Apropos of Nothing...

but it has been my experience, that no one quite carries on like this who doesn't harbor very real feelings of guilt.
When you have something to hide, you scream and carry on, because its your crapulous feelings/memories you are fighting...And even if Mark Judge can't vindicate Judge Kavanaugh he ought to testify all the same, otherwise it implies that evidence is being deliberately withheld.

"I Heard Smiles"

A colleague of mine, the veritable "Sage of Winter Hill", remarked with some mirth yesterday that Trump's disastrous press conference resembled nothing so much as Humphrey Bogart's "Captain Queeg" coming apart at the seams on the witness stand.
A very insightful observation to be sure, even if Trump's standout quote "I Heard Smiles" is a soaring poetical conjuration worthy of Rod McKuen or perhaps Gerardus Tros.  No I have little to add to the general shock,mirth & anxiety save to say that quite literally Trump has been coming apart at the seams live on television since 2015, but unlike Captain Queeg, he isn't being held accountable for it.
Why?
The man has enablers, most of them, in fact hate Donald Trump with a mortal passion, but as long as they fear him and his hold on the "GOP Base", as long as he nominates Falangists to Judgeships and as long as there is a ruinous tax cut to be passed, they'll hunker down and do as they are told.

Thus the day will come when we can carve on Mitch McConnell's tombstone "He Made a Bonfire of his Country to warm his Ideology".

But don't worry when that day comes, many years from now, McConnell, Charles Grassley and Paul Ryan will all rate Flag Draped Coffins, the very national ensign whose proud essence and liberties they did their uttermost to destroy.
Ironic Huh?

Charlie "Lumpy" Baker....Lifelong Moderate:

Just remember when prestige and power is on the line, Charlie Baker would endorse embrace or just cravenly capitulate to just about any Falangist Bastard. He has a particular gruesome talent for consorting with Fagbashing thugs (pictured above VP Pence, unpictured, Geoffrey Diehl) without compromising his own alleged bona fides with the gay community.

Only in America..

Does a woman have to defend her accusation of rape against a powerful man, by hiring lawyers at her own expense....
Abraham Lincoln would be the first to note the burden of proof is on both the US Senate and the Executive Department, this is a felony accusation after all.
But then there is a grim irony in all this, as a young Unscrupulous Falangist Attorney, Kavanaugh fruitlessly sherlocked Hilary Clinton looking for proof of criminality in the death of Vincent Foster. Now someone is sherlocking his privileged @ss and of course, Kavanaugh and his supporters are squealing like entitled little bitches.
So much politics, much of it praetorian, so little reverence for the US Constitution, this cannot be sustained over the intermediate term, sooner or later Justice and Truth will rain down from the Heavens like retribution.

A short note to my delegation to the Great and General Court...

Representatives Garballey & Rogers, Senator Friedman,

After last weeks fatal and terrifying "overpressure event" in Lawrence/Andover...feel free, all of yes, to Investigate The Shit Out of this Disaster!!!
This is the exactly the sort of thing, the state legislature usually does with admirable dispatch and thoroughness, ergo sticking their collective nose in someone else's shady-ass business!!!
I don't care how it's done, Senate Committee,  House Committee, Joint Committee, maybe even a Citizen's Commission...as long as the power of subpoena is in play I'll be happy.  Grill those bastards from Columbia Gas like some barbecue bratwursts!!!
Don't wait around for Charlie "Lumpy" Baker he'll dither and mutter platitudes, harassing miscreants in the private sector isn't his style....that is on the other hand very much in the legislature's wheelhouse, interrogating thieving chiselers is their thang.

Go for it guys! Cover this breathing earth, like a shitstorm out of hell!!!

Kavanaugh...

The US Senate, is pretty much the Republic's Reserve Army of Guilt & Bad Faith, thy waved thru twitchy weirdo Clarence Thomas onto the Supreme Court back in the day, and in the end they'll try at least, to wave thru Brett Kavanaugh regardless of his grotesque sexual escapades in Prep School.
They have no choice they have too many sins on their souls and too many mistresses or peg boys stuffed into the shadows to do otherwise.
I'm not surprised that Kavanaugh has a nasty near rape on his conscience, C.S. Lewis talks about "The Intoxicated Will", those gawd awful prep schools are nothing but vast incubators for class rule and power worship of a grotesque neo pagan variety.
Just remember at the end of the day, Brett Kavanaugh, glib, colonized & naively utopian is the worst possible jurist Trump could have nominated that could be reasonably expected to get confirmed...
On that basis alone he merits fighting to the last ditch to keep him off the court.
The fact that he may well be a drunken rapist is merely the surface manifestation of a larger deeper necrosis of the character.

I don't think its a good idea

for the Sunday Globe's Chief Foreign Policy Bloviator, Stephen Kinzer to refer to Ayanna Pressley & Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez as a pair of jungle lionesses who are gonna shred up the US House of Representatives.  Its a really unfortunate simile IMHO coming from Morrissey Boulevard's notorious neo-appeaser and declinist.

Lawrence, Andover...

One House might go up in chunks due to a gas leak...but dozens at a time? Its unheard of...

