Organizers of the drive to land an abortion rights measure on the 2024 ballot in Florida tell Politico Playbook they’re on track to get the 891,523 valid signatures required by the end of the year to make it, having already gotten 1.4 million signers (200,000 registered Republicans included).

Now since you’re probably asking how 500,000 more than the minimum equals “on track” rather than “a done deal,” here’s an explainer from Ballotpedia: “Florida also has a signature distribution requirement, which requires that signatures equaling at least 8 percent of the district-wide vote in the last presidential election be collected from at least half (14) of the state’s 28 congressional districts,” requiring a thorough review to make sure they got them in enough places.

The organizers sound confident enough as, per Politico’s reporting, they’re sending their canvassing vendor home early and deploying volunteers for the mop-up. So the true test is going to be getting past the DeSantis Regime, who are without a doubt going to make the kind of shit Ohio Republicans tried to pull to stop this year’s abortion ballot measure there look like it was sponsored by Planned Parenthood and probably the real reason the organizers already have more than 150 percent of the legally required signatures. All that extra padding is unfortunately necessary.

We’re not going to be like “Oh Trump’s in BIG trouble in Florida next November if this abortion measure is on the ballot,” because that’s just stupid. He’s still going to win the state, even if there’s serious pro-choice turnout. That’s not to say that turnout isn’t potentially going to be a major headache for him, however. Right off the bat he’ll be forced to invest more money in what’s otherwise a safe red state while Biden can largely just coast on the pro-choice groups’ spending.

We are disappointed by the Court’s decision to allow Democrats a second attempt at gerrymandering in NY.

Instead of focusing on policies that appeal to voters, Democrats are trying to cheat their way to power. We'll continue to hold them & their terrible policies accountable.

— NRCC (@NRCC) December 12, 2023

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger on Tuesday told reporters his office has been spending money from its budget on Narcan, a medication used to reverse opioid overdoses, to distribute to local election officials in the Peach State after Raffensperger himself was mailed an envelope that tested positive for fentanyl last month, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.

“We have all these things that keep us up at night. Our job right now is to be prepared for the 2024 election. Some people are just off-kilter. And I just think we need to get back to those values that our parents raised us with, the values of our country,” Raffensperger said. “We’re in a much better place than other states, but yet we still have some angry people out there. All that anger and vitriol, those thoughts of retribution, I don’t think that’s the American way,” he continued naively.

A Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania man visiting St Pete Beach, Florida was arrested last Friday after he threw “gator nuggets” at other patrons of a restaurant and “sexually molested” their manatee statue, then screamed obscenities at a hotel employee, Fox 35 reports on an outsider going native.

As he plans his next raid on Whoville, Senator Ted Cruz (R-Quintana Roo) wants everyone–particularly his constituents–to know what’s really important to him.  And that would be his podcast.  Ted Cruz has a podcast, folks!  A podcast, where he talks about things!  …because hearing his dulcet tones is what America wants(?) and being a United States Senator is Ted’s back-up gig.  (Seriously, the GOP would be far more stable if they elected public servants, not self-servants like Cruz, Marge and Gaetz who are more interested in promoting their brands.)

Unwilling to accept that sometimes, life doesn’t go your way, the Republican Attorney General has launched an investigation into the NCAA football playoff selection committee because Florida State University was excluded from the four-team field, NBC News reports.

FSU played an undefeated season, finishing as high as third in some polls, but falling to fifth in the selection committee rankings, who gave the seeds to Texas and neighboring Alabama who had one loss each but arguably played harder schedules. Attorney General Ashley Moody, angry that her home state team was snubbed as teams frequently are when subjective rankings are used, will now waste thousands of dollars of taxpayer money to harass the NCAA and the thirteen members of the selection committee because she cannot accept that her state’s team didn’t make the grade, because Florida is special.

“My Office is launching an investigation to examine if the Committee was involved in any anticompetitive conduct. As it stands, the Committee’s decision reeks of partiality, so we are demanding answers — not only for FSU, but for all schools, teams and fans of college football,” Moody said in a statement. “In Florida, merit matters. If it’s attention they were looking for, the Committee certainly has our attention now.”

A Kentucky woman who sued to have an abortion, challenging the state’s virtual ban on the medical procedure, reports that her fetus no longer has a heartbeat, putting the viability of her challenge to the law into question, the Washington Post reports.

