Fuck Kansas--this is Nazi Germany level evil

It seems all Kansas-issued trans drivers' licenses are invalid, effective tomorrow It is now illegal for trans people to drive a car until they surrender their license at a DMV (that most will need to drive to) and have it reissued with the wrong gender marker This was never about woman's sports

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— Laura Jedeed (@laurajedeed.bsky.social) February 25, 2026 at 8:43 PM

Fuck Donald Trump

Peace,

emaycee

 

This is what the GOP will do to America

Police stage 'chilling' raid on Marion County newspaper, seizing computers, records and cellphones - Kansas Reflector

This happened in a Red State Kansas and a Republican district. So much for conservative calls to protect 1st Amendment rights. https://t.co/0LANG2pNsT

— Alexander S. Vindman ❎ (@AVindman) August 12, 2023

Republicans = Nazis

Peace,

emaycee

 

The real pedophile party

BREAKING: Kansas Republicans have successfully overridden the Governor veto to now authorize genital inspections of children in order for kids to play sports. A very dark & disturbing day.#ksleg

— Davis Hammet (@Davis_Hammet) April 5, 2023

Republicans = Nazis

Peace,

emaycee

 

 

The moron platform

This is a really solid midterm strategy for the GOP. They should definitely keep this up. https://t.co/2xwSTLkYqk

— Angry Staffer 🌻 (@Angry_Staffer) September 29, 2022

Republican = Traitor

Peace,

emaycee

 

Republicans fucked around and in November women are going to make them find out

 

Republican = Traitor

Har-de-har-har-har

All the conservatives who insisted they merely wanted to return the issue to the states will surely be good sports about this. https://t.co/b1YWYhh8xL

— Brian Beutler (@brianbeutler) August 3, 2022

They may just have fucked the unfuckable

I continue to believe that overturning Roe was an enormous miscalculation on the part of Republicans https://t.co/2WdXYYGK9s

— Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) August 3, 2022

Republican = Traitor

Peace,

emaycee

 

Good news for this November?

Redistricting this week:
-GOP lost in Wisconsin Supreme Court.
-GOP lost in Kansas Supreme Court.
-GOP lost in Michigan federal court.
-GOP is in disarray in Florida.

Redistricting is on the docket.https://t.co/brAFaAfqXs

— Marc E. Elias (@marceelias) March 5, 2022

Republican = Traitor

Peace,

emaycee

 

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. CCCXI--Clocks: She Looks a Lot Like You

 This week we have another tune discovered during the early days of my first marriage, when my ex-wife and I used to listen to free singles from CBS for an evening's entertainment because we were too poor to afford actually going out....

Clocks is one of the few bands featured here on Friday Night Jukebox to not have a Wikipedia entry, and as such, here is what I learned about them:  they're the greatest (only?) band to come out of Wichita, Kansas, and they released two albums.  Their first album debuted in 1982, and oddly enough, twenty-two years later Zip Records decided to give them another shot at fame and fortune, and they were no more successful than they had been after their first album.  That's it--but it's proof positive you don't have to be the Beatles to get your moment in the sun here on FNJ.

"She Looks a Lot Like You" was the first single released on their first album, entitled appropriately enough, Clocks.  Near as I can tell, neither the single nor the album reached the Billboard charts, though the single did garner a bit of airplay on MTV  when the station was still musically relevant.

"She Looks a Lot Like You" tells the tale (I think) of a man who while looking at a magazine cover sees something in the woman featured that reminds him of his absent or deserted lover, not all that odd of a happening when the heart is aching.  The Clocks play a mean power pop, with the odd synthesizer thrown in, and with just a hint of the new wave sound that had its heyday in the early to mid-eighties.  They make great use of the requisite three guitar chords, have a simple but catchy repeated chorus (basically the song's title is the chorus), and the lead singer sings it with just enough ooomph to make for a nice little hit.  I actually find it kind of surprising that the Clocks didn't get another shot at making a new record for twenty-two years--there have been plenty of artists to get two or three albums out of a shitty song, let alone a bitchin' bit of power pop.  So the boys from Wichita will have to settle for a guest appearance on Friday Night Jukebox, and my undying thanks for another piece of pop magic to add to its ranks.

Lyric Sheet:  "I don't know if I should feel the way I do/What else could I do?/I had her and not you/She looks a lot like you..."

Enjoy:

324,000+ Dead Americans Because of Donald Trump's Incompetence

Biden:  306 EV's, Trump:  232

emaycee

Holy cow, another moral victory

No, it's off to Georgia now...

I don't want to take anything away from what Democrat James Thompson did in Kansas-04 yesterday--Trump won this heavily red district by 27 points and the previous Congressional Rep, Mike Pompeo, won it three straight times by just north of thirty points, so for Thompson to lose to republican Ron Estes by only 7 points says volumes.

