Category: Current Events

Meet the Pest

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Jonathan Capon:  Good evening I’m Jonathan Capon of the Washington Post.

David Books:  And I’m David Books of the New York Times.  And you’re watching the PBS News Hour.  Tonight, we will be speaking to former US President Joe Bilephlegm and his wonderful wife Dr. Jill.  Welcome Mr. President and First Lady.

President Bilephlegm:  Thank you, Phil.  It’s good to be back in Washington.  Where I belong.

Jill Bilephlegm:  Thank you, David.  He meant David.

David Books:  Yes, I’m sure he did.  Mr. President, since your withdrawal from the 2024 race and the subsequent catastrophic loss of your vice president to Donald Trump many people have been waiting for you to speak candidly about what you think happened in the election and what could have been done to prevent the loss.

President Bilephlegm:  I’m glad you asked Brad.  The answer is simple.  When I rope-a-doped Trump in the first debate many faint-hearted Democrats like Nancy Pelosi and George Clooney panicked.  They thought I really had gone bananas and began shouting for me to drop out of the race.  And then that bedwetter George Stepha-what’s-his-name piled on and before you know it, I’ve been kicked to the curb by these weak-kneed cowards.  And that left that drunken bimbo to try and face Donald Trump on her own.  It was hopeless.

Jonathan Capon:  Mr. President are you seriously claiming that your performance at the debate was an act?  Because at the time it was described as a shambolic disaster of the first water.

President Bilephlegm:  Listen nancy boy I’ve been handling bullies like Trump since before you groveled before your first editor.  I was first in my class at Harvard.  I took a bullet for Nelson Mandela and I fought at Iwo Jima.

Jonathan Capon:  What?  You barely graduated from the University of Delaware.  You never met Mandela.  And you were three years old when Iwo Jima was fought.  How could you possibly have been there?

President Bilephlegm:  I fought at the second battle of Iwo Jima.  It wasn’t as famous but the fighting was even tougher.  I was wounded five times and received three Congressional medals of honor for my service.  I turned the tide of the battle single-handedly and routed the Russians.

Jonathan Capon:  Oh, that’s enough, I’m out of here. (leaves the stage)

Jill Bilephlegm:  Come back Jonathan, you have to let him tell his story his own way.  He’s a great communicator.

President Bilephlegm:  Let him go.  I’ll tell my story to Freddie over here.  He’s a real newsman.

David Books:  It’s David, Mr. President, not Freddie.

President Bilephlegm:  Whatever you want to call yourself is fine with me Kemosabe.  Look I’m trying to get my story out so that my 2028 campaign will get off on the right track.  In 2026 I’ve got to hit the ground running if I want to get the moderate vote sewn up early.

David Books:  Mr. President, are you out of your mind?  You can’t run for president again.  You’d be ninety years old by the end of that term.

President Bilephlegm:  So?  Ninety is just a number.  Remember what Morning Schmoe said about me last year.  He said that intellectually, analytically, I was the best Bilephlegm there ever was.  And he was right!

David Books:  Well, their parent company is trying to spin off his network and lay off Morning Schmoe even as we speak so I wouldn’t give that too much weight.

President Bilephlegm:  Listen Brainiac, they laughed at Trump when he said he was coming back after a four-year hiatus and look at him now.  Why, he bestrides the known world like a colostomy.  In four years when he can’t run again, I’ll be back and I’ll win.

David Books:  With all due respect Mr. President, in four years you won’t be able to say your own name.

President Bilephlegm:  So what?  FDR had Elanor to help him.  I’ll have what’s-her-name over there to do the heavy lifting.  We’re a team.  And Hunter is already lining up some trade deals that should net billions for us.

David Books:  Who’s “us.”

President Bilephlegm:  The American people of course.

David Books:  Alright, that’s enough.  I’m going back to Canada.  At least our crooks don’t smell this bad (leaves stage).

President Bilephlegm:  (speaking in a stage whisper) So, all of you viewers out there, remember to vote for good old Joe.  (yelling) Don’t let the Nazis win!

All the World’s a Stage

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The Bible (Psalms 90:10) says, “The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.”

So, seventy years are a little less than 25,000 days.  That seems like a big number.  But at the end looking back, it’s the blink of an eye.  That time is swallowed up in sleeping and commuting to work and drinking bad coffee and keeping your boss from firing you and fighting with vendors and trying to satisfy clients and paying the bills.  Hopefully you spent enough time with your wife and kids so that they had some inkling of who you really are.