I think the AG needs to thoroughly investigate this whole catastrophe, its cost exactly one life so far and that's one life too many as far as your humble bloviator is concerned.
BTW Kudos to the private citizens up in the affected areas who ran up and down streets with Monkey Wrenches shutting off gas valves, that is spontaneous teamwork and magnanimity in the very Best American Tradition.
Meanwhile I've got to figure out where the gas cut off valve is in this house.

Just Remember....

That nice colorless inoffensive Governor of Ours, Charlie "Lumpy" Baker, a man whose blood supposedly runs cold with the milk of GOP Moderation, still managed to Endorse for the US Senate, Geoff Diehl groveling grievance ridden Trump apologist.
The reason for this is simple, Scott Lively a twitchy penniless wing nut weirdo got thirty five percent of the GOP vote in their gubernatorial primary last week.  People forget that Baker only won the Governorship four years ago by thirty thousand votes, if thirty five percent of the GOP Base stays home or blanks their ballots he could still end up in trouble high approval ratings or no high approval ratings.
So...that activates the cynical software in Baker's brain and thus endorsing Diehl's senate bid against Elizabeth Warren is a small price to pay for GOP Unity this fall.
Meanwhile some ten democratic mayors here in the Commonwealth are allegedly supporting Baker for Governor this fall, does this mean they will be passing out Diehl for Senate law signs as well?
At any rate, I think the captioned local democratic municipal committees are well within their rights to seek redress via primary challenges...

Grim Irony...

That the Chinese Muslim Minority, the Uyghurs are being systematically repressed by Beijing and their best advocates are the Admin's biggest witch burners and book burners, I refer to "Roving Ambassador for Religious Freedom, Sam Brownback", a Xian Primitive whose life dream is to compel protestant church attendance for all save perhaps the President he serves.
Of course, if you take a giant step back, all Beijing's actions are the exact same repressive measures that Trump's base routinely fantasize about on Social Media, repression, denial of rights and of course, detention.
Or to take a even bigger step back, "Save The Uyghurs and Screw the Catholic Refugees on the Rio Grande"...but maybe thats too far a step back.

:)

Anonymous...

I'm not gonna delve too deeply into the possible identity of the NYT's Anonymous "Resistance" Correspondent within the Trump Admin, I'm still not convinced the whole thing isn't an elaborate hoax, Trump himself would love to spoof the New York Times, that is if he had the brains for the job.
But...
Assuming the missive is legit, then some things ought to be discussed and detailed...

The letter itself has a whining exculpatory tone common to persons who fear imminent indictment, one is left with the impression that bad craziness is happening Behind the Scenes in the White House.
On the other hand, given the President's Primitive Paranoid & Immature Personality, why would anyone enrolled in a in-house "Resistance Cell" go blabbing to the New York Times when the short and intermediate term success of said undertaking depends on the maintenance of strict secrecy?
I think the writer's goal here, may be to provoke a public constitutional crisis, goad Trump into a berserker meltdown that cannot be walked back by his increasingly besieged enablers and thus either compel the Vice President & the Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment or else induce Trump to resign.
I doubt President Trump can be persuaded to resign save by a overwhelming threat he cannot deflect or evade and even then he'd want certain guarantees.  It is somewhat within his business profile to cut and run when the going gets tough, but he was usually able to "rip off a piece" on his way out, that is very much a potential situation that would require close scrutiny indeed.
As for the 25th Amendment, VP Mike Pence he was well selected in once sense, he seems blindly loyal to the President and exudes the baffled air of an imperiled contestant on the "Celebrity Apprentice".  Pence wouldn't bat an eye if Trump started mainlining thorazine in the middle of a press conference.
That leaves the time consuming option of impeachment which is still a political and logistical impossibility, for the moment...
My only other suspicion is that the author is likely not the VP or any member of the cabinet, it may well be someone fairly anonymous but with a great deal of access to the President and his in & out box, that suggests a staffer within the West Wing, other than that yer guess is as good as mine.

Irony in Postscript...

Mike Capuano who lost his primary race on Tuesday ending a ten year career in the US House, loudly endorsed incumbent Marilyn Petitto Devaney via election day robocall in her primary fight against Nick Carter.  Capuano, lost, and Devaney won, which is at best a confusing lesson on the power of endorsements in a down ballot race...

Primary Post Mortem...

In some ways "that could have gone better".

