DER STÜRMER III

The problem is not with "them," New York Times. 

The problem is with you.

"How many New York Times editors looked at a cartoon that would not have looked out of place on a white supremacist website? ... What does this say about your processes or your decision makers?" That was the reaction of the American Jewish Committee after the publication of what the paper acknowledged was an anti-Semitic cartoon last week, and now it looks like those processes are getting an overhaul. The Daily Beast reports the Times will no longer run syndicated cartoons, including from the CartoonArts syndication service that provided the cartoon in question.

Seriously.  How did you even consider publishing that crap?  Who thought that this was a good idea, let alone a genuine contribution to any serious discussion?

UPDATE: Nobody believes you, Times.  Nobody.

STOP IT

Just stop it.

The Fresh Market grocery chain is debuting a product we've never seen before in this avocado-saturated world, and we have to admit we're more than a bit intrigued: It's a guacamole-infused gouda cheese and it's coming to all 161 locations this Wednesday—just in time for Cinco de Mayo!

The cheese, called Amanti Guacamole Cheese and made by Daily Dairy in Holland, is a green (like "moon cheese" green) cow's milk gouda blended with avocado, lime juice, chili, tomato, onion and garlic.

SERIOUSLY?

In New York, statutory rape gets you probation.

The former Watertown City School District bus driver who admitted in a plea deal in February to raping a 14-year-old girl was sentenced Thursday in Jefferson County Court.

Shane M. Piche, 26, was sentenced by Judge James P. McClusky to 10 years’ probation, as expected, and will be registered as a Level 1 sex offender as a result of his guilty plea Feb. 21 to third-degree rape.

While the district attorney’s office had requested a Level 2 designation, Judge McClusky said because Piche had no prior arrests and there was only one victim in this plea, Level 1 was more appropriate.

A Level 1 sex offender is considered to be at low risk of committing the crime again and is not included in online sex offender databases.

Give me my preference and I'm skinning and gutting fat boy.  But that's just me.

IN LOCAL CORRUPTION NEWS...

This just happened where I live.

St. Louis County Executive Steve Stenger, a target of a U.S. government investigation into political favors traded for campaign contributions, was indicted by a federal grand jury Thursday on charges of bribery, mail fraud and theft of honest services.

Steve, a DEMOCRAT, knows the feds have him dead to rights.

Stenger also resigned as county executive, according to his lawyer, Scott Rosenblum.

In a copy of the indictment unsealed on Monday, prosecutors said that from October 2014 to Dec. 31, 2018, “Stenger and various individuals and companies schemed to defraud and deprive the citizens of St. Louis County of their right to his honest and faithful services, and the honest and faithful services of the St. Louis Economic Development Partnership’s Chief Executive Officer, through bribery and the concealment of material information.”

I've heard a great many things about this guy, none of them good.  Here's the federal indictment if you want to read it.

NEW YORK TIMES?

When you go Julius Streicher on your readership, this kind of response won't make it go away.

Even Jake Tapper knows that.  You've got a serious problem on your hands.

UPDATE: Kicking and screaming.  Anybody been fired yet?

UPDATE: Not quite there yet, Times.

DER STÜRMER II

 

THIS IS JUST NASTY

The countries marked in red have a moon on their flag.  The countries marked in blue planted their flag on the moon.

THAT WAS QUICK

If you had "Illinois Democrat governor investigated for corruption" at or around this date, collect your winnings at the window.  Seems Fat Boy is already getting the stink eye from the feds.

Democratic Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, his wife and his brother-in-law are under federal criminal investigation for a dubious residential property tax appeal that dogged him during his gubernatorial campaign last year, WBEZ has learned.

A law-enforcement source familiar with the investigation confirmed to WBEZ that the probe, which has not been revealed publicly until now, began last October and remains active. There are no signs that criminal charges are imminent.

WBEZ has also confirmed that Illinois First Lady MK Pritzker’s personal assistant who was involved in the property tax appeal, Christine Lovely, is being represented by one of Chicago’s most high-powered lawyers. Her attorney, Reid Schar, is a former federal prosecutor who helped convict ex-Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich on corruption charges.

The developments demonstrate that the billionaire governor and his wife may face a serious legal threat arising from their controversial pursuit of a property tax break on a 126-year-old mansion they purchased next to their Gold Coast home.

Odd.  Usually takes at least a year or two for the graft to kick in.

IOWA?

We're going to need you to get rid of this turd.

Referencing the recent Easter season, Iowa 4^th District Rep. Steve King said Tuesday the criticism he's faced from his "accusers" in the U.S. House has given him “better insight into what (Christ) went through for us."

"For all that I've been through -- and it seems even strange for me to say it -- but I am at a certain peace, and it is because of a lot of prayers for me," King told about 30 people at a town hall meeting in Cherokee.

 

“And, when I have to step down to the floor of the House of Representatives, and look up at those 400-and-some accusers, you know we just passed through Easter and Christ's passion, and I have better insight into what He went through for us partly because of that experience."

