Look, we’ve been saying this stuff for years. A balanced diet, substituting tofu for beef and including corn regularly, will be a complete protein, and is much more healthy. Now, with meat processing becoming more expensive and even dangerous, it is the perfect time to become sandle-wearing, long-haired, tofu eaters. I know, I don’t like these hippies either, but what can I say? For decades, they were our only advocates. Anyway I’m not bitter about you bipeds eating us. The second you turn your back, you’ll find out these horns aren’t just for decoration.
Sleep well,
Hakizimana (55215578)
Tyson Foods Feedlot
Springdale, Arkansas
Hakizamana (55215578), 2020
Dear Madame/Sir:
Whose idea was it to let me out! Have you tried this prison penpal program? Penitentiary Playmates. It is amazing. I didn’t have this much fun on the outside! I have two fine ladies in Springfield, Illinois, one in Springfield, Missouri, one in Toledo, four in four different small towns in Texas, and one…..somewhere else, I forgot. Covid 19? I was in protective custody. I was safer inside! I’ll roll with it. I just need to get word to Sofia, Anne, Sabrina, Tabitha, Caress, Brandi, Cindie, Cyndy and Ms. What’s Her Name so that they know to send my letters here, to the YMCA.
Best to ya,
Michael Cohen
Michael Cohen putting away his phone after checking to make sure the Penitentiary Playmate app was installed correctly
Dear Madame/Sir:
A few things that I probably should have clarified years ago. First, I will NEVER, ever wear Vickies’ or any other sexy lingerie unless it is for a shoot. Second I find orgasms to be positively revolting. Third, I fart a lot. I’m tired of all this silly attention, so people might as well know the truth.
Thanks,
Kim Kardashian
The incomparably flatulent and sexually indifferent Kim Kardashian
Dear Sirs:
Get me a horse, a rifle with 50 rounds of ammunition, and enough food and water for two weeks for me, this female, and our offspring. Otherwise we run around Indira Gandhi Airport, spreading the Covid-19 virus I stole from Uttar Pradesh. Yes, I’m monogamous. On this planet, it’s easy. Somehow, Nova, Caesar, and I are getting back to our planet.
This planet is a MADHOUSE.
Taylor
From left, Caeser, Nova, and Taylor, discussing the best possible plan to leave the Planet of The Humans
–Galina Lada Fedorov, Russian model, former Trump Mistress
Galina Lada Fedorov. It has been reported that after her affair with the President, she washes her hands more than forty times per day.
Why do working class white men forgive Trump’s unmanly behavior? Tom Nichols asked this question at the beginning of this piece, and writes some accurate insights regarding a question that I have had throughout this political horror show. Rather than dispute his explanation, I would like to build upon it.
Nichols grew up white and working class, brought up by the Second World War generation, and was heavily socialized in the Gary Cooper, “a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do” sense of masculinity. This he has in common with many of this demographic, which has provided vital Trump support.
This is true despite the fact that Trump transparently dodged the draft, deflects responsibility from his, the most powerful executive position in the world, is obviously intimated by intelligent, accomplished women, and brags so extravagantly that one would think he was a school’s lowest achieving 6th grader trying to bum rush his way into the Student Council presidency. His vanity alone would get him disinvited from just about any Knights of Columbus or Teamsters smoker, if he were not President.
Nichols persuasively argues that Trump plays a Peter Pan role for many of this demographic’s members, and that his petulance is, in Nichols’ words, “a permission slip to shrug off the responsibilities of manhood.” In essence, his behavior validates the childishness that is inside so many men, but has remained hidden by the stoic need for the decision making and resolve that signals adult hood.
To this, I would add a further motivating factor. Many members of this demographic are fighting what to them has been an unprecedented loss in national hegemony since the Second World War. Beginning with the modern Civil Rights era, one group of Americans after another has declared themselves unwilling to passively live with their positions of legal, political, economic, or social scorn. Black people, brown people, Asians, homosexuals, trans people, and most of all women have asserted themselves. It is no longer permissible to pay unwelcome sexual attention to women at work, to crudely insult them on the street, or to harass gays, or to pull the corners of one’s eyes to get a laugh at Asian people’s expense. No longer can you repeatedly utter the word, “chigger” to obliquely insult an African American boss. I have witnessed all of these events in either a professional or military setting. Now, this behavior can get you in trouble at work, slandered on the internet, or simply make people despise you.
