will be close enough for certain states (coughFLORIDAOHIOTEXAScough) to do their vote-shaving and losing things to cling to at least one legislature.

We already have seen some of this rollout, with Trump attempting to revive Communism as a threat (and House Whip Steve Scalise going even further back to call Democrats “BOLSHEVIKS!” apparently gunning for the great-great-great-great-Grandma vote) and with the continued moves in Texas to electorally geld Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico by calling him “Low-T” and a “Soy Boy” to make people forget about super-scandal-ridden MAGA GOP Senate candidate Ken Paxton, last seen in Europe a few weeks ago with a woman who is not his (attempting to get divorced) wife.

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These efforts are being made as the Democrats are working through a power struggle between younger and older candidates, campaign managers, media contractors, and strategists, which help create opportunities for mischief and wedges. MAGA’s use of the “Communist” nonsense is clearly hoping to dovetail with the ongoing insurgency among many self-described “Socialists” in the Zohran Mamdani/Bernie Sanders mold, nowhere more vividly in the Michigan Senate primary where those issues are also mixing with the hardcore battle over Israel, Palestine, and AIPAC funding of candidates (something to keep in the back of your mind as that race plays out).

Most experts see the “Hate Democrats Harder” strategy as being desperate given that (a) most midterms are always referenda on the party in power, (b) the party in power is the MAGA GOP, (c) things suck hard for the country, and (d) see (a) + (b) + (c). Given the charmers on the GOP side vs. the frankly far more likable Democrats (we all realize Jon Ossoff is becoming a heart throb in some circles, right?), and while unpleasant and nothing is certain until votes are cast and counted (WHAT’CHA DOING TO HELP, NO KINGS/INDIVISIBLE?!), keep working!

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MAZEL TOV TO THE INTERN AND HIS FAMILY!

We are pleased to report that Intern JD Vance and wife Usha have welcomed their fourth child into their bustling family! Alec Neel Vance was born on Sunday, baby and mom are doing well, and will join Ewan (age 9), Vivek (6) and Mirabel (4). Alec is the 18^th baby born in the United States and the first since Woodrow Wilson’s grandson was born there in 1915, the first Vice Presidential baby to be born there since 1870 (to Ulysses S. Grant’s Veep Schyler Colfax).

(In case you were wondering, the only President whose wife had a child in office was Grover Cleveland in 1893, and the first baby born in the White House was born in 1803 to Asnet Hughes, who was born in slavery.)

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The official press release announcing the birth from the Vancess surprisingly mentions that the baby was born in the wake of the murder of MAGA activist Charlie Kirk. As most people remember, Kirk’s death sparked tons of gossip involving Intern Vance and Charlie’s widow Erika, particularly an appearance shortly after Charlie’s death in which Vance (who also hosted Kirk’s podcast post-shooting) was embraced by Erika, who wore skin-tight black leather mourning slacks and cradled JD’s head. Some wags referred to Usha’s pregnancy as a “He’s MY Man!” pregnancy. I report, you decide …

One more note: the President posted what is believed to be the first photo of the newborn on his social media feed – a photo many believe was not meant for public consumption. Because Trump is an uncouth cad who continuously displays symptoms consistent with frontotemporal dementia, one symptom of which is the disappearance of anything resembling tact or social media graces.

In any event, sincere congratulations for a healthy birth!

With that, let’s get to the Trivias, shall we?

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Junk Food Day, National Be Someone Day, Legal Drinking Age Day, Invite an Alien to Live with You Day, National Black Women’s Equal Pay Day, Racial Harmony Day, and No Pet Store Puppies Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1861, the First Battle of Bull Run was fought. In 1925, John Scopes was convicted of the “crime” of teaching evolution in a school in Tennessee. In 1944, an attempt on the life of Adolph Hitler failed. (Darn.) In 1954, Vietnam was divided into a North and South Vietnam. (Oops!) In 1972, George Carlin was arrested and charged with indecency over his “seven dirty words” routine at Milwaukee’s Summerfest.

In 1990, Pink Floyd performed THE WALL on a site where the Berlin Wall had stood months before. In 2011, the landing of the Space Shuttle Atlantis ended NASA’s shuttle program. In 2024, Joe Biden ended his re-election campaign after debating Donald Trump with a severe cold and being deemed “unelectable” by a media still refusing to admit any number of illnesses of Donald Trump.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: A showdown in the American West (won by Wild Bill Hickock, 1865), a female prime minister (Ceylon/Sri Lanka’s Sirimavo Bandaranaike, 1960), BLIND FAITH (1969), APPETITE FOR DESTRUCTION (1987), HOUSE OF PAIN (1992), THE DAILY SHOW (1996), HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS (2007).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Frances Cleveland, Johnny Evers, Sara Carter, Ernest Hemmingway, Hart Crane, Marshall McLuhan, Isaac Stern, Kay Starr, Don Knotts, Norman Jewison, Paul Burke, Dr. Jonathan Miller, Moe Drabowsky, Janet Reno, Les Aspin, Kim Fowley, James Clyburn, Edward Herrmann, Paul Wellstone, Cat Stevens/Yusef Islam, Garry Trudeau, John Hart, Al Hrabosky, Robin Williams, Howie Epstein, Jon Lovitz, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Ali Landry, Cori Bush, Damian Marley, Josh Hartnett, David Carr, CC Sabathia, Betty Gilpin, DeAndre Jordan, Juno Temple, Rory Culkin, and Erling Haaland.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Sir Henry “Harry Hotspur” Percy, Robert Burns, Basil Rathbone, Jimmie Foxx, Dave Garroway, Alan Shepard, David Oglivy, Gus Dudgeon, Jerry Goldsmith, Long John Baldry, Lord Alfred Hayes, Mako, Ralph Houk, E.L. Doctorow, Theodore Bikel, Jonathan Gold, Paul Krassner, Taurean Blacque, and Tony Bennett.

FEED THE WORMS: Amoral hypocrite Ken Starr, MAGAt Sen. John Barrasso, Fauxgressive “comic” Lee Camp, NFL tight end and rapist Kellen Winslow II, and nepo baby ‘reporter’ Peter Doocy entered Earth on this date. Actor and abuser Robert Young and Jeffrey Epstein attorney Roy Black bought it on this date.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday to Michael Fitzpatrick – the “Fitz” of Fitz and the Tantrums!

