Dingus of the week: Lisa Murkowski

A flamethrower and thoughts and prayers

This week, The 19th News profiled LGBTQ comedians who are using humor to conquer fear and to find joy and laughter in a dark time. Esther Fallick, a trans woman, told the 19th, “Humor helps us look at it. It’s a bit of a Novocaine, so we can continue to stare it in the face. We don’t have to look away if we can laugh at it.”

That is the ethos of this newsletter. Yes, I write about serious things on Wednesdays (and sometimes Sundays). But every Friday, we look the horrors dead in the eyes and call them a dingus.

Thank you for reading and for subscribing. Paying subscribers keep this newsletter going. From now until we all die by Lisa Murkowski’s hand.

This week, Congress passed Donald Trump’s spending bill, which was (un)ironically titled the “One Big Beautiful Bill.” Which is the equivalent of naming strychnine “A Totally Safe Thing to Pour into Your Grandmother’s Well.” Or shards of leaded glass “New Year’s Eve Party Confetti!”

Ironic isn’t a strong enough word. I need another word that indicates that I am laughing while sobbing blood.

The bill will pile trillions of dollars onto the national debt over the next decade, according to Congressional Budget Office estimates. It would also leave millions of people without health insurance and cut federal funding for food stamps by hundreds of billions of dollars. But don’t worry, because it also enshrines tax cuts for corporations and wealthy individuals. And you can sleep well tonight because those cuts will be paid for with the blood of innocents.

Wrangling over the This Is Totally Not Going to Condemn People on Medicaid to Die Bill took all week, with many Republicans holding out, because — and this is going to surprise you — it’s a bad bill. It’s so bad even the bad guys are like, “Wait, I don’t like this.”

But the What If We Made Out With Mark Zuckerberg Inside a Shuttered Rural Hospital Bill finally passed because Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski ultimately caved and voted yes. Murkowski wants you to know she totally didn’t want to. She had to. It was the right choice for her. But you know, it was really, really hard and she doesn’t like it, but she still went ahead with it anyway. Like, ma’am, you aren’t describing sex with your husband on a Friday night; this is cutting nutrition assistance and health care for millions of the most vulnerable people in America.

To win Murkowski over, Republicans changed the bill to give Alaska a carveout for SNAP restrictions and some funding for rural hospitals. If Murkowski had held out any longer, our nation’s new capital would be Anchorage and the American flag would depict a salmon riding a moose.

In an interview with NBC political correspondent Ryan Nobles, Murkowski stared in stunned silence after he told her that Sen. Rand Paul had described her vote as a “bailout for Alaska at the expense of the rest of the country.”

In fairness, I too stared in stunned silence, but only because that’s the smartest thing Rand Paul has ever said.

Murkowski was silent for 10 whole seconds. Her response would have been more apt if Nobles had asked about her body count — not to explain why she’d vote for such terrible legislation.

“Oh, my body count? 12 million.” *blushes*

Eventually, the outraged Murkowski said she was doing what was best for Alaska. But I’m not sure what Alaska she’s talking about, because 38 percent of Alaskans are on Medicaid. And one expert warned Alaska Public Radio that if the bill is passed, the state could be forced to cut access to “so-called ‘optional’ Medicaid services, like dental care, vision care, or in-home care.”

You know, optional things like seeing through your eyeballs, having teeth, or your homebound relative receiving lifesaving medical aid.

If Lisa Murkowski were Sophie of Sophie’s Choice, she’d have both her children shot and then issue a statement saying it was a very difficult decision but ultimately she had to do what was right for her.

Asked to solve the trolley problem, Murkowski would kill the person on the tracks with her bare hands, set fire to the trolley, poison the switch operator, and end all access to public transit.

Murkowski, as King Solomon, would take one look at that baby, get out a flamethrower, and then send thoughts and prayers.

As I wrote back in May:

This is like if, in trying to balance the household budget, your dad proposed killing the weakest of your siblings. I mean sure, maybe you save some money on chicken nuggets, but the murder charges are going to cost more than that to fight in court.

This is the political equivalent of burning down your house to save money on your water bill.

Hitting your dog with a car to spend less on dog food.

What if I cut off my feet to save money on shoes?

And now for something good:

Wisconsin, known around here as the Spain of the Midwest, also won my heart this week by striking down a 176-year-old abortion ban.

I don’t actually think that rich people filing for bankruptcy is an unqualified good thing, as they often use it as a way of refusing to pay court settlements and other debts. However, I do know that Dr. Phil is having some bad days, and that makes my cold Grinch heart grow two sizes.

A group called Unbreaking is meticulously cataloging the damage being done to America. While the need is not a good thing, this is hard and necessary work and I am so happy someone is doing it.

I never thought a man talking for eight hours would be a good thing, but it’s 2025.

Democrats aren’t the only ones who hate all of this.

Gay penguins Flounder and Scampi welcome a baby chick.

Something I am enjoying

This week, I got to take a lovely trip to Wisconsin with my kids, one of my sisters, and my brother-in-law. It was a trip we had to reschedule after my daughter qualified for the regional swim competition over spring break. But it was well worth the wait.

We went to a place called Blue Harbor Resort, where we used to go for years when my kids were little. We stopped going in 2020 for obvious reasons. And I finally decided it was time to go back.

It was such a lovely time. We ate cheese curds every day, and I never once had to ask for a side of ranch; it just was always there. Wisconsin is a land where ranch dressing flows freely, the beer is cheap, the swimsuits are sensible, and no one looks askance when you double-fist a margarita and a vodka lemonade.

My son, who is almost 12, rode the riptide so much and had so many Dippin’ Dots that he puked, then rallied. I rolled down the hills on the resort, and I also rode the riptide and got pretty decent at it, even though my hip flexors are killing me this week. (Why? I have no idea. It might not even be related. I don’t care, I’m 42.)

To that end, at the resort, I rediscovered the joys of the painkiller, a rum-based drink that the bartender made me after making the mistake of recommending a “skinny margarita.” And I responded by saying, “A skinny margarita? For a woman? IN THIS AMERICA!? I need all the sugar!”

He then made me a rum drink, which when I looked it up was close enough to a painkiller that we are calling it good. You might want to drink these as you contemplate America this holiday weekend.