 

Steve?  Never ever, ever, ever, ever,

 

EVER

 

Compare yourself, even remotely, to Jesus of Nazareth.

PRONOUN TROUBLE

Seems "spiritual guru" Marianne Williamson is running for president.

CANDY ASS

Professional Conservative^TM and anti-Trump shrieking hysteric Bill Kristol takes what he probably considers to be a devastating shot at Rudy Giuliani.

Anti-Trump conservative Bill Kristol has been blasted on social media after accusing Rudy Giuliani of dropping out of the Senate race against “stronger person” Hillary Clinton in 2000 when the race it got “tough” rather than the ex-mayor's cancer diagnosis.

“Rudy plays a tough guy now, on Twitter. But he didn’t have the guts to take on Hillary in 2000 for the New York Senate seat,” Kristol, who runs The Bulwark website, wrote in a tweet. “When that race got tough, @RudyGiuliani got going. As bullies do when confronted by a stronger person.”

But Kristol left out something kind of important.

Many social media users immediately jumped on the tweet, slamming Kristol for ignoring Giuliani’s cancer diagnosis during the race that led to his decision to end the campaign against Clinton in 2000.

“Well...he was diagnosed with prostate cancer during the race. So this is not your best work,” tweeted Nathan Wurtzel. “You do recall that he was diagnosed with prostate cancer that same year?” seconded radio personality Frank Morano.

Of course it's not like Nancy Boy knows what being tough actually means.

“Billy getting rightly ratio'd for this. Of course, Bill has not been tough anywhere, ever. Not even in the rooms where he advocated for all his wars,” tweeted the Daily Caller’s Derek Hunter, referring to Kristol’s support of U.S. military interventions across the globe.

I got the same diagnosis twelve years ago.  And while the word "cancer" focuses the mind, my experience was not typical.  My prostate cancer was taken care of with surgery, there was no radiation or chemo and the worst part of the whole experience was having to spend a week with a Foley catheter up my penis and then spend a year or so wearing Depends.

I'm still here so I guess it worked.

After about a year, a year and a half, when I was just starting to get back to normal, a friend was diagnosed with breast cancer and she went through the whole shooting match.  Radiation, chemo, losing her hair, losing her energy, all of it.  She eventually beat that diagnosis.

She didn't beat the second one.

Which is why I don't like to refer to myself as a "cancer survivor."  Compared to my late friend, I survived nothing of consequence.  But here's the deal, Bill.  Get yourself diagnosed with some kind of cancer and maybe I'll listen to your comment on how someone else deals with it.

Not before.

BREAKING

Newsflash, dumbasses.

 

TRUMP WASN'T PRESIDENT THEN.

 

See if you can figure out who was.

EASTER SUNDAY, SRI LANKA

A series of eight bombings in Sri Lanka targeting Christian churches and hotels in three cities killed at least 207 people and wounded up to 450 others on Easter Sunday. Defense Minister Ruwan Wijewardene described the coordinated blasts as a terrorist attack by religious extremists.

UPDATE: Amen.  We forget this at our peril.

UPDATE: The death toll has risen to 290.  24 suspects are under arrest.

UPDATE: The password is...Christians (ding).

UPDATE: A whole lot of people suddenly can't make themselves type the word "CHRISTIAN."

WHY YOU GOT TRUMP

It's this simple.  If it had been Hillary versus Willard last election, does anyone seriously think that we'd have a Republican president today?  Me neither.

UPDATE: @BillKristol has learned nothing.

MAXIM

Use online translation but don't rely on it.

DEAR ASSOCIATED PRESS

Get new headline writers.  Nice use of the word "mecca," by the way.

ALTERED LANDSCAPE

It's looking great for my home town.

Major League Soccer owners decided on Thursday to expand their league by three teams to 30, virtually assuring the top two bidders — St. Louis and Sacramento — of a spot in the league.

Owners exited their day-long board meeting late Thursday with sealed lips, but news began to trickle out. One owner told the Post-Dispatch “Congrats!”

Not an hour later, league Commissioner Don Garber confirmed that owners had voted to expand, but cautioned that they did not green-light specific teams.

Still, Garber has said for months that bids in Sacramento and St. Louis were frontrunners, praising both for their markets, stadium plans and ownership groups.

This is how much the sports situation has changed here.  We want this to happen and we're excited about it.  But nobody in this area would cross the street to get the NFL back into town.

AMERICAN HUMOR IS DEAD

From Snopes:

In mid-April 2019, an image supposedly showing U.S. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez guessing that the cost of an item was “free” during an appearance on the daytime television game show “The Price is Right” started circulating on social media:

This is not a genuine photograph of Ocasio-Cortez on the show. This image was created for a satirical article that was originally published by The Babylon Bee.