As frankly should have been expected given the lack of evidence and abundance of history, Thursday’s “ShoCKiNg!” presentation by the President about ELECSHUN INTERDEFERENCE was one big ol’ nothingburger of anything involving fact or substance. Trump twaddled up to a mike and, with a voice that sounded like he gargled on his own phlegm, avoided some of the items some worried about.

Trump did NOT claim GA Democratic Senators Jon Ossoff and Rafael Warnock were elected fraudulently. Trump did NOT declare a national emergency to federalize the 2026 midterms. Trump did NOT even say Venezuela had evidence of any hidden or changed votes. Indeed, no claims of one vote being shifted were made – because, as we all know, Trump lost the 2020 Presidential election to Joe Biden clean and decisively (and whoever constructed the speech at least did that.

Now, it would not have been a Trump thang without inanity. Upset that ABC and NBC decided not to broadcast live, Trump threatwarbled about their broadcast licenses. Trump tried to claim CHY-NUH had voter roll information – but as noted before, that is generally-available information anyone can purchase. Tired, tired, tired.

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So tired that Trump used the bulk of the second part of the ‘speech’ to once again flog his SAVE AMERICA From Listening to Trump Whine About Losing Elections By Making It Impossible for Trump To Lose Elections Act, which continues to be deader than Trump hair follicles. Indeed, AK Senator Lisa Murkowski announced she is a firm NO on the bill and any bill Trump lickspittle House Speaker Mike Johnson tries to graft it onto. That bill b DEAD.

There was a bit of evidence in the pile, though. The sole documents that Trump produced, as journalist Sam Stein and others caught, actually showed that RUSSIA tried to influence the 2020 election by manufacturing a scandal involving Ukraine that – stop me if you think that you’ve heard this one before – implicated corruption on BIDEN through … wait for it … HIS SON HUNTER (BAAAM BAAAM BAAAAAHHHHHMMMM!!!!)!

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TRUMP IS BUSTING DOWN ALL OVER

Thursday was all about voter intimidation, which was proven the following day when Homeland Security lead lunkhead Markwayne Mullen said he and his gang will demand money for homeland security will not go to states that refuse to turn over voter rolls to DHS. They want the rolls to compare to a database that claims to have lists of illegal aliens and non-voters – but due to the combination of that database already being legally ruled to be hot garbage and DHS not having that AUTHORI-TAH to do anything Markwayne wants … uh, no.

So as Trump was lifted off to one of his golf courses to be pumped with whatever they’re pumping him with – and a photo of him in the Presidential helicopter sitting on what appears to be an XXXL throne with Trump still looking overinflated and scowling – the need to energize a MAGA base is ever more important.

THIS JUST IN: a new Washington Post/IPSOS poll shows the number of voters who “Strongly Approve” of the job Trump is doing is now at a record-low FIFTEEN PERCENT – down from the previous record low of 17% set by Trump after the last such poll. Keep that number is likely to reflect on turnout estimates and more spew about the 2026 vote, and with the Iran War back on the front pages, inflation ready to spike because of it, more people asking whether Republicans are literally dead or alive, and whatever else happens … Trump is busting badly, folks.

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2026 MIDTERM UPDATES – APPOINTMENT EDITION

Since the flow of the Update has came to the midterms, let’s take a second to talk about the remaining high-profile decisions that need to be made in some Senate races. We’ll start in South Carolina, where the race to find the new GOP candidate to replace the deceased Lindsay Graham is on. Representative Ralph Norman, two years older than Graham at 73, is the first to formally announce, but Trump is sticking his wee tiny thumb on the race by endorsing the newly appointed Darline Graham, Lindsay’s sister, for the full term – breaking a promise that her appointment would be interim only. What a surprise, eh?

On the Democratic side, in Maine the freshly-called Democratic Caucus to choose a replacement for the scandal-ridden nominee Graham Platner will be this week – but it appears that race may already be completed. Former Maine Senate President Troy Jackson, a progressive with deep union connections who like Platner can boast of working class DNA (he has been a logger as well as a politician), seems to have strong momentum and delegate support.

Jackson will not come without controversy, however. Jackson has an admitted anger issue, and there was a story of him throwing a water bottle at a woman during a caucus meeting. The story has been amended to say he spiked a water bottle as part of the argument, but one hopes Maine Democrats have learned to investigate their own. Polling, by the way, indicates any one of four different candidates will all be ahead of the concerned Susan Collins once a new candidate is seated.

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2026 MIDTERM UPDATES – SOUL OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY EDITION

That will leave full primaries in Michigan and Wisconsin – and in those races, the now-open feud between centrist in-power Democrats and insurgent progressives, some of whom also identify with the Democratic Socialists of America, has in many ways taken center stage. In each state, a prominent DSA-aligned candidate is matching up against endorsed hand-picked candidates – Abdul El-Sayed vs. Haley Stevens for MI Senate, Francesca Hong vs. four candidates including Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes and the newly-reentered David Crowley in WI.

The battle is all about whether a Zohran Mamdani-esque candidate can win in the always-pitched-battle Midwest heartland, and what exactly is meant when a candidate says she or he is a “winnable” candidate in closely-divided states. The influence of AIPAC money and several layers of race and gender politics are also in the mix in both states, and polling has been all over the place in both states and both races.

Labor Day is the traditional start for the November election, and as you can see, there is still much to be decided just to figure out who is on the ballot, much less what happens in the race. Keep your voting qualifications updated (in case there will be any attempt by Trump to mess with things), get your marching shoes resoled (in case Indivisible or No Kings thinks it may be time for another day of mass action – HELLO? ANYBODY THERE?!?!), and onward with today’s updates …

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IRAN AND RUSSIA AND UKRAINE UPDATES

As if there were any actual cease-fire anyway, there is now no question the war in Iran is back and back with a fury. Yesterday, two more American soldiers were killed, and reportedly numerous helicopters on a base in Jordan, as the U.S. and Iran exchanged missile fire and a social media post by Trump boasthowled about “open(ing) the gates of Hell” on Iran in retaliation.

Reports that damage being done to the military is being underreported continue to bubble as America runs low on interceptors and Patriot missiles thanks to how much ordinance has already been used – and that an Army and Navy Trump continued to brag was “completely DESTROYED!” and are “at the bottom of the sea” may be making MAGAts like Fox Bid-ness’ Maria Bartiromo confused.

That dwindled supply of interceptors is also making it for more difficult on Ukraine, as lowering supply of those missiles has allowed Vladimir Putin and Russia to continue their assault on cities in Ukraine. Another massive attack in Kyiv and across the country left at least five more civilians dead as Russia tries to get Ukraine to surrender by attacking innocents.

