218 Comments
Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

This is Michigan, with a beautiful trifecta of Democratic rule. We currently hold the House, Senate & Governorship. Not to mention the AG & SoS. Don't assume the jerk will be reelected. The last R Speaker is currently under indictment for being a sexual predator. We don't mess around in Michigan.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Good to know

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

I don't want to be a nattering nabob of negativism, in the getting-to-be-immortal words of Spiro Agnew (courtesy of the imagination of William Safire -- always credit the writer), but if this goombah wanna-be is in a "safe" (i.e. MAGA) district, why, he could shoot someone in broad daylight on Woodward Avenue in Detroit and still be re-elected.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

He's in Charlevoix, conservative but not MAGA. He can be beaten, and let's hope his shenanigans pushes him right out.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

I know zip about Michigan districts, and hope you're right (correct-right, of course, not Right-Right). It would be lovely if a sane Republican carried the district. Oh, I forgot. The last sane Republicans are huddled together in a 1950s bomb shelter, and then they go out for milk or coffee, they wear Kevlar *everywhere*

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Props to you for knowing Woodward Ave, it's a block and a half from my dwelling.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

In a previous life I wrote automotive columns for a couple of magazines, so yeah, I know from Woodward Avenue. In fact I walked up it a ways when I was in Detroit for one of the dead-of-winter (why?) auto show press days.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Beth, I hope you are right, Charlevoix is pretty, pretty, red.

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Jun 22·edited Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Isn't Friske the Rep for the Buttigeg's residence?

https://www.house.mi.gov/media/District%20Maps/107.pdf

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One can hope …

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Good for you!! That creep belongs in prison. Hope he gets there.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

🤪

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I was at Michigan State when Pat Paulson, running for President, spoke to the Legislature in Lansing. Always interesting in downtown Lansing.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Let's not jump to premature conclusions. Probably due to a heated debate about the meaning of an obscure verse during late night bible study. Translation of ancient texts into vulgar English is hellishly complicated and arouses strong feelings.

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author

Good one.

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Take a bow for the Saturday sarcasm.

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Maybe he insisted she remain to further discuss the Song of Solomon, and she already had tired of not getting paid as he promised?

Song of Solomon 7

3 Your breasts are like two fawns,

like twin fawns of a gazelle.

7 Your stature is like that of the palm,

and your breasts like clusters of fruit.

8 I said, “I will climb the palm tree;

I will take hold of its fruit.”

May your breasts be like clusters of grapes on the vine,

the fragrance of your breath like apples,

9 and your mouth like the best wine.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

And don’t forget (as she apparently did) this line from the Song of Solomon: “I lay down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste.” She was not performing up to biblical standards!

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I cut & pasted that brief section from some guy's Word Press blog, he seemed to be a kind of disillusioned ex-Christian, and mentioned that in many years attending church he had NEVER heard any references from the pulpit to the frankly erotic Song of Solomon, lol.

Moreover - the same people who won't mention that book of THE Bible, also ignore the possible implications of Adam and Eve's "clothing optional all the time" choices in the Garden of Eden, too! Except of course to use the concluding Eve and The Serpent tale to blame the fall from Paradise on women.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

That snake said he was a youth pastor.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_worship

^^^^^ Actually it's ancient culture and religious / mythology wars far transcending the surface appearances - have to start with EVE as first woman and her alleged role in this sacred myth, or even prior to that, God makes man and then out of Adam's rib (???) creates woman. So the whole wild spree of negligence predates either Adam or Eve, as the Gnostic heresies claim, perhaps? ****** Excerpt:

"Snake worship is devotion to serpent deities. The tradition is nearly universal in the religions and mythologies of ancient cultures,[1] where snakes were seen as the holders of knowledge, strength, and renewal.[2]

Near East

Ancient Mesopotamia

Ancient Mesopotamians and Semites believed that snakes were immortal because they could infinitely shed their skin and appear forever youthful, appearing in a fresh guise every time.[3] The Sumerians worshipped a serpent god named Ningishzida. Before the arrival of the Israelites, snake cults were well established in Canaan in the Bronze Age, for archaeologists have uncovered serpent cult objects in Bronze Age strata at several pre-Israelite cities in Canaan: two at Megiddo,[4] one at Gezer,[5] one in the sanctum sanctorum of the Area H temple at Hazor,[6] and two at Shechem.[7]

