WOW!!!

Igorrr - Very Noise from MEAT DEPT. on Vimeo.

TRUMP IMPEACHED ON A GREAT DAY FOR AMERICAN DEMOCRACY

Let Lawrence O'Donnell tell you why that is, exactly, and how the 2018 mid-term elections "blue wave", where 9 million more people cast votes for Democrats than Republicans, set the stage for this important, history-making event... it's a great bit of editorializing on his part.

BEST POLITICAL CARTOON I'VE SEEN IN AGES

THE POLITICAL PERIPHERY AND THE CRIMINAL GOP

There's a whole lot of craziness going down in the USA these days, so much so that it's getting harder and harder to figure out where regular old partisan hackery/mendacity ends, and where truly bugfuck shit-flinging insanity begins.

For example, take Trump's Attorney General William Barr. Ostensibly the People's Prosecutor, Barr's reputation among a certain class of ahistorical, mainstream media "moderate" at the time of his choosing was that of a staid, boring, old school Republican who had performed adequately in the same position for President Poppy Bush, thus making him a "reassuringly middle-of-the-road choice" for the post by Trump.

Barr's current tenure at the head of the DOJ has done much to correct this disastrously erroneous assessment of him as both a professional, and as a man.

Beginning with the high likelihood that he personally hobbled the FBI investigation into a series of sexual assault accusations made against then Supreme Court candidate Brett Kavanaugh (and his role in the official period of gloating that followed Kavanaugh being elevated to that lifelong position), followed by his criminal sabotage of the Mueller Report roll-out (not to mention his suspected behind-the-scenes tampering with same), and now, with recent revelations about his round-the-world goose chase in search of proof for the most ass-backwards bogus fascist conspiracy theory in the history of fascist conspiracy theories*, any illusion about Barr's competence or moderation have been well and duly shattered for all time. There's no coming back from a year like the one he's just had.

In fact, the above would be true even if he hadn't cemented his fate with a pair of almost unbelievably regressive, inflammatory, paranoid and partisan speeches, first to the University of Notre Dame law school, and then to the ultra-conservative Federalist Society. Here's what Esquire's essential Charles Pierce had to say about these two "loony" speeches (and I do urge you to read his entire piece):

If this really is Attorney General William Barr’s final go-round as a servant to radical conservative power, and we can only pray to god that it is, he’s certainly going out with a bang. In the past two weeks, he’s given two speeches that are so stunningly detached from political reality, and so basically and fundamentally un-American, that they were probably best given from atop a milk crate in Washington Square, and not from respectable rostrums provided by powerful and influential institutions. In short, Barr has become something of a raving maniac.

I also strongly urge you to read the Salon piece and the Guardian article. Both are great at explaining exactly how disturbingly batshit both of Barr's incendiary and profoundly un-American speeches were, complete with copious quotes and cogent analysis. In terms of individuals who need to be removed from anywhere near the levers of power, Barr is perhaps second only to Donald Trump, himself, and I'm sure a case could be made that he's even worse.

*"It wasn't Russia, but UKRAINE who meddled in the 2016 presidential elections! And it wasn't on behalf of Trump, but HILLARY!"

***

And you thought the Ukraine scandal was bad! Have you heard the latest about how Trump's former National Security Adviser John Bolton told attendees at a super-secret meeting of Moran Stanley's largest hedge fund clients that Preznit Trump had already made foreign policy decisions in Turkey based exclusively on how those decisions would affect his financial bottom line? Yes, it sounds ridiculous, but considering some of the recent goings-on in that part of the world, not completely out of the realm of possibility. In fact, it's entirely in keep with the Trump brand of politics. From PoliticusUSA.com, linked above:

Bolton was suggesting that Trump is making foreign policy decisions based on what will make him money. Trump’s refusal to separate himself from his business has left him compromised and mired in conflicts of interest. Trump is getting people killed in Northern Syria because he wants to keep making money in Turkey. Trump isn’t just making money off of the presidency. He is jeopardizing US national security and making the country less safe so that he can make more money overseas.

