A hill of beans

 If you hold a small coin close enough to your eye, it will blot out the sun, says an old proverb.  It's not surprising that some people choose to concentrate on their own petty concerns when the world seems to be spinning out of control.  Cher, for example, told the Guardian, "My life seems to be longer than any other human being ever."  Or maybe it's just her face that's longer.


She's promoting her Christmas album and can't believe she's 77.  Maybe Joe Biden should book some time with her plastic surgeon.

Show people don't have a monopoly on obliviousness, of course.  Russell Rickford, a history professor at Cornell University, pronounced himself "exhilirated" by the Hamas attack on Israel.  In a further statement which clarified nothing, he added, "Hamas has challenged the monopoly on violence...even as horrific acts were being carried out, many Palestinians of conscience who abhor violence, as do you, as do I...who were able to breathe for the first time in years...Hamas has shifted the balance of power, Hamas has punctured the illusion of invincibility..."   In warming up for his next book or article, the professor fails to notice that many Palestinians have stopped breathing forever.  A detail.  A statistic.  University officials are considering what action to take, which is never good.  

(Here's an article at Vox where Professor Rickford says progressive Black organizations identify with the liberation of Palestine.  I wonder if they do.)

"I was deeply saddened and outraged by the explosion of the hospital in Gaza yesterday and based on what I've seen, it appears as though it was done by the other team, not you," Joe Biden told Benjamin Netanyahu in Tel Aviv, citing evidence from the US Defense Department.  For the history minded, this conflict has produced its Katyn Forest event, where each side blames the other for an atrocity -- in that case the murder of about 22,000 Polish prisoners of war by the Soviet Union in 1940.  The mass grave was discovered three years later by the Germans and each side -- plausibly -- blamed the other.  One day we will know for certain if the Gaza hospital was destroyed by an errant rocket from Palestinian Islamic Jihad, or bombed by the Israeli Defense Force, or even the work of some other group.  Meanwhile, fringe media can pick on Biden for employing the phrase "the other team."  There's something here for everyone, except the dead.

Why are the Republicans a disgrace to professional clowns?  Here's the chair of the House Republican Conference nominating Jim "Don't Talk About Wrestling" Jordan for Speaker:  "Whether on the wrestling mat or in the committee room..."  The rest was drowned out by gasps.  The pride of the New York 21st, Elise Stefanik may herself be a candidate for Speaker.  She's certainly tone-deaf enough.  

Another Republican, Debbie Lesko of Arizona, is not running for re-election next year because "Right now, Washington, DC, is broken.  It is hard to get anything done."  She probably means the way those selfish Democrats won't save the majority from itself by slipping a few votes to Jordan.  Then they can get on with the important work of shutting down the government in time for Christmas and maybe hanging Ukraine out to dry.  

Here's another of the Angry Children's Caucus, Middle-age Auxiliary, Tom Cole of Oklahoma, praising Jordan for tackling "the real drivers of debt...Medicare, Social Security..."  The Trump Cult certainly knows how to appeal to older voters.  Broken?  Or stupid?

Trump continues to keep his eye on the prize, revenge.  Re-tweeting a post by the ridiculous Laura Loomer, he revealed the home address of Letitia James so his chuds know where to find her.  Then he proclaimed his trashy Florida club "the most expensive house probably in the world."  Maybe before the FBI carried out all the classified documents they could find.

Another vote today and another NO for Trump's boy Jordan.  Not that they aren't giving it the college (wrestling) try.  Sean Hannity tried strong-arming some of the Never-Jordans and his stablemate Brian Kilmeade was heard calling Don Bacon a "dumbass" when he voted for Kevin McCarthy.  Then Bacon's wife Angie began to get abusive, anonymous texts:  "Your husband will not hold any political office ever again.  What a disappoint [sic] and failure he is."  That was probably from Trump.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is finally holding a confirmation hearing for Jacob Lew, Biden's nominee for ambassador to Israel, and all it took was a full-scale war in Gaza.  Thanks, Rand Paul!  

Never big on self-control, Trump continues his slide into full dementia.  Judge Arthur Engoron had to tell him to stop waving his arms and talking audibly to his lawyers during the New York fraud trial.  If Law & Order is anything to go by, the usual admonition is "Counselor, control your client," but the judge clearly knows that would be pointless.  Here, he calculates his next "outburst."

Halloween is still two weeks off but according to Sean Hannity, Hakeem Jeffries and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are scaring Republicans away from voting for Jim Jordan.  "Intimidating" is the word he used.  To Republican voters a Black man and a Latina are terrifying, of course, but these are politicians who should be tougher.  Somebody is threatening the "traitors" who won't elect Jordan but I doubt if it's Democrats.  Today there were two more Republicans who didn't think an election-denying insurrectionist would make a good Speaker, irrespective of his personal sleaziness.  And if Jeffries were really scary, Jeffrey Leonard*-scary, he'd intimidate six Republicans into voting for him and take the gavel away from the children.  




*Former San Francisco Giants outfielder.  Nickname:  "Penitentiary Face."






 




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