Tag: Jon Stewart

  • My Dog

    People love animals, especially dogs. If you have spent all of three seconds on my blog, you’ve seen my picture with our dog. She’s a mix, small, smells bad, has bad teeth, hates every other dog on the planet, but is wonderful with people. We joke that our dog won the Doggie Lottery, as she got a family that totally lets her be herself, and is even rewarded for it. Our dog doesn’t do shit, other than shit, pee, eat, sleep, occasionally play, and sleeps some more. And she’s wonderful and we love her.

    I bet if you have a dog, no matter how odd or awful that dog is, you’re going to tell me that dog is wonderful, awesome, and you love them unconditionally. AS YOU SHOULD! Dogs are great, and we are so lucky to have them in our lives. And if you haven’t seen it:

    And I bet you know where this is going. But I’m not here to beat up on a Governor who thought a story about shooting a fourteen-month old dog was a good one, and needed it to be included in her book.

    No, this is more about how Cricket did one thing that no politician, or leader, could do in this country. Cricket united us. On both sides of the isle, we all came together to say that killing a dog, an adolescent dog, for the crime of being “untrainable,” is wrong. Our dogs share their lives with us, are there for us when we need them, they give so much love, and can help us in many different ways.

    Rest in Power, Cricket. In your very short life, you proved that there are still issue that we all can get behind.

    This is my dog, and if you met her, she would love you.

  • PACT Act Passed and Shame is Back for the GOP

    There are many traditions in the United States, but one of the longest running and most prevalent in our 250+ year history is screwing over veterans. From the Revolution to Afghanistan, the US Government has a habit of letting veterans down. I know no American, not one, who is opposed to helping veterans get health care, mental care, access to housing, food, and substance abuse help.

    So, when Republicans pulled their support from the PACT Act last week, sadly, I wasn’t surprised, and neither was every veterans group who has been pushing for the PACT Act. I am just dumbfounded that Republicans believed that they can get away with praising our military one moment and then turn around and fight against supporting that same military when they come home.

    But something happened this week that hasn’t been a part of the Republican party for the past six years; shame. The reason the PACT Act got passed yesterday was that the Republicans in the Senate got shamed. They were shamed by vets, their families, but especially by Jon Stewart. The Senate GOP tried to roll out their arguments against the bill, but no one was having it; everyone saw it for what it was – lies. The shame of telling lies became so great that they caved and passed the bill.

    I think this is important because over the past six years, the Republican party has had no shame. They have doubled down again and again on reprehensible positions and arguments, daring people to call them liars. This was Trump’s hold on the GOP – just lie and do what you want. At the end of the day, if you accomplished your goal, what does it matter what you had to do to get there, right?

    Could this be the crack in Trump’s grip on GOP politicians? Maybe. I know that Trump didn’t weight in on this topic, and that might have changed things. I also know the VA system is still a shit show, which was supposed to be fixed under Obama, so there is shame to be passed around. But, BUT, I think a few years ago, there was no amount of pressure you could put on Republicans to get them to change their votes.

    Change just might be possible.