And it may very well be that Markos Moulitsas is right and if we can continue this trend of gaining twenty points in each district it will put 123 districts into play and give us a superb chance to take the House back in 2018.

But, boy, wouldn't it be nice to win one of these for once?  For the sake of Democratic morale?  And how about getting an extra Democratic vote in the House?

I'd be willing to wager that republicans don't give a rat's ass if they won by 7 or by 30--they're just happy they'll have another reliably red vote for all the bullshit legislation they can't pass.

Maybe I'm just getting old, but moral victories really just don't cut it anymore, especially in the age of Donald Trump.

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. LXXXII--Freedy Johnston: Bad Reputation

We have another Jukebox first this week--the first time a week's featured artist has done a (killer) cover version of the preceding week's tune.  That's right--Freedy Johnston did an "It's The Shit" rendition of "Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)."

Anyhoo, the best praise I can give to this week's tune is that as I was listening to "Bad Reputation" earlier this week in preparation for this post about halfway through I literally said aloud, "Jesus Christ this is a great fucking song."

Not quite the gravitas of "Ode on a Grecian Urn" but here in 2016 U.S.A., about as good of an exaltation as you'll get.

Freedy (a nickname of his mother for him) Johnston was born Frederic John Fatzer in the swarming metropolis of Kinsley, Kansas (pop. 1658 as of 2009).  At the age of 16 he bought his first guitar via mail order; at the age of 24 he moved to New York City to become a star.  While he never quite became the next Bob Dylan, he began recording albums in 1989 and has been at it ever since.  Johnston is known as a "songwriter's songwriter" (maybe someday when I get big somebody will refer to me as a "blogger's blogger") and was voted songwriter of the year in 1994 by Rolling Stone.  Not a bad resume for a guy who probably truly knows the meaning of "...we're not in Kansas, anymore...."

Released in 1994 on his This Perfect World LP, "Bad Reputation" is Johnston's best known song, reaching #54 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100.  It's the love song of a troubled man, warning a woman that though he's trying he probably won't be the man she deserves--though she already knows this.  Still he sees her face everywhere and can't get her out of his mind.

"Bad Reputation" is a song of wonderful moments, the first of which is the opening (which for whatever reason, reminds me of The Temptations "Ain't Too Proud to Beg") which starts like a million other ballads only to break, out of nowhere, into one of the catchiest choruses you'll ever hear.  Another is Johnston's use of repetitive words ("and it isn't just talk, talk, talk" or "just wasting your time, time, time").   And still another is when toward the end of the song the instrumentation cuts and leaves a stanza just to Johnston, his guitar and his vocals.  In the end, though, it's (as is often the case) Johnston's vocals which seal the deal.  He strikes just the right balance between sorrow and regret without ever becoming maudlin.  And "Bad Reputation" is another in a long line of fine additions to Friday Night Jukebox.

Liner notes:  "Suddenly I'm on the street/Seven years disappear below my feet..."

Enjoy:

Bonus Video (because you can't--well I can't anyway--get enough of "Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes")):

Peace,
emaycee

Not buying it

The half-wit republicans that make up the Kansas legislature, in partnership with their dunce of a governor, Sam Brownback, passed a law last week that forbids recipients of welfare and food stamps from using their government assistance to buy, among many other things, concert tickets, tattoos, movie tickets, lottery tickets, and visiting swimming pools.  In republican bizarro world, punishing the poor will lift them off government assistance, rather than, oh, say, good jobs with good wages.

Though a good case could be made for allowing those in need to buy lottery tickets which have an exponentially better chance of improving their lives economically than republican policies (see also, Bush, George W.), what this proves is that republicans continue to have absolutely no fucking idea what it's like to be poor.  Do they really believe with the piddling amount of money these folks get every month they're really going to risk their families' rent payments or their electric bills on a trip to Disneyland?  They're poor, not stupid.

I work for a grocery chain in an impoverished section of Detroit.  Some days, we do 70% of our business in food stamps, and contrary to what some republicans think, they are not buying lobster and foie de gras.  Their SNAP cards get filled once a month and they are buying five packages of the chicken breasts we have at $1.49 a pound.  They're buying two bags of the Malt o'Meal equivalent of Froot Loops for $1.99 because it will last a lot longer than one box of the actual Froot Loops.  They're buying three packs of hot dogs for .99 each.  They're being frugal because the food they're buying today has to last the entire month.

Just because poor folks don't spend as lavishly doesn't mean they don't love and want to take care of their families any less than those people who are a lot better off financially.

Peace,
emaycee

Morans

Kansas republicans last week passed legislation to shore up their budget shortfall--caused by tax cuts for the wealthy--with tax increases that will primarily affect the poor and working class.

You have to be some kind of serious stupid to vote for republicans if you're poor or middle class knowing full well that they are more than happy to give your money to people who are a whole hell of a lot richer than you are.

Peace,
emaycee