HRC: Don't Hate Me For Not Being Perfect

We've all heard that Hillary Diane Rodham (and sometimes) Clinton wakes up some mornings in a puddle of dried vomit after self-medicating with a couple boxes of chardonnay. It's so sad. Let's hope she'll get the professional help she needs. 

Well, I don't know that about the vomit for a fact, but it's a good guess given the tone of her remarks in a NYT interview published today. For instance, consider this remarkable neurotic loop:

And in a blunt reflection about the role sexism played in her 2016 presidential campaign, she said women were the voters who abandoned her in the final days because she was not “perfect.”

She blames women voters for demanding the impossible of her. This is her latest avoidance of reality, after she first blamed the scary Russians and their obvious agents of influence consisting of two female candidates in 2016, Green Party nominee Jill Stein and Democratic Representative Tulsi Gabbard. 

(That's particularly rich about the Green Party. I mean, they're even more minor than the Libertarians. It's a fourth party at best. Stein got 1.07 percent of the popular vote and no Electoral College delegates in 2016. But Hillary, in her obsessive need to blame anyone else for her own failure, accuses even Stein of being a willing tool of Putin in his nefarious schemes to keep Hillary from being elected President.)   

She accepts no blame for herself, needless to say. Watch her "Russians! Russians! Russians!" interview here.

Hillary's mental health crisis will be on full display as we enter the final stretch to election 2024.  So long as she has media access and there are wine stores that deliver, she'll be treating her fans to prize displays of blame-shifting such as the New York Times saw today. 

Will the Constitution Save Sen. Menendez From Prosecution? 'Speech and Debate' Done for Profit

“So, on the one hand, legislative acts that are clearly official acts cannot be talked about directly; on the other, actions that are not legislative acts [like blatant corruption] may not be deemed significant or substantial enough to [be] official acts.” https://t.co/rz5Ngrfjh9

— TSB (@TweetingTSB) May 23, 2024

 

My least favorite corrupt public official might just wriggle off the hook of those 16 charges he's facing, thanks to the immunity that Senators have concerning 'speech and debate.'

It's in Article I, Section 6, Clause 1: "Senators and Representatives ... shall in all cases except Treason, Felony, and Breach of the Peace be privileged from Arrest ... for any Speech or Debate in either house."

Apparently, that is broad enough to cover any official communication, including the ones Menendez had about, for instance, putting and releasing holds on appropriations to Egypt. Delivering those appropriations was one of the ways Menendez earned his gold bars and six-figure cash, but the speech and debate clause severely hampers his prosecutors from presenting their case to the jury. 

Well, well, well. Really, what were the Founding Fathers thinking in Philadelphia when they ratified that? 

Today's Polling From Blue New Hampshire, Independents Swing From Biden to Trump

“In comparison to exit polls from the 2020 presidential election, independent/undeclared voters in NH demonstrate significantly lower support for Biden, as Biden won around 60 percent of these voters in 2020, compared to around a quarter if the election were held today.” https://t.co/h8eIr0FaNw

— TSB (@TweetingTSB) May 21, 2024

It's still a long way to November, but polling results like this must be causing grief in the Biden campaign. 

Combine that with the polling averages and generic ballot questions which also favor Trump, and it's not looking good for Biden. 

C'mon Man!©, you'd better pull a rabbit out of your hat at that debate you wanted. 

Official Condolences Found Lacking in Churlishness and Bellicosity

 

Predictably, lots of internet hoopla is being raised over that short and simple statement of official condolences:

The United States expresses its official condolences for the death of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian, and other members of their delegation in a helicopter crash in northwest Iran. As Iran selects a new president, we reaffirm our support for the Iranian people and their struggle for human rights and fundamental freedoms.

That's what states say when a foreign head of state dies, plus the references to human rights and freedoms. It would be juvenile and ill-mannered for spokesmen to do something like an end zone dance. 

International organizations, such as the UN and NATO, do the same. The UN was officially saddened, and its statement reads “The Secretary-General expresses his sincere condolences to the families of the deceased and to the Government and people of the Islamic Republic of Iran.” Okay by me. 