The best days are carrying the babies home from a family party where everyone was glad to see each other and there was something to celebrate; a holiday or an occasion.  Or taking the kids to the seashore for a week or two in the heat of July.  Or maybe taking your wife out someplace special for a big anniversary.

And then the kids get married and then the grandchildren come along.  So, there’s a progression.  The cycle comes around again.  Only now you’re on the other side of the wheel.  Way out there on the far side.  You recognize the program but now you’re seeing it from far away.

So, the thing to do is try to make yourself useful and try to add a little something to the plot of the story.  You’re no longer the lead.  You’re not even near the center of the stage.  You’re kind of the guy in the wings with a copy of the script ready to whisper the lines to the actors if they forget their lines.  Well, it’s still useful and who knows maybe there’s a non-speaking role for you as a spear carrier.  That’s when you get to be backup driver for soccer games or band practice.  After all it’s honorable service.

But it is weird how life works.  You really can’t delay gratification.  You can’t work for forty years to make enough money to make the last years worth having missed what came before.  You have to figure out how to squeeze the joy out of the process of living.  You have to enjoy being a kid and a young man and your prime and what comes after that.  You have to find some friends along the way, go on those coffee walks at break time and go to your kids’ soccer games and their kids’ baseball games and volunteer around town and even do really annoying stuff like getting involved in local politics.

Like I said, it’s the blink of an eye.  Twenty-five or thirty thousand days is a short span when so much is eaten up by routine that is almost unavoidable.  I guess if you’re a billionaire it’s a little different but I’ll bet it’s still the same tradeoffs, responsibilities versus joy.

Of course I haven’t seen the last page.  As Shakespeare said,

“Last scene of all,

That ends this strange eventful history,

Is second childishness and mere oblivion,

Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.”

Well, I better hurry up and get my ducks in a row.

Rufus Panhandles a Meal

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A funny thing happened yesterday.  I was heading out to take some photos of a patch of bugle weed that is in bloom.  I had my camera backpack on and I was carrying a small tabletop sized tripod.  And as I walked out on the deck in front of the kitchen a baby fox came walking past me on the upper driveway.  When I closed the door, he noticed me and stopped and turned.  What a strange moment.  Now Camera Girl loves to see the baby foxes when they’re denning in the swamp so I wanted to get a photo for her so I desperately tried to get my camera out of the pack and in hand but the little fox trotted toward the shed and disappeared before I could free the camera.  I followed him behind the shed and looked down into the woods and pond but he was gone.

Camera Girl was out shopping.  When she got home, I told her about it and she was very excited.  She always enjoys when any foxes show up on the property but especially when pups (kits?) are around.  So, she was thrilled when a little while later it returned on the driveway.  And she went and got a bunch of chicken scraps and started feeding it.  I told her to be careful and keep her distance.  A fox walking around in the open in the daytime is a questionable occurrence.  They say that rabid animals tend to show up during the day so I cautioned her.  Well, before you know it, she’d fed the creature and then she put out a small bowl of milk and at that point I’m afraid maybe it’s moving in with us.

I went out with my camera and saw him ducking in and out of a space under the shed.  I got a few not-so-great photos and watched him for a while.  He was young and he didn’t look that strong.  I tried to imagine how a kit that young would be on its own.  I wondered if the den was under the shed but I never saw any sign of the parents or den-mates.  Could his parents have been killed?  It didn’t seem likely.  Was he sickly and abandoned?  Maybe.  After a while he didn’t reappear so I went in.  Camera Girl left out more food and milk.  But by nightfall it was still there.

Last night I heard about how exciting it was that the little fox was about.  I warned her that it wasn’t so good having it around.  I told her it was a health hazard for the dogs to have a wild canid around spreading various diseases they could catch.  She yes-yessed me but I could tell she was hoping it would stick around.  I was preparing myself for the headaches this new “pet” would cause me.  Oh well.

But today Rufus was nowhere to be found.  Even a fresh portion of food and milk wasn’t enough to lure him back.  Is he gone for good?  Maybe.  Camera Girl is disappointed but I can tell she still has hopes.

To be continued.

The ZMan Illuminates the Reality of the “Deep State”

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What the ZMan calls the Blob is the halo of NGOs and other organizations that surround and feed off of government entities like the USAID that dole out the taxpayer money for their friends and fellow travelers.

