Is Trump Too 'Mainstream' for Today's GOP?

It's unthinkable. 

The godfather of political chaos, Trump, may be too mainstream for the Republican Party!

When the crazy caucus took over the House a new dynamic developed within the lairs of GOP lawmakers. Trump was rejected by a group of extreme crazies during the battle for Speaker of the House.

Top GOP loon tunes have turned their eyes away from Mar-a-Lardo and focused instead on their own core of head cases to come up with a new supreme leader for the party.

As evidence I point out Tim Miller, a onetime Republican National Chairman who recently told the press that Trump has certain weaknesses that are going to derail his 2024 campaign. 

Perhaps the most surprising flaw Trump faces is the perception that he went along with the establishment and pushed to develop a vaccine for COVID-19 and mitigation measures such as lockdowns in the early months of the pandemic.

Miller explained that Trump could get positioned as "Oh you went with the establishment, with the medical establishment, and the elites, when Ron DeSantis went in the other direction and listened to the people."

That's scary.

Who for even a moment thought the Great Grifter would become second banana (or worse) in his own cult? 

The former president who urged Americans to use hydroxychloroquine for off-label use to treat the coronavirus just isn't extreme enough for the new wave of insurrectionists now holding the House hostage.

This isn't a conversation I ever expected to see come up. The idea that there are GOP house members with that much power who are actually crazier than Trump takes a while to process.

It appears segments of Trump's cult has turned on him in search for a more extreme successor. 

As it stands, it's not good news having lunatic lawmakers searching for new lows to surpass their one-time mentor of chaos.

McCarthy Throws More Raw Meat to GOP Radicals and Makes Smoking Tabacco Great Again at the Capitol

The halls in Congress are reeking once again with the foul smell of cigarette smoke.

Reminiscent of the days of smoking in high school bathrooms and teacher lounges, House Republicans are allowing lawmakers to stink up their offices while sucking on their cancer sticks.

The new stench in the Capitol's hallways is evidence that GOP lawmakers have a majority in the House who want to turn the clock back and make tobacco great again.

Think about it. This makes the US Capitol one of the handful of places in Washington, DC, and among the few remaining office buildings in the country where smoking is allowed.

Since President Clinton signed an executive order in 1997 restricting smoking in federal buildings the cloying reek of nicotine had all but disappeared.

Smoking stinky cigars and cigarettes evokes recent memories of the old guard Republican House leadership back in the 1990s. 

Remember when the former House Speaker John Boehner smoked so many cigarettes that new carpets, a fresh coat of paint and an ozone machine were required when Paul Ryan took over his office?

The irony is as thick as a brick. The majority of Americans want clean air indoors.

But the minority extremists now squatting in the House are flipping off health experts and organizations like the American Lung Association and are now puffing away in the Capitol. 

It's just another example of a minority within the Republican Party holding the real reins of power in the House and their agenda to burn it down. 

As it stands, smoking in the Capitol is a sure sign of future fires.

Bigly Fox News Alert: Hunter Biden Has Been Visiting His Dad's House - and even Sleeping There - for Years

The cable TV network where truth dies daily - Fox News - released a stunning expose about Hunter Biden today.

You might want to check if kids are around before reading this shocking article. 

It turns out that in Hunter Biden's memoir published in April 2021, the president's son said he and other close family members spent election night on Nov. 3, 2020, at the Wilmington, Delaware home.

Okay. Then what?

Hunter recalled spending several days there with his parents - Melissa and the baby, his girls Natalie and Ashley and Howard.

"More than waiting together, we were also quarantined together. There was no escaping one another." 

Wait a minute!

Did you read that? It appears the family voluntarily quarantined together during the height of the pandemic sweeping the nation.

What depravity! Luckily Fox staffers Thomas Catenacci and Peter (the douchebag) Doocy uncovered the scandal last night. 

You may understandably be puzzled about what crime was committed.

