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This is a preview of the Dingus of the Week. To read the whole thing, go over to Patreon. I’m serious, git out of her!

This week, Politico published a story revealing chats from leaders of Young Republican groups in which they joked about slavery and professed their love for Adolf Hitler. (It’s important to use his first name so we don’t get him confused with the other Hitler.)

And that’s just the PG stuff. Members of the chat talked about raping their opponents. According to Politico’s report, one particular Young Republicans vice chair used the N-word a lot. And as Politico reported, another member of the chat, “who at the time was chair of the same organization, wrote in a message sent in June that “everyone that votes no is going to the gas chamber.”

That member “was referring to an upcoming vote on whether he should become chair of the Young Republican National Federation, the GOP’s 15,000-member political organization for Republicans between 18 and 40 years old.”

So, breaking news: A bunch of amoebic sacs of vanilla pudding sent the exact kind of texts you’d expect them to send: racist ones.

Oh my god — a collection of sentient phlegm behaved in a disgusting manner? What in the pleated-front khaki is going on here!?

➡️ Read the rest of the Dingus of the Week on Patreon.

Then immediately below that:

“Here are five fluffy bathrobes you must buy from Amazon today!”

“Thousands of children are dying in a genocide!”

“How exhaling at the wrong time saps your strength”

“The president deploys American troops against the American people.”

“Are you peeing correctly?”

Am I peeing correctly? It’s the end of the American empire and you want me to worry about incontinence? I don’t have equal rights in this country, I WILL PEE HOW I WANT TO.

Welcome back to the weekly dingus, the newsletter where we make jokes about someone or something in the news, making our lives just a little worse. And it’s a big week for mediocrity.

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Bari Weiss

Because this week, the Elizabeth Holmes of media, Bari Weiss, just became editor-in-chief at CBS. And Bari Weiss makes Ron Burgundy look like Walter Cronkite.

Weiss’ takeover came about after Paramount CEO David Ellison bought her newsletter/reactionary rag/website for every man who declares they aren’t political but quotes Andrew Tate a lot, The Free Press.

Why, you ask? Well, over on Defector, Patrick Redford has a thoughtful analysis that you should read. Because the following sentences fall well short of it. But essentially it has to do with the merger between Paramount and Skydance Media, which was approved by the FCC in July after Skydance swore on a stack of Trump Bibles to eradicate wokeness from CBS.

It’s like the stupidest Succession plotline. Ellison, the son of Oracle CEO Larry Ellison — who is richer than 400 Oprahs — apparently didn’t have enough money. So he needed this merger, and to get it, he had to render up an offering to the angry and petty gods of American authoritarianism. And part of that offering is Bari Weiss.

Not only is this a bad and frankly scary plan, but it’s doomed failure. Ellison thinking that Weiss can appease the Trump administration is like thinking you can fix a broken arm by breaking your neck. Even Megyn Kelly thinks it is a bad idea.

Weiss was the New York Times columnist who couldn’t get a job on The View. The alleged reason was she didn’t test well with audiences, which is embarrassing because Meghan McCain got a job there and so did Elisabeth Hasselbeck. Weiss also couldn’t actually get canceled when the cancel culture grift was good. So she walked off the job, pretending she was being silenced. Then she used that notoriety to found the Free Press, which became a success because it’s been backed by the dollars of a billionaire class that is still utterly livid that five years ago, for three months, America said “Black lives matter.” The billionaires may never recover.

On her first day in the new job, Weiss sent a note to CBS employees that vowed to uphold a journalistic ethos that “holds both American political parties to equal scrutiny”.

Which is the media equivalent of “Read my lips, no new taxes” and “Mexico will pay for the wall” or “I never inhaled.”

Putting your faith in Bari Weiss to uphold journalistic integrity is like hoping Kristi Noem will lose her injectionist’s number, or that the three ghosts of conspiracies past will visit Marjorie Taylor Greene and she will stop believing in Jewish space lasers, or the alien that is using Mitch McConnell’s body as its host will finally go back to the planet from whence it came, or that the Republicans will stop doing a Weekend at Bernies with Chuck Grassley, or that if we ask pretty pretty please Donald Trump will stop using the Constitution as toilet paper, or that RFK Jr. will just leave all that road kill alone. Basically, it’s like hoping that shit will fix the diaper.

But nothing in Weiss’ past would lead us to that kind of equal scrutiny. The Free Press has published articles that fearmongered about trans activism; implied that George Floyd actually died of a drug overdose; salivated over the “virginity” of an AI actress; and claimed that the genocide in Gaza wasn’t so bad because the children dying of starvation had preexisting conditions.

All of this appears under the guise of, “Aw, geez, just asking questions.” They’re not right, they’re not left, the Free Press claims; they’re just asking why all leftists are evil baby murderers. WHY ARE YOU RUNNING AWAY? WHY WON’T YOU DEBATE ME, YOU FILTHY COMMUNIST?!

It’s depressing because it’s a rhetorical trick Americans fall for every time. Give a white person a pair of glasses and have them very calmly state, “I am a deep thinker and I am wondering why you think you have a right to live.” And boom, that person is the EIC of CBS, while billionaires nod their heads sagely and say, “Wow, yes, why did no one think to ask this before?” And pundits herald them as bold truth tellers. If Weiss has a talent for anything, it’s repackaging what people want to hear as a courageous contrarian enterprise.

“I am above politics,” says area media woman who really just means she’s rich enough not to suffer the consequences of how she votes.

But the real problem is not actually what the Free Press and Weiss have said and reported on; some of it, god forgive me, isn’t so bad. It’s what Weiss intentionally leaves out. It’s the stories omitted — the ones about Black women being forced out of the workforce, the violence trans people face, the real cost of the rollback of reproductive rights. It’s the stories of how we got here and why, casually glossed over in favor of the stories that feed the collective click rage. It’s what is left in the silence that is the real damning evidence.

But all of this is not going to work. You let the fox in the henhouse because it promises not to eat the chickens? You let the Kool-Aid man promise that this time he’s not gonna crash through the wall? You are the dingus.

As Redford notes, Weiss will be a kind of Vichy government for CBS, appeasing no one, solving nothing. Because in the end, no milquetoast mediator can reason with the insatiable appetite of authoritarianism.

In other very dingusy news:

Italians, to Trump.

Anyway, speaking of newsletters by writers who were actually fired (hi!), this week marks the five-year anniversary of Men Yell at Me. Thank you so much for being here and subscribing and for sharing with your friends, ex-husbands, parents, and enemies. Thank you for supporting a political newsletter with a feminist slant and making it a success. I cannot wait to talk to you next week about the next five years of this newsletter and how we are going to grow. Every subscriber to Men Yell at Me makes the governor of Iowa a little madder. Thanks for doing your part.

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And now for something good

On October 23, the Iowa Abortion Access Fund is holding our annual fall fundraiser in Des Moines! Get tickets and come meet our new executive director! You might not be able to fix America, but you can fund abortions. I hope to see you there. Also, share this event with your Iowa friends, because we need to sell some tickets!

The worst person you know just made a really good point.

JB Pritzker, the governor of Illinois, told Trump to come and get him after the president said he should be in jail.

And Chicago continues to Chicago so hard.

Protesters in Portland are dressing up in silly inflatable costumes, proving that you can fight back and have fun doing it.

A federal judge sided with Planned Parenthood after it sued the Trump administration over the closure of a program that aims to end teen pregnancy.

Nabarun Dasgupta received a MacArthur genius grant for his work studying the opioid crisis in America. And Tommy Orange won a MacArthur for his writing.

Jane Goodall, in her last interview before her death, said she wanted to blast Elon Musk and Donald Trump into space.

This dog helped the police find his owner (sorry, I mean in the good way). A good boy.

Dolly Parton is NOT dying! SHE IS FINE! YOU HEAR THAT! SHE’S OKAY! *sobs realizing that no one, not even Dolly, can live forever.*

The first round of a ceasefire has been agreed to by Israel and Hamas.

Something I am enjoying

I am back in Iowa and the weather is finally cool enough for me to wear sweaters and eat big bowls of soup like some sort of forest witch in a fairy tale. Which is good because I’ve been trapped in my house working like a maniac. Next week is a big announcement. So stay tuned.

But I am having a hard time balancing motherhood and work. It’s not harder than it was when the kids were 6 and 4 and I was trying to write my first book. And while their father’s work is taken as a matter of fact, my work sometimes feels like a betrayal. I think there is no way to work as a woman and not feel like you are letting down someone you love. I should have more parties for my friends. I should do more volunteer work. I should be writing about one thing over another. I don’t think there are easy answers.

