“A judge in New York is holding former president Trump in contempt of court for failing to turn over documents, and he’s being fined $10,000 until he does. Trump’s actually trying to locate the documents right now. He’s going through his filing system of Buried, Shredded or Flushed.” —Jimmy Fallon
“When Perjury…I mean Marjorie [Taylor Greene] was asked if she considered participating in the [Jan. 6] riot herself, she said it was on her calendar but she was too busy preparing her case against the electoral college vote totals. Which is like saying, I would’ve been at the wedding but I was too busy burning down the church.” —Jimmy Kimmel, on the “Green Goblin’s” court testimony
So, are tweets self-driving now? —Stephen Colbert via Twitter
Continued…
You are now below the fold. Beware—there be fruit here.
“Republicans are sounding the alarm because masculinity isin danger! And taking the lead on this non-issue is Tucker Carlson. Tucker’s new documentary apparently claims that men are physically weaker than they used to be, which translates to weaker political leadership. Clearly he hasn’t seen Nancy Pelosi doing reps at Gold’s Gym. She can bench-press a McConnell and a half.” —Samantha Bee
“Comedy doesn’t change the world, but it’s the bellwether. We’re the banana peel in the coal mine. When society is under threat, comedians are the ones who get sent away first. It’s not the ‘woke police’ that are going to be an existential threat to comedy. … It’s not the fragility of audiences. It’s the fragility of leaders. … Authoritarians are the threat to comedy, to art, to music, to thought, to poetry, to progress.” —Jon Stewart, accepting his Mark Twain Prize for American Humor
— Full Frontal with Samantha Bee (@FullFrontalSamB) April 14, 2022
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“Look, gas prices are a real concern. But Dr. Oz is worth over a hundred-million dollars. So it’s a little weird for him to act like it’s specifically straining his budget. He’s fucking rich. What he doesn’t get to do is stand in front of gas pumps and pretend like he’s personally affected by those numbers.” —John Oliver, after posting a clip of cultist PA-Sen candidate Dr. Oz at a gas pump complaining about the “almost five bucks” price of gas
“House minority leader Kevin McCarthy led a group of Republicans on a visit to the US-Mexico border. But Ted Cruz wasn’t with them because he has no interest in only going halfway to Cancun.” —Seth Meyers
And now, our feature presentation…
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Cheers and Jeers for Friday, April 29, 2022
Note: C&J’s designated NSA tracker Bart will be monitoring us for the next 48 hours from inside the Maypole we set up next to the kiddie pool. He politely asks that you not bang on it with something large like a monkey wrench. We politely ask that you do. —Mgt.
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By the Numbers:
7 days!!!
Days ’til the start of the Memorial Day weekend: 28
Percent of Americans nationally who have been infected with Covid-19: 58%
Percent of Mainers who have been infected: 35%
Age of Lucile Randon, a French nun who is the oldest Covid-19 survivor and also the new oldest living person in the world: 118
Number of individual parts and tools offered by the new Apple online shop, which allows users to finally repair their own iPhones if they want: 200
Amount Boeing lost on their deal with the Trump White House for a pair of new 747 Air Force Ones because Boeing management apparently consists of big dumb MAGA suckers: $1.1 billion
CHEERS to soaking the rich. Where once they chugged the finest cognac and screwed the most expensive whores in the most opulent of palaces and on the most palatial of yachts, today the Russian oligarchs are chugging Alka Seltzer and popping Prozac as they watch their toys and fortunes get seized by governments not happy with their master’s invasion of Ukraine. It’s so unfair!!!And it’s about to get worse:
The White House released the outlines of what it calls a new comprehensive legislative package around Ukraine that includes provisions to “streamline the process for seizure of oligarch assets, expand the assets subject to seizure, and enable the proceeds to flow to Ukraine,” the White House said. […]
Bid early, bid often. All proceeds go directly to the Kick Putin’s Ass Fund.
