Trump is now in Mar a Lago for Christmas.  I can only hope they changed the locks on the White House and have started the deep clean and fumigation.  On his way out the door, Trump granted another 26 pardons, mostly for more of his allies, corrupt congressmen, and murderers who he really enjoys pardoning.  Included on yesterday’s list was Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, and Charles Kushner (Jared’s father) who plead guilty in 2004 to 16 counts of tax evasion, 1 of retaliating against a witness, and 1 for lying to the FEC.  Nice guy.  The congressmen were felons Steve Stockman (fraud and money laundering), Chris Collins (securities fraud) , along with Duncan Hunter along with his wife (misuse of campaign funds).  He also pardon George Papadapoulos and Alex Van De Swaan, snared by Robert Mueller.  He also pardoned the Blackwater mercenaries who killed 14 innocent Iraqis and wounded another 17.

During his time in office, Trump has turned the President’s pardon power on its head.  Envisioned by the Founders as a tool for mercy, to right wrongful sentences or false charges, the pardon power depends on the President actually using these powers for those purposes.  There have been some isolated abuses of this power, like when Clinton pardoned Mark Rich, but those instances are rare.  Trump has used the power almost exclusively to pardon his friends and fellow criminals, those endorsed by Hollywood stars, and criminals who committed their crimes against those who Trump doesn’t like.  They are overwhelmingly white and male.

These pardons are so corrupt that even a few Republicans have been able to stand vertically, sans backbones, to condemn them. Even conservative Been Sasse of Nebraska called these pardons to be “Rotten to the Core.”  That’s an understatement, way too little, way too late.

Mike Pence.  There’s something out of whack in his brain.

Pence was in Florida trying to talk trash about you and me.

Pence told a rally crowd in Florida that progressives and Democrats “want to make rich people poorer, and poor people more comfortable.”

Honey, Honey, Honey, I could tell you a lot worse things about me.  A lot.

Thanks to everybody for the heads up.

Newt Gingrich is back!  Oh damn, I’ve missed him.

He has decided that he will not accept Joe Biden as president because the election was neither “legitimate or honorable.”  Seriously, that whore used the word honorable. And I think he expected that people would not snort laughing.

Gingrich wrote in an op-ed published Monday in The Washington Times. “My unwillingness to relax and accept that the election was over grew out of a level of outrage and alienation unlike anything I had experienced in more than 60 years involvement in public affairs.”

See, here’s the problem, I don’t think he believes that public affairs is the same thing you do. And ya got that whole 60 year dilemma. He was elected to congress in 1978 and he left congress in 1998.  By even fancy math, that’s just 20 years.  He’s now being supported by his wife, the ambassador to the Vatican.  I guess she’s busy packing while he auditions for a job at OAN.

It’ll be like it used to be – Newt is the fountain of where all cheap jokes flow.

Just when you think Donald Trump has the weirdest set of lawyers ever assembled, along comes East Texas with its cast of unique characters to spread joy amongst the peasantry.

Rickia Collings has filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court, Eastern Division of Texas.  Rickia appears to be filing this suit along with his/her lawyer, Capricornus.  For a little while I thought maybe it was a misspelling of Copernicus, a man so cool that law school graduates wear his hat on graduation day.  But it’s not. This is Capricornus, something unfamiliar to me until today.

According to this lawsuit, Capricornus’ legal address is Saturn. Just so you know.

Through the miracle of modern journalism, I have a copy of the lawsuit. I want to warn you up front that one of the pages is scanned upside down, but you’ll hardly notice the difference.

This is a lawsuit under Title VII of the Civil Right Act of 1964. I dunno, but maybe this helps.

You can read the whole complaint by clicking right here.

This planetary alignment, Donald Trump, and the mysterious disappearance of murder bees is causing unearthly things to happen when this lawsuit is not the weirdest crap lately – Sidney Powell holds the license on that.

I think we need to get out those orbs again.

Thanks to Mike for the heads up.

Brought to you by Nick Caraway. 

The Carroways were having a lively discussion the other night about the vaccine. Ms. Carroway is one of those fake doctors that Epstein and all of the Fox News junkies were talking about. She got her doctorate in BioEngineering a little over ten years ago. I was able to call myself a doctor’s husband and we were also able to bet on whose family would be the first to ask for a prescription. Mine was first by the way when my uncle asked for the hook up.

I’m blessed to have my own health expert in the house through this whole ordeal. She’s talked about working for the CDC, but that would require a move. Left to my own devices would be disastrous. My D in freshman Biology isn’t impressing anyone. Most of us could learn a thing or two about listening to experts.

Anyway, she pointed out the breakdown in logic of teachers being near the front of the line. We don’t have to be doing in person instruction. It’s a choice the state and local districts are making. It reminded me of a scene from the movie “Soul Man” from the 1980s. The bank told the main character that loans were meant for students incapable of paying and not ones whose parents were just donkeys (deference to momma). See, his parents were rich but chose not to help him pay for school. Similarly, the state could protect us but have chosen not to.

The vaccine should go to workers that have to interact with those that are exposed or already positive. It makes perfect sense. The logic is unassailable and yet we all feel somewhat short-changed. I’ve watched our campus fly past ten positives. I’ve seen football and basketball games suddenly canceled at our daughter’s junior high. I know Joe Biden wants schools open so maybe Governor Abbott might actually come through and move teachers right behind health care workers and seniors. That seems to be what we are hearing. If it’s true all won’t be forgiven, but it will be a start.

Nick

In an interesting twist, the NY Times is reporting that Trump’s longtime banker has suddenly resigned from her position at Deutsche Bank.  The banker, Rosemary Vrablic, and her associate, Dominic Scalzi, have both resigned.  Vrablic brought Trump to  the bank in 2011, convincing her credit committee to loan him over $300 million in multiple projects despite his long record of defaulting on loans, not paying his bills, and screwing his equity investors.  A real estate loan she arranged for Jared Kushner in 2013 is also under an internal investigation.  NYC DA Cyrus Vance has several civil and criminal investigations underway into whether Trump committed fraud in obtaining the loans.

Watch this space.