Well, it’s scary movie season, but the box office is in the crapper, cuz the American people are all, “You think YOU got problems? Fuck you, I’d give my eye teeth* to just be dealing with an icepick-wielding maniac in a plastic mask. Your boy gets nuclear codes, gimmie a fuckin’ call.”

Let’s examine all the mid-week madness, shall we? (Giggles distractedly. Chews fingernails to the nub. Bleeds.)

Bob Corker has had enough, y’all. He’s investing in purple pants and running around Capitol Hill shouting BOB SMASH! He’s talking about how SCROTUS is a lying liar who lies, who’s fuckin’ up the USA’s relationships with the rest of the world, and who wants to grow up to be a DEBASER (De-base-errrrrr)

And then Jeff Flake joined in the fun, giving a rousing speech on the Senate floor that was largely about how shitty the President is but also about how he’s quitting before he can lose the election he was almost certainly going to lose next year.

And so you start to allow yourself a little hope, that the dam has finally broken, and the treasonweasels in the Republican Party might finally, FINALLY be ready to stand up to this jabbering cancer that’s gnawing away at everything that’s good and decent about this country…but then you find out that instead, they gave him a bunch of standing ovations in a party lunch, each taking turns giving him lap dances, and Ted Cruz’ was the best one because Littlefinger made fun of his wife and dad during the whole thing, and he cried a little.

And yeah, they turned right around that night to repeal a rule that allowed us the right to sue financial institutions when they rip us off, because in the end, they are still fucking Republicans, and Republicans gonna Republican, even if they do cross the low moral bar of criticizing an obviously evil, incompetent, under-qualified, idiotic, too-long-tie-wearing, dotard who threatens all life on this planet.

I dunno, folks. Bob Corker is not going to suddenly co-sponsor a single payer bill. John McCain will still try to give the Pentagon all the money in the world, up to and including the tip jar at the coffee shop down the road from the clinic where he gets cancer treatments. Jeff Flake is still going to…well, still going to be a goofy, useless, rank-and-file conservative wanker who’s wrong about more or less everything.

I don’t know how much we can or should expect from these folks, but from my chair, GOP Senators speaking out against the Shart is better than GOP Senators not speaking out against the Shart.  Maybe not a whole lot better, but better.

Anyhow. Some protester pelted President Crotchvoid with Russian flags, which was, I must say, nicely done. I’d have chosen urinal cakes, but Russian flags are fine.

Devin “Pigfucker” Nunes decided to bring the long-since debunked Uranium Deal Controvery back from beyond the grave. It doesn’t matter that it was debunked. As we saw from the heady days (years) of Benghazimania, all the Frothy Rube Army requires is some nebulous, ever-shifting, non-specific target to rage at, and they’ll rage most happily.

Wouldn’t it be nice, folks, if George Orwell were a little less right about human nature?

Shit, Devin won’t even need to pull out of Ma Howry’s Prized Sow to make this work. Couple of press releases about “uncooperative witnesses,” a few segments on Fux n’ Frenz about how the Lamestream Media won’t cover the story…we’ll have morons shootin’ up pizza restaurants again in NO time!

And of course there’s also gonna be a shiny new investigation into everybody’s old favorite, Hillary’s E-mails! Like a fresh-but-faithful new cover of a time-tested classic! That this comes as Republicans seem unwilling to investigate Jar-Jar and Ivanka for…conducting government business over…private e-mail held on a private server is…well, if hypocrisy bothered Republican congressfucks, they’d have all committed ritual suicide years ago.

Ryan Zinke’s been feeling a little neglected, y’all. Everybody’s been paying so much attention to big-league grifters like Steve Mnuchin and Tom Price, he’s jealous he’s not getting the credit he deserves! Cowboy Z can grift too, y’know!

Boy, can he! The Z-man seems to have steered a 300 million dollar contract to a couple of good ol’ boys back home. One day, you’re running a two-man outfit with absolutely zero experience in restoring power in a disaster zone, the next you’re living the high life, paying folks $462 an hour, even threatening to stop working if the local government doesn’t stop criticizing your corruption!

And that the company, Whitefish, is financed by major Trump donors/pals-of-Zinke? Just another coincidence, folks. It’s not as though your executive branch is just one big organized crime ring giddily distributing your tax money amongst their cheap grifter pals or anything.

…wait.

The bipartisan Alexander-Murray ACA stabilization bill got a CBO score that says it’ll cut the deficit by billions without all the pesky murder from the GOP-only versions, but will McConnell and Ryan even allow a vote? Who knows? Especially now that Hatch-Brady popped up with more of that poor-murderin’ action that conservatives love so much.

Shartboy’s ducking out of a major international summit in the Philippines that had been scheduled for his coming Asia trip, because he is too old/fat/tired/stupid/lazy/sharty to actually do his job. DONNIE TWO-SCOOPS HAS GOLF, YOU GUYS. GOLF’S NOT GONNA GOLF ITSELF, Y’KNOW.

…and if nations like China and Russia gleefully step into the void left by our President’s slacker indifference? Fuck you, America. Your President simply does not care.

