Trump-Zellensky and the Angels of Death

I’m pretty sure the entire script for Trump 2.0 is coming out of Dana White’s WWE writer’s workshops. If you can get your mind around that, it explains a lot of otherwise inexplicable shit. Like how a scene that was cut from Godfather III showed up at the Pope’s funeral. Everybody knows that’s how history works. The protagonists sit down alone, and hammer out the future mano a mano. The future of Crimea is Russian. The future of Odessa is Russian too. Unless… As the Great Men of History shape the future there in the Vatican, it’s just Trump and Zelly and some random dudes in swishy floor-length black gowns. Those are the angels! Alas, not all of the angels are working in the employ of Heaven. In fact, there is reason to believe that at least some of them are Putin loyalists. Not sure how Dana’s people will handle that plot twist. Remember in that infamous beat-down in the Oval Office how JD and DJ were tag-teaming Zelly with the “you ain’t got no cards” mantra? Today Trump was admitting he doesn’t have any either. Which leaves the Free World with a stark choice. Do we admit defeat? Or do we make a deal with Putin and call it victory?

Fried chicken; the soul food that healed America

It’s high time we added another name to the pantheon of civil-rights champions who helped America heal after the racial conflicts of the mid 20th century. Colonel Harland Sanders. And for once, he’s neither an African-American nor was he ever a minister in the Christian church, like MLK and John Lewis. But nobody and nothing has brought more American’s together than the Colonel’s secret recipe. Not McDonalds. Not Dominos. Not Taco Bell. I am reminded of KFC’s pivotal role in the history of human rights by this story. Seems the various intelligence agencies in Pakistan have just sleuthed out that KFC is an American company! Who knew? Apparently not those guys!? So, are the Pakistani’s rallying around this champion of Human Rights? No! Instead, they are boycotting it! KFC is American and America funds genocide in Gaza. Therefore, boycott KFC. Case closed! Luckily, America is developing some rules of law to prevent such antisemitic outrages. Already in over half the US states, it is against the law to support the BDS movement, on account the topic makes some folks uncomfortable. Whereas genocide doesn’t.

Netanyahu slams Canada, claims to speak for "civilized" world

Netanyahu as spokesman for the “civilized world?” My God, what depths of depravity have we fallen to? The man has the blood of tens of thousands of Palestinian children on his hands. The Greatest Leader since Moses went off on Carney today because Carney allegedly entertained, however fleetingly, the thought that maybe, just possibly, the IDF has been doing some war-crimey stuff in Gaza. It’s not just the blood of Palestinians. Every Israeli who perished on October 7 and since was a victim of Netanyahu’s corrupt and incompetent government. Every warning about a pending attack was ignored. Border units were withdrawn rather than beefed up. You’d almost think Bibi was deliberately courting calamity. And why not? It’s worked for him many times before! When the going gets tough, you need a strong man at the helm… When that strong man is desperately flailing about to keep his own ass out of jail, the blood on his hands is a mere afterthought. But he presumes to speak for the civilized world. Disgusting!

Better a curveball than a speedball

I tend to be very modest in my consumption of pharmaceutical products. For twenty years there’s been only two items on the shopping list. A couple months ago my doctor added a third, something intended to tamp down the high cholesterol. Shortly thereafter, I noticed an unexpected side effect - my bony ankles were disappearing. No biggie, I thought. Neither I nor anyone else sits around admiring my ankles, so I let things slide, perhaps a little longer than I should have. By the middle of last week fat ankles had become fat feet and fat legs. By the end of the week my abdomen had doubled in size and I was having trouble breathing. It was a major effort to get my pants on, let alone do them up. By Sunday I hadn’t slept for two nights, my face was beginning to puff up, and I was getting worried. I resolved to call the doctor Monday morning. I tell the office I think I’m having a bad reaction to the new meds. The girl tells me the first thing I have to do is get an assessment, and since the office is 100 miles away she says to go to the nearest hospital for that. The nearest hospital is a modest operation in a quaint town on the shores of Georgian Bay. I walk in thinking I’ll be walking out in an hour or two, with a magic potion that’ll make my body shrink. Well! I finally walked out three days later with four new prescriptions and one new diagnosis. In between I got every test that little joint has the technology to administer. The good news is that the liver and kidneys seem to be functioning normally. The bad news, in the doctor’s own words; “your chest ex-ray is lookin’ kinda nasty.” I like the way they get to the point in these small towns. No sense confusing the locals with nonsensical jargon. The diagnosis; congestive heart failure. That’s not something you want to hear, so I had a lot of questions. To my way of thinking, they shouldn’t call it failure as long as the heart is till pumping. Turns out about 70% of folks my age have some sort of cardiovascular disease. When you look at it that way, I’m as boringly normal as I’ve ever been! So, is the party over? Nah… I figure if I stop with the joints and stock up on edibles, I’ll be good to go for long while yet!

