1 month ago
Showing posts with label satire. Show all posts
Showing posts with label satire. Show all posts
Thursday, September 09, 2021
Friday, October 20, 2017
Relative Depravity
"The Republican Party has gone from Abraham Lincoln to Sarah Palin to Donald Trump. No wonder they don't believe in evolution."
Andy Borowitz
New Yorker satirist, in this short speech
Apart from the common mistake of equating Darwinian evolution with progress (and of course this great joke depends on that), Borowitz is keying on a major reason for our collective cognitive dissonance: the bar for what's normal in Washington and national politics has dropped so far so fast that we're continually thrown into disorientation.
There is also the problem of quantity. There were usually a few cabinet members, a few congressional leaders, who stood out for being especially atrocious. But the current administration is uniformly atrocious, you might even say super-atrocious, though in a completely dull way, as is the current congressional leadership. Particularly with the cabinet this obscures any difference among them, except in the specific ways they've illegally wasted taxpayer money and wrecked whatever they touch.
Among the results for observers are scandal fatigue and outrage exhaustion. Another indicator I've noticed lately is in the inevitable characterizing of two people in a dispute, one as the relative bad guy, the other as the relative good guy. The bad guy is usually pretty bad. But the relative good guy is maybe getting too much of a pass.
It's a human reaction to a binary consideration, familiar to some of us around this time of the year when we inevitably choose our favorite between two teams in the World Series, both of which in the regular season we loathe, or are at least scornfully indifferent towards. (Yankees or Dodgers anyone?)
But it does make us forget just how loathsome the relative good guy in any story actually is in the real world. Senator Mitch McConnell may be less offensive by some criteria than Steve Bannon, but McConnell has been as destructive to this country and the future as any human on the face of the earth during the past nine years.
His complete cynicism began by deliberating opposing everything that President Obama proposed regardless of its merits, subverting the Constitution by refusing to consider a Supreme Court nominee, and finally refusing to cooperate in a bipartisan warning that the Russians were trying to interfere in the 2016 elections and threatening to characterize any such statement by the Obama administration as partisan politics against the Republican candidate.
Senator Bob Corker has been getting good media and kudos for courage as he attacks our apprentice dictator in the White House. He may be due credit for that, and he may play an important role, but his record in the Senate is obstructionist and rabid rightist. He opposed the stimulus that got us out of the Great Recession, and voted against efforts to curb greenhouse gases, among other objectionable positions. But he does look good in a suit.
One of Corker's big objections to the White House is its insane foreign policy, particularly involving North Korea, so full marks for that. But his eloquent sanity on this gives him credibility to boost Secretary of State Tillerson as a good guy v. Homemade Hitler.
Talk about a low bar--there are few individual creatures on the planet who on balance isn't preferable to Homemade Hitler. Tillerson has indeed opposed and perhaps restrained HH on North Korea and perhaps other flashpoints, and he interestingly not only called HH a moron but refuses to say he didn't.
But Tillerson has practically destroyed the State Department, which as much as HH's bluster, could be decisive in getting this country into a war, killing our troops and citizens and costing us billions, not to mention the suffering of others. As the ex-Exxon CEO he is also among the cabinet members turning over government decision-making to the oil companies for their profit.
Media reports also prime us to root for WH chief of staff General John Kelly, the "adult in the room" restraining the romper president from his world-threatening tantrums. Day after day Kelly is lionized, and his possible dismissal or rumored dissatisfaction to the point of resigning, are breathless big news.
But Kelly is a blunt far rightist and partisan all the way, as he proved with his statements Thursday absolving the apprentice dictator from his hamfisted comments to a grieving widow on the way to accept the remains of her fallen husband (comments which seem now to be awkwardly based on what Kelly told him to say.) Kelly conveniently forgot that this entire episode began with the a.d. deflecting a question about why neither he nor his administration had anything to say about the extraordinary action in Niger that killed four soldiers, and instead gratuitously and of course inaccurately suggesting that other presidents didn't call the families of the fallen.
Instead Kelly went after the Democratic Member of Congress who heard the phone call, not because she was listening in but because it was on speakers, and she was in the car going to meet the plane because she had personally mentored the man whose body was arriving--something Kelly left out of his attack on her.
And even after that, Kelly gratuitously and inaccurately accused this Democrat of something she didn't do, his equivalent of an a.d. tweet. Sad.
Update Fri.: The Kelly muckfest got worse on Friday, as video surfaced that proved what he said about Congresswoman Wilson was completely inaccurate. The story took a racial turn as reported by the NY Times. Even before the video, Kelly was criticized for other inaccuracies. The White House responded by doubling down on the original lie about Wilson, just as it insisted that she had inaccurately reported the a.d.'s conversation with the grieving widow, to the point of the a.d. himself calling her a liar and saying he had proof she was--until Kelly himself confirmed that her description was accurate. Then the White House press secretary said that getting into a debate with a four-star Marine general was itself "highly inappropriate." Just another small reveal on the way to dictatorship.
Update Sat.: At the New Yorker, Masha Gessen's devastating essay entitled "John Kelly and the Language of the Military Coup."
Also on Thursday there was President George W. Bush, perhaps the luckiest man in America in that he can no longer be called the worst president in U.S. history. He emerged as a good guy because he made an eloquent speech--full of stirring alliteration-- denouncing the policies and attitudes of You Know Who, without naming him.
He is perhaps the most amazing of all, because in most respects, he is actually a cut above the current incumbent. Further, I am open to being persuaded that he's learned a lot in his 8 years away from Washington. And Michelle seems to like him.
But his presidency was a civil liberties, hyperpartisan, warmongering catastrophe, and helped lower the bar for the current incumbent, leaving us with the legacy of torture, two intractable wars and the Great Recession. Or as Adam K. Raymond noted in his piece dutifully covering the speech, he is "a devoted husband and father and the author of a senseless war that killed more than a million people."
That we have to be so grateful for Bob Corker and G. W. Bush, maybe even Rex Tillerson and John Kelly to some degree (although it stretches a point to include McConnell) tells us something about the Unnameable, this pit of craven lunatics into which too much of our public reality has fallen.
Andy Borowitz
New Yorker satirist, in this short speech
There is also the problem of quantity. There were usually a few cabinet members, a few congressional leaders, who stood out for being especially atrocious. But the current administration is uniformly atrocious, you might even say super-atrocious, though in a completely dull way, as is the current congressional leadership. Particularly with the cabinet this obscures any difference among them, except in the specific ways they've illegally wasted taxpayer money and wrecked whatever they touch.
Among the results for observers are scandal fatigue and outrage exhaustion. Another indicator I've noticed lately is in the inevitable characterizing of two people in a dispute, one as the relative bad guy, the other as the relative good guy. The bad guy is usually pretty bad. But the relative good guy is maybe getting too much of a pass.
But it does make us forget just how loathsome the relative good guy in any story actually is in the real world. Senator Mitch McConnell may be less offensive by some criteria than Steve Bannon, but McConnell has been as destructive to this country and the future as any human on the face of the earth during the past nine years.