And the climax of the decline and fall of Ward Clever is that they elected a black president! Despite outright racist hostility from the McConnell and the Republican party, and Fox’s eight years of 24 hour/day unsupported vilification, his presidency was characterized by an economic recovery, quiet dignity, the assassination of Osama Bin Laden, and mostly business as usual. Aside from a few appointments of people of color to some important posts, the worst never happened. The stock market did not sink into the sewer, gas was never $10.00 per gallon, the Dakotas were not given back to the Sioux, white people did not become the property of black people, and you still have your guns.
However, a successful black presidency did signal the inevitable- the white working class is soon to be outnumbered by the non-white working class. They can fight it with increasingly racist legislation, but in the end, mathematics will shut the door on white hegemony. It is for this reason that so much of the right wing despises the Constitution. “We The People,” plus demographic trends equals “We can no longer ignore or abuse the people we irrationally hate.” That document and its legitimacy are their ultimate targets. To paraphrase Julianna Marguiles’ character Kitty Montgomery of Dietland, “they’ll burn down the entire world before they let somebody else run it.”
An endangered speciesDietland’s Julianna Marguiles (Kitty) and Joy Nash (Plum)
Translation: “Vesuvius will not erupt! Fake news!”
Regulus, Roman town crier, 78 a.d.
Regulus, shortly before his demotion by Nero to urinary tax collector
Letters to the Editor
Dear Sir/Madam:
Ok right, a dam breaks and causes a flood. Supposedly there are some questions about the water quality in Flint. I thought that bunch of long-haired, unwashed hippies at the E.P.A. were supposed to deal with that. Look, there’s no flood, no water scandal in Flint, and no Covid-19. How can you all delude yourselves? Anyway, duty calls. I have to go polish my 60 m.m. mortar. The new legislative session starts soon.
Ben Hedges
President of Pride, Ignorance, and Guns
Ypsilanti, Michigan
Dear Madame/Sir:
What?! Pier 1 is closing?! I have to buy only three more of this darling collection of Pre-Columbian tea caddies and I’ll have the whole collection! Bad things just can’t stop happening to people like me. It reminds me of when the local premier of the 2015 Lexus SUV’s was delayed by that orphanage fire. It’s just not fair.
With Despair,
Karen
Karen, sporting a stoic grimace after hearing that Pier 1 is closing its doors
Dear Sirs:
The President is not kidding about using hydrochloroquine. One time I was with him and TS Erica Mahneater. He asked us to do a few HC’s as he called them. I’m pretty straight edge, but Erica would try anything. She popped a few, expecting to feel crazy the way Donald said he did. She said her heart pounded a little and that’s it. Her son had a cold, so she suggested instead that Donald pop another Cialis so that we could do our thing and get out of there. He never did. He never did figure out that Erica was trans either. Still, I’ll vote for him. If he could just give every American $130,000, he would win 2020 without a problem.
Living to love and loving to live,
Stormy Daniels
The President and Stormy Daniels, before a decadent night of debauchery and hydrochloroquine
–Wade Purvis Spencer, The President’s half brother by his father’s former mistress, Cody Lee Spencer
Wade Purvis Spencer
With the exception of the above quotation, what I describe in this post happened. I tested positive for Covid-19 on March 25th of this year. I was fortunate, in that I had a light case of it that was gone about two weeks later. Time went by and then late last week I woke up with an intolerable pain in my chest. No matter how I laid in bed, I was in pain and breathing, walking, laughing, burping, and coughing (which had been increasing also) were excruciating. I made an appointment with my primary care physician for Wednesday of this week, the first available.
Yesterday morning I woke up and was in such pain I moved like an arthritic sloth. I knew from reading that the most frequent way that patients have died from Covid-19 has been runaway blood clots in the lungs, and to my medically ignorant brain, that seemed to be the problem. I had a catastrophic health crisis two years ago, so I felt a familiar dread that again, I really might die. I went to the ER, and my level of clotting was indeed, “elevated.” After six hours and more tests, I found out I had pneumonia. A few hours later, after some antibiotics, I started to feel something closer to normal. I still have to finish the z-pack, but this drama is passing.