The satirical article started: “Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was pumped to attend a taping of The Price Is Right in Hollywood this week. The special guest introduced herself as a U.S. representative and rising star of the Democratic Party. Things got interesting when the game began and every time it was her turn to estimate the price of an item her answer was ‘free.'”

The Babylon Bee is an entertainment website that does not publish factual content. A disclaimer at the bottom of the website states: “The Babylon Bee is Your Trusted Source For Christian News Satire.”

Fact-check satirical websites all the time, do you, Snopes?

WHAT REMAINS

Notre Dame will rise again.  The rebuilt church might very well not be as wonderful as people remember it but it will still be glorious.  This picture is why.

 

DISASTER IV

Sometimes, all you've got left to do is to sing, pray, cry or keep silent.  But it's nice to know that Parisians can still get emotional about incidents like this.

Crowds gathered late Monday night outside Notre Dame, singing "Ave Maria" and other hymns while the iconic cathedral burned. As the mourners sang and prayed, French officials said the building's towers have been saved, the AP reports.

DISASTER III

DISASTER II

Notre Dame is looking worse by the minute.

DISASTER

Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris is on fire.  Preliminary indications suggest that this fire may have been caused by certain renovations going on there.  Thus far, one spire has fallen and it looks as though the roof might not make it.

MEET THE FOSSA

or, Things That You'd REALLY Rather Not See Staring Back At You When You Wake Up.

JOHNSON'S FIRST LAW

You'd think it would be fun to be right all the time but it's actually not.

The Fascists MAGAites Republicans reveal their latest vile strategy for dividing this country and intimidating minority voices into silence.
 
Verbatim quoting.

From The Washington Post.

The cover of the New York Post on Thursday showed an image of the World Trade Center exploding into flames on Sept. 11, more than 17 years ago.

The target of the tabloid’s ire? Rep. Ilhan Omar, one of the first two Muslim women to serve in Congress, who has become a frequent target of criticism, harassment and outright Islamophobia from the right wing since her election in November.

Omar (Dumbass-Minn.) had made brief remarks about Islamophobia at an event in March that came in the aftermath of the white-supremacist shooting that left 50 Muslim worshipers dead in New Zealand. But after video of the event was published this week, conservative figureheads fixated on the way she had phrased a reference to 9/11, as “some people did something.”

Content edited slightly.

Apparently, directly quoting the words used by some leftist now constitutes an "attack," even an "incitement to violence."  Chris Hayes, America's Student Council President, pronounced himself horrified by the following.

This is also apparently a "provocation."  Again, you'll have to ask the left why but they're bat crap about it.  The Principal Chief of the Sovereign Nation Of Fake Indians weighs in.

The President is inciting violence against a sitting Congresswoman—and an entire group of Americans based on their religion. It's disgusting. It's shameful. And any elected leader who refuses to condemn it shares responsibility for it.

By...directly...quoting her...actual words.  Okay.  In case you're worried about any "anti-Semitic" angle, here's some woman who calls herself a "rabbi."

Trump is engaging in blatant Islamophobia by taking a comment by @IlhanMN out of context in order to smear her with the worst stereotypes. He is likely also endangering her life, as she has already been target of death threats.

Again.  By using her exact words.  And while we're here, let's have Allie High School invoke the Holocaust.  Nothing ever goes wrong when you do that.

Members of Congress have a duty to respond to the President’s explicit attack today. @ IlhanMN’s life is in danger. For our colleagues to be silent is to be complicit in the outright, dangerous targeting of a member of Congress. We must speak out. “First they came...”

By using her exact words.  By quoting her directly. 

Okay.

Moron.

UPDATE: Kammi's in with talking points down.

TALKING GOOD

Back when this site focused almost exclusively on the Anglican controversy, I used to say this about Rowan Williams all the time.  If you say something and other people constantly feel the need to jump in to explain What You Really Meant, you are a horrible communicator.

To a certain extent, the same concept is in play here.  The invocation of the phrase "out of context" means that Larry and Curly know perfectly well that Moe meant what she said.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., have both jumped to the defense of their under fire fellow freshman Democrat Ilhan Omar, saying Thursday her comment in reference to 9/11 has been wildly taken out of context.

Omar, D-Minn., is facing backlash after a speech at a Muslim rights group’s event in which she described the September 11, 2001, terror attacks as “some people did something”.

TAKES THAT DID NOT AGE WELL

Mikey Nats not even a year ago.

Navarro explained, “Lately, to me, you’re like the Holy Spirit. You are all places at all times. Right. I mean, I do — I see you all over cable news, I see — there’s a seat available if you want to be a co-host at ‘The View.’ There’s people here you can pitch. He’d be a great lady around the table … No, but, so, I have the same issue with Giuliani. He’s everywhere. When do you have time to be lawyering? To do real lawyering? You’re representing — ”

Joy Behar interrupted, saying, “[Avenatti] has a bigger calling here. Being a lawyer is minimal compared to what he’s doing.”

Navarro interrupted, “The priesthood?”

