Cheers and Jeers: Monday

The President’s Official Monday Agenda

He will not be taking questions.

Good luck today, electors. We’re all counting on you.

Cheers and Jeers for Monday, December 14, 2020

Note: Now available in your local grocer's deli section: fresh, crispy Good King Wences Slaw. Pick some up today! (And Baby Jesus reminds you: don’t forget your mask.)

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By the Numbers:

7 days!!!

Days 'til winter: 7

Percent of Americans polled by Gallup who believe the pandemic is getting worse: 73%

Percent of lower-income Americans who say they skipped medical care or prescriptions because of the cost this year, far and away the highest of 11 industrialized countries surveyed by the Commonwealth Fund: 50%

Percent in Canada, the UK, and Germany, respectively, who said the same thing: 21%, 12%, 15%

Percent of Americans polled by Quinnipiac who say they are and are not, respectively, optimistic about the incoming Biden administration: 56%, 37%

Senate vote count—a veto-proof majority—on the defense bill that would, among other things, rename military bases currently named after Confederate traitors: 84-13

Minimum number of minutes the Hanukkah candles should burn each night: 30

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Puppy Pic of the Day: Getting down to the nation’s business…

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CHEERS to granting a little boy's wish. I don’t normally pay attention to Donald Trump's tweets, but these three—condensed for your convenience—from last week bear special significance, given the turmoil in which we found ourselves after the November3rd election:

How can you give an election to someone who lost the election by hundreds of thousands of legal votes in each of the swing states? How can a country be run by an illegitimate president?

THE BIG ONE!!!

If the Supreme Court shows great Wisdom and Courage, the American People will win perhaps the most important case in history, and our Electoral Process will be respected again! The Supreme Court has a chance to save our Country from the greatest Election abuse in the history of the United States.

This is the big one!

On Friday evening, just in time for the network newscasts, the Supreme Court ruled 9-0 to put a stop to the attempted coup led by the Texas attorney general and signed onto by 17 red states (plus "New California" and "New Nevada"), 106 Republicans in Congress, and the entire right-wing media machine. So to recap:

» The election won't be given to someone who lost by hundreds of thousands of legal votes

» The country won’t be run by an illegitimate president after January 20th

» The American People did win perhaps the most important case in history

» Our electoral process is respected again

» The Supreme Court, including Trump's three appointees, did save our country from the greatest election abuse in the history of the United States

» This was, in fact, the big one!

So congratulations, one-term impeached lame-duck president Donald J. Trump. You got all of your wishes fulfilled Friday night. Feel free to take the rest of the day off to watch TV, stuff your face with McDonald's, and tend to your Twitter addiction. Because why disrupt your normal routine on account of a court decision?

JEERS to keeping track of America’s fugliest numbers. The mighty Covid-19 Wurlitzer plays on with 73 million cases worldwide—22 percent of them in the U.S.  Our weekly tradition of maintaining a benchmark of the still-escalating awfulness for the C&J historical record continues, so let’s check the most depressing tote board in the world as our death toll now surpasses the population of America’s 64th-largest city Cincinnati, Ohio:  

6 months ago: 2 million confirmed cases. 112,000 deaths.

3 months ago: 6.7 million confirmed cases. 198,000 deaths

“Hello, Gorgeous...”

1 month ago: 10.3 million confirmed cases. 245,000 deaths

This morning: 17 million confirmed cases. 305,000 deaths

As hospitals get slammed, morgues fill up, and pro-life Republicans continue, ironically, to put the almighty dollar over life, there's sunlight breaking over the horizon: with official FDA approval, the covid vaccine will start flowing through front-line healthcare workers' and nursing home residents' veins this week. To get skeptical Republicans on board, Pfizer's marketing team will work overtime to convince them that getting the shot will lower taxes, hurt the environment, bring us closer to End Times, and totally own the libs.

JEERS to missing 1800 by 18 days. He came this close. On December 14, 1799, George Washington died at age 67 (which was actually quite old for his family, relatively speaking, given how many of his relatives died at a younger age).  He caught a cold during a horseback ride in the rain, but forensic historians suspect that the real reason he expired was the 300-pound leech doctors attached to him to drain his "tired" blood.  I read in the book His Excellency by Joseph Ellis (highly recommended) that the last thing Washington did before he died was check his own pulse.  Which probably explains his last words: "Oh, that ain't good."