Me, enjoying this fake crisis. Notice the fake machinery, and the fake gown I had to wear. Later I would get a fake CT scan and take a fake Z-Pack which made me feel much better, but I was probably faking that too.
Once I was convinced that I was not about to exit this life, I reflected upon the various yokels that I’ve seen agitating against the quarantine. Examples:
This angered me. It seemed to defy reasonable explanation that grown men and women would travel and protest a policy that protects them, carry around assault weapons, and support a conspiracy that only only makes sense if they still believe in the existence of Godzilla, the tooth fairy, and the pegasus.
Later I watched Fareed’s Take which he broadcasts during his Sunday talk show.
He unpacked a lot of this. He quoted one author, who observed that most of the people who make these decisions (regarding public health in this case), come from urban areas, have advanced degrees and secure jobs. Many can work at home, out of harm’s way. Many of those who are experiencing the economic hardship of these policies work blue collar jobs in which they have to be present to make money. Many also are from sparsely populated rural areas, where the chances of infection are lower. From their alienated perspective, they see wealthy, urban know-it-alls telling them that they have to miss their rent, deprive their kids of braces, and forego dining out, bowling, and any other simple pleasures that defy social distancing guidelines. Meanwhile, many of the policies that the urban elite champion benefit themselves, or the ruling class. In further support to this perspective, he cites statistics regarding the lopsided impact of Covid on unemployment between moderately high income and low income earners.
This doesn’t mean I sympathize with them. I despise the way they equate this situation with Nazi or Communist tyranny, use racist overtones, and circulate absurd conspiracy theories which would be hilarious if it was not clear that at least some of them believe these myths. Examples:
There is, however, another element that further muddles the situation. The overwhelming majority of these protestors are white, highlighting another divide. Whereas blue collar workers of all races, but predominantly whites, are stuck not working, black and latino workers have to work the most covid-19-exposed jobs. They also have been dying in disproportionate numbers since the crisis begun. From National Geographic, From Businesss Insider , From the LA Times , and from the Guardian. This situation begs the question, “would the protesters be so eager to return to work if instead white people were dying in disproportionate numbers? As Fareed and others have said, the Covid-19 pandemic has eloquently illustrated this culture’s long term inequalities. Not since the Rodney King beating has this country’s stained, unwashed underwear been so exposed for the world to see. Pull up your pants, Mr. President.
“A great example of a moving picture trope is when an incredible idiot is put into a challenging job, and then has to deal with a crisis. Take Charlie Chaplin in Modern Problems. It never fails to kill the people.”
–Anton Rodriguez Fowla, Producer, Movie Maggic, inc., 1927
Dear Madam/Sir,
I always called him by his middle name. Johnny was not a great math student. He had such problems with exponents. Actually, any multiplication was difficult for Johnny. He eventually told me he’d just get a servant to do his homework. If he was given a problem like “5 raised to the 3rd power”,” he could not understand that the 3, written higher than the 5, was not somehow “better” than the 5. I remember later trying to show him a graph of exponential growth. It was similar to this:
You know, kind of how Covid-19 cases are growing now. Then Johnny told me, “That’s going to be my money, Mrs. What’s-Your-Name. I’ll have a lot more than you.” I sighed, because he would say such arrogantly mean things all the time. For about the hundredth time I said, “I know, Johnny. Did you know, a moronic, spoiled narcissist says what?”
“What?”
“Exactly.” He still calls about once a month, and I ask him the same thing, and he still says “what” every time. He sometimes is not the shiniest spoon in the drawer. ”
Bernadette Karen Folkstone
Donald J. Trump’s eighth grade math teacher
Bernadette Karen Folkstone, 2016
Dear Sir/Madame:
Self-quarantining was the biggest relief of my life since earning my M.D. I laughed about it that year, because I received my M.D. the same year the TV show “Batman” started. I had a sense of humor back then and I used to walk around Ithaca with a Bat-Utility belt around my waist while wearing my scrubs. Okay, yes, I was a little nerdy. Anyway last week, I was so close to shouting out during one of those press conferences, “does everybody have ears! He told us to conduct clinical trials of ingesting a toxic chemical!” I graduated first in my Cornell Medical School class to listen to the barely literate poster boy for Narcissistic Personality Disorder tell me to investigate if injecting bleach will make people more healthy. I have a better idea. I will investigate if the ingestion of two dry martinis will make me forget that I work for an incompetent imbecile who thinks the periodic table lets him know when he can’t fool around with one of his mistresses
Bottom’s up,
Dr. Anthony Fauci, M.D.
