Prison, me?!
Ah, another evil Illinois politician goes to Club Fed. Will it change anything? Nah. But, it still is a bit satisfying to see this particular asshat finish his days imprisoned.
OK, that is enough ill-will. Let us look and see if we can find better things out there!
- Attica! Attica! Er, well, sort of.
- I am a bit surprised they actually are doing this!
- WTF, France? I thought you were more car-burny than jabby.
- Tonio, you got some ‘splaining to do…oh, wait. The last sentence of the story is an absolute delight.
How about some Johnny Cash?
Comment section is all yours.
I’m never really following Illinois politics, but I do remember Madigan’s name coming up a lot. He was some sort of king pin.
I’m sure he’ll be getting pinned soon enough.
[Winks and leers.]
Ran the Illinois House and Democrat establishment from 1983 to 2021 with one 2 year break when TEAM Red last was relevant (early 1990s). Was in the IL House 1971-2021. Got his daughter elected IL AG – that covered one flank, but the Feds eventually got him.
IMO they’re just clearing out political territory for a member of the Pritzker clan. And that’s a LOT of space needed to be cleared.
#metoo
I would like to their they’re getting sick of the commies but I think it’s really just about not inconveniencing Parliamenteers.
“The right to protest is essential and we will always defend it, but actions in support of such a group go beyond what most would see as legitimate protest,” he said.
I think he’s right, however there’s this rule about discounting everything said before the “but.”
Illinois State
PenitentiaryHome for Wayward Politicians.I wish they had a branch in New York.
Come, Michael. We need a coxswain on our Notre Dame alum rowing team.
You don’t wish to let those filthy Yale boys win, do you?
But will he get a Trump pardon?
83? Good chance he won’t have to worry about what he’s going to do when he gets out.
He’ll be at the next Johnny Cash concert though.
As JC aged his voice changed, I preferred the younger version
(With apologies to Bill Engall)
You think your flock is protected by a couple of dogs barking at an apex predator? Here’s ursine.
Depends on the dogs and the bear. A couple of adult Great Pyrs would straight fuck up an east-coast-sized black bear.
My mastiff would chase bears. A friend has a Great Dane who would bite them on the ass if they didn’t exit their yard fast enough.
Even a single Great Pyr is pretty badass
(Goodest boy)
My arthritic golden retriever treed a bear to defend me. I’ve never seen a bear move that fast.
‘Disappeared for two days after the brutal fight,’ my hairy ass. Casper spent those two days tracking down the remaining coyotes and killing them. Great Pyrs do not fuck around with threats to their homestead.
Seems like bears are afraid of any dog size. Probably an inherited fear of wolves.
For whatever reason, the bears don’t seem to fear Mrs F’s cooking. They’ll dig though the garbage to get all the left over leftovers.
A dog might well start trouble too. This happened on a trail I had hiked on about a month earlier. https://www.adn.com/wildlife/article/woman-mauled-brown-bear-cordova-hiking-trail/2014/08/13/
Badass? That’s frickin’ John Wick in a Great Pyrenees costume.
We came across a small black bear on Saturday hiking near Caesar’s Head. It ran away, our stupid terrier thought it was a game.
An injured bear is soon a dead bear. They’re very shy about taking unnecessary damage, and an attack by Pyrs or any other dogs that are oblivious to any damage they themselves might take is an unnecessary risk for the bear, no matter how tempting the potential meal might be.
Every bear but one I ever encountered in the wild ran away on sight, or sometimes even before I sighted them. The exception was one I met in May 1980 on one of the balds in the Great Smokies two days out from Lake Fontana. Took my friend’s pack (fortunately not off his back). That was the end of our hiking trip.
That bear had a tag in its ear, which indicated he’d been shipped in from elsewhere in the park after causing trouble there.
Had a monster male black bear come through the neighborhood in NJ. At least 500lbs maybe 600.
Neighbor’s dog tried to chase it. He just stared down at the dog unil it realized and ran away.
