I want Stormy Daniels to be the one to bring down Trump's presidency

There are so many things that should have ended this shit show a long time ago and the Mueller investigation is the most thoroughly investigated and is going to bring down a lot more indictments.

But when I think of all the shitty comments trump has made about women over the decades, the way he has treated the ones he has been married to, the creepy ass voyeurism of his pageants (bragging about going back stage while they are dressing), calling up newspapers & tabloids as John Barron or John Miller to "brag" about his nonexistent sexploits, how every famous beautiful woman would have wanted him (ick remember the stuff about Princess Di), his insults and attacks on women's appearances....just the whole disgusting bundle of how he treats women and how he sees himself as some kind of Casanova.

I want it to be a woman, a porn star no less...to be the one that exposes (eww pun intended) him for vile piece of shit he is. I mean we all know it, but I want him to have to read about (ooops have read to him) and see in tv just nasty humiliating details about his "prowess" and the lengths he has gone to shut women up.

Sex is something everyone understands...the Russian probe is complicated and seems unreal to many of his supporters. Getting spanked with a magazine with your face on it, golden showers, paying for sex and possible abortions - that's the stuff average Americans can focus in and get disgusted by.

I want him to go to jail for his treasonous attack on America. That probably won't happen. I'll settle for him going down in history as not only the worst president ever, but the only one (we know of) that got pissed on.

Sorry if this has been posted before - I just really needed a laugh

Nunberg has weird daddy issues

I mean I know there was a shit ton of "wtf" to unpack from yesterday's meltdown but what stood out to me was how many times he referred to Roger Stone as "like a father" to him. Ok fair enough...that was pretty consistent and many people have mentors that serve as parental figures.

But then on Erin Burnett's show on CNN, she asked why he was so angry at trump...why did he keep saying that trump treated him badly...and he said that Trump was like a father to him

Then someone posted a video of when Nunberg was 5 and was with his father when he first met Trump (so he did have an actual father in his life at some point).

Good lord, all Mueller needs to do to get info from Sam is call him Chamo or Sport, throw a baseball around a few times and give him a pat on the back....he can be his new father figure.

Whenever I see Richard Painter on TV expressing disgust

with the GOP (and yes I know he is a conservative, but he isn't an asshole) and his utter frustration with the lack of ethics in Congress all I can think of is this




but he is really thinking this

Who would send their kids to a school where the teachers are willing to shoot them

Let's be real for a minute...do you really want your kids taught by someone who is okay with gunning them down?

I went to a very small high school in a small town (pop 3,000) and many of my teachers had their own children in my class or at least in the school. We had the usual stereotypes of teachers: cool bro teacher that was awesome and relatable, sweet elderly who was everyone's grandma, slightly absent minded but good natured science teacher, an alcoholic or two, and a couple of teachers that really did not have the temperament to be near impressionable teens.

The ones you would trust with a gun (level headed in crisis) would never shoot a kid even if that kid was shooting up the school. The ones who were too unstable to trust with staple gun would be the first ones to shoot a kid for looking at him funny.

In my school, this idea of arming teachers would mean asking a teacher who was also a parent, to shoot not only a student he/she knew but probably has been friends or at least in the same classes as their own child, maybe had come over for birthday parties etc.

I am not a parent, but I cannot imagine sending my child to school knowing that the teachers were armed, that their children may go to school with my own, that these kids could have access to their parents guns ... guns the president had encouraged to own and carry. I would want my kids to feel like their teachers are role models, trusted safe adults they can turn to...not one that is capable of carrying out lethal force on a child.

How can we expect a teacher to look over their class and think "which of these children would I be willing to sacrifice my life for or willing to stop with a bullet?"

I don't recognize the world the GOP are expecting us to live in

Gov Scott said Florida isn't a violent state

I was listening to the Rachel Maddow podcast this morning and heard his statements from last night.

My brain just stopped ...something broke. My mouth started flapping a response to the comment but no words came out.

Then the stupid comment about how the shooting was done by "evil" ..as in a 19 yr old human being not by pervasive gun culture promoted by the NRA.

We have to stop dehumanizing mass shooters...their actions yes are evil, but by referring to a person as an entity - as evil, it's basically saying it was some weird ass fluke no one could see coming.