The UN Security Council observed a moment of silence, which personally I'd have found awkward, but was in accordance with the protocol for such occasions. In the same way, a funeral isn't the time to start an argument or pick a fight no matter how justified. 

NATO expressed “Our condolences to the people of Iran for the death of President Raisi, Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian, and others who perished in the helicopter crash.” Again, okay by me, and sounds like it was written by an adult. 

That's how the death of adversaries used to be handled when Washington was run by serious people, like Eisenhower, for instance. He did not perform any silly-ass melodrama when Stalin died. To the contrary, he issued his Chance for Peace speech. 

If we had leaders of Eisenhower's ability today, they might conceive of something similar toward Iran. They don't measure up to Ike, of course, but at least some of them don't lower themselves to doing an end zone dance. 

Ike's act of statesmanship would not measure up to contemporary standards of adolescent dick-wagging.

Six Year-Old Plays Hotel California; If It's a Little Bit Faked, I Don't Want to Know

Six year-old Chinese girl plays all the instruments and sings all the parts on "Hotel California." Stick around for her shredding on the guitar solos. pic.twitter.com/SzrRK1l2B4

— i/o (@eyeslasho) May 18, 2024

"We are all just prisoners here, of our our derice." Adorable. 

And, not to read too much into the choice of material, but she's Chinese and singing about being trapped in a place you can never leave.  

Assange Gets to Appeal Extradition on Vague First Amendment Considerations

 

I like this new version of our Julian Assange Update Theme, what with that '60s feel and the heavy-handed anti war visuals. Please enjoy! 

As for Assange, you can be sure he's only gotten more pale than ever during the years he's spent in the UK's worst prison. His vitamin D deficiency must be so great by now that he ought to welcome the prospect of doing a stretch in a sunny Colorado Supermax. But no, that lightweight is still fighting extradition. 

From Reuters today: 

After Monday's hearing, two senior judges said Assange's argument that he might not be able to rely on the U.S. First Amendment right to free speech deserved a full appeal - which is unlikely to be held for months. 

 -- snip -- 

Had Monday's ruling gone against him, Assange's team said he could have been on a plane to the U.S. within 24 hours, ending more than 13 years of legal battles in Britain. 

It could be many months until the appeal is heard, and then that decision could be taken to the UK Supreme Court. 

-- snip -- 

Assange was first arrested in Britain in 2010 on a Swedish warrant over sex crime allegations that were later dropped. 

Since then, he has been variously under house arrest, holed up in Ecuador's embassy in London for seven years and, since 2019, held in the Belmarsh top security jail.

 

This decision is taken as good news by Team Assange, even though it stretches out his prison time for "many months" on top of the almost 14 years he's already spent in confinement, half of it self-imposed. 

Does this guy just like prison? Is he now institutionalized to such an extent that he sees no better way to spend his life than behind bars wearing government underwear? I assume that he once had higher aspirations. But, that's his business. 

If it were me, I'd rather drop all appeals and go face the music in the U.S. legal system. Realistically, he'd be out in a couple years, provided he is even convicted. There is a live possibility that his jury could deadlock and the case would be dropped. If convicted, down the road he could even get a commutation of sentence, as happened to his co-conspirator Bradley Manning. 

Either way, in a U.S. prison he could see the (sun)light at the end of the tunnel. I'd pick that.

U.S. Capitol Police: Apparently This Happened Right Under Our Noses

Nothing much to see here … just a baggie of cocaine on Capitol Hill. https://t.co/U7SOtfmNRH

— TSB (@TweetingTSB) May 16, 2024

At least this time the Capitol Cops didn't leave a pistol in a men's room or get seen reading The Protocols of the Elders of Zion while manning an access control post. 

But it's still pretty embarrassing to stumble across a baggie of cocaine in a work area, even if "the area is heavily trafficked by various contractors and employees" and is also near where they process prisoners.

Who knows how these things happen, the USCP press release seems to be pleading. 

Possibly some drug testing of those various contractors and employees is in order, but far be it from me to tell the Capitol Cops how to handle embarrassing news.