He gives an illuminating example of a woman who fails her way up the ladder of NGO perfidy switching from Middle Eastern influence peddler to immigrant enabler with a stop over in the middle as part of the Biden administration.  It’s inspirational!

Understanding The Blob

Real and Compelling

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For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been smugly telling myself that because of the recent cold weather I wouldn’t have to cut the grass until June or July or something.  But recent walks through the fields revealed the absurdity of this notion.  There were a couple-a-three spots that I neglected to cut at the end of last growing season and those areas were horrendous.  And the rest of it was overgrown to a greater or lesser extent depending on whether those areas get more or less light.

So, when I heard that Saturday would be sunny in the morning and rainy in the afternoon, I resolved Friday night to get up early and cut it in the morning.  Well, of course I forgot all about that because as a special treat, Camera Girl was making pancakes and that along with a good cup of coffee is a holiday to me.  After all, pancakes and syrup are just plain carbohydrates with no redeeming quality other than human joy.  But at a quarter to eleven I realized that I’d forgotten the grass and ran outside and started doing the perimeter with the push mower.  And it was eighty degrees and I was sweating like a pig and my safety goggles (for mayfly prevention) were fogging up and I had to keep stopping to clear them with my handkerchief.  And then I did all the crummy areas that wouldn’t get done right by the sit-down mower and by then it was noon.  So, I had my lunch and then ran out and started around the yard trying to finish it before the rain came.  And I did, but just barely.  Then I took a shower and put on a movie I like watching whenever it’s on TCM; “A Man for All Seasons.”

And this movie always has the same effect on me.  It makes me serenely happy.  Not because the movie has a happy ending.  Because at the end Sir Thomas More is convicted of a crime based on perjured testimony by a former friend and in the final scene he has his head cut off.  And not because the story is exciting or the events change the course of history.  It’s not.  It’s a very small story.

It’s only because the acting and the dialog of the lead actor and several of the other cast members is remarkable.  The conversations between the lead actor (Paul Scofield) with his family, friends and even bitter enemies is altogether compelling.  The character displays a combination of intelligence, compassion, honesty, moral clarity and courage that I find inspirational.  Here is a man who is trapped between an egocentric and possibly unhinged absolute monarch and the toadies and sharks that act as his enablers, but remains faithful to his religious convictions.  As long as lawful means are employed, More is able to hold off a charge of treason.  But his most malevolent enemy (Thomas Cromwell, played ably by Leo McKern) finally employs perjury and this seals More’s fate.

But as interesting as the final duel at the trial is, the real payoff is More’s final meeting with his wife in the prison.  Seeing these two opposites, one a highly intellectual scholar and the other a woman who could not even read, is wonderfully moving.  As she scolds him for his failure to yield and he attempts to placate her we see the enormous affection and love between them and understand just how much he is sacrificing for his beliefs.

And as I was watching this familiar movie it occurred to me that here was a story that had none of the attributes that supposedly make a good piece of art.  It was backward-looking rather than forward.  It was basically a grievance story.  It lacked action, pacing or any of the other characteristics of a book or movie that makes them promising prospects.

What it did possess was human interest.  It showcased the noble characteristics of a man and allowed him to make a stand against the world.  So, in a sense, a book does not have to have the perfect plot and pacing.  What it needs are human beings who can make us believe they are real and make us care what happens to them.

And that way of writing a story seems clearer to me than the other ways of framing the process.  I think I’ll apply that same test to my own writing.  Seems about right.

Vitality and Right-Wing Literature

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I was listening to a podcast by NY Times token “conservative” Russ Douthat talking to conservative publisher Jonathan Keeperman.

Keeperman is a publisher for a press called Passage Publishing.  He has a lot of avant-garde friends like Curtis Yarvin and possibly some of the Silicon Valley folks like Peter Thiel.  He and Douthat talked (a lot) about how the Right is becoming a sort of counter-culture in the way that the Left did back in the 1960s and beyond.

It’s kind of interesting to hear them discuss this shift in the culture in general but one of the more interesting things that Douthat said was that up until now the Right hasn’t produced any real literature on its side of the cultural divide.  Then Keeperman made some offbeat suggestions saying things like Cormac McCarthy’s

“No Country for Old Men” is from the right.  I think specifically he said that the Coen Brother’s movie based on it is from the Right.  Now never in any imagining have I ever equated the Coen Brothers or their movies with anything right-wing.  So, I find this very strange.  And honestly, all the people associated with Curtis Yarvin have always struck me as hipsters.  And I have always ranked hipsters as the most left-leaning of all the various weirdos to be found in New York City.  So, none of this makes a lot of sense.