 Time to add another line item to the ever-growing list of causes for Trump's impeachment and removal from office? I certainly think so, considering it seems to me like we could all do with a bit of reminding about the devastating repercussions that Trump's hasty retreat from the Kurdish territories has had on our historic allies in the region.

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This Vox feature by Sean Illing, entitled The Post-Truth Prophets, takes aim at the super-contentious topic of postmodernism, particularly about how it's been pretty much correct in its predictions about pretty much everything, and yet it's still reviled by many; mostly by people who don't understand it.

And why is that? Mostly, it's because they're mistaking its predictions for prescriptions, spawning the supreme irony of postmodernism's most insistent and committed critics being, themselves, nigh unto perfect illustrative examples of the fatal flaws locked inside the rapidly proliferating and metastasizing, mutually incompatible gaggle of steady-state Big Narratives all competing to be the first to have their Apocalyptic historical teleological endgame scenarios proven Most Correct. The ubiquitous Jordan Peterson being perhaps the most popular, and egregious, case in point.

If you think you know enough about postmodernism to shit on it in public, like to your friends and such, or if you harbor a sneaking suspicion that there might just be something worthwhile to be found therein (in spite of, or perhaps because of, all the negative things you've heard about it), then give Illing's article a read. It's a more than decent jumping off point for learning about the good, the bad, and yes, the ugly, of postmodernist philosophy. Enjoy!

Did you hear the latest from the Southern Poverty Law Center's Hatewatch project about how Preznit Trump's main speechwriter, closest adviser, and chief engineer of Operation Baby Cages Stephen Miller has had his Affinity for White Nationalism Revealed in Leaked Emails? I know, I know... this is about as surprising as when Rosie O'Donnell came out of the closet. But still, despite the fact that it isn't much of a shock, it really should be, if you think about it. Especially when you examine the particulars up close. Part one of Hatewatch's exhaustive report begins:

In the run-up to the 2016 election, White House senior policy adviser Stephen Miller promoted white nationalist literature, pushed racist immigration stories and obsessed over the loss of Confederate symbols after Dylann Roof’s murderous rampage, according to leaked emails reviewed by Hatewatch. 

The emails, which Miller sent to the conservative website Breitbart News in 2015 and 2016, showcase the extremist, anti-immigrant ideology that undergirds the policies he has helped create as an architect of Donald Trump’s presidency. These policies include reportedly setting arrest quotas for undocumented immigrants, an executive order effectively banning immigration from five Muslim-majority countries and a policy of family separation at refugee resettlement facilities that the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Inspector General said is causing “intense trauma” in children.

In this, the first of what will be a series about those emails, Hatewatch exposes the racist source material that has influenced Miller’s visions of policy. That source material, as laid out in his emails to Breitbart, includes white nationalist websites, a “white genocide”-themed novel in which Indian men rape white women, xenophobic conspiracy theories and eugenics-era immigration laws that Adolf Hitler lauded in “Mein Kampf.”

Hatewatch reviewed more than 900 previously private emails Miller sent to Breitbart editors from March 4, 2015, to June 27, 2016. Miller does not converse along a wide range of topics in the emails. His focus is strikingly narrow – more than 80 percent of the emails Hatewatch reviewed relate to or appear on threads relating to the subjects of race or immigration. Hatewatch made multiple attempts to reach the White House for a comment from Miller about the content of his emails but did not receive any reply.

Miller’s perspective on race and immigration across the emails is repetitious. When discussing crime, which he does scores of times, Miller focuses on offenses committed by nonwhites. On immigration, he touches solely on the perspective of severely limiting or ending nonwhite immigration to the United States. Hatewatch was unable to find any examples of Miller writing sympathetically or even in neutral tones about any person who is nonwhite or foreign-born.

Miller has gained a reputation for attempting to keep his communications secret: The Washington Post reported in August that Miller “rarely puts anything in writing, eschewing email in favor of phone calls.” The Daily Beast noted in July that Miller has recently “cut off regular contact with most of his allies” outside the Trump administration to limit leaks.

