CSotD: I read the news today … oh boy
Skip to comments
Deflocked sure won the Serendipitous Timing Award this morning.
I was at the park yesterday with about a dozen dogowners and our pooches.
Somebody had brought ice cream to celebrate a birthday and we were having a lot of fun until a woman showed up who had just heard the news of Kennedy's retirement as she pulled in.
You'd think it would be hard to be somber with a choice of ice cream flavors and a dozen dogs of all sizes cavorting around, but the place just went quiet.
Now, it's true we're a college town, but the college is Dartmouth, hardly a leftwing bastion. I think it's more that people who can be at the park with their dogs at three in the afternoon are mostly old enough to understand the system, and what's at stake.
It's not that I don't want to see the editorial section ever again, but I'm certainly going to take a break from Facebook and Twitter for a bit, and I wish editorial sections — whether left or right — would discuss the situation in well-informed, thoughtful ways.
I wish we could have ice cream at the park every day, too, but that ain't gonna happen either.
Ann Telnaes comments, and it's nothing we don't know and, more important, it's nothing we didn't foresee and warn people about.
McConnell blocked the President's nomination from March 16 until Trump took office the following January, almost a full year, during which people warned that the next president would change the face of the Supreme Court.
During which the GOP nominated an unqualified fascist clown and We The People elected him president.
McConnell may indeed be a devil, but he isn't presiding over a majority of the Senate by happenstance, nor is he serving under an intelligent, reasonable conservative president.
By commission or omission, we did this.
Darrin Bell predicts all the things that will be retiring along with Kennedy and there isn't a surprise on the list.
Here's what seems depressing to someone of my age:
Lyndon Johnson promised that he wouldn't send American boys to fight an Asian war, so we voted for him and the son of a bitch sent American boys to Asia.
And then Richard Nixon promised to end the war and bring them home — we didn't know he'd sabotaged LBJ's peace plan — and so we voted for him and then the son of a bitch continued the war and as many names on the Wall died under his leadership as had died under Johnson's.
This time around, however, nobody lied.
This time, the son of a bitch told us exactly what he was going to do, and we voted for him anyway and here we are.
And, no, I didn't vote for him. But I voted for a candidate I wasn't wild about, mostly because she wasn't him, and she certainly wouldn't have …
Well, never mind. The fact is, America voted and this is what we chose.
And those who were too pure or too wise to vote agreed to let the others decide, which was, in itself, a decision.
As Jim Morin suggests, Osama bin Laden, in the afterlife, is celebrating his success.
While the Deplorables fret over paranoid, racist fantasies of MS13 gangmembers flooding America as unaccompanied minors or by posing as the asylum-seeking parents of small children, out in the real world ISIS and the Taliban are seeing concrete proof of their claim of an American War on Islam.
Here's a portrait of the fascist oligarchy we've built for ourselves, courtesy of Ruben Bolling.
Zero Tolerance for them. Unlimited tolerance for the oligarchs.
And Robert Ariail finds dark humor in the story of how Dear Leader's habit of tearing up memos and letters conflicted with the law about preserving records.
The joke being that Ariail drew this before Kennedy retired and insured that we'd no longer have to waste Scotch tape and glue trying to keep this old liberal anachronism in one piece.
While, as Tim Eagan notes, the editorial board of the Washington Post and a number of other progressive commentators remind us to be polite as we watch the bits of our system swirl around the drain.
Pinkies up, everyone!
Well, perhaps Mike Luckovich will get his wish, as the Parkland kids and their allies join with HeadCount in an effort to register young voters.
I've told the story too often but you're gonna hear it again: A decade ago, I sat a booth at the Washington County Fair, across from a booth for Visa credit cards and next to one for the Army National Guard, and, for a week, got to watch young people flood the Visa booth to sign up for a card and get an American Flag beach towel, then not just walk past but actively steer wide of the National Guard's display.
Though I oppose military adventuring, I have nothing against joining the armed forces, and, in fact, I wish we'd bring back the draft for both sexes with few deferments, but offer other choices of national service, like Peace Corps and VISTA, or providing teaching or medical services in under-served communities.
Other countries require national service, after all, though Dear Leader's grandfather was deported from Bavaria for draft-dodging, and apparently passed along his sense of patriotic duty.
But Step One in a functioning democracy is that people vote, and, while the Parkland kids focus on gun control, I don't care, because we were focused on ending the Vietnam War, but still somehow walked away with some serious environmental laws, educational funding and other social benefits that went well beyond that initial purpose.
And, of course, before the Antiwar Movement there was the Civil Rights Movement, in which desegregating buses, lunch counters and schools took the headlines, but registering voters formed the base.
One of the great lies of history is that the activists of the 60s did not love America, but America's enemy was always apathy.
Mike Peterson has posted his "Comic Strip of the Day" column every day since 2010. His opinions are his own, but we welcome comments either agreeing or in opposition.
Comments
Comments are closed.