Congrats though to Ayanna Pressley, she proved the pundits and the wise guys all wrong, she demonstrated a very thorough ground game through out her district, she won because she wanted it more, spoke eloquently & worked harder.  I predict her victory will set off a wave of primary challenges in Massachusetts come 2020, in particular Boston Mayor Marty Walsh had better get his ducks in a row so to speak.
Sadly, Incumbent Governor's Councilor, Third District Marilyn Petitto Devaney ran up a ten thousand vote majority in her race against Nick Carter. Exactly how she did this remains a mystery to me, unless sheer ubiquitous incumbency has an even greater power than previously measured.  Otherwise the woman has a genius talent for either boring or infuriating her audiences, but then marginal candidates like her can achieve tenure in office in these down ballot races.  If she primaried again next time her challenger is going to have to work up a serious GOTV operation and spend some money.
And equally sadly, Jimmy Tingle got skunked in the democratic Lt. Governor's race by Quentin Palfrey, this one is another puzzler unless Palfrey's last minute television commercial was enough to decisively tip the race in his favor. My only other theory is perhaps Palfrey "pulled an Ed King" and just made a better effort at outreaching and motivating the hard core progressives/Trump Haters.  I suspect heavy Anti Trump rhetoric will be Palfrey's go-to this fall not sure how far that can take us in a gubernatorial race but then I've been mistaken before believe me.
As for Citizen Tingle, I think we missed an opportunity here, Jimmy had a natural constancy among unions and blue collar voters, as a comedian he'd worked those cadres for years its not for nothing that there was a giant "Jimmy Tingle for Lt. Governor" sign posted outside Paddy's venerable pub in North Cambridge.  Its those "Tingle Voters" we need to pull back into our coalition if we hope to win this fall.
Anyhow I hope this doesn't pull Jimmy off perhaps contesting another race going forward, as a candidate he had many virtues and hopefully better outcomes can be expected, going forward.

Primary Day Tomorrow...

I am voting for: Jay Gonzalez for Governor.  I like Jay, he understands one thing, we may be in calm waters now, but the Commonwealth is facing toxic challenges in public transportation, housing, environment & health down the road, and he seems willing to try and face up to them.  Like Charlie Baker he is a former Secretary of Administration & Finance (for Deval Patrick) unlike Lumpy though, Gonzalez understands the less we do now, the fewer options we will have in the future.  I like Bob Massie, if he is nominated tomorrow night he'll have no firmer friend this fall than me, he is a bantam fighter and he'll be the last off the battlefield win or lose.  Given Massie's lack of any public experience at all, he is a bit of a wild-card, moreover putting him at the top of the ticket automatically ensures both our nominees for Govern & Lt Governor have almost zero electoral experience, that seems chancy to me.  But if the democrats choose otherwise, so be it, I'll be out there banging the pots for Massie...
Anyhow, Gonzalez makes a lot of practical sense on the the opioid crisis, transportation, criminal justice and he is willing to call climate change, climate change, the very quintessential Massachusetts Issue we need to start confronting, now.
For Lieutenant Governor: Jimmy Tingle, this race is noticeable for a stark choice between two men with zero electoral experience, Tingle's opponent Palfrey has had some third tier appointments in Obama's White House but it isn't like he was Ambassador to the Court of Saint James or anything. Jimmy Tingle on the other hand is eloquent ,funny, a veritable avatar of blue collar democratic politics whose campaign stickers are in the windows of corner pubs and taverns all over Cambridge and Somerville.  He has a strong "Union Household" vibe something we are gonna need this fall.
Yes he is a stand up comedian by trade, but those at least make Tingle a formidable interlocutor come the fall and that quite frankly is a key deliverable for a nominee for Lt. Governor.
Third District, Governor's Council: Nick Carter.  The Governor's Council passes judgement on the Governor's Judicial Nominees, Carter is a young articulate attorney, he'll evaluate the nominees on their talents and merits, and he's running for a public institution that requires a regular infusion of specialized knowledge, Nick Has All That in Spades. His opponent, Marilyn Petitto Devaney has simply been on the job too long for the good she has done and has consistently exuded an irritating and exasperating campaign style at her public appearances, her campaign mailings are full of nonsensical charges & misspellings, its time for her to go very frankly.  I don't regard Nick Carter as anyone's idea of an apotheosis, but I feel sure he can rise to the occasion.
Secretary of State: Bill Galvin, I don't like the full play of Galvin's personal politics but he has worked his boney ass off for the plain people of Massachusetts, that much is clear, he has done nothing to merit his expulsion from office and in voting for him, I pay a reasonable price for Party Unity.
I wish Josh Zakim well, if his name comes before me again on a future  primary ballot, I'll give him consideration, all that said, its still Galvin. Oh another thing I like about Bill Galvin, he didn't make an endorsement in the Third Governor's Council District...:)

I was at best entirely neutral with respect

to the democratic congressional primary in the Seventh District, better known as "Pressley versus Capuano".
But then Congressman Capuano had to go and endorse via robocall embattled Governor's Council Incumbent Marilyn Petite Devaney who herself is locked in a tight democratic primary race with Nick Carter.
I gotta hand it to Ms. Devaney she must have a very serious marker to call in vis-a-vis Capuano to get this critical an endorsement from a politician with his own primary challenge, but that doesn't change one whit my low opinion of her leadership or incumbency.
I'm voting for Nick Carter tomorrow in the Third Governor's Council District Primary, Ms. Devaney has simply "tarried too long for the good she hath done" we must be quit of her, if for no other reason than she simply refuses to reflect on the calendar and peacefully depart public office.
As for Congressman Mike Capuano, I am deeply disappointed in him, I don't live in his district, so all I can do is wish the very best to his primary Opponent Ayanna Presley, hopefully she'll be the breath of fresh air the U.S. House of Representatives desperately needs.