Miller used his government email address as an aide to then-Sen. Jeff Sessions in the emails Hatewatch reviewed. He sent the majority of the emails Hatewatch examined before he joined Trump’s campaign in January 2016 and while he was still working for Sessions. Miller also used a personal Hotmail.com address in the emails and did so both before and after he started working for Trump. Hatewatch confirmed the authenticity of Miller’s Hotmail.com address through an email sent from his government address in which he lists it as his future point of contact:

“I am excited to announce that I am beginning a new job as Senior Policy Advisor to presidential candidate Donald J. Trump,” Miller wrote from his government email on Jan. 26, 2016, to an undisclosed group of recipients. “Should you need to reach me, my personal email address is [redacted].”

Katie McHugh, who was an editor for Breitbart from April 2014 to June 2017, leaked the emails to Hatewatch in June to review, analyze and disseminate to the public. McHugh was 23 when she started at Breitbart and also became active in the anti-immigrant movement, frequently rubbing shoulders with white nationalists. McHugh was fired from Breitbart in 2017 after posting anti-Muslim tweets. She has since renounced the far right.

McHugh told Hatewatch that Breitbart editors introduced her to Miller in 2015 with an understanding he would influence the direction of her reporting. For that reason, and because Miller would have regarded her as a fellow traveler of the anti-immigrant movement, McHugh sometimes starts conversations with Miller in the emails, seeking his opinion on news stories. Other times, Miller directly suggests story ideas to McHugh, or tells her how to shape Breitbart’s coverage. Periodically, Miller asks McHugh if he can speak to her by phone, taking conversations offline.

“What Stephen Miller sent to me in those emails has become policy at the Trump administration,” McHugh told Hatewatch.

 Yes, I realize that's a very long excerpt, but it's a very long article, so I feel justified. The article goes on to present a ton of disturbing and undeniably factual information that every American should be familiar with at some point, because Stephen Miller, not unlike William Barr and Trump, himself, is a dangerous criminal whose actions have led directly to untold human suffering and numerous deaths of children, and he belongs in the Big House, NOT the White House.

***

MINUTIA & INCONSEQUENTIA

• Well would you look at that! Hillary Clinton has once again been cleared after YET ANOTHER investigation into her emails, this time by Trump’s own State Department! It's enough to make one wonder whether they maybe only let her slide because of recent revelations about the Trump family's own myriad failures to follow protocols when it comes to the proper use, storage, and disposal of communication devices... especially when you're discussing the criminal extortion of an entire nation in order to receive a) bogus, foundationless "investigations" of your top rival in upcoming elections, and b) potential backing for for the most ass-backwards bogus fascist conspiracy theory in the history of fascist conspiracy theories?
• Have we, as a people, already moved beyond Trump's recent disastrous unilateral, overnight withdrawal from Syria, followed by Turkey's aggressive advantage-taking of the situation? All of which led to one of the most shocking developments in America's recent foreign policy history: the abject humiliation of an emergency blue ribbon task force made up of Vice President Pence, Secretary of State Pompeo, and a number of others, all furiously knocking on a door that wouldn't open for them in Ankara as the Turks refused to meet with the highest level envoys ever sent by USA? Historically unprecedented. Already left behind in the swirling mists of the 24 hour news cycle.
• Congratulations to (Dr.jur.) George Mentz, JD, MBA, CWM ®, Counselor of Law, Licensed Attorney – USA – Academy GAFM ® (and, yes, this is how George prefers to refer to himself, complete with all those acronyms and circled "R" symbols) upon his ascendancy to the Commission on Presidential Scholars! What is this Commission, you ask? Well, it's "a group of eminent private citizens appointed by the President to select and honor the Presidential Scholars. Commissioners are selected from across the country, representing the fields of education, medicine, law, social services, business, and other professions. The Commissioners make the final selection of the 161 Presidential Scholars. The Scholars demonstrate exceptional accomplishments in academics, the arts, career and technical education and an outstanding commitment to public service." And what did George do to get on this commission? Turns out he runs a diploma mill, wrote a lot of nice things about Trump on the wingnut website Newsmax.com, and has authored a number of books about the Illuminati! All the best people! 

***

THE BEST DESCRIPTION OF TRUMP EVER WRITTEN?

