Dick Van Dyke, 1925-???

By Zamboni

Tomorrow (Saturday, December 13) is Dick Van Dyke's 100th birthday. The excellent news is that he's here to celebrate it with us. We love him for many reasons, but mostly for The Dick Van Dyke Show, which aired on network television from 1961 to 1966.

It was a creation of brilliant people, mostly Jews, who were looking for a gentile everyman to make Rob Petrie relatable to American viewers in the early 1960s. Van Dyke understood the assignment, and added amazing physical comedy to make Rob Petrie his own. We own the shows on DVD, and we still watch them and laugh as if it's our first time.

"That's My Boy?" was not just a hilarious Dick Van Dyke episode, but a groundbreaking one. There are so many wonderful memories from this show, but maybe this one is the most important. We cats PURR.

Epstein Is Back

By Baxter

The Epstein Files Transparency Act, passed by Congress last month, sets the deadline for DOJ to release the full files as December 19. That's — whoops! — a week from today. Fun!

No doubt Pam Bondi and the Trumpsters have been frantically scrubbing Benedict Donald's name and redacting anything that involves him before they comply with the Act. But until then, Democrats on the House Oversight Committee have been very wily, releasing selected items to remind the nation that yes, the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is a pedophile and sexual abuser. Good work, team.

The latest is today's unearthing of photos from Epstein's personal collection. Goodness gracious.

There's Donald with a bunch of unidentified Epstein trafficking victims. And Epstein with pal Steve Bannon (just a coupla guys taking selfies together, aren't they adorable?). There's also a photo of novelty condoms with Trump's picture on them — were they sold at Jeffrey's sex parties? (Was there also a cash bar?) And because we are equal opportunity pundits, we're sharing a picture of Bill Clinton with Jeffrey and Ghislaine Maxwell. 'Cause, see, unlike MAGAts and Republicans, we're willing to toss Bill overboard if anything terrible comes out.

Benedict Donald has had a pretty bad week. His poll numbers are tanking, his witch hunt against Letitia James crumbled for a third time, Indiana Republicans have told him to go to hell, his Homeland Security secretary was humiliated at a House hearing (and fled), and the press is starting to notice his dementia and bandaged hands. And now House Democrats have sprung these photos on him. We can't imagine what screeds he will post tonight. In the meantime, we cats PURR.

Top Of The World, Ma!

By Sniffles

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney's Liberals are one seat away from a majority government tonight, thanks to Ontario MP Michael Ma crossing the floor (changing parties) from the Conservatives.

Liberals gave Ma a standing ovation at their Christmas party this evening. Fun factito: Ma went to the Conservatives' holiday bash last night, and posed for happy photos with Tory leader Pierre Poilievre.

That's positively gangsta. We cats PURR.

Cat Fight! Stefanik vs. Blakeman

By Hubie and Bertie

Republicans sure are starting to mix it up in the New York Governor's race, aren't they? Elise "Elsie" Stefanik and Bruce Blakeman must be giving State Party Chair Ed Cox serious indigestion. (Yes, that Ed Cox, believe it or not. The years have not been kind.)

Nassau County Executive Blakeman has jumped into the race for the GOP nomination, even though Cox swore up and down that a Republican primary would never, ever happen. Elsie was supposed to have it all sewn up so that she could train her fire from now to next fall on incumbent Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul. (She'd need to, because Hochul is leading her by 20 points in the polls.)

Welp, things haven't worked out that way. As The New York Times reported, Benedict Donald didn't put his thumb on the scale for poor Elsie, whose life he had already ruined by un-nominating her for UN Ambassador. Sad! So Blakeman went on a statewide listening tour, and wrapped it up convinced that he was the perfect candidate to lose to Hochul next November. All righty, then.

Is Elsie not pretty or sexy enough for Donald? (You know, like Kristi Noem or Lindsey Halligan?) Did Blakeman promise to direct more graft Trump's way from Nassau and Suffolk County interests than Stefanik could direct from podunk places like Plattsburgh, Potsdam and Watertown? Hochul's social media team will have a ball with this.

Stefanik used to style herself as a reasonable, reach-across-the-aisle compromiser. Ten years later, she and her team have become Trumpy attack dogs, no substance and all insults. "Everyone knows that Bruce has no shot and is putting his raging ego first," her spokeswoman snapped. Really? It seems that Elsie's the one who's been raging lately. But fight on, kids. We cats HISS and PURR at the same time.

The Magic City Delivers

By Miss Kubelik

Tuesday was another red-letter day for Benedict Donald. By afternoon, The Atlantic had published new coverage about his physical and mental decline, just as he was about to hit the road for one of his "shows" in Pennsylvania. But Governor Josh Shapiro had pre-butted all of Trump's insane claims about how good the economy is. (As anyone who grocery shops or is looking for a job knows, it isn't.) Nice move, Josh.

Then, by evening, another electoral earthquake had shaken Donald and the GOP: Democrat Eileen Higgins won the Miami Mayor's race, beating the Trump-endorsed Republican by 60 to 40 percent. 

The race is officially nonpartisan, but figuring out the candidates' party ID is easy as pie. And it's panic-button time for the Trumpsters. Last time around, in 2021, the incumbent (Republican) mayor was re-elected with nearly 80 percent of the vote. Going from 80 percent to 40 means that yesterday, Republicans lost one out of every two Miami votes. 

Move along, nothing to see here, LOL.

So Miami gets its first Democratic mayor since 1997 — and that's after Democrats flipped the mayor's race in Jacksonville in 2023. Chef's kiss is that Higgins's margin of victory was even larger than the resounding wins we had in Virginia and New Jersey last month. Too big to rig means all the election-fraud winds go right out of the Trumpster's sails.

"Midterms will be a bloodbath," tweeted Trumpy nutcase Laura Loomer. Sounds great, Laura! We cats PURR.

(IMAGE: From Orson Welles's classic film Citizen Kane, which was not about Miami but is pretty timeless, 1941)

Spirit Of The Season, 2025

Randy Rainbow's new video just dropped. Feel free to fast-forward through the ad (but don't tell him we told you so). We cats PURR.

An Early Take On The Texas Senate Race

Looks like America's 36th President wants Texas Democrats to nominate a fighter. We cats PURR.

Who Did This?

 

We cats want one, and we PURR.

Lest We Furr-get: Pearl Harbor Day Plus One

 

By Zamboni

Neat! Here is a colorized version of Franklin Roosevelt's speech to Congress on December 8, 1941. Some notes as you watch:

Believe it or not, December 8 (Japan) and December 11 (Nazi Germany) were the last times the US Congress formally declared war. Since then, Presidents have gotten us "involved" in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, and a zillion other places. It would be nice if the legislative branch got its mojo back someday, wouldn't it?

The correct FDR quote is "a date which will live in infamy." (Not "day." Lots of people — and, by the way, Google AI — get this wrong.)

Thanks to his polio, Roosevelt was wheelchair-bound, but he seems to be standing at the lectern. It's kind of interesting to note, because now we all know how he pulled that stuff off.

Finally, just look at all the men here. Not a woman to be seen. We've still got a long way to go — only 30 percent of today's Congress are female. But it sure beats nine women in the House and one in the Senate 84 years ago. We cats HISS and PURR at the same time.

Mushroom Cloud For The GOP On The Horizon

By Baxter

There's a nuclear bomb waiting to go off in American politics. Maybe some Republicans realize it, but most of the true Trumpy believers are busy whistling past the graveyard. Allow us to explain.

First, let's recap: Things are already pretty dire for the GOP. Democrats have massively outperformed themselves on elections in 2025, including the gubernatorial races on November 4. Even in this past Tuesday's special election in a ruby-red Congressional district in Tennessee, Democrats moved the needle by 15 points. This is all wonderful. Grand Old Party, you in trouble, girl.

Meanwhile, and looking forward, healthcare looms large.

Although Preacher of the House Mikey Johnson swears he'll hold a vote on healthcare soon, we cats have our doubts. Mikey is barely in control of his caucus — how does he think that he's going to pull off a healthcare plan that Benedict Donald has been promising for 10 years, let alone bring the House together on the question of ACA subsidies? The Republicans are in complete disarray. We're not seeing serious policy taking center stage with them any time soon.

