CSotD: Oh, for pita’s sake …
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With the resignation of Hope Hicks, there have been several cartoons about the revolving White House door. I like Walt Handelsman's because it both names the dearly departed and depicts the resulting void and even takes a slap at the president's grasp of reality, which is a factor in all this.
I'm still reading "Fire and Fury" and I suppose as a good commentator I should have gobbled it all down at once, but there isn't a lot in there that hasn't been in the mainstream media.
But whether Wolff's descriptions are 100% accurate or not, I haven't come across much that has fallen apart since, while the on-the-ground picture he paints of a childish, temperamental, erratic bully makes for a little comic relief if you squint and pretend it isn't real.
At the point I've just reached — about 3/4's of the way through, we've just seen the inexplicable hiring and firing of Mooch, but also some chat about the idiocy of the Trump Tower meeting and how it dangled Jared as a weak spot to be exploited by both investigators and blackmailers, while noting that Hope Hicks messed up by becoming part of the cover-up story Dear Leader concocted.
Which is to say that, while there isn't much to do except sit back and watch, it's nice to have bought the program. Can't tell the players without a program.
It also makes it kind of clear that most of those chairs were empty when they were full.
Meanwhile, Jeff Danziger offers this view of Dear Leader's BFF, and, since I'm on the road and haven't been able to follow the chatter very closely, I went to Google News to see if anyone has verified that the Russians actually have this stuff Vlad says they've got.
Which I didn't really find, but I did come across this Washington Post piece which at least confirmed a couple of thoughts I'd had when the announcement was first made, which was mainly that nuclear war is bad.
That is, let's assume a worst-case fantasy for North Korea, which is that they develop a nuke that can reach us and decide to attack. Given the number of missiles they'd likely have, it would mean the loss of maybe one or two major cities here and the total annihilation of North Korea, which is why it's a fantasy and not a scenario.
Kim wants the threat because he doesn't want to go the way of Gaddaffi. He's a porcupine, not a shark.
But if we started a throw-down with Russia, the number of missiles on both sides would pretty much make Mutual Assured Destruction a reality, no matter how many of them got intercepted from either direction.
However, another factor that the Washpo article noted is that Putin has an election coming up and was posing for the home crowd.
No, he's probably not scared of losing the vote count. But he still likes a good showing and doesn't want to touch off demonstrations, so they only hassle Pussy Riot members, not actually disappear them.
But I also came across an article from RT which was basically fawning over their own Great Leader, and said that, if he could time-travel, he'd go back and save the Soviet Union from collapse. The piece was your basic RT propaganda, but I had already been wondering about my own deep fantasy:
What if Putin were trying to re-enact the collapse of the Soviet Union, but reversing the roles? First, your opponent gets bogged down in an expensive, unwinnable war in Afghanistan, then puts in some less than extraordinary leadership?
Do you suppose you could trick them into destroying their economy by pretending you have a brilliant new technical defense system under development?
Been there, experienced that, still remember the Doonesbury.
Meanwhile, back at the bookstore cafe
I don't know if pita bread is still much of a thing and if it's gone off the map of cool stuff entirely, I agree with Mark Parisi about the reason.
Pita was a big thing back in the early 80s, about the time bookstore cafes began to be a thing, and our local place (holy crap have they grown!) featured a variety of veggie/cheese pita sandwiches, which didn't fall apart too much. I suspect it had to do with skilled chefs knowing how to cut the pita and how much shredded veggies to stuff in there.
Or dumb luck. Or that we were bringing small children there and everything they ate fell apart anyway so wotthehell.
Of course, pita still has its place within its own cookery.
But even then, eating falafel in pita seems like mostly a way to find out if cucumber/yoghurt dressing will wash out of your shirt. And pants. And to see if you can grab the falafel off the floor faster than the dog.
Maybe it's like eating with chopsticks. Any doofus can get the big stuff, but being able to get individual rice grains requires cultural immersion.
Those of us from other cultures should stick to hummus, where you actually want the pita in pieces.
Okay, that's enough thinking about pita for awhile.
Well, except that we were eating tortillas last night and talking about finding good ones — even out here in Denver, never mind back on the East Coast — and how unfair it seems that people who grow up in Mexican households learn to make fabulous tortillas and don't think much about it.
I imagine growing up in certain Middle Eastern households might give you the same opportunity to have pita be something you just make without a great deal of fuss.
Though let's not instigate another culture war over which Middle Eastern households pita actually belongs to.
As for me, I keep it simple: I like bread and butter, I like toast and jam.
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.
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