Montana Senator Sets Us Straight On Government Shutdown

U.S. Sen. Jon Tester (D-Montana) explains why everybody in
Washington, especially his colleagues, need to grow up, open
the government and deal with border security like adults

U.S. Sen. Jon Tester, D-Montana is a pretty common sense sort of guy

He has to be, given he's s Democrat from the red state of Montana.  Voters in Big Sky Country usually don't do well with people dishing bullcrap. Tester knows that.

Donald Trump really tried hard to get him unseated by his Republican challenger during the November, 2018 election, but it didn't work. Tester won re-election.

You might find clues as to why Tester won re-election from the video, below.

He explains in less than six minutes to his Senate colleagues why the Senate must lead, re-open the government and end this shutdown which has gone on for more than three weeks.

Tester is all for border security, but would like everybody to act like adults for a change and figure
out how best to accomplish that goal.

Here's his video, which is beginning to turn viral on social media. Totally worth the watch:

Mocking Trump Might Be Only Way To Stop This Dangerous Jerk

Imagining Donald Trump if he was an Olympic swimmer. 

The news over the past 24 hours has been all about Donald Trump's latest outrage. (There's one every day.)

Of course, the latest outrage you've heard about is The Donald saying "Second Amendment People" have, um, options, if Hillary Clinton is elected and she starts appointing Supreme Court justices that are hostile to the Second Amendment.

But it was a joke! he says. Ha ha! What he really meant was people who love the Second Amendment can band together to work for Trump's election and Clinton's defeat.

Riiiight.

As any bonehead knows, if Trump really just wanted to say Clinton is bad for the Second Amendment, all he had to do is say, "Hillary is hostile to gun rights! Vote for me to preserve the Second Amendment and gun laws!"

Boom, that's it.

However, as many commentators pointed out, he does this all the time. He says really bad things but says them in ambiguous ways that he can backtrack and say, "It was only a joke."

Most of the world takes these as jokes, because Trump is a joke.

But Trump also knows there's a certain segment of the population that won't get the nuance, and take his words as marching orders. That's the dangerous part.

Thomas Friedman wrote about that today in a New York Times column, the first sentence of which was:

"And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin got assassinated.

Friedman went on to explain that extremist rabbis and militant settlers branded Rabin a traitor, and then candidate Benjamin Netanyahu addressed a "feverish right-wing rally from a balcony in Jerusalem's Zion Square, as protestors below shouted for the death of Rabin"

Sounds like a Trump rally to me. Which illustrates the danger and how Trump is playing with fire for his own personal gain. Who cares if somebody dies, as long as he wins, right?

Nobody is ever going to rein Trump in, to make his discourse semi-civil.

It seems one way to tear Trump down is to mock him. He's so fragile it seems to send him off the deep end. Plus, his rabid supporters won't listen to facts, but maybe they will if the rest of us somehow make Trump seem "uncool."

It's a long shot, but it eventually worked for cigarettes.

 The ever-reliable Elizabeth Warren hit the nail on the head again when she Tweeted this: "@realDonaldTrump makes death threats because he's a pathetic coward who can’t handle the fact that he’s losing to a girl."

He is especially bad at taking criticism from women, and regularly becomes unhinged when people like Warren launch tweet storms against Trump. She, too, understands mockery is the way to defeat Trump.

I get it that mocking people is a form of bullying. But it can be appropriate when used on a bully like Trump who won't back down.

The following letter recently appeared in the Tampa Bay Tribune.  It's also a perfect sendup.

It might be the best trolling of Donald Trump ever:

Here's the text:

"My Letters Are So Great!"

"I write fabulous letters. If you read all the letters I have written, you would agree. You would love them. Other letter writers are weak, soft and out of touch. I'm not like that, and I'm sure if you are reading this you aren't either.

This paper really needs great letters, and I am awesome at letter writing.

Other letter writers might attack me, but then they go away. They don't have what it takes to keep writing letters. I have what it takes to write the best letters. Letter writers who disagree need to be punched in the face and run out of town.

