But the people get there news from radio, tv, newspapers and social media that are owned by companies that are on his side. People are liking what they’re being told because the media is owned by lackeys.
If everyone read substack and had critical thinking skills we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in.
Admitting error isn’t painful for a person with a healthy self-esteem, but it’s intolerable for a pathological narcissist. And admitting or even comprehending one’s mistakes is essential for learning, whether it’s tying your shoes, working out a math problem, or running an enterprise.
Imagine if all of humanity had been so similarly lacking in self-awareness. It’s safe to assume that every advancement in history was preceded by repeated trial and error by people who could recognize and learn from mistakes.
WOW!!!!!!!!!! Now you've done it, Keillor. All wrapped up in plain paper, no heart-stickers on this Valentine's Day. Said it all. If there's a God, sitting by with his head in his hands, wondering how he missed the target (not the store), he is thanking you for tellin' it like it is, as we used to say in the '60s. Thank you.
Possibly also getting her hat re-blocked after her beloved mate bashed into its brim at the inauguration. That chapeau has already been worth its weight (and mega-cost) in gold. Er, crypto.
She is a grifter, like all who identify with Trump. What kind of ego actually believes anyone cares about her and the ‘documentary’ Amazon is filming. She is not a woman of substance. Not in my world.
Try one of the home shopping networks. She sells junk, like her contractual husband does. Do you folks here actually have a good opinion of her? Is there no refuge from national insanity?
By the way, Melania and Ivanka both, per credible reporting, received millions of dollars for their support of USAid - you know, that "criminal organization....so corrupt.....so bad...." agency that musk and thump have destroyed. The "support" Melania gave? Why, it was her "be best" campaign, of course. She visited an African country, told the children to "be best" and then she put on an outfit reminiscent of an "Out Of Africa" costume, posed in a desert setting, and apparently collected her "support" check, or maybe her contractual wife check.
She and the rest of the crime family..... be best at being the worst. She and her contractual husband apparently have been so ticked off that Vogue Magazine won't put her on the cover. I think they should put Letitia James on every cover, every month until our country frees itself of monsters.
There are some really amazing videos online of people who help marine life - whales, turtles, all kinds - by removing barnacles from them. It's hard work, much appreciated by the liberated animals, as far as observers can tell. Experts in parasites might want to team up with political scientists and figure out what to do about the barnacles and lamprey eels and sea lice that have have transmogrified into "human" form and taken up residence on our Body Politic, weighing us down for sinking, sucking the life away from the nation, and causing infectious irritation and disease.
The best news of this week? Apparently The Great and Wonderful Elon, the wizard behind that curtain firing up all the smoke and mirrors and fog, apparently takes one of his 11? 12? offspring with him to public events; it's been a 4 year old child named something like X A.13. and some other digits that Musk likes to carry around on his shoulders. So, he took little X A.13. whatever with him for the Big Show in the Oval Office. The kid is very cute and was pretty well behaved, much better than the father and his father's puppet. When Musks' little musk stood near the germaphobe "president," thump was visibly uneasy and displeased. Little X proceeded to pick his nose and, according to reports, deposited some of the harvest of said pickings on the desk where King in His Own Mind sat. Of course, there were other reports that the precocious 4 year old approached the Mad King Don and said "Why are you sitting at my daddy's desk?" (And maybe, being a generous little kid, added, "here, have a booger. You can sell it on one of your shopping channels.")
Your attempts to turn the ongoing genocide in Palestinian into humor is disgusting, repulsive and sickening. It is akin to making jokes about Auschwitz and the Holocaust - "Never again" except for Palestinians. Trump's proposal to turn Gaza into a resort demonstrates just what a sick, narcissistic, psychopath he is and what a broken, sick society and world we live in. This proposal must be condemned in the strongest possible language as the revolting, abomination it is. Shame!
For 25 years I lived in a small mountainous town in upstate New York. It used to be a summer holiday place for New York City Jews. That was quite a few years ago, but some of Jews took the town as their permanent residence, and a few of them still go back regularly to Israel. As a result, I got to learn a lot about Israel. I liked that everyone had to serve in the military and I found the social structure and the agricultureal basis of the kubutz interesting (even though I am a capitalist and am unsure of the idea of settlements). So my views on Israel were largely shaped from the Israeli perspective.
I was working with a university rocket club and one of the members was a very talented and outgoing Palestinian student. He is a US citizen, but it was clear that he had very strong roots to Palestine. I told him about my perspectives on Israel, and where they came from. I asked him if he could recommend one book for me to read so I could better understand the Palestinian perspective. He recommended "The Hundred Years' War on Palestine", by Rashid Khalidi. I know I have a lot to learn and I can't wait to dig into this book, as soon as I finish reading Trump's book.
“An old man in Gaza held a placard that read: “You take my water, burn my olive trees, destroy my house, take my job, steal my land, imprison my father, kill my mother, bombard my country, starve us all, humiliate us all, but I am to blame: I shot a rocket back.”
With all due respect, allow me to share two thoughts.
1. I don't think there should be a comma between revolting and abomination. I believe that 'abomination' is a noun, and you shouldn't put a comma between the adjective and the noun it describes.
2. The comparison you make is valid. In both cases, one side swore to kill every man, woman, and child on the other side. We apparently disagree about identifying the aggressor and who is doing what they must in order to survive. Even for one who does not share my perspective, there is plenty of blame to go around.
The Trump stupidity is not the equivalent of Auschwitz. Auschwitz happened and it has been reported in horrifying detail many many times. The Trump quote is just stupidity. It deserves ridicule, along with the claiming of Greenland and the idea of Canada as the 51st state. Dumb, dumb, dumb. But some Trump actions, such as the attack on USAID, have real consequences for real people and should be treated seriously.
Since we are at the precipice of stupidity, let us not forget the Republicans who have just sold out our country to Tulsi Gabbard. I imagine intelligence is now for sale….perhaps Edward Snowden will be pardoned and also become part of this most inept Caninet.
SATIRE: 1. a literary work holding up human vices and follies to ridicule or scorn. 2. trenchant wit, irony or sarcasm used to expose and discredit vice or folly.
Oh Lawrence, your recent comments are so ironic when we remember all of your brilliant anti-Democratic insight in the runup to the election. You were and apparently still are willing to ignore so much about Trump and the Republicans, apparently because you live in the country and don't like cities. What a mess you've helped get us into, and now you "have no doubt that Donald Trump will do the same." Yes? And so? Do you have a real opinion to express here?
Well said, but sadly a day late and a dollar short. Depression arriving soon but unclear if it will be financial or personal or in most cases both! Enough of the folks who also swear by project 2025 voted for him so buckle your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy 4 year ride!
Yes but only if all US folks w/ consciences and the courage of their convictions raise their voices loud enough to drown out the rush by many credulous US folks to the lure of white nationalism or as it more honestly is called… naziism
Hilarious! One of your best works of fiction to date. We love you dearly and admire your ability to spin lovely fables of jocularity. It's going to be very rewarding four years of material for you to weave alternative realities from. You are the best!
The stories from the past, some of them that prompted the creation of the Social Security system, of old people eating cat food will come into public consciousness again as the campaign of hatred and cruelty against old people, disabled people that has long had proponents among elected officials now has force at the highest levels. The Social Security money EARNED by workers for decades has been in the lustful eyes of the craven, greedy privatizers in power who want to privatize everything from water to schools to prisons - and the 'investment hogs" want your Social Security money, your parents' Social Security money, your grandparents' Social Security money, your childrens' Social Security money, your disabled or orphaned friends or relatives or your own SSI money. They cannot bear it that you have your own money, that taxpayers' tax dollars be used to make the country better in any way at all. If it's money, it must go into the coffers of these kleptocrats in power. Kiss it all goodbye.
If the MAGAts or the Muskies or the thumpers or the Vance-Thiel-Vought mob could put everyone who is called "senior" or "elder" or on Social Security or who uses Medicare (mostly privatized already) or who needs Medicaid or is Black or disabled or poor or wounded in war on an ice floe in the old ways of the some peoples, they would, but unfortunately that "hoax" climate change/hot globe problem is melting away the ice floes. Maybe put 'em in airplanes after they get all of the air controllers and pilots fired. Or Mars! Yeah, that's the ticket. Take a Muskie Ride to Mars!
