Today's Big Stuff 11.2.21

11.2.21

It’s Tuesday. ELECTION DAY IS TODAY, and there are 371 days until the midterm elections. Manchin is just the effing worst part 74,820, Trump goes all in over and over again for Youngkin and President Biden is doing damn fine on judges.

Be advised: This is a newsletter with lots of cuss words and typose. Especially on goddamn Erection Day.

Note: Wow. Look at all those sexy game faces. It’s Election Day, and you badass mofos clearly brought your best today. We know you’ve left it all out on the floor. We’re damn proud of you no matter what happens. And because we know you’re nervous about this race in Virginia, we wanted to share with you the TBS Guide to Surviving Election Day. It’s also known as “how to unpucker your butt when you’re freaking out over politics.” We figured the first one was more classy. Even if the second one is more accurate.

Ok step one — Breathe. If you’ve done all you can, then you’ve done all you can. Obviously GOTV efforts will continue, but legal wranglings aside, this fucking cake is baked. Step two — if you do drugs and alcohol, maybe think about a lunch of drugs and alcohol. If you don’t, well, you learned how to cope with days like this a while back, so you don’t need any help from us and we should instead be asking you for tips. Also, we’re mostly kidding about the drugs and alcohol. But it’s Election Day and nobody is judging. Like seriously if you put bath salts on your Red Robin burger we get it and we didn’t see a fucking thing. Step three — DO NOT under any circumstances start calling people you know who work in politics and asking “what are you hearing?” Nobody knows shit. Seriously. Nobody knows shit. Step four — DO NOT under any circumstances read Politico. They feed on your souls and your time, and they get really hungry on Election Days. Plus, they steal Halloween candy from children and give it all to Ben Shapiro. Step five — if you can swing it, take a nap. Like it doesn’t even matter how long. The drugs and alcohol should help to that end. We’re kidding. But a little recharge can really help you be at your best on what could be a long night. Step six — Be cool. If your person goes down big early, try to chill. It might turn out bad, or it might be the early returns were misleading of the overall result. So be like Fonzi, and be cool. Or freak out. Freaking out also works.

These last two steps we’re about to share with you might be the most important. Step seven — Remember there is a tomorrow. So even though it might feel like a kangaroo just punched you in the damn throat or it might feel like you’re riding majestically in a kangaroo’s pouch through a beautiful meadow, we still gotta get our asses up and get back to the business of defending democracy either way. Step eight — Go to bed before the sun comes up. This is just a good rule in general and probably doesn’t need to be said to non-vampires. Unless you put bath salts on your Round Robin burger.

We don’t know what’s gonna happen today, but we’ll be here tomorrow ready to take it to these Trumper sonsofbitches the best we can. We’re Americans. We’re too dumb to quit. So let’s go get ‘em. Hope y’all have a good one.

Note two: That kangaroo thing was weird, right? But doesn’t it sound like fun? Like yeah we’ve heard they’re filled with mucus or something and we’re probably too heavy for this to be remotely possible, but it still sounds really nice. Just so free bouncing through a field. Sigh.

Note three: We hate to admit this, but we are not Supreme Court experts. Yeah, the expertise pretty much stops with profanity. So here’s Vox to give us a read on what went down yesterday. More: Vox

Note four: Were you a fan of Uncle Sam’s podcast? Well he has acquired the rights to the back catalogue and you can either find past episodes at the link below or wherever you get your podcasts. Stay tuned for an announcement about future shows. More: Burning Bridges Pod

Note five: Have y’all seen this ridiculous trend where Republicans seized on drug seizures at the border to claim Biden has failed to secure the border? Like y’all know we’re seizing the drugs right? We’re not just taking pictures of them and then sending them through. Or maybe Chuck Grassley needs his fentanyl fix. Would explain a lot. More: MSNBC

Note six: Do you think if we hadn’t made a glass of lukewarm milk attorney general that Trump might actually be facing some consequences for this shit? More: News Channel 9