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The problem for Russia is that Ukraine continues to use their drone technology to decimate Russian infrastructure. A major Ukrainian drone attack destroyed two massive warehouses from Wildberries, which is a kind of Amazon for Russian consumers who continue to now wait in massive gas lines due to Ukrainian attacks on oil and gas refineries. Two naval drones hit and damaged oil tankers attempting to deliver black market gas for Putin’s coffers.

And a new drone device for Ukraine was unveiled on the battlefield – basically an unmanned machine gun that landed on a beach and started firing at Russian soldiers. Russian casualties are now so horrific that the CIA estimates a typical Russian recruit will be on the battlefield less than half an hour before becoming killed or wounded.

Tumultuous, and as has been noted, the countries with the two alleged mightiest militaries on Earth are now being helmed by mad and sick old men who can do nothing but ramp up the violence because it is both all they know how to and because they cannot admit they have lost the needless wars they chose. Madness.

Speaking of the madness of war …

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CHRISTOPHER NOLAN 1 – MAGA WHAAAAAAAA!!!!

All the hype surrounding Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of THE ODYSSEY is being met and exceeded, with a worldwide opening of nearly $250 million being estimated and audiences matching the rapturous reviews it has been receiving – and nobody is more red-assed and pouty-frustrated about that than MAGA Nation!

You see, with Nolan daring to cast non-white (John Leguizamo?! Lupita Nyong’o?! Zendaya?!) and transgendered (Eliot Page?!) actors instead of blond white actors like everyone knows Ancient Greeks made Team MAGA all MAD ANGRY GRRRR! About the DEI Woke virus ready to ruin a movie about a poem you can bet they all slept through when they had to read it in high school English class (assuming they even went). So to watch as Fox News and even Ben “My Wife Cries Whenever I Mention Moistness – Why?!” Shapiro absolutely go gaga over it is hard for the lil’ guys.

And yes, they are mostly guys – none littler than the loudest Team Odyssey Is Gonna Suck, one-time trillionaire Elon Musk. Apartheid Ketamine Boy has been ranting about the movie and Nyong’o and Page for months, which (a) makes one assume Elon hit on her and she told him to stuff it, and (b) got Elon so in a bother that he got into an angry online battle with Tom Holland – without realizing that it was the wrong Tom Holland!

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SO, yes, Tom Holland is in the movie – he plays Telemachus – and, as fate would have it, there is ALSO a Tom Holland who is a London-based historian of antiquity with a well-regarded podcast (called THE REST IS HISTORY!) and over 370,000 followers on the social media site formerly known as X. When Historian Holland praised the movie, the SpaceX Huckster started a beef with him clearly not realizing he was talking to the historian and not the actor.

The two Hollands have met and have chatted about the movie, and they even did a charming photo where the two of them pointed at each other to parodize the now-classic multiple-Spiderman theme, as actor Tom Holland is also Spider-Man in the Marvel movie multiverse. And Musk is left to stew and perhaps wonder if the throuple he had with Stephen and Katie Miller led to that new kid the two of them have.

I know you’re thinking, that’s a good place to end the update because that’s as much schadenfreude you can handle for a day. But trust me, YOU ARE WRONG. Freshen up your beverage, because we are wrapping with a DOOZY that I am sure YOU ARE GONNA LOVE …

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YOU’RE GONNA DARE TO GET ARRESTED IN THAT OUTFIT?!

Most of us have heard the name Andrew Tate and know he is a “manosphere” influencer and lead face of the epidemic of toxic masculinity, but we should take a little bit of inventory. TRIGGER WARNING …

Tate, now 38, first became famous as a kickboxer about 15 years ago, when he and his brother Tristan, now 39, decided it was time to make some money. So they went to Romania and started livestreaming pornography, much of it featuring underage girls, and hyped as a contestant on the British version of BIG BROTHER in 2008 until the porn was discovered and he got tossed.

From there, Tate built a following that expanded to include grotesque “advice” to alleged men on how to treat women – advice that included beating them, never using birth control, avoiding getting vaccinated for COVID, and starting online feuds with, among others, Greta Thunberg.

Of course he began getting into crypto and is so fond of his own body he would do his podcasts wearing nothing but Speedos while huffing a hookah and throwing down espressos. Naturally, MAGA and their ilk can’t get enough of him. Human toad Nigel Farage is a huge fan. So is failson Donald Trump, Jr. – and Tate’s biggest fan is reportedly Barron Trump.

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Yes, the Tates have been arrested in Romania on numerous charges of rape, sexual exploitation, corruption of minors, and all sorts of other crimes – but that case is stalled and, after being taken into custody, so they of course have the Trump arrogance of thinking they could get away with anything. So much so that this weekend, Andrew boasted that he and his bro were heading to Miami, and if anyone wanted to do something about it, come get them.

Which is exactly what Federal Marshals did last night.

Acting on a warrant from Great Britain, the pair were arrested with the intent of being extradited to Britain on what is now 59 charges of crimes similar to the ones still to be adjudicated in Romania. Even better, Andrew was arrested in one of the most mockable outfits you could find: tight purple shirt halfway buttoned with medallions all over his chest, super-tight Capri trousers, no socks, and clamdigger shoes that social media continue to have a FIELD DAY over.

Now, personally, I am waiting to really celebrate until I know the two worms are safely on British soil to make sure Cokenose and Damien don’t get daddy to try to pull a string or two. Given that Trump insists on being at the World Cup final to see if FIFA will let him steal another trophy as he did two years ago, he may be busy – but as of this moment, luxuriate in knowing two of the absolute worst people on the planet are in a lockup right now, which is the absolute LEAST they deserve and have coming to them.

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SCHADENFREUD-A-LICIOUS!

Told ya!

With THAT, settle in for the World Cup final, which features the two top-ranked teams in the world. Spain is a clear favorite over Argentina, but back-to-back World Cups could make Messi the GOAT of all time, replacing the still-legendary Pele.

FIFA will also work to out-Jay-Z Jay-Z, who is the producer of the last several Super Bowl Halftime epics, with an extravaganza produced by Coldplay’s Chris Martin (uh-oh) that will feature Madonna, Shakira, BTS, and … Justin Bieber?