How about some Johnny Cash?
Wait, Johnny died almost 22 years ago? WTF? Where did the time go?
Huh, i thought it was sometime in 2010s he passed. *shrug*
That’s obviously incorrect, because I saw the biopic in theaters a couple years after he died, and 2005 definitely wasn’t 20 years ago.
Tonio, you got some ‘splaining to do…
My whereabouts are reliably accounted for during that time. At least there was no hateful, inflammatory mention of picnic basket pilfering.
Hey there Boo-Boo!
A dollar to make ya holler, Honey Boo-Boo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wu00dg0fu-s
Not the same as downtown…
I have it on good authority that he was taking pictures with the tourists.
Let’s not paint ourselves into a hole
Some Federal Reserve officials are joining President Donald Trump in calling for lower interest rates as soon as July.
Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Michelle Bowman on Monday downplayed the potential impacts of Trump’s tariffs on prices and said the US central bank should swiftly lower rates to preserve the labor market’s health.
“It is time to consider adjusting the policy rate,” Bowman said. “Should inflation pressures remain contained, I would support lowering the policy rate as soon as our next meeting in order to bring it closer to its neutral setting and to sustain a healthy labor market.”
Bowman is the second Fed official to join Trump in calling for lower borrowing costs. On Friday, Fed Governor Christopher Waller said tariffs will likely only result in a “one-off” increase in inflation. Both Bowman and Waller are Trump appointees.
I think at this point Powell will fight any rate change just so it won’t look like he caved to pressure from you know who.
You might think that, even in the realm of the Florida Man, small-town life might lack excitement.
Well, consider this.
I live across the street from a funeral home, and there have been a couple 21-gun salutes since I moved here. Today, there was black smoke coming up from the chimney, so I guess the crematorium oven was running.
obligatory song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Lh9gqa1WBY
Since you mentioned the crematorium running, I was expecting this
Black smoke, so not a pope.
To be fair, it’s a sensible public warning seeing as the last time “loud noises” were heard, a presidential candidate got a little nick on his ear from an exploding teleprompter, and a bystander died as a result of sound waves traveling through his body.
Ceremonial Loud Noise? I saw them in Boulder in 1978.
Bear attacks appear to be this summer’s European version of shark attacks. It was all over the news when I was in Slovakia because a bear had attacked a woman. Apparently the population is up because nobody is hunting them. My paranoid in-laws kept warning us about going hiking, but alas there were no signs of bears, no tracks, no poop, no rainbow flags.
That satellite picture of the Iranian prison kind of looks like my neighborhood. If I had a basement, I’d consider taking shelter.
Nuh-uh
Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.), the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, scoffed at President Trump’s claims of success following U.S. strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites this weekend.
In a Sunday interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Himes said there’s no way U.S. officials could have enough information yet to make that assessment.
“Look, that’s insane. That’s insane. You don’t need to be an intelligence professional to know that we have no idea whether these strikes were successful,” the Democrat said when asked about the Trump administration’s claims of success and whether the world “is a safer place” following the strikes.
Automatic kneejerk contradiction is always a good response. We should probably assume it was a complete failure.
Do we actually have detailed info on damage? Most likely, no.
Oh, yes we do. At least NSA does. Such info is classified but most likely shared with the Israelis as well.
I wonder how many NRO satellites are tasked with Iran right now.
My guess is the Israelis double tapped Fordow based on reports that the initial strike was ineffective.
Or they were policing up recovery operations.
Satellites aren’t going to tell us about damage hundreds of feet underground. Now, the NSA probably has something, but if the tunnels are collapsed, I doubt even the Iranians what the damage to bunker was.
What good an Israeli strike would do if the bunkerbusters failed, I have no idea.
NRO has SIGINT satellites.
***
The mission and capabilities of these satellites are highly classified, though targets may include telemetry, VHF radio, cellular mobile phones, paging signals, and mobile data links.
