Thought For The Day

TP Or Not TP, That Is The Question

April 10, 2020

Yes, Donald Chrump is still causing his own unique illness across America.  Now though, he can legitimately add death to Americans to his devastating resume.  And he did not even have to go to the trouble of standing out on Fifth Avenue, though I think now would be a great time for him to be in New York City.  President Death is inarguably responsible for thousands of dead Americans thanks to his “handling” of the novel coronavirus crisis.

And yes, we are still living under a virus-induced sequestration.  And oy, one of the most punishing consequences of this pandemic is the fact that Chrump has decided to not only insinuate himself but to make himself the centerpiece of his coronavirus Task Farce by holding daily tantrums wherein he constantly lies and passes off terrible information as sage advice, likely leading to a significant worsening of a situation he personally and single-handedly made worse from the get-go (and more dead people than if he had, a) taken the problem seriously when he was first briefed IN NOVMEBER on the likelihood of this horrendous pandemic coming to our shores, and b) just kept his fucking mouth shut and let the experts guide the American public through this crisis).

Not to mention the run on toilet paper from store shelves everywhere.  Not to mention critical sanitizing products.  And flour.  Where has all the flour gone?

Now For Some Good News

One really good thing to come out of this virus pandemic is that we now have irrefutable evidence that we can have a significant impact on air pollution, as some would say – very strongly and very quickly.  Since it has been all but shut down for two weeks, Los Angeles now has the cleanest air of any major city in the world.

July 1998                                 March 2020

Last month, Los Angeles experienced the longest stretch of days of “good” air since at least 1980, as faras the EPA’s online data goes back.  One expert suspects that L.A.’s air hasn’t been this clean since around the time the United States entered WWII.  It is not just Los Angeles; other large cities are experiencing the same effect.  Maybe there is a message in there somewhere.

At this rate, air pollution could be over magically by Easter.  Chrump pollution will last at least eight more months without divine intervention.

Washington, DC right now

The Air

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Thought For The Night

Bye, Bye Bernie

April 8, 2020

Bernie and Birdie, circa 2016

Bernie Sanders suspended his presidential campaign yesterday.  Bernie moved the national conversation – over two presidential campaign cycles – to a much better place, if you are an actual person.  He affected Hillary Clinton’s messaging during the 2016 primary, causing her to at least talk a more liberal/less corporate game, though only meaning it to a modest degree. 

Another, initially comical, perpetually disingenuous candidate also made a point of echoing much of Sanders’ platform, meaning absolutely none of it.  That of course was Donald Chrump, who played the populist card to a credulous audience, who for some reason took seriously a repeatedly financially bankrupt, and life-long morally bankrupt third-rate TV personality who was running for president as a publicity stunt, with not the slightest idea what the job entailed.

At the time, some (small) number of Bernie’s supporters apparently felt so poorly disposed toward Hillary that they voted for Chrump.  Immediately after Sanders suspended his campaign yesterday, Chrump cynically suggested that Bernie’s supporters come over to Chrump.  As a lifelong liberal kind of person, who always looks at all sides of an issue, I considered Chrump’s proposition in the spirit in which it was offered.  My response is best presented pictorially:

(Insert your own 1000 words here)

 

Bernie Sanders, like so many Americans, understands the importance of ridding this nation – and the world – of the deadly infection, the one-man pandemic of greed, ignorance and hatred that is called Donald Chrump.  I am sure Bernie will do everything he can to help Joe Biden defeat President Death and continue to push an agenda of liberty, justice and healthcare for all.  With any luck Chrump will magically disappear at noon on January 20, 2021. But, as with the end of the current coronavirus pandemic, when it comes (probably not by Easter), the after-effects will linger for an unknown duration and to an unknown degree.

This has been your Paying Attention Thought For The Night.

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Grocers Of The World Unite

Shelfless Service In Desperate Times

April 7, 2020

I just watched a report on grocery store workers.  That’s right, grocery store workers.  They were talked about like soldiers in a war zone.  And that is exactly what they are.  I hadn’t thought about it, but they are one the front lines of the Virus Wars every day.  How are they not dropping like flies?  They should be getting hazard pay.  And they should be issued protective gear.  When will our tax dollars work for workers (who pay a good deal of those taxes) if not now?  We could not survive without them.  Anyone who enters any place that provides food without wearing a mask should be sent packing until they have a mask.  Our masks keep everyone else safer.  Their masks keep everyone except them safer.  I am part of their everyone else.  America's grocery workers are there for us.