In recent weeks, a range of lawmakers have been pushing plans to sell the yachts, apartments, art, and estates of Putin’s allies and give the money to Ukraine as it tries to defend itself in a war waged by Russia since February. The idea has been gaining momentum and took a major step forward this week, in addition to the White House’s announcement.
On Wednesday night, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a bill called the Asset Seizure for Ukraine Reconstruction Act aiming to send seized assets to the former member of the Soviet Bloc. “Under these extraordinary circumstances, the international community should be prepared to use Russia’s frozen assets to rebuild the country Russia is destroying,” co-sponsor Rep. Tom Malinowski (D-NJ) said in a statement.
According to some CIA guy whose name I could tell you but then I’d have to kill you, 16 yachts have been seized. I believe I speak on behalf of the entire planet when I say we should give the proceeds to Ukraine for the sale of each and every one of them except the one we keep as Daily Kos’s new floating pleasure palace. (Hey…we deserve something for being right about everything for twenty years. I mean…right???)
JEERS to Superman’s Achilles peel. Has ever there existed a mightier warrior against the doers of evil than Donald J. Trump? I think not, sir or madam! After all, who can forget this bit of derring-do circa 2018?
President Donald Trump says he would have rushed, unarmed, into the Florida high school where a mass shooting was happening, if he had been there.
Our hero! Nothing can stop America from being great again as long as Superman is looking out for us and…..oh crap, it turns out his arch-enemies found his kryptonite:
In a deposition for an upcoming New York trial over allegations that he sicced his security team on protesters outside Trump Tower in 2015, Trump revealed that he is afraid of demonstrators throwing fruit at him. “It’s very dangerous stuff,” Trump said in reference to the foodstuffs, according to Insider. “You can get killed with those things. … a tomato, a pineapple, a lot of other things they throw.”
Well phooey. This is a fig deal. So much for our hero being pearfect. Orange you berry disappointed? I’m feeling downright meloncholy. I say he should be retro-impeached.
CHEERS to Great Moments in Real Estate. On April 30, 1803, Robert Livingston and James Monroe concluded a deal with France that increased the size of the United states by 828,000 square miles. Price tag: $23,000,000. We know it as The Louisiana Purchase. Century 21 agents know it as “The holy grail of commission checks.”
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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CHEERS to exactly the right word. 170 years ago, Roget’s Thesaurus was first published. And for that I am truly—[flip flip flip]—“grateful; thankful; affording pleasure or comfort; fulfilled; appreciative; obliged; down with that; sweet on it; fist bump-ready; engorged with the sweet nectar of gratification in a small cabin in Saskatchewan where the only sound is the bugling of the elk.” Just a hunch, but I think Roget was lonely.
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Ten years ago in C&J: April 29, 2012
JEERS to scopin’ out the bars scene. Well, that was faster than I expected. It only took 38 days for the first media report to emerge on how prison life is treating disgraced Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. Fair warning: this is not for the squeamish (via CNN):
Blagojevich has been keeping very busy washing pots and pans (it’s what all new inmates do) and he already has big plans for the future: He’s gearing up to teach other inmates about Shakespeare and Greek mythology. … “All things considered, he looked good, he’s still got a headful of hair, it’s gone from black to brown, not gray, as everyone predicted,” Sam Adam, Jr. told WFLD.
Great. Now I hope I can figure out what just got ejected from my brain so that I could absorb that bit of useless data. Judging by the stares I’m getting from people on the street: the part of my cerebellum that tells me to put on pants.
CHEERS to home vegetation. The last weekend of April is here already??? Cheesum crow, this year is flying by, but I hope the weekend takes its sweet time. The boob-tubage starts tonight with the latest news on MSNBC…or Round 2 and 3 of the NFL draft is tonight at 7 on ABC. (Sorry, no Wheel of Fortune or Jeopardy! because of it.) On Firing Line (8:30, PBS), Margaret Hoover devotes 30 minute to the most pressing issue of the day: what happens when Queen Elizabeth II kicks the royal bucket? (Spoiler alert: a beefeater retrieves it so she can kick it again.) Oh, and Bill Maher actually has a decent lineup tonight on HBO’s Real Time at 10: MSNBC’s Ali Velshi, Fran Lebowitz, and former Senator Doug Jones (D-AL).
