A Putin Ally in the State Dept.

How did this clown even get in the door?

Senior State Department staffer Darren Beattie, a passionate Putin supporter behind the move to dismantle a key agency fighting Russian propaganda, is married to a Russian woman whose uncle is a longtime Kremlin ally, according to The Telegraph.

Yulia Kirillova grew up in Moscow, studied abroad in North America, and married Beattie in 2021 in Florida. She moved to D.C. in January. Her uncle Sergei Cherniko is a drinks magnate who had an estimated net worth of $150 million in 2005. That year, he served in Russia’s ministry of natural resources and was then deputy governor of Siberia’s Nenets region. Cherniko later served in Putin’s civic chamber from 2008 to 2010.

The relationship raises even greater scrutiny around Beattie’s April decision to eliminate the Global Engagement Center, a State Department office tasked with dealing with Russian disinformation campaigns. Beattie has been a staunch supporter of Putin, setting himself apart from the traditional conservative right in Bannon-esque fashion.

I cannot think of a single president, other than this one, who would have hired somebody with such close ties to Putin to do anything more than pick up trash on the C&O Canal. He should be residing in a Federal pridon, awaiting a trade to Russia.

Because It's Friday

Swiss cog railway:

A vertical boiler is pretty old-school, but I can see some real advantages on the steep grades of a cog railway.

Trump is an Ignorant Piece of Shit

U.S. President Donald Trump’s praise of the “beautiful” English of Liberia’s President Joseph Boakai drew confusion Thursday in the English-speaking African country and umbrage over what many considered condescending remarks.

“Such good English,” Trump said to Boakai during an event at the White House, with visible surprise. “Such beautiful English.”

Although English has been the official language of Liberia since the country’s founding in the 1800s, Trump asked Boakai where he had learned to speak the language “so beautifully,” and continued as Boakai murmured a response. “Where were you educated? Where? In Liberia?”

I don't understand how n even slightly competent president would go into a meeting with another nation's leader without some briefing. But Trump doesn't think he needs briefing, that he's the smartest guy in the room. So he goes in and, if the president of Liberia didn't have a dark skin, Trump wouldn't have known that Liberia is in Africa.

The Orange Führer's arrogance and condescension was on full display, all mixed into a toxic stew with a base stock of ignorance.

People. Especially Conservatives, Are Dumb as Rocks

It was known in 1965 that carbon dixoxide was warming the globe. That was back when some sbutle tweaks to things could have avoided the mess we are falling into.

We're probably now at the point of no return. Glaciers and ice caps are melting and disappearing as the atmosphere warms up. It's possible that most of the coastal cities will be underwater within the lifetime of kids alive today.

Nobody can say that we didn't see it coming. Our generations, and the couple before us, will be reviled for centuries. They won't care about antibiotics or robotics or cyber-shit or space exploration. They will remember us as the clueless imbeciles who had all the information that we needed to avert the catastrophe and we, instead, burined our heads in the sand.

The only slightly positive thing about it could be that destroying the environment will be the final nail in the coffin of conservatism.

Trump's Brazil Tariff is Clearly Illegal

Not that Republicans would give a fuck. They don't care about the law anymore. They are a fascist party.

It's clearly illegal because the Old Syphilitic Sociopath-in-Chief is slapping his tariffs based on an economic emergency (which doesn't exist in the first place).

There is no economic emergency with Brazil. The US has a trade surprlus with them. The trariff on Brazil is because the Brazilians are prosecuting his friend and fellow wannabee dictator for plotting a coup.

Trump wants to do something and the Republicans fall on their bellies to debase themselves.

ICEstapo - Dumb as Fuck

You don't stand on the row crops, you fucking incel morons.

G'wan and Cry me a River; ICEstapo Ed.

Apparently, morale is slipping in the ICEstapo. Some of the agents fear that the agency is morphing into living up to the caricature of them as an out-of-control goon squad.

Well, if you guys don't like the fact that you're no longer chasing down terrorists or drug smugglers or child pornographers, and, instead, are rounding up farm workers and day laborers with no days off in order to meet the quotas imposted by Discount Goebbels, then fucking quit. It's not as though your career options are either shoving people into boxcars or serving on the Russian front. There are oodles of local law enforcement agencies which have been crying out for new people to fill their ranks. I can think of at least one small state that has over 300 fewer stae troopers than is authorized. They are by no means the only department looking for new hires.

Don't whine about how hard it is to be an ICEstapo agent. This is still a free-ish country, go find another job. Or you can suck it up and tell your grandchildren in the 2050s how heroic you were, wearing facemasks, carrying machineguns and rounding up people working low-wage farm jobs or roofing in the Florida sun or working the third ship in meatpacking plants in order to provide for their families.

Dachau Barbie Fucked With Texas

The FEMA response to the flooding in Texas was delayed for days because Noem couldn't be bothered to sign off on it.

As monstrous floodwaters surged across central Texas late last week, officials at the Federal Emergency Management Agency leapt into action, preparing to deploy critical search and rescue teams and life-saving resources, like they have in countless past disasters.

But almost instantly, FEMA ran into bureaucratic obstacles, four officials inside the agency told CNN.

As CNN has previously reported, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem — whose department oversees FEMA — recently enacted a sweeping rule aimed at cutting spending: Every contract and grant over $100,000 now requires her personal sign-off before any funds can be released.

For FEMA, where disaster response costs routinely soar into the billions as the agency contracts with on-the-ground crews, officials say that threshold is essentially “pennies,” requiring sign-off for relatively small expenditures
...
In the past, FEMA would have swiftly staged these teams, which are specifically trained for situations including catastrophic floods, closer to a disaster zone in anticipation of urgent requests, multiple agency sources told CNN.

But even as Texas rescue crews raced to save lives, FEMA officials realized they needed Noem’s approval before sending those additional assets. Noem didn’t authorize FEMA’s deployment of Urban Search and Rescue teams until Monday, more than 72 hours after the flooding began, multiple sources told CNN..

So what was occupying ICE Ice Barbie while central Texas was flooding? She was fucking around on Instagram with proposals for her official portrait as the SD governor.

Goobing These Down, Here

Only thing that would be better is if a truck hauling porta-potties was in the next lane.

Coup Plotters of a Feather, Stick Together, PlusMAGA Hates Superman

President Donald Trump singled out Brazil for import taxes of 50% on Wednesday for its treatment of its former president, Jair Bolsonaro, showing that personal grudges rather than simple economics are a driving force in the U.S. leader’s use of tariffs.

Trump avoided his standard form letter with Brazil, specifically tying his tariffs to the trial of Bolsonaro, who is charged with trying to overturn his 2022 election loss. Trump has described Bolsonaro as a friend and hosted the former Brazilian president at his Mar-a-Lago resort when both were in power in 2020.

Of course the Premier J6 Plotter is looking out for other coup plotters. One might also presume that if the former leader of another country is accused of rape, that our Sexual-Offender-in-Chief will put tariffs on that country.

Meanwhile, the MAGA Right is getting into a frenzy over Superman because he's an immigrant. Maybe those white-sheet-wearing snowflakes ought to get a fucking clue. Being an alien has been Superman's origin story since Action Comics #1, but the MAGA-lunatics love to forget everything that contradicts their Fox-News-generated worldview.

Shall we recap? Kal-El is an illegal immigrant/refugee from another planet, he came here without a visa, he snuck over the border, and he stands for truth, justice, and the American way.

Of course the Right hates him.