Except this can be seen coming...this is the 18th SCHOOL shooting (because we have so many we can categorize them) this year.

Florida isn't a violent state my ass. America isn't a violent country...the stupid just breaks my brain.

I'd like a minute to talk about food .. in light of the Blue Apron thread

For SNAP recipients.

Fuck the GOP and anyone liberal, conservative, independent etc who thinks they have any right to say what a person should or should not eat.

Our country has a problem shaming people around food (esp women). Eat too much - someone will yell at you to go on a diet, eat too little someone will yell at you to eat a donut. Vegan or vegetarian - you are called a pretentious asshole. Eat meat - murderer. Eat fast food - lazy. Cook at home - must be nice to have all that time on your hands. If you are fat like me, and eat a salad out in public, some asshole will comment (to your face or loudly behind your back) that when you get home, you will eat a cake. If you are thin and eat a burger, be prepared to hear some snide asshole make a comment about how you'll throw it up.

I was raised by a vegetarian, eat very little meat as an adult, married to bonafide carnivore (he's from Iowa..pork and corn run in his blood) so I have heard every judgmental comment on both sides.

I was also on food stamps as a kid, as student worked in grocery stores dealing with people using food stamps, WIC checks, and later on SNAP cards, and as an advocate took women to apply for benefits and took them to food shelves. I have been on each end of the process and the shame felt by me as a child (because my mom made us drive out of town so no one would gossip), the shame I could feel radiating from customers, and the shame felt by victims of domestic violence, trying to get their lives together with limited financial resources and needing to apply for government assistance to feed their kids. Shame was everywhere.

Shame. Over food. Over goddamn fucking food in the richest damn country in the world that throws out more food in a year than other countries will ever have.

Shame. For food. No one should go hungry in this country ever. No one should be fucking malnourished because they live in food deserts where the nearest grocery store is a goddamn convenience store. Because a Big Mac and fries provides more precious calories and energy to fill hungry bellies for less money. Because adults working shitty shifts or two or more jobs don't have the time or energy to cook.

Fucking shame...for not having enough money in your kids lunch account at school so hot food is literally snatched from their hands, thrown in the garbage in front of them, and they are given a lecture, a cheese sandwich, and a stamp on their hand fucking branding them as poor.

Shame...shame on politicians who want to cut school lunch and breakfast programs, esp in the summer when kids need food to grow and to think and to thrive.

Shame...shame on politicians who cut meals on wheels programs ...programs that not only provide necessary nourishment but also vital social interaction and connections to their community.

Shame..on constantly reducing and limiting what SNAP benefits a person or family can have. It's food, for fucks sake ...it's food. If a mom or dad wants to get goddamn cake mix so their kid can bring cupcakes to school like other kids ...and not feel shame..or have a goddamn treat of cereal that they love .. what is the goddamn HARM? Homeless people and some with disabilities or elderly can't cook so what..they don't get to eat? You are gonna deny them eating prepared food and say here's a can opener and some beans, knock yourself out?

It takes a lot of fucking nerve for the party of the man who only eats KFC and McDonald's to start lecturing anyone on nutrition.

Some people will abuse any program...it's fucking human nature, assholes and scammers will always exist. But to punish people who are parents, children, tired, elderly, have disabilities, are homeless, are veterans and who are sadly HUNGRY is sick and deranged.

Food can be good, can be nourishing, can be comforting, can be celebratory, can be tasty, can be healthy and unhealthy. It shouldn't be scarce, it shouldn't be weaponized and it shouldn't be used to shame.

Because I am not Trayvon, I had the privilege of taking a walk at 2am

I am female, 39, white latina living in Minnesota - about as far from Trayvon Martin as one can get.

I live 10 min north of Minneapolis and I am an insomniac. So around 2am most mornings, I walk our dogs - a german shepherd and a black lab mix. We live next to a very busy road, no sidewalks within a good .5 mile around us, so walking at night with no traffic is ideal - plus in the summer its cooler and our german shepherd is a little too excitable and there are lots of dogs that live around us. For the 10 plus yrs we have lived in our rented house, I have walked our dogs (first a collie mix, and two black lab mixes, then added the shepherd, and now the collie and elder black lab have passed away, so it just 2 dogs) in the middle of the night - anywhere between 10pm to 4am, and never gave it a second thought.

