And On Top Of Everything Else, She's A Clueless White Person

By Baxter

We all knew that the new Secretary of Education, who barely squeaked into her job on a Mike Pence-tie-breaking vote, was a right-wing nut. But did we know she was an idiot? A lot of us did, but for the benefit of everyone who hadn't noticed, DeVos has proved it beyond a doubt.

You see, according to DeVos, historically black colleges and universities are all about school choice. They are, she opined, "living proof that when more options are provided to students, they are afforded greater access and greater quality."

And of course the Interwebs erupted. "As if 'white/colored' water fountains were about beverage options," one clever wag tweeted.

So let's take this a little further. In Betsy DeVos's twisted, racist, right-wing world:

Abduction into slavery was a free cruise to the Americas.

Segregated waiting rooms in train and bus stations were a sincere effort to give African Americans more privacy on the road.

Southern restaurants and gas stations barring black drivers from their public rest rooms? Just a desire to acquaint them with the splendors of roadside nature.

Sitting in the back of the bus was a safety measure. You can get killed in a crash if you're too close to the front.

Disenfranchisement? A kindly crusade to free up black Americans' schedules on Election Day.

You know what? We're sure that DeVos still doesn't get it. She must be stumped: What did she say that was so wrong? She probably has the most astonished expression on a white person's face since the cast of "La La Land" learned they'd lost the Oscar on Sunday night. We cats HISS.

Tidbits And Cat Treats: Oscar Night-DNC Meeting-CPAC Disaster Edition

By Miss Kubelik

As former Floridians, we cats fondly remember February as "season" — the month that brought us the best weather of the year, when important community events were held, and when temperatures usually got down far enough that folks pulled out their leather jackets for a night or two.

Now, across the country, this particular weekend in February has seemed like a sensory overload: We have the Oscars, the winter meeting of the Democratic National Committee and the desultory CPAC, all converging at once. Here are some of our reflections on it all.

Oh, gosh, are we relieved about the election of the DNC chair. We so welcome headlines like "first Hispanic ever," as opposed to what could have been. Since the Bannons of the world favored Keith Ellison so they could scream about his Muslim faith, and since Ellison's early admiration of Louis Farrakhan gave us pause — well, that was a sticky wicket best averted, no? And we're glad that Mayor Pete Buttigieg from South Bend will live to see another day. In fact, we think he's a shimmering, glowing star in the Democratic firmament — and we're not the only ones.

Baby Marco Rubio is living up to his nickname. What a pathetic coward. We cats think that constituents across the country should do exactly what the folks in Barbara Comstock's Virginia district did — hold town halls, set up an empty chair on the dais with a name plate and microphone, and have at it. Good visuals for the news the next morning.

We cats aren't sure because of course we weren't there, but from the reporting on the CPAC parties, things were kinda flat at the Gaylord. It's not as much fun now that they're in power and responsible for stuff, is it? As opposed to say, railing endlessly against the foreign-born Muslim pretender Obama?

Finally, we see already that a lot of celebs at Oscar night are sporting blue ACLU ribbons. Goodness gracious. Just as the right wing seems befuddled and disoriented to be in charge of a government they don't believe in, the American Civil Liberties Union is probably seeing its best fundraising period ever. The pendulum does swing, doesn't it? We cats just have to hold onto the fact that the universe of rights and freedoms expands rather than contracts. And we PURR.

Float Like A Butterfly, Sting Like A Samantha Bee

By Zamboni

So Donald Drumpf has decided he hasn't got the moxie to sit at the head table and be skewered by a comedian at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, and has tweeted his withdrawal. Oh, goodness.

We cats are at multiple minds about this.

On the one paw, as anyone reading this blog well knows, we loathe and despise the White House Correspondents' Dinner. What used to be an admirable effort to raise money to train young journalists has turned into an unprinicipled red-carpet fuckfest. (Excuse our language.) Ever since the late Michael Kelly invited Oliver North's paper-shredder Fawn Hall to attend the WHDC in the late '80s, the event has become an unamusing inside joke — with some occasional amazing moments (case in point: Stephen Colbert's 2006 roast of The Previous Worst Person Who's Ever Lived).

