Men's Lifestyle October 31, 2025 0 Comments

How Trump’s Shutdown Strategy Is Starving Kids — And Why It’s a Toxic Move You Need to Know About

Well, isn’t it something when the highest office in the land tries to play politics with something as fundamental as feeding hungry kids? Picture this: a federal judge just dropped the hammer, telling the president plain and simple—using starving children as bargaining chips to manipulate a shutdown is a no-go. Meanwhile, over in Speaker Moses’ camp, the game’s been laid bare; exploiting poor kids as leverage to force a government reopening? That’s not just cold—it’s downright oleaginous. And if you think the drama ends there, wait till you hear about the high seas strikes with unknown targets, and the unsettling aftermath washing ashore in the Caribbean. The political theater, international fallout, and historic discoveries all collide in a week that’s anything but dull. Ready to dive deep into the madness, the mystery, and the moments that make you wonder—what the heck is really going on here? Let’s get into it. LEARN MORE.

Out on the Weekend

(Permanent Musical Accompaniment to the Last Post of the Week from the Blog’s Favourite Living Canadian)

On Friday, another federal judge told the president that he can’t use starving children as leverage to get what he wants from his pet Speaker of the House. From NBC News:

A Rhode Island federal judge on Friday ordered the U.S. Department of Agriculture to distribute money owed to recipients of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program “as soon as possible,” just one day before funding for SNAP was set to lapse. U.S. District Judge John McConnell’s ruling from the bench came shortly after another federal judge in a separate case said that the Trump administration’s plan not to pay out SNAP benefits beginning on Nov. 1 due to the ongoing federal government shutdown was “unlawful” but stopped short of ordering the Trump administration to disperse funds. “There is no doubt that the six billion dollars in contingency funds are appropriated funds that are without a doubt necessary to carry out the program’s operation,” McConnell said in his oral ruling. “The shutdown of the government through funding doesn’t do away with SNAP. It just does away with the funding of it. There could be no greater necessity than the prohibition across the board of funds for the program’s operations.”

This was not only a kick in the jewels for the president, but for Speaker Moses as well. On Thursday, he accidentally gave away the whole game. He and his monkeyhouse are using poor children as a wedge to force an end to his shutdown. From The New Republic:

CNN host Dana Bash asked Johnson why he wouldn’t consider moving money around to fund the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which will stop receiving federal funds at the start of November. The House speaker accidentally revealed Republicans are using the program as leverage to end the government shutdown. “Because if you deviate from the goal of reopening the entire government, Chuck Schumer and the radicals over there will continue to play games with people’s paychecks, their livelihoods,” Johnson said. “And if you do just part of this, it will reduce pressure for them to do all of it, to do their basic job, and that is reopen the government.”

I’m no Old Testament scholar, but Moses never struck me as an oleaginous creep.

On Thursday, at a briefing for members of Congress, the administration copped to the fact that it has no idea who it’s been blowing up on the high seas and, typical of this administration, it claims it doesn’t have to know. Heads up, Carnival Cruise Lines. From The New Republic:

Speaking to CNN Thursday, Democratic Representative Sara Jacobs said she was told in a Pentagon briefing “that they do not need to positively identify individuals on the vessel to do the strikes” and that was part of the reason why the administration has not sought to detain or prosecute the survivors of the strikes, “because they could not satisfy the evidentiary burden,” However, as The New York Times reports, the “evidentiary burden” keeps washing up on the shores of Trinidad and Tobago.

The first body washed ashore on Trinidad’s northeastern coast soon after the United States carried out its first strike in September on a boat in the Caribbean. Villagers said the corpse had burn marks on its face and was missing limbs, as if it had been mangled by an explosion. The tides deposited another corpse on a nearby beach days later, drawing a wake of vultures. Its face was similarly unrecognizable, and its right leg appeared to have been blown off.

The bodies have fueled a mystery that is gripping parts of Trinidad and Tobago, the Caribbean nation that is within sight of Venezuela’s coast: Who were they? Did a U.S. strike kill them? Will more bodies appear on Trinidad’s beaches? The intrigue lays bare how the fallout from the U.S. military campaign targeting Venezuela has reached Trinidad. In contrast to other Caribbean leaders, Trinidad’s prime minister, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, is explicitly supporting the strikes on boats that U.S. officials say are carrying drugs.

Well, we’re giving his vultures a meal, so there’s that. This whole thing is going to unravel very badly. Call it the Morone Doctrine. I’ll just slip out the back now.

Weekly WWOZ Pick to Click

“Moaning and Screaming” – Diamond Joe

Yeah, I pretty much still love New Orleans.