The Fox narrative is that Hunter who is facing wide-ranging probes into his business dealings once noted (remember the memoir?) that he and family members QUARANTINED at his father's home where classified documents were recently found...

So? By insinuating Hunter was hiding classified documents with his name on them because he was there... is downright stupid and defamatory.

News flash for MAGA readers!

It's quite common for a son to visit his parents and family. Full stop. As a matter of fact, he's done that for years.

Twisting facts? You bet. Check out the lurid headline online:

Hunter Biden 'Quarantined' at Delaware House Where Classfied Docs Found: 'There was no escaping.'

It's obvious they tried to give a negative impression by just taking words from Hunter's book - "quarantined" and the line about "There was no escaping," and making them somehow appear sinister.

And that was just the headline. As you can imagine the following article was another MAGA fever dream full of falsehoods and nasty inuendoes.

In other words, just another daily dose of bullshit from the shameless network brought to you by an Australian billionaire who hates America.

As it stands, what would really be shocking is for Fox News to tell a straight news story without lying and catering to MAGA morons.

Insurrection Alert: Facebook and Twitter Looking at Restoring Trump to their Platforms and There's Nothing You Can Do to Stop Them

Elon Musk re-opened Twitter's door to traitor and insurrectionist Donald Trump last year.

Initially Trump told his minions that he wouldn't go back on Twitter even if he's invited because he has his own social media platform TRUTH Social. 

He also told his followers TRUTH Social was going to stand up to the tyranny of Big Tech.

The problem is TRUTH Social is close to financial collapse and is facing several investigations by federal prosecutors and security regulators. 

So, the chance that Trump throws his own company under the bus is increasing daily, especially for the opportunity to get back on one of the two biggest social media platforms in the country.

It would just be another example of Trump's lack of loyalty and impunity to his own cult members.

Meanwhile.

More bad news. Facebook-parent Meta is preparing to announce one of the most consequential decisions in the company's history, a landmark move that will set a precedent for online speech and could affect the course of the 2024 presidential election.

Should they restore Donald Trump to Facebook and Instagram, or not? 

A Meta spokesman today told reporters the decision will be announced in the coming weeks.

Both platforms banned Trump in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 coup attempt. At the time top tech executives felt Trump would incite more violence.

Finally.

There's nothing you can do about it if they both choose to release Donny boy on their platforms.

Why? The best explanation is because of Section 230's shield wall protecting bad actors. 

Section 230 is a section of Title 47 of the United States Code that was enacted as part of the United States Communications Decency Act and generally provides immunity for website platforms with respect to third-party content.

At its core, Section 230(c)(1) provides immunity from liability for providers and users of an "interactive computer service" who publish information provided by third-party users:

"No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." - Wikipedia

Congress is afraid of Big Tech. All the lawmakers' efforts to hold them accountable have failed because of their powerful lobbies.

As it stands, we better hope democracy prevails in stopping domestic terrorists like Trump from using public platforms to spread insurrection and promote extreme right-wing ideology.

Hemp High Breakthrough: Delta-8 THC Converted from CBD's - Good or Bad?

Have you heard of delta-8 THC?

The product emerged in the last couple of years among consumers as an alternative choice to getting high from legal and illegal marijuana.

Delta-8 THC is a component of the cannabis plant. Consumers are increasingly taking advantage of the fact it's listed under hemp and therefore legal. It's also cheaper than legal cannabis.

You can even order delta-8 THC via the mail making it an attractive alternative to buying THC-9 cannabis from the illegal market.

So far everything sounds groovy for consumers, right? Not so fast. There are always two sides to a story.

There's a question of safety involved. 

It takes a proficient and experienced chemist to ensure the safe conversion of CBD molecules into THC molecules. Inappropriate or imprecise techniques could potentially result in dangerous impurities in the final product.

In a recent report from the Brightfield Group, a marijuana analytics company, the demand for hemp-driven products has skyrocketed.

