I mean, maybe it was just a typical Saturday afternoon at the Dairy Queen.  But this past Saturday, police were called to the Dairy Queen in Delmont, Pennsylvania about 20 miles east of Pittsburgh, because a man wearing a rainbow clown wig and a safety vest was waving a gun, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports.

The man, 61-year-old Jan V. Stawovy was armed with a handgun as he entered the restaurant, waving it carelessly.  Police later found two loaded handguns and an additional 62 rounds of ammunition in the man’s car.  Police arrived on the scene and were able to disarm the man and take him into custody.

Stawovy told investigators he needed the guns to protect himself because he was going to kill “Democrat and liberals” so he could “restore Trump to President king of the United States.” 

A solid backer of reproductive rights, the state of California has launched a website listing abortion providers in the state and providing users with other resources if pregnant patients want to travel to the state, the Associated Press reports.

Under the leadership of Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom, the state passed a $200 million spending bill to ensure patients will have access to reproductive health services in the state.  Of that, one million dollars was assigned to developing a website to provide access to providers and other available services.

Part of the website informs users about laws in California which make abortion access easier for teens, such as no mandatory parental notice.  Other sections provide links to organizations that can help patients who need to travel to California, with some providing housing and others funding travel to the state.

Tom Klingenstein, the president of the ultraright-wing Claremont Institute, explains how all of the problems Trump caused for himself are actually a liberal version of the childish “own the libs” strategy of the policyless conservatives:

Part of the rationale for the raid was to incite the Right, right? The Left–what I’m calling the WokeComs–are looking for reasons to oppress, particularly white males. Right.  The whole argument is, America is systemically racist, about to be overrun by white supremacists.  And if the Right were to take to the streets, that would help confirm the WokeCom narrative.  I don’t think we’re there yet, but I think, y’know, we’re getting closer.

“MINUTE ORDER denying Defendant ELMER STEWART RHODES III’s (1) [3091 Motion to Continue Trial and for Appointment of Special Master to Administer Digital Discovery and [307] Motion to Sever Case from Codefendants or, in the Alternative, to Place Defendant Rhodes in the November Trial Group. Both of Defendant Rhodes’s motions are denied. The court will place its reasons for the denials on the record at the pretrial conference scheduled for September 14, 2022” says the Tuesday order from DC Circuit Judge Amit Mehta, who by now is really sick of Rhodes’s bullshit.

The West Virginia Senate on Tuesday passed a near-complete ban on abortions after eight weeks, giving that long to victims of rape or incest to prove they are victims of a crime in order to obtain an exemption, West Virginia News reports.

Pregnant patients who have a non-medically viable fetus, ectopic pregnancy or medical emergencies can also get an abortino in that period if it is in the “reasonable judgement of a licensed medical professional” that carrying the pregnancy would threaten the life of the patient.

Adults who are the victims of rape or incest can get an abortion up to eight weeks of gestation, according to the proposed law, which will likely be signed by Republican West Virginia governor, the inappropriately named former mining barron,  Jim Justice.

Arguing in a motion in support of their request for a partial stay of Judge Aileen Cannon’s special master ruling in favor of her client, disgraced former President Trump, federal prosecutors pointed out that, despite all their bullshit stories outside the court, Team Orange’s lawyers have not actually asserted that the fat bastard ever declassified the documents that he stole before leaving office or declared them to be the kind of personal records that would necessitate a special master review.

“Plaintiff does not actually assert – much less provide any evidence – that any of the seized records bearing classification markings have been declassified. More importantly, the issues Plaintiff attempts to raise are ultimately irrelevant. Even if Plaintiff had declassified these records, and even if he somehow had categorized them as his ‘personal’ records for purposes of the PRA – neither of which has been shown – nothing in the PRA or any other source of law establishes a plausible claim of privilege or any other justification for an injunction restricting the government’s review and use of records at the center of an ongoing criminal and national security investigation,” DOJ lawyers wrote, probably giving Cannon an ulcer thinking about how to bullshit her way around this one.

It’s probably easier for the Trump lawyers though. They can probably just lie to the judge and not face any consequences or better yet simply not respond at all because it’s not like the fanboys care about why the MAGA Reich would say one thing on Fox News but not in court.

As Russians desperately run away from their positions in Ukraine in the last week like they’re Josh Hawley fleeing the violent mob he stoked, the Ukrainian military has collected more than 200 operational tanks and other armored vehicles the Russians have abandoned on the battlefield, Foreign Policy reports.