Someone on Quora recently asked "Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?" Nate White, an articulate and witty writer from England wrote a response that pretty much lays it all out in starkly accurate terms. I reprint it here for posterity's sake, because finding it on Quora isn't exactly easy:

A few things spring to mind. 

Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. 

For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed. 

So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump's limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief. 

Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever. 

I don't say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman. 

But with Trump, it's a fact. He doesn't even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty. 

Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers. 

And scarily, he doesn't just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness. 

There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It's all surface. 

Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. 

Well, we don't. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. 

And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. 

Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. 

He's not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. 

He's more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege. 

And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully.

That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead. 

There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down. 

So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think 'Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy' is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:

• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are.

• You don't need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.

This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss. 

After all, it's impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. 

God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. 

He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. 

In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump. 

And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish: 

'My God... what... have... I... created? 

If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set.

THREE EXAMPLES OF SERIOUS TRUMP CORRUPTION IN KAZAKHSTAN ALONE

Incredible work on this beat by the incomparable Rachel Maddow, as usual. You're going to want to stick with it until the very end, because the climax features a real ironic corker of a journalistic flourish that you're just gonna love.

PS - I know this story is from January 2018, but a lot of the (blistering, absolutely damning) information contained within it was new to me, and it's just so well presented (Maddow's occasionally irritating voice notwithstanding), that I just had to share it with y'all.

THE TRUE PSYCHOPATHY OF THE FASCIST BRAIN ON FULL DISPLAY

It's a short enough video so make sure you watch (and, more importantly, listen) until the very end. The sound of this "media friendly" white supremacist baring his true soul, while hardly surprising, is nevertheless illuminating.

NEVER FORGET WHAT YOU ALREADY FORGOT

ALL THE PREZNIT'S SCUMBAGS

In-fucking-credible.

AN INKTOBER OFFERING FOR Y'ALL!

Yes, I know that the tradition for "Inktober" is that you're supposed to create one drawing per day for the entire month... but who's got the time anymore?! Particularly with the world being in the state that it's in. Attention is forever drawn elsewhere, and it seems as though time just gets away from you. I haven't even really had a chance to catch up on my reading (be it literature, non-fiction, or even comic books), or even my movie watching (I've had Midsomar cued up and ready to go for two weeks now). 

Thankfully, however, I recently decided that I needed to get my drawing chops back, in order to get ready to work on some new personal projects. So I took a crack at drawing the leader of Cult 45, the man some call Preznit Trump! 

Here's how it turned out...

So that's how my first effort turned out, using nothing but a blue ball-point pen and drawing freehand, without a guide image of any kind. The results were okay. I felt a little rusty, and it shows, but I was sufficiently encouraged to give it a second go, this time basing it on one of my most hated photographs of the crusty orange slug-man, creating a light pencil guide image first, and then drawing over it with three different sizes of technical pens. Then I imported it into Photoshop and did a tiny bit of enhancement using the Oil Paint overlay style to smooth it all out. 

Here's how THAT one turned out...

Not bad, eh? Gotta admit, I'm actually VERY pleased with how this one came out! So pleased am I, in fact, that I believe I will continue to practice drawing (particularly my problem areas, like backgrounds, architecture, vehicles, weapons) from hereon out, hopefully until I get good enough to finally tackle some illustrated stories I've been wanting to tell over the years!

Who knows? Maybe I'll even start doing commission art for money! Got a fetish you'd like to see visualized? Let me know and maybe we can work out a deal! Y'all know the email address.

WHO'S WHO IN TRUMP'S LATEST SNAFU

SUGGESTED READINGS AND VIEWINGS ~ FRIDAY, OCT 18

The above comic, which presents the "arguments" of Alex Jones' fascism-adjacent sub-moronic lackey PeeJay Watson pretty much verbatim, is by Matt Bors. He's pretty great. Check out more of his work at his website.

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I COULDN'T HELP BUT NOTICE...

It's odd, isn't it?

Lie on a document to get your kid into a better school in a neighboring district, and you might end up getting arrested and cooling your heels in the hoosegow... especially if you're Black! 