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BRIEF SANITY BREAK

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Lazy I know but I want one 😂 pic.twitter.com/wQs3gnk1tB

— CCTV_IDIOTS (@cctv_idiots) December 11, 2020

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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK

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CHEERS to shutting another door. As if Friday's Supreme court decision wasn't enough of a humiliation against the Big Loser of the 2020 election, today salt will be poured into the wound as the 538 members of the Electoral College cast their votes:

Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris are set to end the day with 306 electoral votes, topping Trump's 232.

They’ll be doing this from the White House in 37 days.

Historically, the Electoral College meeting is a formality given little attention. But Trump's unprecedented efforts to overturn the election have magnified every turn in the election calendar and shined the spotlight on electors who are usually overlooked.  "This is the moment of truth, and something that is already inexorable becomes fully locked in," said Ben Wikler, a Wisconsin elector pledged for Biden and chairman of the Wisconsin Democratic Party. "This year, more than ever, it's almost a sacred act to cast the official votes that have been determined by voters to choose the most powerful person in the world."

Eliminating more suspense, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in July states can insist members of the Electoral College support the winner of the popular vote on Election Day, prohibiting rogue [aka “faithless”] electors in most states.

If you're wondering who's who while you're watching today, the electoral college people are the ones wearing togas and beer hats.

CHEERS to “Moscow Maggie.” Happy 123rd birthday to Maine's own Margaret Chase Smith.  She was the first woman to serve in both the U.S. House and Senate, and she reserved some choice not-so-nice words for Senator Joseph McCarthy (who responded by giving her the aforementioned nickname).  And get a load of this from 1950, which would no doubt get her branded a libturd by The White House and the right-wing noise machine today:

"I don't want to see the Republican Party ride to political victory on the Four Horsemen of Calumny—Fear, Ignorance, Bigotry and Smear.

I doubt if the Republican Party could—simply because I don't believe the American people will uphold any political party that puts political exploitation above national interest.  Surely we Republicans aren't that desperate for victory.

I don't want to see the Republican Party win that way.  While it might be a fleeting victory for the Republican Party, it would be a more lasting defeat for the American people.

Surely it would ultimately be suicide for the Republican Party and the two-party system that has protected our American liberties from the dictatorship of a one party system."

Yeah. They'd be crazy to try that. And don’t call me Shirley.

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Ten years ago in C&J: December 14, 2010

CHEERS to hangin' on. Michael Steele officially threw his lesbian-bondage-strip-club membership card in the ring yesterday, saying he still really really really wants to stay on as the head of the RNC.  (The reaction among the GOP donor elite: unprintable.)  When asked why he really, really really wants to keep his job, Steele said that he really really really got a good look at the U.S. job market and ran back inside.  Welcome to the real real real America, kiddo.

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And just one more…

OH NOES! to Billeh’s Big Troubles! Over the weekend my email in-box exploded with this bombshell from what must be a credible source because it came from the internet:

Dear Client,

Your Aρρlе ID was used to sign in to iCloud on an (sic) Chrome.

Time and Date: December 10 2020  [No time listed] Operating System: Windows 10 Pro Country: St. Pierre and Miquelon, France

If you have not recently signed in to an (sic) Chrome with your Aρρlе ID and beleive (sic) someone may have accessed your Apple (sic), please sign in and complete the steps to confim (sic) your identity and recent activity. To help protect your Apple (sic), access will remain locked until you complete the neccessary (sic) steps.

Strange, but I don’t even have "an Apple." But maybe my partner Michael got me an Apple for a War on Christmas present and it's already talking in vile, foul language at the iCloud. So I placed my cursor over the "Log in" button in the above email, and it leads to a very un-Appley URL called "shopee.com.id." I assume the id stands for anyone who clicks on it is an idiot. Back to your hole, Russian troll. There will be no ransom payments of toilet paper to you this day.

Have a tolerable Monday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?

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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial

If Donald Trump said, ‘I’m going to trash you on Twitter unless you go smack Bill in Portland Maine in the face,’ they would go smack BiPM in the face and try to explain it to him afterward.”

—John Harwood

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Source: Daily Kos