Behar continued, “He’s out there saving the country.”

Mikey Nats today.

Michael Avenatti was indicted Thursday on 36 charges of tax fraud, bribery and embezzlement, including in a case in which the embattled celebrity lawyer allegedly hid $4 million of settlement money from a mentally ill, paraplegic client.

Avenatti’s alleged scam caused his client, Geoffrey Ernest Johnson, to miss two months worth of Social Security Administration disability payments earlier in 2019, according to The Los Angeles Times.

In the latest indictment, Avenatti is accused of scamming five separate clients, including Johnson. He also allegedly withheld a $2.75 million settlement payout from another client in 2017. Avenatti allegedly spent $2.5 million of those funds to purchase a private jet.

DIRTY POLITICS

The Fascists MAGAites Republicans reveal their latest vile strategy for dividing this country and intimidating minority voices into silence. 

Verbatim quoting.

While at a fundraiser for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) in LA on March 23, [Rep. Ilhan] Omar [Dumbass-MN] said, "CAIR was founded after 9/11 because they recognized that some people  did something, and that all of us were starting to lose access to our civil liberties." (USA Today notes she was mistaken about CAIR's founding, which happened in 1994.)

Conservatives pounced, of course.  Or seized on or whatever it is we do now.

The Daily Beast reports the comments began making the rounds this week among right-wing media outlets, "with conservatives interpreting them as minimizing the terrorist attack."

"How was the theater tonight, Mrs. Lincoln?"

"Not great."

"Why not?  What on Earth happened?"

"I don't know, some stupid crap went down."

Rep Dan Crenshaw of Texas on Tuesday tweeted, "First Member of Congress to ever describe terrorists who killed thousands of Americans on 9/11 as 'some people who did something'. Unbelievable."

In his speech before Congress, didn't Franklin Roosevelt describe Pearl Harbor as, "some stuff that just happened a day or so ago in the middle of the Pacific?"  Anyway, Illie took it the wrong way, as you knew she would.

This is dangerous incitement, given the death threats I face. I hope leaders of both parties will join me in condemning it.

Not so much given that what you said just before that quote makes it FAR worse.

The HuffPost has the lines that preceded her 9/11 statement. "Far too long we have lived with the discomfort of being a second-class citizen. Frankly, I’m tired of it, and every single Muslim in this country should be tired of it."

Because it's all about you, isn't it?  Good God, sit down and shut up.

EVENT HORIZON

First reminder.  Albert Einstein correctly called this over a century ago.

Mankind has now something it has never seen before: an image of "the most mysterious objects in the universe"—the black hole. On Wednesday, six simultaneous press conferences were held around the globe, in Washington, Brussels, Santiago, Shanghai, Taipei, and Tokyo, reports Reuters. There, researchers shared the first result of the Event Horizon Telescope project, which in 2017 swiveled a network of radio telescopes worldwide to focus on the center of the galaxy Messier 87, or M87. "We now have visual evidence for a black hole," they announced. Per a tweet from the Event Horizon 'Scope, "The image shows a bright ring formed as light bends in the intense gravity around a black hole that is 6.5 billion times more massive than the Sun."

Second reminder.  Sometimes science takes people to places that they'd really rather not visit.

"The image offered a final, ringing affirmation of an idea so disturbing that even Einstein, from whose equations black holes emerged, was loath to accept it. If too much matter is crammed into one place, the cumulative force of gravity becomes overwhelming, and the place becomes an eternal trap, a black hole. Here, according to Einstein’s theory, matter, space, and time come to an end and vanish like a dream."

BADASSES

You JUST didn't screw with the Mongols back in the day.

SAFETY PRISON

The most American thing ever.

In news that should surprise no one, affluent Hollywood elites are scared sh_tless of going to jail, but they have every intention of doing so fully prepared for the experience.

The parents once seeking "consultation" on the easy way to get their kids into elite universities are now seeking another type of consultation: what prison life could be like. 

As a result of the "largest college admissions scandal in history", actresses Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman were among 15 other parents and celebs who appeared before a judge last Wednesday afternoon, accused of cheating to get their kids into elite universities like USC and Yale. Most defendants have remained mum on their legal strategies as they head to "face the music" as a result of their involvement in the scheme. 

Some parents are considering plea deals, while others are seeking out consultants to help them with advice on what prison life could be life. Parents are seeking advice from a former convicted felon, Justin Paperny, who now works as a "prison consultant". He recently told CBS that he had been hired by one parent charged in the scheme, while he is "in talks" with others.

DEPLORABLETTE

Bitter, doddering, elderly woman demonstrates why she lost to DONALD J. TRUMP.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton implied Tuesday that millions of Americans might be white nationalists, by association if nothing else.

The twice-unsuccessful Democratic presidential candidate tweeted a HuffPost article about far-right activists abroad who have adopted the slogans and rhetoric of President Donald Trump. “The white nationalists certainly think MAGA is a white nationalist slogan,” was the comment Clinton added.