I guarantee this letter will be picked as letter of the month. If it isn't picked, it will prove that this letter writing contest is rigged."

----Terry Vaught, Dover

Actually, Vaught later said the letter was a little longer but the paper apparently edited it down some.

The omitted sentence. "My letters are so great I'm going to build a wall and putting my letters on them. Then I'll get the other letter writers to pay for building the wall."

In my opinion, the letter should have also said that anyone who disagrees that the letter is great is mentally unstable.

If you have any great ideas on how to mock Trump, tell me in the comments section, or on Facebook or  Twitter. 

8th Grader Should Just Be President Already With His Candidates' Voices

Jack Aiello went presidential hilariously during
his eight grade graduation this spring, and
now he's a viral sensation.  

I didn't touch it at the time when a video you'll see at the bottom of the post went viral in May, but I now can't resist, since the kid involved is becoming a political sensation.

Jack Aiello, 14, became a sensation during his 8th grade graduation speech from Thomas Middle School near Chicago last month.

That because he hilariously adopted the voices of top presidential contenders like Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton, along with our current president Barack Obama

As noted by NPR, Aiello even got the gist of each candidate's campaign philosphy during that graduation speech. When he was doing Sanders, he said his school had great cinnamon rolls. However: "I do have one improvement for them, though: We need to make them free.

"Why should students have to pay for their own cinnamon rolls? Doesn't make sense. What we need is a cinnamon roll revolution."

When Aiello did Trump we hear: "Congratulations, you are getting to hear a speech from the magnificent Donald Trump. And let me just tell you that Thomas has been such a great school. Quite frankly, it's been fantastic."

When he moved on to Ted Cruz, religion naturally mixed in: "Let me start by saying this: God bless the great school of Thomas."

Aiello the captured Hillary Clinton's rising crescendo common in her speeches: Teachers at Thomas were "Our champions. They've given us the skills to get us through sixth grade, and through seventh grade and eighth grade and now we're going to take those skills and apply them to high school!"

Jimmy Fallon was so impressed with Aiello that he had him on his Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon.  Aiello played "Little Trump," who turned out to be the only person who could be (big) Donald Trump's Vice Presidential running mate.

Here's the awesome viral video from the graduation, followed by his appearance with Jimmy Fallon



And here's the video from Jimmy Fallon:

Advertising To Offend As Many People As Possible? Misogyny Amok In Australia

There's an Australian camping company called Wicked Campervan that has a, uh, unique way of promoting itself.

One of the, er, "artistic" Wicked Campervan
messages that are offending people in
Australia and worldwide.  

Just offend as many people as possible.

So, scrawled on some of their camper vans are charming little messages like "A wife: An attachment you screw on the bed to get the housework done."

Charming, no?

How about this one, quoted exactly how they have it on their vans: "It's better 2 be black than gay cos U don't have 2 tell your parents."

According to a July 14 report on Australia's ABC News, people are understandably not happy with Wicked Campervan:

"By Sunday afternoon, more than 12,000 people had signed a Change.org petition called on Brisbane-based Wicked Campers to remove slogans labeled as degrading to women.

"People are also bombarding the company's Facebook page complaining about the slogans."

Advertising 101 dictates that you find unique, provocative ways to call attention to your business. since Wicked Campers' market is mostly young backpackers, you want to be a bit edgy.

But really. Who in their right mind would want to even be seen in a camper with any of these messages. I'd die of embarrassment if I was in one of those things.

It makes you wonder how much the people who run this wacko company hate women, blacks, gays, whoever is not Just. Like. Them.

Also, is offending much of your market base that great a strategy for your company's success?

I guess there is somewhat of a market for this weirdness, though. Wicked Campers has been the subject of complaints over its slogans for at least the past six years, ABC says.

So far, nobody from Wicked Campers has responsed to media requests for comment.

The shit storm over this is still building, though. They'll probably  have to comment at some point. It will be interesting to hear what they have to say.

The company president will probably say the controversy is all the fault of those stupid women who should feel honored to be insulted.

Or something like that.