Four For the Fourth 2019 Phase One In Which trump Gets His Oafs

There's not much about this year's 4th of July being a happy one. Balloon Juice via Anne Laurie has its own nice roundup of how bad a clusterfuck trump's hijacking of the DC celebrations will turn out to be - and for once I am happily calling for bad weather in the Virginia-Maryland region for every hour between 11AM to 10PM today - but all in all this is going to be the most dour Independence Day I've endured in a long time.

Laurie links to Esquire's Charlie Pierce, who deserves a few quotes here about how bad this Fourth can get:

Oh, and in case you thought the sheer grift had been neglected, fear not. This is a taxpayer-funded, self-promoting campaign wankfest, just like all of those that get him so turgid out in airplane hangars and vacant arenas across this great republic...  At this point, I'm amazed he hasn't demanded that they float the Nimitz up the Potomac...

Because this is a celebration of all Americans, and not a political event at all, the tickets are being handed out by the Republican National Committee. Some of the president*'s loudest and proudest supporters are planning a real hootenanny for themselves; after all, yelling at detained and destitute migrants through a cyclone fence can only go so far as a demonstration of your commitment to the country's founding values. This thing has the potential to be the biggest, chewiest cluster of fck in Washington since the last time Louie Gohmert dined alone. And an infinitely more perilous one.

This is out-and-out banana republic authoritarian performance art. That it also is obviously a multimillion-dollar exercise in low comedy is sadly beside the point. It should be mocked, relentlessly and everywhere, by every American who still has a sense of dignity and a vague memory of what an actual celebration of patriotism feels like...

There are separate reports that the turnout even among the Republican elites will be minor: Most elected officials had already left for the long holidays last week and had previous plans for their 4ths. Even with good weather, trump's handlers are fearing a meager turnout - most of the people who attend the usual fireworks are locals, and the locals in DC have already proven they do not love trump - and that he'll have a dangerous reaction if this show of his gets bad attendance figures (how many Press Secretaries are gonna lie for his ass after this one?).

I've said it before. The best way to handle trump's Tribute to His Own Pasty Orange Ass is to ignore it (but dammit, we need to keep our ears open if he tries to pull any shit on us).

Better off spending this day with friends. Taking a baked bean casserole for my friends' house party tonight. Salut.