Senator Bob Corker has been getting good media and kudos for courage as he attacks our apprentice dictator in the White House. He may be due credit for that, and he may play an important role, but his record in the Senate is obstructionist and rabid rightist. He opposed the stimulus that got us out of the Great Recession, and voted against efforts to curb greenhouse gases, among other objectionable positions. But he does look good in a suit.
One of Corker's big objections to the White House is its insane foreign policy, particularly involving North Korea, so full marks for that. But his eloquent sanity on this gives him credibility to boost Secretary of State Tillerson as a good guy v. Homemade Hitler.
Talk about a low bar--there are few individual creatures on the planet who on balance isn't preferable to Homemade Hitler. Tillerson has indeed opposed and perhaps restrained HH on North Korea and perhaps other flashpoints, and he interestingly not only called HH a moron but refuses to say he didn't.
But Tillerson has practically destroyed the State Department, which as much as HH's bluster, could be decisive in getting this country into a war, killing our troops and citizens and costing us billions, not to mention the suffering of others. As the ex-Exxon CEO he is also among the cabinet members turning over government decision-making to the oil companies for their profit.
Media reports also prime us to root for WH chief of staff General John Kelly, the "adult in the room" restraining the romper president from his world-threatening tantrums. Day after day Kelly is lionized, and his possible dismissal or rumored dissatisfaction to the point of resigning, are breathless big news.
But Kelly is a blunt far rightist and partisan all the way, as he proved with his statements Thursday absolving the apprentice dictator from his hamfisted comments to a grieving widow on the way to accept the remains of her fallen husband (comments which seem now to be awkwardly based on what Kelly told him to say.) Kelly conveniently forgot that this entire episode began with the a.d. deflecting a question about why neither he nor his administration had anything to say about the extraordinary action in Niger that killed four soldiers, and instead gratuitously and of course inaccurately suggesting that other presidents didn't call the families of the fallen.
Instead Kelly went after the Democratic Member of Congress who heard the phone call, not because she was listening in but because it was on speakers, and she was in the car going to meet the plane because she had personally mentored the man whose body was arriving--something Kelly left out of his attack on her.
And even after that, Kelly gratuitously and inaccurately accused this Democrat of something she didn't do, his equivalent of an a.d. tweet. Sad.
Update Fri.: The Kelly muckfest got worse on Friday, as video surfaced that proved what he said about Congresswoman Wilson was completely inaccurate. The story took a racial turn as reported by the NY Times. Even before the video, Kelly was criticized for other inaccuracies. The White House responded by doubling down on the original lie about Wilson, just as it insisted that she had inaccurately reported the a.d.'s conversation with the grieving widow, to the point of the a.d. himself calling her a liar and saying he had proof she was--until Kelly himself confirmed that her description was accurate. Then the White House press secretary said that getting into a debate with a four-star Marine general was itself "highly inappropriate." Just another small reveal on the way to dictatorship.
Update Sat.: At the New Yorker, Masha Gessen's devastating essay entitled "John Kelly and the Language of the Military Coup."
He is perhaps the most amazing of all, because in most respects, he is actually a cut above the current incumbent. Further, I am open to being persuaded that he's learned a lot in his 8 years away from Washington. And Michelle seems to like him.
But his presidency was a civil liberties, hyperpartisan, warmongering catastrophe, and helped lower the bar for the current incumbent, leaving us with the legacy of torture, two intractable wars and the Great Recession. Or as Adam K. Raymond noted in his piece dutifully covering the speech, he is "a devoted husband and father and the author of a senseless war that killed more than a million people."
That we have to be so grateful for Bob Corker and G. W. Bush, maybe even Rex Tillerson and John Kelly to some degree (although it stretches a point to include McConnell) tells us something about the Unnameable, this pit of craven lunatics into which too much of our public reality has fallen.
Wednesday, May 24, 2017
Not Healthy, Not Wealthy, Unwise (with Updates)
You're living in a neighborhood you'd rather not live in, or you're having trouble paying the mortgage or the rent, and you see strange people around, probably poorer than you are. One reason you can't afford to move is the proportion of your income you must spend on healthcare. So who do you blame?
Do you blame the strange people you can see, or the super rich you have never seen, who run the corporations that export jobs and together haven't raised the average American wage in a decade, who lost little in the Great Recession and have mightily prospered since while you lost and have not recovered?
The ACA at least helps with medical care, and in certain cases it can be the difference between life and death, or some security and certain ruin. The CBO analyzed the Republican-passed replacement, and found how devastating it will be for tens of millions of Americans--cutting them off from healthcare insurance, offering them extremely expensive policies when they're sick and utterly inadequate policies otherwise.
Michael Grunwald in Politico put it succinctly:
"Obamacare has had plenty of glitches, especially for the small minority of Americans who don’t get their insurance through the government or their employers, but it basically succeeded in taking some of the top 1 percent’s money to improve the health security of the bottom 99 percent.
The GOP wants to take money that the government has been spending on the poor and working class—mostly for expanded Medicaid coverage or tax credits to help moderate-income families afford their premiums—and give it back to high earners.
...what’s really being contemplated is a gigantic redistribution from health to wealth."
This was the agenda all along, and it is behind the regime's proposed budget: enrich the rich. It's just an extreme version of the basic Republican plan. It can be so extreme--and so extremely obvious--because of what Shadowy stuff has been stirred up to obscure this, or in the minds of way too many, make it not matter. They don't call it blind rage for nothing.
On a somewhat different matter, when a reporter tweets that a Montana congressional candidate has just body slammed him and "broke my glasses" on election eve, the cynical response has to be, this guy just got elected. The "broke my glasses" especially. The Republican candidate was charged by police with misdemeanor assault. We'll see what level of civilization proves out at the polls on Thursday.
Update: Apparently this assault was witnessed by, of all people, Fox reporters, and it seems to have been a good deal uglier than the reporter's tweet suggested. According to NPR:
According to three Fox News reporters who were in the room preparing for an interview with the GOP nominee, Gianforte "grabbed Jacobs by the neck with both hands and slammed him into the ground ... then began punching the reporter. As Gianforte moved on top of Jacobs, he began yelling something to the effect of, 'I'm sick and tired of this!' "
The Ginaforte campaign claims the reporter was the aggressor but witnesses from Fox News make that awkward for Fox News to agree with. Meanwhile the Borowitz headline is REPUBLICAN HEALTH-CARE PLAN LACKS COVERAGE FOR INJURIES RESULTING FROM BODY SLAMMING. Satirical but true.
Apparently there's a lot of early voting in Montana in this statewide race, so nobody knows the possible impact of this story on an election that experts guess is close.
Second Update: The Republican Ginaforte won the Montana seat in the US House of Representatives. Before he goes to Washington, he'll have to answer to the charge of assault on a reporter. Who knows, he may get a medal for it from this White House.
Do you blame the strange people you can see, or the super rich you have never seen, who run the corporations that export jobs and together haven't raised the average American wage in a decade, who lost little in the Great Recession and have mightily prospered since while you lost and have not recovered?