There are serious consequences to this GOP shitshow. People are going into 2026 not knowing how much their healthcare coverage will cost them. And they're mad. "Some voters may punish Congressional Republicans in next year’s midterm elections if expanded Obamacare insurance subsidies are allowed to expire at the end of this month, a new poll released Thursday suggests," The New York Times reports.

"Without the extension of larger subsidies, which lower the cost of health insurance under the Affordable Care Act for millions of Americans, many people will see their health expenses rise by about $1,000 next year," the Times said. "Among those facing a spike, most said they would blame President Trump or Republicans in Congress, according to the poll, which was conducted by KFF, a nonprofit health policy research group."

Hmm, this seems like a problem for them. We cats are not keen to see people suffer, but voters — especially white Trumpy voters — have to understand what the actions of Benedict Donald and his henchmen mean for them. If that translates to Democratic votes in November 2026, well, GOOD. We have to get the House back to save democracy — so if we can save healthcare for millions of Americans at the same time, big yay. That would make us cats PURR.

Another Harbinger Of A Blue Wave

By Sniffles

Gee, from the look of the coverage, Republicans didn't even get a moment to go "Yay!" about their victory last night in Tennessee Seven. All the headlines were gloom and doom. That's what a 15-point swing to Democrats in a deep-red, gerrymandered district will get you.

Preacher of the House Mikey Johnson had to fly out there and appear on Monday with candidate Matt Van Epps and a bunch of other GOP pooh-bahs, accepting a call from Benedict Donald, who is no longer capable of doing his many road "shows" and therefore literally had to phone it in. That was a lot of firepower for what should have been a slam-dunk win for them. Hence the hand-wringing this morning.

We Democrats, meanwhile, are feeling pretty good. Here's why:

Turnout was at eye-poppingly midterm levels — 179,634 (just shy of 181,822 in 2022). This is amazing for a "special" right after Thanksgiving. That means we got our vote out, bigly. Let's do it again in 2026.

What kind of money and resources were the Republicans forced to spend on TN-07 in a panic? We're guessing a lot. It could mean less for other elections down the road, since politics, like economics, is the allocation of scarce resources among competing choices.

Aftyn Behn was a terrific candidate with a great future, and she should run again. In fact, she's thinking about it. Yippee!

Finally, will Benedict Donald have the energy next year to campaign for every House Republican in a district that's less than plus-16 GOP? Will he even be alive then? Hmm! We cats PURR.

New Randy Rainbow!

That journey from cradle to tomb? Trump wants to make sure it isn't that long a stay. We cats HISS at him but PURR at Randy Rainbow.

JD Flunks The Test

By Hubie and Bertie

It's pretty amazing when one of the stupidest people around — RFK, Jr., who has said that he couldn't get decent grades unless he was doing heroin — stumps couch enthusiast JD Vance on the eight Presidents who hailed from (or had ties to) Ohio.

Kennedy was hosting a "Make America Healthy Again" confab that Vance attended, so the subject was unexpected. Still and all, Vance fell down on the job. In case you're wondering, the Buckeye Presidents were (in order of appearance): William Henry Harrison, Ulysses S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, James Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, William McKinley, William Howard Taft, and Warren G. Harding. Vance could only come up with Grant and Hayes.

Several questions spring to mind:

Why wasn't Vance able to rattle off his home-state Presidents immediately? As a former Ohio Senator with White House ambitions, he should be able to do that at a moment's notice. Betcha Tim Kaine and Mark Warner know who the dudes from Virginia were.

Why did Vance feel he could get away with dissing the Presidents he wasn't able to name? He said they came from a "black hole" (jeez!). He slings insults like this pretty constantly — the last time was when he spoke to the troops on Thanksgiving and said nobody likes turkey.

Why wasn't Vance able to cite Big Bill Taft, whose name is storied in Ohio and who was the only President who also served as Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court? For shame.

And why, oh why, since Benedict Donald has expressed such admiration for William "King of the Tariffs" McKinley, was Vance unable to ID him? Particularly since, um, McKinley's assassination elevated his Vice President, Theodore Roosevelt, to the White House? Double shame.

Just because you've written a book, that doesn't make you smart. What a fraud Vance is. We cats HISS.