Good stuff! But probably the Press has once again taken up their sacred vow to only criticize Joe Biden for any faults. I luv that idea about using giant biblical monuments interspersed in the Trump Gaza Golf courses. And work in some biblical stuff about the manger and Jesus using the 18th tee. lol!
Exactly!!!!! And they're eating the dogs!!!!! They're eating the cats!!!!! If you see a hot woman, grab her by anything you want!!!!!! And we've got to "look at" the judges!!!!! They shouldn't be allowed to rule against the cult leader!!!!! Suspend the Constitution!!!! Thanks for voting in 2024; you won't ever have to vote again!!!!!
Graham, you have your own Substack and you write "cool aide"? And "responding as such, from Minnesota"? In any case, there's no need for further discussion with you, because you've already shown us your MO. You show up with a mocking comment, but when someone engages with you seriously by answering your questions, for example, you don't respond except with further mockery. I remind you, keep an eye out for Haitians hungry for your dogs and cats.
Graham, friend of crackers everywhere, right? Are you seriously defending the destruction of this country? Of looting everything and everybody? Of "taking" Canada, Greenland, Gaza? Were you raised and educated in the U.S.? If so, can you explain how you came to despise it so much?
Your reputation as a satirist is well known and well earned. However, there comes a time and this may well be it when the subjects have gone so far over the edge that satire fails. One of the all time best at satire was Tom Lehrer. Most of our generation know his stuff. I think he is still alive at age 96 but has not performed in years primarily because his massive powers of human observation told him that things during and after the GW Bush administrations had gotten so bad they were beyond the ability of satire to demonstrate the point. He, once again, "saw" it correctly. Trump and Musk are both clinically mentally ill and the sycophants surrounding them are not far behind. If things don't change soon, the chaos they are creating will sink us all. At age 88 and still in good shape physically and mentally I got up today in fear that my SS check was not going to show up automatically in my bank account. It did and I am relieved for a few minutes until opening the laptop for the day's news. Literally thousands and maybe soon millions who are being targeted by these two idiots are waking up similarly as their livelihoods are being upended!
I do too. But my point was that he, himself, came to the conclusion some years ago that it was pointless to satirize gross stupidity since it can only work where there is at least some sense of genuine value of the subject at hand. Trump's antics come from no such place as he is too stupid to have depth knowledge about much of anything and has not a wit of empathy or concern - including for his wives and children. Thus there is no irony to create the necessary humor that make satire worth the effort.
Gosh dang it anyway. There’s all these folks writing on that social media, you betchyur boots it’s worst thing ever to happen, social media I mean, after that gul dang Cable News 24 hours a day bs. Now, of course, that social media isn’t all bad, I mean ya gotchyur plain old facts written on Substack by pretty darn good, really smart people about that there Trump criminal.
Ya sure, those folks nail that there con man right to the gul dang wall. Butchya know, there’s 77.3 million lame brained fools out in the USA that should be reading Substack but those yayhoos just aren’t gonna read Substack, so that means that there mafia of Trumpublicans are just gonna go on about gettin’ their way.
You know, I saw a movie once that was about a guy named Joker, and I think lots of those Trump people that they’re putting into that there cabinet used the same makeup person who did the lips on that there joker, if ya know what I mean.
Well, anyway, I’m glad my chickens are doing pretty darn good, what with the price of eggs…and chickens.
That's quite a punchline, in quite a punch-paragraph.
But the people get there news from radio, tv, newspapers and social media that are owned by companies that are on his side. People are liking what they’re being told because the media is owned by lackeys.
If everyone read substack and had critical thinking skills we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in.
Yes, do what a wife should do….and what Dr. Jill failed to do.
One major step in maintaining one's manhood is admitting when he's done wrong.
Admitting error isn’t painful for a person with a healthy self-esteem, but it’s intolerable for a pathological narcissist. And admitting or even comprehending one’s mistakes is essential for learning, whether it’s tying your shoes, working out a math problem, or running an enterprise.
Imagine if all of humanity had been so similarly lacking in self-awareness. It’s safe to assume that every advancement in history was preceded by repeated trial and error by people who could recognize and learn from mistakes.
That admission is the beginning of actual learning, while the denying of
any failure is the beginning of a life of lying, in all its many forms.