In the surrounding region, serpent cult objects figured in other cultures. A late Bronze Age Hittite shrine in northern Syria contained a bronze statue of a god holding a serpent in one hand and a staff in the other.[8] In sixth-century Babylon a pair of bronze serpents flanked each of the four doorways of the temple of Esagila.[9] At the Babylonian New Year's festival, the priest was to commission from a woodworker, a metalworker, and a goldsmith two images, one of which "shall hold in its left hand a snake of cedar, raising its right [hand] to the god Nabu".[10] At the tell of Tepe Gawra, at least seventeen Early Bronze Age Assyrian bronze serpents were recovered.[11]" ***** As if that weren't

enough, there were all these troublesome goddess worshiping trends goin' on, what's a convinced patriarchal monotheist to do with these heretics?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goddess

https://public.wsu.edu/~delahoyd/mythology/goddess.html

GODDESS WORSHIP

Although Adam, Eve, and a nasty serpent define images of origin in this culture, historical, mythological, and archaeological evidence indicates:

a male-oriented view of divinity can claim only about 5000 years of history.

female deities were worshipped at least 7000 bce, thousands of years before Abraham served as prophet of Yahweh, and some say as far back as 30,000 bce (based on Upper Paleolithic figurines, cave paintings, and other archaeological finds in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa).

The Goddess would have been thought of as the original creator (since this makes sense as a female role) and as patroness of sex and reproduction. These early social and religious structures, when acknowledged to have existed, have traditionally been dismissed as "fertility cults." SERPENTS

The serpent of Genesis was a deity in its own right, revered in the Levant for at least 7000 years before Genesis was written. Trees and gardens were involved in these early religions also, with no associations concerning guilt, sin, disobedience, or unpleasantness.

The serpent's divine association has been insistently (and hopefully) interpreted as phallic, but the serpent was revered as female in the Near and Middle East (based on Sumerian and Babylonian texts, artifacts from Crete). (Did pre-dynastic Egyptians flee to Crete in 3000 bce with their belief in the cobra goddess?)

In ancient myths, the female deity was often symbolized as a serpent or dragon. The picture of the cobra as symbol of mystic insight and wisdom is used as a hieroglyphic sign signifying goddess, and it precedes the name of any goddess in Egyptian writing.

***** So it's far more sweeping: the Serpent had been worshiped as a god in its own right for THOUSANDS OF YEARS (let that sink in!) and female goddesses for thousands of years longer.

So all of the religious back-and-forth and especially that connected with women's rights has a history, I mean, a herstory!

https://www.remedialherstory.com/2-to-15000-bce-goddesses.html

"Female goddesses in all their sexualized glory can be found across the globe in the ancient world. What can these goddesses tell us about pre-historic and ancient faiths, and what can they tell us about gender dynamics? Quite a lot. Was there ever a great goddess-- more powerful than the male gods? Probably not." - Took the "remedialherstory.com" website to bring in another perennial aspect of the "war of the sexes" in this religious and myth-making form: sex.

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I have 5 Bibles sitting on a shelf, all from my childhood. I just had to read Song of Solomon. Whoa Nellie, why did we never hear about or read this in Sunday school? And I'm a liberal Presbyterian. I was trained to be Woke, but nothing else.

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It was the King James Version.

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There are whole shelves of books, or so I'm told, containing the torturous exegeses of the Song of Solomon, by both Hebrew and Christian theologians. Both religions read the work "symbolically," although coming to rather different conclusions!

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If it's connected with sex in a positive way, the next thing is playing cards and dancing, singing secular songs and probably carefully arranged but very wild orgies?

These things are are shook up together, Plato was well aware of the serious threats to the state and the status quo thereof (as he perceived them, threats) when musical styles change:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23zLefwiii4

Elvis Presley - All Shook Up (Official Audio)

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Haha

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Possibly you have won the internet today. I'm sure it was bible study.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Haha!

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Very nice

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Maybe he had a premature conclusion.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

He's a Rethuglican, that goes without saying, and if course he blamed the woman.

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Or no conclusion at all. I have a theory, which I have never been able to test, that there is a direct connection-- in both men and women-- between extremely reactionary sexual attitudes and sexual dysfunction.

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🤣🤣🤣

Well done!

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Haha!