WELCOME TO THE WORLD

Announcing the birth of a bouncing baby GOP campaign ad.  This twatwaffle is yours, Dems.

JOBS AMERICANS WON'T DO

or, Another Brick In Trump's Wall.

A suspect in five murders in Kansas and Missouri was pronounced dead at a hospital Tuesday after he was found hanging from a light fixture in his cell at the St. Louis jail.

Pablo Serrano-Vitorino, an [illegal] immigrant accused of killing four people in Kansas and one man in Missouri, was in his cell alone when he was found by jail staff during a routine check at 2:02 a.m. Tuesday. He was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead at 3:06 a.m., officials say.

Serrano-Vitorino, 43, was charged in Montgomery County, Mo., with killing Randy Nordman on March 8, 2016, at his rural home near New Florence. Prosecutors alleged that Serrano-Vitorino, on the run from a quadruple slaying in Kansas, killed Nordman, 49, after abandoning a getaway vehicle on the interstate.

A trial for the Kansas crimes would have followed any Missouri trial. Serrano-Vitorino was charged in Kansas with four counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of Jeremy Waters, 36; Michael Capps, 41; and brothers Clint Harter, 27, and Austin Harter, 29. Serrano-Vitorino lived next door to Capps; he allegedly burst into his home with a rifle and shot all four men.

The killings received nationwide attention in the ongoing debate over legal and illegal immigration. Serrano-Vitorino was a Mexican national who had been deported from the United States in 2004 and illegally re-entered the country at an unknown time, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

I'd speculate that this poor fellow was triggered by rampant American racism but that's probably a poor choice of words in this situation.

GABBA GABBA HEY

Nothing beats foreigners telling you what you really think.

Former Texas Democratic Rep. [Bob] O'Rourke offered sweeping criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday, outright calling him "racist" and an obstacle to peace.

"That relationship, if it is to be successful, must transcend partisanship in the United States, and it must be able to transcend a prime minister who is racist,

Because he thinks that just maybe it's a good idea that the Jewish citizens of his country aren't indiscriminately slaughtered?

as he warns about Arabs coming to the polls, who wants to defy any prospect for peace as he threatens to annex the West Bank, and who has sided with a far-right, racist party in order to maintain his hold on power," O'Rourke said.

Or someone who has lived in Israel for most of his life, who lives there now and who sees things as they actually are a damned lot clearer than some leftist Texan who thinks in bumper stickers.

O'Rourke continued, saying he did not believe Netanyahu "represents the true will of the Israeli people" or the "best interests" of the relationship between the US and Israel. He went on to endorse a two-state solution to achieve peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

Bob?  The "true will" of the Israeli people is for their Muslim neighbors not to want to kill every Jew they possibly can.  Until that happens, what say we let the Israelis decide how best to defend themselves and you sit this one out?

Airhead.

DONKEY BONG

I really don't think this idea is the winning issue the Democrats think it is.  How on Earth do you think that those of us who got college degrees and then spent years and years and years paying off tens of thousands of dollars of student loan debt are going to take it when students can suddenly go to college for free?  Do you honestly believe that we're going to say, "Hey, that's just great for those kids.  Gosh darn it, I'm voting Democratic?"  Because I've got news for you morons.  There isn't that much magnanimity in the entire universe and there never has been.

CAUSE?

Meet Effect.

New York City restaurants are eliminating jobs, reducing employee hours and raising prices due to the higher costs of the $15-per-hour minimum wage.

A once-growing industry is contracting, according to an online survey conducted by the New York City Hospitality Alliance, an association representing restaurants in the city.

Last year, “full-service restaurants recorded a 1.6 percent job loss, which is the first recorded annual loss in two decades,” said Andrew Rigie, executive director of the trade group.

The survey also said about a third of respondents will eliminate jobs and most will raise prices this year because of the new $15-an-hour law backed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo and other state officials, which took effect on Dec. 31, 2018.

"Business costs?" asks local economic illiterate.  "What the hell are business costs?"

The governor, through a spokeswoman, defended state policies: “All New Yorkers deserve to make a living wage and under the governor’s leadership, more minimum-wage workers than ever before have received an increase in their wages. The fact is that increasing the minimum wage puts more money in the pockets of hardworking New Yorkers, which creates more demand for local businesses and increases economic activity.”

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, WELCOME TO THE MACY'S THANKSGIVING DAY PARADE

When you look like ropes need to be hanging from you, it's time to mix in a salad now and then.

LORD?

Is there any chance that You could bring all this to a close any time soon?

Two women drugged themselves and their six ADOPTED children before intentionally killing the entire family by driving off a California cliff last year, a special coroner’s jury has ruled.