The new super star - delta-8 - has created a $2 billion-dollar industry in the last two years. It's also created problems.

Some retailers of the product avoid clarifying to buyers that the compound is derived from hemp and the possibility of something bad happening is greater than buying legal delta-9 products.

In addition, the report warns that the rising popularity of delta-8 THC in areas where cannabis is still illegal could negatively affect potential support for cannabis reform.

The fact of the matter is there's an unregulated, psychoactive hemp-driven product flooding the cannabis market.

The Food and Drug Administration and Center for Disease Control have issued warnings to companies illegally selling delta-products online.

The key to this gray area lies in the passage of the 2018 federal Farm Act that legalized hemp. Delta-8 hasn't had to deal with the same testing requirements as cannabis. The result was a legal loophole.

As it stands, the Farm Act is up for renewal this year and we'll find out if this legal loophole lasts or is closed.

Is There Anything Americans Are United About?

Some Americans celebrated Martin Luther King's birthday yesterday and his legacy of fighting for freedom and equality.

Some didn't. 

The question is what are American's united over?

We're certainly not united in protecting democracy against the rising tide of fascism embraced by the MAGA cult.

We can no longer agree on what's fact or fiction.

The gap between Americans who live in the real world, or an alternative universe continues to get wider.

Right-wing politicians use the power of the Big Lie without feeling shame. They've normalized lying to the point it's no longer a problem, but actually an asset in Trump world.

Americans are so divided over climate change that we'll never be able to take the right actions to mitigate it.  

Polls show how politized the Supreme Court has become under the conservative majority of justices. 

The majority of people in the country don't trust the Supreme Court and see it as corrupted. But there are others who are pleased to see their radical agenda getting closer to reality.

There was actually a time when the majority of Americans wouldn't hesitate to defend freedom in countries across the world. 

But now we are divided over supporting Ukraine in the fight for democracy against Russian invaders.

Division over wearing face masks during the height of the pandemic resulted in over 1 million Americans dying... and counting.

I have to admit that I can't think of one thing Americans are united over. If you have a suggestion, please share. 

As it stands, it feels strange calling us the United States of America when clearly, we're not!

'Wokeism' Turns into a Republican Fever Dream

If you ask a Republican to define wokeism they will have trouble giving you a straight answer.

The fact is wokeism is a disparaging term that conservatives have appropriated and polluted to avoid talking about real history that makes whites look bad. 

Since the political term wokeism oozed out of the dark corners of the internet propaganda machine Republicans have tried to change the original meaning into an attack adjective.

The dictionary defines wokeism as promotion of liberal progressive ideology and policy as an expression of sensitivity to systemic injustices and prejudices.

Those Republicans who can read the dictionary carefully avoid looking up the term because it exposes what hypocrites they are.

It's much easier to live in a fever dream where wokeism is misused in right-wing circles and bubbles. Where equality only applies to whites. Where social injustices are ignored to further Trumpism/aka fascism.

Some Background.

In some varieties of African American English, woke is used in place of woken, the usual past participle form of wake. The term first came up when used by folk-singer-songwriter Lead Belly in 1938 in his song "Scottsboro Boys." It was a story about nine black teenagers who were falsely accused of raping two white women.

Examples.

The newly elected GOP governor of Arkansas Sarah Huckabee spent her first day on the job signing executive orders attacking wokeism (spelled out in the documents) and the popular use of Latinx to describe Hispanic women in the LGTBQ community.

In Florida Governor DeSantis has made a name for himself by corrupting the state education system with anti-woke bullshit. The history students in Florida are now only getting selected parts of American history that favor whites.

As it stands, it's no wonder why so many Americans consider Republicans domestic terrorists seeking to destroy our democracy. They've earned the sobriquet by their actions.

We Better Get Used to It: America is at War... With Itself

As predicted the New Year brought in absolute chaos when the Republicans reclaimed the House of Representatives.

After another weary week of political bombshells Americans are once again under siege with misinformation and outright lies.