Now, though, the event has outlived its usefulness. And since The New Worst Person Who's Ever Lived has declared he will be a no-show, we are left with the following options:

1. Hold the event with some mediocre comedian and without the leader of the free world in the room.

2. Cancel the event.

3. Combine the event with Samantha Bee's "Not the White House Correspondents' Dinner" and make it a YUUUGE anti-Drumpf roast. Invite all the people who have been marching against the Drumpfsters to speak. (Why not? Drumpf has declared the media to be "the enemy of the American people." What have you got to lose?)

We cats vote for this: That the WHCD should be canceled, and for Samantha Bee's event to go forward.

Why? Because the WHCD organizers, in the wake of media outlets being shut out of Sean Spicer's press gaggle the other day, should have rescinded their invitation to Drumpf forthwith. Since they didn't, they look weak and inconsequential. So they should cancel themselves.

Onward and upward, Samantha Bee! We cats PURR.

Gagged At The Gaggle

By Sniffles

Actually, our headline is slightly off. CNN, The New York Times, POLITICO and other news outlets were not even at the gaggle. Melissa McCarthy — oops, Sean Spicer — slammed the door in their faces.

For those needing a quick refresher on Beltway lingo, a "gaggle" is an off-camera but very definitely on-the-record briefing that people like the White House press secretary hold with the press. Spicer welcomed the right-wing media along with more traditional (read: credible) news organizations — but Time and the Associated Press, to their credit, took a pass in protest.

We cats say, good.

What the Drumpfsters don't seem to understand is that by doing crap like this they are cutting off the very attention they crave. Good journalists will still report the news, but can we all agree that it's not a bad thing to deny these monsters a platform for their lies?

Ron Ziegler and the Nixon crowd are starting to look good by comparison. We cats HISS and PURR at the same time.

Quoth McRaven, Nevermore

"We must challenge this statement and this sentiment that the news media is the enemy of the American people. This sentiment may be the greatest threat to democracy in my lifetime."

—Retired US Admiral and Joint Special Operations Command, 2011, 

William H. McRaven, on Trump's statement that 

the media are "the enemy of the American people"

Cat Fight! Gabby Giffords vs. Louie Gohmert (Spoiler Alert: No Contest)

By Baxter

How amused are we at the Republicans' reaction to a dose of their own 2009 medicine? Pretty darn much.

It turns out — no surprise — that the GOP and the teabaggers can dish it out, but they sure can't take it. After spending the summer eight years ago screaming about "death panels" and "Keep your government hands off my Medicare" (WTF?), they are shocked, shocked to discover that their constituents actually care about their ACA coverage being taken away — particularly after three million more people voted last November to keep it rather than toss it.

But the cake-taker in all of this is, of course, the pre-eminent jackass Congressman from Texas, Louie Gohmert, who is beside himself that he and other US House and Senate members might have to answer to their constituents about this issue. Louie is so upset, in fact, that he topped the GOP's lame talking point about paid activists and went straight to the "OMG, my life is in danger" argument. But he didn't stop there.

"The House Sergeant at Arms advised us after former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords was shot at a public appearance that civilian attendees at Congressional public events stand the most chance of being harmed or killed—just as happened there," he whined.

You know what, Louie Gohmert? Screw you. Gabby Giffords was shot six years ago, and that horrific event has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with your current cowardice about facing voters who are angry about the policies you Republicans are trying to enact. And besides, you've been a huge champion of swaggering gun-toting in Texas — so fucking live with it, if you'll excuse our French.

And how did former Congresswoman Giffords react?

"To the politicians who have abandoned their civic obligations, I say this: Have some courage. Face your constituents. Hold town halls."

Oh, Louie, Louie. We hate to tell you, but you have just been humiliated. We cats PURR.

For The Love Of Pete

By Miss Kubelik

We cats try to be meticulous about grammar and spelling — so let us just confess right away that South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg's last name presented us with a challenge.

But we're hoping that soon, we'll need to spell it effortlessly — because Pete Buttigieg will be elected Chairman of the Democratic National Committee. After surveying the horse race that's stampeding toward the finish line on Saturday in Atlanta, we think that this young mayor of Maltese heritage is the stuff that Democratic dreams are made of.

So, how young is he? Wow — incredibly young. (But remember, according to the Constitution, old enough to be President.) But that's part of the point. And we also like Buttigieg because he doesn't fit any cookie-cutter molds: He's an openly gay veteran of Afghanistan, a churchgoer and a gun owner, who's been twice elected in a red state — and who, by the way, was the only DNC chair candidate to personally attend the Women's March on Washington on January 21. (Knowing what a pain the ass it was to stand still for seven hours in a crowd of 500,000 people, we cats are impressed.)

