Making liberals tear out their hair is not an accident.
It is policy.
A youthful incident gives me a way to understand the MAGA world. They are teenagers, acting out. They are the team of students versus the adult kill-joys.
At Medford
High School in the spring of 1967, the Vice Principal, Mr. Alex McDonald, announced a crackdown on kids smoking in the bathrooms. Some rowdy kids decided to do something about it, to hang him in effigy. One morning there it was, in the oak tree in the parking lot next to the school. There was a sign: "Everyone Run Alex To Hell." ERATH. For a few days the word "ERATH" got knowing nods. It was secret code. People said it in the halls with a snicker. "ERATH."
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| Alex McDonald |
The rowdy boys thought it great fun.
I came to know Alex McDonald as an adult. He was a sweet, gentle man, who spend a lifetime as an educator. He remembered the incident. He laughed about it. He said it was kids having fun, making memories for themselves, being teenagers, rebelling against authority. "Teenagers do that kind of thing," he told me.
This morning's opening page on the Fox News website is Tucker Carlson saying that Biden failed miserably in dealing with COVID. Why? Because even though most people are vaccinated against COVID, a record number of people are still dying from it and these deaths are a total failure of Biden's policies.
He does not mention that the people dying (currently 93% of people in overcrowded Michigan hospitals) are unvaccinated people who get COVID guidance from people like himself. How dare he blame you unvaccinated people for getting the virus, he tells his audience. Yet incredibly, simultaneously, Carlson also says COVID is not particularly dangerous and Biden's efforts to deal with it are unnecessary overkill. Didn't he just say hundreds of thousands of people died? Didn't he hear himself?
Of course, one wants to scream.
Donald Trump, Junior, sends me email advertisements, with the subject "Triggering!" and "This is hilarious!"
Let's Go Brandon. This is sweet for them. It is code for "Fuck Joe Biden" and everyone knows it. The rowdy boys have a way to be naughty but not-naughty, by saying it and not-saying it. We have a secret language! ERATH.
Twenty years after the event Mr. McDonald laughed about it. It turned out to be harmless teenage fun, except for the fire danger with the paper towels, and perhaps for the people who smoked in the bathrooms as teenagers because it was really cool to be part of the crowd. Some got addicted to the cigarettes, and then died young from something. That consequence is remote and ultimately on them. They took their chances and got unlucky, like the people who don't get vaccinated. The other issue, the authority of high school principals to keep order, was never in question. The adults were in charge. Teachers stood guard in the bathrooms. Mr. McDonald kept order. We graduated and went on with our lives.
It is different and worse for Biden. The teenage-style mocking of Biden does put his authority and credibility into question. Biden looks physically and cognitively weak. I wish it were not so. I know I irritate some readers by writing it, but I consider it a reality to address, not one to deny. A presidential leader needs to be able to explain things to the American public and to show them his policies are addressing the needs of the nation. Joe Biden seems incapable to doing it, alas. Biden cannot do an essential element of his job.
Biden is easy to mock, and the mocking sticks, more than it ever did for Mr. McDonald. Biden is being run to hell.
11 comments:
Gary Trudeau has such a knack for capturing the zeitgeist, and last Sunday’s “Doonesbury” illustrates exactly what Peter is talking about. The last panel especially nailed it:
A doctor, holding a chart at the foot of an ICU bed, does a double take and says, “Ed? My God, what’re you doing here?” From the head of the bed, lost in the machinery, comes the reply, “Owning the libs.”
Posted for Rick Millward
It's a bit early to tell for sure, but it seems to me that President Biden was facing an uphill climb in terms of popularity from the beginning. Perhaps the tortoise/hare analogy is at play here, we'll see.
The $45 t-shirt scam, one of several, is for most of us utterly telling as far as understanding Trump's motives. The question is how far they will push it because the grift can only go so far and I don't quite see it going all the way to 2024.
In the meantime, President Biden is, as you say, at the door of the bathroom.
