CSotD: Mistakes, Errors & Downright Lies
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Spanish cartoonist Christian Mirra (Cartoon Movement) poses a problem: In English, the Sixth Commandment is normally translated as “Thou shalt not kill,” but he uses the term “murder.” Is it an intentional distinction or a matter of someone for whom English is a second language?
When I went to doublecheck which commandment that was, I stumbled across an essay that directly addresses the matter, in which the writer says that “murder” is, in fact, a more correct translation.
The Old Testament is surely not against killing, since there are plenty of times following the handing down of the 10 Commandments in which lots of people are killed with the Lord’s approval.
The commandment is against unlawful killing, or “murder.” Once you accept the distinction, Mirra’s intention becomes clear: He is accusing Israel of illegal killing, and saying that the deaths are being falsely defended as God’s will, with critics being accused of antisemitism.
Another cartoonist might have put Netanyahu in the role Mirra assigns to a more generic Israeli (Moses?), and he keeps it within nationalist bounds by identifying the anonymous person with an Israeli flag rather than a plain Mogen David.
His use of the more specific translation and of the flag makes this a precisely targeted statement.
Ann Telnaes’ intentions are similarly clear: She quotes Trump’s campaign promise, and then, in light of his recent admission that he cannot readily lower grocery prices, accuses him of deliberately having lied to voters.
You are free to disagree, but given Dear Leader’s well-established pattern of lies, of broken promises and of outright fraud, it’s not unreasonable to suspect that he made the promise simply because it would appeal to voters.
Will voters respond to the lack of lower prices by turning against him, or will they absorb it as one more thing to shrug off?
The other question, in light of ABC’s cowardly decision not to defend itself against Trump’s defamation suit is how many other news organizations will stop criticizing his shortcomings, broken promises and apparent failures?
Trump’s continued advocation of tariffs brings to mind Howard Baker’s famous question, “What did the president know and when did he know it?”
Greg Kearney points out the damage tariffs pose to American farmers, not only in losing export business in a trade war, as soybean farmers did during Trump’s first administration, but in the increased costs of equipment and supplies that are either foreign-sourced or contain significant foreign-made content.
Any elementary understanding of tariffs includes knowing that American companies, and thus American consumers, pay for tariffs, while an elementary knowledge of American history reveals how the tariffs of the Gilded Age, which Trump praises, fell heavily on farmers and created a situation in which the very rich profited while those who were not wealthy paid the largest price.
What does the president know, and will he ever find out?
Dana Summers (Tribune) attacks Biden’s pardons and clemencies, suggesting that freeing nonviolent drug offenders or wiping clean the record of those who have served their time is an unacceptable move.
He didn’t criticize Trump for the pardons and clemencies of his first administration, which included violent criminals and those who betrayed the nation through lies that served the Trump administration but not the nation as a whole.
We’ll have to watch to see how Summers reacts if Trump keeps his promise to pardon those guilty of attempting to overthrow the government and of assaulting police officers, which many people consider greater offenses than smoking marijuana.
Pat Bagley celebrates the conversion of Scrooge, while portraying the Republicans as being opposed to anyone awakening to a more generous approach to life.
Scrooge was awakened by the messages of the three spirits, just as the slave trader who reformed and wrote “Amazing Grace” was awakened by a sense of human decency, just as Saint Paul was awakened on the road to Damascus.
Bagley sees these as righteous changes of heart, but notes that Republicans have actively campaigned against such transformations, and are on the record as opposing those who become “woke,” humane and decent.
I saw a clip of Mitt Romney yesterday in which he criticized Democrats for their failures in the elections, saying they mishandled grocery prices, immigration and transgender issues. The latter puzzled me because it made me wonder how he might have criticized campaigns a half century ago, when other civil rights were on the docket.
So I looked it up and here’s Mitt proudly noting how his father had marched for civil rights in the ’60s. I supported George Romney’s presidential campaign until it fell apart in 1968 and I still think he’d have been a good man in the White House.
Mitt himself stood up for the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020, which makes me wish the clip I saw had included a hint as to how he felt the Democrats should have appealed to fear and hatred of transgender people in order to win votes.
At least I’m not worried that he’ll sue me for wondering aloud.
Juxtaposition of the Day
Jones admits he hasn’t found a link between the Trump administration and the McRib, but he points out the link between Dear Leader’s intention of appointing a conspiracy theorist to oversee the nation’s health and the danger of reviving polio and other childhood diseases.
I remember a girl in my first grade class who wore leg braces, and I also remember knowing about iron lungs, though I was too young to grasp what it would be like to spend the rest of your life in one.
I don’t believe RFK2 will follow through on his aide’s intention to withdraw FDA approval of the polio vaccine, but I’m concerned that he will manage to do away with vaccination mandates in schools.
That’s not a personal choice. While vaccines provide protection against these diseases, they are not foolproof, and having infected children in a classroom will inevitably cause some vaccinated kids to fall victim to diseases that can cause lifelong damage, or even death.
And much as I like Bramhall’s cartoon, I suspect the only way RFK2 could change would be not by a visitation of spirits but by catching polio himself.
However, I’m sure his parents, who were sane and intelligent, got him vaccinated.
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