I Didn't Say It ...

Ronaldo Salgado, son of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo who was murdered by the ICEstapo, on burying his father:

“Today we laid my dad to rest. We were surrounded by family, friends, and members of the community. We played music, horses danced, and we celebrated the life of a man who provided for my mom and my brothers for more than 30 years. Tonight, I visited the site of where it all began. I was alone for the first time in 11 days. I was moved by all the candles, signs, and mementos that people have taken time out their day to place here. Thank you to all who have supported us through prayers, words of encouragement, and simply thinking about my family . I thought to myself, ‘with so much love from the community, how can I focus on any negativity?’ My dad made Houston home. And this city has been nothing but supportive. Thank you.”

The murder of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo should be a crime and those responsible need to be held accountable. He was not the undocumented immigrant who should have been detained and arrested and deported; he is not one of the criminals that the White Men and The Women Who Support Them regime was looking to find.

And to be clear, even if he was a violent criminal I thought the idea was to deport them and not murder them in cold blood.

Fuck ICEstapo; abolish ICEstapo!

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Jon Ossoff, Georgia Democrat Senator, slapping Defense Secretary and DUI hire Pete Hegseth over his lies about the war in Iran:

“You said, ‘Operation Epic Fury was a historic and overwhelming victory.’ You said Iran’s military had been rendered, ‘combat ineffective for years to come,’ and you stated we had ‘achieved every single objective.’ You stated four months ago that Iran’s military had been rendered ‘combat ineffective for years to come.’ Has Iran’s military been for the last four months combat ineffective?”

Hegseth, of course, stammered and stuttered and looked for the nearest bar because he couldn’t answer those questions. He’s lying. Americans are dying, innocent Iranians are dying, and we have clowns in charge.

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Jim McGovern, Democrat Representative from Massachusetts, on the idiotic logic of a demented man:

“[Cankles] says Democrats forgot to rig the election in 2016, successfully rigged it while he was president in 2020, then forgot how to rig it again in 2024. So the only election the Democrats supposedly stole was the one he himself controlled. You have to be a special kind of stupid to believe this bullshit.”

Seriously … if you think Cankles is right, read this quote again slowly and if you still think he’s right have someone with a higher education than you read it again and if you still think he’s right STFU because there is no help for your bran of ignorance.

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David Reddish, journalist, columnist, commentator, and novelist, on what life would be like if Democrats actually rigged elections:

“If Democrats were truly rigging elections, we’d have universal health care, gun safety, high-speed rail, paid family leave. Billionaires actually paying taxes, a Democratic Supreme Court [and] President Harris would be sipping mimosas in Jackie Kennedy’s intact White House Rose Garden right now!”

We would have arches and drained broken reflecting pools and cage matches on the lawn and his name scrawled on the sides of buildings and plastic gold ornaments everywhere he had space and Superglue™.

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Gavin Newsom, Democrat Governor of California, on Cankles’ big speech:

“Last night America watched the ramblings of a mad king. [Cankles’] address was not about the last election—it was about this one. Before a single vote has been cast he’s already laying the groundwork to rig this election and convince you not to trust the results if they don’t go his way. This is what authoritarians do. Don’t fall for it. Organize. Mobilize. Show up and vote in November.”

Sitting by and doing nothing because you didn’t like the white woman in 2016 or the brown woman in 2024 does no good.

CAST A GODDAMNED VOTE!

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I Didn't Say It ...

Raphael Warnock, Democrat Senator from Georgia, on SCOTUS’ dismantling of the Voting Rights Act:

“The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is the crown jewel of the Civil Rights movement. Without it, I quite literally would not be standing here today in front of you as a voice in the United States Senate for the people of Georgia. This [Cankles] Supreme Court just threw out the protections that were earned by the Civil Rights movement, those who bled, who fought and who died, so that people might have a voice.”

Okay, for those of you who don’t think we need a Voting Rights Act any longer in America I have one simple question to ask you:

Would you want to be Black in America today? Or treated like a Black American? Given all we know about the way people of color are still treated in the United States, would you want to be Black?