Anyway, the game’s gonna be fun and this Update is a big’un, so on to the trivias and GOOOOOOOOOOOOO-al!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is National Ice Cream Day, National Daiquiri Day, International Retainer Day, Flight Attendance Safety Professionals’ Day, Lake Superior Day, National Words with Friends Day, National Urban Beekeeping Day, Flitch Day, and Lake Superior Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 64 A.D., a fire began that destroyed much of Rome. In 1848, the first convention to discuss women’s rights began in Seneca Falls, NY. In 1879, Doc Holliday murdered for the first time. In 1903, Maurice Garin won the first Tour de France. In 1952, air traffic controllers in Washington, DC report UFO sightings over the White House and Capitol buildings – sitings that were called “harmless weather phenomenon” by the government.

In 1954, Elvis Presley’s first single (“That’s All Right”) was released. In 1975, Apollo and Soyuz rockets docked in space for the first time. In 1980, the Moscow Summer Olympics – boycotted by over 60 countries including the United States – opened.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: Wimbledon Men’s Tennis (1877), Billboard music charts (1913), Winston Churchill’s “V for Victory” campaign (1941), Tom and Jerry (1941), “Help!” (1965), MAD MEN (2007).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Edgar Degas, Max Fleischer, Phil Cavarretta. George McGovern, Rachael Robinson, Arthur Rankin Jr., Pat Hingle, Richard Jordan, Vikki Carr, Commander Cody, George Dzunda, Ilie Nastase, Brian May, Abel Ferrara, Jayson Stark, Allen Collins, Atom Egoyan, Campbell Scott, Lisa Lampanelli, Anthony Edwards, Stuart Scott, Vitali Klitschko, Benedict Cumberbatch, and Yan Gomes.

REST IN PEACE/POWER: Aung San, Mary Jo Kopechne, Joe Flynn, Lefty Frizzell, Jack Warden, James Garner, Garry Marshall, Cesar Pelli, and Sheila Jackson Lee.

Samuel Colt, Lizzie Borden and Howard Schultz were born on this date. You decide if they get Happy Birthdays or if they Feed the Worms.

ON THIS DAY IN THE CULTURE: The Number One Novel in America on this date … in 2026, THEO OF GOLDEN by Allen Levi … in 2016, THE GAMES by James Patterson and Mark Sullivan … in 2006, TWELVE SHARP by Janet Evanovich … in 1996, CAUSE OF DEATH by Patricia Cornwell … in 1986, WANDERLUST by Danielle Steel … and in 1976, TRINITY by Leon Uris.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday to composer Ramin Djawadi. This is from a jam session put together by Fender Guitars that features Djwadi and a gang of Fender users – Tom Morello, Scott Ian, Nuno Bettencourt, Brad Paisley, and Dan Weiss - who created the show whose theme they are all playing that Djawadi wrote and most of you will certainly know …

Even when network TV reigned back in the day (or my day), weeks and days like this were not chock full of big time programming. The All-Star Game is over and the MLB regular season would be jacking up, packing up the car to hang for a few days with some cousins (my family is blessed with numerous and numerous cool and fun cousins!), pickup games or re-watching the summer movies in the theatres and drive-ins - why stay home for reruns or old movies?

Now with multiple movie options that can take you away from the big lettered networks (if I may, I highly recommend the Earth, Wind & Fire documentary on HBO) and street fairs (although today here in Chicago the Canadian wildfires have settled and it is hazy and chemical-smelling - mask weather), pulling any eyeballs would be difficult.

It is in this atmosphere that the current occupant of the White House is demanding all said networks, along with the basic major cable news outlets, broadcast what will be a staggeringly ridiculous stack of long-ago-debunked claims of ELECTION INTERDEFERENCE, delivered with all the gravitas and linguistic skill of an off-his-meds unbathed maniac on a public transit bus.

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THIS JUST IN: As of 1 pm EDT, all three major networks - including on-the-block CBS - will NOT be airing this speech live. Now, Fox will, of course - apparently having finally packed their desk that was watching all the empty space that was the Trump 250 Street Fair and all, and cable news certainly will because it's live content that can be filled by talking head analysis (with the critics given free rein on MSNOW).

Now, FCC chair and Trump French bulldog Brendan Carr (no offense to Frenchies!) has reportedly threatened that not letting Dear Leader urpflap whatever will be nominally on his TelePrompTer will result in license harassments, so we shall see if the resolve of Disney and Universal holds.

As for the, uh, “content” that is reported to be spewed … well, that has been well-trod and long-ago exposed as bunkum.

We know of the possibility that Trump will squeesnit that all the Georgia 2020 wins, including of Jon Ossoff and Rafael Warnock, were NONFAIR and WINNOTS, that blah blah Hugo Chavez blah blah, and that “newly discovered” reports will claim CHY-NUH got a hold of voter rolls to make them mean to Daddy (SPOILER ALERT: what China saw were exit polls and voter information that is posted on Secretary of States web sites for all to analyze) - all to potentially declare NAZIONAL EMERGENCEES to “take over” the 2026 midterms and harass voters with ICE smegma.

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Social media Democrats are stressing out. But, comma, it should be noted that according to Politico, another group of people are stressing out more about tonight’s dumb show: 2026 Republicans who have to run for office.

It makes sense.

A nutzoid President who avoids all the various crises generated by said nutzoid President to obsess over the cleanest election in decades that ended with Joe Biden kicking nutzoid’s heinie just to get an ever-shrinking base to vote - and thinking that nutzoid President’s giggle of clowns (that’s what they’re called!) will be able to execute voter suppression plans successfully - frankly should pha-REEK them out.

You aren’t gonna watch it live, I’m not gonna watch it live, even the hardest-core MAGAts aren’t gonna watch it live. It will sway nobody and is far more likely to cast even more attention to the 25th Amendment and why it is long overdue to invoke it - if said Republicans, who are still in such fear of Daddy Bully that his personal attorney Todd Blanche is still likely to become Attorney General (and Blanche slipped up and called himself Trump’s personal attorney at his confirmation hearing yesterday), were they to ever get any semblance of spines.

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WHEN MEMES BECOME DARK HUMOR REALITY

Remember the 2024 campaign? At one point in the home stretch, a meme was generated to humorously express the choice voters had between Kamala Harris (last seen getting a standing ovation at an WNBA game). On the left, to represent a Kamala Harris win, a picture ran with the accompanying caption “EVERYONE GETS A PUPPY!” On the right, to represent a Trump win, a very different picture ran with the accompanying caption “DIARRHEA FOREVER.”