***
No comment on any of the above.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orion_(satellite)
When stuff blows up, people talk.
Florida Man charges cops with butcher knife after AI chatbot told him to avenge her:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qv_MTTam1uY
Well, Son of Sam said dogs were talking to him, so imagine how’d he’d react to a chatbot.
Skynet will take us down; one Florida Man at a time.
… I don’t get it.
That’s OK, we still like you!
That a boy! You stick it to those Dems!
“I can’t get a real job.”
Maybe he should have gone to a real school instead of taking a political ride at Harvard.
Meh, he could probably make it on late night MSNBC for a few months. If he gained some weight, he’d look like Chris Hayes.
He could try out to become dinner on the View.
He’s kind of like that Japanese racehorse that never won.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haru_Urara
Nonetheless, the horse became a crowd favorite for demonstrating gaman, the key Japanese virtue of perseverance.
***
In June 2003, after garnering her 80th consecutive loss, the story was picked up by the national Japanese media, making “Haru Urara” a household name. She quickly became very popular in Japan, and was called “the shining star of losers everywhere” (負け組の星, makegumi no hoshi), for continuing to run with all her heart, despite her seemingly endless losing streak
***
Sometimes it’s better to realize your head is going to cave before that brick wall does.
Bah, you’ll never achieve gyokusai (shattered jewel) with that attitude.
***
The origin of the term is a classical Chinese phrase in the 7th-century Book of Northern Qi, which states “丈夫玉碎恥甎全”, “A true man would [rather] be the shattered jewel, ashamed to be the intact tile.”
***
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQiH_QwTLkI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1pNU85Euwg
Sounds more like Beto O’Rourke
There is no value in shattering for a useless cause.
You’ll never reach Valhalla with that attitude.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5yYMjU8xDg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkMVsNEwvX0
***
Odin, throughout this story [Grimnismal] is seen to have pet ravens that he sends out, and the warriors of his hall are dead men and ghosts who endlessly fight battles and endlessly die. There are also women who feed them and serve them alcohol and are the same spirits who chose them to die in the battles they fight. Valhalla in this story can be seen as a beautiful hall for the dead but it can also be seen as a lofty stylization of a battlefield after a fight. There are broken weapons and shields and dead bodies and ghosts cover the hall that gets ravaged by wolves and ravens. To the Vikings of the time, this was not only their desired afterlife, but a way to cope with the horrors of battle.
***
The first wave at Omaha beach had something like a 90% KIA rate. But they went anyway.
The loss rate for US bombers during WW2 was 4% per mission and crews had to fly 25 missions. 25*4% = 100% chance of being shot down. In practice, a handful of planes and airmen survived all 25 missions.
Even shattering for a noble cause is something most people don’t want to contemplate.
*25*4% = 100% chance of being shot down*
Pretty sure that’s not the way probability works. I flip a coin twice, don’t have a 100% chance of getting heads.
True, but you have a 75% chance of getting at least one heads up.
They only needed to get shot down once to become part of the 4% per mission.
***
During 1943, only about 25% of Eighth Air Force bomber crewmen completed their 25-mission tours—the other 75% were killed, severely wounded, or captured. Despite knowing the poor odds of finishing their tours, bomber crews courageously pressed their attacks mission after mission.
***
https://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/Visit/Museum-Exhibits/Fact-Sheets/Display/Article/1519640/bigger-raids-bigger-losses-and-crisis/
OK, so not quite as grim.
Unfortunately, I don’t have a math font to post here, but lim (1-1/x)^x as x -> ∞ is 1/e.
If they have a 96% chance of making it in each mission then they have a (0.96)^25 = 36% chance of staying airborne for 25 missions in a row. So that gives them a 64% chance of going down.
I want Hogg to stick around, if only because he’s the Democrat’s Dylan Mulvaney when it comes to attracting normies.
Ooh, Mulvaney can be his running mate. No, the other way around!
