Police on Hawaii’s Big Island are investigating whether a 20 year-old Romanian man who on Monday emerged from a swim in the waters off Anaeho’omalu Bay in Waikoloa with bloody lacerations to his foot consistent with teeth marks was bitten by a shark, MauiNow.com reports.

It’s not clear why “consistent with” a shark bite isn’t enough to just say a shark bit the poor bastard since the available circumstantial evidence strongly indicates it was a shark. Unless they’re prepared to reveal knowledge of the existence of some kind of new form of predatory sea life previously unknown to the public they should just go ahead and blame a shark. Like what else is there to this “investigation” if the cops aren’t also considering that a radioactive bear with a mutated ability to breathe underwater found its way from Siberia to Hawaii? And if and when they find the shark and its teeth marks match perfectly to the bite are they going to say it “allegedly” bit the guy?

If we had to guess we would say this is Jesus Dork’s mini-“damage control” or “walkback” from a Tuesday night CNN bit in which he said all the MAGAverse’s accusations that Biden will be cocaine, Adderall, bath salts, or some kind of secret experimental super serum were “said in jest” and now Johnson has to at least nod at the whole narrative with “a gallon of energy drinks.”

The US Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled 6-3 that MAGA states lack standing to sue the federal government over COVID “censorship” on social media. Alito, Gorsuch, and Thomas dissented.

Verbatim from CNN’s Wednesday morning article hyping their big debate and on the Trump Campaign’s efforts to coax their Dear Leader into at least trying to act like an adult: “Sources close to the former president say that while Trump is aware of the gravity of Thursday’s debate and the importance of hammering a message, they acknowledged his propensity to veer into lengthy, off topic rants that leaves the possibility they may have fallout to manage come Friday morning.”

The reporting also details the convicted felon’s team are starting to come to terms with the idea that the lack of a live audience and automatic muting that they were pissed he got cornered into accepting might actually be helpful with getting him to stay “policy-based.” One “Trump ally” tells CNN “The moment Biden said to him ‘shut up man’ [during the 2020 debate], I knew we’d lose the election,” adding that the muted mics could ending up helping save Donald from himself.

The Orange Tyrant’s minions put the pedal to the metal over the last week on their contradictory Joe’s on drugs, the debate is rigged, it’ll be 3-on-1, he was actually pretty good against Paul Ryan in 2012, blah blah blah messaging after having learned the president was spending the week at Camp David prepping for the showdown, with CNN describing it as “a realization that one Trump adviser described as a turning point in their plans to try and raise the bar for how Biden may perform.”

“EVAN GERSHKOVICH, the young Wall Street Journal reporter who is being harshly detained in Russia as his ESPIONAGE TRIAL is about to begin, will be released prior to my taking office if I WIN the Election on NOVEMBER 5th. Crooked Joe can’t do anything right, although it is likely that he will pay $BILLIONS, which continues a very bad ‘Biden Precedent,’ to get Evan home. I got a record 58 hostages brought home, paying next to nothing. Putin has no respect for Biden – and that’s the way it goes!!! Fear not, Evan, I will get you home soon, and you will be safe while there!!!” posted convicted felon former President Trump on Wednesday, again revealing he’s been communicating with the Kremlin and prolonging Gershkovich’s ordeal for his own political gain.

Convicted felon former President Trump’s campaign legal team on Tuesday sent a cease and desist to the Pennsylvania Values PAC demanding they take down an ad accurately quoting the fat orange fuck in his years-long crusade against mail-in voting, something Team Trump have tried to reverse on knowing that it cost them at least a few winnable elections since 2020, NBC News reports.

“We are aware of your advertisement falsely claiming that President Trump has asked Pennsylvania voters not to vote by mail. This advertisement may constitute both a criminal and civil conspiracy to injure the rights of President Trump’s supporters to cast their ballots in Pennsylvania. Cease and desist broadcasting, or otherwise distributing via the internet or elsewhere, this false advertisement immediately and preserve all relevant documents in anticipation of likely litigation,” some shitbag Trump campaign lawyer wrote in the letter, which also mentioned the Ku Klux Klan Act as a potential criminal liability for the PAC. Sounds like they’re “over the target” as the fanboys say.

Jesus Dork Speaker Mike Johnson and his minions on the leadership team announced Wednesday that “The Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group voted 3-2 to file a brief with the DC Circuit in the case against Steve Bannon. The amicus brief will be submitted after Bannon files a petition for rehearing en banc and will be in support of neither party. It will withdraw certain arguments made by the House earlier in the litigation about the organization of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the US Capitol during the prior Congress. House Republican Leadership continues to believe Speaker Pelosi abused her authority when organizing the Select Committee.”