Speaking of international diplomacy, our new ambassador to Canada has looked at climate science from Both Sides, Now…and finds them more or less equal, which is NOT HOW SCIENCE WORKS, YOU DIZZY TWIT.

Will Justin Trudeau find it insulting that we’ve sent an ambassador that couldn’t pass third grade? Hope not. If he starts takin’ pointers from the North Koreans…we got trouble, friends.

Oh, look at this. Another politically motivated murder by a deranged Drumpf supporter. Actually killed his own dad. Hey, if we’re not too busy leaving refugees to die in war zones in order to placate paranoid dumbasses, maybe we can talk about the rapidly-expanding problem of deranged, radicalized-by-the-right-wing-internet, rage-filled, murderous, shitsack white boys?

See where Precious Paul Manafort is now under investigation by the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office for money laundering? For the kids keeping score at home, that’s a STATE-level charge, so Boss Shart has none of that magic pardoning power, and therefore this particular news surely sent more than a few sets of testicles shrinking into hiding.

…shines a little light on why Don the Con has been personally interviewing U.S. attorney candidates, though.

In a little bit of good news, the Jane Doe in federal immigration detention was granted the right to have the abortion she was always legally entitled to, despite the GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED FUCKING STATES fighting tooth and nail to prevent it. Mike Pence must’ve been too busy to barge into the room and personally tackle the doctor, I guess. Probably masturbating to photographs of aging, unadopted, house pets.

And hey, Kid Rock won’t actually be running for the Senate, that counts as a win, right? Shit, TWO good news stories in one blog post? I may just celebrate with a pouch of freeze-dried chocolate pudding from the fallout shelter I’m building!

Princess Ivanka’s campaigning her ass off for the tax “reform” bill that’ll save her millions, demonstrating more dedication than she’s shown for any other issue that’s grabbed her fancy to date, isn’t that WEIRD?

Meanwhile we learned that the DNC took over bankrolling the opposition research that resulted in the famous Piss Dossier once Republicans gave up and went Full Fascist. This is otherwise known as Politics as Usual, but golly, Smallhands Magoo and his craven media surrogates are celebrating like he cast off this whole Russia thang once and for all.

Heh. Let ’em, says I. Mueller’s still on the job. If the indictments come as a shocking surprise, well…that’s just sprinkles on the cupcake.

In contrast, we learned that the Shart Campaign’s data team at Cambridge Analytica went to Julian Assange for some of those sweet, sweet, hacked Clinton e-mails, which is, y’know, a CRIME. Assange even confirmed it, but I guess the deal fell apart when Cambridge proved incapable of smuggling a hooker carrying nine boxes of Julian’s favorite Little Debbie Snack Cakes into the Ecuadorian embassy where he’s hiding like a coward from rape charges.

Let’s check in on the Perpetual Motion Trumpal Nut-Punching Machine we call “Polling.” Still the least popular president ever? Check. Record low in the Fux Gnuz poll? Check. Underwater in fucking INDIANA? Check. Oh, and the Fux poll had Dems up on the generic congressional ballot…by FIFTEEN points.

The Candycorn Skidmark gave a little impromptu press conference today, talking mostly about great and smart he is (as we all know, the one true hallmark of intelligence is repeated declarations of intelligence. Isaac Newton was notorious for his “Smarter than you, dumbass!” t-shirts.) He shit on Flake a bit, and that one war widow lady, too, and reminded us that his daddy bought him a spot in a fancy college.

He says he has one of the “greatest memories of all time,” which is particularly comical coming from the guy who frequently wanders out of signing ceremonies without remembering to sign the fucking bill they threw the whole fucking ceremony for in the first place.

As questions mount relating to the disastrous terrorist ambush in Niger, your Commander in Chief wants you to know that come hell or high or water…he had nothing whatsoever to do with it. Civilian oversight of the military has been reduced to “I told you, do whatever the fuck you want, CAN’T YOU SEE I’M GOLFING,” heaven help us all.

Ben Carson hasn’t been in the news much lately, but don’t worry, he’s still a huge festering asshole.

ACA premiums are going up, an average of 34% for silver plans, which Baron Golfin von Fatfuk somewhat hilariously imagines he won’t be blamed for.

Hey, the government wants to double the prices to gain entry to a bunch of national parks, isn’t that somethin’? Even the MOTHERFUCKING OUTDOORS is only for rich people now! “Oh, you wanted to partake of our nation’s majestic natural beauty? Well, you shoulda made more $$$$$, you fucking PARASITE! STOP BREATHING MY AIR, TAKER!”

And looka here, the Republican candidate for Virginia governor is closing out the race with an ad supporting…Confederate monuments? And to think, some say the GOP is out of ideas.

And of course, Team Shart STILL refuses to actually implement the Russia sanctions passed into law, because they are in no way beholden to Uncle Vlad or his merry band of oligarch gangsters, WINK WINK.

Before we sign off, don’t miss this NYT piece on General John Kelly…maybe not one of the worst guys, but definitely not one of the good guys.

Since it’s almost Halloween, I suppose I should try to scare you a bit before I go, right? Ok, but fair warning: send the kids out of the room before you click THIS LINK.

*What the fuck are eye teeth? I don’t fuckin’ know. I don’t fuckin’ care. You can have ’em.