A jury of eight women and six men unanimously found Thursday that Jennifer and Sarah Hart, both 38, committed suicide and that their six children — ages 12 to 19 — died “at the hands of another, other than an accident” in the Mendocino County murder-suicide on March 26, 2018, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

The jury’s verdict came after eight investigators and one pathologist testified that the women took steps in advance to intentionally kill their entire family by driving off a 100-foot cliff along Highway 1 near Westport with their drugged children inside their 2003 GMC Yukon.

ME: Because I'm old and just playing out the string here, waiting to die.  And I can't see how this world can possibly get any more depraved than incidents like this.

GOD: You might want to let Me hold your beer.

FREEDOM FRIES

French woman wants the right to vote in American elections.

I was nine years old when I first seriously pondered the result of a US presidential election. It was 2000 and my father suggested we bet on who would win the 2000 vote – George W Bush or Al Gore. In the kitchen of our apartment in the Paris suburbs, I bet a piece of gum that it would be Gore. Two months later, the Supreme Court decided otherwise, and I didn’t realise until many years later how close I had come to being right.

Boy, that takes me back.  I still remember all the international political discussions my family and I used to have just about every night when I was nine.  We'd sit around for hours at a time arguing about whether the Progressive Conservatives could hold on to Alberta, whether the Tories would ever be competitive in Wales or Scotland, how that new conservative government in Italy would work out, things like that.

The single worst row my dad and I ever had was when I disagreed with his assertion that Germany's Christian Democrats would lose Baden-Württemberg big-time in some German state election or other.  He and I loudly went at it hammer-and-tongs and when I turned out to be right, he didn't talk to me for about a month after that.

I'll take "Things That Never Happened" for $2000, Alex.

One election after the next, we have seen how much the results of the US presidential vote impact not just the 50 states, but the rest of the planet too. And if the future of foreign countries is shaped to a significant extent by what goes on on US Election Day, shouldn’t they get a say in who gets to lead the most powerful nation in the world for the next four years?

Unless you want to officially become a US citizen, I'll go with "HELLS NO!!"

Perhaps it helps to imagine America as the pot

A "melting pot?"  No?

in which tomorrow’s ideas are brewed, for better or worse. Perhaps it helps, too, to look at the more tangible signs of how US politics contribute to shaping all of our lives. The most convincing example may be global warming, and Donald Trump’s overt skepticism when it comes to climate change.

It goes without saying that whatever the US does or does not do to limit the effects of global warming impacts every single being, human or otherwise, on this planet.

Perhaps it also helps to imagine those statements as yet another example of Europe expecting the US to do the heavy lifting, keep its mouth shut and enter the house only by the servants' entrance.  Gosh, you bail a continent out of two world wars and this is the thanks you get. 

Then comes the economy: in June last year, we were warned that tensions between the US and its main trading partners could precipitate global trade turmoil similar in scale to the 2008 financial crisis. Whoever gets to sit in the Oval Office, then, plays a major role in shaping the state of our wallets as well as the state of the planet. Is it really that outrageous that people around the world might want to have a say on who runs the show?

Uh...yeah?  Is this a trick question? 

I am, of course, aware that the US is extremely unlikely to go along with my idea.

If "extremely unlikely" means "snowball in Hell," good observation.

This isn’t a country that’s particularly known for avidly seeking external input.

Kind of why we're who we are and France is Monaco with delusions of believing that anybody still gives a crap what it thinks about anything.

And of course, there’s the idea that the right to vote is intrinsically tied to residence,

You spelled "citizenship" wrong.

and that those who don’t live in a given country aren’t qualified to make a call on what goes in said country.

Which you've pretty much proved.

Except things are more complicated, and more nuanced than that.

I thought they might be.

Take, for example, the idea that living in a country is a condition to having the right to vote there. Permanent residents such as myself, also known as green card holders (also known as people who aren’t US citizens but live and work in the US full-time) pay the same income tax as US citizens, but don’t get to vote.

What part of the concept of "citizenship" is tripping you up?

Naturally, US citizens (like citizens of many other countries) still get to vote for their president even if they permanently move to a different country. All this to say: there is an established disequilibrium between who gets to vote in the US presidential election and who arguably has the most skin in the game.

Napoleon sold us Louisiana, you know, so in a way, all this is kind of your own fault.  If you'd kept all that land and all those natural resources west of the Mississippi, I'd have to tell people that I lived in Sawn LooEE and France might still amount to something.  Damn Corsicans, amirite?  So if you want to complain, go throw escargot all over Bonaparte's grave or something.

How would it work, then? If the US were to entertain the possibility of letting foreigners participate in the presidential vote (and again, I’m not holding my breath), how would we make it happen? Does each foreign country get the same weight as each of the 50 states? Surely, that would be giving too much weight to the outside world. Do we restrict the vote to member states of NATO and/or historical allies? This seems slightly more realistic – as realistic as it gets in this purely hypothetical scenario – but also somewhat unfair to those whose voices would be left out.