As they continue an offensive to retake ground in the Kharkiv Oblast that has liberated more land than the Russians have taken since April, the Ukrainians have also captured working armored vehicles from amphibious troop carriers to scores of tanks.  The equipment is being examined and refurbished so it can go back to the front lines–this time with Ukrainians at the controls.

“They just left their tanks, artillery, special equipment, a lot of armor, and were just trying to save their lives,” a Ukrainian military official told Foreign Policy.  “They will be used against Russia. … “The U.S. didn’t start their Lend-Lease program, but instead of the U.S., the Russian government started a Lend-Lease program for Ukrainian forces.”

Former President Bill Clinton is alive and well Tuesday while his 90s-era nemesis, prosecutor Ken Starr, is dead at 76 following complications from surgery (or maybe “Arkancide”), CNBC reports.

“Re-truth” appearing a little ways down the feed of the disgraced former president on his failing social media network. Yet again we have to point out that to our knowledge Trump has never openly spoken out against pedophilia and sex trafficking, nor does he appear to be funding any charitable efforts to help combat it and/or aid the victims. He just likes the Q bullshit.

The Kremlin have spent more than $300 million on meddling in foreign elections – the United States included – since 2014, according to a CNN report on an assessment by the Biden Administration.

“In its review, the IC found that Russia has covertly transferred over $300 million dollars, and planned to covertly transfer at least hundreds of millions more to foreign political parties, officials and politicians in more than two dozen countries and across four continents in this period,” an administration official told CNN, adding that “Russia likely has transferred additional funds covertly in cases that have gone undetected,” and they’re “trying to advantage specific political parties and undermine democracy in all of these countries. Our view is one of the most effective ways to counter Russian covert influence is to expose it,” even though MAGA assholes refuse to believe it.

The screaming, squealing reaction to every such report like this from fanboys only underscores how critical Russian meddling is to helping out right wing candidates. Even though Republican politicians themselves have acknowledged Russian efforts to interfere in American elections – not to mention disgraced former President Trump’s open embrace of it in 2019 – the MAGA hatters still live in a fantasy world where Russia has nothing to gain by spreading propaganda designed to exploit and exacerbate racial and political strife inside the United States and other Western nations.

The abortion ban proposed by Republican South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, in a crass attempt to soften some of the damage of the GOP’s temporarily successful quest to overturn an individual’s right to choose their reproductive medical care, contains some items that befuddle logic, let alone the science of biology.

The 27-page bit of legislation, which Graham dubbed the “Protecting Pain-Capable Unborn Children from Late-Term Abortions Act,” repeats some frequently used scientifically dubious “facts” as part of its background information–from repeatedly using the term “unborn baby” to refer to a fetus, to claiming that at fetuses can feel “pain” as early as seven weeks gestation.

But the most heinous parts of the bill are not the misstatements of science–which, frankly, have become a cornerstone of all GOP legislation.  Instead, it’s how Graham wants pregnant patients, doctors and law enforcement to handle issues regarding pregnancy.

FBI agents on Tuesday cuffed Rensselaer County, New York Board of Elections Commissioner Jason Schofield on a federal indictment over his involvement in an absentee ballot scam to help a GOP incumbent in a 2021 Troy, New York city council election, the Times-Union reports.

The Republican former councilwoman, Kimberly Ashe-McPherson, pleaded guilty to a felony in June and admitted she had submitted fraudulent absentee ballots in the election. As part of her plea agreement, Ashe-McPherson was required to cooperate with federal prosecutors in bringing Schofield and others to justice for helping her obtain the ballots. Let the squeals of anger and whataboutery from the MAGA assholes obsessed with “election integrity” commence.

Seriously. What the fuck is this guy thinking, putting a 15 week national abortion ban to a vote less than two months before the midterms? He won’t even give a straight answer as to whether he spoke with Moscow Mitch about it before he went in front of the media on Tuesday.

Seeing the massive backlash the GOP has seen in public opinion and the ballot box for its joyous embrace of the unethically conservative-packed Supreme Court’s revocation of the right to bodily autonomy, South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham has introduced a bill in the Senate that ban abortion after 15 weeks of gestation, the New York Times reports.

Weeks after Republicans took to the airwaves to gleefully celebrate the Dobbs decision ending the federal right to an abortion, the GOP is now experiencing nationwide angst in a “dog caught car” moment:  voters have overwhelming rejected anti-choice legislation, which is not surprising given that prior to the SCOTUS decision, two-thirds of Americans supported some type of access to abortion.

