A Once Great Nation

No real visuals to speak of. Consequently, won’t make the evening news.

From Bloomberg. “Trump Unveils Plan to Scrap Power Plant Pollution Controls”.

“The Trump administration revealed plans for repealing mandates that force power plants to curb greenhouse gas emissions, representing its most significant action yet to reverse policies combating climate change.

The proposal by the Environmental Protection Agency, which could be finalized later this year, is being coupled with a plan to ease limits on mercury and other toxic air pollution from the facilities.

. . . ‘In repealing the carbon pollution standards for power plants — without a proposed replacement — EPA is going beyond climate denial to outright climate surrender,’ said Meredith Hankins, a senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council. ‘EPA is attempting to claim with a straight face that power plants, the nation’s largest industrial source of carbon pollution, don’t significantly contribute to climate change.’

In addition to repealing the greenhouse gas curbs, the EPA is moving forward with plans to unwind standards that limit emissions of mercury, a neurotoxin that impairs brain development, as well as other hazardous air pollutants. EPA limits on mercury pollution, which effectively compel pollution controls at coal-fired power plants, date to 2011, though requirements were strengthened under Biden last year.”

Outright climate surrender. Simultaneously, gut the federal agencies that help people and places devastated by extreme climate events.

Slow Learners

Us Democrats.

Did you see the story about the Mad King and drug prices? Here’s an overview from (cough, cough) Fox Business News.

“President Donald Trump used the story of an overweight friend getting weight-loss medication at a much lower cost overseas to illustrate why he’s working to cut prescription drug prices for Americans. 

Speaking to Fox News’ Sean Hannity earlier this week, the president said one of his ‘slightly overweight’ friends purchased what Trump called a ‘fat shot’ in London for significantly less money than in the U.S.

‘He called me and he said, ‘Hey, strange thing happened. I just bought a drug, same company, same plant, same everything, everything was the same. In one case, I paid in New York $1,300 and in London, I’m paying $88,’ Trump recounted. ‘He said, ‘What’s going on?’”

I heard multiple Demo opinion leaders rip the MK for flippantly using ‘fat shot’. They probably preferred “weight control injection”.

More important is what Fox left out of its own reporting on its own interview. At the end of the story, the MK smirked and added, “I told my friend, it’s not working.”

Demo opinion leaders were appalled. How dare the MK call his friend fat. They were genuinely upset. Uncouth. Not presidential.

I wondered, were they asleep from 2016-2020?

The Mad King’s secret sauce is the contrast with all the politicians who came before him who said exactly what they thought everyone wanted to hear, not necessarily what they were thinking. And his contemporaries who regularly measure their words too closely to connect with anyone.

People dig the Mad King for saying things no one else will. Telling his friend his “fat shot” was not working harkens to the middle school nature of my friends’ group text.

Sometimes I wonder whether some Demos have had their sense of humor surgically removed. Telling his friend his fat shot was not working was rude, crude, and funny. People like that it’s unexpected and not at all presidential. That’s the point. That the Demos still don’t get.

Some Demos are trying to get it by using the “f” word more often. I agree with Michael Adam’s take on that.

“I think that in the case of the Democratic candidates … the swearing reflects their sense of crisis,” said Michael Adams, a lexicography expert and author of the book “In Praise of Profanity.”

The Mad King’s calculus is “If all of your peers are trying to appeal to the largest possible audience, do the opposite.” Talk like and to non-elites, who greatly outnumber the humorless, and too polite for their own good elites.

Sentences To Ponder

From the NYTimes.

“Republicans are seeking to extend Mr. Trump’s 2017 tax cut and temporarily enact his campaign pledges not to tax tips or overtime pay. They want to partly offset the roughly $3.8 trillion cost of those tax measures — as well as plans to increase spending on the military and immigration enforcement — by making cuts to Medicaid, food stamps and subsidies for clean energy.”

Don’t be fooled by the easy to spot “Eat the Rich” signage in downtown Olympia, WA. The guiding principle of the fairly elected kleptocracy is “Feed the Rich”.

Postscript: Welcome new readers from Germany.

The Upside Down

Somehow, I’ve stumbled into a Stranger Things episode. And thanks to Biden, Trump, and the Lakers, I can’t get out.

Democratic Party leaders and Biden officials say I shouldn’t trust what I’m seeing and hearing. They know what I, a certified bed-wetter, don’t. The President is not aging. The debate was a one-off. His voice, energy levels, and communication skills are all fine. And will continue to be throughout a second term. He continues to be the exact right person for the job at the exact right time.

Following the debate, the Serial Liar said, “As I walked off the stage on Thursday night, at the end of the highly anticipated ‘Debate,’ anchors, political reporters and all screamed that I had had the greatest debate performance in the long and storied history of North Korea Presidential Debates. They all said, effectively, ‘Trump was fantastic!'”

Cue JJ Redick, the Los Angeles Lakers’ new head coach who today said, with a remarkably straight face, “Rob (Pelinka) and I did not give Bronny anything. Bronny has earned this. … Bronny has earned this through hard work.”

Bronny, who is shorter than me, averaged 4.8 points on 36.6% shooting (26.7% from 3), 2.8 rebounds and 2.1 assists in 19.3 minutes per game at some loathsome college. But the Lakers are saying I shouldn’t trust that sample set and that they would’ve picked Bronny even if the team wasn’t desperate to make his dad happy and resign him.

Biden’s Reelection Team, The North Korean, and the Los Angeles Lakers all think we’re too stupid to think for ourselves. So they’ll do it for us.

Our eyes, ears, and brains be damned.

Team Kendrick Lamar

Told the Good Wife I’m on Team Kendrick Lamar in the second highest profile feud going today. After, of course, Trump-Cohen. She asked what he’s like. I explained, “He’s edgy, from Compton, more of a populist. More substantive lyrics. Drake is more commercial, always seeking the limelight, and will never have a Pulitzer.”

Then this dropped. Oops. If I’m honest with myself, maybe I’m not the rap connoisseur I think I am.

Postscript: The article says Drake lives in a $100m mansion, so I guess Kendrick Lamar can still claim to be more of a commoner.

Sentence To Ponder

BALTIMORE—”The crew of workers from Mexico and Central America were well into their night shift, pouring concrete to fix the potholes that dotted the Francis Scott Key Bridge.”

So they weren’t animals from insane asylums committing crimes?

Anti-immigrant hysteria depends upon not seeing or thinking about the people fixing potholes on bridges in the middle of the night.

Math To Ponder

From CBS News.

“As of mid-February 2024, Forbes estimates Trump’s net worth at $2.6 billion, putting the real estate developer at No. 1,216 on the magazine’s list of the world’s richest people. 

Trump’s wealth largely stems from real estate, spanning residential buildings in New York City to golf courses and hotels around the world.

According to Bloomberg, one of his largest assets is his $500 million stake in 1290 Avenue of the Americas, an office building in Manhattan. Trump also has $600 million in liquid assets, while his Trump National Doral Miami Golf Resort is worth about $300 million, Bloomberg said.”

Source.

And yet, today he’s claiming he can’t pay his $454m judgement. I tapped out after Algebra 2/Trig, but isn’t $600m > $454m.

He should prob start charging more for the shoes.

Do Follow My Lead

Political analysts of all stripes agree that the 2024 Presidential Election will be decided by about 5% of voters who don’t identify with either the Red Team or the Blue Team exclusively. Those rarely seen in the wild independents will prove especially important in the six states that will likely determine which candidate gets 270+ electoral votes—Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, North Carolina, Arizona and Georgia.

I’m Team ‘Blue Team’ in a decidedly blue state, meaning the Octogenarian won’t really need my vote. So what can I do, and people like me, who are desperate to preserve our democracy?

Several things. First, let’s identify all of our independent friends. For example, using their Alaska Airline abbreviations to maintain their privacy, I’m thinking of MARN, TMAT, and MLAL.

Second, ask each 5 percenter which of the six swing states they like the most and would be willing to move to by summer’s end*.

Third, find them a job in their swing state of choice that pays an equivalent amount.

Fourth, help them sell their current crib and buy a similar one in their swing state of choice in time to establish residency.

Fifth, hire a moving company to ease the transition, give them ample gas and hotel money, and pack treats for their journey.

Imagine if everyone on Team Blue, did this, like me, for three of their independent friends.

Landslide baby, landslide.

*with the understanding that as soon as they vote, they can move back if they so choose

Orange Jesus Explained

If you’re anything like me, you don’t “get” Iowa. More specifically, you wonder, “What’s up with Iowans?” Especially, the white evangelicals.

David P. Gushee thinks he gets “it”.

From “The Deification of Donald Trump Poses Some Interesting Questions“.

“Trump’s evolution into a Jesus-like figure for some but not all white evangelicals began soon after he began his first presidential campaign. As David P. Gushee, a professor of Christian ethics at Mercer University, explained by email:

‘Some of Trump’s Christian followers do appear to have grown to see him as a kind of religious figure. He is a savior. I think it began with the sense that he was uniquely committed to saving them from their foes (liberals, Democrats, elites, seculars, illegal immigrants, etc.) and saving America from all that threatens it.’

In this sense, Gushee continued, ‘a savior does not have to be a good person but just needs to fulfill his divinely appointed role. Trump is seen by many as actually having done so while president.’

This view of Trump is especially strong ‘in the Pentecostal wing of the conservative Christian world,’ Gushee wrote, where he is sometimes also viewed as an anointed leader sent by God. ‘Anointed’ here means set apart and especially equipped by God for a holy task. Sometimes the most unlikely people got anointed by God in the Bible. So Trump’s unlikeliness for this role is actually evidence in favor. The multiple criminal charges against Trump serve to strengthen the belief of many evangelicals about his ties to God, according to Gushee:

‘The prosecutions underway against Trump have been easily interpretable as signs of persecution, which can then connect to the suffering Jesus theme in Christianity. Trump has been able to leverage that with lines like, “They’re not persecuting me. They’re persecuting you.” The idea that he is unjustly suffering and, in so doing, vicariously absorbing the suffering that his followers would be enduring is a powerful way for Trump to be identified with Jesus.'”

No doubt, add a lot of PressingPausers to the list of liberals, Democrats, elites, seculars, illegal immigrants, and other nefarious foes that many Iowans think they need saving from.

Of course, they don’t really know any PressingPausers, some of whom I’m indebted to for reaching out after my recent “It’s My Parents’ Fault” post. I had a beer with one in Olympia yesterday. Others in Olympia; Greensboro, NC; Huntington Beach, CA; and Japan messaged, texted, and emailed. Trust me, no one needs saving from them. They’re savers of others.