This. The freak show seems to think no one is buying tickets because they aren’t freaky enough. I encourage them to stick to that.
” Leaders We Deserve ”
Something something good and hard.
STEVE SMITH EARS (ER, AND UH, YOU KNOW) PERK UP!!
Its so hot up here, the meth addicts are putting copper back in their a/c.
And the pollen’s so bad, they’re turning the meth back into Sudafed.
A thousand upvotes for both jokes!
I don’t think this has been covered here directly, but the media is freaking out because Trump appointed some dipshit kid to be head of “the Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships- a division of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that oversees terrorism prevention”. His picture is…not impressive. Kind of a mix between Harold and Kumar honestly with probably just about as much weed.
His previous employment included a job as a grocery clerk and law maintenance.
Don’t scoff just because you never heard of this critical post before! We’re all going to die, and it will be because The Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships was led by this little shit.
That sounds like an organization that needs an outsider to clean it up and he’ll do. He should have penciled in a scar on his face or worn an eyepatch for that photo though. I’d be more concerned if the “experts” had done a better job but here we are.
It sounds like a position that had been used to put out press releases on right wing terrorism and funnel money to left wing NGO’s, honestly.
What Bro says.
My previous employment included paper boy, country club lifeguard, farm tractor driver, maintenance monkey at bean processing plant, flag waver on a construction site, you get the idea. Kids who have those jobs are at least working and not in some featherbed internship somewhere, racking up brownie points.
“maintenance monkey at bean processing plant”
So, RC fixed the bean flickers.
He was a pool boy, too.
Offhand, that department sounds like a corruption and cronyism festival, and he could well be one of the DOGE boys, which would just what it needs.
He could probably appoint an overripe coconut to run the task force with no difference in results.
The right thing to do is just eliminate the post.
Serious administrations hire failed novelists or kink merchants who steal women’s clothing at airports.
I am going to scoff because I have never heard of this critical post before.
It’s pretty hard to abolish a fedgov agency or even cut its funding. So the next best thing is to put someone in charge of it who will minimize the damage it does.
BuSab for the win.
Bastard ended a war and went a very long ways towards stabilizing the ME.
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/06/23/iran-qatar-iraq-attacks-us-israel.html
No Kings!
🤪
The Qatar attacks seem like they were for show. Apparently even gave us a courteous heads up. That regime is reeling from the looks of it and just trying to cling to power.
Just like they would have even if they did get nukes.
It’s all dumb, but hopefully it just fizzles out with neither side giving into their worst impulses.
Israel has been kicking the dog snot out of them and then Trump said “hold my beer”. The Ayatollah just wants to live at this point.
I pretty much agree. That’s what it seems like.
I think Israel achieved most of what it wanted. They hopefully settle for not destroying the whole regime.
About 56 Iranians were killed during Soleimani’s funeral. That’s about 10% of the number of Iranians killed by us and Israel in the past 12 days.
As usual, we greatly underestimate the resilience of our foes.
I don’t even know what you’re referring to. If true that Iran gave a heads up before responding and agreed to a ceasefire, that’s hardly what I’d call a great show of resilience. 500 deaths, no matter how high up the food chain, is not some great bloodbath for the nation of Iran.
If anything, the Iranians now look like giant pussies.
I thank them for being reasonable, but that’s how many are going to interpret this.
I’m seeing a lot of parallels with North Korea. The Iranians, leadership and common folk, want security guarantees and an end to sanctions. The nuclear program is and has always been a bargaining chip, which is why they signed the non-proliferation treaty.
46 years of sticks have not budged them. Time for some carrots, which might also lead to peeling them away from Russia and China.
“…I would like to congratulate both Countries, Israel and Iran, on having the Stamina, Courage, and Intelligence to end, what should be called, “THE 12 DAY WAR.” ”
I’m glad Trump is staying focused on branding.
And the Great Gaza Turkey Shoot continues…
Without Iranian backing, how long can the Palestinians continue to fight?
