
Does anyone else find it suspicious that as we enter the Year of the Pig there will be some preposterous oinking from Capitol Hill?
Saaaaaaay: You don’t suppose he’s a Chinese stooge instead of a Russian stooge. …

Does anyone else find it suspicious that as we enter the Year of the Pig there will be some preposterous oinking from Capitol Hill?
Saaaaaaay: You don’t suppose he’s a Chinese stooge instead of a Russian stooge. …

Hmph. After six consecutive days of healthful outdoor exercise I thought I’d award myself a day of rest yesterday.
Should’ve kept an eye on the weather wizards. ’Cause today, it’s snowing again. Bah, etc.
Happily, I wrapped and shipped the latest “Quick Spin” video to Adventure Cyclist on Sunday, so I won’t have to check the integrity of those Jamis fenders today. Instead, I can go for a short run in the snow, see if I can find a new place to fall down.
And it could be worse. It could not be snowing in January, and come June I would be bitching about being on fire.
Or I could be an unpaid federal employee standing in line near the Trump International Hotel in DeeCee, waiting for some free food.
Radha Muthiah, president of the Capital Area Food Bank, tells The New York Times that her organization has had to reassess its targets, which now include people “making upward of $60,000 a year.”
“What was more interesting than the number were the types of calls: individuals who had never had to request food,” she said of those contacting the food bank. “Many had donated, but had never expected to be on the receiving end.
“What this experience is showing them is that so many of us live paycheck to paycheck. Any time of emergency — whether a medical emergency or something else — how quickly one can become vulnerable.”
Some federales are hunting other work, whatever they can find — babysitting, driving for Uber, substitute teaching. This may or may not keep other Americans from landing those jobs.
Notes FDA employee David Arvelo: “Who’s going to hire me not knowing how long I’m going to stick around?”
One common thread running through all these stories involves infernal combustion: people who suddenly can’t afford gas, insurance, car payments, whatever. The humble bicycle looks awfully good by comparison. Unless, of course, it’s snowing.

Once again Charles P. Pierce breaks it all down so the rest of us can lean on our shovels.
Waiting for Mueller is now an unacceptable and inadequate response from the national legislature. Mueller’s job is to see if the president* and his minions should go to jail. The House’s job is to determine if the president* should not be the president* anymore.
Bring it. Impeach the sonofabitch. If nothing else you give him a fresh case of ants in his pants to distract him from rendering the Republic uninhabitable.
Here’s more, from Adam Serwer and Yoni Appelbaum at The Atlantic.

The pestilence of the Benighted States, Wally O’Steele, a.k.a. Artie Deal, wants a Big, Beautiful Wall® at the nation’s southern boundary to keep brown people* from crossing the border to work anywhere other than at his hotels or golf courses.
Unable to procure funding for same, he has instead walled off the feddle gummint from its own tax-paying citizens, idling more than a few of them in the process and forcing others to work without pay while selling their Christmas presents on eBay to keep from freezing to death in the dark.
It’s a hard reign, and the water — if that’s what it is — just keeps rising.
Man the lifeboats and rig for heavy seas, matey — it’s the latest episode of Radio Free Dogpatch.
* Russian oligarchs and Saudi princelings get a pass, of course, along with a coupon for a complimentary fluff and fold at Artie Deal’s Motor Inn & Money Laundry.
• Technical notes: This episode was recorded with a Shure SM58 microphone and a Zoom H5 Handy Recorder. Additional bad noise via an Audio-Technica ATR2100-USB mic and a Sony ICD-UX533. I edited this hot mess using a Behringer XENYX 1200USB mixer wired to a 2014 MacBook Pro with an external LG 24MP59HT-P monitor and Apple’s GarageBand. Obligatory Cultural References From Bygone Days© courtesy the Bard of Hibbing.

I just rang up our freshman representative in DeeCee, Deb Haaland, and asked that she and her colleagues start working up articles of impeachment.
Haaland was quick out of the chute with a response to last night’s State of the Wall Address, saying:
“The real national emergency right now is thousands of New Mexicans not being able to put food on the table or pay rent, because of the government shutdown. New Mexicans need quality public education, good paying jobs, and a renewable-energy economy — the wall does nothing to address those issues. On day one, the House passed a bill to get federal workers back to work and paid, and now it’s time for the Senate and the President to do their part.”
I imagine that the congresswoman has a pretty full schedule, being new to the job, but as I told the woman who answered the phone, “This administration is a cartoon that never was funny, and it’s long past time the show was canceled.”