And that’s why we need the Voting Rights Act, why we need to elect Democrats, why we need term limits on the court, why we need equality for all Americans.

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Gavin Newsom, California Democrat Governor, on the newest ridiculous indictment on James Comey:

“The day after he talked about a beach photo and an indictment of his enemies  he talked about his Kremlin ballroom. He’s not doing anything to try to unite this country. The biggest reflection of this moment is the sewer we’re living in because of [Cankles]. This guy is cosplaying as the Pope, as Jesus, putting his face on Mt. Rushmore. None of this is normal.”

Cankles truly believes that the more monuments he leaves behind the more history will portray him as a great leader.

But when all his gold-plated toilets and wall décor and ballrooms and arches and signs and shoes and Bibles are thrown onto the trash heap, that’s how we’ll think of him: trash heap.

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Hillary Clinton, former First Lady, former Secretary of State, former Senator from New York, on the dismantling of the Voting Rights Act:

“In the 24 hours since the Supreme Court’s majority ruled to demolish the Voting Rights Act’s remaining protections, Louisiana and Tennessee have already signaled they will redraw their congressional maps with the clear effect of shutting Black voters out. The Court’s decision overlooks reality for a self-serving right-wing fantasy and it will live in infamy.”

Still think it’d be no different being Black in America today when two states—and more will likely follow—heard that SCOTUS ruling and began the plan to make it more difficult for Black voters—and all voters of color—to be heard.

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Pope Leo, on Cankles’ baseless claims that the Pope supports Iran’s nuclear weapons program:

“I have already spoken from the first moment ‘Peace be with you.’ The mission of the Church is to preach the Gospel, to preach peace. If anyone wants to criticize me for proclaiming the Gospel, let them do so truthfully. The Church has spoken out against all nuclear weapons for years, so there is no doubt about that.”

Sad that Cankles wants to pick a fight with the Pope considering the Leo is educated man and Cankles can barely pick a giraffe out of a lineup.

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James Carville, Democratic strategist, political consultant and author, on that SCOTUS ruling:

“The only nine people in the entire fucking government that operates under no ethics rule. These sons of bitches were so political, so happy to help the Republican party any way they could. What they’re trying to do at every juncture they can is screw Black people as hard as they can.”

Now John  Roberts is trying to spin it that SCOTUS was not taking a political stance in gutting The Voting Rights Act.

Voting. Rights. Act. It doesn’t get simpler than that no matter how Roberts and his band of racists and self-loathing Black men try to spin it.

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Meme Dump

Bobservations

For this episode of Tales of Carlos I need to refresh your memories of his first baseball game. When we lived in Miami, Carlos’ boss took the entire staff and their spouses and significant others to a Marlins baseball game. I was excited because, as a kid, we often went to see the Giants play the Dodgers—Dad was a Dodgers fan—or see the Oakland A’s play, but Carlos had never been to a baseball game.

We’re at the stadium and—I forget who the Marlins were playing—the Marlins had the first at bat; three outs and the other team was up, and they had three outs and the first inning was over. Carlos stood up, stretched his legs and said:

“Great game.”

“Sweetie, it’s not over yet.”

“But both sides had a turn.”

A discussion of innings and the idea that there would be at least nine of them ensued. Now, cut to Tuesday morning, this week, and there was a news story on about a rapper and Carlos says:

“Pete Rose, the baseball player?”

“How do YOU know Pete Rose?” [And let's not even dive into why Carlos thought Pete Rose was a rapper]

“It’s a famous name.”

"But how do YOU know he was a baseball player?”

“I don’t know, I don’t even know innings.”

The man slays even when he’s not trying.

This Tuxedo Says is from April 22, 2021: Tuxedo is also overjoyed at the idea that, somewhere in Mar-a-Lago, Thing #45 is throwing an epic hissy fit.

And it’s stunning to see that, no matter how things change, history repeats:

I don’t know who came up with this idea, but whoever thought of having cakes on cakes is an absolute genius!

I’ll be honest, I wouldn’t pay six bucks to see Lionel Richie in concert but if I paid six hundred dollars to see him and all I got was an hourlong interview of Richie with Robin Roberts talking about his new book, I’d be in jail about now. But that happened this week when fans … seriously? … showed up at a Times Square concert venue for “Truly: An Evening of Lionel Richie and Friends.”

And now they are clamoring for their coins back … y’all should’a asked me first, I’d charge you just sixty bucks apiece to listen to me.

Sidenote: yes, the poster for the event says, “In conversation on his memoir,” but his Vegas residency is also called “Truly: An Evening of Lionel Richie and Friends” so I understand the confusion.

But again, they wanted 600 bucks a person to hear him talk?

The same guy telling pregnant women to 'tough it out' has been complaining about climbing one flight of stairs now for three days straight.

I have been painting the sunroom for the past few days. I was just going to do the ceiling since we had the skylights removed but then I decided I didn’t like the yellow walls so I'm switching that up.

But Rosita and Consuelo have been loving having the room all to themselves and taking advantage of the warm tile floors on these cool mornings. And while Consuelo looks like a lady enjoying the sun, Rosie sprawls out like a drunken whore quite well.

Apparently GOP tool Derrick Van Orden wants California Governor Gavin Newsom arrested for saying Stephen Miller is a fascist but … and this is for the people in the back:

STEPHEN MILLER IS A FASCIST.

PS I found this photo online … has Miller had work done?

Stevan Miladinovic is from Serbia and has a master’s degree in industrial engineering but has been living in Miami and Thailand as a model of late … so Would You Hit It?

I Didn't Say It ...

Robert Garcia, out Democrat Representative from California, leading the charge on the Epstein files:

“[GOP Representative from Kentucky,  James Comer] and Republican leadership understand that we are picking off Republicans to join Democrats in assuring that we get as much disclosure and transparency as possible. We are going to raise hell. What we got was complete bulls**t [from the DOJ and from Comer]. “We demanded the full Epstein files, and that’s not what was sent over. The White House cover-up clearly continues. What they sent us was 33,000 pages of documents that have already been in the public domain. Handpicked, partial productions are wholly insufficient and potentially misleading. They are now trying to claim somehow that Ghislaine Maxwell was claiming that [The Felon] wasn’t involved? Give me a break. She’s a sex trafficker and known liar. She should not be trusted. Once again, [The Felon], Pam Bondi, [Republican House Speaker] Mike Johnson, they’re all involved in a massive cover-up. I think what James Comer and the Republicans finally know is that Democrats on the Oversight Committee are not messing around. We’re gonna force votes, just like we forced the Epstein files to get released. We’re gonna force them to take votes they don’t wanna take, and we are not going to stop until we get justice for all the victims.”

Garcia and the Democrats have used the fury from the MAGAt base over the Epstein case to their advantage and yet, Oversight Chair Comer issued 11 subpoenas for testimony from Democrats such as former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and former FBI Directors James Comey and Robert Mueller, as well as former Attorneys General Merrick Garland and Bill Barr; The Felon was not on the list.

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Oliver Kornetzke, in his words, ‘not a historian … not a Kremlinologist … not a credentialed scholar on authoritarian regimes … a behavioral psychologist … not a PhD in fascism or kleptocracy’ but he can tell you a little something about The Felon:

“Behold. The festering carcass of American rot shoved into an ill-fitting suit: the sleaze of a conman, the cowardice of a draft dodger, the gluttony of a parasite, the racism of a Klansman, the sexism of a back-alley creep, the ignorance of a bar-stool drunk, and the greed of a hedge-fund ghoul—all spray-painted orange and paraded like a prize hog at a county fair. Not a president. Not even a man. Just the diseased distillation of everything this country swears it isn’t but has always been—arrogance dressed up as exceptionalism, stupidity passed off as common sense, cruelty sold as toughness, greed exalted as ambition, and corruption worshiped like gospel. It is America’s shadow made flesh, a rotting pumpkin idol proving that when a nation kneels before money, power, and spite, it doesn’t just lose its soul—it shits out this bloated obscenity and calls it a leader.”