The ACA at least helps with medical care, and in certain cases it can be the difference between life and death, or some security and certain ruin. The CBO analyzed the Republican-passed replacement, and found how devastating it will be for tens of millions of Americans--cutting them off from healthcare insurance, offering them extremely expensive policies when they're sick and utterly inadequate policies otherwise.
Michael Grunwald in Politico put it succinctly:
"Obamacare has had plenty of glitches, especially for the small minority of Americans who don’t get their insurance through the government or their employers, but it basically succeeded in taking some of the top 1 percent’s money to improve the health security of the bottom 99 percent.
The GOP wants to take money that the government has been spending on the poor and working class—mostly for expanded Medicaid coverage or tax credits to help moderate-income families afford their premiums—and give it back to high earners.
...what’s really being contemplated is a gigantic redistribution from health to wealth."
This was the agenda all along, and it is behind the regime's proposed budget: enrich the rich. It's just an extreme version of the basic Republican plan. It can be so extreme--and so extremely obvious--because of what Shadowy stuff has been stirred up to obscure this, or in the minds of way too many, make it not matter. They don't call it blind rage for nothing.
On a somewhat different matter, when a reporter tweets that a Montana congressional candidate has just body slammed him and "broke my glasses" on election eve, the cynical response has to be, this guy just got elected. The "broke my glasses" especially. The Republican candidate was charged by police with misdemeanor assault. We'll see what level of civilization proves out at the polls on Thursday.
Update: Apparently this assault was witnessed by, of all people, Fox reporters, and it seems to have been a good deal uglier than the reporter's tweet suggested. According to NPR:
According to three Fox News reporters who were in the room preparing for an interview with the GOP nominee, Gianforte "grabbed Jacobs by the neck with both hands and slammed him into the ground ... then began punching the reporter. As Gianforte moved on top of Jacobs, he began yelling something to the effect of, 'I'm sick and tired of this!' "
The Ginaforte campaign claims the reporter was the aggressor but witnesses from Fox News make that awkward for Fox News to agree with. Meanwhile the Borowitz headline is REPUBLICAN HEALTH-CARE PLAN LACKS COVERAGE FOR INJURIES RESULTING FROM BODY SLAMMING. Satirical but true.
Apparently there's a lot of early voting in Montana in this statewide race, so nobody knows the possible impact of this story on an election that experts guess is close.
Second Update: The Republican Ginaforte won the Montana seat in the US House of Representatives. Before he goes to Washington, he'll have to answer to the charge of assault on a reporter. Who knows, he may get a medal for it from this White House.
Tuesday, December 20, 2016
2016 Bumper Sticker of the Year
Apparently it's been around for a few years, so I should qualify the award as Best Bumper Sticker I Saw for the First Time in 2016.
Friday, September 16, 2016
The Donald Chronicles: Yes, He Can
Of course he can. And every day he does. If America can't see through this, can't understand what the job the President must do means to their lives every day, then this country is too far gone and ain't coming back.
In no particular order, Trump today: "has once again insinuated that Hillary Clinton be assassinated, telling a crowd of supporters in Miami on Friday night that he thinks Clinton’s bodyguards should disarm in order to “see what happens to her.”"
Unveiled a new tax policy worse than the last one, made an about-face on Cuba --too much to deal with!
Played the media into covering live Trump praising his soon to be opened new hotel in Washington and getting free air time for military supporters to praise him--all because he's been pushing the absurd birtherism for years and now has a new tune about it--thanks to him, we now know that Barack Obama was indeed born in the USA, since he punctured the rumor he wasn't which was started by Hillary Clinton. Yet another complete lie that plays well with the rabid alt.right.
(Meanwhile at the White House: Calling this “the greatest day of my life,” a visibly moved Barack Obama held a news conference on Friday to thank Donald Trump for granting him U.S. citizenship. Borowitz strikes again. Complete with photo.)
Perhaps one good came of this--Trump burned the media so badly, they are maybe less likely to fall for his shit next time. Or not. Though there are signs of rebellion.
Trump lies and contradicts himself so often and outrageously that anybody with a memory sees it. And maybe that's the problem. Not only is Trump profoundly ADD, he's talking to a society that is structurally unable to retain a memory for 24 hours, let alone a few years. Overwhelmed by saturation coverage of every news event, yesterday must be forgotten just to have enough brain capacity to take in today, or a couple of events from it.
There are three--count 'em--three lies there, that is every assertion he was making: 1. That there was any unanswered question about the when and where of Barack Obama's birth (2) That he sent a team of investigators, (3) that this non-existent team found anything, let alone stuff "they cannot believe."
And still, this guy has a path to the presidency in an election to be held in less than two months.
The media can't get enough of him--good for ratings, good for hatings--but maybe voters are listening to other voices. Like Hillary, who had yet another nice pivot from her illness story when she addressed an audience of black women: "As the world knows, I was a little under the weather recently," Clinton said. "The good news is my pneumonia finally got some Republicans interested in women's health."
Hillary also got an assist from another Obama--Michelle this time, who spoke from her experience as First Lady: “Because the president can hire the best advisers on earth, but let me tell you something: five advisers will give five different opinions. And the president and the president alone is always the one to make the final call.”
Michelle Obama also said what should be the watchwords of this campaign: "As I’ve said before, the presidency doesn’t change who you are, it reveals who you are. The same thing is true of a presidential campaign."
We know who Trump is. The question is: who are we?
Thursday, August 04, 2016
The Long Abyss (With Updates)
Though the headlines and opinion pieces continue to focus on GOP and Trump campaign disarray, the only actual news Wednesday might have halted this momentum: Trump raised enough bucks to actually finance a campaign.
It's possible that the unraveling that seemed to have spectacular momentum 24 hours ago is just in a public pause, and will resume Thursday (or before I stop typing this.)
But it feels to me likely that it's over. If Trump deploys that money with new hires and so on, and if (as is likely) he eventually endorses Paul Ryan, the public hand-wringing will cease and things will go back to what they were going to be: Republican candidates and Trump each running separate and seldom overlapping campaigns.
For how many times can Trump insult a Gold Star family? He can call Clinton the founder of ISIS all he wants. The Republican party has so thoroughly and openly demonized President Obama that they'll just nod in approval. Sure, they may know by now that Trump really is dangerously unfit for President, but they aren't going to say so. Why would anyone expect Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan and the rest of them to commit a moral act, and put country over their own jobs and future earnings? They've shown no signs of such a capability before. Quite the opposite.
If Trump's numbers threaten those jobs and their power, then maybe they'll separate themselves publicly. But as long as their numbers are running independently, and as long as Trump raises money for the RNC, they can ignore him. Some of them (who truly believe he's dangerous, or who want to avenge being bullied) may silently subvert him at election time--there are lots of ways powerful politicians in their districts and states can influence how people vote. Especially a candidate who shows no interest in staffing a ground game of his own.
This isn't to say that the past few days changed nothing. It has probably weakened Trump a great deal, perhaps fatally. But that won't be known for three long months.