Spend megabucks in an effort to bend the rules, or sweeten your spawn's CV in an attempt to score them a coveted spot at an Ivy League university, and you, too, might go to jail. Even if you're a celebrity!

But if you create a fraudulent "university" that bilks thousands of people out of millions of dollars in exchange for a big hairy box of Sweet Fuck All, except for the opportunity to be upsold even more worthless "programs" based not on their value, but on how much money you have in your bank accounts, or can get via various forms of credit... and you can become President of the United States of America. 

That's how sick, twisted, and generally fucked up things are these days. And it's got nothing at all to do with gay folks, or atheists, or the lack of guns in schools, or whatever stupid fucking bullshit it is that right-wingers believe might help to make things better.

Oh, hey, to all my Canadian friends and family... this Monday, you better get out and VOTE! And you better vote for the Liberal Party if you know what's good for ya! 

Heheh... I kid, I kid. But seriously... vote Liberal. Because independent auditors have proven that, when it comes to keeping election promises, Trudeau's record is actually pretty goddamn good.

R.I.P. JOE WILSON (1950~2019)

Joe Wilson has passed away of multiple organ failure. He was 69 years old.

For those who don't remember, Joe was one of the good guys during the dark days of the Bush administration, and he and his family suffered greatly for it. I won't go into details here, because there's a lot to go over, and the link provided below does an admirable job of covering it all.

However, I will say that Joe's work formed a substantial part of the background to my own attempts to untangle the realpolitik of the day, for a substantial daily readership (at its peak, numbering in the hundreds of thousands), back when I was E.I.C. of the fondly remembered and now all-but-wiped-from-the-pages-of-history Daily Dirt newsletter, circa 1999-2006.  And my work was the better for it.

If you don't remember Joe, please read this obituary. At the very least, it will remind you that there are good guys in every milieu, though sometimes very well hidden, and that therein sometimes lies our only hope.

MORE DISGUSTING REPUBLICAN SEX CRIMINALS

One of the most cognitively dissonant elements of American politics today involves the widespread conservative belief—propped up by sophisticated New Fascist International(e) psyops-disguised-as-conspiracy-theories such as PizzaGate and Q-anon—that the Democratic Party is brimming with Satanic covens of child-molesting, baby-eating witches and warlocks. Gullible members of Cult 45 drive themselves into frenzied, frothing apoplexy over the countless victims of these (non-existent) atrocities, while a significant plurality of this same demographic simultaneously declare that actual victims of real-life massacres either don’t exist, or else they’re “crisis actors” taking part in “false flag” events, made up to make gun nuts and the Far Right look bad.

When you actually dig into the reality behind the rhetoric, however, it starts to seem as though Republicans and other right-wingers aren’t just spreading these vicious, ludicrous lies to eke out a few more victories at the ballot box thanks to low information voters susceptible to the effects of fascist propaganda and Fake News*. Instead, it seems far more likely that they’re engaging in pre-emptive strikes designed to get ahead of the fact that, in truth, it’s actually Republicans who are—by a huge margin, and proven by a truly grotesque collection of undeniable empirical evidence—the party of perverts, sickos, pedophiles and penis crime.

We’re not talking amateurs and pikers here, either. The list of Republican Sex Monsters is as vast as it is terrifying, containing literally hundreds of judges, commissioners, councilmen, party activists, state reps, members of Congress, and even a few Senators, Secretary-level Executive Branch members, and a President or two, all engaging in the worst sorts of transgressions, in the process victimizing a small city’s worth of women, teens, pre-teens, and sometimes even (dear Christ almighty) infants and toddlers. The list even includes such Evil All-Stars as Ted Bundy, the BTK Killer, Lawrence E. King (who organized boysex parties at the White House in the 1980s!), and Philip Giordano—the Mayor of yours truly's hometown of Waterbury, Connecticut—who is currently serving a 37-year sentence in federal prison for repeatedly raping two sisters, aged 8 and 10.

Believe it or not, folks, that’s just scratching the surface. The above-linked list hasn’t been updated in far too long. In fact, this week alone, we’ve got two new entries to add to this disgusting parade of perverts.