That this meme has become a fulfilled prophecy is amazing, and when we get past this unpleasantness - and we will - we may be able to give a head-nodding laugh at it. But right now, thanks to a spread of a parasite called cyclospora that attaches on leafy vegetables exposed to (TRIGGER WARNING) feces-infected water that can, up to two weeks after consumption, to what is charmingly called “explosive diarrhea” is just par for the course of this era.

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Naturally, there are Trump connections to the spreading mess. First, the axing of the group that tracks just this kind of outbreak at the hands of the dipshite DOGE dopes and Apartheid Ketamine Boy opened the door to it.

Further, the governmental agency that should be tracking and stopping it is headed by a man who was photographed swimming in a creek CLEARLY LABELED as being one that gets sewage runoff in it.

No, right now the Centers for Disease Control is reportedly not doing anything to slow the cyclospora spread - but fear not! Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is building energy with raw milk and jeans-wearing working to try to get five buh-buh-buh-BILLION dollars to look for long-ago-proven-do-not-exist connections between vaccines and autism! YIPPEE!

And speaking of needles and pins and vaccines ...

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WHEN TINY ENDOWMENTS BECOME PERVERSE DEFENSE POLICY

... this brings us to the latest toxicity of Pete Hegseth, the deeply damaged and thoroughly incompetent Secretary of DEFENSE. In between his drive to purge the military of qualified women and soldiers of color, Petey announced months ago that new recruits would no longer be required to get vaccines. Because vaccines are DEI and woke to this guy. (Seriously.)

What happened was as predictable as the sun rising and Heggy flailing his legs trying to finish a pull-up - an outbreak of flu among soldiers in barracks, particularly in Texas, where said diseases would naturally flourish.

But yesterday, in an effort to apparently prove he is not anti-needle, Hegseth came out with the most perverse manifestation of his WARRIOR ETHOS (MOUNTAINS OF AMPLIFIERS BLOW OFF THE LEAD SINGER WITH A STRUM OF A C CHORD!): a new directive that the manly men of the US Military will stay super-duper-ultra-mucho-macho-MANLY by getting testosterone tests and, if deemed to not have enough super serum, to be injected with more T-cells!

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If you’re thinking that sure seems like gender-affirming care to you, you certainly can and should draw that conclusion. If you are further thinking that Petey may be making a very loud announcement of his own lack of said manly manliness because PETEY HAS A TINY PEE-PEE (lone single harp string plink!), well, if the gauze works as a loin cloth, wear it.*

And if you’re thinking you damn well better get your ass out there to vote and get everyone you know everywhere they live to vote and vote blue - HELL YES WE ALL BETTER!

(And, if I may go off on a tangent for a second, where the Hell are No Kings? Seems like we should be getting our hamstrings warmed up for some marching, no?!)

* Oh, and THIS JUST IN: after an Air Force jet made an extremely low flyover over a public beach in Pensacola, FL - low enough for jet exhaust and G forces to cause sand and towels and umbrellas to fly around and terrify kids and other beachgoers - Heggy acknowledged it on social media by posting “The flyovers will continue until morale improves.” Because his maturity matches his manhood lack of size.

Speaking of voting ...

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YES WE CAN HAVE ELECTORAL NICE THINGS - SEE MINNESOTA!

Many people are a bit peeved at Amy Klobuchar. The senior Minnesota Senator eulogized Lindsay Graham in a way that ticked off Democrats who demand the same kind of performative anger 24/7/365 as MAGAts do. Klobuchar is leaving the Senate and running for Governor to replace the retiring and awesome Tim Walz, and there may be people who will roll their eyes in the land of sky blue waters to vote for her.

To them, Donald Trump has given them - and us - a glorious gift. This week, Trump decided to give his “FULL AND COMPLETE ENDORSEMENT” to one of our favorite we-are-not-laughing-with-you-we-are-laughing-AT-you lunkhead Trump followers there are. Trump has endorsed the one ... the only ... MY PILLLOW CEO MIKE LINDELL!!!!!!!!!!!!

YES! We will have Mike Lindell to kick around at least through the primary - and the one place where Trump still has rancid electoral rizz is in Republican primaries. So the chances of Lindell facing Klobuchar off is major, and even if there will need to be efforts to get Klobuchar to read the room and stop being SO centrist all the time, Klobuchar ain’t no freaking Mike Lindell!

GO MIKE GO is what I say, trusting Minnesotans still genuinely angry at the Renee Good and Alex Pretti assassinations would come close to allowing any Trump-attached jerk elected office.

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QUICK UPDATES!

A few items of note - so quick they don’t even take three paragraphs!

- Former Homeland Security Tsarina Kristi Noem has announced she and her husband are getting a divorce. The filing comes after a video of soon-to-be ex-husband Byron was revealed to be a role-playing cross-dresser who stuffed balloons in blouses and arranged them so he appeared to have protruding nipples. Noem is believed to still be carrying on an affair with former Trump scumbag and known woman abuser Corey Lewandowski.

- The Trump scam-fest that will be telecast tonight is coming on the heels of a slew of legal losses Trump has recently suffered. Trump was finally forced to - and has paid - the nearly $6 million in fines to E. Jean Carroll after a jury found he slandered her and raped her.

- Another judge sanctioned his attorneys after the attempt to create a $1.8 billion trust fund through an IRS “settlement” was thrashed for its transparent illegality. And even his buddy’s attempt to buy Paramount/Warner Bros. (and with it CNN and HBO) has been hit with a massive antitrust lawsuit from 12 states - and may be joined by other countries.

- It appears Christopher Nolan has done it again. On the heels of the Oscar win for OPPENHEIMER, Nolan’s adaptation of THE ODYSSEY is about to open with absolutely rapturous reviews, raving about his use of the Greek epic to comment on war and loneliness with a laundry list of performances many are already calling Oscar-worthy (from Matt Damon to Charlize Theron to John Leguizamo). The word is to see it in IMAX since it is the first movie to be filmed 100% in that format!

And speaking of epics ...

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SOCCER AND ROCK AND PETTY GRIEVANCES OH MY!!

The 2026 World Cup Final is set, and for the first time in its illustrious history, the two top-ranked teams in the world - Spain (1st) and Argentina (2nd) - will meet for it in New Jersey on Sunday. Spain got there by icing the prohibitive favorites France 2-0, while Argentina and the now-in-the-conversation-for-GOAT Lionel Messi charged from behind again with two late goals to beat a conservative-edging-into-cowardice England 2-1 on Thursday.

