I had a couple fun Substack live chats the last two weeks. One with Ben Ulansey and Peter Murphy, and then I went on Murphy’s zany Peter & Philip Show.
I also did a Brain Milk podcast interview with Ulansey. If you like my content, subscribe to my podcast Brain Milk!
Zohran Mamdani looks likely to be the next NYC mayor.
I don’t know about you, but I’m really sick of hearing multi-millionaires and billionaires constantly excuse their historic avarice, hoarding, and tax evading by shrugging and saying things like, “Don’t blame me, blame the tax code — if you want to change the tax code you should elect politicians to reform it.”
But every time someone like Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, or Zohran Mamdani starts running for office to try and do something about our extreme wealth inequality, those millionaires and billionaires throw a fit and cry, doomcast about communism, and threaten to move away from their liberal city or even America itself.
Mamdani is young, idealistic, and Internet-savvy, three qualities the Democratic Party is really struggling with currently, and check the scoreboard: Democrats are very unpopular nationally and are the minority party in every federal branch of government… it’s time for Democrats to start swinging for the fences with candidates who inspire young people and force generation change.
I think generation change will be a top issue in the Democratic primaries this upcoming midterm election.
The Democrats have become a gerontocracy, and liberal voters are tired of watching Baby Boomers cling to their positions of power until they die in office. The last 8 members of Congress to die in office have all been Democrats, and it’s wrecking our government.
The Supreme Court got fucked because Ruth Bader Ginsburg refused to retire, and Joe Biden screwed Democrats in 2024 by deciding to run until it was painfully obvious he was too old. I mean no disrespect to Boomers, but it’s maybe time to retire from politics if you’re over 70, and better to announce your retirement before a punishing primary fight.
Sunsetting Boomers just aren’t capable of crafting legislation to deal with the big issues of the era whether it’s Big Tech, AI, social media, fascism, the housing crisis, wealth inequality, or the shifting foreign policy tectonic plates clearly breaking apart the institutions and norms of the post-war system in which Boomers have lived their entire lives.
I predict there will be many Democratic incumbents next year who lose their primaries in surprising upsets.
The Trump Shutdown has no end in sight.
I’m glad Democrats called Trump’s bluffing on the government shutdown, and I support them holding the line as long as it takes. Prior to the shutdown, Trump was threatening to fire thousands of government employees, and I was immediately on board for letting him. It’s his own government he’d be shredding, so I support any of Trump’s efforts to make his administration less capable of carrying out his will. Of course it’s not surprising that Trump is not actually doing following up on his threats because Trump always chickens out #TACO.
It’s also becoming increasingly obvious that a big part of the GOP’s shutdown play is to indefinitely put off the inevitable vote to release the Epstein Files. Speaker Johnson won’t swear in Arizona’s Representative-Elect Adelita Grijalva specifically because she’s the 218th vote needed to go around the Speaker’s obstruction of justice for Epstein’s victims.
Let’s call it the “Epstein Shutdown.”
Mike Johnson is the weakest Speaker of the House in US History.
Mike Johnson has turned out to be as impotent a Speaker of the House as I suspected he would be. This Congress has passed barely any bills at all, and this shutdown might break the 35-day record Trump set in his first term.
This closure is even stupider than the others, though, because Republicans have control of both chambers of Congress and the presidency, with a blowhard who never shuts up about what a great dealmaker he is.
Johnson’s job is virtually impossible because the GOP caucus is a wildly unstable coalition of roughly one-third fascist-flirting cultists, one-third lazy opportunists, and one-third relative moderates who aren’t totally willing to end America’s experiment in democracy (but won’t risk sticking out their neck for it and having Trump write a mean tweet about them). But even I am surprised at how little leadership he is able to exert on his Republican caucus.
Republicans cannot govern at all, and just do not deserve at all the majority power they have gerrymandered.
I love these recurring rumors every time Trump isn’t seen for several days that he’s had a stroke or is having some other severe health emergency.
Trump and his administration lie about everything so there’s really no reason to trust anything he or his press people say about his health. It’s certainly ludicrous to put any stock in his doctors’ public claims that he’s a paragon of energy and vitality. I’ve definitely been having fun with the rumors in my comedy!
Democrat spotlight!
I’ve been following Fred Wellman on Threads and Twitter for several years, and he’s actually now running for Congress to unseat Missouri Republican Ann Wagner! He’s a veteran and a sharp pundit on social media, so if you’re looking to help Democrats take back the House, he’s a good candidate to throw a few dollars or make a monthly donation!
I guess one saving grace of our government’s dismantling is that Congress is not really doing anything.
Congressional Republicans are barely working on legislation at all, and the Trump Administration’s efforts are largely through executive orders and bureaucracy policies. Thankfully these can easily be overturned by the next president, and even conservative judges are throwing out many of Trump’s efforts for having no legitimate legal basis.
It might not be such a bad thing for Democrats to try and just keep the government shut down till the new Congress is sworn in January 2027 — only half kidding. Then Democrats should come in with a D.O.G.E. of their own to fire all the lunatics Trump hired. 🥃
☕️ Help me keep writing daily. Become a paid subscriber for only $2.50/month so I can relentlessly mock Donald Trump and his administration’s fascist tendencies.
Or buy me a coffee if you want to help keep me caffeinated.
If you think Donald Trump is a joke, I published two books for you: Satire In The Trump Years, and Satire In The Biden Years, available on Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and Kobo. Or, better yet, request your local library order a copy on their website.
I’ve also published three existentialist poetry books, Cabaret No Stare, Moon Goon, and Hotel Golden Hours available in print and on Kindle.
Because our social media platforms are being scrambled up by oligarchs, if you like my humor, diversify where you follow me so you never miss my jokes to interrupt your doomscrolling: Twitter, Bluesky, Threads, Facebook, Instagram, Spoutible, Medium, and Substack.
Browse my comedy portfolio, my graffiti news portfolio, and my poetry portfolio.
The Halfway Post 