It’s all good news today, readers.
Let the celebrating begin tonight and continue all day tomorrow. For all the world, it feels like New Year’s Eve. Can’t you just feel a giant weight being raised from the nation’s collective shoulders?
I started feeling the winds of change this evening as I was reading some of today’s headlines. Consider these stories, for starters…
:: My Pillow chief executive Mike Lindell, a big-time Trump backer and devotee of “the-election-was-stolen” school of thought, said Kohl’s, Bed Bath & Beyond, Wayfair and other retailers were dropping his products. Isn’t it pathetic when a con man can become a celebrity? And, what got into Royals’ announcer Ryan Lefebvre when he agreed to pitch this goofball’s pillows?
:: Georgia election officials certified the victories of Democrats Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock. They will be sworn in tomorrow by Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.
Avril Haines
:: During her Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday, Avril D. Haines, President-elect Joe Biden’s nominee for director of national intelligence, said she would release an unclassified report on the killing of Saudi journalist and Washington Post contributor Jamal Khashoggi. (The Trump administration wouldn’t give it to the Senate.) As a bonus, Haines also condemned waterboarding, saying: “I believe that waterboarding is, in fact, torture…And all those techniques that use cruel and inhuman treatment are unlawful.”
:: Secretary of State nominee Tony Blinken told senators that he would appoint a chief diversity officer to help oversee and insure the State Department had “a workforce that looks like the country it represents.”
:: Alejandro Mayorkas, Biden’s nominee to be Secretary of Homeland Security, told senators: “I can assure you that the cybersecurity of our nation will be one of my highest priorities because…the threat is real and the threat is every day, and we have to do a much better job than we are doing now.”
:: Defense secretary nominee Lloyd J. Austin III said he would act to stamp out extremism in the military. “We can never take our hands off the wheel on this,” he told members of the Senate Armed Services Committee. “It has no place in the military of the United States of America.”
Lloyd J. Austin III
:: Even outgoing Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell got in on the shifting tide, telling senators that “we stood together and said an angry mob would not get veto power over the rule of law in our nation.”
:: After a four-year hiatus, Hollywood stars and noted performers are stepping back under the White House arc lights. Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez and Garth Brooks will perform at the inauguration, and several others, including Tom Hanks, Demi Lovato, Bruce Springsteen and Lin-Manuel Miranda, will appear on a prime-time inaugural special called “Celebrating America.”
:: A tear ran down Biden’s cheek as he prepared to depart his home state of Delaware for Washington. He told supporters, “When I die, Delaware will be written on my heart.”
Of all things, a tear. From an incoming president who has a heart.
I tell you, after a long period of mourning, it’s a great day to be an American!
JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC 
Well stated. Tears welled up during the memorial service for our fellow Americans. I’m tuning in extra early tomorrow.
Once again, Joe Biden plagiarized from a Brit. And remember Muskie? He cried and it cost him the nomination. Which is how when I was a Democrat, I became a McGovern alternate in 1972.
I am sad for you Fitz, to be so cruel to the My Pillow man who turned his life around. Y’all are sore WINNERS!
Never too late to turn back around, Tracy — I mean, become a Democrat again.
Truth again can prevail +The Medal of Freedom will again be awarded to the worthy.
The My Pillow guy is about to go through a lot of things. It looks like Dominion Voting Systems will be suing him for massive damages. He is going to be investigated for sedition against the United States. A paragraph take down of him on this blog is the very least of troubles.
That several of the current Republican members of the House of Representatives were looking for a pardon from Trump related to actions on January 6th shows they know they are in big time legal jeopardy. As I wrote here 10 days or so ago, the events on the 6th are going to look worse as more comes out. There are going to be a lot of people in the Trump circle involved and they will likely be going to jail for a long time to come.
For all of Trump’s supporters who thought Trump would pardon them for their actions on January 6th, they found out that the rule of Trump is loyalty only goes one way – to Trump. People like Jenna, the Texas realtor who flew to DC on a private plane, who have shown no remorse, and claim to be being persecuted, are going to find out what it is like to be prosecuted. They’ve destroyed their lives for a man who cares nothing about them.
And Trump pardoning Steve Bannon who conned Trump supporters out of their money for a border wall project, what a perfect end to the thinking that Trump cares about them or what they think.
You’re talking, Bill, about Jenna Ryan, whose name I hadn’t heard until now. What a piece of work. Before entering the Capitol that fateful day, she posted a now-deleted Facebook video, on which she said: “We are going to fucking to in here.” Then, just before entering the building, she said, “Y’all know who to hire for your realtor – Jenna Ryan for your realtor.”
Pretty soon, she could be making her real estate pitch to fellow inmates.
Fitz, it’s not too late for you to return to the principles of Christ and Abraham Lincoln: “With malice against none and charity toward all…”
You fell off the path when you attacked Virginia and Tim Coppinger, taunting and accusing them for the mistakes of their son, Stevie. Despite the fact that you partied in the Coppinger’s home for YEARS on St. Patrick’s Day. Somehow, since you retired from the STAR, you have reinvented yourself as the Chief Accuser and Scolder and Judge.
Come on, man!
–Joe Biden
Today is a new beginning to unify the country.
Virginia Coppinger is a saint…Son Tim? Nah, although I hope he’s trying to redeem himself.
And speaking of redemption, I’m starting to feel a little bad about taking the tip of the poison pen to Mike Lindell. After your first comment, I went to Wiki and saw that he had beaten an addiction to cocaine, crack cocaine and alcohol.
Good for him…I fear, though, that his walk on the wild side left him a bit brain addled. How else could you explain his theory that a plant extract called oleandrin cures COVID-19?
As the late, great R.J. Roper Jr. once said of a guy who was talking nonsense in The New Stanley bar one night: “He should put on a nice pair of glasses and keep his mouth shut.”
Re: Lindell. Not a tale of redemption, just a grift shift.
Great day. Very excited to have Joe and Kamala’s strong leadership team they are assembling – true public servants. So nice to not have to wake up anymore to daily vile twitter storms from someone who spent most of his time watching TV…..
A county Democratic chairman from PA was quoted in The Times today as saying of Trump: “It was like, like a car horn. You’re having dinner, you know, and initially, the car horn doesn’t bother you. But after about an hour, you’re looking around: ‘Will someone shut that car horn off?!’ “