But I guess if someone interested in literature who wasn’t a Leftist wanted to talk to the New York Times about literature, he would talk to Russ Douthat and try to find some middle ground where they could both make believe that Douthat wasn’t a total leftist.

I was interested to read that Keeperman has published illustrated editions of H P Lovecraft and Robert E Howard and that leads me to think that maybe he’s not a leftist.  The Left despises both of those old authors and would never publish their works under any circumstance.  So, I need to find out a lot more about Keeperman and his press.  It could be interesting.

But he said one interesting thing about the current state of right-wing literature.  He said that the problem with most of it is that it’s mostly just grievance based.  It exists to rail against and blame the leftist society we currently live in and therefore loses the chance to be “vital.”  Essentially, it’s existence is only as a protest against the status quo and therefore only has a negative presence.

And that interested me.  Because my book is in a real way, exactly that.  It is a war being fought against the status quo.  And so, I have to look at what I wrote and see if his criticism of this kind of story is a legitimate case against the value of the story I have written.  In order to do that I will have to look at what gives “vitality” and entertainment value to a story.

Of course, all things are relative and being objective, especially about something I myself wrote is fraught with peril.  Probably the only way to know for sure is to attempt to get it published and see what results.  But it has given me pause and I will think long and hard to see if I think there are any aspects of the story that lack “vitality.”  Whatever that is.  Boy when it rains it pours.

Trump Signs EO Ending Federal Funding for NPR & PBS

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Sure, I know there will be a court injunction within the hour but still the schadenfreude and just general hilarity from this move makes it all worthwhile.  I dream of all the muppets being laid off.  Elmo, Big Bird and the other weirdos who inhabit the creepy corners of Sesame Street.

Imagine all the NPR hosts of “All Things Considered” talking in the Robert Siegel whisper until they find out they’ve been laid off and then all shrieking and cussing at the tops of their lungs.  How glorious.

But my favorite subtractions will be Jonathan Capehart and David Brooks.  These two pretentious blowhards have been the greatest sources of government funded misinformation on display.  Not having to pay for their efforts will be an enormous relief.

Trad-Wife Boot Camp

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I wonder if Camera Girl knows that if she were a zoomer she’d be considered a “trad wife.”  I’m actually afraid to tell her what that is.  She’d shake her head and tell me that people today are ridiculous and I shouldn’t waste my time talking about ridiculous things.  But she’s so far out of the mainstream that she might as well be from another planet.

And that brings me to the topic of today.  How to find trad wives for my grandsons.  It’s a complicated question.  I wonder if Google Ads has a category for it?  I’m sure there are dating sites that categorize people by the lifestyle they align with.  But I don’t trust my grandsons to handle an assignment this important.  I’m not even sure if their parents are up to the challenge.  I think this requires Camera Girl to handle the interviews.

I don’t expect her to have the final say over the bride but I think she should be given a veto over the candidates that are obviously flawed.  Now of course the heart wants what the heart wants.  But I think it would make good sense to have some oversight of the matrimonial process.  Let’s face it, men are not very savvy when it comes to women.  In fact, the zoomers may actually be responsible for this whole kerfuffle about the question of, “What is a woman?”  Maybe they honestly don’t know.  Sure, they’ve seen them online but have they ever spoken with a live woman since graduating college?

What would make sense would be some kind of practical exam.  Let’s see:

  • Make spaghetti and meatballs from scratch.
  • Make decent coffee.
  • Make pancakes.
  • Figure out the menu for the week.
  • Bake an apple pie.
  • Entertain your prospective in-laws without saying the word “cringe” once.
  • Show that you like kids.
  • Tell a joke.
  • Go shopping with your prospective mother-in-law.
  • Don’t look at your phone once during dinner.

Now I know this is a stone-age list.  Women nowadays can’t cook, don’t want kids and have no interpersonal skills except in the office or on-line.  But that’s the point.  Men should be trying to find a way out of the awful world that girl-bosses and feminism has created.  If they marry, they need to find a woman that they’ll be able to stay married to for more than a month.  And if a woman doesn’t intend to have children, then there’s no imaginable reason to marry her in the first place.  If she wants companionship, she should save time and money and buy a cat or two or three.

