CSotD: Fear the Kept Promises, not a Broken One
Skip to comments
Jimmy Margulies (KFS) isn’t the only commentator who appears trapped in a mutual admiration society, but his donkey’s remark makes a perfect starting point, because I would dispute it.
While the Chattering Classes echo outrage over the pardon, if you look at the comments, on stories, on columns, and on cartoons where comments are permitted, you’ll see a strong trend towards, at worst, acceptance but quite a bit of approval of the pardon.
There seems to be a divide between what we’re being told we care about and think, and what we actually care about and think.
Obviously, there are Biden haters who foam at the mouth over anything he says or does, but if you sort through the trollery, you sense a disconnect between average folks and the opinion makers who rail against the pardon.
As Matt Golding notes, the imbalance is absurd, and for those who haven’t seen the list Trump is holding in his hand, here it is.
Granted, Biden has handed out more than one pardon, but Golding touches on the self-interest factor. Biden’s pardon of his son is obviously personal, but Trump’s list is tightly targeted to his favorites as well.
And one of the complaints from the left side of the aisle is that Biden should also pardon those convicted of drug offenses. Well, pay attention: He didn’t pardon everybody, but he got several thousand people off the hook for marijuana and extended clemency to some for larger offences.
No, not everybody, but, to repeat Obama’s warning again, don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Particularly when we’ve got an incoming president who lies about the sources of fentanyl and whose toadies envision a military invasion of Mexico as a curative.
Oh well. There are people who refused to back Harris because of Biden’s support of Israel, thus enabling the election of someone even more hawkish who wants Hamas wiped out so his son-in-law can build a seaside resort where Palestinians once dwelt. (Though our new ambassador to Israel says there are no such people in the first place.)
I digress, but part of the disconnect has been the flood of “How did the Democrats lose?”
It’s a question Jeff Danziger addressed, somewhat, in 2005, as the tiresome old drunks began crawling out from under their rocks, emboldened by the rise of hate radio and the rise of Rupert Murdoch’s combined television and newspaper ventures.
It led to a boldness in which things decent people never said aloud were trumpeted and seized upon, and truth not only was left lacing up its boots but sitting seemingly alone in the darkness.
Juxtaposition of the Day
One of the cornerstones of the crackpot right has been the idea that Hunter Biden funneled corrupt funds from a Ukrainian energy company to his father. They never came up with a bit of proof, and much of what they claimed turned out to be either grotesquely exaggerated or utterly false.
But it doesn’t matter. Truth is whatever you choose to believe, which is why a Florida legislator has introduced a bill to make it illegal to alter the weather.
We’re now required to prove that vapor from jets is not “chem trails” and that there are no Jewish Space Lasers. And the Marjorie Taylor Greenes are free to denounce all evidence as proof of a Deep State hiding the facts.
Though the only thing that MJT managed to prove from Hunter Biden’s laptop is that he took dick pics, which she was happy to share as proof of something or other.
Meanwhile, as Daniel Boris says, the True Believers are not willing to give up on their Precious.
If it were just a coterie of delusional whacko’s, we’d survive, but, as Bagley points out, we have a major political party seriously invested in torturing the president’s son.
Mike Smith (KFS) points out that, while Biden is being accused of going back on his word about Hunter’s pardon, his chief accusers have been completely fine with a president who spouted more than 30,000 lies in his first administration and is back now, peddling more.
Jeff Bezos reports that Trump seems more calm and confident now than he was four years ago. Well, he ought to be.
Four years ago, members of his staff were willing to caution and even contradict him, but he seems to be solving that problem this time around.
As Kirk Anderson points out, the Republican torture gang has chosen a Grand Inquisitor. One victim may have escaped, but there are others on his list, and I think it’s important to note that, as much as J. Edgar Hoover became a monster over the 48 years during which he led the Bureau of Investigation and then the FBI, he began as a hard-nosed cop and only built his hate-list over time.
While when Nixon’s “enemies list” emerged, he was already so deeply mired in Watergate that it was taken by most observers, including Gene Bassett, as something of a joke.
Nothing funny about Kash Patel, who, if confirmed, plans to disable the FBI, Bill Bramhall points out.
Patel wants to shut down the central organization and disperse agents as a sort of federal police force around the country, kind of a posse. Perhaps not the kind that brings the accused hoss thief back for a fair trial.
Mike Luckovich imagines who will be on Patel’s 10 Most Wanted List, but he doesn’t have to imagine a whole lot, because Patel has announced who he’d like to bring before the torturers of the New Inquisition.
If anything, Luckovich is guilty of stenography rather than parody.
Jeff Danziger (Counterpoint) doesn’t need parody, either. Simply imagine a situation in which the parties are shorn of whatever diplomacy and tact they might employ, then lay out the conversation as it would be.
Monty Python joked about the Spanish Inquisition because, at the time, it seemed an unrepeatable historical outrage.
Well, times change. Anyone who isn’t expecting the Inquisition hasn’t been paying attention.
As for that pardon, Deb Milbrath sums it up. We should not forget that humanity and personal honor should be more valued than some hypothetical place in history.
It made me think of Abraham, of Wilfred Owen, and of Leonard Cohen:
Comments 8
Comments are closed.