Why isn’t Chrump out there throwing us rolls of toilet paper?

Meanwhile President Death promised he would not be wearing a mask because it was optional.  Because his uncle was “like a super genius.”   Chrump blew this thing from the start.  Bigly.  He has done nothing but make it worser by the minute.  So now, he undermines actual smart people.  I have the strong sense that if Anthony Fauci says it’s a good idea to wear a mask to protect my fellow human beings from me accidentally making them sick, it’s probably a good idea.

Chrump could spare us much pain if he would just cover his face

Chrump calls the novel corona virus the “invisible enemy.”  As bad as this pandemic is, I’m much more worried about the overly visible, albeit oddly colored enemy.  I can see it now; when Chrump’s miracle cure, the one his gut told him will save the day, despite the lack of medical evidence, fails to work out, he will simply deny ever claiming it would work and pivot to the next delusional mental diarrhea.

Los Angeles County health officials have urged people not to go grocery shopping this week if possible.

I. Mangrey reporting.  Don’t hug a grocer today.

Thought For The Day

These machines kill fascists

Let My People Vote

April 6, 2020

As many Republican’ts struggle to manage and/or distract from the coronavirus pandemic running roughshod over our nation (moreso than the rest of the world at this point) – and none more than our dearly un-departed President Death – we still find ourselves in the throes of a presidential election.  Whatever else they may be, Republican’ts are consistent.  They have never wavered from certain essential philosophies, one of which is voting rights.  Perhaps more accurately – voting wrongs. 

Yet another shameless, brainless, anti-democratic Republican’t has said out loud what they normally only say in private.  This time it was hot air buffoon Donald Chrump explaining to the mental invalids hosting and watching Fux and Friends how allowing too many people to vote hurts Republican’ts.  Chrump took a break from ignoring medical experts - constantly contradicting them and himself, misinforming the American public, and assuring that many more people will die from COVID-19 than would have been the case without his “leadership” to weigh in on his imminent resounding defeat at the polls in November.

The Pied Piper of Halfwits spent 54 minutes of our precious time phoning in to Fux and Friends reminding his faithful rats that he was not that relatively calm, presidential looking (for him at least) phony assaulting our senses every damn day at his fake task force briefings.  President Death was able to go paperless and freestyle his crazed verbal diarrhea, lashing out blindly in all directions.

As has been known for a very long time, Republican’ts are not just anti-Democrat, they are virulently anti-democracy.  We can never forget that our founding fathers, however wonderful some of their works, besides many of them being unrepentant slave owners, saw fit to limit voting to land-owning white males.  But, we were supposed to come a long way baby, and to some degree we have, though Republican’ts would prefer to go back to the olden days when only wealthy white men determined which wealthy white men were to wield power.  If it was not so obviously abhorrent, and to most people completely unacceptable, they would probably be in favor of bringing back slavery as well.  Certainly a considerable number of Chrump’s supporters wouldn’t mind.  Of course, Chrump was not alone in understanding the relationship between voting and Republican't political fortunes.

Let my people vote

 

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Special Paying Attention Encore Presentation - Twilight Zone Edition

Read on McDuff 
April 4, 2020

 

At this point in the coronavirus sequestration I wish I had more time on my hands and less time on my butt.  Nonetheless, in a valiant and futile effort to give the brains (such as they are) of the staff at Paying Attention a rest.  In the off chance some of you might be bored, we present an encore presentation of I. Mangrey’s musings, abusings and effusings.  Please enjoy this entry from one year before the un-election of Donald Chrump, President Death. 

Ed Venture
Managing Editor  

The De-evolution Will (Continue to) Be Televised 

November 4, 2019

I do not watch reality TV – not since I watched the occasional segment of PBS’s An American Family in 1973.  That all might change when Paying Attention’s Chrump Family House Arrest proudly airs after Chrump and his entire crime family are made to deliver the best reality TV ever, once the Chrumps are found guilty of crimes against reality.  For not, no one here at Paying Attention watches that stuff.  I certainly never watched more than an accidental moment of The Apprentice or its equally absurd offshoot.  Even back then, a mere momentary exposure to the thing called Donald Chrump made my skin crawl, by ears bleed and made my eyes hate my guts. 