But this weekend is my daughter’s first homecoming dance. And I get to take a moment and see my tiny baby all dressed up and off to have fun with her friends. And then my son and I will go bowling and knock back a couple of Shirley Temples, and eat a plate of fried pickles, and that will be a moment of good in the middle of all of this.

Correction: The first version of this newsletter said “Bari Weiss makes Ron Swanson look like Walter Cronkite.” That was a mistake. Wrong Ron! I meant Ron Burgundy. My apologies to Ron Swanson who has done nothing wrong, ever!

Is it the stress of knowing my health care costs are rising, and so are the costs of my medications?

The rising cost of literally everything due to tariffs? The only thing Trump hasn’t put a tariff on is stupidity, because that would amount to a tax on the wealthy.

Was my pillow positioned incorrectly, thereby causing a pain in my body so severe that it has me confessing to kidnapping the Lindbergh baby?

Is it allergies, which have gotten worse thanks to global climate change and a country that thinks polluting the environment has no consequences?

Is it the knowledge that the administration is sending armed ICE agents into people’s homes without warrants and disappearing them without due process?

Perimenopause?

Blond influencers on Instagram keep telling me to wake up early, splash my face with spring water, and eat more protein. But no amount of protein powder is going to defend me against the rising tide of authoritarianism. Maybe I need some creatine?

At no point has eating more boneless skinless chicken breast made me feel better, and the water in Iowa is poisoned, so at this point I’m just going to take up smoking, swallow seven Tylenol each morning, and bathe in red dye #3 until the microplastics in my brain become sentient and take over.

Welcome, my friends, to the Dingus of the Week newsletter. Each Friday, I make fun of someone or something in the news that has made our lives just a little or a lot worse.

In a time when Jimmy Fallon is being a coward and Stephen Colbert is being canceled, I think it’s even more important to make jokes and to laugh at the army of lobotomized incels running our country. To quote the late and great Molly Ivins, “Satire is traditionally the weapon of the powerless against the powerful.”

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This week, Dunning-Kruger poster boy Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called all the nation’s generals into a room to give them a 40-minute speech that could have been a three-minute TikTok, which could have been a 10-second skateboard to the nuts, or alternatively, an email.

Traditionally, the military does not like to gather all its top commanders into one room because it’s too tempting to our greatest enemies, who continue to target America, our freedoms, and our way of life.

By which I mean other white men.

But Pete, who looks like a nondenominational youth pastor just seconds away from being discovered on Grindr, had an important message that could not be an email, a Zoom call, or a TikTok.

For days leading up to the event, news commentators wondered what the message could be that was so important. What could the man who looks like if Yakety Sax was a person and also drunk have to say to the leaders of the greatest military presence in the world?

Well, listen up chucklefucks, because Pete Hegseth downed a 32oz of vodka and rolled onto that stage and delivered a rousing address to the military that makes the St. Crispin’s Day speech look like a PowerPoint from Brenda in HR.

What did he tell them? Not to get fat.

It’s not like I had high hopes for Hegseth. Trump’s second administration is run wholly by crooks, dorks, brainworms, and sentient lip filler. But Hegseth, a man so sauced even Prego won’t jar him, spent millions of taxpayer money on the day the government shut down to gather everyone together and tell them to stop being so fat.

Anyway, here’s Pete Hegseth hitting himself in the nuts.

@trendy_viewz#PeteHegseth accidentally flipping a #skateboard into his nuts on live TV

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And now for something good

This week, past DotW winner Eric Adams dropped out of the NYC mayoral race, leaving America’s largest village in want of an idiot. RIP to the campaign of a man who made Mr. Bean look like Albert Einstein. (New Yorkers, the nation is counting on you to bear in mind that Andrew Cuomo has spent tens of millions of dollars of your money to defend himself in multiple sexual harassment lawsuits. Please do the right thing.)

The beloved children’s television show “Reading Rainbow” is coming back. This time, the host will be Mychal Threets, the internet’s favorite librarian.

Happy Taylor Swift Day to all who celebrate.

And Philadelphia has its first queer women’s sports bar!

Mark Duplass launched a production fund for queer filmmakers.

Garrett Bucks and Sarah Wheeler have a new podcast. And you know what? That’s very good news.

Like so many ambitious girls who grew up to be called “difficult” women, I loved Jane Goodall. And while I am sad that she died this week, she led an incredible life.

In response to the president’s repeated attacks on the First Amendment, Jane Fonda is reviving a Cold War-era activist group. I really loved the deep dive that one of my favorite podcasts, You Must Remember This, did on Jane Fonda and Jean Seberg. It’s worth listening to recall the smear campaigns that the FBI orchestrated against these women and how so many people believed them and still do.

Nicole Kidman, welcome back.

Something I am enjoying

This week, I am in Maine to run a writing workshop hosted by the MidCoast Villager. The Villager is a small, local, independent newspaper run by my friends Alex Seitz-Wald and Willy Blackmore, who edit the paper, and Lucia Graves, who works on the marketing side.

What a delight to see my friends and spend time in the beautiful world they live in. I ate at Primo, one of the best restaurants in Maine, and made so many jokes about “airy balls” I thought I was going to get kicked out of the place.

The workshop was designed to drive revenue to the paper, which, like so many small newspapers in America, is struggling. But we need these papers and these voices. We need to tell these stories because they are a record of our lives and the things that give them meaning. And even if these stories feel small and inconsequential, in the overwhelming onslaught of a world of genocide and attacks on our democracy, they are the very texture of our lives. Sure, maybe a story about road construction on Highway 1A isn’t the most glamorous thing to write, but it’s far more important to the people who need that highway to get to work than a profile of a famous actress. Every story about a new restaurant is the story of someone’s dream, someone’s future hope. Every story about a high school athlete is a story of triumph. Every story about a local artist is the story of artistic freedom and vision. And every single time we write a story that tells the truth about our lives, even just the fact that we existed, and ate food, and had one glorious night, we leave a reminder that we lived and that we mattered.

​​…no one was working harder to aid and abet the cause of fascism than Ezra Klein, the New York Times columnist and podcaster, who rushed to defend Charlie Kirk’s legacy from Kirk’s own words. Literally no one was asking him to do this, but he was like, “Oh, we need a reasonable centrist to provide a veneer to hate? I VOLUNTEER AS TRIBUTE!”

It’s the stupidest Hunger Games of all time.1

And I thought I was done writing about Klein and his backbone of soggy toilet paper. But he was back this week with a new proposal: Democrats, stop running on abortion rights.

Here was his full quote:

My view is that a lot of people who embrace alarm don’t embrace what I think obviously follows from that alarm, which is the willingness to make strategic and political decisions you find personally discomfiting, even though they are obviously more likely to help you win.

Taking political positions that’ll make it more likely to win Senate seats in Kansas and Ohio and Missouri. Trying to open your coalition to people you didn’t want it open to before. Running pro-life Democrats.

That’s right, you little weasels: A white guy with a beard is here to tell you how to win an election. So put down your matcha lattes or whatever bisexual beverages you drink and LISTEN UP. Here is the plan: To stop authoritarianism, you must give up all your rights. And by “you” Ezra Klein means anyone not him.

Oh you don’t get it? Let me explain again, because I think there was vegan cheese in your ears. In a country where people’s rights are being stripped away and an authoritarian president is actively silencing voices of dissent, Klein’s brilliant idea (derogatory) is to toss even more rights overboard.

Some of you may die, but that is a sacrifice he’s willing to make!

Klein is arguing that Democrats must run candidates who oppose a policy that is so popular even Republicans showed up in red states to pass measures protecting the right to an abortion.

A Pew study this year found 85 percent of Democrats and 41 percent of Republicans believe that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Abortion rights are one of the few things Americans agree on, alongside hamburgers are good and Mitch McConnell is bad.

As you can see, Klein — who is so much smarter than you, with your little pea brain — has made a compelling case: We must simply toss your rights off this boat, as though sacrificing Jonah to the whale, to calm the storms of fascism in America.

What a choice to look at the vast hellscape of American democracy and think, “Okay, the solution is depriving half these people of even more of their rights.”

Ezra Klein is so quick to yeet people’s rights out the window you have to wonder how much he actually believes in them. If Ezra Klein had to make Sophie’s Choice he’d be like “fuck all dem kids.”

If Klein were King Solomon and two women each claimed the same baby was theirs, his solution would be to take away their right to health care and tell them Charlie Kirk was a hero.

Faced with the Gordian Knot, Ezra Klein would interview three pro-knot pundits and write a 700-word op-ed arguing that dialogue with the knot is the only way to fix America.2

Ezra Klein in the French Revolution would spend the entire time chiding the sans-culottes for not wearing pants.