I have clearly disclosed my status as a French citizen, so I know the question will be raised: how would I react if someone proposed to let other countries vote in the French presidential election? Well, France is currently about five spots behind the US in the ranking of the world’s most powerful nations,

Who came up with those rankings?  France Doesn't Suck Quarterly?  White Flag Review?

and its GDP is more than seven times lower.

Ever stop and ask yourself why we matter and France doesn't?

But sure, should France ever have the kind of political and cultural influence the US currently yields, then I’d be inclined to let others have a say. In fact, I might even vote in favour of it.

The word is spelled "favor."

What if we start here?  If the French want to vote in American elections, Paris has to give the US total veto power over French legislation as well as the power to change or discard any French laws it doesn't like, the power to establish French tax rates and what that revenue is spent on and the power to change the French constitution in any way Washington sees fit.  And the same goes for any other country in the world that wants the same thing.

Deal?  Thought not.  But it's actually nice to know that even to many modern Europeans, Americans are still thought of as Europeans who couldn't make it in decent society.

JEFFERSON CITY, MISSOURI?

It may save you a lot of trouble down the road if you start picking out sites for the refugee camps right now. Because Illinois is SCREWED.

A union lobbyist who worked just one day as a substitute teacher is entitled to a pension worth potentially tens of thousands of dollars annually, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday in an opinion reinforcing its position that retirement benefits promised to public workers can’t be “diminished or impaired.”

David Piccioli was a lobbyist for the Illinois Federation of Teachers from 1997 to 2012. A 2007 law allowed officers of the IFT and the Illinois Education Association to receive teachers’ pensions for service in the union by qualifying for a teacher’s certificate, working in a classroom and paying past-owed employee contributions with interest.

Piccioli earned a certificate, worked as a substitute teacher in a Springfield elementary school for one day in January 2007, and paid $193,000 to TRS for contributions he owed for the previous 10 years, qualifying him for the pension

Justice Anne Burke, writing for the majority, said the fact that the General Assembly reversed the law in 2012 following reports by the Chicago Tribune and WGN-TV is immaterial. The constitution bars action that would cause established pensions to be “diminished or impaired” and Piccioli followed the law as it stood.

Piccioli said Thursday he was uncertain how much the additional TRS pension would be. He already receives a $35,436 TRS pension for work after his certification. In 2017, when a Sangamon County circuit judge declared the prior-service pension unconstitutional, Piccioli estimated it was worth about $36,000 annually. He also receives a $33,780 annual pension for 10 years’ work on the Illinois House staff.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker has proposed raising extra money for pensions by borrowing, selling state assets, and using additional revenue from a progressive tax system which would require a constitutional amendment. Even then, he wants to stretch the payoff date to 2052.

Fat man?  You do realize that you're on your own here, right?  Whenever Illinois finally goes belly-up, don't expect any of the rest of us to care.  And whatever you do, don't expect federal help; none of the rest of us will ever agree to pony up to bail your lazy asses out and any non-Illinois politician who does should make sure that his or her resume is up-to-date.

This is all on you, Springfield.  You made this bed; lie in it.

THE BANGALOREAN CANDIDATE

Indian-born Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) enthusiastically supports a proposed piece of legislation in the Congress.

The federal government must regulate behavior by 330 million Americans to protect the freedom of transgender people, says progressive Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal.

Why is that?

“My beautiful, now 22-year-old child told me last year that they were gender nonconforming,” she tearfully said Tuesday.  She described how her son claims to be neither male nor female.

Did you catch it?  As Daffy Duck once said, "Pronoun trouble."  But what needs to be done?

Jayapal’s demand and her tearful celebration for her adult son’s “freedom” came during a hearing about H.R. 5, the Democrat-drafted bill that would require federal agencies to pressure Americans into agreeing that men and women can change their sex by declaring an opposite-sex “gender identity.”

This bill is not a stretch for Indian-born Jayapal, because she is a progressive who favors top-down direction of Americans’ economy, civic life, culture, and population. For example, she justifies this demand for government authority over sexual identity with a claim that progressives can maximize people’s freedom by imposing intensive regulation on thoughts and words.

I don't know if Jayapal is an Episcopalian or not but she sure sounds like one.

Like other progressives at the hearing, Jayapal paired her support for government-controlled culture with her dismissal of Americans’ evolved culture of self-government and local autonomy. For example, Jayapal dismissed objections to the transgender ideology as mere fear. “We are talking about fear versus love; we are talking about fear versus freedom,” she said.

And I hope a lot of leftists realize what is at stake.

But the Democrats’ legislation would force all women to submit whenever men claimed the legal right to take women’s places in sports and showers, in shelters, scholarships, and business set-asides; in culture, commerce, and language, such as in the use of male or female pronouns.

Didn't make the boys basketball team or track team?  Change your "gender identity."