That Argentina-England game had real venom behind it. England has never forgiven what it is still convinced was a handball by the weird-yet-legendary Maradona in 1986 that Maradona called “the Hand of God” goal, and Argentina has never forgiven England for the Falkand Islands invasion in 1982 - and from tons of shoving to Messi reacting to something England superstar Jude Bellingham said to him early in the game to the unfurling of a banner attacking the Falklands invasion, the match was nuts before all the actual game drama played out.

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That drama spilled further into London’s Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, where American-born Armenian-diaspora rock band System of a Down was playing two nights of shows. SOAD have a bit of an edge playing in England going back to 2001, when Oasis guitarist Noel Gallagher called SOAD “the shittiest band of all time.”

That edge - and Noel’s diss - was hammered to a fine sheen and upped by SOAD guitarist Daron Malakian, who on Monday introduced the song “Needles” by saying the song was named after a tape worm, and “Just for today I’m going to name the tapeworm “Oasis”” whereupon Malakian got the crowd to chant “PULL OASIS OUT OF YOUR ASS!”

Hard to top that, but on Wednesday Malakian did.

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SOAD’s Wednesday show was going on as the Argentina-England match played out, and when Argentia tied England 1-1, Malakian told the crowd “If England loses, I blame Oasis!” When Argentina won and the crowd booed, Malakian said “Don’t blame me - blame Oasis!”

OH - and have I mentioned that in the 2026 World Cup, England celebrated each win by going to the English crowds and singing one of the shittiest songs ever recorded - Oasis’ “Wonderwall?”

OH OH OH - and have I also mentioned that English star Harry Kane got the Trump Losing Stank on him by admitting that he and Trump played golf together in 2025?

Beefs are awesome!

Sports are awesome!

System of a Down is awesome!

Oasis …

With THAT - ON TO THE TRIVIAS!!!

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is Artificial Intelligence Appreciation Day (m’kay), Fresh Spinach Day (just buy it at farmers market or accept from a friend’s garden - see “diarrhea” above), Guinea Pig Appreciation Day, National Cherry Day, National Corn Fritters Day, National Wedding Invitation Day, and World Snake Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1790, Congress declared the capital of the American government would be built on property along the Potomac River between Maryland and Virginia In 1941, Joe DiMaggio got a hit in his 56th game in a row. In 1945, the Trinity nuclear test was successfully carried out at Alamogordo, NM (see OPPENHEIMER). In 1969, Apollo 11 lifted off.

In 1973, the Watergate hearings were rocked when former assistant Alexander Butterfield testified to the existence of a secret system that recorded every conversation in the Nixon Oval Office. In 1979, Saddam Hussein became President of Iraq. In 2002, George W. Bush proposes the creation of a Department of Homeland Security in the wake of the September 11 attacks. In 2017, Jodie Whitaker was announced as the first female Doctor Who.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: RCA’s “His Master’s Voice” logo (1900), Parking meters (1935), THE CATCHER IN THE RYE (1951), Cream (1966), Joni Mitchell live (1967), BILLY IDOL (1982), DIAMOND LIFE (1984), YOSHIMI BATTLES THE PINK ROBOTS (2002), Millenium Park (2004).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Ida B. Wells, Roald Amundsen, “Shoeless” Joe Jackson, Percy Kilbride, Barbara Stanwyck, Orville Redenbacher, Ginger Rogers, Barnard Hughes, Jules Witcover, Max McGee, George Perles, Lee Elia, Desmond Dekker, Jimmy Johnson, Barbara Lee, Ron Yary, Alexis Herman, Pinchas Zukerman, Ruben Blades, Stewart Copeland, Tony Kushner, Michael Flatley, Phoebe Cates, Miguel Indurain, Claude Lemieux, Will Ferrell, Barry Sanders, Larry Sanger, Rain Pryor, Corey Feldman, Bobby Lashley, and Gareth Bale.

REST IN PEACE/REST IN POWER: Anne of Cleves, Thomas Kyd, Mary Todd Lincoln, Harry Chapin, Frank Rizzo, Buck Buchanan, Juan Manuel Fangio, John Panozo, John F. Kennedy Jr., Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, Terry Gordy, Celia Cruz, Bob Orton Sr., James Gammon, Kitty Wells, Alan Vega, Nate Thurmond, George A. Romero, Ernie Broglio, Pat Bowlen, Biz Markie, and Jane Birkin.

Australian tennis superstar and virulent racist Margaret Smith Court was born on this date. You decide if she gets a Happy Birthday or if she Feeds the Worms.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Oh, what the Hell - here’s some appropriate System of a Down for ya!

In the wake of the verified death of Lindsay Graham, there seemed to be a recognition that something had to be done in the case of the longstanding Mitch McConnell hospitalization. We ALL know the exhausting is-he-or-not spinning since he was verifiably taken from his home on a stretcher, and after the shock of Graham, someone in the McConnell office (and possibly Senate Republican leadership?) decided it was time to hush the naysayers!

Now, that could have been done in a relatively straightforward way. Howsabout making a video of Mitch urping out a statement? Or a phone call to a rando Hannity or Levin or even Cuomo? Why not even send an actual live person to the hospital ward and have said live person chat with an expected not-dead McConnell? Lots of clear options to quell the controversy.

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What was presented instead was a photo of a surprisingly well-rested-looking McConnell, sitting up in an arm chair wearing jeans and a newspaper under his hand, with wife Elaine Chao all perky and concerned next to him. With the photo came a written statement that claimed McConnell fell and “temporarily” lost consciousness, then contracted a “mild” case of pneumonia (as all pneumonia cases are for 84-year-olds with a litany of health issues – see Trump, Donald for reference), and while he was definitely on the uptick, “doctors” “advised” he would not be back on Capital Hill anytime soon with a vote his caucus desperately needs.

Do you believe any of that?

Lots of Internet-types do not, as they assess the photo and insist the proportions of the room, weird-looking newspaper, and hard-to-believe details (an ICU patient putting jeans on?!) makes all of it not believable. Heck, one of the biggest MAGAts in the Senate, Putin-adoring WI Sen. Ron Johnson, went on MAGA media to give the photo the stink-eye.