The shorter version, per Politico’s Kyle Cheney, is that Bannon will all but certainly already be two weeks into his stay at the big hotel by the time the House GOP can file their brief to Los Supremos, something that was supposed to be banged out by this morning as reported Tuesday night.

During her Tuesday night CO-4 GOP primary victory party – accurate because she successfully pulled off the switch into the safer seat – far right Colorado Congresswoman Lauren Boebert admitted the chintzy gold sneakers she was wearing were not in fact convicted felon former President Trump’s $399 super-limited edition “Never Surrender High-Tops” that sold out quickly earlier this year, but a Chinese knock-off that sells for $99 at “Sporty Slip Ons,” Westword reports.

“These are very China, but I’m ok with that,” Boebert told a Westword reporter. “If I could’ve bought the OGs I would have.” The “Sporty Slip Ons” version of the gold Trump sneaker made the rounds on Twitter a few months ago when some libs mistakenly believed too quickly they were the fat fuck’s official brand. Maybe it was an understandable-ish error at first glance given that the page touts them as “Never Surrender Sneakers” and lists the price as “$399.99 $99.99,” clearly intended to sucker fanboys (and fangirls) into buying some piece of shit that cost a no doubt tiny fraction of that to manufacture, scamming those already scammed into wanting fucking Trump sneakers.

Too bad Boebert didn’t try to lie her way out of it. Would’ve been funnier to see a whole stupid mini-scandal spring from this. Maybe Trump’s campaign will send her a cease and desist warning.

Other Trump ballsucker Congressman Troy Nehls was spotted by Semafor’s Kadia Goba wearing either the genuine article or a more convincing knockoff outside the Capitol on Tuesday.

In a not-terribly unexpected but no doubt welcome move, “RINO” former Illinois Congressman Adam Kinzinger on Wednesday officially endorsed President Joe Biden for reelection, the AP reports.

“While I certainly don’t agree with President Biden on everything, and I never thought I’d be endorsing a Democrat for president, I know that he will always protect the very thing that makes America the best country in the world: our democracy,” Kinzinger said in a video, adding that Trump would “hurt anyone or anything in pursuit of power.” The AP notes that the support appears to be timed to hand Biden some ammo in Thursday night’s debate (where he will also be hopped up on Mountain Dew) and reach to moderate Republicans and indies sick of the MAGA bullshit.

“Crooked Joe Biden’s ‘Handlers’ are loudly and profusely complaining that there will be no Fact Checkers during the Debate on Thursday. Actually, that is just DISINFORMATION – They could not be happier, because there is nobody that’s as loose with the TRUTH as Crooked Joe. From the 51 Fake Intelligence Agents, to Russia, Russia, Russia, to the Fake ‘Suckers and Losers Story’ he created about our beloved Military, to cheating in College and saying he was first in his Law School Class when he was actually LAST, to claiming he marched for Civil Rights, drove trucks, and has a 6.2 Handicap (He can’t hit the Golf Ball 10 yards, but that’s a minor detail!), and so many more falsehoods, the man is a walking LYING MACHINE, and a Fact Checker’s DREAM. Maybe we should call him ‘Lyin’ Joe’ in addition to Crooked?” posted convicted felon former President Trump on Wednesday morning, worried he’s going to appear dishonest during Thursday’s CNN debate.

For some reason, the Federal Elections Committee granted convicted fraudster and presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump a second 45-day extension to file his personal financial disclosures, Reuters reports.  This is part of Trump’s playbook:  delay disclosing anything.  Trump now has more reasons to delay public disclosure given he’s involved in multiple lawsuits involving his personal and corporate taxes.

It’s not the first time Trump has requested an extension, but it’s unlikely Trump will get a third extension:  after he had already gotten a 90-day extension for his first quarter statement, Trump requested an additional 30-day delay in March 2023.  The FEC denied the third request.

Trent Scaggs, the Trump-endorsed Republican mayor of Riverton, Utah running to replace the retiring Mitt Romney in the Senate, lost the primary to the more moderate John Curtis, the Washington Post reports.  In a state that sent both Romney and far-right pro-Trump radical Mike Lee to the Senate, the race was a measure for Trump’s influence with moderate Republicans, and Trump lost.

After one of her traditional rants about how everything is biased against Donald Trump (including, apparently, the evidence in all the cases), Trump spokeslawyer Alina Habba proposes that Hunter Biden was convicted in a trial rigged against the defendant to make things seem balanced, an argument Senator Bob Menendez and Congresswoman Cori Bush would oppose. 

