Balancing act

I've been trying to occupy myself with non-politics things the past few days, mostly successfully, as I climb my way out of a mild (moderate?) black-hole episode that consumed my entire Friday and Saturday. I had a physical yesterday—first one in a couple of years thanks to some insurance issues—during which we discussed the merits of moderating my news consumption vis-à-vis my fucked-up brain chemistry. But in this, the time of madness, we can't stay away too long or we risk, well, everything, so I checked back in today.

There's a lot of shit happening and I had to stop diving into it after a while. Every day, it seems, there's a new five-alarm fire to absorb and new reasons to write/call your Congresspeople. Here are the "highlights" from my checking back in:

I learned that POTUS47 has tapped Dan Bongino—aka Alex Jones lite—to be the number two guy at the FBI, under top dog Kash Patel. I don't know why this surprised me, as this  outrageous, manifestly unqualified rage factory is essentially an average POTUS47 appointee, but it is yet another sycophantic moron in a position of authority. And as we've seen over the past month, such people cause great harm both when they intend to and when they don't.

I read more about how POTUS47’s firing of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the top Judge Advocate Generals in the armed forces is likely a prelude to an attempt to use the military illegally, which is a fun thing to think about. Pete Hegseth, aka Drunky McSexist SecDef, flat-out said on TV that the JAGs were fired because they respected the law and he and POTUS47 want lawyers who "don’t exist to attempt to be roadblocks to anything."

I saw that last night the House of Representatives passed (barely: 217 Republicans for, 214 Democrats and one Republican against) a budget resolution—not an actual budget, this is, like, step one of a longer process—that showed in stark terms what Republicans want to prioritize. Their plan would raise the debt ceiling by $4 trillion, putting the lie to the oft-repeated claim that Republicans want less debt; cut taxes, vastly for wealthier Americans and corporations, by $4.5 trillion to further expand the wealth gap in this country; and eliminate well over $1 trillion in spending on things like Medicaid, health assistance, SNAP, and staffing the government, because fuck sick people, poor people, and public employees. What could possibly go wrong.

I read about POTUS47 releasing a genuinely insane video touting "Trump Gaza," which is so absurd as to merit no consideration at all, except as it relates to our president's accelerating estrangement from reality and the gullibility of his cultists. I learned from that same article that POTUS47 intends to sell citizenship to the United States as if it were some sort of country club rather than a country. Here's what he said: "We’re going to be be selling a gold card. You have a green card, this is a gold card. We’re going to be putting a price on that card of about $5 million and that’s going to give you green card privileges, plus. It’s going to be a route to citizenship, and wealthy people will be coming into our country by buying this card. They’ll be wealthy and they’ll be successful. It’s never been done before, anything like this." That last part is correct—we've never had anything quite as batshit crazy as an immigration gold card proposed before because we've never had a president as staggeringly corrupt and despotic as this one before.

I discovered that the Washington Post, once the standard-bearer for American journalism, has declared that its editorial pages will henceforth be devoted to pieces focused on "personal liberties and free markets." And I don't think it's a stretch to say that they aren't looking for the ACLU perspective on personal liberties. Post owner Jeff Bezos said in the declaration that "viewpoints opposing those pillars will be left to be published by others." The Post's editor promptly resigned rather than continue on with a publication now promoting oligarchy and kowtowing to the new, fascist White House.

On the other hand, I also see that Republicans in Congress, unlike POTUS47, still care about elections. No, no, I don't mean they still care about democracy or any of that quaint "government of, by, and for the people" stuff, I mean they still care about having to run for reelection. Thus, when their constituents let them know in no uncertain terms that they're failing them they start to move off of their devoted loyalty to Dear Leader just a smidge. Not enough, not yet, but it's a start. True, mostly we're seeing stuff like this, from Georgia Congressman Rich McCormick: “I’m not against anything [Elon Musk] is doing, but I’m concerned. I’m concerned that maybe we’re moving a little bit too fast.” Pretty weak sauce, but it shows he's feeling a little heat. So, Georgians—and others in Republican districts—turn that oven up to maximum and keep telling your representatives that you're not interested in living under tyrannical rule.

Finding a balance between keeping current on important matters and finding time to enjoy things is proving to be more challenging than even I expected it to be. But I'm working on it.