So, while Legacy Media Inc. gave the report the initial okey-dokey while finding Democrats to blissfully eulogize Lindsay Graham (thanks for NOTHING, Cory Booker and Amy Klobuchar!), for the moment the squawk of “I’m getting better!” is crowding out the “You’re not fooling anybody” as the rest of the village brings out their dead. (Then again, Father Time always wins, so … tick tock anyway …)

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VACANCY FILLED IMMEDIATELY (FOR NOW)

Meanwhile, Lindsay Graham’s seat will be filled by the end of the day Tuesday, at least for the end of his term. Graham’s sister, Darlene Graham Nordone, was ‘recommended’ by Trump to fill the term, and South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster agreed – and prepared to swear Nordone in on Tuesday afternoon.

Rapid fire because, thanks to the above story, the Senate really needs her vote for a number of issue, in the short term confirmation of Trump defense attorney Todd Blanche as Attorney General Trump defense attorney with Department of Justice at his beck and call.

Naturally, while getting Nordone in Graham’s seat, Trump did his typical icky bloviating about Graham’s death, at one point giving a virtual shrug and saying Graham “blew up” and died (a preliminary analysis showed cardiac arrest that led to a rupture in Graham’s aorta, likely exacerbated by his long trip to and from Ukraine, as the cause of death) while insisting Graham blathered on about the “need” to pass the SAVE America From Making Congress Call Hearings on All of Trump’s Misdeeds in 2927 Act (more on a story connected to THAT soon).

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Trump also revealed Graham called Trump minutes after Graham melted down in the wake of the 2020 coup attempt in the wake of Trump’s loss to Joe Biden (again, more on that story soon) to literally say “Did I say that?!” which is a nice pissing on Graham’s grave done by the guy Graham protected with most of the rest of his life. In case you get MAGAs whining about telling you what Graham’s real record is or anything …

Meanwhile, scrambling for the full Graham term has begun. This Substack talked about the possibility of Rep. Joe “YOU LIE!” Wilson for the position, but he has announced he will not run for the seat. It is looking likely that Nancy Mace will, though, as she is reportedly sucking up to Trump to get his blessed endorsement after not getting it for the SC Gubernatorial primary and subsequent fifth-place finish.

No announcement on a new primary has yet to be made, but this corner of the virtual political analytic world will keep tabs on it.

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FCK ICE WITH EVERYTHING YOU HAVE

With all of this going on, we turn with fury towards the rat bastard masked murderous fake male coward cucks that make up ICE. ICE has been continuing to do their evil, and for all the mockery Trump and his clowns deserve, they also deserve venom and justice the second we have the ability to deliver it.

In the last week, two deaths at the hands of these punks – with the subsequent and now routine cycle of denial and coverup and lies – need to be more broadly known and reacted against.

In Houston, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo. A 52-year-old father of three boys, all college graduates, was going to work at his construction business as he did for the 35 years he has been in America. He submitted paperwork to finally become a citizen, but ICE agents in unmarked cars surrounded his van and shot him. He died on the site – and at least one of his sons found out about it on Facebook.

ICE initially claimed Araujo rammed one of their vehicles and tried to run an agent down – but the three men in the car with Araujo disputed that (and were reportedly put into custody with threats of deportation if they kept to their truths), and witnesses who saw the car behind police tape saw no damage to Araujo’s van. Later, ICE admitted they were looking for a different person – but continue to deny everything else.

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While anger built around Araujo’s death, another one occurred in Biddleford, Maine. There, Joan Sebastian Guerrero, a 26-year-old Colombian national, was in a car with his partner and their and 3-year-old daughter, reportedly wearing Bluey pajamas. Agents surrounded the car, shot into the windshield, dragged Guerrero out while witnesses heard him plea for help, and cuffed him on the pavement. Guerrero died later.

As with Araujo and Renee Good and Alex Pretti and at least 16 other cases (per New York Times reporting) of non-fatal encounters where ICE agents shot at or in vehicles, ICE again started by claiming Guerrero was being targeted for arrest and was resisting (the phrase in Maine is “afraid of public safety”), only to have the story changed hours later, Democrats and activists demanding real answers, and ICE shrugging about how out of control their officers have become as they begin receiving a $70 BILLION influx of funds.

At least in Maine, one of the targets of the anger is one of the important votes for that extra ICE money: up-for-reelection Senator Susan Collins, whose office has been swamped with protestors. That the ICE shootings have come with a marked increase in reports in cities that ICE arrests are on the rise, and it was a matter of time before ICE brutality would again be back in the headlines.

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IS THE BIGGEST TRUMP PHA-REEK-OUT ABOUT TO HIT?

Shifting back to Maximum Snark mode – difficult after the previous story, to be sure – last night a story from the MAGA outlet the “Washington Reporter” (already we sneer) led to one of the biggest liberal/progressive online Democratic Pha-REEK!-Outs in a long damn time.

Late Monday, the announcement was made that Trump will be making a Royal Trump-clamation and Gargle-Bargle Yap Fest on Thursday evening that requires Legacy Media Inc. to drop everything and tune it.

To fill in the answer to “What now?,” the “Reporter” came out with a stinking cheese lump of a doozy: that on Thursday, Trump and a Band of his Boobs – including acting “Intelligence” director Bill “Lil’ Trump” Puelte, Homeland Security lunkhead Markwayne Mullen, and the always upsucking Ka$h Patel – will announce NeW EVIdencE! That PROVES PROVES PROVES that not only did Daddy have his 2020 election stollen right out from under him, but also NONLEGITIMATELY stuck Georgia Senators Jon Ossoff and Rafael Warnock into the Senate UNGOODLY and BADWRONGMEANLY and OUT WITH THEM NOOWWW!!!

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To accompany that bilge, other stories claim Trump may shart out anything from reports that kidnapped former Colombian strong guy Nicolas Maduro will “confirm” the delusional Sidney Powell/Tulsi Gabbard garbage that he somehow made 11,780 Trump votes disappear from deep in Central America (along with a sweet relocation where Maduro may get to hang with Ghislaine Maxwell for a while) to Trump declaring a NAZIONAL EMERGENZEE requiring federalization of the 2026 midterm elections if not a full-out suspension of the votes.

As often happens, hair-trigger sensitive Democrats have deferred from again claiming Kamala Harris lost because she appeared in public twice with Liz Cheney and are semi-inadvertently doing everything they can to legitimize this idiocy by taking the entire thing super-seriously and giving Trump such agency and power he looks like MAGA Thanos.