I still believe that was Israel’s main motive for all of this. Natanayahu has basically been saying the same shit about their nuclear program for 20 years now.
Iran has helped Hamas a lot, but they can get by without them and have before. It was a mistake for Israel to attack Iran directly.
Hezbollah and Hamas both started in the 80s when Iran was busy fighting Iraq and the rest of the Sunni world was helping the mujahideen in Afghanistan. Iran kept a low profile between 1989 the 2003 invasion.
People want permanent solutions, but sometimes the best option is to mow the lawn. Over and over.
No no no I wanted another forever war!
On the TV just now “This is such a let down….for Trump’s critics”
President Donald Trump has announced a ceasefire timeline he says will end the war between Israel and Iran.
War? What war?
Overheard someone using Siri to calculate tip on a bill I the restaurant. Good lord.
Percentages, how do they work?
In a bizarre plot twist, Jugsy offered to pay for breakfast Sunday. The bill was $36.20. She asked me, “how much do I tip?. I said “20 percent”.
She replied- “how much is that?”
“Just put a $10 on there. ”
I am a rounder.
I have a legitimate fear that the incoming generations will be incapable of solving any problems without being able to ask questions to the “smart” phone.
I know you can go back to ancient times and find examples of older people ranting about “these damn kids today getting dumber and dumber”, but the fact that there have been warnings before doesn’t disprove that there’s a crisis point and we’re moving closer to it every day.
Trump just announced ceasefire between Isreal and Iran, with lots and lots of the use of the number 12 (the Ayatollahs are 12thers, a branch of Islam similar to End Times Christians). After Iran called and said “we’re gonna launch these missiles here, please get everybody out of the way.”
So, basically the Crazy Persians are saying “we give up, let us save face in front of our people.” No regime change, no more missiles.
It’s a very expensive and stupid way to maintain the status quo, but a bad peace is better than a good war.
Sometimes it’s best to let the wookiee win, even if it can’t pull your arms out.
If it pans out, I think it’s the best outcome available.
We all know what you are, we’re just getting to the haggling-over-a-price part
Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, one of President Donald Trump’s most vocal critics in the Senate GOP, said in a podcast on Monday that there are certain situations in which she’d consider becoming an independent and caucusing with Democrats.
“There may be that possibility,” she told Galen Druke in an interview excerpt of his GD Politics podcast, scheduled to post in full on Tuesday.
Druke asked Murkowski how she’d respond if Democrats won three seats in the 2026 midterm election, “and they say, we’re gonna let you pass bills that benefit Alaskans if you caucus with us.”
“You’ve started off with the right hook here, is ‘if this would help Alaskans,’” she told Druke.
The Democrats will tell you how special and wonderful and smart you are, unlike those mean old Republicans.
Trade her and a bag of donuts for Fetterman.
Gaza (Hamas) and the West Bank (PLO) have been playing the bad cop, good cop game with Israel for decades. Step one towards a lasting peace involves no more Israeli settlements (land grabs). Unfortunately, that is something Netanyahu staunchly opposes. I can’t blame him. They ended the Gaza occupation, Hamas took over, and it’s been rockets ever since.
It’s easy to wipe out a guerilla movement if you heavily outnumber them. Israel doesn’t and never will.
Dad took 4yo and me to the nearby Dairy Queen for some ice cream for my nephew. I decided to have a mini-adventure, with him leading us home on the walk back. He took a longer route, but he was confident and got us home in a very satisfactory manner.
I’m off work for ~55hrs, with swimming planned with the two youngest, 4 and 10, tomorrow. Another scavenger hunt at Walmart may occur on Wed.
Many thoughts on my soon-submission and on finding a steady project to keep my writing focused on something resembling a ‘plan.’ A recent idea comes from Dad on ‘Six Things That Make You Unique.’ Good ice-breaker and perhaps an ‘easy’ way to get more submissions, and getting the ball and conversation rolling in comments.