A brief rant, to start. I’m now seeing music videos, lyric music videos, that also have AI lyric gibberish accompanying them. I never signed up for the AI lyric gibberish, and I have no idea how to get rid of it. It detracts from experiencing the music. And to now have that shit shadowing the real lyrics? You know where I’m going: No new data centers.
Who Hasn’t Ever Written A Letter Like This To Their Employer?:
A few things become immediately clear upon reading two letters Trump White House aide Natalie Harp allegedly wrote to President Trump, which were published by the Daily Beast on Thursday: One is that Harp, a 35-year-old woman in possession of a college diploma, a master’s degree, and a $150,000-a-year job in the White House, has absolutely no idea how to use a comma. But another, probably of more urgent concern, is that none of the media reports that described Harp as scarily obsessed with Trump appeared to be exaggerating even a little bit.
These letters, previously seen by reporters and quoted in books and articles, were published in full this week amid a late-August frenzy over Harp and her role in the Trump administration. (The well-sourced but, according to some critics, embellishment-prone journalist Michael Wolff said he obtained them while working on a recent biography of President Trump. Though they haven’t been verified by anyone beyond Wolff at this point, New York Times reporters have claimed to have seen letters too, and the bits they’ve quoted appeared to match language contained in these.)
And now, we’ve got these letters. Both appear have been written to Trump during or after a May 2023 trip he took to Scotland and Ireland to visit his golf courses there. The first is an apology, and the second is also sort of an apology, but also a journal entry–like reflection, thank-you note, and love letter, all wrapped into one. What is she actually apologizing for? The letters are so overtly sycophantic that I’d believe that she makes a habit of regularly apologizing in writing just in case she happens to have done anything wrong lately. In the first letter, she refers to walking on one of the golf courses rather than taking a cart. Does this mean Trump specifically chided her for walking on a golf course instead of taking a cart, or does it mean that Harp perceived him sneer in her direction and began to worry it had something to do with her chosen mode of transportation? Both scenarios are believable and yet completely bizarre. Harp also apologizes for calling Trump—doesn’t Trump famously love picking up the phone?—and not returning texts promptly enough, though she shunts some of the blame for that one toward some guy named “John.” “I want things to always be right between us,” Harp writes, sounding like more like the fictional voiceover from a young-adult novel than a real person.In the next letter, Harp spends more time musing about her relationship with Trump. They have really good conversations, she repeatedly asserts. Has anyone ever had a good conversation with Trump? If I didn’t already suspect Harp of being severely delusional, that alone would be evidence enough. She writes that she misses the days when she was just a “talkshow host,” when they used to talk about “everything and nothing.” Uh, no wonder Melania Trump is apparently wary of this woman. At the end of this letter, Harp chooses to quote Jane Austen of all people: “I could not have parted with you, to anyone less worthy,” she writes. In Pride and Prejudice, this is what the main character’s father says about the man she eventually marries, Mr. Darcy, as in: You found a good match. When Harp says it, she’s talking about her late father, and how he is probably proud that she’s with Trump now, but needless to say, she is not with Trump in the same way Elizabeth Bennet was with Mr. Darcy. Unless. “And, I will add, it is I who is unworthy.” I am just quoting that part to make you barf, whether from the grammar or the meaning or both.
The Pentagon on Friday fired the editor-in-chief of Stars and Stripes and a top reporter for insubordination after they spoke publicly against any interference by the Defense Department in the military news outlet that has a long history of editorial independence. It was the latest move by an administration that has grown increasingly aggressive toward the news media.
The newspaper’s publisher, who announced his impending retirement days ago, was also dismissed.
Erik Slavin, editor-in-chief of the military newspaper that is partly funded by the Pentagon, told The Associated Press he was dismissed for insubordination after an interview he gave that objected to potential censorship by the U.S. military. He received a notice of separation, as did publisher Max Lederer — who had just announced his upcoming retirement — and Middle East reporter Lara Korte, Slavin said.
Chief Justice Roberts Ain’t Fooling Us:
Chief Justice John Roberts on Friday allowed the White House to continue construction on President Donald Trump’s $400 million ballroom project for now, as the Supreme Court considers the Trump administration’s emergency request to intervene in lawsuits over the project.
The temporary order comes hours before lower-court rulings would have forced a halt to aboveground construction. It will remain in place until the court issues a more durable decision, though the one-page document does not detail his reasoning or indicate when another ruling will be handed down.
Is this mic on? The ballroom project is not gonna be partially unbuilt during this stay. Especially since:
The Trump administration says 65% of the work has already been completed on the planned 90,000-square-foot (8,400-square-meter) ballroom, where the East Wing stood before the president ordered its demolition. Crews are working 20 hours a day, seven days a week on the project, where about $200 million in private donations has been spent or committed, according to court documents filed by the Justice Department.
Some Republicans are blasting President Donald Trump over his administration’s efforts to lower U.S. beef prices by temporarily allowing up to 300,000 metric tons of ground beef to be imported without tariffs.
“Importing a bunch of foreign beef is just a giant gift to the meat packers who then get to undercut our American ranchers who cannot differentiate their product from the cheap foreign shit,” right-wing podcaster Tomi Lahren said on X, adding that American ranchers are “being driven out of business so the land can be gobbled up for data centers and other bullshit.”
The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association issued a statement following Trump’s announcement, making it clear that it was “disappointed.”
“While America’s cattle producers share the goal of keeping groceries affordable for consumers, flooding the market with government-subsidized, below-market beef is not the way to rebuild the American cattle herd,” the statement read. “Cattle markets have already turned sharply lower this morning, to the detriment of farmers and ranchers.”
ShowerCap’s Back! Enjoy your weekly Snark-A-Thon:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2026/8/21/800087840/community/natalie-light-of-my-life-fire-of-my-loins-if-they-still-worked-which-they-do-not/