And the fact that our fan fave, former Vermont Governor and former DNC Chair Howard Dean, just endorsed Mayor Pete doesn't hurt, either.

The other candidates are, make no mistake, just swell. But we cats really don't want the Democratic Party to get caught up in a lot of pointless arguments that rehash the 2016 Presidential primaries. We need to look forward, move forward, and not let the confrontations of the past define our future. Choosing a candidate who can't easily be pigeonholed into either camp seems to be the way to go.

We cats may be old — we have nine lives, after all, and we've already gone through a few — but we're not creaky. Or, at least, not creaky enough to stop caring about whipping the Democratic Party back into shape. The country's future rests with the people who are most likely to vote with us. Let's seize it together. We cats PURR.

"Shut Up And Deal"

See, the beauty of blogging is... when you're a cat, you can do it from either side of the Rainbow Bridge.

Redundant (But Necessary)

Our only regret about this banner?
That the park rangers didn't go rogue and leave it there.

"The Worst We Have Ever Seen From Any Administration"

"The President’s sudden acknowledgement [of attacks on and threats against US Jewish community centers] is a Band-Aid on the cancer of anti-Semitism that has infected his own Administration. His statement today is a pathetic asterisk of condescension after weeks in which he and his staff have committed grotesque acts and omissions reflecting anti-Semitism.

"When President Trump responds to anti-Semitism proactively and in real time, and without pleas and pressure, that’s when we’ll be able to say this President has turned a corner. This is not that moment."

 —Steven Goldstein, Executive Director, 

The Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect

Maybe Jerry Sandusky Can Speak Instead

By Zamboni

CPAC, which has been screaming for as long as we cats can remember about how evil lefties censor fine, upstanding patriots they don't agree with, has just done a little censoring of its own.

Yep, the fearless defenders of free speech today decided that right-right-wing Internet terrorist and all-around vomit-inducer Milo Yiannopoulos is not, repeat, not welcome as a speaker at their annual Nazi confab this week. This is pretty funny, considering that CPAC chair Matt Schlapp was vigorously sticking up for the little creep until — well, until he wasn't. "First amendment is dead on campus," he tweeted just yesterday to Jonah Goldberg. "Conservatives should fight back. As radioactive as Milo is, he is fighting back."

Gosh! What happened to all that "fighting back," Matt? What a difference a day makes. The CPAC board met this afternoon and decided that while racism, anti-Semitism, misogyny and online bullying are still just fine, endorsing gay sex with underage boys is verboten. (Oh, and good news, folks — Simon & Schuster finally canceled their Milo book deal, too. Hooray!)

Since CPAC will no longer stick by their man, we cats will keep urging colleges and universities (and yes, you, Bill Maher) to stop giving this disgusting turdball a platform to spew his venom and hate. Meanwhile, we celebrate a small victory for decency in America, even though we're annoyed that in the age of Drumpf we have to endure the existence of such protozoan intellects. We cats HISS and PURR at the same time.

Small Mind. Small Man. Big Meme.

Tiny Hands, Big Pen.

Crabby Baby

Don-Don

Donald Trump likes to insist that his hands are not small. We don't know about his hands — but when it comes to being a human being, he is the smallest person we know.

That why we love these Tiny Trumps so much. We could spend hours here, because people are so clever. We cats PURR.

Empty Chairs At Empty Tables (Still Hoping)

By Sniffles

How can it be that Donald Drumpf is a teetotaler? Because his online behavior is so bizarre. Surely this is someone who drunk-tweets — or something tweets.

But we're trying to make excuses for the fact that Drumpf has, as of 4:32 PM today, called the press "the enemy of the American people."

We could get into an entire lecture about the dangers of equating oneself with the country ("L'état, c'est moi"), but we won't bother. Let us just say that after today's tweet, any self-respecting journalists who attend that farce known as the White House Correspondents' Dinner have got to have their heads examined.

What more reason do you need, folks? Drop out now. Or buy tickets and don't show up. That would make us cats PURR.

Um, Can We Just Have Hillary Instead?

