The Trouble With Statues

Here’s a story for you:

Wilson Center [Princeton University]:

Statement from The Wilson Center  —  The Wilson Center was chartered by Congress in 1968 as the official memorial to President Wilson.  The namesake of our institution – while a visionary in international affairs – held racist views and implemented racist policies as President of Princeton University and as President of this country…

And here’s a word for you: iconoclast.

Wild in the Streets

Ah, a poll! Just the thing for a news story when you don’t have any news to report:

 Mark Murray / NBC News:

Poll: 80 percent of voters say things are out of control in the U.S.  —  WASHINGTON — Eight out of 10 voters believe that things are out of control in the United States, with majorities still concerned about the spread of the coronavirus, pessimistic about the economy returning to normal before next year and down on President Donald Trump’s ability to unite the nation.…

Yes. The train is off the rails, but I wonder if people actually realize just how far that actually is.

Here’s another quote from NBC news from the past 24 hours, and it OUGHT to scare hell out of you:

They said they came with shotguns, rifles and pistols to protect their downtown businesses from outsiders. They had heard that antifa, paid by billionaire philanthropist George Soros, were being bused in from neighboring cities, hellbent on razing their idyllic town.

That’s the NBC news story about the “Black Lives Matter” protest in Klamath Falls, Oregon.

President Kafka does his Orwell Impression

 

Here comes the tantrum:

The White House

Executive Order on Preventing Online Censorship

—  By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:  —  Section 1.  Policy.  Free speech is the bedrock of American democracy.

“Free speech”?  The Trumpkin is whining because Twitter added two fact check tags to his outrageous lies that voting by mail was massively fraudulent.

The Wall Street Journal defines ‘media bias’ — OOPS!

How corrupt is the Wall Street Journal?

Today, an “op-ed” with “former CBS News” chief Gordon Van Sauter decried media bias. (Except for the little intentionally suppressed fact below).

WSJ.COM

Opinion | The ‘Liberal Leaning’ Media Has Passed Its Tipping Point

A return to balance would be commercially unviable [sic]. The best solution may be an honest embrace of bias.

Van Gordon Sauter
May 25, 2020 2:21 pm ET

The WSJ pushes Sauter’s CBS bona fides, without mentioning his actual tenure (Wikipedia):

Sauter was a two-time president of CBS News, serving as president of CBS News from 1982 until 1983 and again in 1986…. In 1992, he was hired to be the president of the new Fox News division.

America Achieves Herd Inanity

Dear Posterity:

You won’t believe this when you read about it in the history books, so let me assure you, it actually happened.

Trump created a false dichotomy and ordered churches open today, as “essential” — just like meat packing plants and their workers. Yes, it was pandering to the evangelical “base.”

Behind Trump’s demand to reopen churches: Slipping poll numbers and alarm inside his campaign
Gabby Orr / Politico

—  A sudden shift in support for Donald Trump among religious conservatives is triggering alarm bells inside his reelection campaign, where top aides have long banked on expanding the president’s evangelical base …

To safeguard his relationship with religious conservatives, Trump on Friday demanded that America‘s governors permit houses of worship to immediately reopen, and threatened to “override“ state leaders who decline to obey his directive ….“Some governors have deemed liquor stores and abortion clinics as essential, but have left out churches and other houses of worship. It’s not right. So, I’m correcting this injustice and calling houses of worship essential,“ Trump said.

“Essential“?

Hold that  thought a minute.

There’s a classic film noir movie that I keep thinking of entitled “D.O.A.”

The lead character has been poisoned and has a few days before he dies.  He has to untangle the mystery of his own murder — D.O.A. meaning “Dead On Arrival.”

No more plot is needed. Amazing film if you want to watch it. My point being:

It’s official! USA now a Banana Republic!

Associated Press:
AP Exclusive: Justice Dept dropping Flynn’s criminal case  —  WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department on Thursday said it is dropping the criminal case against President Donald Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, abandoning a prosecution that became a rallying cry for Trump …

Funny how a “president” installs a “fixer” and suddenly investigations, prosecutions and other legal problems go away. History is rewritten and pardon me because I have to go and throw up now.

Remember, Flynn tried to weasel out of his “guilty” pleas, and the judge asked him straight up: “Did you DO the crimes you pled guilty to?”

The Frankening of Joe Biden

For two days, the Right held a blogswarm, shedding voluminous crocodile tears for one “Tara Reade” over a position that they themselves DO NOT HOLD! Now this:

Kevin Drum / Mother Jones:

So, Tara Reade . . .   —  Did Joe Biden sexually assault Tara Reade in 1993, as she claims?  I don’t know.  As is so often the case, there were no witnesses and no physical evidence, so it’s literally her word against his.

Meet the new Leeann Tweedon, the Sean Hannity contributor who kicked off the media and political frenzy that drove Al Franken from office without even the semblance of due process, but which panicked the Democratic establishment so much that THEY crucified Franken, saving the GOP the trouble.

Then-Sean Hannity regular, Leeann Tweedon
who initiated the “charges” against Al Franken

Rather than Jeff Sessions being referred for criminal prosecution for his perjury in Senate testimony, his questioner, Al Franken, was unceremoniously exiled to Minnesota.

A Fuster of Clucks

When it comes to “intelligence,” the Oval Office and the eponymous community stand at antipodes:

 Washington Post:

President’s intelligence briefing book repeatedly cited virus threat  —  U.S. intelligence agencies issued warnings about the novel coronavirus in more than a dozen classified briefings prepared for President Trump in January and February, months during which he continued to play down the threat …

Surprised? Me neither.

click pic for link

Today, at some point, by some counts using some different authorities, the US death count from COVID-19 will surpass the US death count in the 1964-1975 Vietnam War.

Mistaking Secession for Cessation

 

Washington Post:

Rallies against stay-at-home orders grow as Trump sides with protesters  —  Protesters at state capitols across the country this week expressed their deep frustration with the stay-at-home orders that are meant to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus, pushing a message that is rapidly coalescing among …

It isn’t often that you see actual lemmings running off of actual cliffs.

The Mayor of Amity

I have been sick. This is not an uncommon event, alas. And I have been stuck at home. Ditto.

Washington Post:

The U.S. was beset by denial and dysfunction as the coronavirus raged  —  By the time Donald Trump proclaimed himself a wartime president — and the coronavirus the enemy — the United States was already on course to see more of its people die than in the wars of Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq combined.

And, since I have a television set, I have been watching the Greek Tragedy of Donald Trump’s Open Mic (formerly Mike Pence’s Open Mic and Pandemic Show) and the hurdy gurdy of the “approved by the FDA for use against coronavirus” of the drug that has just entered clinical trials for efficacy against the novel coronavirus er, Covid-19, which is kind of like, “let’s have unprotected sex while we wait for the results of our AIDS tests!”

But Mach Show! Mach Show! as the Germans said.