The ACLU of Kentucky filed the challenge to Kentucky’s law on the unnamed woman’s behalf when she was eight weeks pregnant, claiming the state ban on abortion access violated her rights to privacy and self-determination.  Rated as one of the most restrictive states for abortion access in the country, Kentucky has the sixth-highest maternal fatality rate in the United States.

The suit attacks two pillars of Kentucky’s anti-abortion law:  the provision that allows an abortion only for a medical emergency or a danger to the life of the mother, and the provision that allows an abortion up to the sixth week of pregnancy.  “The bans and the irreparable harms they inflict are an affront to the health and dignity of all Kentuckians,” the lawsuit states. “Everyone who can become pregnant has a right to determine their own future and to make decisions about their relationships and life opportunities without government interference that puts their health and well-being at risk.”

House Oversight Chairbilly James Comer is suspicious of Fox and Friends host Steve Doocy after being asked one too many questions about why Comer keeps saying shit that he can’t actually come close to proving and is no longer going on the Fox News morning show because of the bespectacled dork still capable of a modicum of independent thought. Comer seems to almost be stopping himself here from mocking that show’s audience the same way he did with CNN and MSNBC for questioning him.

According to US intelligence community estimates, the Kremlin has lost 87% of the troops–roughly seven out of eight soldiers–that were in the Russian ground forces since the beginning of its invasion of Ukraine, CNN reports, with an additional estimate that two-thirds of the tanks in its inventory are destroyed.

It’s not coincidental that this assessment was released on the day that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited the White House and Capitol Hill to push for continued aid to Ukraine and President Biden announced $200 million in additional assistance.

At least twice over the past three days disgraced former President Trump’s campaign has sent out an email asking fans to “Please add your name to my Official Petition: Restore President Donald J Trump’s First Amendment Rights,” an action call likely representing the apex of MAGA dumbassery.

Something makes this considerably fucking dumber and weirder than the lame unscientific polls they have people answer and then not even show the current result afterwards (the most recent one’s question of “On a scale of 1-5, with 5 being ‘I would write in President Trump’s name even if left-wing judges removed his name from the ballot,’ how strongly do you support President Trump?” is a whole other hilarious can of worms). Setting aside that entering one’s contact data and even more so a credit card number for the campaign contribution prompted afterward is what they’re really after in both the “petition” and the “polls,” the latter at least carries some vague quantum of feedback like rating a customer support person’s helpfulness after you’ve interacted with them.

Does the Trump campaign actually use the feedback data? Almost certainly not. The tiny theoretical possibility that they could do so however is more than we can say about this “petition.”

Pro-Russia far right Polish MP Grzegorz Braun on Tuesday went full MAGA on the menorah in the parliament building in Warsaw, ripping a fire extinguisher off the wall and blasting at the candles.

When someone yelled he should be ashamed Braun said “Those who take part in acts of the satanic cult should be ashamed.” It’s unclear if Braun faces any discipline or legal trouble for the attack.

The New York State Court of Appeals (the “Supreme Court” in every other state) on Tuesday ordered the Empire State’s congressional district maps redrawn, a huge win for Democrats seeking to nuke as many as six of those pesky “moderate” twats like Mike Lawler and Marc Molinaro.

From an FBI agent’s affidavit on the the arrest warrant for Michigan Capitol rioter Paul Caloia, who is a sick fuck: “On January 12, 2021, the FBI’s National Threat Operations Center received a tip from an individual (‘Witness 1’) regarding an internet pornography personality using the name ‘God Hypnotic.’ Witness 1 stated in the report to the FBI that God Hypnotic was ‘bragging’ on Skype about his participation in the January 6, 2021 riots and that God Hypnotic had described being inside the Capitol building during that Skype chat. I interviewed Witness 1, who stated that he/she first interacted with ‘God Hypnotic’ through email, and that the Skype meeting in question was an invitation-only chat hosted by God Hypnotic. Witness 1 further stated that as God Hypnotic was bragging about his involvement in the January 6 riots, another individual in the chat asked God Hypnotic why he went to the Capitol. At that point, Witness 1 said God Hypnotic backtracked and said that he went to the Capitol for reporting purposes. Witness 1 said that God Hypnotic’s comment about the events on Jan 6 was a ‘one-liner’ unprovoked by any other participants in the meeting.”