Carney's haircut becomes issue in Canadian election

You know you’ve got a vibrant democracy when that happens! Our world has never been as awash in bullshit and flim-flam as it is today. Where oh where are the credible headlines? Where are the debates around the life-and-death issues that make this the most important election of our time? Carney’s haircut is not one of them! These are pivotal times. The values that underpin Western Civilization are under siege as never before; human rights, freedom of speech, democracy itself! Look at how our allies in Europe are backsliding. Just a few months ago VP JD went to Munich to deliver a stern rebuke on how the champions of freedom are dropping the ball on tolerating diversity of opinion. This from a country that’ll deport you if you dare criticize Israel! Speaking of our sacred Western values, they have been on full display in that tragic ruin of a democracy. Murdering 20,000 children is self-defense, you antisemite, you! Any divergence from that view makes you a Hamas supporter, and you richly deserve your fate. Meanwhile, Western Civ’s campaign to save us all from Putin seems to be on the back burner, thanks to that crazed madman Trump unleashing tariff terror on the planet. Holy moly… however did we get to a place where media in his own country declares the Leader of the Free World a crazed madman? Has Freedom fallen? Not quite yet. The Resistance Lives! Just last weekend hundreds of thousands took to the streets in what some Dem party- affiliated PR shop branded the Hands Off movement. Hands off health care! Hands off reproductive rights! Hands off foreign aid! Hands off higher education! Hands off NATO! Say what? Hands off NATO? Really? Ya, the slippery devils almost slipped that past me! In case you haven’t noticed, the US/NATO campaign to save Europe from Putin is struggling mightily. That, I believe, is the main reason we don’t talk much about it. The channel has ben changed… Tariffs tariffs tariffs! And in case that doesn’t work, Trump is already promising even tougher tariffs! The world must be brought to heel! Not sure how that’s going to impress Putin. There’s already 28,000 sanctions on Russia, which have mostly weakened EU countries while their target sports the most robust economy in Europe! It’s enough to make you wonder if Western Civ has lost its way. And in the midst of this existential global mayhem, Canadians face the most important election of our lives. Will we choose the banker’ haircut? Or will we choose PP’s semi-quiff?

American Empire creates its own reality

But the rest of the world has to live in it. Watching the Rose Garden clown show - revival meeting last night brought to mind the alleged Karl Rove quote, to the effect that "when you're an empire you create your own reality." The people around Trump remain convinced they’re still an empire. The reason America runs huge trade deficits with much of the world is because America no longer produces much that anyone wants to buy. That’s not very empire-like, so trade deficits are re-defined as subsidies, or at least they were a few weeks ago. By last night they had somehow morphed into the rationale for “reciprocal tariffs.” That’s how the American Empire invents new realities. If we pause for a moment and consider the old realities, we can see why Uncle Sam is in a rush to move along. In short, the American Empire is in such deep shit that it is unlikely to remain an empire much longer. Trump 2.0 promised he’d end two wars immediately. Unfortunately, they’re both escalating and they both continue to drain US resources. The richest country in the world is running up a vast unsustainable debt that can only end in a major devaluation of the USD, and/or an outright repudiation of the debt. Goodbye global reserve currency status. In the glory days of Empire, the US had the muscle to enforce its dictats. As the Ukraine debacle vividly demonstrates, that is no longer the case. Soft voice- big stick has given way to belligerent bossy-talk without much of a stick at all, unless Uncle Sam fast forwards to nuclear apocalypse. Short of that, when you can’t produce artillery shells in sufficient quantities to support the vassal you goaded into war, maybe it’s time to go back to the soft voice. I’m not optimistic.

Canada rejoices as Trump stops making stupid 51st State joke

Mafia Don had a lot of fun with that “Governor of the 51st State, Justin Trudeau” gag he first fired up last November. He had no idea how intensely many Canadians would take offence at that. CBC alone probably racked up a few hundred hours of on-air umbrage. So Trump being Trump, he obviously had to use it at every opportunity. The Globe and the CBC were aghast that not even King Charles or our EU allies would speak up for us and protect us from hearing Trump’s stupid joke yet again. Today was Trump-proclaimed “Liberation Day,” the day the dreaded Trump Tariffs would take effect. Canada, or at least our legacy media journalists, have had months of sleepless nights waiting for the big day, and wondering how much longer we had to keep our elbows up. I tuned in the CBC coverage. The talking heads were stunned. After all these months of hyperventilating over imminent doom, Canada didn’t even get the baseline 10% tariff! And even better, not once did the Orange Oracle refer to us as the 51st State!

Reflections on the ice storm

The electricity went out here 9:30 Saturday night, and came on again about an hour ago. That’s three days and nights of no internet, no water, no home-cooked meals, no bath, no shower, and to flush the toilet I gotta mosey on down to the creek with a five gallon pail. No internet means I can’t live stream Al Jazeera’s Gaza coverage. Haven’t seen a dead baby in three days! I’m OK with that. It’s a nice break. Apparently the babies are still dying, but I appreciate the break even though they never got one. The water thing shows you how much we take for granted. You could live a lot longer without internet than you could without water. And three days without water? That’s a crisis for me, but three days can easily turn into three months or more in Sudan or Ukraine or Gaza. Three days is a minor inconvenience by their standards. When it comes to flushability, it’s a good idea to stockpile your toilet water before you actually need it. Here’s a tip; load up early in the day before you load up with a beer and a toke. The creek is well over it’s banks and it’s a bit of a muddy mess down there. One false step on the path back to the house and you’re on your ass with your empty water bucket rolling down the hill. When you need three trips to the creek for one flush it’s a long three days without electricity.