In the meantime, it has raised the stakes for Democrats--and their temporary allies against Trump. Trump has proven himself a cruel, vindictive liar with no conscience and no attention span. He is the essence of a bullshit artist, and--in sum--he is (as President Obama said) dangerously unprepared and unfit to be President, and as it turns out, he is one of only two people who might be elected to that office. If people were somewhat amused by this before, they aren't anymore.
What we also re-learned is that Trump's base, however small or large it is, has supported him enthusiastically through all this. Their rage--as is clear from this painful NY Times video compiled from various Trump events--is deluded but paramount and irredeemable. TTrump is Hate is one of the milder signs they carry. In other countries they would be terrorists. TheyHate Tr are the zombie apocalypse.
Put together with their quieter enablers who rationalize the rage they deny, they constitute a political force that is almost as dangerous as Trump. Therefore, as Bob Cesca at Salon writes, it's not enough just to defeat them:
Donald Trump is an existential threat to American democracy, and therefore he can’t simply lose the election. He has to be electorally humiliated. Crushed. Embarrassed. The candidate who pledged “so much winning” has to be personally mortified by an unequivocal loss — an electoral massacre so severe that it leaves little room for screeching about rigged elections, and, more importantly, the loss has to be so overwhelming that it discourages any similar would-be populist tyrants from emerging in the future. Trump and anyone similar needs to be politically put-down in a way that permanently ends whatever derangement led us to this point.
Trump's recent implosion gave hope that this could really happen. The NY Times:
Democrats, prompted by Mr. Trump’s latest antics and the string of Republicans who have spoken out against him, have, perhaps prematurely, started discussing a loftier goal than just winning in November: a wide margin of victory, driven by a record turnout among black, Latino and young voters, that could help squash Mr. Trump’s movement.
David Plouffe, President Obama’s former campaign manager, proposed the idea in June. “It is not enough to simply beat Trump,” he wrote on Twitter. “He must be destroyed thoroughly. His kind must not rise again.”
This may be a strategic intent. The Clinton campaign--and Hillary herself--reached out to Republican Meg Whitman. This could be part of a wider effort to create a coalition from the center-right to the left, anchored on women voters. (More likely this year than young voters.)
But as Cesca continued: Sadly, however, the latest polls continue to indicate that the popular vote will come down to a five-point contest. Even Plouffe suggests a close Clinton victory is the most likely (though a blowout is second, a Trump victory third.)
However, we won't know the outcome until November 8 at the earliest. The polls will be of little comfort the closer we get. We won't know if voters are tuning out Trump's obvious bullshit, the baldfaced lies of his campaign manager, the trolling masked as comment by his press representatives (one of whom actually blamed Captain Khan's death on President Obama, though it happened as a result of President Bush's invasion of Iraq while Bush was in office.) Or if indeed Trump has touched a nerve that sends true believers to vote in vast numbers unknown, while apathetic others stay home.
For it's unlikely that Republicans will dump Trump or induce him to quit so they can nominate somebody else, or that electoral college electors will revolt--some of the scenarios feverishly discussed on Wednesday. It's unlikely Trump is going to disappear this week in a cloud of suddenly patriotic Republicans. And that's going to make for an unpleasant three months.
We won't really know until the final election night if Trump has actually tumbled into the abyss already or not. We only know that Trump is the abyss.
Thursday Updates: Most news today supports what I said above. Paul Ryan refused to repudiate Trump directly but clearly went his own way with a fundraising appeal for congressional Republicans that seemed to concede the presidential to Clinton. The WPost did an article on Clinton's outreach to Republicans, while New York noted she can do it without moving to the right. Meanwhile, the Trump campaign rattled on, with Trump insisting everything is going great, in the face of two new polls that show Hillary up 9 points and 15 points, kind of a record. Swing state polls also went to Clinton. In the McClatchy poll (the 15% one), the entire field of four prez candidates was surveyed, and with young voters Trump came in fourth, with 9%. This is better than he did with black voters in a poll not long ago, when he got 0%. He was up to 1% in one poll today.
Trump tried to concentrate on attacking Clinton, but instead became the story once again when he insisted on describing a video that only he has seen in his own head, after his own campaign more or less said he was delusional. His quixotic appearance in Portland, Maine (a Democratic stronghold in a non-swing state) was continually interrupted by protests (including the silent display of those best selling copies of the Constitution) while his v.p. Mike Pence's entire strategy was unmasked by an eleven year old boy.
That reminds us fondly of the Obama as Spock stories of yore. After his press conference, the President prepared to celebrate his 55th birthday with a White House bash, and then head out for a two week vacation.
Sounds good to me. A vacation from this loooong campaign at least.
P.S. Almost forgot--in my attempt to leave you with at least a twisted smile, the latest headline from Borowitz:
D.N.C. HEADQUARTERS MOBBED BY REPUBLICAN REFUGEES SEEKING ASYLUM
WASHINGTON, D.C. (The Borowitz Report)—A humanitarian crisis has been unfolding over the past week as Republican refugees seeking asylum have overrun the Democratic National Committee headquarters, in Washington, D.C.
D.N.C. staffers have confirmed that they were woefully unprepared for the masses of desperate Republicans who have shown up at the D.N.C.’s door, looking for safe harbor.
“These people have been brutalized for months and have decided to risk everything to save themselves and their families,” D.N.C. staffer Tracy Klugian said. “When they tell you their stories, they are absolutely heartbreaking.”
Monday, August 01, 2016
It's REALLY Starting to Suck to be Donald Trump (with Updates)
Moreover, a Gallup survey shows that the DNC did much better than the RNC in lifting their candidates positives and driving down negatives. Trump's negatives in particular went up. In viewing the RNC, a majority of viewers said they were "less likely" to vote for Trump--a 15 point change that is by far the worst dive Gallup has recorded.
CNN: By any conventional standard, Donald Trump just blundered through the worst three days of any presidential candidate in living memory.While Trump tells supporters the general election may be rigged and he continues to be denounced even by Republicans (though few are withdrawing support), he has helped to create a new Best Seller--the U.S. Constitution (as featured in the picture of the Khans), which ranks just behind the latest Harry Potter.
7/31: First was the powerful appearance of the parents of Captain Khan, a Muslim American soldier killed in Iraq, at the DNC on Thursday, the night Hillary Clinton accepted the nomination. It was widely showcased in reporting the next day.
Then Donald Trump put his mouth in it in a couple of interviews, guaranteeing at the very least that the Khans riveting rebuke would be in the news for another day.
Then one of the Trump interviews aired on Sunday morning, Trump tweeted himself deeper into his hell hole, the Khans were invited onto more TV shows and suddenly the Washington Post and the New York Times were wondering if this wasn't a major event in the campaign.
Trump not only picked on private citizens and parents of an American soldier killed in action. He not only pushed back at the father, Khizr (currently a consultant on immigration law) but on the Gold Star Mother Ghazala, for not saying anything at the DNC, where she was too moved to speak. Plus he just really picked on the wrong people.
Captain Humayun Khan was killed in Iraq in 2004. After sending his troops to safety he confronted a vehicle that turned out to be suicide bombers. He was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart. He graduated from the University of Virginia, where he was part of its ROTC program. His parents have kept in touch with the program, and especially the new cadet graduates. WPost:
Every year since their son’s death, the Khans have invited the cadets to their house for hot dogs and burgers, to honor their son, a graduate of the program, and to give the students their first exposure to a Muslim home, to see “how similar it is to their own,” Khan said. “They’d feel like this is our aunt or uncle’s home. And I have cards from them, understanding the gesture of giving them the Constitution, because they were getting ready to take an oath to that Constitution.”
It was one of these ninety cent copies that Khizr Khan offered to lend to Trump from the DNC podium.
A trio of reporters in the NY Times however, were less cautious in their appraisal:
"The confrontation between the parents, Khizr and Ghazala Khan, and Mr. Trump has emerged as an unexpected and potentially pivotal flash point in the general election...And Mr. Trump’s usual political tool kit has appeared to fail him. He earned no reprieve with his complaints that Mr. Khan had been unfair to him; on Sunday morning, he claimed on Twitter that Mr. Khan had “viciously attacked” him. Mr. Trump and his advisers tried repeatedly to change the subject to Islamic terrorism, to no avail. Instead, Mr. Trump appeared to be caught on Sunday in one of the biggest crises of his campaign..."
By early Monday morning, NBC reported: The families of 11 service members who died fighting for the U.S. demanded an apology from Donald Trump on Monday, accusing him of "cheapening the sacrifice made by those we lost." They were joined by other military vets later Monday. The WPost article cited above mentioned that if Trump loses military families, it could be a significant part of his apparent constituency.
Also in his ABC interview Sunday, Trump stumbled in his answers about Russia and Ukraine, showing basic ignorance of the current situation. Along those lines, new pieces by NBC and a more detailed piece by the Guardian kept alive the questions about Trump and his campaign's connections with Russia and Russian spies.
Meanwhile the Clintons and the Kaines were quietly barnstorming Pennsylvania and Ohio, largely ignored by the national press (except for quotes on Trump) which is presumably as they like it. In Pittsburgh, Clinton was endorsed by local bad boy made good, Mark Cuban (owner of the Dallas Mavs) who called Trump a quintessential Pittsburgh name: a "jagoff." Cuban is kind of a jagoff himself, but I guess now he's our jagoff.
New polls taken after the DNC should begin to come out early this week. A couple of minor polls that have been issued so far show Hillary getting a bump and ahead again--in one poll, substantially ahead. The postconvention bump is important to keep donors donating and campaign workers enthusiastic, but otherwise may mean little. August is a long month. But one campaign story suggests that at least some persuadable swing state voters are turning against Trump for his derogatory statements, including this latest against a Gold Star mother.
If you can still laugh about any of this, there's The Simpsons: According to NBC, The Simpsons reproduced the famous 3 a.m. global emergency call to the White House ad, speculating on how it would go with each candidate. When it rings in the Clinton White House, a wide-awake Bill Clinton answers eagerly, but glumly hands the phone to Hillary: "It's for you." Trump doesn't take the call, too busy tweeting about having exiled Elizabeth Warren.
The ad is "paid for by Americans who are really starting to miss Obama."
Friday, July 15, 2016
Trump Repudiates Pence! (Well, not yet...)
Death in Nice, coup attempt in Turkey, usual dreadful signs of the Climate Crisis. Is this why we need the Entertainer? Is this what Trump is for?
(Remember that Billy Joel song, "The Entertainer"? He once summarized it for me: "I am the Entertainer, I am so full of shit.")
Sowing the usual whirlwinds, Trump officially settled on Mike Pence as his vice-president. After saying he wouldn't announce it Friday morning, he announced it Friday morning, but postponed the introductory event. Several reporters were told he was trying to get out of it as recently as midnight.
(So there's another faction in the Trump campaign that leaked that Trump wanted somebody else, and since they leaked to CNN it may be that of the former campaign director who is now making a half million for propagandizing for Trump on what used to be an all-news network, and now isn't even a news network.)
What isn't being reported that I can see is that Pence had until noon Friday to declare whether he was running for reelection as governor of Indiana (not a sure win by any stretch) or not. By Indiana law he can't run for two offices. So he at least had to know. Update: Now the NY Times has reported it. Pence's people filed the necessary papers after 11 a.
He might have been the only one who knew. All the reports I've read say that neither Gingrich or Christie were told in advance that Trump had definitely chosen Pence.
To me it looks like the whole thing was pretty much engineered by somebody high in the Trump campaign, likely the head honcho Paul Manafort. He likely had it leaked yesterday, including that Pence was on his way to New York for the announcement. That seems designed to keep Trump from changing his mind.
But he probably did want to change his mind anyway, which doesn't bode well for this as a long-term relationship. I fully expect that under the least amount of pressure, Trump will let it be known that Pence wasn't his favorite, and even that he regrets the choice. There's more soap opera to come with this.
For now, the choice mollifies establishment GOPers like Paul Ryan, rabid religious righters and TP folk. Trump evidently has chosen the Koch Brothers money (they like Pence) over Sheldon Adelson's money (he likes Gingrich.) (So it's not clear how successful the GOP will be in begging Adelson to make up the $6 million shortfall for their convention.) Update: If he was trying to get Koch money, it didn't work.
The choice of Pence seems designed first of all to get Trump through the GOP convention--and the idea that his opposition was already vanquished may have inspired him to want to dump Pence and get a soul brother, a fellow "pirate" as Gingrich said.
But Manafort also quickly unveiled the new Trump-Pence logo, so Donald really couldn't change his mind. It's getting widely reviewed for its sexual suggestiveness. My my.
Trump knows that Pence dissed him in the past. The pressure will increase as Trump sees (and is even asked about) Pence's statements in the past, from trade etc. to the presidency itself-- that contradict Trump's most aggressive positions and rationale.
So now let the betting begin on how soon Trump disses Pence, and repudiates him. Probably not in the introduction Saturday, but...
And if Trump manages to essentially forget about Pence, and sends him off to campaign in small towns and hamlets, the question come October might be...whatever happened to Mike Pence?
As for the losers, Gingrich is off using his almost-vp megaphone to get media attention for his outlandish out-Trumping Trump plan to interrogate every Muslim in America on whether they believe in Sharia law, and deport those who are dumb enough to admit it, or perhaps are convicted by special tribunals.
Christie is getting widespread whatever the cynical version of sympathy is, for this latest and biggest humiliation. Borowitz suggests he's angry enough to refuse to pick up Trump's dry-cleaning.
Meanwhile, announced speakers for the GOPer convention keep dropping out: the big star--Tim Tebo!--ain't going, and neither is Trump's daughter's rabbi. But she's still speaking. Maybe for a little longer than planned.
(Remember that Billy Joel song, "The Entertainer"? He once summarized it for me: "I am the Entertainer, I am so full of shit.")
Sowing the usual whirlwinds, Trump officially settled on Mike Pence as his vice-president. After saying he wouldn't announce it Friday morning, he announced it Friday morning, but postponed the introductory event. Several reporters were told he was trying to get out of it as recently as midnight.
(So there's another faction in the Trump campaign that leaked that Trump wanted somebody else, and since they leaked to CNN it may be that of the former campaign director who is now making a half million for propagandizing for Trump on what used to be an all-news network, and now isn't even a news network.)
What isn't being reported that I can see is that Pence had until noon Friday to declare whether he was running for reelection as governor of Indiana (not a sure win by any stretch) or not. By Indiana law he can't run for two offices. So he at least had to know. Update: Now the NY Times has reported it. Pence's people filed the necessary papers after 11 a.
He might have been the only one who knew. All the reports I've read say that neither Gingrich or Christie were told in advance that Trump had definitely chosen Pence.
To me it looks like the whole thing was pretty much engineered by somebody high in the Trump campaign, likely the head honcho Paul Manafort. He likely had it leaked yesterday, including that Pence was on his way to New York for the announcement. That seems designed to keep Trump from changing his mind.
But he probably did want to change his mind anyway, which doesn't bode well for this as a long-term relationship. I fully expect that under the least amount of pressure, Trump will let it be known that Pence wasn't his favorite, and even that he regrets the choice. There's more soap opera to come with this.
For now, the choice mollifies establishment GOPers like Paul Ryan, rabid religious righters and TP folk. Trump evidently has chosen the Koch Brothers money (they like Pence) over Sheldon Adelson's money (he likes Gingrich.) (So it's not clear how successful the GOP will be in begging Adelson to make up the $6 million shortfall for their convention.) Update: If he was trying to get Koch money, it didn't work.
The choice of Pence seems designed first of all to get Trump through the GOP convention--and the idea that his opposition was already vanquished may have inspired him to want to dump Pence and get a soul brother, a fellow "pirate" as Gingrich said.
But Manafort also quickly unveiled the new Trump-Pence logo, so Donald really couldn't change his mind. It's getting widely reviewed for its sexual suggestiveness. My my.
Trump knows that Pence dissed him in the past. The pressure will increase as Trump sees (and is even asked about) Pence's statements in the past, from trade etc. to the presidency itself-- that contradict Trump's most aggressive positions and rationale.
So now let the betting begin on how soon Trump disses Pence, and repudiates him. Probably not in the introduction Saturday, but...
As for the losers, Gingrich is off using his almost-vp megaphone to get media attention for his outlandish out-Trumping Trump plan to interrogate every Muslim in America on whether they believe in Sharia law, and deport those who are dumb enough to admit it, or perhaps are convicted by special tribunals.
Christie is getting widespread whatever the cynical version of sympathy is, for this latest and biggest humiliation. Borowitz suggests he's angry enough to refuse to pick up Trump's dry-cleaning.
Meanwhile, announced speakers for the GOPer convention keep dropping out: the big star--Tim Tebo!--ain't going, and neither is Trump's daughter's rabbi. But she's still speaking. Maybe for a little longer than planned.
Wednesday, June 08, 2016
"We're in This Together":California Primary Conclusion
With all precincts in--but with an unknown number of mail-in votes still to be counted--Hillary Clinton has won the California Democratic presidential primary with nearly 56% of the vote, to Bernie Sanders 43.2%. So it wasn't close. And as Ed Kilgore worked the numbers, whatever the surprise AP announcement Tuesday that Clinton had clinched did to turnout, Clinton had enough momentum from mail-in ballots (which is most of them in CA) to win handily. If anything, Bernie picked up late momentum. The LA Times analyzes.
As I expected, Bernie pretty handily won Humboldt. He did well way up here in the northern counties. But that was pretty much it. His hopes in the Bay Area and Silicon Valley didn't work out. Apart from a few rural counties in eastern CA, plus Santa Cruz, his southernmost county were Mendocino and Lake. Except for Santa Barbara county (50/49), Hillary's lead was usually in the mid 50% to mid 60% range.
Apart from other factors, California is pretty comfortable with women candidates. After all, the state has been represented in the US Senate for decades by two women, and in this election, two women will contend for one of those seats, as Barbara Boxer retires. Thanks to this new non-partisan primary system for non-presidential candidates (the top two vote-getters regardless of party face off in the general), the two women (Kamala Harris and Loretta Sanchez) are both Democrats. That was much remarked on, of course, but the fact the race is between two women is too normal to mention.
Clinton earlier won New Jersey (63%-37%), New Mexico and South Dakota primaries.
Bernie Sanders spoke in Santa Monica after the close of voting, when Hillary's landslide victory in California was already obvious. Wednesday there were conflicting reports on what he is likely to do, and on his state of mind (responding to one set of reports that he remains angry and committed to a convention fight, New Yorker satirist Borowitz posted a column claiming that: Sanders Vows to Keep Fighting For Nomination Even if Hillary is Elected President.)
Eric Levitz parsed the speech in a different way, and isolated this quote: "And tonight, I had a very gracious call from Secretary Clinton and congratulated her on her victories tonight. Our fight is to transform our country and to understand that we are in this together. To understand that all of what we believe is what the majority of the American people believe."
Though Levitz didn't note this, the phrase "we are in this together" indicates not only a common effort to defeat Trump which Sanders had begun his speech saying is the number one objective, but it is a phrase that Hillary emphasized in her victory speech. "We are all in this together" is a major expression of her "Stronger Together" theme (which wasn't quite...together in the speech, but it's getting there.) I notice this phrase--which again is one that President Obama uses--because I've long advocated it as the theme we need, to face the challenges of this century.
Whether and when Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton are in it together is yet to be seen. But Sanders meeting with President Obama Thursday, and Obama's endorsement of Hillary as the nominee shortly after, will suggest the shape of that eventuality.
As I expected, Bernie pretty handily won Humboldt. He did well way up here in the northern counties. But that was pretty much it. His hopes in the Bay Area and Silicon Valley didn't work out. Apart from a few rural counties in eastern CA, plus Santa Cruz, his southernmost county were Mendocino and Lake. Except for Santa Barbara county (50/49), Hillary's lead was usually in the mid 50% to mid 60% range.
Apart from other factors, California is pretty comfortable with women candidates. After all, the state has been represented in the US Senate for decades by two women, and in this election, two women will contend for one of those seats, as Barbara Boxer retires. Thanks to this new non-partisan primary system for non-presidential candidates (the top two vote-getters regardless of party face off in the general), the two women (Kamala Harris and Loretta Sanchez) are both Democrats. That was much remarked on, of course, but the fact the race is between two women is too normal to mention.
Clinton earlier won New Jersey (63%-37%), New Mexico and South Dakota primaries.
Bernie Sanders spoke in Santa Monica after the close of voting, when Hillary's landslide victory in California was already obvious. Wednesday there were conflicting reports on what he is likely to do, and on his state of mind (responding to one set of reports that he remains angry and committed to a convention fight, New Yorker satirist Borowitz posted a column claiming that: Sanders Vows to Keep Fighting For Nomination Even if Hillary is Elected President.)
Eric Levitz parsed the speech in a different way, and isolated this quote: "And tonight, I had a very gracious call from Secretary Clinton and congratulated her on her victories tonight. Our fight is to transform our country and to understand that we are in this together. To understand that all of what we believe is what the majority of the American people believe."
Though Levitz didn't note this, the phrase "we are in this together" indicates not only a common effort to defeat Trump which Sanders had begun his speech saying is the number one objective, but it is a phrase that Hillary emphasized in her victory speech. "We are all in this together" is a major expression of her "Stronger Together" theme (which wasn't quite...together in the speech, but it's getting there.) I notice this phrase--which again is one that President Obama uses--because I've long advocated it as the theme we need, to face the challenges of this century.
Whether and when Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton are in it together is yet to be seen. But Sanders meeting with President Obama Thursday, and Obama's endorsement of Hillary as the nominee shortly after, will suggest the shape of that eventuality.
Wednesday, June 01, 2016
In A Word
But a couple of days ago, the word scientist Steven Hawking used to describe Trump was "demagogue." Satirist Andy Borowitz at the New Yorker responded: "The theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking angered supporters of Donald J. Trump on Monday by responding to a question about the billionaire with a baffling array of long words.
Speaking to a television interviewer in London, Hawking called Trump “a demagogue who seems to appeal to the lowest common denominator,” a statement that many Trump supporters believed was intentionally designed to confuse them.
Moments after Hawking made the remark, Google reported a sharp increase in searches for the terms “demagogue,” “denominator,” and “Stephen Hawking.”
In this case satire was not far from the truth, at least in one respect. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary site reported an immediate 9000% jump in searches for the meaning of "demagogue."
But reviewing that definition can be instructive for everyone. While "fraud" is certainly applicable, "demagogue" turns out to be a remarkably precise fit for Donald Trump: "a leader who makes use of popular prejudices and false claims and promises in order to gain power.”
Wednesday, January 06, 2016
Common Ground, Common Sense in the Land of Guns
What was the significance of President Obama's executive actions on gun safety? The actions themselves are described in this Washington Post story, and the President summarizes them in the speech embedded above. But apart from the modest changes possible under current law, it was the speech itself, what it said and how the President said it, that was the most significant.
"Emotional" is the word used most in stories--at CNN, in the Post story, in a valuable WaPost annotated transcript of the speech, in John Cassidy's New Yorker piece. It's emotion based on urgency and backed by overwhelming reason and evidence. The balancing of rights, the safety measures used for cell phones and aspirin bottles but forbidden for guns, so much of it simple social sanity. It's so obvious that it's satiric, as in the Borowitz headline: Obama Continues to Stubbornly Link Gun Violence with Guns.
Cassidy describes the rhythms of the speech, including the tears. His last paragraphs make the salient point:
The denunciation of the N.R.A., which went unnamed in this part of the speech, seemed to rouse the President and get him back on track for the climax of his speech. The best way to defeat the gun lobby, he insisted, was at the polls. “And, yes, it will be hard and it won’t happen overnight,” he said. “It won’t happen during this Congress. It won’t happen during my Presidency. But a lot of things don’t happen overnight. A woman’s right to vote didn’t happen overnight. The liberation of African-Americans didn’t happen overnight. L.G.B.T. rights, that was decades’ worth of work. So, just because it’s hard, that’s no excuse not to try.”
Obama was only being realistic about the prospects for further progress. He was also serving notice for those who agree with him. In addition to shedding tears of despair, they will need to shed some tears of defiance."
President Obama seems intent on keeping this issue in public consciousness. It's likely he'll continue this mission after he leaves office. The politics of this is similar to climate crisis--follow the money. The gun lobby--which has gotten more extreme over the years-- has bought the Republican party, and the extremism is self-reinforcing, back and forth. (What would happen, I wonder, if the gun lobby and the fossil fuel billionaires were on different sides of an issue? The GOP might implode.)
So politically it's up to 2016 candidates and those who follow. It may be that incremental judgments at the polls encourage this issue to break into agreement at least on background checks (which are supported by 90% of Americans) or it may implode with other extreme positions when today's GOP implodes. That could happen any time, soon or not soon at all. But either way, we'll need to share and maintain that emotional defiance.
It is perhaps clearer on this issue than some others what the fundamental commitment of Barack Obama has always been: to make the case that summons agreement and common ground, but on fundamental matters of importance. Again, the Borowitz satire makes the point. In a list of barely imaginary quotes from Republican candidates accusing President Obama of being deluded in linking gun violence to guns: "The former Hewlett-Packard C.E.O. Carly Fiorina said that Obama’s persistent linking of gun violence with guns was “sad but not surprising, from a man who believes that people’s health can be improved by access to health care.”
And like the Civil Rights movement that is his touchstone, addressing gun violence requires persistence and hope, which is not just an emotion of the moment but itself a commitment. Maybe we can't get it done right away. "So just because it's hard, that's no excuse not to try." Because, eventually, yes--we can.
Monday, January 04, 2016
Thursday, September 17, 2015
Unreality Show
This was the often an implicit theme in coverage of the second GOPer "debate," this time on CNN. It was overt in Jonathan Chiat at New York Magazine, whose report was headlined At Second Presidential Debate, Republicans Try to Out-Crazy Trump, and Succeed. He concluded: "The [R] party’s decades-long flight from empiricism and reason shows no sign of abating. Alas, from Trump to Rubio to Carly Fiorina, it is filled with talented demagogues well suited to pitch America on nonsense."
The New York Times editorial board later said pretty much the same thing in an editorial entitled Crazy Talk At the Republican Debate: "Peel back the boasting and insults, the lies and exaggerations common to any presidential campaign. What remains is a collection of assertions so untrue, so bizarre, that they form a vision as surreal as the Ronald Reagan jet looming behind the candidates’ lecterns.
It felt at times as if the speakers were no longer living in a fact-based world where actions have consequences, programs take money and money has to come from somewhere. Where basic laws — like physics and the Constitution — constrain wishes. Where Congress and the public, allies and enemies, markets and militaries don’t just do what you want them to, just because you say they will."
.
New Yorker satirist Andy Borowitz turned to Strangelovian gallows humor as he headlined his report on the debate Millions Watch American Democracy’s Final Episode: "American democracy, a long-running institution whose popularity endured for over two hundred years, drew millions of viewers to its final episode Wednesday night.
While the official ratings for democracy’s finale will not be available until Thursday, initial reports indicated that a larger than expected number tuned in to witness the last moments of the nation’s system of government. Network executives had warned that the final episode was not for the squeamish, but many viewers were still shocked by how dark and apocalyptic it turned out to be."
Borowitz followed up with a column entitled Fact Checking Reveals G.O.P. Debate Was Four Per Cent Fact: "According to HonestyWatch, a Minnesota-based fact-checking organization, over the course of three hours the Republican candidates served up between eight and twelve facts, not including their names and job descriptions."
Also in the New Yorker, Amy Davidson (who is a reporter rather than satirist, at least in intent) began her report: "With about fifteen minutes to go in the G.O.P. Presidential debate last night, at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, it looked as if it might be hard to pick a low point. The candidates had, after all, been squabbling for almost three hours, long enough to foster fantasies of using Reagan’s Air Force One, which was onstage, as an emergency-escape vehicle."