The team at Paying Attention prefers watching the news since it is relatively less scripted – even the fake propaganda spewed by Fux News is more worthwhile than fake reality TV.  At least the real fake news – as opposed to the news labeled fake by the fake soon-to-be-impeached president who believes any news that is not kissing his ass is fake – informs you as to what is going on in the alternate reality of Chrump and his psychotic administration. 

I. Mangrey enjoying the evening news

Reality TV today is quicksand for the mind.  The end of each episode is calculated to leave viewers drowning in curiosity, convinced that they absolutely must tune in to see what backbiting, angst, sexual tension, hi-jinks and mind-boggling idiocy the really real folks will be told to get into next week.

The key element here is – next week.  You have a whole week to digest, ignore and/or recover from the previous episode.  You also have sufficient time to reflect and perhaps decide that this is the most worthless heap of horseshit you have ever seen, forgive yourself for ever subjecting yourself to such garbage, and never watch another minute.

Chrumpin’ Jack Ass, It’s a Gas 

Despite the best efforts of the majority of American voters in 2016 and now the majority of the American public, we are all forced to not only watch, but to literally live, the reality TV that is the Chrump presidency – what Harry Shearer lampoons as The Appresidentice.

The reality show we find ourselves living in today (if you call this living) is more like an episode of The Twilight Zone, where everyone is sucked into a 1950s black and white Zenith console television.  The Earth has been enveloped by an Orange Gas Cloud that has somehow become President of the United States.  

The Orange Gas Cloud has caused all of the laws, political and social norms in America, and hundreds of years of progress (such as it is) made by humankind seem like little more than figments of millions of desperate and tortured imaginations.  People are walking around dazed, desperately seeking even a glimpse of the reality they thought they knew.

This reality show is relentless.  It does not give you a week to prepare in between episodes.  There is no in-between for this unending episode.  It allows you not one moment of peace.  It does not let you decide to change the channel or just stop watching.  We can try to ignore it, but its crushing presence is always lurking, like a 16-ton weight gradually lowering itself onto our heads, with us too numb and incredulous to move out of the way.

A nauseating-shade-of-orange gas cloud – no substance, no form.  No core, utterly untethered to anything.  It fills whatever container holds it; if there is no container, it expands unceasingly.  And keeps expanding unless and until some outside influence can neutralize it.  Who you gonna call?

Chrumpbusters

Submitted for your approval…

A man with a very, very small uh, brain, by all accounts an extremely unstable
idiot with orange complexion and “hair,” loses his barely humanesque form, morphs into a
toxic orange gas cloud, and becomes president of the United States of…the Twilight Zone.

Run like hell, don’t look back, don’t breathe

I. Mangrey reporting.  Do not try to adjust your set.  You are fucked.

Fraught For The Day

A Serial Killer By Any Other Name

April 3, 2020

President Death has a ton of spray on his “hair.”  He has artificial orange coloring over much of his face.  And now, thanks to his inconceivable, irresponsible, insane response to the coronavirus pandemic, he has blood on his unusually small hands.

“I can make this whole thing disappear very beautifully
with my very incredibly normal sized hands.
And much sooner than anyone ever imagined.”

Even now, after being repeatedly and publicly “corrected” for just about everything he has said about the current emergency, and privately beaten into submission against infecting the national dialogue with his “hunches,” hallucinations and non-stop spewing of preposterous bullshit, Chrump is only pretending to be concerned.  First of all, Donald Chrump has no capacity whatsoever to give even a mouse-sized shit about anyone but himself.  Second, despite having access to some of the best (for real this time) minds, who are no doubt almost crippled by the effort involved in trying to explain what is happening, Chump’s ability to understand anything not directly pertaining to his ego, greed or “hair,” is not dissimilar to that of a dead skunk in the middle of the road, stinking to high, high heaven.

Moments earlier…

Perhaps the most concerning side effect of Chrump’s monstrous idiocy is the fact that his less mentally stable and/or equipped zombies know him well enough to know that he is only feigning concern and that deep-down (such as it is) Chrump just thinks this about money and his re-election…and a great way to keep his phony face in front of cameras and microphones every fucking day. 

As a result these yahoos – including some number of governors, mayors and other government officials bound to Chrump like slightly aged dog shit squished into the nooks and crannies of the soles of your running shoes – continue to ignore the proven expert advice that provides the best chance of fighting back a virus that is clearly better equipped for survival and more intellectually competent than a large swath of Chrump’s base of deplorables. 

 

We will all pay the price for their ignorance as they spread their thoughtlessness and the coronavirus farther than it needed to be, just as their dear leader did by ignoring it for three months.  It is likely Chrump’s army of ventriloquist dummies will soon begin making the rest of us sick in a whole new way.  Only time will tell how many lives could have been spared if President Death and now his minions lived in the same reality as the rest of us. 

This has been your Paying Attention Fraught For The Day.

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Bottom’s Up

The Blight At The End Of The Tunnel

April 2, 2020

Everyone is familiar with the concept of hitting rock bottom.  Hopefully, you have not done it, but you know what it is.  People with addictions keep hurting themselves until they hit rock bottom.  Sometimes that is the only way we as humans finally get the message that we must change our behavior.  More on this later.

He gives himself a ten.  Your carnage may vary.

Apparently because of all the other unbelievable successes that have been added to Jared Kushner’s fantasy portfolio, his father-in-law had also put him in charge of keeping people from dying from COVID-19.  Jared is out there making great deals for desperately needed equipment.  Naturally it’s all about the money.  Jared won’t be conned into paying too much for respirators and ventilators – that’s his schtick.

Side note: Speaking of greedy motherfuckers, passing an emergency aid package that will put a small amount of money directly into the pockets of working-class Americans appeared to be harder than passing a grapefruit-size kidney stone for Republican’ts who are freaking out because they have to give money to people who actually (and now desperately) need it.  These are the same “people” who never bat an eye when it comes to reallocating trillions of our dollars to the richest among us over and over and over again.  Tax cuts for the rich we are told, pay for themselves.  Money for those who need it?  That, my friends is SOCIALISM.  We have not reached the peak of this pandemic – the virus I mean.  We may never reach the peak of the greed pandemic.  Not to mention the pandemic of stupidity that has Chrump’s approval rating higher than ever.

Rand Paul (KY), Tim Scott (SC), Mike Lee (UT), Ben Sasse (NE)
Jim Inhofe (OK)*, Ron Johnson (WI), Marsha Blackburn (TN), Unk Putz
If possible, donate to defeat these assholes, or if you are
unfortunate enough to live near them, vote them out NOW.

For his part, Chrump pretended he knew when it would be safe to ignore the pandemic and get back to eating the $130 per person Easter buffet at his DC hotel (you know, the one the law specifically forbids from owning since he allegedly works for the federal government).  Chrump also knows what states need how many ventilators and is doling them out according to what his gut tells him – that’s the same gut that is swimming in Coke, KFC, Burger King and one imagines, golf balls.  If you think this sounds bad you don’t know Donald Jello Chrump. 

President Death is also withholding needed support from states whose governors are insufficiently deferential to his highness.  Chrump told reporters exactly how he felt about certain governors, “I think they should be appreciative. Because you know what? When they’re not appreciative to me, they’re not appreciative to the Army Corps [of Engineers], they’re not appreciative to FEMA. It’s not right.”  He has instructed his translucent side-kick not to return phone calls from governors who are unwilling to kiss the Ass That Launched a Thousand Flushes (per day).

If we are learning anything in the days of Chrump, it is that when it comes to his ability to be abominable there really is no bottom.  It has been an illusion all along.  There simply is no such thing as the worst thing he could possibly do.  Be advised and assured that he is and always will be capable of something worse than whatever you thought was the most horrendous thing he could do.  But don’t worry, Joe Biden will rally the nation to repeal and replace President Death – America’s Virus-in-chief.

*Totally not OK; seen below “proving” the absence of climate crisis with snowball and causing American icon Jon Stewart agita in February 2015.  

I. Mangrey reviling. 

Song For The Day

Imagine yourself on an empty beach in Hawai’i

Music To Feel Better By

April 1, 2020

It has been a rough few years dealing with Donald Chrump’s New American Carnage; add to that months of presidential primaries and then coronavirus upheaval.  And, as if all that was not a sufficient degree of tzuris, plop on top of all that weeks of sheltering in place, unemployment, incessant hand-washing, sterilization of countertops, doorknobs, light switches, shopping carts and food packaging, and the unending vigilance required to keep one’s toilet paper out of the very-likely-unwashed hands of marauding interlopers.

Now we are hearing that if we ever get up the nerve to leave our homes we might need to be walking around with some sort of mask for the foreseeable future.  It’s kind of amazing that though we see ourselves as such a technologically advanced species we are being laid low by one of the smallest, simplest most primitive entities in the known universe.