“At the time of these interviews, Witness 1 had not been in contact with ‘God Hypnotic’ since January 12, 2021. Separately, the FBI received a tip from a confidential source containing public photographs of Twitter user @CashHypnotic. The source believed that the user of the @CashHypnotic Twitter account resembled an individual who was present in the Capitol based upon publicly available footage of an individual labeled ‘Insider 805’ by the group the online group, Sedition Hunters. The source provided images to the FBI, as well as CALOIA’s Twitter handle. I have reviewed @CashHypnotic’s Twitter account, which includes several self-provided images.”

That last part is where we feel bad. A National Zero reporter very briefly look at it too and it was gross. Not like need therapy gross, but gross enough. Caloia is not a particularly good looking dude and his abusive language toward the “cashfags” who pay him to pee and jack off on camera is just as disturbing as his “content.” Just the kind of citizen MAGAmerica accepts openly and willingly.

My dear friend James Comer has had a tough year filled with failed hearing after failed hearing. But in the spirit of Hanukkah, I wanted to offer him some words of encouragement from a Jew-ish former colleague of ours. pic.twitter.com/AblVjAz8ag

— Jared Moskowitz (@JaredEMoskowitz) December 12, 2023

Gotta catch em all, right? A 35 year-old Westerville, Ohio man who walked out of a Meijer store with $679.59 worth of Pokemon cards didn’t have enough HP or high enough defense stats to overcome the ferocious moves by a local cop who beat him senseless for attempting to resist arrest during a confrontation in the parking lot, WCMH reports. The cop chose excessive force, Pikachu!

Per a police report, Fields was yanked out of a vehicle by a responding officer who had pursued him out of the store. One of the cops ordered Fields “several times… to place his hands behind his back, turn onto his stomach, and to stop resisting,” but Fields “continued actively resisting our attempts to secure his hands by pulling his arms under his body and trying to roll over.”

The cops then tased the fucker and hauled him to the station, charging him with felony assault. The article’s pretty long and goes into police brutality and all that stuff that kind of takes away from all our stale Pokemon jokes that we keep using every time there’s some stupid crime involving them.

Taking the witness stand Tuesday in her and her mom Ruby Freeman’s defamation trial against alcoholic shitbrain Rudy Giuliani, former Georgia election worker Shae Moss testified that she was looking for other work in the months after the election and, per ABC News, had an interview at a Chik-fil-A that went well – until the end when the manager said he had googled her name.

“I was dressed up. I had my notebook with my resume. I was excited, I was ready,” Moss said, adding that the interview “went great, I had made up my mind that, oh well, I’ll have to start at the bottom… I can work my way up here.” But then the manager showed her some MAGA website’s article with the word “traitor” pasted over her face. “Tell me about this. Is this you? Is this true?”

“The more he was talking, the more I just tuned it out. I was so shocked, I was so embarrassed… I just had to leave. I just left,” Moss said on what was already a bad day for Rudy.

Yeah this is real. Trump posted “Due to the great Excitement and Success of my previous TRUMP DIGITAL TRADING CARDS, we’re doing it again – The MugShot Edition, available RIGHT NOW. Plus, buy 47 cards and get a piece of the suit I wore for the ‘Mugshot Photo,’ and also get an invite to a Gala Dinner with me at Mar-a-Lago! Don’t wait, they’ll go FAST (I believe!). I’m happy if you’re happy. Have fun. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!” on Truth Social. And the site for his bullshit NFTs says “Limited Physical Trading Card w/Piece of President Trump’s Suit from the MugShot. Only 2,024 available with different rarities. Some are Autographed. Shipped Free to US Addresses,” if you spend $4,653.00 on these “digital trading cards.” Not sure what else to add.

Middleburg, Florida registered Republican Douglas Moore is facing six counts of aggravated assault with a firearm, reckless discharge of a firearm, and using a firearm while under the influence of alcohol after he “became agitated” Saturday by a Christmas parade and shot off a few rounds in the direction some of the participants who had gathered on a nearby property, Fox 35 reports.

No one was injured in the incident, with the possible exception of Moore, who was taken to the ground by a Clay County sheriff’s deputy who responded. The arrest affidavit mentions that Moore had slurred speech and bloodshot, watery eyes when he was confronted by the deputies.

Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith on Tuesday hit the Supreme Court over the head with a “Hey assholes, this was decided almost 50 years ago in US v Nixon, the only difference here in US v Trump is that this is a criminal matter. Everything else is the same, so just bang the gavel and get this over with,” in his petition to the court to keep his trial on schedule. The opener: