Y’all, I have to agree with Elie Mystal when he calls Betsy DeVos “clinically stupid.”

DeVos’ latest balm of the sea of shallow waters is her idea that it’s kinda up to each school district whether or not they follow the constitution.

When asked whether or not schools should report undocumented children to ICE, DeVos stammered thusly,

“I think that’s a school decision… That’s a local community decision. And again, I refer to the fact that we have laws and we also are compassionate, and I urge this body to do its job and address or clarify where there is confusion around this.”

Nope.  No confusion at all, except in DeVos’ perky little head.  From the Washington Post, where the headline says, “outstandingly ignorant of the law” …

The Supreme Court made clear in Plyler v. Doe that public schools have a constitutional obligation to provide schooling for children, regardless of immigration status. That means schools also cannot enforce measures that would deter undocumented children from registering. They cannot ask about immigration status. And according to the American Civil Liberties Union, they cannot report students or their families to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Okay, so we’re gonna ask kids to rat out each other because of skin color?

Man, I’d pay a fresh dollar bill to hear DeVos and Trump hold a forum on the Bill of Rights. That would produce enough energy in dumb alone to power New York City for a year or two.

Thanks to Henry for the heads up.

This weekend, Republican Virginia congressman Tom Garrett announced he would not seek reelection for his seat over charges that he and his wife misused his staff members to run personal errands.

But that’s not why he he’s throwing in the towel. He says he dropped out because he’s an alcoholic.

Garrett spent the weekend being a Drama Hog, which is really saying something in the age of Donald Trump. First, he was going to resign, and then he was not gonna run again, and then – screw it all – he was going to seek reelection after all.

I think he finally settled on not running again. But, it’s only Tuesday so that can change.

Garrett is a member of the House Freedom Caucus.  Yeah, those guys. He’s also pretty much a jerk.

He faced heavy criticism in the wake of last August’s Charlottesville white supremacist rally when a picture surfaced on Facebook of him and one of the event’s organizers, Jason Kessler.

Being an alcoholic makes you order around your staff, have them walk your dog, and send them out to get your groceries?

Look, I wish this guy all the luck in the world, and I hope he gets sober. But getting sober doesn’t mean that you won’t be a sumbitch. All it means is that you’ll be a sober sumbitch. I dunno, being a sober sumbitch is even worse, because then you don’t have an excuse.

it was a pretty good day today.  The Astros beat the Yankees in New York and Rudy Giuliani got booed.

Thunderously booed.

it was nice.

The media is building up for a Battle Royale among Democrats – liberals vs. centrists.

That’s cool and I can live with that except it ain’t happenin’.

Dana Milbank offers some suggestions about this made-up “war among Democrats.

“Certainly, there are policy differences among Democrats, and those will come out whenever they are again in a position to govern rather than resist. But Democrats are more ideologically homogenous than they have been historically. The Southern conservatives are long gone, and there is no equivalent to the “New Democrats” of the Bill Clinton era. The party has been pulled to a populist consensus by Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and pushed there by the Trump plutocracy, which has showered riches on the wealthy and the corporate.

Milbank gives examples of wars in the primary that were supposed to happen but didn’t, specifically mentioning one in Texas.  Beside the one Milbank mentioned, there was a second Democratic primary run off in my district where the minority female candidate campaigned mainly on “Vote for the Woman.”  She had Our Revolution’s support.  It didn’t work.  The minority male had Labor and the Houston Chronicle endorsement.  He talked about health care, education, and jobs.  He won by 2 to 1.

I, like most Democrats, do not have a side in the Bernie – Hillary wars. I frankly don’t care.  It’s over and nobody won.  They can both kiss my big blue butt. Leave that smoldering heap of ashes alone and start thinking what you want the Democratic Party to be and then find someone to run on that platform.

I believe that campaigning on beating Trump or impeaching Trump will not win an election.  Voters want to hear issues and plans.  If we keep it on the issues, we win.

And the reason I know that is right here in this article.  I knew the information in the article is true, but it still gave me a gut punch.

Sorry to start off the week being serious.  But, it was either this or 1,500 missing children handed over to our government.

In today’s NYT: The FBI is urgently requesting that everyone reboot their home and small business routers.  Russian malware has been infiltrating small networks causing damage from stolen passwords and personal data to rendering devices unusable.  This is not a joke, this is not The Onion.  Reboot your router.

And, no, Donald, this is not fake news.

This morning, Karen Attiah contributed a piece in the Washington Post about how it’s time to cancel the NFL.  She summarizes the sorry history of the league as pertains to not only race, but to life threatening brain injury and other chronic injuries that result when 300 lb. guys smash into each other for years.  She also points out that the NFL teams have a terrible track record regarding domestic abuse and treating their players more like assets than people.  The league owners are generally ultra-conservative zillionaires who, as Attiah notes, run their teams with “plantation style” politics and tactics.  Said zillionaires are also more than happy to take billions of dollars from taxpayers for their new stadiums, then complain about taxes they have to pay taxes on the billions of dollars that flow into their pockets from people who pays upwards of several thousands of dollars a seat per game to watch 300 lb. guys try to kill and maim each other.  The whole thing is Orwellian.

After this last decision where players must stay in the locker room rather than exercise their right to free speech, I have to say that I’m pretty much done, too.  It’s not a big stretch for me since I love baseball, especially Astros baseball, WAY more, but I’ve enjoyed watching holiday games, and certainly the Super Bowl.  But it’s time to take a stand.  Maybe if the owners are hit in the wallet will their hearing improve.