The biological differences between the sexes remain scientific and certain … H.R. 5 nullifies “women and girls as a coherent legal category worthy of civil rights protection.” The bill privileges the rights of men who identify as women over biological women and girls … Allowing men to compete against women in women’s sports isn’t demoralizing because female athletes … aren’t talented; it’s demoralizing because it makes their talent irrelevant. Martina Navratilova explained the threat H.R. 5 poses to women’s sports: “Unless you want to completely remake what Women’s Sports means, there can be no blanket inclusion rule. There is nothing stereotypical about this – it’s about fairness and it’s about science.”

Texas Rep. Louie Gohmert highlighted data which shows how males have a huge advantage over females in sports. Top-ranked “women would lose to literally thousands of boys and men,” and also lose athletic scholarships if men change their sex, he said.

Arizona GOP Rep. Debra Lesko said the Democrats’ legislation would “prioritize the rights of biological males over biological women."

You'll never guess who else isn't crazy about this idea.

Collins also invited Julia Beck, a left-wing lesbian, to present the shared argument that men and women need to maintain single-sex civic options to help them make the best of their physical bodies in relationships, competition, work, recreation, and sports. Beck describes herself as a “radical lesbian feminist,” and is a former co-chair of the Baltimore City Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Commission, a civic advisory group. She said:

"Female survivors of rape will be unable to contest male presence in shelters. Men will dominate women’s sports. Girls who would have taken first place will be denied scholastic opportunity. Women who use male pronouns to talk about men may be arrested, fined, and banned from social media platforms. Girls will stay home from school when they have their periods to avoid harassment by boys in mixed-sex toilets. Girls and women will no longer have a right to ask for female medical staff or intimate care providers, including elderly or disabled women, who are at serious risk for sexual abuse …

So we're switching it to LGBQ now?

Everything I just listed is already happening, and it’s only going to get worse if gender identity is recognized in federal law. I urge my fellow Democrats to wake up. Please acknowledge biological reality."

Even Sully thinks this is a horrible idea.

This “biology matters” argument is being made by Andrew Sullivan, a British-born gay advocate who led the political push to allow single-sex marriages. In a February article titled “The Nature of Sex,” Sullivan argues that a pending Democratic-drafted bill which provides legal recognition and rights to people who try to live as members of the opposite sex:

"…could put all single-sex institutions, events, or groups in legal jeopardy. It could deny lesbians their own unique safe space, free from any trace of men. The bill, in other words, 'undermines the fundamental legal groundwork for recognizing and combating sex-based oppression and sex discrimination against women and girls.

If you abandon biology in the matter of sex and gender altogether, you may help trans people live fuller, less conflicted lives; but you also undermine the very meaning of homosexuality. If you follow the current ideology of gender as entirely fluid, you actually subvert and undermine core arguments in defense of gay rights. 'A gay man loves and desires other men, and a lesbian desires and loves other women,' explains Sky Gilbert, a drag queen. 'This defines the existential state of being gay. If there is no such thing as ‘male’ or ‘female,’ the entire self-definition of gay identity, which we have spent generations seeking to validate and protect from bigots, collapses.' Contemporary transgender ideology is not a complement to gay rights; in some ways it is in active opposition to them."

I'm pretty sure that this idiotic proposal will never see the light of day although considering modern Democratic ultra-radicalism, you never want to say never.  But if it does, Rep. Jayapal will have made a major contribution to making her adopted country a one-party state.

And that party won't be hers.

UPDATE: Make yourself some popcorn, pull up a chair and watch the Democratic Party fly apart.  Seems the Democratic Radicleft thinks this is a winning issue.

REMINDER

At Aretha Franklin's memorial service, Bill Clinton didn't mind sharing a stage with this tool. Barack Obama was photographed with him more than once and there isn't a radical Democrat anywhere in the country who would turn down a similar photo-op with the blithering idiot.

EPISCOPALIANIZATION

Why I'm not a Roman Catholic and why I can never be one.  Francis is a joke.

Pope Francis and Morocco’s King Mohammed VI called on Saturday for the protection of Jerusalem’s multi-religious character, saying the city’s sacred sites must be accessible to worshippers of all faiths.

In a joint appeal signed on the first day of Francis’ visit to Rabat, the pope and the monarch said they were “deeply concerned for its spiritual significance and its special vocation as a city of peace”.

“We consider it important to preserve the Holy City of Jerusalem / Al-Quds Acharif as the common patrimony of humanity and especially for the followers of the three monotheistic religions, as a place of encounter and as a symbol of peaceful coexistence, where mutual respect and dialogue can be cultivated,” said the joint appeal, using the Arab name for Jerusalem.

It called for “full freedom of access” for Jews, Muslims and Christians and a guarantee of their right to worship there.

Guess what, Holiness.  They have it. 

Right now. 

The mere fact that Israel has Christian residents at all is, considering our mutual history, one of the greatest miracles ever.  But if what you actually mean, and I suspect that you do, is that we want freedom of access and worship THAT'S NOT CONTROLLED BY THE JEWS, that's not ever going to happen again. 

Nor should it. 

You had your chance. 

Shut up and sit this one out until Jesus returns.

UPDATE: Yup.