Trump Faces Crisis of Faith

Some call Trump the Artful Dodger (a clever play on his draft dodging days with disabling bone spurs) and some call him Don the Con. He's also been referred to as the Felon-in-Charge and the Grifter King.

Trump's ability to elude paying for his crimes and corruption is legendary. Teflon Don built up a following by posing as a strong man who could save America from the devilish democrats and immigrants who are invading the country. 

His harsh rhetoric riddled with lies appealed to a segment of Americans who felt disenfranchised and were searching for a savior. 

MAGA was born out of chaos. And that chaos was Trump breaking every rule, every law, and pursuing every perceived enemy with wild abandon.

For the last nine years Trump cultivated his cult like a gardener watering the weeds instead of the flowers. He nurtured white Nationalists, the KKK, and anti-government goons willing to do or say anything for him. His MAGA base swelled over the years and carried him to two terms in the White House.

Then the Jeffrey Epstein scandal rolled over Donny like a tsunami out of nowhere. In a panic he turned on his own base when they demanded all of the Epstein files be released and he called them weaklings. MAGA figured out Trump and Pam Bondi were lying to them about turning over all of the files. Worse, they defended their lies with new lies.

MAGA melted down. Some die-hard followers have limped back after attacking Trump for days. Either because of fear or they just had too much of the Kool aid for too long. 

But the bulk of MAGA nuts are still raging about Trump's betrayal. Their holy Epstein conspiracy that was going to expose Bill Clinton and a host of pedophile liberals went up in smoke instead. After nine years MAGA minions are now being told to not even talk about THE CONSPIRACY that provided a foundation for their whole MAGA movement.

Wait a moment.

Does this mean that Trump's very pissed off base is going to do everything they can to make him miserable? I suspect they're a vindictive bunch who will embarrass and harass him until he leaves the White House - and more than likely afterwards. Haters know how to hate.

The rest of the country is slowly realizing how vulnerable Trump has become with the growing Epstein scandal. Democrats are calling for transparency and demanding all Epstein files be released. The majority - an astounding 93% of Americans - polled about the scandal say Trump is trying to hide something.

In times like this Trump normally throws out bright and shiny objects to change the conversation in the news. However, the diversions have done little to change the subject. Even Trump's libel lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal and Fox News is boomeranging on him. If he follows through owner Murdock will be more than ready with the receipts. Real evidence.

Trump has to win back the trust of his followers. That's why he ordered the attorney general to seek the release of grand jury testimony in the Jeffrey Epstein case. The problem is the grand jury indictment will only be a sliver of the information that's still being concealed.

As it Stands, the bottom line is Trump betrayed his followers and there's going to be hell to pay.

The Day They Tore 'Ol Donny Down

This wasn't supposed to happen.

MAGA is at its zenith. The halls of Congress are MAGA-fied. 

Every government agency is MAGA-fied. The Oval Office was MAGA-fied with gold objects. Law firms and Universities are threatened by Trump and his corrupt MAGA lawyers. America has been MAGA-fied in six short weeks.

The takeover is nearly complete. Laws are broken with impunity. The Supreme Court keeps bailing Trump out and enabling his assault on the Constitution.

Trump has his own private army of thugs willing to invade people's homes and workplaces and kidnap them while wearing masks and carrying assault rifles.

MAGA minions supported the One Bigly Ugly Bill despite the fact it took away Medicare and SNAP programs from their constituents because Daddy told them to. Because they were loyal. Whatever Trump said was gospel.

Being loyal MAGA rats Trump's followers believed every conspiracy he brought up in the last nine years. From Russia, Russia, Russia to Jeffrey Epstein's client list of evil Democrats, they believed in him with all of their anti-government little hearts.

Trump loyalists even stood by him when he tried to stage a coup, believing his latest conspiracy that the 2020 election was rigged. Despite evidence to the contrary Trump supporters clung to his blatant lies like rats in life rafts on a turbulent ocean.

If there was one holy grail for his staunch followers, it was the Epstein saga. Bill Clinton and a host of Democrats were supposedly on a secret list that Epstein kept for his own purposes. It was the shining star of conspiracies and grew over the years into a massive expose waiting to happen.

