Speaker7 Solves the Deficit

The U.S. deficit is ballooning, you guys, almost as if it’s been feeding itself a steady diet of fast food hamberders. For some reason the $1.5 trillion dollar tax cut in 2017 isn’t to blame even though that caused the deficit to grow by 17 percent. How else was U.S. Rep Vern Buchanan going to pay for his $3.25 million yacht that he bought after the tax cut passed?

No the problem are the freebies that are given out to those worthless old people and those useless sick people, among others. And the wall. I mean the lack of wall or there is a wall, but it’s a fence or it’s not a fence, it’s beautiful concrete or it’s not or it is or there’s a caravan or there isn’t, but those goddamned old people and sick people with their insistence on eating food and living in shelters, the nerve.

This is some serious stuff. Do we cut off programs that save millions from destitution and an early grave or do we prevent winners from buying less yachts? You see the struggle.

I’m not a legislator, but I do see a way out of this problem that won’t entail a resurgence of poor farms and no-yacht support groups.

Hear me out.  The population of the United States is around 325 million. If you add in the 3 million who Trump claimed voted illegally for Hillary Clinton in California and the 25 million illegals he invented in a tweet then the population is, like, more.

Like 350 million hamberders. What if we made those 350 million hamberders an offer they couldn’t refuse? Like for instance, if you give the federal government $5, the federal government would let you punch Sen. Mitch McConnell in the face?

It make sense. He says and does horrible things. His face is very punchable. We have a deficit, and I’ve been wanting to take a round kick to that face for a long time, and I don’t think I’m alone.

I came to this brilliant idea watching Mitch give a speech on the Senate floor about a democratic proposal to turn Election Day into a federal holiday. Mitch would occasionally pause and swallow his lower lip as he guffawed about voting barriers being eliminated.

Mitch saw this proposal as a “political power grab.”

When I think of those unpurchased yachts, it makes me want to punch something.

Like Mitch McConnell’s face.

I have $100 saved for this venture. Won’t you please join me?

 

Let Them Eat Wilbur

With the government shut down heading into its second month, many federal workers are facing hardship, but none so much as Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.

Ross, who looks like a less handsome Admiral Ackbar, is struggling, you guys. He’s having to take breaks from looking into ways to suppress the latino vote to think about why unpaid government workers need to use food pantries.

“Can’t the cook just make a white truffle and gold pizza from the basic pantry items?” Ross wondered as he opened bottle after bottle of $225,000 Chateau Margaux only to pour them out over a cleaning lady who is incidentally an unpaid federal worker.

“My doomsday bunker in New Zealand has a year’s supply of high-end ice cream made from the breast milk of albino sherpas. I’m at a loss as to why they don’t access the foodstuffs from their doomsday bunkers in New Zealand?” he asked as he painted his own visage into Renoir’s Le Moulin de la Galette.

“Can they not just steal millions from their business partners and hide it with bogus paperwork and exchange those stolen millions for food products? It boggles my brain that those people who do those things….what are they called now? When you go into an office and someone hands you a sack of money with a dollar sign on it? Grifting?”

Ross suggested the helpful notion of taking out a loan to pay bills. “Sure there’s a bit of interest, but then you just steal from your business associates and problem solved,” he said before diving into a bathtub full of $1,000,000 bills.

Lara Trump, whose father-in-law received at least $413 million in today’s dollars from his own dad so he could piss it away on shitty business deals, also weighed in on the government shut down.

“Listen, it’s not fair. I know that. I married the least intelligent Trump and that is saying something,” Lara Trump said. “But this sacrifice, this inability to pay your bills and take care of your family will be so worth it because I’m on tv right now. It’s a win-win.”

“I know they have things to pay for like porn stars’ silence and playboy bunnies’ silence. But those are what your charities or campaign donations are for,” she added.

It may seem a bit tone-deaf for multimillionaires whose bosses/father-in-laws started this whole mess and could end it in a heartbeat, to be commenting on the struggle of actual people. But that’s because these people are giant assholes.

Don’t just take my word for it.

 

 

 

Looking for the Best Men

There’s a reason why Ted Cruz has a beard. He’s ready to start his second killing spree as the Zodiac Killer. He’s not going to let some razor tell him he can’t sexually subjugate women and brutalize weaker men. This person knows what I’m talking about:

Damn straight. I want my men made of meat and as violent as possible, please.

For the bearded or those who don’t live their life on Twitter–I’m in the former category–I will catch you up to speed. Gilette ran a commercial today about toxic masculinity and teaching boys to not succumb and, as expected, some people lost their minds. Some people took offense that the various scenarios within the commercial, e.g. men sexually harassing, a man man-splains and a group of boys beat the shit out of boy, were portrayed as negative.

Hey, didn’t you go to prison for accepting a bribe?

I know, I know. You want to be able to raise your son the way you want to raise him so that one day he will be sitting at his Supreme Court nomination hearing crying about a calendar, reminiscing about lifting with Squi and angry bellowing to the high heavens about how much he likes beer.

I’ll admit it’s a little hard to empathize. My experiences with advertising are all about making me my best self if I could just lose some weight; get bigger breasts; age in reverse; bring home the bacon and do all the domestic duties; make my teeth whiter and my face less ugly; lose more weight; febreeze my vagina; and disappear once I turn 35. So I don’t know what I would do if my Bic For Her pen ran some commercial saying the emphasis on a woman’s appearance and the objectification of women is a big pile of fermented shaven beard hair.

Oh, I know!

 

I’m going to write something pretty controversial for an object that has no use in the world.

Misogyny is a real thing. It’s the reason why we have yet to see a woman become president. It’s the reason why when a woman tries to run for president, we get think pieces on whether or not she’s likable enough (she never is).

This is why a country rejected and raged against an accomplished stateswoman who used a private email server and collectively shrugged at a man denigrating entire swaths of people, having close ties to mobsters, and showing a remarkable lack of knowledge and interest in about anything other than fast food hamburgers. This is why we have this:

The only thing this commercial has illuminated is that we have a long way to go in breaking free of engendered stereotypes. This person knows what I’m talking about:

Or maybe not.

Can you even see this post since it was written by an older woman?

Listen up. I’ve got a few more years to be lovable and I’m not going to waste them. I didn’t realize that when a woman hit 50, she ceased to elicit any feelings of any kind except the feeling of ewwww.

But apparently it’s a thing and it’s total science, like it’s up there with the time President Donald Trump said California only needed to rake its forests to prevent fires. That’s why his announcement today to cut all FEMA funding to California for wildfire management makes science sense.

But enough about that brilliant man, let’s get to this brilliant man. Of course this assessment comes from a man (obvs since men do science and women do nails) who knows stuff because he’s like 50 and all wizened with the wisdom that comes for 50 years of being encouraged to open his man hole and spout his man knowledge.

French author Yann Moix told Marie-Claire, the French version, that he can’t even see women 50 and over. That’s likely because eyesight is one of the first things to go as one ages. And he’s 50.

Younger bodies were more interesting, he mused as his increasingly aging balls sagged even lower.

“I like them. They way they have tits and ass, and I think that is all. There is a face? Maybe?” he said, getting up from the couch his knees snapping and creaking from the effort. He grunted a painful “Oof” and rubbed his knees. Jesus Christ, his knees ached. He wondered if it was gout from all the foie gras he consumed.

Gout affects older men. Yann Moix is 50.

“I like bodies, preferably Asian bodies,” he stated as he realized he peed a little in his pants. His prostate pressed against his bladder; these “accidents” seemed to keep happening more often.

Because he is 50.

He continued to pontificate about his Asian preferences as if he were talking about an assortment of Starbursts™ and non-Asian women 50 and over are the orange and yellow ones. And the Asian women 50 and over are the orange and yellow ones.

He said he was the prisoner of his tastes, one that preferred women to come to him in a box with different parts that he could assemble like a younger body Asian potato head.

“I don’t have to answer to any taste police,” he harpied as the bile rose in the back of his throat. Heartburn becomes more prevalent as one ages.

And Yann Mois has a non-young, non-Asian body that is 50 and possibly invisible.

“Maybe older women could provide some use, no? If they could go to some factory and be grounded up into dust that could be used to make younger Asian bodies?” He stopped for a minute and shuddered. “Still disgusting. And unlovable.”

Mois left the Marie Claire offices and stumbled onto the sidewalk. Unable to see the crush of 50-year-old bodies, but yet could feel something non-younger pressing against him. He panicked and ran into the street, and was promptly run over by an Uber driven by a non-Asian 57-year-old woman.

“I couldn’t see him,” she told police.

 

She said WHAAAATTT?!?!?!?!

I am in a state of shock so it is a bit difficult to write. Something happened that shook the heavens, unspooled the thread of human progress and destroyed a child named Caden’s sense of wonder.

A woman said the word “mother father.”

Okay, so that’s not exactly what she said, but any time I’ve tried to write what she actually said, I go into a Bird Box-like trance and reach for the scissors to plunge into my neck. I look at my child and cry for his lost innocence.

This woman, who’s name I have trouble pronouncing and appears to be a terrorist, was using such vulgarities in speaking about President Donald Trump, declaring she wished to impeach him. Trump rightfully stated that he thought her comments were disgraceful and that she dishonored herself and her family.

It’s as if she has no idea how to act diplomatically. She wouldn’t know the first thing about mimicking a disabled reporter, mocking a sexual assault survivor and eagerly embracing a parade of murderous dictators.

America is known for its strong sense of civility, its adherence to respect and decency, and its keen awareness of what designates a country as shithole or not. We hold these truths to be self evident: some women are pigs and others bleed from their wherevers.

And now this? This is what we are? A nation that must contend with a freshman lawmaker using vulgarity? We, of course, must analyze this indefinitely unless Sen. Elizabeth Warren does something else to increase her unlikeability. These are the only two issues affecting this tremendous nation. Well, and the emails. Not Ivanka’s, but Satan’s Hillary’s.

I mean, grab me by my pussy, but this dishonors all who serve this great nation. Get that son of bitch off the field, am I right.

Is this what will be our eventual demise? Apart from the inevitable economic collapse from reckless tax cuts; the continued degradation of our environment and increase in catastrophic weather events; a president who has no understanding of foreign policy, democracy and the correct temperature to cook meat; gun violence that shows no sign of abating, I say yes, yes this profanity is what will do it.

Thanks, Obama.

Strange Country Podcast

Ever wonder why NYC firefighters call some properties “Collyer mansion?”

What about the legend of Lizzie Borden…did she really hatchet up her dad and stepmother and get away with it in what was the trial of that century?

Did you know that two young girls were responsible for creating the modern spiritualism movement by stating they could communicate with Mr. Splitfoot? He was super dreamy.

If these are the kind of stories you like, then Strange Country is for you. Co-hosts Kelly and Beth are former reporters turned librarians who love a good story–the stranger the better.

Strange Country is available for download at iTunes, Google Play and Stitcher Radio. Subscribe and listen often, and if you like what you hear, tell your friends or the hermit who lives in a cave near you. And if you have a story to share…say the time you saw Bigfoot make out with the Loch Ness Monster, then send  your tale to strangecountrypodcast@gmail.com

Thanks for listening.

PS – Trump is a giant turdmonster

Trumpsgiving

Thanksgiving is a time to connect with family members you likely have nothing to do with on a daily basis. These may be the same family members you unfollowed on social media after flooding your news feed with an assortment of memes:

But now, here you are. Face-to-face. For a long dinner that will include lots of alcohol.

Should you discuss politics?

Well….

Remember Thanksgiving was officially designated a federal holiday in 1863 in the midst of the Civil War. Relatives fought on opposite sides, firing cannons into each other’s faces.  Imagine how awkward those Thanksgiving gatherings might have been?

But this was also the time when the telegraph was the Twitter of the day. News moved more slowly and there was no such thing as “news of the day” or “24-hours news cycle” or Dr. Phil’s giant screaming head.

Ahh. . . the good ole days. Of course penicillin was not discovered yet, but still at least Americans, for the most part, agreed on the same set of facts.

That’s what makes it so difficult to discuss politics at a Trumpsgiving dinner. You are approaching the conversation with a different set of facts fed to you by your local Google algorithm then your uncle who eagerly shared the pope’s endorsement of Trump.

Best to avoid the topic all together. Stick to neutral topics like:

• Mannequin Challenge – Now that the olds, like me, know about it, is it time to discontinue? (Answer: yes)
• Cereal aisle in supermarkets – Too much choice or not enough choice? Possible side topic: Were Sugar Smacks the grossest cereal? (Answer: yes)
• Other relatives – As in, do we have any relatives who live outside the states that I can possibly bunk with?

Now pass the carving knife.