A cultural chasm has opened up further this year dividing Americans into two separate warring camps where compromise is impossible. 

Both sides are seeking political retribution against the other for past and present grievances... to the detriment of governing the nation.

We found out that having classified documents in private homes after leaving office is almost a common occurrence in Washington. 

After discovering a trove of secret government documents in Trump's Florida retreat, we found out last week Biden had at least one top secret document and 10 other classified documents in his private garage.

Which makes me wonder if other prior presidents have classified documents that they shouldn't have? Either out of intent, or unknowingly because staffers accidently put them in with other files while packing up for their departure from the White House?

And what about The National Archives roll in these displaced government documents? They're also guilty for apparently not doing their job assuring their security. 

To be clear, Biden has cooperated with the DOJ and FBI in the resulting investigation from the start, unlike Trump who has been obstructing his investigation daily for over a year and will likely be criminally charged for it by the Special Counsel and AG Garland.

It's a false equivalent. Right-wing media is muddying up the facts of Biden's investigation with a landslide of lies that have been imported to the Republican House where they quickly launched their own investigations into the president's role in having classified documents.

That despite the fact that AG Garland has appointed a Special Counsel to investigate why Biden had them in the first place.

The one thing we can bet on is this new twist in the handling of classified documents (that now appear to be an ongoing situation for years) is going to be the basis for whataboutism when it comes to sentencing Trump.

Biden's case will be forever etched in right-wing mythology - regardless of whether it's true or not.

It helps to bear in mind this is a war between MAGA nation and the rest of the country. The stakes are high enough to threaten our republic's existence. 

As it stands, we're only halfway through the first month of 2023 and it feels like a full year of chaos already.

When the Penalty for Felony Convictions is Not a Real Penalty Something is Wrong

Big news!

The Trump Organization was fined $1.6 million for running a decade-long tax fraud scheme.

A New York judge handed down the penalty for 17 felonies, including tax fraud and falsifying business records today.

What a farce! 

Fining the Trump Organization, a measly million bucks is chump change. Even worse, political pundits point out that Trump may be able to write the fine off on his income taxes!

In other words, this penalty (if you can call it that) isn't going to cost Trump a penny. It'll be a push on his books. Not to mention that Trump himself suffered no consequences for his own company's criminality.

This is not justice.

The prosecutor Joshua Steinglass admitted that the penalty will have minimal impact on a multi-million-dollar company.

If that's a fact, why was this investigation ever launched? It cost taxpayers millions to convict the Trump Crime family only to see a ridiculously small penalty and no accountability for Trump and his corrupt children.

New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg told reporters after the court's decision that the fine wasn't big enough.

"I want to be very clear - we don't think the fine was appropriate. Our laws in this state need to change in order to capture this type of decade-plus systemic, egregious fraud," Bragg told reporters.

What we now know.

--Trump's real estate business is not at risk of being dismantled because there is no mechanism under the law to dissolve the company. 

--Trump and his family were not charged with any crimes.

--The Manhattan district attorney's office is continuing to investigate the company's business practices.

--The biggest threat to the Trump Organization is currently New York Attorney General Letitia James $250 million-dollar civil lawsuit against Trump and his children.

--James is seeking to permanently bar Trump and his offspring from serving as director of a business registered in New York State. 

She's also seeking to cancel the Trump Organization's corporate certificate, which if granted by a judge, could effectively force the company to cease operations in New York state. 

--The trial won't be until October.

It appears James's case against the Trump crime family will have more teeth to the possible penalties for conviction.

But there's still one glaring omission... Trump and his family aren't personally going to suffer for their crimes. No jail time. Just some hits on their finances which we now know can be written off on their tax statements.

As it stands, when will Teflon Don actually be held accountable for his serial state and federal crimes? It sure doesn't look like it's going to be soon.  

America is Exporting Fascism Instead of Freedom

Once upon a time - before the Trump era -America was known for exporting freedom.