Note seven: Democrats are still working hard to take on drug prices in the reconciliation bill. Now we’re just waiting to see if a so-called moderate fucks it up. More: Washington Post

Note eight: Joe Biden apologized to the world for Trump pulling us out of the Paris climate accords. He should also apologize for Don Jr. Just because. More: Talking Points Memo

Note nine: Today we’ve read a lot of stories about how kinder gentler Trump Republicans like Glenn Youngkin are the future of the party. What fucking bullshit. Here’s a story about a violent domestic abuser who could be their Senate candidate in Pennsylvania. Oh and this is the case in at least two other races. More: Philadelphia Inquirer

Note 10: Wanna read a really cool Harvey Milk story? More: LA Mag

Note 11: We don’t know who the fuck Christy Swanson is, but we hope she gets better from COVID and then stops lying about it. We also don’t know what we did with our thoughts and prayers. They were around here somewhere. Oh well. More: Huff Post

Note 12: Wait. The FEC said ok to more foreign money in our elections?! Um shouldn’t they be trying to stop that shit?! More: Axios

Note 13: The Let’s Go Brandon stuff was never that funny. But this is fucking disturbing. More: NBC News

Note 14: Are you wearing clean underwear? Would you like to change that? Then read this. More: NPR

Note 15: 5 million people have died worldwide from COVID. We’ll always have to wonder what that number would be if the world had had real U.S. leadership from the beginning.

Note 16: Marjorie Taylor Gross has been fined multiple times for refusing to wear a mask. We don’t mean to be dicks, but maybe if she wore a mask it would keep all that shit from coming out of her mouth. More: Washington Post

Note 17: Ok, sexy patriots, let’s get to the news. We hope you’re feeling good about today. Read your TBS, do your bath salts and then get a nap. Wait. That might not work. We do want to say thank you to everyone who worked their asses off on these races. Thank you for fighting to save our democracy. We love y’all, and we hope you have a great day.

Goddamn Manchin

So yesterday when it seemed like everything was cool and we were rolling to finally passing Biden’s legislative agenda this week, Joe Manchin called a press conference because he wasn’t getting enough attention and he wanted to shit all over his own party. But it didn’t really work because House progressives said they were moving full-steam ahead regardless of that dumbfuck from West Virginia. So at this point, if someone kills the agenda, it will be Manchin and not the progressives. Seriously what a dick. More: Business Insider

Trumpkin

While the mainstream media has worked overtime to defend Glenn Youngkin as some kind of moderate — ya know because moderates totally want to ban Beloved from schools — Trump has repeatedly shouted from the rooftops that he and Youngkin are cut from the same gross cloth. Yesterday Trump put out two statements of support and then held a tele-rally for Youngkin. How did the press react? By calling McAuliffe a liar for saying that Youngkin was working with Trump to win. With a press corps like this, we might just be toast y’all. More: NBC News

Here come da judge

So we’re closing today on a really high note. Last night, the Senate confirmed Beth Robinson to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit. Robinson is the first openly LGBTQ woman to be appointed to a lifetime seat on the court of appeals. According to Jennifer Bendery at HuffPo, this appointment along with another one last night, the balance on the U.S. Court of Appeals has now been swung to Democratic favor. Well done to President Biden and congrats to Judge Robinson. More: Huff Post

Today’s clips

A jury was selected Monday evening in Kyle Rittenhouse’s homicide trial here, paving the way for opening statements to begin in the volatile case. More: Washington Post

This is how it’s going to be forever: Republicans and conservatives will claim that any election they lose is fraudulent. Donald Trump established this as the playbook for his party-cum-cult. And the full embrace of this authoritarian and dangerous tactic has been evident in the much-watched and tight-as-a-tick governor’s race in Virginia between Republican Glenn Youngkin and Democrat Terry McAuliffe. More: Mother Jones

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