For decades, Republicans ran loudly on repealing the Roe decision, but Graham believes that a 15-week ban would appeal to those hypocrites who want to stay in office but yet feel no backlash from angry voters.  The position will be difficult for many Congressional Republicans to adopt given their vociferous demonization of women who seek abortions, people who are pro-choice and doctors who perform the medical procedure that is often needed to save the life of the pregnant patient.

One of the five plaintiff’s in Laura Loomer’s election fraud lawsuit claiming she actually won the election but was cheated–she lost the Republican primary for Florida’s 11th Congressional District to incumbent Daniel Webster by more than 5,000 votes–has demanded her name be taken off the complaint, saying she never agreed to be one of the plaintiffs, the Daily Beast reports.

Theresa Rinaldi, an Orange County Republican who admitted to voting for Loomer, said she was approached to discuss her voting experience with conservative serial litigator John Pierce, a loudmouth right-wing attorney who is best known for a stable of clients who attacked Congress on January 6th.  (Pierce’s representation of these clients has been spotty, with Pierce disappearing for two weeks and then claiming he was first incapacitated by Covid and then by being hit by a car while crossing the street.)

Rinaldi said she had a phone conversation with Pierce in which he spoke quickly and would not explain his legal case to Rinaldi.  Rinaldi believed that she was just giving Pierce an account of her experience and beliefs, but she was shocked when she read a news report on Friday listing her as one of the defendants. 

A Republican judge in Missouri has refused to order the closure of a privately run boarding school in Stockton despite entreaties from local and state officials investigating multiple complaints of abuse, the Kansas City Star reports, siding with a defense attorney who claimed scheduled victim testimony was for the benefit of the media, not the pursuit of justice.

On Monday, Judge David Munton of Missouri’s 28th Circuit Court tutted down concerns by the Missouri Attorney General’s Office and the Missouri Department of Social Services, both of which have pushed to close Agape Boarding School, a school with around 60 male residential students that bills itself as a “Christian Boarding School That Turns Around Rebellious Boys.”

Munton halted all proceedings yesterday, including the testimony of two former students who were prepared to provide traumatic accounts of the abuse they experienced at the hands of staff at the boarding school.  The government has argued that students still at the school are at risk of continuing threats to their health and safety. 

Some bloody bogan living in the bush far out southeast of Perth was keepin a wild kango in a cage on his property and the fuckin cunt done kicked him to death, the Associated Press reports. The jacks come and they’d no choice, they had to blast the kango since it developed what them animal experts and croc huntas call a “predatory instinct” towards bogans who ain’t too sharp.

They’s a lot of bogans like that out in the bush. Most of em bout as sharp as a kolly’s ears. Bloody wankers got to worry about crocs and dingos enough, the last thing they need is fuckin killeh kangos stompin on them for they jollys on a Saturday night. Hell of a unique situation, the first time a bogan got killed by a kanga since back in 1936. Imagine he feelin a little sheepie when Saint Peter askin him how’e ended up with a fuckin kango claw marks right down’is guts. Bet Saint Pete got a good chuckle from that and from the kango with a bullet in his kisser.

US Marshals enforcing a federal warrant shot a killed an alleged fugitive last month seconds after the man and other pallbearers loaded his father’s casket into a hearse to take it to a cemetery from the funeral home, the Washington Post reports.

Jason Arnie Owens was turning to embrace another mourner when a team of marshals approached the group and called Owens’ name.  Witnesses say Owens turned toward the men when they opened fire, killing him and spraying his blood on his 18-year-old son who was standing nearby.

“They yelled Jason’s name. They just said ‘Jason’ and then started firing,” family friend Cassandra Whitecotton said. “There was no identifications they were U.S. Marshals — anything. They did not render this man any aid at all. Never once they touched him to render any aid whatsoever.”

The inflation in the United States stayed relatively flat month over month, with the inflation rate compared to the previous year slowing from its peak in June, the Associated Press reports.

Consumer prices were up 8.5% in August compared to a year ago, an increase of just 0.1% month-over-month, with the core prices increasing 0.6% when volatile food and fuel prices are removed from the calculation.  Year-over-year, core prices increased 6.3%, driving largely by increases in rents, medical care services and new cars.  Food prices have increased 13.5% year over year, the biggest 12-month increase since 1979.

Though inflation appears to have peaked, economists predict it will take at least two years before the inflation rate drops to around 2%.

Right wing hell witch Giorgia Meloni is now a favorite to become Prime Minister in Italy, the Washington Post reports. Shocker: she uses the words “woke” and “cancel culture” a lot.