We we're considered the beacon of Democracy across the planet. People from every country wanted to come to America, the land of the free. They still do.

But now we have domestic terrorists working with other countries like Brazil to install authoritarian regimes. Leading the charge is Steve Bannon, a Trump-pardoned criminal who helped the former president get elected.

When Brazil's leader Jair Bolsonaro recently lost his election he ran to Miami, Florida.

His son Edwardo went straight to Mar-a-Lago to consult with seditionist experts Trump and Steve Bannon on how to stage a coup. They both had ties to the Bolsonaro family that go back for years.

Bolsonaro and Trump had one thing in common. To install a fascist-style government with themselves as lifetime leaders. Bannon's mission was to help them and any other insurrectionists around the world achieve their goals. Burn baby, burn.

That bond was never more apparent than when Bolsonaro minions stormed Brazil's government buildings demanding the new president step down because he rigged the elections, recently.

It was a Latin American replay of Bannon and Trumps attempt to disrupt a legal election with lies and dark money on Jan.6th.

The coup playbook penned by Bannon as a blueprint for insurrection is circulating among other countries where democracies are under fire even as you read this.

Between Bannon's global efforts to burn down democracies and the rising numbers of White Supremacists in the nation exporting violence and racism, America has become a breeding ground for right-wing ideologies intent on exporting hate and fascism.

The world is watching the creeping chaos with concern about how it will eventually affect them. Lady Liberty's torch is dimming more every day.

With the House takeover by Republicans, we're seeing a litany of frivolous investigations spring up from the sewers of QAnon and traitor lawmakers who tried to overturn our electoral system in 2020.

We don't have a united Congress. What we do have is a war between a Democratic Senate and the Republican House of Representatives that's threatening the very foundations of our republic.

As it stands, we must reestablish our reputation as defenders of freedom and democracy by not voting for right-wing insurrectionists in the next election.

GOP House Members Assault Democracy: Meet the Insurrectionist Protection Committee

When Republicans narrowly took over the House it was a guaranteed shitshow.

The public now has a front row seat to all the upcoming attempts to dismantle our government by MAGA minions who put McCarthy in their pockets.

With ultra MAGA minion Jim Jordan chairing the Judiciary Committee it was no secret he was not only going to protect Trump in any way possible, but that he would be sending heat-seeking missiles at the Democrats and established rules of law.

As Jordan puts together a subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government their mission will be to attack President Biden, the FBI, Merrick Garland, and the Department of Justice.

The opening salvo is putting insurrectionists like Scott Perry on the committee to oversee their own criminal cases being investigated by Special Counsel Jack Smith.

To no one's surprise Jordan is also protecting his ass because the Jan.6 committee was investigating him.

The House resolution authorized the 13-members to allow Jordan to subpoena the Justice Department about its inquiries into Trump's fail coup attempt and handling of classified documents.

If this doomsday committee is granted access to records normally restricted to Congressional intelligence committees, the GOP-majority panel could potentially have the authority to investigate the Justice Department, even as the department investigates lawmakers' actions concerning Jan. 6 insurrection.

That will never happen. They might as well pound sand. Despite MAGA fever dreams to the contrary the MAGA rats are going to be up against reality.

That reality is they'll lose every court challenge to the FBI and DOJ because their dealing in facts and evidence and the Insurrection Protection Committee is pushing lies and conspiracy theories.

The DOJ has spent decades resisting similar attacks. In 2000, the department issued a response to congressional inquiries, known as the "Linder Letter" that outlined its staunch position against sharing information related to criminal matters.

After four years of Trump and his administration seeking to cripple the Justice Department the die was cast. The feds aren't going to fold. They didn't when the GOP had both the House and Senate and they won't now.

The political flotsam that surfaces during the upcoming court battles will undoubtable dismay mainstream America. 

As it stands, watching traitors trying to destroy our Justice system in the next two years is going to be very difficult.