Ezra Klein during the Salem Witch Trials would be like, “I saw Goody Proctor getting health care!”

With Democrats like these, we don’t need Trump and his supporters to take our rights away. We’ll do it ourselves.

Dingus Runner-Up: Jeremy Carl

A Trump State Department nominee has been busy cleaning up his past on social media, where he promoted the racist “Great Replacement” conspiracy, said Nancy Pelosi should be prosecuted, and accused all Democrats of being evil fascists.

In any other era of American history these tweets would get him sent off to run the Heritage Foundation. But it’s Trump’s America, so really the dingusry here is that he tried to delete them and did a crap job at it. Also, if he’d doubled down on them and gotten some lip filler, he could be running the Department of Homeland Security.

Where are those dinguses now?

Ryan Walters, a two-time dingus winner whom you may know as that perpetually damp-looking man from Oklahoma who thinks the Bible belongs in classrooms and porn belongs on his work computer, has resigned his role leading Oklahoma’s schools. That must have been some serious (alleged) porn, my guy.

Cancel culture has gone too far when men simply cannot (allegedly) watch porn on their work computers during meetings. But Walters, unlike Carl, parlayed his right-wing extremism into a job with a conservative nonprofit. And I am sure he will be back.

And now for something good

Global philanthropies are working together to make a promising HIV treatment more widely available.

While not a cure, researchers have been able to treat Huntington’s for the first time, offering a glimmer of hope for people who suffer from the disease and their families.

MacKenzie Scott literally cannot give all her money away. But she’s trying, bless her. This week she donated $70 million to HBCUs.

Chicago gets an all-women’s sports bar!

There is some great news for rabies vaccines!

And the worst person we know, past dingus winner Ted Cruz, actually made some good points.

Fat Bear week continues! Fat Bear week is sponsored by the National Park Service and is like a March Madness bracket where bears go compete for the fattest among them right before hibernation kicks in. This year there is a bear named Flotato, because he naps and floats. Here are some pictures of Flotato, our bear king. If Flotato doesn’t win, I’m going to make January 6 look like a 5-year-old’s birthday party, I swear to god.

Just a reminder that while politicians and pundits continue to let us down, we are the hope here in America. Shout out to all the people protesting ICE. Are you all chiropractors? Because you are out here showing us what a spine looks like.

Ayman Soliman, an Egyptian hospital chaplain, finally won his release after being jailed and threatened with deportation.

Something I am enjoying

This summer, I finally got my backyard landscaped to handle some lingering derecho damage to the retaining wall and fence. And while I was at it, I had the back patio redone, and, I am ashamed to admit, a water feature put in. (It runs off recycled rainwater!)

I spend at least 80 percent of my time at home on my back porch. Even when it’s cold and snowy, I’ve been known to wrap up in a robe, stuff chips in my pocket, grab a heated blanket and have some whiskey out there. The porch was the reason I fell in love with this house. And the backyard has these two gorgeous pine trees that somehow survived the derecho, and we put up a hammock between them, where my kids play a game they call “legitment” where they spin each other around in the hammock until I’m sure someone is going to die.

Perhaps, in hindsight, I picked the best summer of my life to do this project. Road construction in front of my house, plus the backyard construction, plus being busy as hell, meant my house has been perpetually dirty and I’ve been stressed out. In my defense, usually when you ask a company to do a big project, they are like, “We will fit you in … in 18 months.” When I was trying to get renovations done on my bathroom, I had to beg the company, “Please do it before my son hits puberty!” And they did, barely.

But the backyard is done now. And the past couple of mornings I’ve spent outside in a chair, reading books, listening to the water, trying to forget about the decline of man.

And yesterday, I took some time off to plant an offensive amount of hydrangeas. It occurred to me that when the apocalypse settles in, the survivalists who camp out at my house will curse me for focusing on pretty flowers over vegetables, but I’ll be too busy being conscripted into nannying for Andrew Tate’s kids to care.

Villains are going to villain. We expect them to be villainous. What pisses me off are all the well-meaning people rushing to help them. Like, I know it seems like the slide into fascism is inevitable, but do you really have to roll out the red carpet? Like, do you have to whip out your coat and put it over the puddle, so JD Vance doesn’t get his shoes wet as he sashays away to get us all fired?

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Dingus Runner-Up: Ezra Klein

This week, no one was working harder to aid and abet the cause of fascism than Ezra Klein, the New York Times columnist and podcaster, who rushed to defend Charlie Kirk’s legacy from Kirk’s own words. Literally no one was asking him to do this, but he was like, “Oh, we need a reasonable centrist to provide a veneer to hate? I VOLUNTEER AS TRIBUTE!”

It’s the stupidest Hunger Games of all time. Tracker Jackers, but it’s just a host of podcast bros who cannot grow facial hair wearing ill-fitting khakis to follow you around demanding you debate your right to not die of sepsis in a parking lot.

Lizard mutts, but it’s just the president’s Cabinet, and you have to pretend like they’re helping the economy while they chew on your lower intestine.

Jabberjays, but it’s just a bunch of blond women with lip filler telling you how much they love being a stay-at-home girlfriend while they rake in thousands from Instagram posts sponsored be DefinitelyWon’tMakeYouCrapYourself cooking oil.

“I’m a wife and a mama!” is the last thing you hear before you bleed out through your ears.

Klein wrote a whole column arguing that Kirk had done “politics right.” Which is completely accurate if you ignore everything Kirk ever said or did or stood for. Like if you completely ignored the virulent racism, the homophobia, and the transphobia, the history of racism in Kirk’s organization, Turning Point USA, and the iffy way it skirted campaign finance laws, then sure. That’s politics done right.

Plastic bags have more structural integrity than Ezra Klein, and a lot more backbone.

Ezra, buddy, did they give you a gold star for being such a good bootlicker? Does it help you to be the dictator’s favorite little boy?

Ezra Klein in 1916: “Grigori Rasputin Was Practicing Politics the Right Way”

I would make Klein the dingus, but Ta-Nehisi Coates already took him to the cleaners, writing of Kirk in Vanity Fair:

What are we to make of a man who called for the execution of the American president, and then was executed himself? What are we to make of an NFL that, on one hand, encourages us to “End Racism,” and, on the other, urges us to commemorate an unreconstructed white supremacist? And what of the writers, the thinkers, and the pundits who cannot separate the great crime of Kirk’s death from the malignancy of his public life? Can they truly be so ignorant to the words of a man they have so rushed to memorialize? I don’t know. But the most telling detail in Klein’s column was that, for all his praise, there was not a single word in the piece from Kirk himself.

This country and our pundit class are so good at ignoring the words of Trump and his supporters. For years now, we have had leaders who will stand up and say things like, “I am going to punch babies in the face.” The headlines then read, “Republicans vow to reach out to American children.” Then, a year later, when a baby gets punched, everyone is shocked, surprised, and upset by the black eye. But inevitably, the pundit class will write effusive columns noting that perhaps fewer babies would get punched if only the liberals weren’t so self-righteous about it.

Centrists lining up to go chide liberals, while Republicans make jokes about the murder of politicians, and cheer on the deportation of lawful permanent residents of the US.

Dingus of the Week: ABC

But this week, the real dingus was ABC, which put Jimmy Kimmel on indefinite leave after the president complained about one of Kimmel’s jokes and FCC chair Brenden Carr threatened to pull ABC’s license.

And you know it’s a bad time in America when a man who used to host a show called “The Man Show,” which featured women with big boobs jumping on trampolines, is considered too liberal.

It’s a bad day in America when the guy who made his career on a show with “Juggy Girls” is now the one holding it down on our rights. Like if I have to go to bat for a problematic white male comedian, at least make him funny, like Dane Cook.

Okay, what happened was that on his ABC show, Kimmel observed, “The MAGA gang (is) desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it.”

Kimmel added, “This is not how an adult grieves the murder of someone he calls a friend. This is how a 4-year-old mourns a goldfish.”

In response, Carr went on Benny Johnson’s podcast to threaten to pull the license from ABC and its affiliates for Kimmel’s crime of making fun of the president. You can understand why Carr, a public servant, would talk to Johnson. Johnson is a good, trustworthy, corn-fed Iowa boy who also happens to be accused of being verbally abusive to staff, and has also been accused of a plagiarism or two. You know, a good Midwestern guy (derogatory).

And ABC immediately capitulated, putting Kimmel on indefinite leave.

Carr claims to believe the FCC should champion free speech, but my good man, is free speech in the room with us right now? Did you help all the free speech when you threatened to fire the men for speaking?