Garrison Keillor: i'm still wondering if the orange toddler can even *read*? and if he can, i suspect he struggles to read at the 5th grade level.
WOW!!!!!!!!!! Now you've done it, Keillor. All wrapped up in plain paper, no heart-stickers on this Valentine's Day. Said it all. If there's a God, sitting by with his head in his hands, wondering how he missed the target (not the store), he is thanking you for tellin' it like it is, as we used to say in the '60s. Thank you.
Where is Mel anyway??
Exercising her "soft power" in the White House and more confident in her role, according to a fawning piece on Fox News, whatever that means.
Oh, selling her cryptocurrency
Possibly also getting her hat re-blocked after her beloved mate bashed into its brim at the inauguration. That chapeau has already been worth its weight (and mega-cost) in gold. Er, crypto.
It's suitable for a villain like Oddjob.
She is a grifter, like all who identify with Trump. What kind of ego actually believes anyone cares about her and the ‘documentary’ Amazon is filming. She is not a woman of substance. Not in my world.
Try one of the home shopping networks. She sells junk, like her contractual husband does. Do you folks here actually have a good opinion of her? Is there no refuge from national insanity?
By the way, Melania and Ivanka both, per credible reporting, received millions of dollars for their support of USAid - you know, that "criminal organization....so corrupt.....so bad...." agency that musk and thump have destroyed. The "support" Melania gave? Why, it was her "be best" campaign, of course. She visited an African country, told the children to "be best" and then she put on an outfit reminiscent of an "Out Of Africa" costume, posed in a desert setting, and apparently collected her "support" check, or maybe her contractual wife check.
She and the rest of the crime family..... be best at being the worst. She and her contractual husband apparently have been so ticked off that Vogue Magazine won't put her on the cover. I think they should put Letitia James on every cover, every month until our country frees itself of monsters.
There are some really amazing videos online of people who help marine life - whales, turtles, all kinds - by removing barnacles from them. It's hard work, much appreciated by the liberated animals, as far as observers can tell. Experts in parasites might want to team up with political scientists and figure out what to do about the barnacles and lamprey eels and sea lice that have have transmogrified into "human" form and taken up residence on our Body Politic, weighing us down for sinking, sucking the life away from the nation, and causing infectious irritation and disease.
The best news of this week? Apparently The Great and Wonderful Elon, the wizard behind that curtain firing up all the smoke and mirrors and fog, apparently takes one of his 11? 12? offspring with him to public events; it's been a 4 year old child named something like X A.13. and some other digits that Musk likes to carry around on his shoulders. So, he took little X A.13. whatever with him for the Big Show in the Oval Office. The kid is very cute and was pretty well behaved, much better than the father and his father's puppet. When Musks' little musk stood near the germaphobe "president," thump was visibly uneasy and displeased. Little X proceeded to pick his nose and, according to reports, deposited some of the harvest of said pickings on the desk where King in His Own Mind sat. Of course, there were other reports that the precocious 4 year old approached the Mad King Don and said "Why are you sitting at my daddy's desk?" (And maybe, being a generous little kid, added, "here, have a booger. You can sell it on one of your shopping channels.")
Bravo!
A good one, Garrison.
Glad to see that an 82 year old still has his chops.
Blessings to you.
Your attempts to turn the ongoing genocide in Palestinian into humor is disgusting, repulsive and sickening. It is akin to making jokes about Auschwitz and the Holocaust - "Never again" except for Palestinians. Trump's proposal to turn Gaza into a resort demonstrates just what a sick, narcissistic, psychopath he is and what a broken, sick society and world we live in. This proposal must be condemned in the strongest possible language as the revolting, abomination it is. Shame!
Thank you sir.
For 25 years I lived in a small mountainous town in upstate New York. It used to be a summer holiday place for New York City Jews. That was quite a few years ago, but some of Jews took the town as their permanent residence, and a few of them still go back regularly to Israel. As a result, I got to learn a lot about Israel. I liked that everyone had to serve in the military and I found the social structure and the agricultureal basis of the kubutz interesting (even though I am a capitalist and am unsure of the idea of settlements). So my views on Israel were largely shaped from the Israeli perspective.