Republican voters in South Carolina’s 3rd District on Tuesday rejected Trump-endorsed MAGAchurch Pastor Mark Burns – seen above at a December 12, 2020 Stop the Steal rally in DC – as their candidate in a runoff to replace some dipshit incumbent GOP Congressman who’s retiring, instead going with a white woman named Sheri Biggs who probably sucks too but differently.

Burns had in 2022 called for Lindsey Graham – who once held that very same 3rd District seat while in the House – and Mitch McConnell to be executed (The headline of the Newsweek story says “Pro-Trump Pastor Wants LGBTQ ‘Indoctrinators’ Executed for Treason” but Burns wanted Lindsey dead for voting to pass some very marginal gun control legislation after the Uvalde massacre).

Incumbent Democratic New York Congressman Jamaal Bowman lost one of the most expensive primaries in US election history, NBC News reports.  A vocal critic of Israeli policy in Gaza, Bowman was defeated George Latimer, West Chester County executive.

Theater fluffer and police station frequent flier Lauren Boebert won the GOP primary for the Colorado 4th Congressional District, the New York Times reports.  With nearly two-thirds of the votes counted thanks to Colorado’s bias toward early voting, Boebert held just 42% of the vote in a highly divided field with five other candidates.

The production company behind the Donald Trump biopic “The Apprentice” appears to be blocking the film’s distribution in the United States, the Washington Post reports, apparently because the company’s key funder, Daniel Snyder, the former owner of the Washington Commanders NFL team, doesn’t want to embarrass Trump.

“The Apprentice” won rave reviews at the Cannes Film Festival and critics have praised lead actors Sebastian Stan’s and Jeremy Strong’s performances as Trump and Roy Cohn, respectively.  But reportedly the production company, Kinematics, which is run by Snyder’s son-in-law, has balked at agreeing to a distribution agreement.  Recent talks with the company that distributed the Michael Moore movie “Fahrenheit 9/11” have reportedly stalled.

While people close to Snyder say he’s not directly involved in the company or the negotiations, insiders told WaPo that Snyder is “unhappy” with the movie and that the production company objected to including a sexually violent scene relating to Ivana Trump’s allegation that Donald raped her.

Talking to confirmed sexual harasser and a dog murderer’s illicit lover (allegedly) Corey Lewandowski, adjudicated rapist Donald Trump claims that he’s “been preparing [for Thursday’s debate] my whole life” and that during his presidency, the Republican Party “had some great elections and some, uh, amazing number of votes.  Nobody got more than we got.”

This is a lie:  Donald Trump lost the popular vote in the elections held in 2016 versus Hillary Clinton and 2020 against Joe Biden.  Trump’s statement prompted Newsmax to run the following chyron moments later:

The vibe ain’t right for a self-congratulatory retrospective on the fourth anniversary of National Zero’s launch. Doesn’t feel like there’s a whole lot to celebrate given that after all the countless hours spent covering politics we’re all still in at least one major respect the same place we were on June 25th, 2020: Staring down the barrel of another four years under the rule of a fascist madman who consumes so much goddamned time and attention and it just freaking sucks.

There’s so much symbolism in this photo and some of it even fits in thematically with the following ten paragraphs.

There’s only so outraged the average person can get and yet still the forces of evil persist in their quest to seize power permanently and inflict unimaginable horrors upon you and everything you hold dear – a threat all the more offensive because you were once naive enough to think this shit was all over and that the madness infesting American politics was quarantined. That by now Joe Biden would have retired or was about to and Kamala Harris would have been a strong favorite over Ted Cruz or whichever other dipshit the GOP nominated. That Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema weren’t such cunts and the Dem Congress would have gutted the Supreme Court one way or another as well as ending gerrymandering nationwide. That Merrick Garland would have been more aggressive and Donald Trump would be serving the rest of his life in prison after being convicted of treason, his selling our country out to Vladimir Putin laid out incontrovertibly in black and white at trial.

Sixteen Nobel Prize-winning economists believe Donald Trump’s policies would skyrocket inflation and bring ruin to the US and global economies if he gets back in the White House, Reuters reports.  “While each of us has different views on the particulars of various economic policies, we all agree that Joe Biden’s economic agenda is vastly superior to Donald Trump,” the letter states.  “We believe that a second Trump term would have a negative impact on the U.S.’s economic standing in the world, and a destabilizing effect on the U.S.’s domestic economy.”