We are dying from all this freedom. We are choking on all this free speech. We are literally asphyxiating on the First Amendment.

But it’s ABC that is the real dingus here. Recently, ABC, which is owned by Disney and ergo has so much cash it’s the equivalent of 27 Bezoses, settled a lawsuit with Trump after he sued the network when George Stephanopoulos incorrectly stated that Trump had been found liable for “rape” in the E. Jean Carroll case. Trump was actually found liable for sexual abuse. They could have spent one half of a Bezos and fought this, but no. ABC settling so quickly, without even a fight, did not augur well for this new era of American dingusery. I’ve had farts with more perseverance than ABC.

If only there were some sort of historical precedent that we could look at and learn from? But alas!

What is all the money good for if you can’t use it to fight creeping autocracy? What are you using the money for, ABC? Are you using it to train ants for a live-action A Bug’s Life?

Or did it think it could appease the beast by bending to its every whim? Did it think that if it made one sacrifice, the administration would pat its leaders on the head and let them continue on with business as usual? Did those leaders think that by sacrificing a George to the angry orange god, they could save a James?

Or is this an “every fortnight we sacrifice one man into the volcano to appease the hungry gods of free speech” kind of a situation?

Like when the Republicans said they wanted to make this a Christian nation, I guess I didn’t realize how many people would be hanging off crucifixes.

Me, looking at all the free speech in America.

On a more serious note:

Every week for the past five years, I have written a Dingus of the Week. It began as a way to make myself laugh at a time when I was at my lowest. I, too, had been fired from a media job. Then, my crime was telling my boss not to publish an op-ed that argued unarmed Black people deserved to be shot. For that, I was labeled “insubordinate.” That, coupled with the backlash campaign to my work mounted by local Republicans, meant I was out just a year after I started the job.

After that, I started this newsletter as a way to support myself and my kids, because there were no more media jobs in Iowa. And the Dingus of the Week was part of that endeavor, because I’ve always believed that if you can laugh, you can survive. Maybe a joke can’t change the world, but it can make it better and more inhabitable. If you laugh, you know you are going to be okay. And problems you can laugh at are problems you can beat.

Attacking the laughter, taking away the jokes, is a way of stripping us of our humanity.

So, I will keep making my little jokes here. I will keep saying Jared Kushner looks like a wet paper towel, and I will keep saying Trump’s Cabinet is a collection of expired dairy products, and that RFK Jr. is a worm-addled Habsburgian prince of the collapsing American empire.

And as long as I am independent, let me just take a moment to say: We are living under the most corrupt administration that America has ever seen. It makes Watergate look like a high school prank. And the way Kirk’s death is being manipulated into an excuse for an authoritarian crackdown on teachers, journalists, comedians, and so many more people is both craven, pathetic, and dangerous. And any centrist who plays cuck to this charade should be ashamed.

And I’ll see you all in hell.

Thank you for supporting me.

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And now for something good

Local Johnson County Supervisor Jon Green defied the governor’s orders to fly the flags at half staff in honor of Charlie Kirk. And it’s nice to see someone willing to use the power they have to call bullshit on the absolute nonsense that is happening. You simply do not have to do what you are told. You don’t have to hand it to anyone. You don’t have to capitulate to the violence of an unjust order.

People in power only have that power because we give it to them. So, we can take it away. We can refuse to comply. We can stop trying to keep the peace. There is none.

So thanks, Jon Green, for reminding people, even for a moment, that we have a choice. We can do our best to gum up the works of this fascist project called the Trump presidency.

Every time Rudy Giuliani suffers, an angel gets its wings.

Literally, a whole-ass study proved that unions are good.

Lisa Cook continues her fight against Donald Trump. Good for her.

Fat Bear week is upon us! And this refers to literal bears, not the burly gay men. Although this newsletter vehemently and ardently supports all kinds of bears.

Shut it down.

Something I am enjoying

When my son started preschool, he hated it. He’d so much prefer just staying at home and reading books all day. And when I’d pick him up, I’d ask him how his day was, and he’d say, “terwibble.”

At that time, he also loved it when I sang him “Big Rock Candy Mountain,” which is a folk song about the Great Depression, where the narrator imagines a hobo’s paradise. “Oh, the buzzin' of the bees in the cigarette trees/ The soda water fountain.”

Every night when I sang that song before bed, I changed the lyrics to imagine his paradise. “Where your sister always shares/ And you don’t have to wear your clothes, you can wear your underwear.” Because he thought everything was “terwibble,” I began making him tell me one good thing that I’d try to make up a verse about. Some days it was cookies, soccer, cats, puppies, snuggly blankies, no school, and sisters not being violent. Whatever it was, I’d try to make up a little verse about his paradise in that moment.

He’s 12 now, and we still sing “Big Rock Candy Mountain,” and every night that I get to put him to bed, we imagine new ways the world can be better, new joys to extend, new happinesses we never want to end.

I am sure one day soon he won’t want me to sing it to him. And like with so many moments, I won’t know when my last day will come. So every night I get to put him to bed, I make up little utopias just for us. And I am so happy for every moment I get to do it.

Of course, I am talking about another school shooting in Colorado, where two students are in the hospital after a teenager with a gun opened fire and then took his own life.

Of course, I am talking about Putin launching drones over Poland, pushing the world closer to wider wars.

Of course, I am talking about the ICE raids.

And of course, I am talking about Charlie Kirk’s murder at Utah Valley University.

Pundits have been decrying the political violence. The plot to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer; the storming of the Capitol; the attack on Paul Pelosi; the assassination attempts against Donald Trump; the assassination of Melissa Hortman and shooting of John Hoffman; the arson attack against Josh Shapiro.

But every day, the very same people decrying the political violence are enacting political violence: taking away trans rights and reproductive rights, violently arresting immigrants in the streets, and threatening all-out war on US cities. America was founded by and on political violence.

This violent country is made only more brutal by the violence that hides under the guise of “just asking questions,” and those questions are often about the right of Black, brown, and trans people to live. And guns. Always the guns.

And Now, the Dingus of the Week: Twin Towers Teas

If you identify as a human, this has been a hard week. Also a bad week for moderately sentient robots, because kids don’t use them to cheat in school over the summer, which must be a terrible feeling. Kind of like Henry VIII once the gout hit, or Al Capone once the syphilis hit.

So out of respect for everyone, I found a low-stakes dingus that I think we can all agree was working hard for America.

A store (whose name I will not reveal, because we don’t need to doxx these patriots), that this week was selling “Twin Towers Teas.”1

The teas were a special to commemorate 9/11. Nothing says the “strength of our nation, America” like tea — a beverage we famously tossed into the sea as part of our nation’s founding.

Yes, these absolute patriots created a drink so that we will never forget how awful that day was. Because these so-called teas sound worse than a terrorist attack in your mouth. Pomegranate and coconut, two of the key ingredients in these drinks, are not native to the United States, but that’s okay, because I am sure that the store selling these drinks loves immigrants. So, nothing to worry about here.

Still, we must ask: What do these drinks actually taste like? Freedom? Tariffs? That quintessentially American metallic flavor of back-of-the-throat panic over not being able to pay your medical bills?

The really good news is that these drinks are named after Tower A and Tower B. So any real American has to buy both. But you only get to buy Tower B after the toxic collapse of the first tower has imploded your guts and your tastebuds.

One can only assume that once you drink both teas you automatically grow a pair of wraparound sunglasses, don a Blue Lives Matter t-shirt, and get a divorce.

But in true patriot spirit, here is a list of other 9/11-themed foods (beyond Freedom Fries, of course) I’d love to see:2

Dirty Bomb Martini

Terrorist Taco – You cannot eat it; you can only shoot it.

Wontons of Mass Destruction – These tiny delicious pockets of flavor will give you diarrhea more explosive than your uncle on the Fourth of July after seven beers. Just kidding; they actually don’t exist.

Lasagna bin Laden – He’s hiding in there!

Flight 93 – 93 shots of beer. Domestic, of course.

Fried Valerie Plamtations

Rudy Giuligazpacho – Show America your love by drinking a soup colder than the heart of NYC’s fifth-worst mayor. If you spill it on yourself, you can kind of look like you have Giuliani’s melting face.

Spanikopatriot Act – Layers of flaky FOIA dough, filled with cheese and spinach.

TSAlfredo – This is a normal dish, but before you can eat it, the restaurant gropes you and rifles through your valuables. Also, you’re only served 3.4 ounces of liquid.

WARdorf salad – Again, this is normal food, but you cannot stop eating it, it goes on forever and ever, and it costs $911 trillion.

Lady Liberty Fingers – She’s pointing at you and accusing you of not loving America ENOUGH.

Condoleeza Rice

Dingus runner-up:

Also, as part of my very deep and serious joke-making process, I Googled “Foods that start with A” and was given this result.

And now for something good

I really appreciated this thoughtful response to the week’s news by , who wrote in his newsletter:

“Life is not precious in our world. If it were, we would not disappear human beings and pretend that doing so solves social problems. If it were, we would not rest until everybody was fed and clothed and housed and loved. If it were, we would not be so skittish at naming the patterns of caste and exclusion that still define our lives. If it were, we would not coronate the people we do, reward the behavior we reward, applaud any work that draws us further away rather than closer together.”

There is no great way to transition from that thoughtful and insightful essay and into the next good thing, so I am just going to say, DRUNK RACCOON!

A couple exchanged vows over a Chili’s Triple Dipper, and I have new relationship goals now.

Trans teens sued the state of Iowa and won.

Also, science says it’s actually great to let your kids just watch Bluey, so if you need to do that this weekend, you have my permission and science’s permission. It’s good for them. Now, go take a little nap.

New Mexico becomes the first state to offer free childcare.

Octopuses are ambidextrous but tend to use their tentacles like we use our arms, favoring one side over another. And I know the world is bad, but it’s also filled with weirdness and wonder.

Something I am enjoying

For almost three years, I have been on the board of the Iowa Abortion Access Fund. I joined after Roe was overturned because I felt like if I was going to write about the Iowa I wanted to exist, then I needed to do the work to make that happen.

I no longer go to church, but I was raised Baptist, and part of me still believes that faith without works is dead. And if we want the world to be a better place, we have to do the grassroots, uncomfortable, unglamorous work to make it better.

And this summer, I got to live that in a very real way.

In the spring, the executive director of the fund had to step down for personal reasons. As a result, I spent the summer running the Iowa Abortion Access Fund. It has been laborious, time-consuming work — all the unexciting things, like making sure bills get paid, emails get sent, job postings are written and posted, meetings attended, rules followed, interviews are held, everything is put to a vote, we document, we take notes, people’s ideas are heard, frustrations aired, and conflicts resolved. The work of making the world better is often boring, repetitive, drudgery, and so, so necessary.

I have never run a hiring process, but I kept telling the rest of the board, if Pete Hegseth can run the Department of War, then I can do this, with their help. And they did help. It was a team effort.

More than once, I cried from being so tired and burned out. My laundry is in shambles. So are the floors of my house. I haven’t cooked many real meals this year. We’ve been living off pasta and takeout.

On September 8, our new executive director, Beaufield Berry, started her job. She’s incredible. She’s a mother, an artist, an activist, and someone I am so proud to have run our organization.

Thus ends the summer I ran an abortion fund. What did I learn? I think I learned that the work of community requires putting ego aside. It requires listening and kindness when you want to rage, and it requires putting your foot down and making decisions when you’d rather not be in charge at all. It requires research and collaboration. And it requires showing up when you’d rather hide in bed. At some point, I resolved that even my 40 percent was better than no one’s 0 percent.

Everyone in America right now is despairing. We are afraid and worried. And we should be. It’s very worrying out there. But finding something you believe in and doing that work even when it is annoying and exhausting is the only way I know to make this place better.

To celebrate, this evening I will be toasting with a drink of brandy, apple cider, lemon, and ginger beer.

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This week, Malcolm Gladwell, the very wealthy bestselling author and staff writer for the New Yorker, said he’d been forced to say trans women belonged in women’s sports.

And wow, poor little baby. Malcolm, are you okay? Do you need to go to the hospital? Should we call your mom to come pick you up?

What did the bullying look like, Malcolm? Is the bullying in the room with us right now?

Gladwell, whose work has been repeatedly debunked by legions of exhausted social scientists, but who somehow still gets heralded as a genius, went on “The Real Science of Sport” podcast with host Ross Tucker and sports journalist Mike Finch.

In the interview, Gladwell talked about being on a panel about trans women in sports hosted by Tucker in 2022. Tucker, who is a vocal opponent of trans women competing in women’s sports, voiced his opinion at the event, but Gladwell said that he felt too “cowed” and “ashamed” at the time to say he agreed with Tucker.

This explanation, much like The Tipping Point, is a bunch of gilded word turds — crack the shiny surface and it’s just a bunch of shit.

Gladwell already tipped his hand in 2019 by retweeting Tucker’s long-winded analysis of the issue, calling it “smart.”

Then, three years later, Tucker had Gladwell on a panel to talk about the issue, and Gladwell, a wealthy man who has yet to suffer any sort of consequence for churning out takes with the intellectual rigor of a conversation at RFK Jr.’s dinner table, felt “cowed” into silence?

The man wrote a whole book praising military tactics that target civilians. He glorified military atrocities! No one asked him to. Everyone was just minding their own business, and Malcolm Gladwell, Kool-Aid Man, burst through the wall and was like, “Hey! Here is a book about how I think bombing cities is genius!”

If you are ashamed of something, my guy, be ashamed of yourself.

A major part of Gladwell’s career has come from convincing legions of dinguses that they could overcome any lack of talent by simply spending 10,000 hours doing something and becoming an expert. Repeated studies have debunked all of this.

Also, Gladwell’s latest opinion really undercuts his own theory, because even if he spent 20,000 hours studying this issue, he’s still wrong. Nevertheless, he persists.

I have written about this topic before, so I won’t bother repeating myself. There is no threat posed by trans women competing in sports. But you know what does threaten women? The fact that I have fewer rights in 2025 than I did five years ago.

It’s truly distressing that in 2025, as our cities are invaded by a tyrannical despot who is actively rotting in front of our eyes, the purported great minds of our era are too busy rotting in a stew of transphobia to do anything about it. Who convinced these absolute losers that targeting less than 1 percent of the population with unfounded hate made them interesting and anti-orthodox?

Kids are dying of gun violence at school and these absolute TED Talk-pilled poster boys for Dunning Kruger are like, “Well, actually, it makes me interesting and not a total creep to talk about a stranger's hypothetical hormone levels on a podcast.”

Also, how is this dingus’s tipping point common decency? Like, people said to him, “Hey, this is a complex issue that doesn’t really affect many people at all. Let’s let trans women play and not spread transphobic rhetoric?” And one of the wealthiest writers in the world responded by curling into a ball and crying, “Help, help! I’m being repressed!”

There are truly no bounds to the desperation of the planet’s most fortunate people. So hungry are they to experience one actual minor inconvenience so they can crow about being victimized that they’re forced to pull fake problems out of the ether. Yes, the wealth enjoyed by certain prominent authors would surely buy a lot of therapy. And yet! Here we are.

I can’t wait to explain this period of history to my grandchildren as we sit around a campfire, armed to the teeth, fearful of the roving hordes of sentient AI-bots coming for our potable water. “Yes, sweeties, women were dying of sepsis in hospital parking lots, but Gavin Newsom and Malcolm Gladwell really hated trans women, so we had to talk about how one swimmer got a fifth-place win over some blond girl while they passed laws taking away our vaccines, and we died from the measles. But hey, at least a subpar college athlete got to take fourth place.”

Dingus Runner-Up: The People Who Emailed to Explain Burning Man to Me

Last week, after I wrote an incredible (if I do say so myself) newsletter roasting the attendees of Burning Man — or as I like to call them, “All my friends’ ex-husbands” — I got no fewer than three very long emails explaining Burning Man to me. All the emails were basically, like, “Burning Man is about inclusion and acceptance, you stupid slut!” Even more people reached out on Substack notes to call me humorless and boring.

Which, yes, definitely, ranting at a stranger online makes you the fun one. That’s right. No, no, keep explaining in 900+ word emails about how Burning Man attendees aren’t the most exhausting chuds on the planet. This all makes perfect sense, you absolute haboobs.

To quote Coldby in the Discord, what we have here is infinite nesting dingii.

And now for something good

Another day, another lawsuit.

Republican Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming is “deeply concerned” about RFK Jr.’s handling of the CDC. And yeah, my man, it’s very concerning. Maybe stop clutching your pearls and do something?

Women should not have to talk about the worst things that happened to them to make everyone care. That said, I am always so grateful when survivors tell their truths.

A court ruled that Trump’s tariffs were illegal. Now, the actively decaying president is asking the Supreme Court to intervene.

Let’s all bully our politicians a little more.

Dinosaur body armor? DINOSAUR BODY ARMOR!

Remember to take my reader survey

Please don’t make me beg. I mean, I will beg, but don’t make me! Just take the survey.

Something I am enjoying

This week, I got very sick and spent a lot of time sitting in bed, high on cold medicine, watching Department Q, which is a dark British crime drama full of a lot of mean people. And I loved it.

I also made this potato soup recipe, and it received rave reviews from my kids, which is the highest of praise.

Also, despite feeling like my throat had been stuffed with flaming pieces of straw, I am enjoying that it is shorts and sweater season.

Also, be it known: I do listen to men, sometimes. And it might take four years. BUT I DO LISTEN.1

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Have you ever wanted to do MDMA with a bunch of tech bros in an outdoor stewpot of mud and piss, with the vibe set by the worst electronica imaginable, and some guy named Trey is demanding to take you to the consensual Orgy Dome while a totem pole of precariously stacked vehicles looms above you? Well, get your ass to Burning Man.

Burning Man is Fyre Festival for people on ketamine.

Burning Man is like a trade show for DJs, where men who have nicknamed themselves “Lampshade” and “Cheeze” will tell you that The Matrix is a good idea, actually.

Burning Man began in 1986 and was initially conceived of as a weeklong countercultural festival in Nevada's Black Rock Desert, at a spot that Burners call the Playa, that centered art and free expression. Now, it’s basically glamping for every man who was behind the 2008 market crash and their third wives.

To be fair to Burning Man, the Orgy Dome, which was destroyed this year by a massive dust storm called a haboob (I know — you can’t make this shit up), is still more stable than the housing market these men built.

But at Burning Man, these men are not concerned with consequences or what evil AI robots they’ve currently unleashed upon humanity, squaring our electricity bills, sucking up our water and convincing the worst person you know that ChatGPT is Jesus and they should definitely become a prophet. No, they’re too busy shirtcocking.

Don’t know what that is? It’s walking around with a shirt but no pants on.

This is Disneyland for fucksticks.

Back to the Orgy Dome, which is a real thing. You can have an orgy on a bunch of mattresses floating on a mud swamp* with a bunch of strangers who think #MeToo went a little too far. (*Actually, given the haboob situation this year, it may have been more like a pack of horny chinchillas writhing around in their dust bath.)

If that doesn’t sound sexy, then wow, are you contributing to the male loneliness crisis? Treyvis Williamford McMuffin III (his playa name is Panty Dropper) has to vote for Trump now because you’re so uptight.

Don’t worry, though, the Orgy Dome organizers vow to rebuild. And I for one find that to be an inspiring testament to the strength, resiliency and potency of their will. And their dicks.

Burning Man is the EPCOT of Trump’s deregulatory agenda. And if your dream is to be mansplained to about the paleo diet and have a 56-year-old man contemplate the nature of reality while he grabs your ass, then it can be your EPCOT, too.

Young people at Burning Man? A bunch of nepo babies cosplaying as Marxists. Their family money comes from strip-mining Appalachia, but they’re going to go on shrooms and tell you about how they’ve found strength and inner peace in these trying times by going offline, eating organic food, connecting with nature, and drinking raw milk.

Also, Burning Man is dangerous. People die there. And injuries are so common SFGate reports that attendees can come out with piles of medical debt. And like, imagine your name is Pepper McFadden and you have to create a GoFundMe because you broke your arm falling from the top of a 70-foot-tall Labubu made from Poppi cans while high on nitrous, wearing a My Little Pony backpack and no pants.

I know all of us are God’s children and we all deserve lifesaving medical care, but this does make it challenging to stand on principle.

While researching Burning Man, I discovered that in 2023, Diplo and Chris Rock evacuated (along with many others) because of heavy rainfall. The two said they walked for six miles before hitching a ride out in someone’s truck. Apparently, that was a very controversial move! Let me quote from Zapper Jones, your Reddit guide to Burning Man:

Last year, when someone had turned on a lightning effect at the Fluffy Cloud stage, Diplo stopped the music, dropped his headphones and started running away like Forrest Gump into the darkness of Deep Playa. The Reason was that apparently he is terrified of rain and has massive cloud cover anxiety. Look, anyone who Bailed out early because of the rains of 2023 should have never been allowed back. I have ZERO respect for anyone who turned their backs on the community and ran away. There was no valid reason for anyone to leave. Work is not a valid reason for leaving. If you got fired from your job because you went to Burning Man, then you need to get a different fucking Job. Did you need to leave early because you brought kids? If your kids can't spend a few extra days in the rain then you should have never fucking brought them along in the first place. Or maybe you just need to get new kids. Either way, None of Ya'll should ever be welcomed back.

Petition to give Zapper a Pulitzer. Because that is the funniest paragraph I have ever read in my entire life. The whole post is absolutely incredible.

Don’t Diplo out, fucksticks. Not even for your kids.

And now for something good

In Iowa, Catelin Drey, a Democrat, won a special election for a House seat, breaking the Republican supermajority. They still have a majority. But Drey’s win, I think, is a model of what an outspoken woman can do with a social media platform, an incredible ground game, and an actual strong liberal stance. People want to vote for people who stand for something.

Kari Lake has been barred from removing the head of Voice of America.

Whoever is heckling Susan Collins, keep it up.

Tina Smith.

What I am enjoying

This week, I got to do a lot of exciting behind-the-scenes MYAM work that I will talk about very soon. In the meantime, I got to scream my head off at my daughter’s first high school swim meet and watch her win every single one of her events.

My god, the adrenaline rush. I totally understand Tonya Harding’s mom now.

Also, I haven’t had much to drink lately. But on Tuesday night, I did break open a bottle of Bødalen Whiskey, which is made in Minnesota, and had a small glass on my back porch and enjoyed the cooler weather.

Also, this review was one hell of a way to learn that Elizabeth Gilbert was the inspiration behind the most perfect movie ever made.

Diplo, out.

Burrows became speaker after winning more Democrats over to his side than Republicans — 49 Democrats and 36 Republicans.

According to the Texas Tribune, “In his acceptance speech after winning the gavel, Burrows promised to protect the House as an independent institution, where lawmakers could disagree with each other without fear of repercussions and get a fair shake, even if they’d opposed him.”

*whomp whoooomp*

Let’s see how that promise is working out.

As speaker, Burrows has pushed through every item on the GOP-led agenda; is overseeing the incredibly gerrymandered redistricting process; and imprisoned a Texas representative inside the Capitol building.

This week, Democratic state Rep. Nicole Collier wasn’t allowed to exit the Capitol after she refused to be shadowed by an armed escort. Collier and other Democrats fled the state to delay a vote on the redistricting process in Texas. This is a time-honored protest tactic in Texas.

And it was deployed this time to draw attention to the craven power grab happening in the state.

According to the Texas Tribune, “...the map dismantles Democratic strongholds around Austin, Dallas, and Houston and makes Democrat-held seats in South Texas redder — all without seriously jeopardizing any of the 25 districts Republicans already control. The proposed map also would push a handful of Democratic members of Congress into seats already represented by other Democrats, setting up possible primary battles between long-serving members of the Texas delegation and younger newcomers.”

Collier and other Democrats fled the state and delayed the vote for two weeks. They returned after lawmakers in California vowed to do the legislative equivalent of “I’m rubber, you’re glue” in their state and gerrymander right back — this time for the Democrats.

When Collier returned, Burrows insisted that she and other lawmakers could only leave the Capitol building if they were followed by a 24-hour police escort. Tell me more about the party of small government, will you? Collier refused those terms and was imprisoned on the Capitol floor until the vote happened on Wednesday.

Remember what Burrows said about being fair and letting people disagree with him? Turns out what he meant was, “Fall in line or I’ll detain you and violate your constitutional rights.”

It’s arguable that Burrows’ actions are not supported by law.

But what is not arguable is that he’s a smarmy bottom-feeder with the moral integrity of dog vomit.

I’ve seen mollusks with more spine than Dustin Burrows.

And listen, I wasn’t present in the back-door negotiations that led to Burrows being elected speaker. Perhaps there was the idea that a Burrows-brand House would hurt less than one led by a more hard-line Republican.

But if 2025 has taught us anything, it’s that there is no negotiation with terrorists, or the whiny little cave-dwellers who promise they are reasonable and then just go about treating habeas corpus like a roll of Charmin. There isn’t a softer, gentler, more sane Republicanism that you can deal with. When your choices are being smothered to death with the flag or choked out on the Constitution, does it really matter? If your murderer says sorry at the end, does that make you any less dead?

Dingus runner-up:

In a normal week, trying to bribe a reporter by putting $160 in a chip bag would make you the top-tier dingus. But in 2025, that level of crispy, idiotic corruption barely ranks. My favorite is the lawyer essentially saying, “Let’s just forget this all happened. Friends just give each other money in chip bags. It’s normal. No worries!”

And now for something good:

This week, James Dobson joined Hulk Hogan in the league of dinguses who died before they could be properly roasted here on Earth. But that’s okay, because I know he’s roasting in hell. Where Lyz fails, the devil prevails.

Dobson was the head of Focus on the Family, an Evangelical nonprofit that is responsible for at least 65% of what is wrong with most American adults. Turns out, we needed him to focus a little less on the family.

Dobson, a homophobic misogynist with a face like God turned it in at 11:59 on the sixth day of creation, spent his one wild and precious life arguing that parents should beat their children and their dogs. And I know, because it was his books that led to my being terrorized by a wooden spoon that had “Spare the rod, spoil the child. Proverbs 13:14” written on the bowl, which over the years became cracked and broken from being used to hit me and my siblings.

But that’s not his only contribution to America’s evils; Dobson did everything he could to make the lives of gay people worse. Sir, the only thing threatening about the gay agenda is that you might have to use some moisturizer.

He lived 89 years too long. And I hope he’s found a home in that great gender-neutral bathroom in the sky.

I do not know this woman, but she is innocent.

The Onion is bringing print back.

Every day Alex Jones gets closer to losing his empire, we all get closer to returning to the warm light of God’s love.

Maryland is rejecting the Trump administration’s efforts to censor what schools can teach.

And Gavin Newsom is working really hard to shake those dingus allegations. I am not retracting his title, as he is the No. 1 winner of the Rahm Emanuel Award for Politicians With Heads of Hair and Hearts of Craven Ambition, but I am appreciating the memes.

And a judge ruled that Florida needs to shut down Alligator Alcatraz.

Something I am enjoying

It’s the week before school starts, and I’ve spent the summer running an abortion fund.

And I am exhausted. I took most of the week off to parent my kids — back-to-school shopping, endless appointments for eyes and teeth and, well, everything else. Then, next week, I begin working on some VERY exciting changes at this newsletter.

Which I hope to be able to tell you all about soon. In the meantime, I took Wednesday off to do laundry, fold clothes, drink red wine and scream-sing Celine Dion.

If you don’t remember Davis, lucky you and I’m sorry. Davis was the Rowan County, Kentucky, clerk elected in 2014. In 2015, after the Supreme Court legalized gay marriage in Obergefell v. Hodges, Davis refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. She was sued and ordered to issue the licenses. She continued to refuse and spent five days in jail for contempt of court; a judge and jury later ordered her to pay a total of $360,000 in fees and damages.

Davis lost her 2018 reelection bid and has clearly spent the past decade or so doing what Jesus would do — stewing in the juices of her own hate-filled heart. Now she’s bursting back into the American political consciousness like a poorly dressed Kool-Aid man.

Davis recently petitioned the Supreme Court to overturn Obergefell (and also, separately, to overturn an appeals court ruling earlier this year that she really does have to pay that money). While it’s unlikely that the Supreme Court will rehear the case, the fact that this homophobic bridge troll who cosplays as a Christian freedom fighter is rearing her brittle head of hair again is truly a recession indicator. Don’t we deserve a new set of villains — not just the run-through ghouls of the past?

Not to mention gay people and their allies deserve a better enemy than a woman still sporting a Bumpit and a missionary’s reject-pile jean jumpers.

Kim Davis claims she was fighting for her religious freedom, but if that was the case, she should have just resigned from the job. If your job is to dig holes, and then you convert to an anti-hole religion, you don’t get to insist on being paid for not digging holes and then compare yourself to Jesus Christ himself.

Sorry, Kim, you aren’t a freedom fighter. You are using your religion as a tool of oppression rather than a tool of liberation.

As Larry Wilmore pointed out nine years ago, “Going to jail for what you believe in does not necessarily put you on par with Martin Luther King. Jeffrey Dahmer was in jail because he believes in eating people. That doesn’t make him a freedom fighter!”

I am not the first to point out all this sanctity of marriage business is a bit ironic coming from a woman who has been married four times to three different men. I’m not against divorce! I am very pro-divorce. But if you have such a literal interpretation of the Bible, Kim, your divorces count as multiple sins. I mean, per Evangelical math, three divorces? That’s like a butt sex and a little manslaughter.

Also, as Andrew L. Seidel writes in his book American Crusade, Davis also got her job in the first place from a healthy dose of nepotism.

So to recap, the woman who got a nepo baby government job and has had more spouses than Father Abraham is still out here acting like some paragon of holiness. And in the entire decade, she hasn’t bought one bottle of conditioner. I’m honestly not sure which is more offensive.

Anyway, my religion says that I can discriminate against raggedy bitches named Kim Davis, and if you say I cannot, then you are oppressing me and I will take it all the way to the court of Christ himself.

Runner-up: Owen Shroyer

The Vikings have two male cheerleaders. And that’s great.

But what’s really amazing is how mad it’s making some Vikings fans.

Listen, male cheerleaders have been around for a long time. My little brother was one and the guy is in the Army. He is not what anyone would call “woke.” And he hates when I write about him, so I will stop because he’s better with weapons than anyone else in the family. Except, for me, weirdly, which is a long story that goes back to growing up in Texas and winning a lifetime membership to the NRA at the age of 10 because I won a shooting competition. ANYWAY.

George W. Bush was also a cheerleader! And last season, according to Outsports, seven NFL teams had a total of 18 different male cheerleaders — some gay, some bi, some straight. Additionally, the Panthers had a trans cheerleader.

None of these things has stopped Owen Shroyer, a radio guy who I refuse to learn any more about, from being so mad that he’s spitting. And honestly, I love it. Are you made that your game with the men in tight tights where they pass balls back and forth and between each other's legs might be a little gay? Are you worried that a male cheerleader is going to ruin your view of the scrum of heaving, sweaty bodies of men?

You — a man who cheers for men in sports — are mad that other men are cheering for men in sports, but they have better hair and pom-poms? Are you just furious they have such nice skin? What’s going on?

Actually, I don’t really care. Don’t tell me. Just hire the gayest, cuntiest boys, and put them on the squad. And then let me bask in the impotent outrage of these men. Inject it straight into my veins.

And now for something good

Taylor Swift announced a new album. And she did it on the Kelce brothers’ podcast, which I think is a sign that the patriarchy comes for us all. A new album means that the Swifties now have a new little project and I love that for them. I think Swifties could find and release the Epstein files if they thought Taylor left an Easter egg in there.

Gen Z is making my eye bags trendy.

A special gift just for readers of this newsletter

Last week, I wrote about my newfound love of Trail Mixers, a powdered form of low-dose CBD and THC that my dear friend Megan and her husband created through their company Yonderbound. It combines three of my favorite things — supporting friends, Iowa businesses, and a little THC. And apparently you all loved the idea of them so much that last Friday, Trail Mixers had their biggest sale day ever.

As a “thank you” to the MYAM readers, Trail Mixers is giving us a little deal. Use the code DINGUS10, and it's good for 10% off their entire order. Right now, it'll combine with the free shipping code GETRADICAL for a limited time, so double whammy. Megan says she doesn’t know when the free shipping will end, so order now.

Get Trail Mixers

Something I am enjoying

Summer is always rough as a single mom with no summer childcare. This summer has been even more overwhelming as I have been managing the Iowa Abortion Access fund, hiring a new executive director, starting work on a new book project, and doing some very exciting behind-the-scenes stuff with this newsletter that I think you will all be very pleased to hear about.

This week, my kids asked to make some tea and sit on the couch and talk. This was a tradition that started in 2020 as a way for us to wind down together. We don’t do it every night, but whenever we need some deep heart-to-hearts, the signal is, “I’m going to make some tea, do you want some?”

So, they made tea and we sat on the couch. My daughter asked her brother if he was worried about starting sixth grade and she listened to him and gave him advice on the teachers he will have. And they laughed and talked some serious shit about their school, commiserating together, and there was only a light amount of physical violence.

And despite everything, I just felt so lucky – like I was the richest woman in the world to have these two people and my two dogs, my work, our community, and our little house.

I could use a nap, though.

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This week, that sentient Froot by the Foot, the man who looks like roadkill got turned into beef jerky with a voice that sounds like a haunted wooden gate, RFK Jr., defunded mRNA vaccine research.

This is really good news if you are longing for the sweet release of death. But for everyone else, including those of us who are a little ambivalent, this is bad.

You know it’s bad when the people who are actually experts in the field are screaming, crying and throwing up. Which is my translation of this NPR headline, “Public health experts dismayed by RFK Jr.'s defunding of mRNA vaccine research.”

