Another action-packed week. There was no limit to the craziness, from Gary Johnson on Aleppo to Matt Lauerâs interviewing performance, to North Koreaâs Kim dropping another bomb.
When presidential candidates answer questions with another question:
Matt Lauer tried to rebound from his poor interview performance:
Lilâ Kim is pissed off again:
Trump reveals his secret plan to defeat ISIS:
Both Parties tried to keep their campaigns afloat:
He’s a bull shitter, and a bull in china shop:
Welcome to Labor Day weekend. This means that summer is over, and mercifully, there are only nine weeks until Election Day:
Donald Trump did a drive-through in Mexico. His souvenir sombrero says âCuleroâ. For those who do not speak colloquial Spanish, Culero means asshole:
Some thought he looked presidential while with President Nieto, but then he looked more like an ultra-nationalist in Phoenix. A Trump advisor said that without enforced deportation, we would soon have a taco truck on every corner. America responded:
Even better, there were some estimates that a taco truck on every corner might deliver enough jobs to eliminate today’s US unemployment. Great idea Donald!
The Pant Suit did not have a good week. The FBI released some of the information they had collected while investigating the email issue. The outrage by those who believe Clinton is the worst candidate ever was palpable. Should we be buying it?
OTOH, for many itâs just too much appearance of guilt:
49rs QB Colin Kaepernick has touched a nerve. It is surprising to see who is for and against his position:
Wrongo and Ms. Oh So Right have returned to the Mansion of Wrong. That means we are back to âAll Trump, All The Timeâ, something we did not miss while in the American and Canadian Rockies.
Saturdayâs NYT had a long-form article. âSyriaâs Paradox: Why the War Only Ever Seems to Get Worseâ details the reasons that the Syrian war could last a very, very long time. From the NYT:
The core combatants â the government and the insurgents who began fighting it in 2011 â are quite weak and, on their own, cannot sustain the fight for long. But they are not on their own. Each side is backed by foreign powers â including the United States, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and now Turkey â whose interventions have suspended the usual laws of nature. Forces that would normally slow the conflictâs inertia are absent, allowing it to continue far longer than it otherwise would. Government and rebel forces are supplied from abroad, which means their arms never run out…These material and human costs are easy for the far richer foreign powers to bear.
Not all cartoons are funny. Here is a graphic way to think about the warâs impact on Syriaâs children:
Khalid Albaih is a Sudanese cartoonist living in Doha, Qatar.
The French forcing Muslim women to take off their burkini is another form of warfare:
Trump backtracks on the wall:
Trump knew from the beginning that he couldnât deport 11 million people, and he knew from the beginning that his wall would never be built. So, maybe this isnât a flip-flop, just an admission. Trump supporters, however, were conned about as much as they deserved to be.
The Orange Trumpet pitched African-Americans this week:
Hillary better hope the Clinton Foundation issue doesnât weaken her campaign:
Epipen pricing by Mylan is just another racket:
Although the Wrongologist cannot get newspapers, and only has occasional wifi, the news does not seem to have changed much in the past week. So, here are a few cartoons curated from the wilderness:
Aetna pulled out of Obamacare. Why are you surprised?
Trump accused Democrats of exploiting Blacks at Minnesota Rally:
Trump told CBS News:
I have seen them marching down the street essentially calling death to the police and I think we’re going to have to look into that…When you see something like that taking place â that’s really a threat, if you think about it. And when you see something like that taking place, we are going to have to perhaps talk with the Attorney General about it or do something.
He also painted the entire African American community as living in poverty with no jobs. Doesnât that show he’s completely out of touch?
The Clinton Foundationâs practices continue to puzzle Clinton supporters:
Ryan Lochte and teammates entered the wrong event:
Bonus cartoonage from Australia. They cover Trumpology:
Apparently, President Obama makes a playlist every year for his summer fun time on Marthaâs Vineyard. Playlists by politicians are common, and usually are big nothingburgers. Obama has a âDayâ playlist and a âNightâ list. This year, The Atlantic approves of Mr. Obamaâs night playlist, and thinks the day list is a snooze. Guess critics gotta criticize.
Make up your own mind: here is the Obama âNightâ playlist.
It was a big week in manufactured news. Trump dominates, but Politico speaks about the Trump campaign thusly: (emphasis by the Wrongologist)
Whatâs bothering people on the [Trump] campaign is that they feel like theyâre doing all the right things, but theyâre losing every news cycle to Hillary and thereâs nothing they can do about it.
Itâs doubtful that Clinton has won a news cycle since the convention, but what the Trump campaign is trying to say is that Clinton doesnât need to win a news cycle as long as Trump âmisspeaksâ every day. From Karoli Kuns at C&L: (brackets by the Wrongologist)
I think thatâs precious, donât you? Considering that Trump dominates the news for every cycle with his intentional demonization of President Barack Obama and [his] opponent, Hillary Clinton, itâs hard to imagine Republicans wringing their tiny little hands over losing news cycles to her.
Ok, the GOP should keep explaining Trumpâs gaffes until America is tired of all the winning.
On to cartoons. Simone Biles gave us a feel-good moment:
This is the one Burka that Trump likes:
With all of the âresetsâ and âmansplainingâ, the GOP could lose its balance:
This is as understandable as any other explanation by Monsieur big mouth:
Trumpâs new tax policy is same old, same old. Itâs a reconstitution of the standard Republican trickle-down economics that benefits big corporations and a wealthy few:
At a rally in Virginia, Trump said:
The [economic] numbers are getting worse and worse all the time.