America’s top very-stable-genius has been in constant contact with some of the most experienced experts in epidemiology and virology for months now.  Formerly-respected physician and current coronavirus task force/Chrump suck-up member Deborah Birx actually said aloud, and apparently expects Americans to believe that President Death has “been so attentive to the scientific literature and the details and the data.”  Chrump showed off just how attentive he has been, and I quote, “The young people are really this is an incredible phenomenon but they are attacked, successfully attacked, to a much lesser extent by this pandemic, by this disease, this whatever they want to call it, you can call it a germ, you can call it a flu, you can call it a virus, you know you can call it many different names, I’m not even sure anyone even knows what it is.”  Yes, for some godforsaken reason this is an unfortunate phenomenon but this blobulent fart of a man is a one-man pandemic, or disease, this whatever you want to call him, you can call him a dick, you can call him a putz, you can call him a fraudulent psychopath, you know you can call him many different things, I’m not even sure anyone even knows what he is.  But thank goodness we have someone in charge who gets this in a way that no one else does, though many people are saying that Attila the Hun would have understood more and been more empathetic than Donald Chrump.

Desperately needing a pause in the disaster, we found an old tune that is just what the quarantined, possibly-COVID-19-positive-doctor-lacking-proper-protective-equipment-because-the-governor-of-her-state-did-not-kiss-Chrump’s-ass-sufficiently ordered in these troubled times…

Harry Nilsson provides the cure 

This has been your Paying Attention Song For The Day.

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Why Is President Death On My TV Every Damn Day?

Isn’t This Virus Pandemic Bad Enough Without This Asshole Yammering Nonsense All The Time?

Pence preparing his next lie, Dr. Fauci trying desperately to keep his hands
from wrapping around Chrump’s neck during a space task force briefing

March 31, 2020  

It is time that President Death stop blaming the Democrats, the “fake news media” and Hillary Clinton’s emails for perpetrating the coronavirus hoax (which he had been told over and over was a serious threat that demanded immediate action).  No one is under any illusion that Chrump will take responsibility, he has mad that perfectly clear.  Maybe he could compromise and just shut the fuck up.  
Certainly, the major networks should simply stop showing his fake-medicine show/public masturbation sessions live every single damn day.  They could just broadcast the other presenters – those, like Dr. Anthony Fauci – who actually provide important, factual information. 

We have had quite enough of Chrump accusing New York’s front-line doctors of selling protective masks “out the back door” of hospitals, lying about how many “beautiful” tests are available for “anyone who needs one” and pedaling unproven “cures” that have already killed people.

Would you buy a used protective mask from this man?

It is surprising that the big televangelists have not seen the light and placed the blame where it belongs.  It is clear that God is punishing the United States for allowing Chrump to occupy the sacred White House that Jesus built.  It’s almost like they just make this shit up to rile up their congregations in order to perpetuate many of the things Jesus fought against – hating thy neighbor, greed and that sort of thing.

High-profile televangelists – all of whom seem to love alleged serial rapist and proven adulterer and self-proclaimed grabber of women’s private parts just slightly less than they claim to love Jesus – were so quick to blame various natural disasters on gay people or lack of prayer in school or whatever cockamamie reasons they like to give for hurricanes and the like. 

Jerry Falwell, Jr. plied his bullshit on Fux and Friends recently, after taking heavy flak for reopening his Liberty University.  Son of Falwell told the Friends, “It’s just strange to me how so many are over-reacting…impeachment didn’t work, and the Mueller Report didn’t work, and Article 25 didn’t work, and so maybe now this is their next attempt to get Trump.”  Since being forced back to campus by Falwell, and despite the pretense of proper social distancing, nearly a dozen (so far) Liberty students have fallen ill with symptoms that suggest COVID-19 infection.  Only time will tell how much God loves Falwell and his institution.  Falwell will no doubt cover any and all medical expenses for those stricken under his watch.

This time it is crystal clear that God hates America because of Donald Chrump…or maybe we have the most cases of COVID-19 because President Death was busy playing with himself for almost two months, ignoring all expert advice and telling all of us that the virus would magically disappear very quickly with only 15 people ever getting sick and that number quickly going to zero. 

A good start

Consider signing this MoveOn petition to all major news outlets to stop airing Chrump’s BS daily poop rallies: Ending live daily coverage of Trump’s COVID-19 briefings

I. Mangrey reporting…from more than six feet away…with clean (and very large) hands.