I was working with a university rocket club and one of the members was a very talented and outgoing Palestinian student. He is a US citizen, but it was clear that he had very strong roots to Palestine. I told him about my perspectives on Israel, and where they came from. I asked him if he could recommend one book for me to read so I could better understand the Palestinian perspective. He recommended "The Hundred Years' War on Palestine", by Rashid Khalidi. I know I have a lot to learn and I can't wait to dig into this book, as soon as I finish reading Trump's book.
Skip the Trump, this is a better short read:
“An old man in Gaza held a placard that read: “You take my water, burn my olive trees, destroy my house, take my job, steal my land, imprison my father, kill my mother, bombard my country, starve us all, humiliate us all, but I am to blame: I shot a rocket back.”
With all due respect, allow me to share two thoughts.
1. I don't think there should be a comma between revolting and abomination. I believe that 'abomination' is a noun, and you shouldn't put a comma between the adjective and the noun it describes.
2. The comparison you make is valid. In both cases, one side swore to kill every man, woman, and child on the other side. We apparently disagree about identifying the aggressor and who is doing what they must in order to survive. Even for one who does not share my perspective, there is plenty of blame to go around.
The Trump stupidity is not the equivalent of Auschwitz. Auschwitz happened and it has been reported in horrifying detail many many times. The Trump quote is just stupidity. It deserves ridicule, along with the claiming of Greenland and the idea of Canada as the 51st state. Dumb, dumb, dumb. But some Trump actions, such as the attack on USAID, have real consequences for real people and should be treated seriously.
Since we are at the precipice of stupidity, let us not forget the Republicans who have just sold out our country to Tulsi Gabbard. I imagine intelligence is now for sale….perhaps Edward Snowden will be pardoned and also become part of this most inept Caninet.
Cabinet
SATIRE: 1. a literary work holding up human vices and follies to ridicule or scorn. 2. trenchant wit, irony or sarcasm used to expose and discredit vice or folly.
Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/satire. Accessed 12 Feb. 2025.
Recent history teaches us that presidents do not bow out gracefully when they really ought to. I have no doubt that Donald Trump will do the same.
Oh Lawrence, your recent comments are so ironic when we remember all of your brilliant anti-Democratic insight in the runup to the election. You were and apparently still are willing to ignore so much about Trump and the Republicans, apparently because you live in the country and don't like cities. What a mess you've helped get us into, and now you "have no doubt that Donald Trump will do the same." Yes? And so? Do you have a real opinion to express here?
The invertebrates who populate the US Congress are responsible for 98% of our problems today.
Want a warm fuzzy? Dial up the US Debt Clock website sometime.
Well said, but sadly a day late and a dollar short. Depression arriving soon but unclear if it will be financial or personal or in most cases both! Enough of the folks who also swear by project 2025 voted for him so buckle your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy 4 year ride!
Only a 4-year ride?
Yes but only if all US folks w/ consciences and the courage of their convictions raise their voices loud enough to drown out the rush by many credulous US folks to the lure of white nationalism or as it more honestly is called… naziism
Hilarious! One of your best works of fiction to date. We love you dearly and admire your ability to spin lovely fables of jocularity. It's going to be very rewarding four years of material for you to weave alternative realities from. You are the best!
Lol no, the fiction is “End Ukrainian War on day one, bring down the price of eggs and gas, fight for his constituents.”
That's right!!!!! They're eating the dogs!!!!!! They're eating the cats!!!!!!
His constituents might be doing that by next year. /not entirely snark
The stories from the past, some of them that prompted the creation of the Social Security system, of old people eating cat food will come into public consciousness again as the campaign of hatred and cruelty against old people, disabled people that has long had proponents among elected officials now has force at the highest levels. The Social Security money EARNED by workers for decades has been in the lustful eyes of the craven, greedy privatizers in power who want to privatize everything from water to schools to prisons - and the 'investment hogs" want your Social Security money, your parents' Social Security money, your grandparents' Social Security money, your childrens' Social Security money, your disabled or orphaned friends or relatives or your own SSI money. They cannot bear it that you have your own money, that taxpayers' tax dollars be used to make the country better in any way at all. If it's money, it must go into the coffers of these kleptocrats in power. Kiss it all goodbye.