Democrats have a messaging problem. The only message they seem to have come up with so far is, “We are going to take care of you.“ The problem is, most Americans don’t want to be taken care of; most Americans want to be able to take care of themselves.
America was populated from Europe by individualistic people who wanted to get away from the authorities and live free lives. They left behind compliant people who were willing to live under those authorities. America is much more individualistic than Europe. A social safety net has much less intrinsic appeal here.
The slogan on the New Hampshire license plate is, “Live free or die.” There is no state license plate with the opposite slogan.
Even if the Democrats were to come up with a better message, they need someone who could project it. That’s apparently not Biden; Harris is even worse.
The Biden Administration is out to lunch on response to Omicron. Information accumulation is snowballing.
“1. This variant is cause for concern, not cause for panic
2. The best protection is getting fully vaccinated and boosted
3. In the event, hopefully unlikely, that updated vaccines are needed, the US will accelerate development and deployment.”
2020 all over again. Look for the latest statements from Moderna CEO.
Endpoints News is one of the best sources out there, and most is free to read merely by signing up.
Note, same statements can be found elsewhere.
https://endpts.com/this-is-not-going-to-be-good-moderna-ceo-bancel-warns-of-a-material-drop-in-vaccine-efficacy-as-omicron-spreads/
Another source here.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/covid-19-antibody-drugs-are-challenged-by-omicron-preliminary-testing-indicates-11638270003
Pains me to see the dupery going on. And the pandemic of course.
Some additional context is appropriate for the Tucker Carlson segments. He was lampooning Joe Biden based on Biden's own words. In the final 2020 presidential debate, Biden intoned the following:
"220,000 Americans dead. If you hear nothing else I say tonight, hear this. Anyone who is responsible for that many deaths should not remain as President of the United States".
Politically-speaking, Biden's demagoguery on COVID was smart. Without COVID, Biden would have lost by 3-4 points. But if Biden says unequivocally that the buck stops with the sitting Prez on COVID deaths, especially after boasting once elected that HE would "contain" COVID? He owns that silly claim. In my opinion, neither man is primarily "responsible" for COVID deaths. Their administrations' public health policy approaches to COVID have been pretty similar. Most importantly where blame is concerned, generously setting aside causation for now, a British university study says 80% of all cases worldwide would have been saved with China and WHO telling the world the truth about the nature of COVID even one month sooner than they actually did.
Biden deserves all the other guff he gets. Unlike Mr. McDonald as described, Biden himself is and has always been an abusive, blustering creep when confronted or angered. He isn't just stuttering once again like in his childhood, he's regularly uttering shocking inanities and regularly displaying shocking loss of memory and coherency. He can't handle a real press conference even with his legacy media allies because unscripted follow-up questions will befuddle and expose him. He can barely get through his sessions squinting at the teleprompter for a few minutes before shuffling off after a prefab softball question or two. He is a querulous, crotchety puppet of Ron Klain, Susan Rice and other leftists, with his wife Jill the chief translator and ego-mollifier.
A little reality check for our Fox Noise fans:
What Biden said is absolutely true – the best protection is getting fully vaccinated and boosted. Wearing masks helps too. Unfortunately, Republican opposition and disinformation have resulted in hordes of people going unvaccinated, prolonged the pandemic and causing countless thousands of preventable deaths.
Mike,
It’s not a productive way to communicate when you don’t respond to what other people say, hit your pre-programmed talking points over and over, and wrap the whole thing in unnecessary snark. “Fox Noise?” Really? Why even bother?
Honest conversation is beneficial; dueling slogans, not so much. Maybe you have something to teach us. Why not give it a try?
Yes, Michael, the crap spewed by the likes of Tucker Carlson is noise. Unfortunately, the clueless heed it and as a result, they’re still dying in droves. It's too bad they're so impervious to facts. It makes honest conversation impossible.
Mike,
But honest conversation could happen here.
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