Dr. Fauci, after only one day of self-quarantine
Dear Madam/Sir
Bill Barr likes to look out for people, in particular Trump. I asked him the other day, “You know, don’t you, that Michael Flynn is a confessed criminal, right?” “Yep,” he said. Then I asked, “If you interfere with career prosecutors you’re blatantly damaging our entire branch of government, right?” Again he said, “yep.” Finally, I asked, “if you and I both know this, why doesn’t the President understand this?” Barr said impatiently, “Because we’re not as confused as the President!” That was when I left the WH and started our Topless Republicans website with Sean Spicer and Sarah Huckabee. My Dad wouldn’t approve, but nobody listens to Spinal Tap anymore anyway.
Wendy St. Hubbins
Former Undersecretary of Justice
Wendy St. Hubbins, Former Undersecretary of Justice, and 85% Owner of Topless Republicans
Dear Madame/Sir:
It seems like we’ve been celebrating Festivus since 2017. Every day we get a list of Trump’s grievances. He performs feats of strength, by engaging in corruption, nepotism, incompetence, and casual bigotry at superhuman levels. He even got into the spirit and predicted a Festivus Miracle when he said the virus would just disappear. The truth is, in fact, if Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David were to write a horror show, it would look a lot like the Trump Administration.
Regards,
Jerry Stiller
Jerry Stiller, 1928-2020. We’re grateful for your comedy.
Today, I’m going to shut the futz up (I’ve recently resolved to cut out cursing from any(snicker) serious work I write). Instead, I’m going to post some excellent cartoons about the current state of affairs. All cartoons courtesy of Politico.
–Blair “The Tooth” Richter at the Valachi hearings, 1963
Blair The Tooth” Richter, shortly before his surprising 1964 disappearance
!!!Exclusive interview!!!:
Bittersweet Abattoir: What can you tell us about the Covid-19 conspiracy?
TTH: I admit it. There IS a conspiracy to foist this fake disease upon you. I know, because it is my plot. I started it, and it wasn’t easy.
I first had to meet with my contacts in the medical industry. We obviously needed them on our side. Otherwise who’d be giving fake tests, processing fake insurance claims, fraudulently declaring fatalities from the “disease,” faking autopsies, giving out sugar pills, conducting false scientific studies, the list goes on. The union guys were not a problem. But those doctors. These guys can’t stop talking about their stupid oath! The infectious disease doctors were just the worst. That wuss, Fauci, kept saying, “No, there really IS a covid-19!” I told him, “Sure, college boy, just play along like we told you.” Anyway, after we got all 950,000 of them on board, we had to get the hospital directors, There were 6,146 of those shysters. They were pretty easy, though. They could see the benefits to their bottom lines. The nursing home directors, though. There were some stubborn holdouts among the 17,000 of those communist fools. We had to get a little rough with them, see. You know how it is.
“Anyway, the doctors and nursing home directors were a struggle, but the funeral home directors were as easy as Bangkok prostitutes at the end of the month. They were important, too. They’re actually the ones who came up with that whole purple toes thing. 25,000 of those swindlers, and they all came along with our liberal conspiracy without so much as a whimper.
Then there was the real struggle: getting other governments to go along. You wouldn’t think it would be so difficult to get people who speak 6,500 languages to go along with a liberal conspiracy, but I (and the Clintons, along with Biden) managed to make it happen. That is how powerful liberals truly are. We don’t win elections because we don’t need to. We control everything else.
