Rum and Social Distancing FRIDAY!

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“For one of his favorite movies, Trump is not that clear on the plot of Mutiny on the Bounty. Things do not turn out well for Captain Bligh. He’s overthrown and ends up in a tiny boat rowing back to England. God, I hope this is like Mutiny on the Bounty.”
—Stephen Colbert, after Trump declared Democratic governors forging their own alliances to buy medical supplies were mutineers, citing Mutiny on the Bounty as one of his favorite films

“The federal government’s big idea for obtaining critical medical supplies is to find out when states are buying stuff and then go take it. When the president says ‘I’m behind you on this, governors,’ he means it like in the form of a stickup.”
—Rachel Maddow

“President Trump met with recovered coronavirus patients today. ‘Great to see you out of bed,’ they told him.”
—Seth Meyers

“Only essential businesses are allowed to be open, and in Florida one of those businesses is the WWE: World Wrestling Entertainment. WWE will continue to hold matches but without crowds. Is professional wrestling without a crowd still professional? I mean, at that point isn’t it just an argument on a trampoline?”
—Jimmy Kimmel

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“Why me as host? Well, for one, I have been the celebrity canary in the coal mine for the coronavirus, and ever since being diagnosed I have been more like America’s dad than ever before, since no one wants to be around me very long and I make people uncomfortable.”
—Tom Hanks, hosting the return of SNL

And now, our feature presentation…

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Cheers and Jeers for Friday, April 17, 2020

Note: Thanks to everyone who joined us for our first Daily Kos Social Distancing Friday Zoom event that just ended. Now we just sit back and let the Emmy nominations roll in. Right? That’s how this works, right?

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By the Numbers:

Days ’til Earth Day: 5

Support among Kansans polled by PPP who support Gov. Laura Kelly’s policies on social distancing: 76%

Percent of Germans polled by broadcaster ZDF who support Chancellor Angela Merkel’s handling of the COVID crisis: 80

Percent who approve of the German government’s response overall: 88%

Percent chance that GM and Ventec say their production of ventilators is running ahead of schedule: 100%

Rank of Sunday among days of the week during which internet-porn viewing is highest: #1

Weight of the average smell, according to some web site: 760 nanograms

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Puppy Pic of the Day: Quarantine Day #5645

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CHEERS to poll dancing. Uh, guys? I think we’re looking at a big blue wave this November. Jus’ feel it in my bones. There’s the undisputed fact that the ongoing pandemic response is showing Democrats at their big-government best, and Republicans at their rugged-individualism worst. Plus there are some decent polling numbers in a handful of flippable Senate races. Quick recap, just because you asked so politely:

Maine: Democratic state House speaker Sara Gideon out-raised Sen. Susan Collins (which I’m sure both “disturbs” and “concerns” the incumbent mightily), $7.1 million to $2.4 million, a demonstration of voter intensity that will likely turn the red seat blue. Polls are currently tied.

Mark Kelly will be the first senator to come with a spare in his trunk.

Arizona: Republican incumbent Martha McSally needs to resign herself to the fact that she’s just a clunky Kool-Aid peddler for Donald Trump, and her opponent is a proud Democrat, celebrated astronaut, and American hero who’s probably going to crush her by ten points or more. Mark Kelly now leads by nine.

Kansas: Great news in the “What’s The Matter With Kansas?” State: in the race to replace Republican fossil Pat Roberts (R), Democrat Dr. Barbara Bollier (currently a state senator) leads voter-suppression king Kris Kobach by two points. That’s a positive swing of 11 points—a February poll had her down by nine.

North Carolina: Retired Lt. Col. Cal Cunningham (D) leads incumbent Republican Thom Tillis by seven points. That ain’t chump change.

Colorado: Republican incumbent Cory Gardner is now officially considered “the underdog” as John Hickenlooper leads in virtually every poll by double digits.

Even Democrat Jaime Harrison just out-ch’chinged Lindsey Freaking Graham in South Freaking Carolina. So a surprisingly strong and level playing field at the moment, which is the second-most-horrifying thing for Republican candidates. Their top terror: Trump’s endorsement.

CHEERS to sticking that lawsuit in your pipe and smokin’ it. Beers all around for Bold Nebraska, The Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Earth, the Northern Plains Resource Council, and the Natural Resources Defense Council…and two for this robed wonder, whose ruling has once again put the foul Keystone XL Pipeline on hold:

Chief U.S. District Judge Brian Morris said in his decision that the Army Corps of Engineers had failed to consider how a 2017 permit allowing the pipeline to cross waterways could harm some species,including the endangered pallid sturgeon. […]

What a Keystone leak looks like.

“Today’s ruling confirms, once again, that there’s just no getting around the fact that Keystone XL would devastate communities, wildlife, and clean drinking water,” Doug Hayes, a senior attorney for the Sierra Club, said in a statement.

And the judge whose ruling caused one more Trump Oval Office meltdown that will take up its own chapter in the next tell-all book by a former staffer? An Obama appointee. Hee.

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Brief Sanity Break

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End brief Sanity break

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CHEERS to Evolution Man. Charles Darwin started out as a single wriggly cell in 1808, evolved into a fully-grown human being, and died on April 19, 1882. His legacy is always worth revisiting:

Influenced by the ideas of Malthus, he proposed a theory of evolution occurring by the process of natural selection.