On 60 Minutes: a look at the guy behind the Birds Aren’t Real fake conspiracy theory that makes fun of other conspiracy theorists, and the whys and wherefores of the Eurovision Song Contest. Then Homer becomes a craft beer brewer on The Simpsons and Lois tutors a nefarious piano student on Family Guy. To wrap up the weekend, John Oliver returns to lay a fresh platter of intellectual haggis on our doorstep with a new edition of Last Week Tonight Sunday night at 11 on HBO.
Now here’s your Sunday morning lineup:
Meet the Press: Homeland Security director Alejandro Mayorkas; Senate Foreign Relations Committee chair Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ).
Or you can watch reality-based Sunday morning news.
This Week: Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development Samantha Power; Ukrainian Ambassador to U.S. Oksana Markarova; Rep. Michael McCaul (The Cult-TX).
Face the Nation: Samantha Power; Moderna Chief Medical Officer Dr. Paul Burton; Dr. Deborah Birx (“BUY MY BOOK!”) continues her rehabilitation tour; Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL).
CNN’s State of the Union: Homeland Security director Alejandro Mayorkas; Gov. Asa Hutchinson (The Cult-AR).
Fox GOP Talking Points Sunday: Alejandro Mayorkas; Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ).
Happy viewing!
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And just one more…
CHEERS to Friday evening Obama blogging. The White House Correspondents Dinner, the late-April schmooze-fest during which the politicians, pundits, reporters, and the one-percenters who fund them gather under the beltway bubble for an evening—hopefully not a super-spreadery evening—of rubbery chicken and jokes from the emcee and the president, returns tomorrow night after a pandemic-related hiatus. Unlike the former guy, who failed to show up because his orange skin is thinner than tissue paper, Joe Biden will be there. And although I’m sure he’ll land some blows, no POTUS will ever hold a candle to the comedic chops of his former boss. A few classic zingers from WHCDs past…
2009 ”Dick Cheney was supposed to be here but he’s very busy working on his memoirs, tentatively titled: How to Shoot Friends and Interrogate People.”
Not many presidents with better comic timing than 44.
2010 “A few weeks ago I was able to throw out the first pitch at the Nationals game. I don’t know if you saw it, but I threw it a little high and a little outside. This is how FOX News covered it: President panders to extreme left-wing of batter box.”
2011 “Where is the National Public Radio table? You guys are still here? I know you were a little tense when the GOP tried to cut your funding, but personally I was looking forward to new programming like No Things Considered or Wait, Wait…Don’t Fund Me.”
2012 “Congress and I have certainly had our differences—yet I’ve tried to be civil, to not take any cheap shots. And that’s why I want to especially thank all the members who took a break from their exhausting schedule of not passing any laws to be here tonight.”
2013 “I know CNN has taken some knocks lately. But the fact is I admire their commitment to cover all sides of a story just in case one of them happens to be accurate.”
2014 “I’m feeling sorry, believe it or not, for the Speaker of the House. These days, the House Republicans actually give John Boehner a harder time than they give me, which means orange really is the new black.”
2015 “Just this week, Michele Bachmann predicted I would bring about the biblical end of days. Now that’s a legacy. That’s big. I mean, Lincoln, Washington, they didn’t do that.”
2016 “And then there’s Ted Cruz. Ted had a tough week. He went to Indiana—Hoosier country. Stood on a basketball court and called the hoop a ‘basketball ring.’ What else is in his lexicon? Baseball sticks? Football hats? But sure, I’m the foreign one.”
And yes, Obama tipped his server.
Have a great weekend. Floor’s open…What are you cheering and jeering about today?
