I've seen the enemy

It's us.

The stock market has crashed, and experts are describing this as the classic rotation into poverty. At least everything is more expensive, services are getting crappier, and more people are getting measles. To be fair to Trump, his administration is finally delivering the reductions in air traffic controllers and National Park rangers that we have all been clamoring for.

Per Trump, the people have been allegedly begging for the elimination of Daylight Savings Time, the ritual of setting clocks forwards or backwards that happens twice a year in America. Commenting on the issue, Trump told reporters, “This is one of the great divisive issues of our time. Elon’s Twitter polls show a 50/50 split between those want it gone and those who don’t. Some people don’t want to take their children to the school in the dark. Other people like to drop their children off under the cover of darkness. Don’t ask me why. Maybe they are ugly people. Who the hell knows. And, you have people like Elon who use their children as human shields whenever they’re out and about. It’s hard for me to get excited about any of this. Maybe I’ll force the Canadians to stop adjusting their clocks and see what happens.”

With everything going on, I don’t want to add to your worries, but Trump just announced that he has asked Elon “to work with a scalpel instead of a hatchet.” I don’t know about you but this is giving Hannibal Lecter vibes bigly.

Have you noticed?

Have you noticed that ChatGPT is only about 40% right about the things you already know, but is 100% right about the things you don’t know?

Have you noticed the MAGA white supremacists? They are all uniformly UGLY, like something the cat dragged in. To the white supremacy guys, I say, stop and think about it. If you want to push the supremacy of white men, you should consider getting George Clooney or Tom Cruise to join the ranks. Not a single person is buying your story at this point.

In other news:

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has reportedly run up a five-million-dollar bill at a DC area restaurant after wrongly assuming that the cocktails were complimentary.

A Secret Service agent is being lauded for heroically throwing himself in the way and saving President Trump from being embraced by Marjorie Taylor Greene after his State of the Union speech.

New studies show that by replacing your daily cup of coffee with a cup of green tea, you can lose up to 92% of whatever little joy you have in your sorry little life.

On a serious note-

A lot has been said about the polarization in America. That the country has divided itself into two, the right and the left, and has stopped talking to each other. Blah blah blah and so on.

At some level, I can understand people on opposing teams not wanting to talk to each other. I am not saying that it’s correct, but I can see why that might happen. But what I cannot understand is how people on the SAME team are not letting each other speak. The entirety of the Republican party has silenced themselves for fear of offending the Emperor. There is practically no debate among the Republicans. Trump has steamrolled everyone into submission. There is no dissent allowed. Game over.

It's a little different on the left. The Democrats are leaderless and yet there seems to be an equally insidious group think at work. Take the example of a recent bill introduced by the Republicans in the Senate seeking to block the participation of transgender athletes in girls’ and women’s sports. All 45 Democratic Senators voted against the measure, which over 78% of Americans would like to see happen. Without even getting into the merits of the bill, are you telling me that there is not even a single Democratic Senator who is willing to break ranks and vote with the Republicans on this? Seriously? What are they afraid of?

California Governor Gavin Newsom broke ranks earlier this week and spoke out on the “deep unfairness” of allowing athletes who were born biologically male to participate in women’s sports. He caught flak immediately from his own party.

This is exactly the type of zombie-sheep-like culture that led to Nazism in Germany and Fascism in Italy. Forget Trump and his dictatorial bent. The Democrats and democratic voters need to first unshackle themselves from their self-imposed tyranny before they can even begin to resist Trump.

The younger folks especially need to understand this. We are all supposed to be on the same team. If we are not allowed talk to each other and say things, there is really nothing else to talk about. I am not saying that we abandon our ideals. Yes, we must ensure transgender, gay and other minority groups don’t face victimization and bullying. But there is a line somewhere along this path of ideals that we must not cross. At the least, we must learn to respect those who choose to not cross that line even if we choose to.

There is no such thing as a perfect union. Harmony is a mirage. We are not soul mates looking to get married to each other. We are not in some race to find out who amongst us the most virtuous of all. We are just trying to build a better community, society and nation. We must learn to take the good with the bad. We need to roll with the punches. We need to cut each other some slack. This is what friends do for each other. If we can’t stay friends with each other, who needs enemies? Right?

Stay cool. Stay chill. Happy weekend!