CSotD: The Ties That Blind
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I’m getting a “shut up and hand over your wallets” vibe from this one, for a number of reasons.
One is that nobody voted for this war, and, in fact, Trump was elected on a pledge to keep us out of foreign wars. Not only did the people not vote for it, but their legislators didn’t, though it may be unlucky timing that the Senate voted to shut off the spigot just as Ramirez was submitting his cartoon.
Still, you shouldn’t ask someone to pay for something they didn’t order.
Also, Iran was not on the verge of developing a bomb and, until Dear Leader cancelled it, we had a multinational treaty under which they promised not to build one, and to allow international regulators to make sure they didn’t. The justification for the war is a load of hooey, and to insist we pay for it is likewise.
While I often disagree with Ramirez, it’s usually a challenge that deserves a nuanced answer. But this one makes the sound of clicking heels, and I ain’t buying it.
Here, by happenstance, is a challenging topic that deserves a more nuanced answer. I’ve been aware of Bagley’s opposition to the Box Elder data center, but I still didn’t know enough about the specifics to address the issue.
That is, I know that data centers consume a lot of water, and that water rights have always been a major issue out West, that the Great Salt Lake is evaporating, that the Ogallala Aquifer is a fossil aquifer and when it’s gone, it’s gone. And that the snow pack this past winter was a disaster and everyone along the Colorado River is screwed.
Which sounds like a lot of reasons to oppose the project, but I still didn’t understand the specifics. Then yesterday I caught an edition of On Point in which Meghna Chakrabarti spoke to people who do understand the specifics.
Chakrabarti is not only one of the sharper interviewers around, but she happens to have, the program’s website tells us, a “bachelor’s degrees in civil and environmental engineering from Oregon State University (summa cum laude), as well as a master’s degree in environmental science and risk management from Harvard University.”
It’s worth a listen. She doesn’t mount a soap box. She just asks all the right questions.
I also heard a Daily Blast podcast in which Greg Sargent discussed Dear Leader’s visible decline in acuity with a colleague from the New Republic who has covered the topic. I like Sargent’s podcast because he is, at heart, a print reporter, and so his questions are well couched and his podcast, though personal in tone, remains focused.
You can’t just chatter about the mental health of a president, or the irresponsible enabling he gets from his staff of sycophants. You have to show your cards, and it was a reasonable, though not disinterested, look at a major ongoing crisis.
Meanwhile, it seems silly to indict Raoul Castro for shooting down two airplanes when you’ve not only been blasting fishermen out of international waters but going back to slaughter any survivors.
Perhaps I should have said “it seems crazy,” but that would be a violation of the Goldwater Rule.
When you’re hot, you’re got, and Ohman scores again by pointing out another victim of a weaponized justice system. There have been a lot of cartoons bemoaning the rewarding of traitors who attempted a violent coup, but reductio ad absurdum offers an argument that may be more effective for readers who like a little humorous sarcasm in their politics.
On the other hand, Milbrath cuts to the chase and points out that the Jan 6 convicts were given full due process and, those who didn’t plead guilty were pronounced so by juries after full trials. It might be justice to go back and find some technicality under which various individuals were entitled to new trials, but to simply pardon them all and then repay them is neither justice nor patriotic.
I seem to recall something in his oath about promising that he “will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
He’s lucky he hasn’t been hit by lightning. We’ll see in November if he gets hit by voters.
Anderson trades on the common outrage over rewarding the coup attempt, but adds a dash of Tabasco by tying in the fact that the Epstein victims continue to wait for somebody in power to give a damn about them. Gotta say the longer they have to wait, the harder it becomes not to believe that there’s some reason for the delay.
Particularly since it didn’t take long for the Brits to hold Prince Andrew and Peter Mandelson to account.
Juxtaposition of the Day
Speaking of due process, how much of a Sherlock Holmes do you have to be to tell when someone is performing a little insider trading?
Jud Legum has put together a few samples of Trump’s pattern of investing in a company just before it gets a major boost, either from some actual advancement or because he made speeches praising it. What’s it take for the SEC to figure this out?
The worst part is that I’m not sure if Hudson is referencing insider trading or the curious way certain people happen to place astonishingly successful proposition bets just before news hits.
It’s becoming commonplace to say, “What if a Democrat had done this?” but some things are common because they are self-evident. Hunter Biden was a nepo baby and that’s pathetic, but he never came close to cashing in the way the Trumplings have. There’s a level at which “pathetic” becomes “illegal” or, certainly, “impeachable.”
The Teapot Dome Scandal didn’t really explode until just after Harding died, but it would have anyway, and perhaps the stress contributed to his coronary. Those, however, were different times, when politicians had the decency to regret their ethical shortcomings.
Finally, to lighten this dismal litany, Stantis offers this commentary on Chicago’s parking meters, and links to an editorial that was too long to read, but that did bring to mind an old Steve Goodman classic:
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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