Weekly Visit to the Pathé Archives

Here, from 1934, is the celebration of the Wheel of Fortune in Dublin, a massive sweepstakes drawing. They burn the Hoodoo in the Liffey and the black cat stands for good luck. I have no explanation for a) the weird golden headgear, and b) why the narrator found it necessary to point out that the nurses were “bare to the shoulder.” Cool out, dude. History is so cool.

In 1934, LSU football coach Biff Jones was fed up with Governor Huey Long’s meddling with his team. At halftime of a game against Oregon, with LSU two touchdowns behind, Long demanded to be allowed into the Tiger locker room. Jones refused and said he’d quit at game’s end. LSU came back to win and Jones, true to his promise, quit. As they say around New Iberia, plus ca change, y’all, From The New York Times:

Landry, during a news conference regarding state-funded assistance for Louisianans amid the government shutdown, was asked by a reporter about his role in the firing of Brian Kelly and the hiring of LSU’s next coach. When asked about Woodward, Landry emphasized that the athletic director, a position that traditionally hires coaches, would not make the decision this time. “I can tell you right now, Scott Woodward is not selecting the next coach,” Landry said. “Hell, I’ll let Donald Trump select it before I let him do it.

Given the president’s track record of hiring people, this would not be advisable. Coach Laura Loomer might give some people pause.

Landry said LSU’s board of supervisors would form a search committee to select the next coach. That was news to LSU board chair Scott Ballard. When asked by WBRZ-TV in Baton Rouge later on Wednesday for comments about Landry’s claim that the board would run the search, Ballard said “No, I didn’t know that.”

Kingfish would have handled this better. Who looks after shitkickers like you, anyway?

Discovery Corner

Hey, look at what we found! From GB News:

During a three-week excavation at Drumburgh, roughly 10 miles from the city, the diggers unveiled a section of Hadrian’s Wall. … The western section of the wall has largely now been lost to time, making this latest find particularly significant. Archaeologist Mark Graham, of the archaeology group Grampus and Heritage Training, said the find confirmed the accuracy of geophysical surveys that had suggested where the wall ran.

I have a sweet tooth for old stone walls, since there are so many up here. This is the mother of all stone walls. Hadrian, as our president would say, was a builder. Except he actually, you know, built stuff.

Hey, Spectrum 1, is it a good day for dinosaur news? It’s always a good day for dinosaur news!

They were able to confirm that Nanotyrannus is a distinct dinosaur species, not a teenage version of Tyrannosaurus rex, which was the common belief before. “This is the biggest dinosaur discovery of the decade, and I am proud that it is happening right here in North Carolina,” Gov. Josh Stein said in a statement. “North Carolina’s public universities and public museums are continuously on the forefront of scientific research and advancement.”

See, Jeff Landry? This is the way governors are supposed to stray out of their lane.

Scientists have argued about whether Nanotyrannus fossils were a separate species or just the teenage versions of T. rexes. “This fossil doesn’t just settle the debate,” Dr. Lindsay Zanno, head of paleontology at the museum and associate research professor at North Carolina State University said. “It flips decades of T. rex research on its head.”

Turns out this guy had longer forelimbs than T. Rex did. Reach advantage. I’m happy now.

I’ll be back on Monday for whatever fresh hell awaits. Be well and play nice, ya bastids. Stay above the snake-line and wear the damn masks, and take the damn shots, especially the boosters and the New One. In your spare time, spare a thought for the victims of Hurricane Melissa in Jamaica, and of the unspeakable violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and for everyone touched by the mass shootings in Michigan, North Carolina, Colorado, Minneapolis, NYC and Reno, the victims of the Manchester synagogue attack, and everyone recovering from the flooding in Charleston, and in the Roanoke Valley, and in Wisconsin, and in Texas, and in North Carolina, and by earthquakes in Myanmar and Thailand, and in Turkey and Russia, and by the tornadoes throughout the Southeast, and for everyone touched by floods in Kentucky and in West Virginia, and Nigeria, and by the crash in Washington, and by the measles outbreak in the Southwest, and in the wildfire zone around Dallas, and in the fire zones in Napa, and in Las Vegas, Nashville, and Queens, who were visited by the Crazy before the year had hardly begun, and the folks in Dallas and Tallahassee, who were visited by the Crazy this week. And the people in drought-stricken north Alabama. And the victims of Tropical Storm Melissa in Haiti. And the folks caught in floods and tornadoes in Nebraska, and in Missouri. And the folks caught in “historic floods” in Kentucky. And in Oklahoma. And the folks in L.A., now fighting floods and mudslides exacerbated by the recent wildfires. And the folks in the wildfire zones in Pennsylvania, and in Minnesota. And the folks in Lahaina, who are still rebuilding. And the victims of the nightclub collapse in the Dominican Republic. And especially for our fellow citizens in the LGBTQ+ community, who deserve so much better from their country than they’ve been getting. And for all of us, who will be getting exactly what we deserve. Thank you for your attention to this matter.