He was saying that he thinks the economy is going to tank, and that he hopes he will benefit politically. Itâs clear that if his assertion were true it would help him, but, itâs not:
The BLS reported Friday that nonfarm payrolls rose by a seasonally adjusted 255,000 in July. Revisions showed US employers added 18,000 more jobs in May and June than previously estimated. The unemployment rate was unchanged at 4.9% in July.
In any case, itâs good to know that the Pant Load is rooting for an economic downturn to happen in the next 90 days, so he can personally benefit. Seems like his normal mode of operation.
Sorry Donny, the American economy has now experienced 77 months of consecutive private sector job growth. Heâs wrong, but OTOH, it is a very uneven recovery.
On to cartoons. The Rio Olympics dominated Trumpâs efforts to command the news cycle this week.
Brazil put its Christ on the Hill statue in an appropriate garb for the Games:
Concerns about Rioâs water reminds us that Congress didnât appropriate any money for Flint:
Many athletes pulled out due to the Zika virus when the solution was Trump-simple:
Being in Rio gives athletes a respite from the news at home:
The ceremonial dumpster lighting kicked off our presidential Olympics:
In other news, voting rights won a few fights:
Happy post-conventions Sunday! Now settle back and watch the hair pulling between the Pant Suit and the Pant Load for the next 100 days or so.
Here is an apocalyptic story that you didnât see while watching the war of tweets between Bernie, Hillary and Donald. First a heatwave hit Siberia. Then came the anthrax:Â (emphasis by the Wrongologist)
Temperatures have soared in western Russiaâs Yamal tundra this summer. Across Siberia, some provinces warmed an additional 10 degrees Fahrenheit beyond normal. In the fields, large bubbles of vegetation appeared above the melting permafrost â strange pockets of methane or, more likely, water. Record fires blazed through dry Russian grassland. In one of the more unusual symptoms of unseasonable warmth, long-dormant bacteria appear to be active. For the first time since 1941, anthrax struck western Siberia.
Ok, so only 13 Siberian nomads have gotten anthrax so far, and the science is unsettled on tundra warming.
Here are a few cartoons to take your minds off the living hell of the election season, or alternatively, taking it off of anthrax and the Zika virus.
Hillaryâs nomination was greeted by change on the home front:
Bernie mansplained politics to a supporter in Philly:
Trumpâs negotiating style puzzles Putin:
Boris and Natasha get a new gig:
The Dems had a bit of buyerâs remorse:
The big fear with Trump voters between now and November:
We said last Sunday that âEvents were in the saddleâ, that life ran a risk of spinning out of control. Well, the past week proved that events are driving everything. We had the horrible attack in Nice, France as their Bastille Day celebration was ending, and there was an attempted military coup in Turkey on Friday night.
Hard to believe two events in one week could drive Trump off page one, but it happened. And this week, the new Pokémon is more popular than either presidential candidate.
It may seem ironic that, while France refused to participate in the Iraq War, they are a preferred target for terror. But France DID led the way in the dismantling of Libya (while we âled from behindâ). They intervened in Mali, and their history in Algeria was horrific. And France’s failure to integrate immigrants is a major causal element as well.
One of the big problems with terrorism is that it always strikes innocent people rather than the bosses who led their countries into war.
Welcome to the TerrorDome:
France now lives under the TerrorDome:
On the home front, Trump selected Mike Pence:
Regrets, they had a few:
The Hill and the Bern get on the same page:
America has decided:
The GOP convention starts this week. Letâs hope it is peaceful:
Our Havanese dog Bandit lost his fight with an autoimmune disease at age 15 this past Tuesday:
Gonna miss him terribly.
Turning to other news, what does the Dallas attack against police mean for the rest of this American summer? As Mark Shields said on PBS, âevents are in the saddleâ, and there is a distinct feeling that our leadership is not only not in control, but they have no answers.
No one knows what the reaction will be to New Orleans, Minneapolis and Dallas:
Despite all we know, we canât escape our need for Gunz:
Some truths demand an explanation:
Our satellite in orbit around the giant gas planet Jupiter found something horrifying:
The Brits waited seven years for the Chilcot report on Tony Blairâs role in the Iraq War:
Really, is W. sorry? Maybe heâs sorry he got 4500 American soldiers killed, and another 32,000 wounded. And unknown numbers of American military damaged mentally. Or, that the Middle East is totally destabilized. Or, that our economy crashed. Or, that the country is totally polarized. Maybe heâs sorry, but thatâs highly doubtful.
You know, it was OKAYÂ because a Republican did it.
Thatâs the mission he accomplished.
Californians will be pleased to know that when Donald Trump becomes president, he can stop their drought overnight. California just went through the driest four-year period on record.
But Trump isn’t sold. He told supporters in Fresno, CA that the dry spell is bogus. Trump said the state was denying water to Central Valley farmers to prioritize the Delta smelt, a native California fish nearing extinction â or as Trump called it: “a certain kind of three-inch fish.â He told the crowd:
Weâre going to solve your water problem. You have a water problem that is so insane. It is so ridiculous where theyâre taking the water and shoving it out to sea…
At least we know where Trump stands on the issue:
If I win, believe me, weâre going to start opening up the water so that you can have your farmers survive.
Never mind that this is a state, not a federal issue, because Trump will win on the environment too.
In other news, Hillâs email problem gives her a few hurdles:
So far, weâve heard what we already knew, she broke a rule that others had broken before her. Of course, to Republicans, breaking an agency rule is proof sheâs broken the law. Maybe, but rules ainât the same as the law. She needs to put this behind her, or face death by a thousand cuts.
We got our first look at Hillâs emails:
Bill & Hill feel the Bern in CA:
Trump and Bernie wanted to debate. You know who the target was:
Apparently, we have no antibiotic for the Superbug:
The GOP plans to make the transgender toilet rule a centerpiece in the campaign:
