Breaking forth in cheers

There’s a meme that was making the rounds of Twitter:

“A Black man and a Jew walk into a bar in Georgia. The bartender asks, 'What can I get you, Senators?'”

So today I’m leaving aside all the coup crap and giving the space to honor the victory of Jon Ossoff and the Reverend Raphael Warnock, the two Democratic Senators from a state that’s about as Deep South as you can get. Their election is a testament to the changing demographics of our nation and to the amazing efforts of the even more amazing Stacey Abrams.

The song is, of course, “Marching through Georgia”. It was written in 1865 and commemorates the sweep through the state by the army commanded by William Tecumseh Sherman. (I thought about Cump Wednesday when “Elizabeth from Knoxville” was interviewed crying into a towel because she’d been maced by Capitol Police after she’d just stepped inside the building. “I was storming the Capitol,” she shrieked. “It’s a revolution!” She clearly had not expected war to be all hell.*)

(Okay, I lied when I said I was laying aside the coup.)

Here’s the Old Crow Medicine Show singing it. Crank up the volume for any right wing nut jobs in your vicinity. They’ll really appreciate it.

*Update: "Elizabeth from Knoxville" is apparently Elizabeth Koch, who lives in Maryland. And that towel may contain an onion, which she was rubbing into her eyes. Regardless, Elizabeth has some 'splaining to do.

 

Nightmare on Pennsylvania Avenue

Folks, I just do not know what to tell you.

I lived through the police riot outside the Democratic National Convention in 1968, the Days of Rage in ’69, the Vietnam War protests, and I still never thought I’d see what I did yesterday. While nearly 150 Representatives and Senators were in the process of an unconstitutional attempt to overturn the election, the sitting President of the United States stood in front of a mob of white nationalist thugs and urged them to march on the Capitol. And they did—because, hey, what would they have to worry about? They’re White!

So instead of a pile of bodies below the steps (which is what we’d have if they’d been Black), a few hundred terrorists got past the apparently unarmed Capitol Police, invaded the Capitol, swanned through the halls, crowed in the Senate chamber and took selfies in the offices of Senators and Representatives. (Some CP also posed for selfies with the thugs. I am not making that up.)

I am utterly disgusted. And appalled. And ashamed. And so fucking furious I could spit teeth. Cadet Bonespurs, Moscow Mitch, McCarthy, Hawley, Cruz, Rubio, Nunes—hell, every damned Republican who went along to get along for the past four years: this douchebaggery is on you. The assault on the national legislature is the logical outcome of four years of letting Bonespurs get away with high crimes and misdemeanors in exchange for some federal judges. You got your wish: democracy has been breached; how’d you like huddling in some secure basement room while the mob howled outside?

It’s also on whoever’s running federal policing in the District (the rally was on National Park Service property, and then the mob moved to the Capitol), who were armed to the teeth in June to tear gas and beat down BLM protestors, but who mostly looked dressed for a parade yesterday. And who did nothing more than pepper spray the terrorists.

Well, you know: White.

(At one point, there was a report that the cops were trying to “de-escalate” the situation. Yeah, because: White.)

Capitol Police haven’t had any problem literally hauling away healthcare protestors in wheelchairs, or arresting veterans protesting the war in Iraq. But white nationalists? “Tryna de-escalate, dude.”

What the hell happened to all the billions in post-9/11 Capitol security?

Nah—that was a rhetorical question.

Well, like I said at the beginning, I just do not know what to tell you.

 

 

 

Smart cookie

Last week, one of my colleagues (not a close one, which is good, because he’s one of those people who feels the need to contribute authoritatively on any subject) posted to a Teams channel that his daughter is doing a Girl Scout virtual cookie booth. It annoyed me, because selling Girl Scout cookies is meant to encourage skills in a girl that don’t happen when your parents basically do all the sales work for you.

I mean, standing at a table outside a grocery store, looking shoppers meaningfully in the eye is a thing. I get it that this year that's not Fauci-approved, but still.

Shortly thereafter, I found this on my doorstep:

Evidently “virtual booths” are what’s happening, but at least Wren got out of her room and put the pitch on people’s doorknobs.

Unless her dad did that for her.

Well, regardless, I ordered a box of Samoas.

 

 

Modern geometry

My employer had kind of a rough year in 2020. I mean—outside of the billionaire boys’ club, everyone did. But cyber security was just a 366-day dumpster fire and no alteration in the final digit on the date is going to change that.

So to mark this, the company (which I have to say is the cheapest tech org ever when it comes to swag) is offering all employees a tee-shirt gift. We had until yesterday to put in our size requirements using the below chart as guidance.

I don’t know where this thing originated, but this is the first time in my life that I have ever seen chest/bust measurements not expressed as circumference. I mean, what does “one-sided measurements” of a three-dimensional entity even mean?

I guess I’ll find out when the shirt arrives. I hope I can get into it.

 

 

Gratitude Monday: [tap, tap] Is this thing on?

Well, Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ. Looks like 2020 needs to be shot with a tranquillizer gun and then just humanely put down. Because Republicans—who have sworn an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, both foreign and domestic—have decided that the oath doesn’t actually prevent them from some light couping, if it gets them a head start on the 2024 presidential election, and they’re planning on spending Wednesday posturing and bloviating about how the votes of 74 million Americans somehow matter more than the votes of 81 million Americans.

That’s in addition to the Chaos Monkey (who spent an hour Saturday trying to whine Georgia’s secretary of state to magic up votes that would give the state to him) egging on the Incels- and Neck-Beards-R-Us crowd to swarm into the District They Call Columbia in their color-coordinated little outfits on Wednesday to engage in some heavy violence and criming so he can invoke the Insurrection Act, declare martial law and generally satisfy his ever-growing need for fuckery.

And they all are completely bollixing my first Gratitude Monday of the year.

Also, a few days ago a squirrel climbed up my screen door and looked me in the face as it peed right down the screen. I am just not in the mood.

However, it is Gratitude Monday and it is a new year. So at the moment, I am deeply grateful that at noon on 20 January, no matter what sedition kabuki the Repugs engage in or how much tear gas and tasers the pumped-up maskless crowd ingest—at noon on 20 January, Cadet Bonespurs ceases to be President of the United States. Whether he’s replaced by Joe Biden or Nancy Pelosi, it’s still all good.