He ain’t wrong …

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Gavin Newsom, California Democrat Governor, taking apart JD “CouchF*cker” Vance over the recent shootings in Minneapolis:

“JD Vance just blamed mental illness for the epidemic of mass shootings in America. That’s rich considering that he and [The Felon] have cut over a trillion in mental health funding, including: $1 trillion in Medicaid, the nation’s primary funder of mental health services; $1 billion from school mental health programs; $1.1 billion from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration; $1.81 billion in National Institute of Health mental-health related grants. Enough hypocrisy, JD.”

JD, woefully out of his league and his only qualifications are taking vacations and running away from protesters.

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Larry Krasner, Philadelphia' Democratic District Attorney, lays out a plan for arresting and prosecuting fascist ICEstapo agents and troops as the MAGA crackdowns spiral out of control:

"If what you have is a group of ICE agents or you even have the military coming into Philadelphia and they're committing crimes, they're committing assaults that are illegal, homicides that are illegal, they're kidnapping people, they're engaging in unlawful restraint which is a crime in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania ... They're obstructing the administration of justice ... If you have people coming in—military, ICE, whoever it is—acting beyond their legal authority they can be prosecuted, assuming they commit crimes, in state court. And they cannot be pardoned by the president which means that they get to tell a Philadelphia jury exactly why it is that they thought that they could invade this city and they get to bear the consequences whether they are in handcuffs, a jury trial, or a jail sentence."

This is exactly what we need from all of our Democratic leaders. The Felon and his band of fascists are breaking the law at every turn and it's time that we started holding them accountable. And by prosecuting any lawbreakers on a state level, Democrats can circumvent the presidential pardon which has been irreparably corrupted by The Felon.

Do it.

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Mark Takano, out Democrat Representative from California, compared civil rights abuses that immigrant detainees face to the more than 125,000 Japanese-Americans forcibly sent to internment camps during WWII:

“I have seen that logic before, when the government imprisoned my family in camps, officials wrapped the policy in the language of necessity and security. They cited military zones and expedience, and they used banal words to mask a violation of the Constitution. There are distinctions between Japanese American incarceration of WWII and Alligator Alcatraz. But at its heart, there is not a wide gap between the two. In both instances, the government claimed that violation of human rights en masse was and is justified because of emergency circumstances. In both cases, there was and is no vetting, due process, or writ of habeas corpus. The government is so concerned with making it appear that they are executing on wild campaign promises that no human rights, no Constitution, and no court orders can stand in its way. This administration, which has leaned heavily into the optics of the prison and celebrated its cruelty, treats people as cattle to be processed rather than human beings with rights. [The Felon]’s ever-growing state apparatus makes sloppy, careless, and rushed arrests, which is precisely why independent oversight and real access are not optional luxuries but basic safeguards. None of this is radical. It is the bare minimum in a democracy that claims to respect the rule of law. The last time our nation failed this test, my family paid the price. I will not be quiet while others are made to pay it again.”

Is this the country any of us want to be? Locking people up in camps without due process? Separating families? Jailing children?

Seriously, this needs to stop and we all need to rise up against it.

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Pete Buttigieg, on his tenth wedding anniversary with Chasten:

“Ten years ago tonight, I went on a first date, arriving at the pub with tickets to that night’s (South Bend) Cubs game in my pocket in case our chat over beer went really well. Which it did. A decade later, I can’t imagine life without Chasten and the amazing family we have built together. And I can’t wait to see what the next ten years and more will teach us about life and love.”

The Future President and First Gentleman, y’all.

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I Didn't Say It ...

Jacob Frey, Minneapolis Mayor, a voice of reason after the shooting in his town this week:

“I have heard about a whole lot of hate that’s being directed at our trans community. Anybody who is using this as an opportunity to villainize our trans community, or any other community out there, has lost their sense of common humanity. We should not be operating out of a place of hate for anyone. We should be operating from a place of love for our kids. Kids died today. This needs to be about them. This needs to be wrapping our arms around these families with every bit of love that we can possibly show. And I know that our Minneapolis family and well beyond is prepared to do exactly that. And so, my message to everyone out there is, again, these families are experiencing some acute pain right now; but don’t just think of these as somebody else’s kids. Think of your own. Let’s make sure that we’re acting now to not just say it’s never happening again, but ensure it doesn’t.”