History’s verdict on Charles Darwin: great naturalist, excessively grumpy mall Santa.

The animals (or plants) best suited to their environment are more likely to survive and reproduce, passing on the characteristics which helped them survive to their offspring. Gradually, the species changes overtime.

[T]he logical extension of Darwin‘s theory was that homosapiens was simply another form of animal. It made it seem possible that even people might just have evolved—quite possibly from apes—and destroyed the prevailing orthodoxy on how the world was created. Darwin was vehemently attacked, particularly by the Church. However, his ideas soon gained currency and have become the new orthodoxy.

Of course, there are some organisms that demonstrate evolution can work in reverse. Like dust mites. And the current occupants of the West Wing.

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Gong! Gong!! BuddaBuddaBudda… GONG!!!

This is another edition of The One Word Answer ~~Man~~ Woman. Two special celebrity guests this evening! Rachel Maddow asks Senator Elizabeth Warren: “If [Joe Biden] asked you to be his running mate, would you say yes?”

“Yes.”

Now back to Cheers and Jeers.

Gong! Gong!! BuddaBuddaBudda… GONG!!!

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JEERS to the coin-tosser-in-chief. Fourteen years ago, George W. Bush, in yet another moment of detachment from reality, proclaimed after 5½ years of utter incompetence: “I’m the decider and I decide what’s best.” If I may weigh in on that, sir? You sucked at deciding.

CHEERS to home vegetation. The big TV event of the weekend happens tonight at 8 when Fox airs an all-new WWE Friday Night Smackdown—oh thank you for deeming WWE an “essential business,” Florida governor DeSantis! Thank you thank you, you muscular, sweaty god you!!! (Sorry, dear reader, if my sarcasm dripped on you.) Rachel Maddow is known for her Friday night opening rants, so you might want to tune in to MSNBC at 9. Tonight at 10 on HBO’s Real Time, Bill Maher live-streams with Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX), Andrew Sullivan, and Fareed Zakaria.

New home video releases include the legal drama Just Mercy and underwater thriller Underwater. Tomorrow night at 8ET, all the major TV networks (except, of course, Fox, because the event co-sponsored by their latest boogey monster: the World Health Organization) are airing One World: Together at Home, a tribute to front-line healthcare workers hosted by Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, and Jimmy Fallon. No new SNL this weekend (last weekend’s social-distancing episode was a noble effort) so they’re rerunning the one hosted by Daniel Craig. Chef Jose Andres’ efforts to feed America during the pandemic will be featured on 60 Minutes Sunday night. Cletus—oh, good lord—becomes a helium tycoon on a new episode of The Simpsons, and on Family Guy Peter has a sweating problem. Finally, John Oliver, whose one-man monologues have withstood the pandemic the best among all the late-nighters, serves up a new episode of HBO’s Last Week Tonight Sunday at 11.

Now here’s your Sunday morning lineup:

Meet the Press: Chef Jose Andres; White House Waste of Space Mike Pence.

Face the Nation: Former FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb; Chamber of Commerce President Suzanne Clark; Gov. Charlie Baker (R-MA); Dr. Deborah Birx; The president of…Jordan???

This Week: TBA

CNN’s State of the Union: Governors Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) and Larry Hogan (R-MD); White House Waste of Space Steve Mnuchin.

Fox GOP Talking Points Sunday: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi; White House Waste of Space Mike Pence.

Happy viewing!

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Ten years ago in C&J: April 17, 2010

JEERS to blowing smoke up Europe‘s ass. Oh, Iceland…how could you? Things were going so well until one of your volcanoes lifted a cheek and blew an air biscuit at your neighbors to the southeast. Classy! Now the ash is settling and people are being warned to stay inside so they don’t destroy their lungs. Oh, and a huge number of commercial flights have been cancelled. Apparently the “plume of grit” is highly abrasive, dirty, disruptive and fucks up a plane’s engines so that it can’t move forward. Oh…my…god: Republicans have taken over Iceland‘s volcanoes.

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And just one more…

Duncan Black, aka Atrios. One of bloggerdom’s original freedom fighters and creator of the catchphrases “Heh indeedy” and “Preznit giv me turkee.”

CHEERS to the Baby Blue Cherub. Everybody stop by and say “Heh indeedy” to Atrios (aka millstone-around-Philadelphia’s-neck Duncan Black) today on the 18^thblogiversary of his Eschaton blog. Few dirty fucking hippies can reduce the traditional media and punditry’s wankery to one or two lines of cool-as-a-cucumber snark like this communist peacenik can, and he’s been one of my blogger north stars for the duration. He was especially ahead of the curve on the ‘08 economic meltdown and the Iraq debacle, and he led the charge to expand Social Security, a movement with real traction these days. His latest crusade: predicting the inevitable doom of driverless cars and picking on poor, poor Elon Musk. Besides that, his is a classic, old-fashioned blog that looks the same as it did during the Dark Times of 2002 (although he happily embraced the twitter revolution early on). By the way, this was the moment on April 17, 2002 when he flicked the switch for the first time:

Is this thing on?

by Atrios at 22:13

0 comments

Yes, it’s still on. And if it ever shuts down, civilization is doomed.

Oh, and Philadelphia resident Ben Franklin died on this date in 1790. I guess that explains why he never returns my calls. Have a safe weekend. Floor’s open…What are you cheering and jeering about today?

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