In fact, gravity is a liberal conspiracy. People could fly without the airplane industry. But they’re paying us so we just keep supporting the theory of gravity. Oh, and acids and bases? Go ahead and mix them. Just make sure your life insurance is paid up. Um, for reasons. Computers are run by microprocessors? No, they all have brilliant, microscopic insects inside them, running them with adoring dependability. As Wonka said, “We are the music makers. We are the dreamers of the dreams.” Maybe Fox News should stream this confession. Wait. Am I confessing? Wait. Maybe Fox News is already streaming this! Hey, you, Fox! I want Billy Powell to buy up your entire nitwit, toothless network and establish a trans news hour!
Anyway, I’m going to look at the Dow. My company cold calls Christian women to see if they need abortions, promotes witchcraft, and makes PPE. I’m hoping for at least a $2 per share rise today.
-Thor Taradash Hyerdahl
Norwegian Investor/Liberal Tyrant/knows more than you do
Thor T. Hyerdahl, the reason you are unemployed and your children are hungry tonight. These people want to turn your children into LGBQT prostitutes, raise your taxes to 150% and take your guns.
“There has got to be a decent apple in a barrel of its otherwise putrid peers. Fetch THAT one, Jack!’
–Cpt. Tobias Slaughter in Figgish Clippe’s Isle of Riches. (Later Clippe received a cease and desist order from the Estate of Robert Louis Stevenson. We probably should not have even posted this. Bullocks.)
I don’t want it said that I do not recognize when the other side’s people commit laudable acts. Republican Governor Mike Hogan has been consistently leading Maryland using good sense, expert opinions, and leading by example. He’s also had the testicular fortitude to call out at least some of Trump’s most egregious lies. Governor Hogan, you and I probably agree on very little, but you’ve got my respect. Thank you for your service. I may be wrong, but I think this is my first entry with no sarcasm.
Update: See Governor Hogan recently interviewed by Trevor Noah of the Daily Show. Gov. Hogan & Trevor
Shameless Commerce: Working today. Check out American Science and Surplus for Quarantine Essentials as well as just about everything everything you need for the upcoming Zombie Apocalypse. American Science and Surplus
“I sometimes wonder about how many papers Trump copied off of other kids at school, how many tests he cheated on, how many big kids he kissed up to, how many smaller kids he bullied. Other times, the answer is clear: all of them.
Araceli Elizabeth Perez,
Winner of 2 consecutive Phineas Gage awards for political writing
Dear Madame/Sir
Are you making a joke? Why did I dump the airlines? Because President Bleach Boy couldn’t find the Oval Office couch if he was sitting on it. If you’re in a high risk business now, and I own you, I’m gone. I just hope I have enough change left over from the laundromat so I can get a lottery ticket.
Warren Buffet
The Oracle of Omaha posing with one of the very few people in the world that he cannot buy 900 times over
Dearest Peasants,
You all are worried about the employees I fired for opening their big mouths, right?Get used to it. I have big plans for all of you. How’s this: “The United States of Amazon –One Nation, under Jeff, Indivisible, with Justice for Jeff.” The best part about it is the new Constitution. It has one line: “Jeff wants it.” I know future generations of seventh graders will thank me for making their civics classes so easy.
Kneel, vermin,
King Jeffrey Preston Bezos I
King Jeff I , after being told what “Prima Nochta” means
Dear Madame/Sir: I heard Putin identify himself, and then tell the scientist, “make sure intelligence gets this by tomorrow. We’ll plant this in Wuhan, and by 2021, American will be the 47th Oblast.” I heard him say this. I’m always looking over my shoulder now. I know I haven’t got much longer to live. ”
A Covid-19 Virus, speaking on the condition of anonymity
The Covid-19 virus who wrote the above letter. She has her back to the camera to protect her identity
Dear Sir/Madame:
Of course there’s no way to know if Covid-19 was developed in a Wuhan lab. But hey, when the Big Man says “jump,” I jump. When he says “jump back, ” I jump back. Who cares? I need to get back to the Oval Office, though. We’ve had a Fortnight tournament for two weeks, and I’m about to wipe out that skinny runt Jared for the title of WH Champion. Wish me luck!
Mike Pompeo
Secretary of State
WH Fortnight Runner up, 2018, 2019
Fortnight rivals Jared Kushner and Mike Pompeo, each taking a time out from their tournament to do some WH work.
Bittersweet Abattoir 