Welcome to Day One of OMGreg

The wiring is still being tucked away and the paint is drying, but we’re out here. And, to be clear, we is pretty much just me: Greg. I’ll try to use I instead of any kind of royal “we” as we go — dang it, already messed up.

Let’s get to the point — thank you for checking this out, I really think you’re going to enjoy it. If you just want some brief updates during the week, please subscribe for the free version and check that out. If you want some more in depth, including the full week’s preview on Sunday nights, consider paying $5 for a paid subscription.

I have been writing comedy, and about the news, for what is now a surprisingly large amount of my time on Earth. But I’ve never done it in this format — regularly putting it down in print. So I’m taking a bit of a risk here, but one I think we (you and I, not the royal we) are going to have a great time with. This week I’ll be dropping pieces on Tuesday and Thursday, and next Sunday will be the first full sized Sunday Service. But before we get to all that, and before Easter draws to a close, let’s talk about one big story of the upcoming week.

SUNDAY SERVICE: The Adventures of Pete & Pete’s Phone

So, there are a lot of stories to keep in the ol’ brainbox this week:

• Donald Trump held up a doctored photo of Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s knuckles to “prove” he was an MS-13 gang member. Couple problems there, because it’s photoshopped and also because even if you’re an MS-13 gang member you have due process. Especially when the Supreme Court went out of their way to say you specifically have due process. That’s like visiting the Statue of Liberty and she leans down to go, “Hey, everyone, check out this huddled mass in particular!” [TANGENT: Fun fact about the Marvel Cinematic Universe… apparently in that NYC they built a new Statue of Liberty, kept it copper, gave it Captain America’s shield, and then no one liked the shield and it went back to the old but-not-green version. And none of this is talked about at length in any movie, it just… is hovering there in the background canon.] Also Sen Van Hollen went down to El Salvador and met with Garcia, which is the kind of direct principled action that meant he was attacked by Republicans and Centrist Democrats who wish he’d just talk more about egg prices instead of what can happen to brown people in America.
  

• JD Vance went to the Vatican and mostly got ghosted by Pope Francis. Vance took his family (he’s the only one that’s Catholic after he converted somewhere between growing a beard and starting to love Trump) and didn’t get any time to meet with the Pope he dislikes and wants to be replaced by a Latin-speaking robot who wants to talk to you at length about how the death penalty is actually allowed in Church teaching. Now you might not be super up to date on Pope Francis’ leadership style, but he has… a strong hand… which was exemplified today when he gave Vance less than half an hour to get a scolding in person before Papa Frank had to go give the Urbi et Orbi message to the entire Earth. Always backstop a bad meeting with a hard out — papal wisdom.

But the BIG story, the one that’s gonna be bubbling up everywhere this week, involves Secretary of Defense and “guy mumbling the alphabet to himself backwards just to practice for the DUI test” Pete Hegseth.

Bad week for Pete, which started with his old coworkers talking about how he liked to eat food off the floor. We’re talking a bagel with cream cheese lands on the floor and Pete chows down. Very normal guy! Cool and normal! Why did we stop calling them weird oh right because the Obama / Carville wing got to Kamala and said not to do it anymore uh oh I’m spiraling time to calm down with some floor cream cheese….

I don’t want you to think everything in this newsletter will be a rambling mess — at least 20% will be cogent thought. So let’s get to that quickly and talk about the Pete story that’s going to be in your feeds and cable shows and probably social settings.

Pete was part of the first Signal scandal, the one where information on a military strike in Yemen got shared on an unsecured group chat before the attack happened. Signal, if you don’t know, is pretty secure. But also Signal, if you don’t know, has already been hacked by the Americans, the Chinese, and the French. Yeah, even the French are in there reading your texts and critiquing your movie night choices.

SignalGate was bad but the administration pushed past it by (a) lying about what happened (b) not caring they got caught and (c.) eliminating any kind of governmental authority that could punish them for it. But then tonight news broke that a second SignalGate scandal had hit the tower. And this one seems worse because instead of sharing it with, y’know, heads of government, this was a group chat with his wife and his brother and his personal lawyer. Dude was in Signal chat rooms showing airstrikes!

How and why did this come out now? Pete has been firing dudes left and right from DoD for “leaking” (something they deny and say there is no evidence of) and having these people frogmarched out of the building. [Not Fun Fact: frogmarch originated with British police and how brutally they moved suspects in the 1800s! Bobby Lives Matter!] But when you fire a bunch of people who’ve been around you and heard all your secrets… your secrets come out. This is like, d-bag 101. It doesn’t matter how horrible your best friend Deuce is to be around. You will never make him pay you back that $1500 from March Madness, because if you end the friendship he’s speed-dialing your girlfriend to explain what actually happened that time you came home covered in glitter.

This broke on a Sunday night, with enough time for everyone to stew on it before tomorrow morning. Does it mean Trump’s gonna fire him? That depends on if Trump gives a s#!t, or if he understands what’s going on with an app he’s already said he doesn’t know about. [Remember, Trump is very old and is the kind of guy who gets in a Tesla and says, “It’s all computer!”] So who knows if Pete’s out. But he certainly has an active enemies list who’s seen the full Regina George Burn Book.

Lots of words will get wasted on Pete’s response and aghast Democrats and bla bla bla. In reality this is pretty simple: this guy was a soldier and then a TV host and now he’s doing a job he’s not at all qualified for, nor are the buddies he hired to work with him. Like usually happens in this situation [see: Mat Ishbia owning the Phoenix Suns] it all come crashing down as reality hits and people start attacking each other. He’s making dumb mistakes because the entirety of his life screams: this is a guy who makes dumb mistakes. Pete Mess Up. Dog Bite Man. World Spin Round. We just gotta hope it ends in a frogmarch and not a thumbs up emoji to “should we launch the nukes?”

See you Tuesday. Who knows what happens by then.