Now it’s entirely possible that there are no more wifeable women left.  Maybe the whole western world of women is composed of girls who want to work in middle management and eventually end up as middle-aged, Botox-shooting, cat-keeping, barren girl-bosses spitting venom at the whole male sex for not wanting to serve as their place-holder partner at the corporate parties and gatherings.

If that’s the case my recommendation is for my grandsons to go marry a girl from a traditional country where women still give birth to children and think of house-wife as a pretty nice career.  But we’ll have to see how my talk with Camera Girl goes.  She’s ornery and may not agree right away.  But she’ll come around.  She likes to help young people.  And she can give remedial classes in the spaghetti and meatballs exam question if it’s a problem.  After all nobody is perfect.

Seeing Things as They Really Are

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The stoic Epictetus is supposed to have said, “Freedom is the only worthy goal in life. It is won by disregarding things that lie beyond our control.”  When I read up on what Epictetus thought was within our control it’s pretty small.  All that’s under our control is our thoughts and opinions.  Even our actions are constrained by the external world.  So, this freedom he speaks of is internal.

It doesn’t seem to be much.  But I guess if you live in a world where there is one Nero and a hundred million Romans without any real freedom you have to take what’s available.  And who knows, some of the good emperors were stoics.  At least Marcus Aurelius has been presented to us through his writings as one.  Maybe he was.

Then what about our world?  We brag that we are a free people.  And compared to the Roman Empire I guess we are freer.  But when I think of the direction, we are headed it’s not that much better and in fact because of the efficiency of our technology maybe eventually we will be more thoroughly enslaved than my ancient forebears on the Italian peninsula.  In that case maybe I should consider the wisdom of Epictetus and his world view.

This all came up because I saw a quote that said something like, “Hopelessness is freedom.”  I took it to mean that hoping for things that won’t happen is wasting your life.  That the better way is to take the situation as you find it and work around it to accomplish what is possible.

This makes sense to me.  I waited decades for things to go the way I wanted them to go and it only ever got worse.  That’s because I thought that other people believed what I did.  I thought that George W. Bush was a “conservative.”  Well, maybe he was, by his definition.  But reality wasn’t the same for him and me.

Now, Donald Trump seems more like what I hoped for.  But Donald Trump isn’t the Emperor of America.  He’s not even the boss.  He’s just someone trying hard to fix things.  I wouldn’t exactly equate him to Marcus Aurelius.  I don’t think anyone who spent any time with Stormy Daniels could be considered a stoic.  I don’t think he’d even qualify as an epicurean.  He’s a well-meaning man trying to fix things by plugging holes in a collapsing dam.  Will he succeed, even temporarily?  It’s really hard to say.

Stretching the Roman Empire analogy way beyond recognition, the Goths are already over the Rhine and the legions are undermanned and poorly trained.  So, things look pretty bad.

Maybe it is time to start looking within to see what can be done to make the best of a bad situation.  The stoic viewpoint was an important part of the Christian philosophy that allowed something to survive the wreck of the Western Roman Empire.  The Christians couldn’t become legionnaires and defeat the barbarians.  But they could become monks and form a nucleus of knowledge and civilization to help the common people survive the chaos of the dark ages.

Maybe we will see something similar.  Any help that is going to come in the future might have to come from ourselves.  I’m not sure I’d express it as, “Hopelessness is freedom.”  Maybe a better way to say it is. “The truth shall set you free.”  Facing reality is the best way to make progress.  See things for how they really are and you are less likely to be disappointed in how things turn out.  Do I feel freer now?  Maybe.

Guest Contributor – ArthurinCali – 30APR2025 – American Media Bubble

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I think the biggest reason that the narratives were so jarring and caused such a sense of cognitive dissonance comes down to the fact that I had spent so much time overseas. Outside of America, the media landscape stops being a constant funnel of US-centric news. This sounds obvious, but one must personally see the difference to truly understand the constant bombardment of information and narratives versus how others receive news on world events. I still chuckle to this day when an Op-Ed or headline declares how “the world is watching” what the US is doing with baited breath, as if there are villagers in far-flung East Timor or a town in Norway huddled around the TV or computer awaiting the next headline from CNN or NYT. Yes, many around the globe pay attention to current events, but not to the extent that MSM implies. The Legacy media kabuki theater is mostly for the US audience. I used to believe that finding 5-10 sources on a story was enough to put together a mostly accurate picture of what machinations were happening. Now, I try to find 2-3X that many because of the rampant misinformation displayed. It’s even worse now than it was two decades ago.