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Jun 22·edited Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

This is a case where I wish that woman had been armed, had turned around and put one between his two piggy little eyes. “Stand your ground” should work both ways-/not just for racists eager to take a shot at black people.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Agree with you, Judith, except with the placement of the round. Two little something else’s.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

The "Littles" is his problem.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

If you have not seen it, the "Captain's Balls" scene in the movie, "The Heat" is THE reference point for all things testicular, where gun-waving MAGAmice are concerned:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3J2zwmT7M-0

If you have seen it, well, didn't you need a laugh this morning?

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Thanks for posting that clip.

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The swinelike eyes would have been a bigger target.

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author

Misspelled name of arrested Republican asshole: Friske, not Fiske.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Just sent him a message at the Michigan House:

With hopes that you will meditate long and hard on the reasons for which you personally introduce legislation to remove rights from women, and books from libraries.

Women's health and topics of sex are things that most of us can deal with in broad daylight, without pointing a gun. You can be like most of us.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Claire, you have my undying respect and devotion for having the courage and taking the time to write him yourself. Kudos to you.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

That is kind, David. It was a very small thing. I form the impression that you will live forever by granting such respect and devotion for small things.

Whoever would have thought that I would be following George Bush Dad's wishes? Wasn't it Bush who said way back when that we needed more kindness in politics?

I felt it was necessary to show kindness to the apparently brutally messed up elected representative. To be kind but firm.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Well said.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Have you noticed that these kinds of stories are always Republicans? I wonder why. And just FYI, his name is pronounced "frisky."

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Jun 22·edited Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Well, almost always...don't forget about the legendary Wilbur Mills, (D.Ark.) caught in 1974 chasing exotic dancer Fanne Fox around the Tidal Basin Fountain in D.C. These stories always involve hypocrites,who always seem to be politicians.

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Mmmm, also … just a thought … in 1974, Southern Democrats were still Proto-Republicans, following their retreat from the Dem Party after Civil Rights were {supposedly} enacted ..

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Ha...I was just thinking that myself! (PS...no relation. The Mills's of Maine have always been decent political moderates, as opposed to indecent extremist degenerates)

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And here I've thought all this time his name was Wilbur MillsChairmanofthepowerfulHouseWaysandMeansCommittee.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Tom, I'll wager you and I are the only ones who remember that Wilbur Mills story! And let's not forget Rita Jenrette's Playboy spread incl. nude pix on the Capital steps. (She was wife of John Jenrette R from Texas).

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IIRC it was Ms. Rita's performance that gave the late, lamented Capitol Steps troupe its name. Still miss them, especially the brilliant "Lirty Dies" monologues of the late Bill Strauss (d. 2007).

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

And people think DC doesn’t have a sense of humor! Capitol Steps were magnificent…

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

I well remember Wilber And Fannie…

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

I remember reading later that Ms.Fox went on to graduate college and had a successful career, but I don't remember all the particulars.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

In 1980, Battistella married her manager, businessman Daniel Montgomery, and had a daughter before their 1985 divorce.[5][6] In 1981, she gave an interview to The Washington Post in which she spoke about being upset that Mills claimed not to remember what he was doing during his affair, and was particularly hurt by his saying that he had "learned not to drink with foreigners".[5]

Under the name Annabel Montgomery, she moved to the St. Petersburg, Florida, in the late 1980s. She earned a bachelor's degree in communications from the University of Tampa in 1995 and master's degree in marine science and business administration—both magna cum laude—from the University of South Florida in 2001 and 2004, respectively. She worked as a divemaster for the University of South Florida and participated in underwater filming in Cozumel, Mexico.[5][6]

Foxe died on February 10, 2021, in Clearwater, Florida, four days before her 85th birthday.[21

From Wiki …there was much more to her life after Wilbur….

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

I don't recall lovely Rita, but she must have been an inspiration to our Dear Leader's Melanie.

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Poor Melania isn't in the same league with Rita and Fanne Foxe (who had a better name than even Stormy Daniels).

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

I remember old Wilbur in the tidal basin with Fannie, too.

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Jun 22·edited Jun 23Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Miz Jenrette later married an elderly Italian aristocrat—a Ludovisi-Boncompagni. After their father’s death, his sons from his first marriage had her evicted from the family palazzo in Rome.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

YES! Now I remember reading about her becoming a countess! And what came after. Great story!

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Did not know that. Wow!

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Google it-- truly a marvelous tale. She fought tooth and nail to stay in that palazzo; they practically had to drag her out clawing and shrieking!

