CSotD: Monday Miscellany

First today, we’ll address a political/environmental crisis of great importance. First Dog on the Moon, whom I would trust with something or other, probably, reports that Brenda reports that the attacks on boats by orcas in the North Atlantic are a case of jumping the gun on what was intended to be a wider movement.

And we all know that isolated incidents are often reported as part of a wider movement and those who do so are never, ever wrong.

So watch it.

Juxtaposition of the Day

(Steve Kelley — Creators)

(Michael Ramirez — Creators)

I don’t really understand the inner dynamics of this stuff, but it does seem someone at Creators might have noticed two of their cartoonists making the same joke about the same news story, but apparently not and so I’ve noticed it for them.

Ramirez is more specific on the details, both dubbing the fellow who killed that mentally ill busker as a “Good Samaritan” and a Marine, the former based on not having read the Biblical story and the latter based on the USMC tradition that there is no such thing as a “former Marine,” and once a jarhead, always a jarhead.

But if having been trained as a Marine is relevant — and Ramirez is hardly the only one emphasizing that aspect — we should discuss how a Marine is trained and what they ought to know about the various restraints and holds they are taught.

There is a myth that boxers have to register their hands as lethal weapons. It’s not true, but it is true that, if a boxer uses his fists to hurt an untrained person, it could be introduced as a factor in court, as could other martial arts skills and training.

Before my son began doing VBSS ship boardings in the Gulf, his team was taught non-lethal restraint methods which, after he left the Navy, he used as an ER nurse in MOAB (management of aggressive behavior), and also taught hospital staff. I don’t know why Marines couldn’t be taught the same effective, non-lethal techniques and I’ll bet they are.

Anyway, I just read Kareem Abdul Jabbar’s latest substack posting, in which he goes on at some length about the rise of macho losers, and I agree with him 100%.

Which in turn reminds me of how much I like this Lalo Alcaraz (AMS) cartoon, because Trump has indeed condemned himself through a failure of knowing when, and perhaps how, to shut up.

And aside from admitting he stole, and possesses, classified documents when he knows a recorder is running, he also committed the smaller but equally asinine anti-campaign move of going to a diner to hear the crowd’s applause, and then promising them some food and walking out without providing it.

There truly is no filter between his brain and his mouth. It would be pitiable if he weren’t so powerful.

Juxtaposition of the Day #2

(Jack Ohman – Tribune)

(Ed Hall)

But he has a history of making money based on hot air and empty promises.

Jack Ohman is general in his accusation; Ed Hall narrows it down to the latest scam.

Once a grifter always a grifter, and Trump turns every reversal into a scam, imploring his followers to send money to help him overcome whatever he’s facing, and most of the money seems always to go into his pocket rather than for the cause intended.

Intended by his donors, that is. It certainly seems to always go towards the cause Trump intended.

Meanwhile, Clay Jones points out, the MAGAts are babbling about some rumored bribe Biden probably supposedly reportedly took, only they can’t remember who told them or they can’t find the guy who has the proof and maybe he died.

It’s a long story, and it would be even longer if it had something to do with Jared getting that $2 billion from the Saudis, but it doesn’t and how dare you bring that up?

While, speaking of hucksters …

Gotta love Pia Guerra’s analysis of Putin’s current dilemma, as his elite Wagner mercenaries clash with his dragged-off-the-streets regular army. The chaos in his command is wonderfully illustrated here, and the open question is the ultimate goal of Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, which certainly could include replacing Putin himself.

She may be indulging in a little creative exaggeration by showing the two bears of equal size, but the mass of the Russian army does compensate for the far better training of the Wagner group, and, meanwhile, the consternation of her bogged down Roman conqueror is spot on.

Morten Morland‘s piece is not a political cartoon, though it could be, but is the illustration for a Spectator article that outlines the growing desperation Putin feels as his glorious attempt to add Ukraine to Russian territory has gone seriously awry.

It’s a substantial piece but definitely worth reading, particularly since, as Morland suggests, that finger is getting close to the button.

For my part, I want to believe that it’s not as simple as pushing a button and that such an order would have to go through a level or two of cooler heads, but, whatever else I learned as a young NRA member, I learned that you must always assume that a gun is loaded and handle it accordingly.

In Honor of the Day

Arlo takes Juneteenth as another day the banks and post offices are closed and is sorry it’s date-specific so he can’t get a three-day holiday each year. Janis is right to bring up the fact of how lucky they are, aside from that.

Indeed.

I just finished reading a history of the Civil War and started one on Reconstruction, and Juneteenth is a wonderful choice of holiday because slavery had been abolished well before those folks in Texas got word from the US Army, and it continued in other pockets of the South years longer, because union troops couldn’t be everywhere.

And as Michael de Adder reminds us, word hasn’t necessarily reached the whole country even yet.

Some years ago, I was invited to play for a Juneteenth gathering. Here’s one I gave them, on June 19th and thus a week after the anniversary of Medgar Evers’ murder.

Many of the older people had never heard the song before, but they all knew the story.