American Madness Journal

Ew, and Other News
Well, if you’ve come sniffing around this blog hoping for smug, salacious gossip about perverts in high places, I hope you’re ashamed of yourself. In this household, we honor our president’s wishes, especially the ones about ignoring his intimate friendship with the...

Superman vs. MechaHitler, for the Epstein Files, and Other History Lessons You’ll Be Afraid to Teach Your Grandkids
Well, I spent the week curled up snugly within my windmill house writing folk songs. Here’s what I came up with: In MacArthur Park they’re marching in the dark All those creepy ICE guys running ‘round Someone left our rights out in the rain Now that weirdo who bought...

Fragrant Fourth Fuels Fascism Fears
Yyyyeah, the vibes’re pretty strange on this, objectively the least American July 4th celebration to date. And may we never top it. My god, they actually passed the fucking thing. The legislative process has been likened to sausage-making. This one was more like every...

How Hard Can War Be, Really?
I could almost enjoy the news if the bumbling Christopher Guest hucksters weren’t also playing the leads in the Tom Clancy thriller. Pie to the face, steps on a rake, stumbles around blind…it’s all very amusing till he feels his way to the big red launch button. I bet...

Sure, No Kings, But Definitely Not One This Shitty
Lotta big milestones for ascendant American autocracy this week. Uniformed military in the streets, opposition politicians in handcuffs…they grow up so fast, don’t they? Suddenly we’ve got a chubby, fascist toddler running amok, and we never quite got around to...

It’s All Fun & Games Until One Oligarch Accuses the Other Oligarch of Being in the Epstein Files
We used to have a little something called “family values” in this country. When two billionaires joined forces to subvert democracy, it was for life. Sure, there’d be bumps along the road, but you worked that shit out, you stayed together. Fired veterans together....

Let’s TACO Bout the Week’s News
Hello, friends. Hope you’re well. I am writing to you tonight from CECOT, having been deported for reposting chicken memes on social media. The delousings are a little more frequent than I’d like, but I got to meet Kristi Noem. I suppose it’s theoretically possible...

More Like Big UGLY Bill, AMIRITE?!?!?
With the passage of the GOP’s reconciliation bill in jeopardy, House Republican deficit hawks held fast to their principles, ultimately resulting in fiscally responsible legislation that balances the budget for the first time in nearly…hang on, that’s not right. With...

Planes, Brainworms, and Autocracy
The Turd Reich unveiled its new anti-terror initiative this week, a plan to bankrupt organizations like Hamas by diverting their funders’ budgets into bribes for rapist game show hosts. You have to feel bad for any NATO member nation that scrambled to dramatically...

I Hear They’re Holding POWs From the Trade War with Mattel at Alcatraz
Friends, I know things seem grim, but I think I’ve finally worked out a solution. All we need to do is convince the folks who created the very first cognitive test to replace the “is this a moo cow or a horsey?” section with a couple of questions about how tariffs...

Gosh, Has it Been 100 Days Already?
I used to find the whole “first 100 days” thing kinda arbitrary, but that was back before I ever viewed a presidential term as something to be survived. Well, now that we mark the passage of time in terms of gulag avoidance milestones, we may as well celebrate, I...

According to Polling, Screwing Everything Up is Unpopular. Huh.
So, they started selling Trump 2028 hats this week. Me, I might’ve held off on that particular assault on the constitutional order, for a moment less inundated with headlines about how everyone hates everything I’m doing, but then, I’ve never bankrupted a casino. Even...

Constitutional Crisis on Infinite Earths
You guys, it is so beautiful out today. One of the maybe three mathematically perfect spring days Chicago gets per year. Weather that cries out for day drinking. But alas, I must remain faithful to the vow I made to the original, Golden Age Shower Cap, when he...

(Trade) War, What is it Good For?
With all due respect to my regular readership, I’m addressing this week’s post directly to the alien archaeologists excavating the ruins of our stupid, stupid civilization, which I don’t see lasting past Thursday. Okay. Greetings, alien archaeologists! Have a Twinkie,...

Idiot Rapist Also a One-Man Recession
You’re probably seeing the term “mad king” all over the place this week, but I honestly don’t think that’s fair. What we’re dealing with here is a stupid king. A dumbass. An imbecile. A bag-of-hammers, thinks-a-cognitive-test-measures-intelligence,...

All I Wanna Know is Where Jeffrey Goldberg Falls in the Line of Succession
Golly, online dating sure has changed. Once upon a time, the worst you had to worry about was an unsolicited dick pic; nowadays, seems like you can’t log in without half the dang Cabinet sliding classified war plans into your DMs. Yes, in the Turd Reich, OPSEC stands...

Idiot Rapist Continues Ruining Everything
Following the news these days is like watching the shittiest people alive furiously pound away at a Hungry Hungry Hippos board, where the marbles are, like, massive chunks of the federal budget, or our fundamental human rights. Ukrainian oblasts. Hopes for the future....

Orange Man Worse Than Ever
So, the Offal in the Oval wants to send troops to Greenland. I wonder if we shouldn’t let him. Given his recent success rate, we’d wind up a Danish protectorate inside a week. On the other hand, a war of aggression under our current commander in chief runs the risk of...

Sometimes There’s National Decline So Quickly
Man, I definitely needed the annual birthday week detox this year. Good to let the poison drain outta the ol’ noggin from time to time, y’know? Anyway, I couldn’t possibly have missed much, it was just one week. We didn’t join any axes of evil while I was gone, did...

The Rapist Who Would Be King
Golly gee, a lot’s happened since last we met! Yeah, we’re a monarchy now, but also somehow the vassal of a rapidly collapsing petrostate prosecuting an illegal, genocidal war of conquest against a longtime ally. Shit moves pretty quickly these days. Do chainsaws not...

Ew, and Other News
Well, if you’ve come sniffing around this blog hoping for smug, salacious gossip about perverts in high places, I hope you’re ashamed of yourself. In this household, we honor our president’s wishes, especially the ones about ignoring his intimate friendship with the...

Superman vs. MechaHitler, for the Epstein Files, and Other History Lessons You’ll Be Afraid to Teach Your Grandkids
Well, I spent the week curled up snugly within my windmill house writing folk songs. Here’s what I came up with: In MacArthur Park they’re marching in the dark All those creepy ICE guys running ‘round Someone left our rights out in the rain Now that weirdo who bought...

Fragrant Fourth Fuels Fascism Fears
Yyyyeah, the vibes’re pretty strange on this, objectively the least American July 4th celebration to date. And may we never top it. My god, they actually passed the fucking thing. The legislative process has been likened to sausage-making. This one was more like every...

How Hard Can War Be, Really?
I could almost enjoy the news if the bumbling Christopher Guest hucksters weren’t also playing the leads in the Tom Clancy thriller. Pie to the face, steps on a rake, stumbles around blind…it’s all very amusing till he feels his way to the big red launch button. I bet...

Sure, No Kings, But Definitely Not One This Shitty
Lotta big milestones for ascendant American autocracy this week. Uniformed military in the streets, opposition politicians in handcuffs…they grow up so fast, don’t they? Suddenly we’ve got a chubby, fascist toddler running amok, and we never quite got around to...