NPR is not sensationalist. Twenty rabid toddlers armed with knives could take over a daycare in the San Fernando Valley and the headline would be, “Daycare troubles have some California parents concerned.”

NPR is so responsible.1 They will not worry you at all. They’re like the journalistic equivalent of your Midwestern mom breaking bad news to you.

“Oh yeah, no, your aunt won’t be on vacation with us. Oh, why? Well, she died in a car accident last week. No, I was going to tell you, but the authorities were still picking up pieces of her off Highway 151. Make sure you pack sunscreen, sweetie.”

In fact, let’s just do a quick NPR headline translator:

Headline: Federal records contradict what FEMA leader told Congress about Texas flood response

Translation: FEMA is more dysfunctional than your uncle’s third marriage and everyone in charge is gaslighting you and we have the receipts!

Headline: Trump's broad tariffs go into effect, just as economic pain is surfacing

Translation: The economy is sinking faster than your son Aiden's chances of making the major leagues. Hope you like being poor, you dumb sluts.

Headline: Trump cuts threaten access to birth control for millions of women

Translation: THE ONLY BIRTH CONTROL JD VANCE WANTS YOU TO HAVE IS THE HOLY SPIRIT. BETTER START STANDING IN FRONT OF SOME MICROWAVES .

But honestly, sex with a straight man? IN THIS ECONOMY? Who can afford it?

Now, back to RFK, that termite-eaten human fence post who clearly wants us all to die. Because why else would he defund life-saving technology?

That worm-addled Habsburgian prince of the collapsing American empire is out here canceling vital scientific research because he thinks it’s dangerous. Which is the equivalent of getting rid of all the elevators because of that one scene in Final Destination. You are trying to solve a fictional problem.

I’ll never forgive that brain worm for not finishing the job.

And now for something good

The Las Vegas strip is being unionized.

You can’t have health care but you can have golden sriracha Doritos.

I love that Texas lawmakers literally fled the state rather than be part of the GOP’s extremely corrupt redistricting scheme.

*puts finger to ear* Sir, I’m hearing that Fox News actually told the truth.

Elizabeth Warren continues to be right.

And funny.

What I am enjoying

A couple of weeks ago, my friend Megan sent me some Trail Mixers – THC-infused dissolvable powder that can go inside any beverage. They are single-serve, low-dose, and really tiny; they fit inside my purse, which is now small because my kids don’t need diapers anymore and carry their own snacks or just beg me to buy them some Starbies.

Megan has been my internet friend for years and she and her husband are the brains behind Trail Mixers. This week, as I continue to do a lot of work with the Iowa Abortion Access Fund, start working on my next book, plan for the school year, get kids to their various camps, and somehow feed them and myself, I had a very small meltdown.

The meltdown looked something like me sobbing on my bed in the middle of a pile of printed-out school calendars, my laptop, and a phone with 27,000 school apps all buzzing at me.

Which led to me taking part of Wednesday off and going paddleboarding. I started paddleboarding in 2021 as a thing to do on weekend mornings when my kids were with their dad. It’s an easy way for me to put my phone away and get out on the water and just stare placidly at the trees and water, and angrily at the McMansions that line the lake shore.

This week, it was made all the more chill with the Trail Mixers. I just mixed a little into my water bottle. Paddled around for an hour and then came home and took a little nap.

So, if you want to support an Iowa-based company and bring some THC into the next Kesha concert, I highly recommend them.

And also paddleboarding.

And also, I recommend a little meltdown, as a treat.

So many of these dinguses have made it into the Cabinet of this administration that you’d think the president himself was combing through the newsletter, thinking, “Who sucks the most? I need that guy to run the Department of Defense. A drunk and he’s not qualified? I MUST HAVE HIM!”

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And sometimes it’s a her! Because Trump is very inclusive about handing power to all evil people. And if 2025 has proven anything, it’s that women can be just as despicable as men. You go, girls! And by “go” I mean “straight to hell.”

This week, I thought I’d do a “Where Are They Now?” roundup of the people so inept, so craven, so supremely unqualified that they could only be the ones in charge.

Ryan Walters:

The school superintendent in Oklahoma is a bastion of Christ’s love, purity, and holiness. He’s fought hard to protect kids from such vicious evils as “reading books” and “gay people.” He has worked tirelessly to ensure that aspects of the Constitution, like the separation of church and state, are flagrantly violated.

Given his history, how dare you accuse him of having porn on his work computer during a closed-door meeting with the Oklahoma State Board of Education? This is CLEARLY the work of Satan. Yes, Satan has gotten ahold of you and made you lie about this man, this pure innocent man, with hair that rises like the golden light of Christ’s love and a forehead that gleams like the damp dew in the Garden of Gethsemane. How can you accuse that face, that face that looks like a megachurch youth pastor just hours away from a statutory rape accusation, of anything untoward?

As I wrote last year, in Oklahoma, where carrying pretty much any sort of gun is legal, there are easier ways to shoot yourself in the foot, my guy.

Tariffs:

Tariffs were named as a dingus in April, but wow, have they continued to dominate the headlines (derogatory).

Not since the married guy I met on Tinder in 2018 have I seen anyone so consistently afraid of commitment as Donald Trump with tariffs. My god, sir, this is dandruff levels of flake. Like corn levels of flake. Like “I’m a 52-year-old man and not sure what I want from a relationship” levels of flake.

I’ve seen pie crusts with more structural integrity.

Are we on again? Off again? Are we having a manic episode? Who can say? Certainly not the syphilitic brain behind the absolute chaos of this economic moment.

Marjorie Taylor Greene:

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has two meth-addled hamsters instead of a functioning brain. She is the one politician with less pathos than Cruella de Vil. In fact, murdering puppies for their coats would actually be one of the more likable things this woman could do. I have seen puddles of dog diarrhea with more charisma. Given all of that, this week, Greene actually said that what is happening in Gaza is genocide.

She is right, of course. But you absolutely do not have to hand it to her. That would be like giving Hannibal Lecter an award every time he didn’t murder someone. But somehow, in this timeline, she has a little more moral courage than Sen. John Fetterman.

And now, a blunderbuss approach to dinguses

Pete Buttigieg:

This week, the man perhaps most thirsty for the presidency, Pete Buttigieg, noted that “there are fairness issues” with trans people in women’s sports. Regardless of the context of his remarks, it is incredibly cowardly to stoke the fires of transphobia to try to score some political points.

There are so many better ways to handle this question, like, for example, pointing out that this is a non-issue and involves maybe five people in all of America, and there are better ways to handle it than passing laws that unfairly target trans people. People keep talking about how media-trained he is and how savvy. Seems like this time he couldn’t be bothered. At this point, it’s becoming exhausting to say, “Stop throwing trans people under the bus to win over some bigots who were never going to vote for you anyway, you knobheads.” But let me just say it again.

Anyway, this week, Pete wins the Rahm Emanuel award for politicians with heads of hair and hearts of craven ambition.

The presidential fitness test:

As if we weren’t miserable enough, the presidential fitness test is back to traumatize your kids. Just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse in America, now your kids have to do pull-ups in front of their friends and most devastating bullies, learning not how to be healthy, but how to be traumatized.

Sydney Sweeney:

Every generation has a blond actress that no one can be normal about. That said, I’d rather walk across a wasteland strewn with LEGO pieces or step in dog shit at 2 AM on my way to the bathroom than write about Sydney Sweeney’s ad or explain it. To quote Sam Sanders, “Everything I have learned about Sydney Sweeney, I learned against my will.”

And now for something good

• I just love it when I get to see dingus on dingus violence. In this case, it’s Trump vs. Hawley. And also, it’s Joe Rogan vs. Trump. It’s like that old Irish proverb: Live by the conspiratorial brain worms, die by the conspiratorial brain worms.

• RSS is back, you beautiful nerds!

• WHAT CAN’T WOMEN HOLD?

• Some Celsius cans were accidentally mislabeled as High Noon. And as someone who has had Celsius, I have to say, I probably wouldn’t notice if it made me a little drunk. Also, a little free booze? In this economy? THANK YOU.

• And the AP won its lawsuit against the White House.

• Violent crime rates have fallen! But my own personal thought crimes are up, so good luck to the Minority Report team as they try to catch me.

Something I am enjoying

This week, I snuck away to Galena, Illinois, for a quick overnight. I ate at Fritz and Frites, which is a wonderful German and French fusion restaurant, then got high and watched The Firm.

And while there, I got to tell the incredible story about the time I went to Galena with a former politician (who shall remain nameless) and we heard a ghost say BACON.

Also, Open Mike Eagle has a new album out. And in this house we love Open Mike Eagle!

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