If the MAGAts or the Muskies or the thumpers or the Vance-Thiel-Vought mob could put everyone who is called "senior" or "elder" or on Social Security or who uses Medicare (mostly privatized already) or who needs Medicaid or is Black or disabled or poor or wounded in war on an ice floe in the old ways of the some peoples, they would, but unfortunately that "hoax" climate change/hot globe problem is melting away the ice floes. Maybe put 'em in airplanes after they get all of the air controllers and pilots fired. Or Mars! Yeah, that's the ticket. Take a Muskie Ride to Mars!
Good stuff! But probably the Press has once again taken up their sacred vow to only criticize Joe Biden for any faults. I luv that idea about using giant biblical monuments interspersed in the Trump Gaza Golf courses. And work in some biblical stuff about the manger and Jesus using the 18th tee. lol!
Are all you people responding as such, from Minnesota? You probably think your current governor is the most wonderful person you ever heard of, right?
Exactly!!!!! And they're eating the dogs!!!!! They're eating the cats!!!!! If you see a hot woman, grab her by anything you want!!!!!! And we've got to "look at" the judges!!!!! They shouldn't be allowed to rule against the cult leader!!!!! Suspend the Constitution!!!! Thanks for voting in 2024; you won't ever have to vote again!!!!!
Dana, you have to stop drinking that strange cool aide, it is warping your mind girl!
Graham, you have your own Substack and you write "cool aide"? And "responding as such, from Minnesota"? In any case, there's no need for further discussion with you, because you've already shown us your MO. You show up with a mocking comment, but when someone engages with you seriously by answering your questions, for example, you don't respond except with further mockery. I remind you, keep an eye out for Haitians hungry for your dogs and cats.
Graham, friend of crackers everywhere, right? Are you seriously defending the destruction of this country? Of looting everything and everybody? Of "taking" Canada, Greenland, Gaza? Were you raised and educated in the U.S.? If so, can you explain how you came to despise it so much?
Nightmare —
But —
We can’t give up —
And —
We are in this together —
💙💙🇺🇸💙💙
Bravo! Best assessment of the DJT “presidency” I’ve read in a while.
Your reputation as a satirist is well known and well earned. However, there comes a time and this may well be it when the subjects have gone so far over the edge that satire fails. One of the all time best at satire was Tom Lehrer. Most of our generation know his stuff. I think he is still alive at age 96 but has not performed in years primarily because his massive powers of human observation told him that things during and after the GW Bush administrations had gotten so bad they were beyond the ability of satire to demonstrate the point. He, once again, "saw" it correctly. Trump and Musk are both clinically mentally ill and the sycophants surrounding them are not far behind. If things don't change soon, the chaos they are creating will sink us all. At age 88 and still in good shape physically and mentally I got up today in fear that my SS check was not going to show up automatically in my bank account. It did and I am relieved for a few minutes until opening the laptop for the day's news. Literally thousands and maybe soon millions who are being targeted by these two idiots are waking up similarly as their livelihoods are being upended!
I miss Tom Lehrer. I wonder what devastatingly sarcastic songs he would write about today?
I do too. But my point was that he, himself, came to the conclusion some years ago that it was pointless to satirize gross stupidity since it can only work where there is at least some sense of genuine value of the subject at hand. Trump's antics come from no such place as he is too stupid to have depth knowledge about much of anything and has not a wit of empathy or concern - including for his wives and children. Thus there is no irony to create the necessary humor that make satire worth the effort.
Gosh dang it anyway. There’s all these folks writing on that social media, you betchyur boots it’s worst thing ever to happen, social media I mean, after that gul dang Cable News 24 hours a day bs. Now, of course, that social media isn’t all bad, I mean ya gotchyur plain old facts written on Substack by pretty darn good, really smart people about that there Trump criminal.
Ya sure, those folks nail that there con man right to the gul dang wall. Butchya know, there’s 77.3 million lame brained fools out in the USA that should be reading Substack but those yayhoos just aren’t gonna read Substack, so that means that there mafia of Trumpublicans are just gonna go on about gettin’ their way.
You know, I saw a movie once that was about a guy named Joker, and I think lots of those Trump people that they’re putting into that there cabinet used the same makeup person who did the lips on that there joker, if ya know what I mean.
Well, anyway, I’m glad my chickens are doing pretty darn good, what with the price of eggs…and chickens.