The right wants to paint the entire trans community based on the deeds of one man so let’s do that … think of all the white straight men who shot up schools and churches and stores and theaters and concert and start looking at the white men who shoot more often than any trans person.

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Gavin Newsom, Democrat California Governor, on The Felon trying to steal the White House for a third term:

“You think people actually think this guy’s serious about having another election? You think he’s joking about 2028? I don’t think Donald Trump wants another election. He showed me a painting. He said, ‘Turn around.’ And I said, ‘Oh, there’s FDR.’ And I went, ‘Of course.’ And he goes, he said, ‘What do you mean?’ I said, ‘I know exactly what you mean.’ And then he went on and on about the third term. He has the largest private police force in the world. All that funding allows more resources for this private police force that increasingly is showing a tendency not to swear an oath to the Constitution, but to the president of the United States. And he’ll be sending them to voting booths and polling places all across this country. You’ve seen it. He tried to steal the last election. He’s trying to rig it in plain sight this time. He wants to get rid of vote-by-mail. He’s talking about eliminating voting machines he doesn’t like. He’s setting up the contours where he can declare a declaration of emergency for anything. ‘Just cause’ means whatever he just said on Truth Social. Wake up, everybody! Wake up! I know it’s impolite. ‘We have to be more calm and demure.’ But I’m not calm and I’m not going to submit myself to niceties, not when this guy has tried to wreck our goddamn country.”

This is why we stand up and shout; why we march every single time we’re asked; and why we vote.

If we stop doing any of this we’ll get The Felon again and have no one but ourselves to blame.

SHOUT!! MARCH!!! CAST A GODDAMNED VOTE!!!!

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Maura Healey, Democrat Governor of Massachusetts, the first out lesbian governor in America, on signing the Shield Act 2.0 into law:

“Massachusetts will always be a state where patients can access high-quality health care and providers are able to do their jobs without government interference. From the moment Roe was overturned, we stepped up to pass strong protections for patients and providers, and with President [Cankles] and his allies continuing their assaults on health care, we’re taking those protections to the next level. No one is going to prevent the people of Massachusetts from getting the health care they need.”

Shield Act 2.0 further strengthens protections for patients and providers of reproductive healthcare, while explicitly mandating that abortions be performed when deemed medically necessary. The state's original shield law, enacted by Democratic Governor Charlie Baker in July 2022, prohibits states that have banned the life-saving treatment from punishing those who travel to Massachusetts to receive it by preventing the release of information or the arrest and extradition of someone based on another state's court orders.

The Resistance at work.

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Demetre Daskalakis, doctor and now former CDC Chief,  resigning with a scathing letter for The Felon and RFK:

“I am unable to serve in an environment that treats CDC as a tool to generate policies and materials that do not reflect scientific reality and are designed to hurt rather than to improve the public’s health. Having to retrofit analyses and policy actions to match inadequately thought-out announcements in poorly scripted videos or page long X posts should not be how organizations responsible for the health of people should function. I am not sure who the Secretary is listening to, but it is quite certainly not to us at the CDC. Unvetted and conflicted outside organizations seem to be the sources HHS use over the gold standard science of CDC and other reputable sources. The Felon and RFK Jr's] desire to please a political base will result in death and disability of vulnerable children and adults. Their base should be the people they serve, NOT a political voting bloc."

This isn’t just a resignation—it’s a heroic moral stand. Daskalakis—and let me go shallow for a moment because he is a hot gay bald man—is refusing to be complicit in a politicized dismantling of public health and so he is standing up for the American people in the face of The Felon and The Brain-Wormed Heroin Addict and their relentless attacks on science and sound medical advice.

And there’s more: Dr. Daskalakis's resignation follows the ousting of CDC Director Susan Monarez who had been in the job for weeks and fired after refusing to back RFK Jr.’s anti-science policies.

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Meme Dump