NATIONAL CLEAN YOUR ROOM DAY UPDATES
And Don't Forget To Get the Dust Bunnies in the Corner!
-You'll NEVER guess - no, wait, of course you will - but Ex-President Trump reacted to the jury verdict which found him liable for sexually abusing and defaming E. Jean Carroll in the 1990s by returning to his wobbly social media site Truth and videos and ... continue to defame and trash Carroll, using some of the same arguments his attorneys used and failed with in court ("I never met this woman!") while returning to his I-am-the-victim-of-corrupt-Democrats line he has been using as his court cases have mounted.
-These posts among many, many, many, many, many, many, MANY others are likely why the judge in the Stormy Daniels fraud case has ordered Trump to limit his social media posts surrounding that trial, in which Trump has been indicted for paying Daniels to keep quiet about their affair while Trump ran for President in 2016. It is not likely these will help slow Trump down ...
-... especially since Trump will be the centerpiece of a town hall in New Hampshire this morning, as he is a candidate - and as of this writing the poll-leader for the Republican nomination - for President in 2024. CNN continues to be pilloried for their decision to give Trump an hour or so of free campaign time, and the question of whether any of the voters in the audience will question the twice-impeached, once-indicted, jury-voted-sexual-offending Trump about that or any of the other myriad investigations and legal history remains to be seen.
-Speaking of legal proceedings, THIS JUST IN: "Rep." "George Santos" ("R," "NY") has surrendered himself to authorities in New York, having been charged with 13 counts of wire fraud, money laundering, stealing public funds, and lying on financial disclosure forms. It is unclear whether "Santos" will resign from his House seat, though if he pleads guilty he will need to, placing Rep. Kevin McCarthy's (SINO-R, CA) House majority to an even smaller four-seat margin as McCarthy attempts to hold the American economy hostage in exchange for draconian, unpopular budget cuts (which President Biden continues to refuse to do).
-Speaking of that budget showdown, as Congressional leaders and the White House ready a second meeting later this week to see whether one or the other side will blink, reports are starting to swirl that the White House may be considering a bold move to end the debt ceiling showdowns once and for all: invoking the 14th Amendment's clause about the "national" debt to apply it to the debt ceiling, use it to declare the debt ceiling unconstitutional, and thereby allow the government to continue to pay all its debts. Such a move would undoubtedly prompt McCarthy and House Republicans to take the case to the Supreme Court, and give the UltraMAGA crowd and its media acolytes fodder to declare the supposedly ancient and decrepit Biden The Worst Tyrant to Ever Soil The White House - but the move has its defenders among legal scholars across all the aisles, and the fact that Biden and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin are not forcefully rejecting the idea makes it one to watch.
-Speaking of right-wing media, Tucker Carlson, a frozen fish magnate who recently lost his radical right-wing talk show on the Fox News network after helping Fox lose money in the first quarter of the year due to a massive defamation settlement, has apparently found a new home to attempt to mainstream right-wing talking points: Twitter. Thanks to another child of privilege, billionaire weirdo Elon Musk, Carlson’s ‘show' will ‘air’ in yet another effort to shore up that site, which have been bleeding users since he paid $44 billion for the platform last year. Whether Carlson's much-older-than-Twitter demographic will be able to even create Twitter accounts or not, much less watch or listen to Carlson in numbers that even approach what his Fox News show did, would need to be proven.
-To end the updates on a fun note, remember when Dolly Parton was voted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and she declared herself a rock star? Well, get ready - Dolly's all-rock album, ROCKSTAR, has just released its 30-song playlist - along with a truly jaw-dropping list of guest acts joining her for the all-cover release. Random needle-drops of just some of the guests and tracks include the familiar (Emmylou Harris and Sheryl Crow on "You're No Good", Sting on "Every Breath You Take"), the historic (Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr on "Let it Be," Steve Perry on "Open Arms" and the last appearance of Gary Rossington along with Artimus Pyle on "Free Bird"), the imaginative (Lizzo on flute for "Stairway to Heaven", Chris Stapleton on "Night Moves") and the it's-so-wild-it-just-may-work (Rob Halford and Nikki Sixx on "Bygones"). There is no release date yet, but digital and vinyl pre-orders are being taken.
-On this date in 1865, Jefferson Davis was captured by Union soldiers. On this date in 1869, the Trans-Continental Railroad was completed. On this date in 1924, J. Edgar Hoover was named director of the FBI. On this date in 1963, Decca Records took the advice of George Harrison and signed The Rolling Stones to their first recording contract. And on this date in 1994, Nelson Mandela was sworn in as President of South Africa.
-Happy Birthday to Fred Astaire, David O. Selznick, Maybelle Carter, T. Barry Brazelton, Nancy Walker, Pat Summerall, Gary Owens, Arthur Kopit, Taurean Blacque, Wayne Dyer, Ken Berry, Jim Calhoun, Judith Jamison, Dave Mason, Donovan, Sly Dunbar, Tito Santana, Chris Berman, Sid Vicious, Bono, Danny Carey, Young MC, Helio Castroneves, and Kenan Thompson.
-Rest in Peace/Rest in Power to Paul Revere, Joan Crawford, Peter Weiss, Woody Shaw, Shel Silverstein, Carroll Shelby, Norman lloyd, and Bob Lanier.
-Feed the Worms: John Wilkes Booth, Mark David Chapman and Rick Santorum entered Earth on this date. Stonewall Jackson and John Wayne Gacy bought it on this date.