Everything is Going to Be A-Okay

The United States presidential election is over. And while this campaign turned democracy into something you would scrape off in disgust from your shoe, one in five eligible American voters chose Donald J. Trump as our 45th president. That is less than the 25 percent of Americans who believe the Sun revolves around the Earth.

You may be part of the other 20 percent who voted for Hillary Clinton or the 30 percent who didn’t vote at all and are now expressing regret as you see Trump loading up his cabinet with an assortment of Dick Tracy villains. But don’t worry, everything is going to be a-okay.

How do I know this? Because I just wrote it and that’s how the spread of information works. I write it, it gets passed along and becomes truth.

Even Kathleen Parker, columnist for The Washington Post, wrote an opinion piece titled “Calm down. We’ll be fine no matter who wins” a few days before the election. The point of the piece was “I’m a rich, white heterosexual woman past the point of ever needing an abortion so I’ll be cool–like all of us.”

She also opined that Trump won’t do any of the things he said he would on the campaign trail. He will rise to the position. And she’s obviously right.

Yes, it’s true that Trump said he wanted to close mosques after the terrorist attacks in Paris, then called for banning all Muslims from entering the U.S., and then called for creating a Muslim registry, then called for suspending any immigration from nations compromised by terrorism, but he’s not actually going to do any of those things. I know Trump wants Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn to be his national security advisor–an appointment that does not require Congressional approval–and Flynn has said “a fear of Muslims is rational” and has compared Islam to cancer. And yes, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach is advising the Trump transition team and he created such a database while working under the George W. Bush administration and has said recently that Trump will be doing this. But words and actions don’t necessarily translate into words and actions, right. So it’s cool. Everything will be a-okay.

It’s like when Voldemort and the Deatheaters took over the Ministry of Magic. They became chill and worked on improving infrastructure and Muggle relations. Or I think that’s what happened, I never read the books.

I know Trump began his campaign generalizing Mexican immigrants as raping drug fiends, and in his Republican convention speech made it sound like America (i.e. white people) was under siege by murdering, marauding illegal immigrants (non-Western European people). And, true, he continued to use coded language on the campaign trail that made white supremacists swoon, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to continue that invective in the Oval Office.

Not possible.

I mean, remember how powerful it was when Trump called a pressie and announced that President Obama was born in the United States after spending five years saying the complete opposite and then blamed Hillary Clinton for starting that rumor?

That was so….presidential? Sure, let’s go with that because everything is going to be a-okay.

Sure Trump did select Steve Bannon as his chief advisor, a man connected to a news site that was a platform for the alt-right movement, a loosely connected group of white supremacists, anti-semites and men’s rights activists, among other super fun people. And okay,  Jeff Sessions, Trump’s pick for attorney general, was denied a federal judgeship because of his history of racist remarks, including but not limited to, saying the Ku Klux Klan was okay until he learned they smoked marijuana. And true, if you were to ask a police sketch artist to draw a stereotypical Southern racist, the sketch artist would draw Sessions’ face–that still doesn’t mean the Trump Administration will engage in racist behavior.

See this is what happens when you are about to hold the most powerful office in the world. You do a complete 180 and change every personality trait you have held your entire life.

It’s like the quote from that guy…was it Shakespeare? Or the really calm dude who writes the Dilbert cartoons? I don’t know….I digress…..anyway, that quote: “Absolute power corrupts no one, in fact, it makes people act like Gregory Peck in To Kill a Mockingbird.”

See? We’re fine. Everything is fine. Nothing to see here folks.

 

 

Fuck. I’m back.

So Donald Trump is president-elect.

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuccccccckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk.

 

Orange Fury

I watched Donald Trump’s speech Thursday at the Republican National Convention. It was…uh…good? I’m afraid I don’t know what words mean anymore. It was definitely loud, I’ll give him that. Lots and lots of yelling. I felt like I was back in 9th grade band.

I had not realized that America had become the Thunderdome, a hellish landscape filled  with marauding gangs of illegal immigrants in place of bikers. Um, okay?

It was a laundry list of a country in crisis. While it was low on information and high on fear mongering, it had little in how Trump will actually accomplish anything other than by saying “believe me, I’ll do this.”

I’m sorry, but I don’t believe you.

I condensed the best parts of the speech:

He insisted he would honor us with his “truth.”

His obvious affection for the GLBTQ community

His “policies”.

He declared he was the voice of the voiceless.

A few other gems:

And finally:

I don’t know. It kind of smells like napalm.