But, like when someone in the Trump office tried to make the same analogy by using the scene where Thanos tries to re-destroy the world without showing the next beat where Thanos realizes the Infinity Stones got stolen by Iron Man (OH TOO BAD THE MOVIE’S BEEN OUT FOR 10 YEARS – spoiler alert my patoot), it is the opinion of this humble Substacker that, even if Trump and the Boobs actually try something, it will be stupid and inept and we will be ready to fight it off and beat it if it doesn’t implode and Trump doesn’t TACO before it.

If I may …

(STANDS ON SOAPBOX)

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Two stories pop into my head reviewing all this panic over Trump and Georgia and his latest “threat.”

The first is from my high school, when a super-popular teacher and coach was running for Mayor of a nearby suburb. Everyone really thought he had a great chance to win, but two weeks before the election I asked him how he felt – and he sadly shrugged and said no, the Mayor of the town would “do something” and would probably win.

One week later, flyers showed up throughout the town insisting our teacher would be promoting “public housing” – undisguised racist code for “he’ll let BLACK PEOPLE move in!” He lost.

That was my first lesson in what the Watergate burglars called “ratfcking” – and the lesson was that the most effective smears and fixes that can take place in elections come close enough to the election to impact voters but far enough from the election for the opponent to counter the dirty trick.

Hell, the 2016 FBI report on Hillary Clinton’s nothingburger of email “scandal” did the trick for Trump in that election – but in 2026, the old man is taking his low shot way, way, way, way, way, way, WAY too early to have a chance to work.

I imagine (and hope) Indivisible is gearing up to hit the streets should Trump ramble to trying this – but there is more than enough time to counter. Not to mention the very real potential of the move to Acme-exploding-cigar right into Trump and company’s mushes.

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Which is where the second story I alluded to pops into my mind – a much more recent story involving the actual bipartisan housing bill that Congress – THIS Congress! – passed with massive numbers.

As you recall, Trump whinepeed that he would not sign the bill, both because he believefainted that housing is “boring” and that Congress wouldn’t pass his SAVE America Voter Suppression bill – and, last Thursday, he made it clear that he would not sign the bill and PASS HIS SAVE AMERICA ACT OR ELSE!!!!!!

All of which may make some deep in the bunker MAGAts remember the early days of Trump, but there was one minor problem with the plan … it had zero chance to do anything Trump wanted it to do. To even try to stop the bill, Trump would have had to VETO it – and that was never on the table or even alluded to.

Better, because of parliamentary trickery implemented BY Republicans on White House order to prevent any further use of parliamentary rules to expose the Epstein files (NEVER FORGET), Congress technically has not adjourned for this entire term. THAT meant that midnight Thursday was the ten-Congressional-day anniversary of the act passing – and THAT, in turn, made the housing bill law for the country!

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So to summarize, Trump’s threats not only meant less than nothing, the work he and Congress did at Trump’s commandguaranteed the bill would pass with Trump on the record of opposing the bill – and THAT, in further turn, gutted any ability of desperate Republicans to claim the housing bill in elections – all of which blares Trump as the losing loser that he is!

Does that sound like some kind of super-genius whose schemes will kill democracy?

Am I saying do nothing? NO. Am I saying blow off Trump’s threats? NO. What I AM saying, however, is that this is the moment when maximum scorn is justified and will work – and also to stop sounding like you’re afraid of Donald Trump.

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The fear and anger needs to be directed elsewhere (see ICE above) – but for Trump we need humor, shoes for marching and registering voters, and being smart (which, to be fair, will be easy).

Trump is desperate, demented, decaying, and decrepit. Use that and we will win.

(STEPS OFF SOAPBOX)

With that, THIS JUST IN: E. Jean Carroll just saw her bank account increase by $5 million, as a part of the lawsuit payment Trump owes her has just been deposited from him to her.

See?

Now, let’s get to the Trivias for the day and resume laughing at Mango Mussolini, shall we?

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HOLIDAYS TODAY: Today is Bastille Day, Pandemonium Day, National Grand Marnier Day, National Be Nice to Bugs Day, National Nude Day, National No Splinters Day, National Tape Measurer Day, Shark Awareness Day, and National Mac and Cheese Day!

ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY: In 1789, French mobs stormed and captured the Bastille Prison, sparking the French Revolution. In 1795, “La Marseillaise” became France’s national anthem. In 1798, the Sedition Act became law. In 1933, Hitler and the Nazi Party banned all other political parties in Germany. In 1960, Jane Goodall arrived in the area where she began her research on chimpanzees. In 1968, Hank Aaron hit his 500^th home run. In 1975, plans for EPCOT Center in Orlando were announced. In 2018, Drake landed a record 27 songs on the Billboard Hot 100 charts.

DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: The ice-making machine (1850), Benjamin Spock’s COMMON SENSE BOOK OF BABY AND CHILD CARE (1946), sports in color on television (1951), EASY RIDER (1969), Elvis Costello and The Attractions (1977), MORE SONGS ABOUT BUILDINGS AND FOOD (1978), BEAUTY AND THE BEAT (1981), SUPER MARIO BROS. (1983).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Frederick Louis Maytag, Happy Chandler, William Hanna, Gerald Ford, Douglas Edwards, Arthur Laurents, Ingmar Bergman, Harry Dean Stanton, Joan Tisch, John Chancellor, Polly Bergman, Rosey Grier, Del Reeves, Lee Elder, Jerry Rubin, Maxine Waters, Steve Stone, Tommy Mottola, Andy Newmark, Bob Casale, Joel Silver, Angelique Kidjo, Jane Lynch, Kyle Gass, Jackie Earle Haley, Phil Rosenthal, Tanya Donnelly, Robin Ventura, Missy Gold, Bubba Ray Dudley, Darrelle Revis, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, and Dan Reynolds.

REST IN PEACE/REST IN POWER: Adlai Stevenson II, Dick McDonald, Meredith MacRae, Pernell Whitaker, Ivana Trump, Nick Benedict, and Jacoby Jones.

FEED THE WORMS: Franklin Graham, L. Brent Bozell and Howard “Nutlick” Lutnick entered Earth on this date. Billy the Kid bought it on this date.

Rock drummer extraordinaire and convicted murderer Jim Gordon and UFC figure Conor McGregor were born on this date. You decide if they get Happy Birthdays or if they Feed the Worms.

TODAY’S MUSICAL INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday, Woody Guthrie! This is from the album MERMAID AVENUE, featuring Guthrie rarities recorded by Billy Bragg and Wilco in 1998 - and performed as part of the 1998 LiveAid concert …