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

No, you’re not the only ones! But let’s admit, that was more fun, in a fountain in DC itself - and no guns involved.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Just two drunks...

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

A raunchy old toff playing with a shady lady.

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Well, at least it didn't involve a live boy, a dead girl, or a sheep.😆😆

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You'd lose that wager! We of a certain age remember it well!

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I remember Mills....see above

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Now that seems like good fun ...

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Politicians and clergy

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Mr. Mills' antics seem tame by comparison to these days.

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Yeah. When Dems do get nailed, it's for good old-fashioned graft and corruption.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Traditionalists

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

If I may gently remind you: Gary Hart and Bill Clinton, to pick a couple of headline names. Statute (if not statue) of limitations for JFK and Ted Kennedy. It's the waving the roscoe part that seems to be attached by bump stocks to today's MAGAminiscular Trumpublicans. :-)

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

For a little second I saw pronoun "frisky"...Oh GOD old eyes....

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Oh no

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Kornelius Wolfram Fiske Sr. ( from Detroit Free Press (pronounced "Fris-kee") as Ward Cleaver. There is no June, April, or May.

"A lifelong resident of Northern Michigan, Neil was born in Petoskey and raised near Charlevoix on the family farm, Friske Orchards. He has four sons and five grandchildren, and he enjoys spending time with his family. Neil lives in Charlevoix County." (From his MI House website)

Sides hurt from the "his arrest is highly suspect". Suspect? He is the suspect. Waiting for the defense the adult dancer rolled him and while doing so assaulted (bit instead of spit?) Kornelius making the incident in self-defense.

The MI House would be wise to check on the expenses Kornelius has submitted since he was elected.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

He's got the Family Values vote locked up.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

65 year resident of MI here. Shit for brains is everywhere in this state. In the Carter vs Reagan election of 1980, Raygun convinced all the voters of Macomb County (a racist redoubt a little north of Detroit) to vote for him because he alone would stem the job losses and create new opportunities for laid off auto workers. He didn't. Today, Macomb county=Maga. The mental midgets of the 'Michigan Militia" armed to the teeth and convicted of planning to kidnap the greatest governor we've ever had: WHITMER. I have plenty more examples ( nugent, engler kid rock, etc etc...) but will end with this, see todays's NYT interview with Governor Whitmer.

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https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/22/magazine/gretchen-whitmer-interview.html

Hope I live long enough to see Whitmer where she belongs, in the White House.

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Put Mom in charge, works well worldwide.

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Where does the GOP find these people?

https://www.startribune.com/minnesota-gop-candidate-steve-boyd-wants-to-make-america-christian-again/600375355/

Man oh man does this guy ever get lit up in the comments - for example,

"Again? When was the US EVER a "christian" nation?

In 1797 the US Senate ratified the Treaty of Tripoli, which contains (in the English version that was ratified), this text:

"As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion..."

I think those people knew better what they intended and created than any right-wing extremist today."

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Strip clubs, Cracker Barrel and walmart, peat bogs.......

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author

Holding my sides.

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Murica...2024

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The GOP has for years been the party of impotent sex perverts. It is now led by one.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Insert here emoji of face laughing so hard tears come from eyes

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

😂😂😂

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Years ago, my wife joked about writing a parody book titled "Lies & Excuses For All Occasions". Who could have guessed it would become the go-to strategy manual for an entire generation of Republican politicians.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Yeah and rule number 1 ...Immediately double down on the stupid.

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If I ever write a spy novel, I'm going to name the villain Kornelius Wolfram.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

It’s perfect

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Make him a great and moral hero, so you can claim the fiction has no resemblance to any Kornelius Wolfram living or dead.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

LOL

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Great and moral heroes are boring. Maybe I'll make her Kornelia. ;-)

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Now THAT has possibilities!

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Soon, pulling a gun on a stripper will be required of all GOP candidates. Apologies to Jonathan Swift.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

It doesn't appear that there are any functioning adults left in the Republican Party.

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Were there ever?

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

Bob Dole, John McCain, some guy known as Ike.

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Only RINO'S and CINO'S, sad to say.

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Jun 22Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV

And has everyone heard, guns will be allowed in the outer ring around the RNC in Milwaukee. Would it be too cynical to think that this is so the MAGAs can "defend" Cheeto Jesus from the protesters that are sure to be there to welcome him?

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