I have had many a police cruiser pass us by over the years, never once have I worried about being stopped. We have come across neighbors coming home late or outside their homes, and never worried that they would find us suspicious. I have worn a hoodie, bundled up in the winter, shorts in the summer - never worried my clothing would be deemed thuglike.

This behavior - walking around at night - is not new to me. I have always walked at night and never worried about my safety. In college and law school, I often had jobs that had late shifts or late nights trying to get my work done at the last minute and walking home in the dark never once bothered me. I walked home from bars, from parties, from work, from school - all the time and never worried about getting attacked or being thought of as suspicious or worried about being harassed by police.

Now, to be fair - I have not lived in the most crime-ridden areas - I went to college in Wisconsin, then transferred to Minnesota, went to law school in Des Moines and now live north of Minneapolis. But crime can and does happen everywhere and college campuses are not the safest place for a young woman to be wandering around drunk (which was me more than once). Don't worry, I know how stupid I was and the risks I took - my grandma lectured me often.

The only thing I really fear are bugs and small animals that jump out at me - toads are the worst in the summer. Please don't think I have lived a sheltered life. As a child, I was physically, emotionally and sexually abused. I think because I survived all that, it gave me a false sense of invincibility - I fought a lot as young girl and teen and to this day I am not one to back down from a physical altercation.


It never occurs to me when I am out wondering through the neighborhoods with my flashlight and plastic bag to clean up after a dog - that I might be considered a threat. Nor does it ever occur to me to be worried that someone is going to attack me (ok, the dogs help, but even without them I don't worry).

And you know what, no one - not me, not you, certainly not Trayvon - should ever have to worry about being attacked or gunned down for walking home. Race, age, manner of dress, location - none of that should matter.

This tragedy has so many lessons to be learned - and opens my eyes to things I take for granted - that I should be able to take for granted - that everyone has a right to take for granted. I hope that when this is no longer "news", we don't forget and we don't his death be just another statistic.

The power of "Why"

The word "why", though small, can be so powerful when used. Ask any parent of a small child how powerful the word "why" can be.

Many can instantly think of examples - had "why" been asked by the media, by ourselves, by our politicians - perhaps the war in Iraq would never have started, rather than now just ending after 9 years and thousands of lives lost and billions of dollars wasted.

"Why" was the start of learning about climate change - why are glaciers disappearing, global temperatures rising, and why are we experiencing such extreme weather phenomena.

"Why" is a central theme in the OWS - why is there such a huge gap between the 1% and the 99%, why do we bail out banks but not our neighbors, why is corporate welfare acceptable but not social welfare?

These examples I consider to be big "whys" - questions that effect us all, questions we all benefit from answering.

But there are little "whys" in my everyday life - some I ask all the time, some I don't ask enough.

This was recently brought to my attention by my wonderful husband during the barrage of holiday advertising that has managed to convince me that I *need* a Kindle.

My husband in IT, so he has every gadget imaginable - iPad, iPhone, laptops, desktops, iPods, flash drives, digital cameras... its like a little Best Buy in his office. I am more old school - yes I am writing this on a laptop - but I prefer books to ebooks, film to digital, CDs to downloads, and smart phones make my head hurt.

But suddenly, I started asking for a Kindle for Christmas. My husband, who was more than happy to get me one, just asked me one question "why". I started to get defensive - because I said, what's it to you. He said well, its just that you always said you never wanted one - you prefer paper books.

And I didn't have an answer - I realized I had gotten swept up in the consumerism I see around me daily. I am an educated woman who seriously thought I was more cynical to advertising - and that I was immune to such obvious ploys.

Not asking "why" - about big things, little things, personal things or worldview things - is lazy. Its easy to sit back and not ask "why do I believe what I do" or "why do I want what I want", I realized that those questions are answered for me who don't have my best interests at heart.

I need to do more asking - of myself and of others.

As this election cycle continues to rev up, spin out of control and threaten to divide DU even more - I hope before we start demanding others answer our "whys" - we can answer those "whys" ourselves first.