Margaret Hartmann at New York culled the coverage on each candidate. One of her choice quotes from others:"Trump came out swinging — but ended up missing. Not only wasn't he substantive — again — but he made some pretty bizarre statements. " —SE Cupp, CNN.
There was one question about the climate crisis in this debate (which brings the number of questions in both debates up to one), and not surprisingly the ignorance and fact-free denial were universal.
Otherwise, the coverage was about as insipid as this "debate" apparently was. On my Google News page, the topic was dominated by "listicules"--the six big moment, the 10 quotes, the five takeaways, seven ways the debate changed the race etc. By late today, the conventional wisdom was that dangerous demagogue Carly F. was the winner. Trump's trumpeting being muted.
The world hangs by a thin thread? What if something goes wrong with the psyche? Welcome to the Republican Party.
Monday, September 07, 2015
Labor Day 2015
Sunday, April 26, 2015
President Obama Unleashed
President Obama names his choice as the worst President of his lifetime, gives his rhymes-with-bucket list, responds to people who say he is arrogant ("Some people are really dumb") and says what he really thinks about climate crisis deniers.
Wednesday, April 01, 2015
April 1: A Retrospective
"And the Internet, for better and very often for worse, does not tend to distinguish between stories and facts, between the earnest and the satirical. The World Wide Web is an epistemological free-for-all—which makes it wonderfully democratic, definitely, but which also means that lies can spread on its platforms with, often, as much ease as truths."
Certainly, well, true, with many seriously troublesome effects. The Internet is a platform for attention on the basis of bizarreness, so it's not clear whether the world is stranger than ever, or we just know more about it. I'd say for sure both. But that so much that is accurate is crazy (and that's just the Google News page) does flavor April 1 satire, which depends on the possibility of it being true.
Or maybe it just does what satire does--get the imagination freed for a new perspective. I have to say that most of what I read today just wasn't that funny or interesting in this way, except for some sly "news" from an unlikely source, a very earnest and specific environmental group, the Center for Biological Diversity. Their jibes came in the usual email advisory, which lately has often been about wolves endangered by aggressive hunting practices in several western states. So it took a second for the satire to register in the headline "Idaho Governor Caught Stealing Wolves From Yellowstone."
In order to appease wolf hunters running out of prey, you see. The gotcha moment made a point, but that was just the first of several stories. For my money, here's the best one, both for quality, amusement and making several really telling points, plus there's something charming about it that goes beyond the joke-- Exploding 'Wind Trains' Wreak Mild Breezes on Unsuspecting Towns:
Wind-by-rail transport has been on a dramatic rise in the years since new technology allowed midwestern gusts to be captured, stored and transported to wind refineries in New York and California. In 2015 alone wind has been spilled eight times along rail routes, including in Nevada, where an outbreak of chapped lips was reported, and in Indiana, where a toupee was carried into a stream and drowned.
"So many of these 'wind trains' pass right next to our schools," said Pat Gumpter of the National Association of Peeved Parents. "Our children could be assaulted, at any moment, by an unexpected blast of air."
Friday, February 13, 2015
Where the Future Is (II)
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| Global Divestment Day: South Africa |
82% of African Americans say the world is getting hotter, and 56% correctly identify fossil fuel pollution as the chief cause. That's the reality that 54% of Latinos recognize as well. Compared with 37% of white Americans surveyed.
So the question arises: are white people inherently inferior?
A glance at American politics would suggest that conclusion. Especially when one of the two major political parties is officially stupid on the subject. And most white people are Republicans, as most Republicans are white people. So if a Republican politician is not actually a moron, he or she still has to pretend to be one.
Willed ignorance and strategic stupidity, while probably more dangerous than sincere if psychologically twisted ignorance and stupidity, in the end amount to the same thing, for their clueless selfishness risks the well-being of the planet and the future. Which makes white people seem inferior in more than intelligence.
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| Norway |
Those of us Americans who don't get out much anymore may be surprised as how the world views our willed ignorance and sociopathic stupidity, so a reminder such as Ann Jones' bracing piece in TomDispatch ("Is This Country Crazy? Inquiring Minds Elsewhere Want to Know") is a much needed splash of perspective.
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| Australia |
Which is why political activities such as Global Divestment Day (today and tomorrow, according to datelines) organized by 350 and related organizations are in fact international, even when their chief aim is to affect policy in the US.
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| Philippines |
Especially since, as Jones' piece points out, white dominated America is seen not only as shockingly brutal, it is recognized as falling behind the rest of the world, both internally (collapsing physical and social infrastructure) and internationally (collapsing education, health etc. compared to many other countries, including some that Americans have long considered inferior.) It's not that America is the worst. It's the contrast with America at its best, as well as this comparative fall.
That's far from the whole story--America still has vast resources of intelligence and compassion, knowledge and resilience. (It actually takes a lot of energy to keep up the pretense that there is credible evidence the climate crisis isn't happening, or that frigid winter weather in the Eastern US is an argument that there is no global heating.) But it also seems that America is becoming too much like the last days of Rome, decaying at a very bad moment for the world. That possibility also should motivate people to step up their efforts to meet these challenges. Old assumptions no longer accurately reflect the whole reality, for the whole world.
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| Boston |
Monday, February 09, 2015
The Week in Borowitz, Internet Hysteria Etc..
The Salk piece of course is about the Internet-stoked and celebrity-enabled justification for refusing measles inoculations that is now paying off in a resurgence of a once-dead disease. Millions of dollars, suffering and perhaps some lives will be the price for this. Notably, a whole lot of backtracking is going on now, as people wake up to the consequences that were staring them in the face.
Hysteria, born of repressed unconscious emotions, has been a feature of so-called civilization since well before the witch hunts, but contemporary complacency (it can't happen here, or now) is unwarranted, especially since the instantaneous mobs enabled by the Internet have proven such eruptions are alive and well, and larger and faster than ever.
Monday, January 26, 2015
Monday, January 12, 2015
Insight Ephemeral
Whatever the future of this site will be this year, I've already determined that it will not follow the 2016 presidential election campaigns. I've done enough of that. So there will be no 2016 label to join the previous ones.
On the other hand, I still read the news headlines at least and I'm not cancelling my email notice of Andy Borowitz satirical commentary, and he's already come up with two wonderful posts: First Smart Move of 2015--Jeb Bush Resigns as George W. Bush’s Brother, and today's:Poll: Most Americans Now Consider Romney a Stalker.
Really, isn't this all you need to know? A laugh, being a brief outburst, seems the proper response to insights about the ephemeral.
On the other hand, I still read the news headlines at least and I'm not cancelling my email notice of Andy Borowitz satirical commentary, and he's already come up with two wonderful posts: First Smart Move of 2015--Jeb Bush Resigns as George W. Bush’s Brother, and today's:Poll: Most Americans Now Consider Romney a Stalker.
Really, isn't this all you need to know? A laugh, being a brief outburst, seems the proper response to insights about the ephemeral.
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