Especially For Scottie, Because He

especially loves when Riley Gaines catches heck, especially with a bonus of Nancy Mace!

Nancy Mace Is The Riley Gaines Of Swimming Toward The South Carolina Governor’s Mansion!

Doktor Zoom

In the latest round of primary elections, voters in four states chose candidates for the November general elections, and something something national consequences, something something Donald Trump’s continued clammy grip on the Republican Party, yadda yadda. Primaries were held Tuesday in Maine, South Carolina, Nevada, and North Dakota. And in California, vote counting in last week’s primary for governor was complete enough that Republican Steve Hilton, a former Fox News host, secured the second spot in the at-large gubernatorial primary, so it’ll be him and Democrat Xavier Becerra facing each other in November. Funny how Democrats somehow only frauded up the LA mayor’s race, while the very same vote count process put Hilton on the ballot.

One might even think the cries of fraud were complete bullshit!

(snip-we know about Maine. Lets get Dems elected to our legislature!! Click through if you wish to read it, though.)

South Carolina: Nancy Mace Out, Lindsey Graham Persists Like A Bad Odor

In the Palmetto State, Rep. James Clyburn (D) easily won his primary and is likely to hold the seat, for an 18th term in the House. Clyburn benefited from the Republican-dominated state Lege’s decision to not join the rest of the former Confederacy in redrawing every last majority-Black congressional district out of existence this year.

But before you get carried away and accuse South Carolina Republicans of having a fit of decency or ethics, several top Goopers in the Lege said last month they opposed redistricting because early voting was already underway for this very primary. Still, that’s better than Louisiana, slightly, in the voting rights race to the bottom. For this year.

The really big outcome from South Carolina was that Rep. Nancy Mace, of the House Republican Batshit Awful Caucus, finished fifth — dead last — in the state’s gubernatorial primary. After this year, she’s both out of Congress and maybe even out of elected office forever, though here we note that the evil baddies in slasher flicks never seem to stay dead, either.

True to hateful bigoted form, Mace was an asshole right up to the final days of the primary, pandering to xenophobes by introducing a constitutional amendment that would ban naturalized citizens from serving in Congress, serving as federal judges, or serving in any position requiring Senate confirmation. She insisted that three of her Democratic colleagues in the House — Reps. Ilhan Omar (Minnesota), Shri Thanedar (Michigan), and Pramila Jayapal (Washington) — are “all making clear every single day their loyalty is not to America.” Jesus, what a vile person.

While campaigning in Greenville County earlier this month, Mace screeched, “I didn’t come out of a slum in India. I am born and made here in America.” Gosh, we sure feel bad about Trump turning against her after she called for releasing the Epstein Files.

Trump’s endorsed GOP candidate in the governor’s primary, Lt. Gov. Pamela “not Nancy Mace” Evette, wasn’t able to get enough votes to secure the nomination outright, and will go up against state Attorney General Alan Wilson in a runoff on June 23. Mace endorsed Wilson, probably out of spite, although last year she had attacked Wilson, baselessly claiming he was protecting defendants accused of child sex abuse.

Always being very mature, after Trump endorsed Evette, Mace immediately went to Twitter and Facebook to lie about it in an attempt to gaslight voters.

“Pamela Evette is NOT ENDORSED by DONALD TRUMP,” Mace wrote, incorrectly. “Do not believe her LIES.” Mace posted an AI-generated image of herself posing with Trump.

Peanuts cartoon of Lucy sitting in front of a big TV; her original speech bubble has been replaced so she's saying 'Christ, what an asshole.'

Oh, and speaking of assholes, Lindsey Graham easily fended off a primary challenge from self-funded business guy Mark Lynch, clearing the 50-percent threshold to avoid a runoff with 56 percent of the primary vote. Trump had unironically warned that it’d be a “DISASTER for the Republican Party” if Lynch won, which, hmmm, sounds vaguely familiar to something we heard a decade ago … what was that?

Screenshot of May 3, 2016 tweet by Lindsey Graham: 'If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed.......and we will deserve it'

Oh yeah, that.

In the Democratic primary for Senate, Dr. Annie Andrews, who we like a hell of a lot, won the chance to run a long-shot bid against Graham. It’s a weird year, but probably not weird enough to dislodge Graham from the seat he’s clinging to like a goddamn candiru fish.

(snip; MORE re NV and ND; click on through! I wanted to cheer everyone with Nancy Mace being called the Riley Gaines of her election.)

Susan Collins, Short & Sweet

(Normally, I hold with the idea of not giving a candidate’s opposition name-advertising, but it is a strategy that can work if one of our own candidates are getting dragged through the mud. Platner’s not the first. Keep it short, sweet, and truthful, like this.)

Let’s talk about DOD trashing the Constitution and Latter-day Saints….

As I have written about before this is simply a move by Christian nationalists in the military and government to force everyone to conform to their religious beliefs and desires. This is again to return to the 1950s when it was normal for Christianity to seem like the dominant religion of the majority of people in the country. The reasons stated make so sense for the purpose claimed as Belle points out. This is a minority fundamentalist / evangelical believers trying to force their rule and beliefs onto the majority. Hugs

Pete Hegseth Gives D-Day Speech Hitler Would Have Loved

At a D-Day celebration, Secretary of Defense Pete Kegseth claimed that today a different dangerous ideology is storming the beaches of European countries, and he listed them. Kegseth is a die hard white supremacist Christian nationalist who is trying to enforce a Christianity only policy in the US military to the point military members can no longer have atheists on their dog tags. So aside from Kegseth implying the Allies had a dangerous ideology which I guess the Nazis would have agreed with as Sam and crew discuss, the dangerous ideology he is demanding Europe stop and repel is Islam and the dangerous men are Muslims. Hugs

TV & FCC News

Disney Finds Its Spine

By Lizzie O’Leary

In normal times, in a normal Federal Communications Commission, Anna M. Gomez’s job might be described as wonky. But now is not that time.

“A large part of my role is to call out this administration’s abuses of the First Amendment, particularly when it chooses to weaponize the FCC in trying to shut down any voices that it doesn’t like,” said Gomez. “And we see this constantly, there is a constant infringement on the free press and on the First Amendment and on the rights of viewers and listeners to see and hear what they want to see.”

Gomez is the sole Democrat on the commission. Her term is set to end on June 30. Normally, there would be five commissioners at the FCC, but right now, there are only three. Two resigned last year, and the Trump administration has not nominated their replacements. Gomez is on a First Amendment tour of sorts—telling Americans that the actions of the FCC chair, Brendan Carr, are egregious. Disney seems to agree. Unlike other media companies, it’s lawyered up to fight against the FCC’s latest demands.

On a recent episode of What Next: TBD, host Lizzie O’Leary spoke to Gomez about the FCC and why ABC isn’t folding like CBS did. This transcript has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Lizzie O’Leary: How do broadcast affiliates work?

Anna M. Gomez: Although Disney owns and operates only eight stations nationwide, there are hundreds of ABC affiliates because there are hundreds of markets all over this country. They are owned independently by other broadcasters. Some of those broadcasters are quite large, and some of them are very small.

The FCC manufactured a complaint against a Disney station in Texas that carried The View. And although multiple ABC stations carried that particular program, it had the Texas Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico on it.

There were tons of other ABC affiliates that also could have had this complaint lodged against them. But the FCC went to the nonowned affiliates in the market and said to them: “We want you to file with us, and we’re not going to hold it against you because of this alleged violation.” They didn’t go to Disney.

The FCC then used the fact that other affiliates filed as a reason to initiate this investigation against the one Disney-owned station. That to me is a setup. Some would call that entrapment. It’s where the FCC manufactures an issue and coordinates with the other stations so that only the Disney-owned station is the outlier. And this is why it is so egregious what this FCC is doing, because it is clearly targeting Disney in retaliation for its viewpoints.

How is that legal?

It’s not. It’s absolutely unlawful. Not only is it unlawful, it is also unconstitutional. The FCC is challenging the First Amendment rights of the broadcasters, the talent, the press, through all of these actions. We are explicitly prohibited from censoring broadcasters, but this is censorship.

This feels like a shakedown. This feels like the emperor doesn’t like these comedians, whether it’s Jimmy Kimmel or Joy Behar, and if you don’t do something, we’re going to take away your affiliate licenses. Is that a fair reading?

Absolutely. This administration cannot tolerate anything that is critical of it, that doesn’t mention its worldview. And it is weaponizing any tool in its toolbox, whether it’s the FCC, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Defense, in order to go after the press and to go after the media.

It is clear that this is absolute harassment in order to get Disney to capitulate. The good news is that Disney is not capitulating. It has actually shown courage. It has decided to stand up for its First Amendment rights and to push back. And if this gets carried out to its conclusion, and by that I mean it goes to court, the FCC will lose.

Is Disney finding a spine, or can Disney read a poll?

Disney has, in fact, found its spine. Part of that, of course, is that we saw Disney capitulate very early on when it settled the case against ABC because of the George Stephanopoulos interview. And legal scholars said there is no basis for this case, but it went ahead and settled it. And that opened the door to all of these future actions against the media. I think what Disney learned is that capitulation doesn’t buy you protection; it might buy you some time, but they will keep coming back and coming back for more because what they demand is absolute allegiance to this administration and nothing else.

I’m curious about where this impacts TV. How much of this campaign is about pressuring tech platforms?

There’s an absolute campaign by this administration to censor and control any media outlet using whatever levers it has at its power. Look at social media. The Federal Trade Commission used the fact that there were two ad agencies merging to force them to carry ads on Twitter, which they had stopped doing because of some of the content that they found to be harmful to their clients’ interests. And that is forced speech. That is a First Amendment violation.

I do believe that this administration is sending a signal. We have seen media companies win time and time again against this administration when they go to court. But litigation and regulatory investigations are costly, and a lot of companies, corporate parents, make the decision that it is actually less painful to settle and to capitulate than it is to fight. So the process is the point, the pain is the point, the threat is the point. They don’t want this to be carried out to its fruition. They want it to just force the companies enough pain so that they will capitulate. Now, I think this is a signal to every part of the media that they would do this to them, whether it’s to the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, universities, law firms, or broadcasters. They will go after anyone who speaks out against them.

2 Video Shorts From Jessica, + A Short From Ronny Chieng

Just A Quick Funny One-

What I hope is yet another example of #ETTD though not literally dies in these two cases; we have several Republicans running for Governor this time. (We do have Dems running as well, and yes, each of them will be fine governors, so we’ll see what the primary brings in a couple of months. Anyway.) Jeff Colyer was Sam Brownback’s Lt. Gov. back in those days; when Trump 1.0 poached Brownback, Colyer of course was governor for a bit. He basically simply kept things on an even keel. He seems, apart from being Republican, to be a decent person. He’s been running campaign ads for a couple of months, showing him with POTUS, showing himself and POTUS while POTUS proclaimed him a fantastic governor, blah, blah, blah. I kept hoping for #ETTD for that campaign, and it has happened. The headline just below is the link to the story, which you’re welcome to read if you care to. It’s less important than many other things, but there it is.

Former Republican Gov. Jeff Colyer drops out of Kansas gubernatorial race

Seven GOP candidates file to compete in August gubernatorial primary

By:Tim Carpenter–

So the funny part: on the 5:00 news last night, I had the closed caption on while I was doing my 5:00 steps; it was noisy in the room. The closed caption reported that “Jeb” Colyer had dropped out of the race, due to POTUS endorsing another candidate. It was only a minute or less report, with “Jeb” Colyer mentioned a few times. It reminded me of when Jeb Bush was running for president along with others including the current POTUS, and POTUS kept needling Jeb! about being low energy and no ideas.

Just a giggle I thought I’d share. Also yet another example of POTUS kicking the very people who’ve helped him, encouraged and boosted him, and kissed his behind. We should really tell our Republican electeds to stop that, as POTUS has no loyalty to anyone whosoever.

How’re the midterms looking in your states?

Iowans Be Aware, and Beware-

Co-founder of Wichita private school contending for Iowa GOP’s gubernatorial nomination

Iowa Democratic Party raises red flag about dozens of Zach Lahn’s flights to Kansas

By:Tim Carpenter-May 29, 2026

TOPEKA — Private school founder, farmer and businessman Zach Lahn is running an insurgent Republican campaign for governor in Iowa.

The former Kansan has labeled this outsider bid as an “Iowa First” campaign. He’s opposed abortion and high taxes, but defended gun rights, school vouchers and religious freedom. He told Iowa voters he admired President Donald Trump’s tenacious fight against the political establishment.

“I told my wife many times, if I ever ran for anything, the only thing I’d ever want to run for was governor,” Lahn said.

Lahn grew up near Sioux City, Iowa, graduated from University of Colorado in Boulder, worked for Montana and Colorado congressmen, served as Montana director of Americans for Prosperity and as an AFP fundraiser, and bought a Belle Plaine, Iowa, farm previously owned by relatives. He launched an unorthodox school in Wichita and voted in Kansas elections in the 2018, 2020 and 2022 cycles.

Lahn’s campaign didn’t respond to a request for comment about why he chose to run for governor in Iowa rather than Kansas or questions raised by the Iowa Democratic Party about his close ties to Kansas and decision in 2024 to transfer his voter registration to Iowa.

Lahn has stood out among Iowa’s GOP gubernatorial candidates by denouncing lobbyists, corporations and organizations with outsized influence on politics. He’s not been shy about criticizing Democrats and Republicans responsible for blocking public policy reform.

“I’m fighting the ‘Uni-party.’ Both sides have been bought off in many ways,” he said.

Lahn is on the Tuesday primary ballot with U.S. Rep. Randy Feenstra, state Rep. Eddie Andrews, former state Rep. Brad Sherman and former Iowa Department of Administrative Services director Adam Steen. The Democratic nominee will be Iowa state Auditor Rob Sand, who is running unopposed.

For the first time since 2006, an incumbent Iowa governor won’t be on the ballot. Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds, with one of the lowest approval ratings in the country, didn’t seek reelection.

Populist approach

Michael Smith, a political science professor at Emporia State University, said old-school political theory dictated gubernatorial candidates had to be rooted in a state’s political infrastructure and local community life to be relevant. That changed as Trump assumed control of GOP politics and showed how firebrand conservatives, including those without prior experience in public office, might find a lane to run, he said.

“It’s all different now,” said Smith, who indicated Lahn could be a beneficiary of that shift. “He’s trying to be his own kind of populist.”

Lahn created momentum for his candidacy by loaning the campaign $2 million and using that cash to fill the airwaves with television advertising.

After working for Americans for Prosperity, an advocacy group associated with founders of Koch Industries, Lahn moved to Wichita to launch the unconventional private school named Wonder. The pre-kindergarten through 12th-grade school opened in 2018 on the campus of Wichita State University. It was financed by Chase Koch, the son of billionaire Charles Koch, and Chase Koch’s wife at the time, Annie Koch.

Annie Koch and Lahn subsequently divorced their spouses and were married. They have seven children in a blended family and the kids have been featured in campaign materials.

Kansas voter registration records show Zach Lahn voted in Kansas with a provisional ballot in November 2018, in-person at a Sedgwick County polling place in November 2020 and with an advance ballot in the August 2022 primary. Zach Lahn registered to vote in Iowa on Oct. 17, 2024. Transferring his registration at that time allowed him to meet the state’s two-year residency requirement for a run for governor in 2026.

Jennifer Konfrst, a professor of journalism and strategic political communication at Drake University in Des Moines, said there was potential for Lahn’s “Iowa First” campaign slogan to come across as disingenuous among voters aware of his lengthy presence in Kansas. Iowa voters appreciate the life history of candidates, she said, but some dig deeper into whether a candidate’s staff came from Iowa or Washington, D.C.

“Being from here matters,” said Konfrst, a Democratic member of the Iowa House not seeking reelection. “It’s not unimportant that somebody who wants to be governor of Iowa isn’t from here.”

Kansas connections

In July 2024, according to Sedgwick County’s register of deeds, Annie Lahn purchased a home in Kechi near Wichita and declared on mortgage documents it was her primary residence. One year after acquiring the property, Zach and Annie Lahn sold the home to an LLC for $1.

Business records filed with the Kansas Secretary of State’s Office identified the LLC’s “authorized person” as Wichita resident Mikaela Ledbetter, who made a modest donation in December 2025 to Zach Lahn’s campaign for governor.

Less than two weeks after the transaction in July 2025, Annie Lahn registered to vote in Belle Plaine, Iowa. Zach Lahn and his previous wife, Lauren, had purchased that Belle Plaine homestead in 2014.

The Des Moines Register reported in April that Zach Lahn flew from Iowa to Wichita in his personal airplane 37 times since Oct. 1, 2025. Zach Lahn told the Register the flights allowed him to be with children that he and his wife had from previous marriages.

“I’m trying my best to be present for things,” Zach Lahn told the Register. “I have no worries that we’ll be able to fulfill every duty we need to do on the campaign or as governor.”

Zach Lahn told the newspaper he moved from Kansas to Iowa in 2023 and was an official Iowa voter in the 2024 general election and a 2025 local election.

Iowa Democratic Party spokesperson Terra Hernandez seized upon the Register’s reporting to declare Zach Lahn a “Kansas carpetbagger.”

“Lahn has been trying to fool Iowa voters since the start of his campaign, thinks he can pay his way to the governor’s mansion with his millions in out-of-state money and spends more time in Wichita than Belle Plaine,” Hernandez said.

On campaign trail

During the gubernatorial campaign, Zach Lahn has emphasized he was a sixth-generation Iowan with family roots as far back as the Civil War.

His campaign has concentrated on restoration of academic achievement in the state’s education system and removal of classroom educators who insisted on advancing personal ideology.

“We don’t have a spending problem. We have a quality problem,” Zack Lahn said during a GOP forum broadcast by KCCI in Des Moines.

He said he would work to preserve Iowa family farms after 10,000 vanished during the past 20 years. He said one-fourth of Iowa land was now owned by out-of-state investors. He proposed raising property taxes on Iowa land held by nonresidents so property taxes for Iowa residents could be lowered.

He’s questioned economic development strategies in Iowa that did little to stem the brain drain of youth to other states.

Zack Lahn, endorsed by MAHA Action associated with U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr., made a campaign issue of rising cancer rates in Iowa. He promised to veto any bill granting agricultural chemical companies immunity from lawsuits tied to alleged failure to accurately warn consumers of health risks.

“I believe big ag and big pharma have treated our farmers and families as numbers, not neighbors,” Zack Lahn said.

REPORT: Trump To Pull US Assets Set Aside For NATO

Putin must be so pleased with his US employee and asset. This thin skined ego managi in dementia with a cult following and a terrified Republican Party has ruined all efforts to rein in dictatorships and authoritarian countries. The only authoritarian country they attack is because it has the wrong religion for the religious part of the cult. This tRump guy wrote love letters to the dictator of North Korea and bows deeply metaphorically to Putin, talking lovingly about autocrats around the world who push white supremacy and the Christian family values talking points. But since his first term he has had it out for NATO seemingly at Putin’s behest. He has refused to provide Ukraine with weapons and support again something Putin has been demanding. tRump repeated Russian talking points of Ukraine starting the war with Russia. He has constantly attacked NATO partners about funding not understanding that funding is not money put into a pot for NATO to use, the funding was what each country could / would put into the group in weapons, people, and equipment. He is angry that NATO did not support the US illegal unprovoked war against a country who had not attacked the US. But the NATO charter specifically mandates that they wouldn’t be required to do so in that case. But the only time that article five was activated was for the US after 9-11 attack on the US. tRump is not allowed to remove the US legally from NATO so this is a way he can legally do it with out really removing us from NATO. I wanted to post the linked article but it required allowing adverts and I simply won’t do that. Hugs

REPORT: Trump To Pull US Assets Set Aside For NATO

That Public Notice About NDA’s for Government Workers:

We have 29 more days to make our views known in regard to the executive wishing all federal workers to sign a very broad NDA. This will crush transparency and notice of abuse, and there will likely be no more whistleblowing.

Anyway, here it is, along with the link so we can make our comments (of course it is not hyperlinked on the page, we need to copy it and paste it into our browser. WP has made it a live link in this post, but it doesn’t work.) It’s our duty and a right we still have; if we do not use it, we will most certainly use it. I found out about this yesterday on MPS’s post; it just took me a bit to get to this.

You can find this here. (This hyperlink is good; I made it myself and it works.) It is a .pdf. The NDA notice begins in the lower right-hand column.

From within the public notice, here is the info for submitting our comments:

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments
using the Federal eRulemaking Portal at
https://www.regulations.gov. Follow the
instructions for sending comments.
The general policy for comments and
other submissions from members of the
public is to make these submissions
available for public viewing at https://
http://www.regulations.gov without change,
and including any personal identifiers
or contact information. Before finalizing
the NDA, OPM will consider all
comments received on or before the
closing date for comments. OPM may
make changes to the NDA after
considering the comments received.

And a little more:

Request for Comment
OPM welcomes public comments on
all aspects of the draft NDA, including
whether the Privacy Act statement’s
description of the authority, principal
purposes, routine uses, and effects
provide sufficient notice to employees.
The draft NDA is available in the docket
for this notice on regulations.gov. See
https://www.regulations.gov/document/
OPM-2026-0100-0003. OPM specifically
requests comment on the following
issues.

What scope of information should
be covered by the NDA? Should it cover
only unclassified information? How do
you understand the terms confidential
and confidentiality in the context of this
NDA? What customization of the NDA,
if any, may be necessary for agencies to
ensure it covers the appropriate
information?
Does the NDA clearly communicate
the types of information that would be
subject to non-disclosure requirements?
If not, how could OPM better describe
what information can or cannot be
disclosed to ensure employees have
appropriate notice of their
responsibilities?
Are there other statutes to which
OPM should cite in Appendix A of the
NDA when describing the nondisclosure
requirements applicable to individuals
working for or on behalf of the Federal
government?
Do you have suggestions regarding
the layout or formatting of the NDA?
Does the Privacy Act statement in
the NDA provide sufficient notice to
employees of the authorities, principal purposes, routine uses, and effects of
the form?
Does the OPM/GOVT–1 system of
records notice provide sufficient notice
that the government-wide system of
records would maintain records related
to the signing of, or failure to sign, the
NDA?
What are the appropriate actions, if
any, for agencies to consider taking if
existing employees choose not to sign
the NDA?
What are the appropriate actions, if
any, for agencies to consider taking if
new employees choose not to sign the
NDA?
Does the NDA clearly communicate
the potential consequences of refusal to
sign the form for both existing and new
employees, along with whether signing
the form is voluntary or mandatory?
What else should OPM consider
with regard to the NDA??
OPM will consider comments
received before finalizing the NDA.

There are several other things there, if you have some time and want to see what the exec is doing besides trying to hide all they do and finally/fully cut off our representation, even as we are taxed for government work. I don’t believe we can let this slide, but maybe that’s only me. Anyway, if you also don’t like this, please go, read the bit, and write what your conscience tells you. I’m certain you will not be alone in doing so. The thing is, our government, for which we all pay, is not a business. The only parts that should not be public are those that actually shield the actual security of the country, things such as when we go after Osama Bin Laden, and locations of items that other countries might like to drone. There should be no covering of regular day-to-day government business-that is our business and we have the right to know.