By Baxter

We cats worry that the White House today is home to the sickest man since Woodrow Wilson had his stroke.

The scary thing is, there were no nuclear weapons back in 1919.

If everybody thinks that the Fake President was unhinged this afternoon, just wait until he gets to his "rally" this weekend in Central Florida. As soon as he gets out of his Washington confines and can bask in whatever love his merry band of lowbrow Hispanic-haters can throw his way, we expect that he'll go even further off today's deep end.

Meanwhile, a few observations.

When you have to wildly insist that you're not a racist or an anti-Semite when nobody asked you if you were a racist or an anti-Semite, it's pretty clear that you're a racist and an anti-Semite.

Your national security adviser resigns (and might go to jail — lock him up!), the guy you picked to succeed that guy says, "Thanks, but no thanks," your idiotic, rushed-out Muslim ban is stopped by the courts, you turn Mar-a-Lago into an unsecured Situation Room, the US intelligence community won't tell you anything because they think you're a threat to the nation, and millions of people march against you across the country every week — but this is what you call "a fine-tuned machine"? We sure would hate to see a badly tuned one.

Oh, and before we forget: Nobody, but nobody, inherited a bigger "mess" than Barack Obama did. Well, maybe FDR. We cats HISS.

Puzder Goes Poof

By Miss Kubelik

Wife beater and super-creep Andrew Putz — oops, "Puzder," we guess — will not be the United States of America's next Secretary of Labor. Frances Perkins can stop spinning in her grave. (And let's hope that Donald Drumpf goes on an unhinged tweetstorm to slam the Democrats and, especially, Oprah Winfrey for sticking a shiv in the wife beater's back.)

And wait, there's more: Knowing what a pathetic mess this administration is, it could be two weeks to two months before they nominate anyone to take Putz's place. Then another four to eight weeks before the Senate holds hearings and votes. So the pussy grabber may not have a Labor Secretary in place until... Memorial Day? And then how long until the successful nominee gets his (very definitely "his") deputies through the Senate?

The upshot? This will end up being a lost year in a key domestic department in a two-year Presidency. (Two years, that is, if the midterms go the way all the protests are pointing.)

Gosh— remember back when Drumpf said America would get bored with all the winning he was going to do? We cats are wondering if the Putz withdrawal counts as a win. If so, somebody please tell Drumpf that we will never get tired of this kind of winning. We cats PURR.

PHOTO: Frances Perkins, looking relieved.

UPDATE: Whoops! Looks like the Trumpsters had Plan B waiting in the wings all along. Too bad The New Worst Person hijacked the announcement with the most alarming press conference, ever.

Out Like Flynn

By Zamboni

We cats thought Donald Trump fired people. You know, that ridiculous bit from his silly TV show that we never watched? Turns out that like everything else about him, it was fake. Michael Flynn, Russian collaborator and latest Benedict Arnold of the 21st Century, has not been sacked but has resigned.

And as others have pointed out, Flynn quit for lying exactly two weeks after Sally Yates was fired for telling the truth. Ahh, Michael Flynn — who memorably accused Hillary Clinton of compromising national security and even led a chant of "Lock her up" at last year's Nuremberg rally — oops, we mean, the Republican National Convention.

So Flynn is out, but you know what? They should all be out. This administration is a dangerous disgrace. Trump is a pussy-grabbing, Constitution-violating, clueless buffoon, Pence a religious nut, Bannon a white supremacist, Conway an ethics-law-breaking Ivanka shill, Puzder a disgusting wife-beater, Rancid Pieface an "in-over-his-head" embarrassment, Miller a Hispanic-hating, voter-fraud fabulist, and in only the last three weeks they have all put the country at risk. And we only know the tip of the iceberg about this Russian stuff.

Republicans, where are you? The United States is in peril. Where are your clamoring, outraged voices that cried "email" and "Benghazi" until you were blue in the face? We cats HISS.

We May Be Down One Of Our Nine Lives

By Sniffles

Scared yet? It's only been three weeks into the Trump debacle, and the terror is mounting by the day.

Not thanks to ISIS or al-Qaeda, of course: It's all because of the incompetent nutjobs who 77,000 measly voters in November put at the head of the federal government. On top of the confusion over China, the mad scramble over North Korea on Saturday night, and now, newly clear evidence why Trump & Bannon were so eager to fire Sally Yates — we're all creeping ever-closer to midnight on the Doomsday Clock.

(By the way, you do know that had a Democrat handled a national security crisis the way Trump did at Mar-A-Lago, he/she would not just be impeached by now, but convicted — right?)

Well, as frightened as we all are, we cats are here to tell you: The Trumpsters are scared, too — of a former Republican Congressman from Florida named Joe Scarborough. How do we know? Today's Twitter feud between Sean Hannity and the Morning Joe crowd over Scarborough's attack on the Hispanic hater and voter-fraud liar Stephen Miller.

We're sure that Hannity doesn't do a thing without the blessing of this crazy White House. Which, as far as we're concerned, is proof hiding in plain sight that Trump is worried that Scarborough (a TV star, remember) will challenge him in 2020. That is, if he — and the rest of us — make it that far. We cats HISS.

UPDATE, Feb. 14: We cats rest our 2020 case. Scarborough has wasted no time this morning, going after Kellyanne Conway as a clueless liar on Michael Flynn. We can hear Sean Hannity's knickers twisting right now.

R.I.P., WHCD? Let's Hope.

By Baxter

Here's another thing that we can thank Donald Drumpf for: He may have killed the White House Correspondents' Dinner.

We cats have long despised this silly event, in which alleged journalists kiss up to the power-wielders to whom they are supposed to speak truth. It began to cross over into ridiculousness in 1987, when Michael Kelly, then a reporter for The Baltimore Sun who later was killed in the Iraq war he supported, invited Fawn Hall, Oliver North's paper-shredder, as his guest. The bastardization of journalism's finest mores had begun — but how surprising is that from the guy who also edited (and defended) the liar Stephen Glass?

Okay, we've gotten that off our furry chests. Suffice to say that that kind of thing should have been nipped in the bud 30 years ago, but wasn't. And we're left with the farce that exists today.

So while we're still devastated about the Presidential election, and beside ourselves at the ICE raids and the Russian intrigues and the Muslim ban that have ensued, we're thrilled that the loathsome WHCD also appears to be part of the fallout.

The New Yorker, Vanity Fair and The Guardian are just three of the news outlets that have dropped out (The New York Times hasn't attended for years), celebrity A-listers are taking a pass, organizers are having trouble finding a comedy host, and Samantha Bee, bless her, will hold a competing "Not The" event at the storied Willard Hotel. All because nobody wants to be in the same room with a narcissistic sociopath who has demeaned and derided them and their profession, and pretend that just because he got 77,000 more votes in three Rust Belt states, everything is normal.

This is all just great. May it continue. And may we all follow the thinking and example of Jimmy Carter, who neglected to attend the WHCD in 1978, Ronald Reagan in 1981 (he'd been shot), and Hillary Clinton, who, when someone in the Situation Room pointed out that the Osama bin Laden raid was scheduled for the same weekend, famously said, "Fuck the White House Correspondents' Dinner." We cats PURR.

The Langley Natives Are Getting Restless.

By Miss Kubelik

We cats have good senses of smell, and we are sniffing out some serious unrest in the US intelligence community. Sure, it's been hiding in plain sight for awhile now — but we were reminded of it yesterday, when unidentified investigators confirmed to CNN some of the details in last month's sensational dossier about Trump and the Russians.

Clearly, somebody in Intelligence World is very disturbed about all things Trump. After all, how else do we know about this except for the fact that it was leaked? And apparently the Trumpsters see it as a threat, since Melissa McCarthy — oops, Sean Spicer — wasted no time in leaping to call it "fake news."

Some whom we cats admire have speculated that with the intelligence community concerned enough to leak away like this, the tenure of the current crowd of knaves and fools at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue could be "shorter than we expect." Which got us wondering: How, exactly, would that happen? Would Trump be impeached, which half the country now seems to want? We're thinking not. The Republicans are in charge of Congress — and then, ugh, Mike Pence.

So here's a scenario we like. Try this on for size:

The groundswell of opposition to the clown President grows to such a fever pitch that the Democrats take back not just the House but the Senate next year. Then, the House impeaches Pence first. (Why not? He's embroiled in the Michael Flynn Russian scandal.) Then, Trump. And after he's convicted in the Senate, Speaker of the House Tim Ryan — that's Tim, not Paul — becomes President. Yeah, it's the stuff that dreams are made of, but it sure would make us PURR.

Hitler Makes A Comeback, Thanks To GOP

By Zamboni

We cats have no doubt that the Freepers and their fellow delusional right wingers are convinced that the anti-Semitic valentine foisted on the College Republicans at Central Michigan University was a plant to make them look bad.

Now that we've gotten that out of the way, let's just say: NOT.

Why are we so sure? Because the Republican Party has already made it abundantly clear that it welcomes anti-Semites in its midst.

Heck, one of the most prominent Jew-dislikers in the country is sitting in the Oval Office right now with The New Worst Person Who's Ever Lived. What more proof do you need — aside from the fact that David Duke is a proud member of the GOP who has bragged that the appointments of Steve Bannon, Jeff Sessions and Michael Flynn are "great first steps" to "taking America back"?

Can we just get it on the record right now? The Democratic Party does not welcome people like this. Nor have we welcomed, or been welcomed by, the Ku Klux Klan for 50 years. (Ted Cruz, are you listening? There will be a quiz on this.) The Democratic Party believes that our country's diversity is its strength. And as for us, we cats always welcome new groups to America, because — gosh! — maybe they'll bring some really good food with them.

Additional point: The right-wing nutcases, who claim to love Israel, only love Israel because they believe its destiny will bring the Rapture. That, in our view, is not "pro-Israel." It is "anti-world." In the best Lenny Dykstra tradition, we cats call bullshit on that.

Bottom line: Do we really need to say, in 2017, that anti-Semitism is unacceptable? How many times do we need to fight these battles? And how many people have to die before the question is settled? We cats are disgusted, and we HISS.

Tidbits And Cat Treats: Trump Is A LOSER Edition

By Sniffles

Well, it looks like we'll have the rule of law in this country for at least a few more hours: The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has refused to reinstate the Muslim ban. But we still have the night to get through — knowing that Trumplethinskin will be sitting in The Residence, getting madder and madder, tweeting goodness knows what else and listening to heaven knows who.

We'll check in the morning to see how many more demoralizing attacks he's made. In the meantime, here are some other stories that have captured our attention.

We cats were just rushing off to Nordstrom when we heard what Kellyanne Conway did on FOX "News" today. It must be serious, because even Jason Chaffetz is upset. You know what we say? LOCK HER UP!

Remember back when, in a phone call with journalists, Rancid Pieface referred to President Obama as "Osama," and continued to do so even after reporters corrected him? We think that every Democratic Senator on the dais during the upcoming Supreme Court hearings should call Neil Gorsuch "Judge Garland" to his face.

How did Rafael Cruz, Jr. get into Harvard when he doesn't know American history? Wasn't he around during the Johnson Administration? Has he never heard of LBJ's legendary quote, after signing the Civil Rights Act of 1964, that the Democratic Party had "lost the South for a generation"? (It's been a lot longer than that, Mr. President.) Where does Cruz think all those racists went? To the Green Party? Does Cruz not know that the Ku Klux Klan endorsed Donald Drumpf? Cruz's KKK comment is so stupid, we think Rafael must have been homeschooled.

Finally, it's pretty neat that five New England Patriots are refusing to go to the White House for their Super Bowl celebration. And we're sure that the Trump-loving Freepers are outraged. You remember the Freepers — those same guys who were thrilled when the Ryder Cup golfers wanted to boycott Bill Clinton? What goes around, comes around, folks. We cats PURR.

A Capital Letter

By Baxter

Now that (male) Democrats are reading, without incident, Coretta Scott King's scathing Jeff Sessions letter on the Senate floor, we cats are wondering what all the fuss was about last night.

Did the Republicans silence Elizabeth Warren because she's a woman? Will we see Turtle-Face McConnell shut down, say, Kirsten Gillibrand or Tammy Duckworth if they give the Coretta letter a go? Or did McConnell have specific instructions from Trumplethinskin just to banish "Pocahontas"?

We'll probably never know — just as we'll never be able to figure out that terrorist attack in Atlanta that Sean Spicer keeps talking about. The only explanation for the chaos of the last two and a half weeks is that when you hate government, you suck at governing.

Meanwhile, it's occurred to us that it could also be the words of famous wives that the Republicans are finding so discomfiting. Coretta Scott King was not the only elegant and eloquent American spouse who shone on the page in her own right. Here are two more. The GOP should take them as fair warning, and they make us cats PURR.

"We must show by our behavior that we believe in equality and justice... Here is where each of us has a job to do that must be done at home, because we can lose the battle on the soil of the United States just as surely as we can lose it in any one of the countries of the world." (Eleanor Roosevelt)

"Arbitrary power is, like most other things which are very hard, very liable to be broken." (Abigail Adams)

Arbitrary power is like most other things which are very hard, very liable to be broken.
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/a/abigail_adams.html

Arbitrary power is like most other things which are very hard, very liable to be broken.
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/a/abigail_adam

And Then There's That Piece Of Antarctica That's Breaking Off

By Miss Kubelik

It's dawned on us cats that an incredibly qualified woman — perhaps the most qualified candidate ever, as certain former Chief Executives have observed — was denied the Presidency last November thanks to 77,000 votes in three states.

Yet today, a woman who might be history's most incompetent and unprepared Cabinet officer was (barely) confirmed by the Senate to be Secretary of Education.

There is something deeply wrong when you work hard all your life, build your resume, perform countless hours of public service, play by the rules, win all the debates, and still lose the White House — but an uninformed religious zealot gets a Cabinet post because her right-wing family has given $200 million to Republicans.

We cats pine for the good old days, when instead of casting tie-breaking Senate votes, Mike Pence was merely screwing over his gay constituents and, in the process, Indiana's entire business community. The damage he and the Trumpsters are doing now — whether it's Betsy DeVos dismantling the Education Department, Scott Pruitt destroying the EPA or Rex Tillerson running State on his own business interests — is incalculable. It all makes us HISS.

We Are All Bowlers Now

By Zamboni

We cats are very upset that Lady Gaga's performance at last night's Super Bowl ignored the victims of the Bowling Green Massacre.

Okay, we're probably late to that joke, but we don't care. Kellyanne Conway's pissy response to the witty mocking she's endured on the interwebs after bitching about a media-ignored terrorist attack that never happened is just one of the aspects of the Bowling Green kerfuffle that amuses us most. "Honest mistakes abound," Conway tweeted crossly, demanding an indulgence that she grants to none of her adversaries.

It's all rubbish, anyway. Conway tried to claim that she meant to say "terrorists" instead of "massacre," but if you read her original quote, "terrorists" makes no sense. ("...Two Iraqis came here to this country, were radicalized and were the masterminds behind the Bowling Green massacre,” she said.)

Pretty soon Conway will be claiming that this eight-person Trump rally had a crowd of thousands.  (And did those eight people salute the victims of Bowling Green?) We cats HISS.

A Perfect Fit.

Including the bulging suit-jacket collar. Uncannily accurate, in more ways than one. We cats PURR.

So-Called President Hits A Wall (No, Not THAT Wall)

By Sniffles

It's a consolation that after the Republicans denied Barack Obama any kind of a honeymoon — even during a national and global financial crisis — the country is turning on the GOP's new fake President with a vengeance.

Already there have been anti-immigrant-ban protests for a second consecutive weekend. (Which makes it a third straight weekend of major demonstrations since Mr. "American Carnage" was inaugurated.) Now we've heard rumors about protests at tomorrow's Super Bowl. And people are yelling outside Mar-A-Lago tonight. Really good job uniting the country, dude. (Not.)

But there's more than just protests going on.

The New Worst Person Who's Ever Lived surely will find out, if he hasn't already, that the American system of checks and balances just doesn't suit an autocrat. The judiciary, as is its wont, has put the brakes on rash executive action. (The other branch of government could have done it, too, had it not been in the hands of a bunch of Republican weenies.)

So it was left to a George W. Bush-appointed federal judge to throw a monkey wrench into Trump's dreams of anti-immigrant dictatorship, and he's whining about it.

It's called separation of powers. Yes, the President can do a lot, but he (wish it had been "she") is also, to a certain extent, limited. Since Trump knows nothing about the Constitution, and nothing about government, could it be that he's blundered into this job thinking he can get away with murder — only to be thwarted in the first two weeks by James Madison's brilliant system of mutual restraint?

Gosh, we cats sure hope so. Our democracy can be confounding, frustrating and slow-moving — but it's also fragile, so we don't want it smashed to bits by a bully in a china shop. But we're heartened by the pushback that at least one branch of the government has, so far, had the guts to pull off. Let's hear it for the Founding Fathers, whose amazing creation may yet survive Situation Normal All Trumped Up.