Then Epstein supposedly committed suicide (during Trump's first term) while awaiting trial for sex trafficking of minor girls. Case closed right? Not so fast. The Trump narrative that the Deep State was covering for Democratic pedophiles took off like a rocket in the MAGAverse.

But, after a recent series of events that resurrected the Epstein scandal Trump turned on his most loyal followers this week and called them weaklings for wanting Pam Bondi to turn over the rest of the Epstein files and client list. 

She supposedly had the goods on the Democrats... right? What was the problem?

Shocked mega supporters quickly grew angry as they realized Trump had been lying all along. He was concealing the files to mask his complicity in sex trafficking with his buddy for 10 years. Now even some timid Republicans in Congress are asking for Bondi to release what whatever records she has on the Epstein case. Even MAGA Mike Johnson wants to see them.

Trump is beside himself with anger and is doing everything he can to divert from the Epstein story, even bringing up silly crap like Biden's use of an autopen (which by the way he uses too).

Sensing an opening Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein's accomplice who procured girls, is asking the Supreme Court for a retrial after being sentenced to 20 years in prison. Trump's goons quickly filed an appeal to squash the effort. The way I see it Maxwell could do one of three things if she doesn't get her retrial:

1. Ask Trump for a pardon. Agreeing to keep her mouth shut.

2. Ask to speak in front of Congress and spill the beans in the hope it'll reduce her sentence.

3.Talk to a reporter and give them ALL of the sordid details about Donny. 

It remains to be seen how many loyalists will still stay with him. Some MAGA critics like Charlie Kirk are pretending they don't care about what's going on - even after Kirk lost his mind about the betrayal to only change it a day later when Daddy called and threatened him.

As it Stands, Trump has managed to dodge trouble for the better part of his sordid life. It'll be interesting to see how this latest scandal plays out. 

The Perils of Laughter

There's nothing like a good laugh, right? 

Laughter is generally beneficial for your health, promoting stress reduction, improving your mood, and boosting your immune system.

In describing how hard someone laughed you may have heard the phrase, "He was dying from laughter." It's often used hyperbolically but what if there was some disturbing truth behind that phrase.

The fact is you can die from laughing. Death from laughter is a rare form of death, usually resulting from either cardiac arrest or asphyxiation, that has itself been caused by a fit of laughter. Dying from laughter has been recorded in ancient Greece right through modern times.

Three Recorded Examples...

Chrysippus, also known as "the man who died from his own joke," was a 3rd-century Greek philosopher who reportedly died of laughter after he saw a donkey eating his fermented figs; he told a slave to give the donkey undiluted wine to wash them down, and then, "having laughed too much, he died," according to Diogenes Laertius a local scribe.

Ole Bentzen was a Danish audiologist who found a scene in the movie A Fish Called Wanda so sidesplittingly funny that his heart rate rose to an estimated 250-500 beats per minute, leading to a heart attack as he laughed his way into the afterlife.

Alex Mitchell, from King's Lynn, England, died on March 24, 1975, laughing while watching the "Kung Fu Kapers" episode of The Goodies. After 25 minutes of continuous laughter, Mitchel slumped on the sofa and died from heart failure.

Three examples In Fiction...

"The Three Infernal Jokes," short story in The Last Book of Wonder (1916) by Lord Dunsany, is about three jokes "which shall make all who hear them simply die of laughter." 

"The Stand In," was an episode of the American comedy Seinfeld, which featured Jerry Seinfeld telling a joke to a hospital patient who then suddenly dies from laughter.

Who Framed Roger Rabbit, a 1988 fantasy comedy, had a scene where the weasels of the Toon Patrol literally die laughing.

So now that we have determined laughter is not always a good thing in large doses, we can take the necessary precautions although I don't know what that would entail. Stop laughing? I don't think so. Check with your doctor before going to see a comedy? Not practical. 

As it Stands, when you think about it dying from laughter may not be such a bad way to exit this life. I can certainly think of worse ways.