First up, say hello to Pennsylvania state Senator (and chair of the state government committee) Michael Folmer! Mike was forced to hand in his letter of resignation on Wednesday, after police had conducted an investigation and decided to charge Mike with sexual abuse of children, possession of child pornography, and criminal use of a communication facility, all thanks to a tip from a concerned citizen who grew suspicious of some of Mike's more disturbing content on Tumblr.

Next up we've got Steve Pankey, who ran as a Trumpnik Republican in Idaho’s 2018 gubernatorial primary! Seems Steve has recently been declared a “person of interest” in the 1984 kidnapping and murder of 12-year-old Jonelle Matthews in Greeley, Colorado! Stevie claims that he only wants the truth to come out, and that he’s offered to take a polygraph, gave Greeley police his DNA, and is cooperating fully with authorities… but those authorities say different. They claim he’s been avoiding them at every turn, and that they haven’t even got around to asking for his DNA yet. Here's some more information on this bizarre, twisted case.

Meanwhile, it’s been 35 years, and poor Jonelle’s remains have yet to be located. Might I humbly suggest that, if there were any swamps around where Jonelle first went missing, they take a clue from Pankey’s own campaign posters?

*I mean REAL Fake News, and NOT the conservative movement’s bullshit re-branding of that term to mean any journalistic coverage of which they don’t fully approve.

BRETT KAVANAUGH, EXPOSED (EVEN MORE)

With all the high crimes and misdemeanors, fiscal improprieties, sex (and sexual assault) scandals, fraudulent business endeavors, the never-ending torrent of lies, the criminal conspiracies both foreign and domestic, and the excursions into ever more radical iterations of fascist rhetoric and legislation that have taken place under Preznit Trump, probably the event that has most disgusted and disturbed me over the past two-plus years was the way in which Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation to the Supreme Court was handled. This is an opinion I share with Esquire's mandatory political columnist, Charles Pierce.

The degree of vicious, enraged, privileged entitlement with which Kavanaugh and his Trumpnik backers bluffed and bullied past even the barest minimum of oversight, despite his obviously being a deeply damaged and dangerous psychopath—not to mention a wholly bought-and-paid-for agent of the New Fascist International(e), guaranteed to do their bidding regardless of what judicial norms they demand he destroy, or the awful precedents they demand he help set—felt like a historically important moment, wherein the Bad Guys decided to go all in and let their emotions guide their every action, no matter how brazen, bizarre, thuggish or creepy it caused them to come across.

The biggest tell was most definitely their faces, which were frequently twisted into masks of pure, unadulterated hatred, born of the deepest, most seething contempt imaginable... Contempt for Kavanaugh’s accusers, but perhaps more importantly, contempt also for the long-established processes meant to deal with such issues, and keep unqualified, compromised lunatics like Kavanaugh (and Trump!) as far away from the levers of power as humanly possible.

For instance, my gorge still rises at the sight of pretend-tough-guy Lindsay Graham, purple-faced and shrieking his outrage, spitting incoherent venom at any camera or microphone pointed in his general direction. That was instructive, as was the cavalcade of twisted, bizarre expressions forever waxing and waning across Kavanaugh’s crimson countenance, the sheer effort he put into holding himself back from leaping across the table and throttling his interrogators (especially the women) causing him to look for all the world like a man desperately trying not to transform into a werewolf.

And now, this week, just under a year after his shameful confirmation… we're learning even more about the black-out drunken alcoholic, misogynistic frat-boy super-jock “penis prank” and perjury enthusiast with a PTSD wife, quiet, flinchy kids and a bunch of bad credit card debts most likely paid off by Far Right elements around the same time he was nominated by Trump to a lifetime appointment to the highest court of the land… and it’s looking like—SURPRISE!!!—there actually was a bunch of corroborating evidence and contemporary witnesses to all the “nasty things” multiple women were accusing him of. And the FBI “investigation” that cleared him? It never fucking happened.

And so, only one question remains, as far as I’m concerned: America… what are y’all gonna do about this shit?