Virginia On The Front Lines

By Baxter

We cats are proud that our state — oops, commonwealth — is front and center in the anti-Trump, anti-Muslim-ban movement that is rising up across the country.

We're heartened that US District Judge James Robart from Seattle has blocked the Muslim ban today, ruling that states like ours — Virginia — have standing against President Bannon's bigotry.

The Old Dominion, of course, has been drawn into the fight because Dulles International Airport — at which many lawful visa and green-card holders were unconstitutionally detained last weekend — is located here. But we'd like to think that our Democratic Governor, Terry McAuliffe, and our silver fox Attorney General, Mark Herring (sigh!), would have joined the fight anyway.

And we love the fact that our Democratic elected officials turned out at mosques today for Friday services — to reinforce their support for the Muslim community and to echo Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in saying that diversity equals strength.

What's that old line about awakening a sleeping giant? We're thinking maybe it's happening again, before our very eyes. We cats PURR.

A Nice Ring.

By Miss Kubelik

While the knaves and fools who head our government continue to bar people from the US because of their religion — and make up terrorist attacks that never happened — the people of Canada are once again setting an example about how to act in the face of hate.

Hundreds of people across the country held hands and formed "rings of peace" around local mosques today as Muslims gathered for Friday services — like these folks at the Toronto-area Imdadul Islamic Center. Their message to microscopically-endowed-but-heavily-armed right-wing Trump fans: If you want to commit a hate crime here, you have to go through us first.

We cats love this — particularly because it was inspired by an incident two years ago, when Muslims in Oslo similarly surrounded Jewish temples after terrorist attacks.

At the end of another dark week, it's a nice reminder that Love Still Trumps Hate. We cats PURR.

Another Week Of Trump Outrages, Another Magazine Cover

"We Are Turning Off The Light"

Protesters Chase Yiannopoulos, Free Speech Survives

By Zamboni

We cats are completely unmoved that poor widdle Milos Yiannopoulos had a speech canceled at the University of California, Berkeley because protests against him got wild.

Yiannopoulos is a far-far-right-wing hobgoblin and heartless abuser whom Twitter has deemed forever verboten — so it's unfathomable that a major university invited him in the first place. He only believes in terrorizing and trolling — not in the thoughtful exchange of ideas.

Yiannapoulos is so appalling that only the Jeffrey Dahmer Fan Club, Misogynists International and the Westboro Baptist Church — oh, and probably the Republican National Committee — would invite him to speak. So why did UC Berkeley do it? It can't have been a good day at the Development Office there. (Which is bad for them, because the New Worst Person, acting unhinged as usual, is threatening to yank the university's federal funds.) We cats HISS.

UPDATE: It appears that he was invited by the Berkeley College Republicans. See, we told you.

"Relocating"

—Mike Luckovich, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Justin Trudeau Potches* FOX "News"

By Sniffles

Usually it's just up to us conscientious Americans to call out the right wingers here for their bald-faced and, later, uncorrected lies. But we cats are happy to report that the Office of the Prime Minister of Canada has joined the fight.

Eager to prove that the jackass who shot up a mosque in Quebec City wasn't a Trumpster, FOX "News" rushed to tweet the erroneous information that the shooter was Moroccan. In fact, the Moroccan was not the killer but a misidentified witness. The alleged perp, Alexandre Bissonnette, is — bien sûr — as French Canadian as they come.

The PMO wasted no time firing off a letter to FOX, not just to demand a correction but to scold them for their hate and fearmongering.

"Canada is an open, welcoming country that stands by its citizens," the letter said. "We are a nation of millions of immigrants and refugees, of hundreds of cultures, languages and religions bound by one unwavering, unshakable belief: We are stronger not in spite of our differences, but because of them."

FOX's tweets, the letter went on, "dishonor the memory of the six victims and their families by spreading misinformation, playing identity politics, and perpetuating fear and division within our communities."

FOX backed down: "We regret the error." They also claimed that they'd deleted the tweets. Although there's some dispute about that, we cats still PURR at Justin Trudeau and his staff — for their sharp claws, and their speed in wielding them. Bien joué, nos amis!

*TRANSLATION: Yiddish for "to bitch slap," of course!