Today

Today I find myself wondering whether humankind has simply ceased advancing, and maybe instead, we find ourselves moving backwards into some earlier state of precivilized behavior pattern.  I am thinking of Vladimir Putin specifically, who acts as though he wishes to return to a world state in which he rules as permanent monarch and the world outside his realm simply bows to him each time he opens his mouth.

Yes, yes, I know that we (the non-Russian world) have taken steps both to arm Ukraine, and to financially punish Russia for its Nazi-like wartime behavior against Ukraine.  But I also see folks like Mitch McConnell, and the other republican clowns (think Marjorie Taylor Greene) continue acting as though Joe Biden was the real enemy, not Vlad the Impaler. Now, how is that possible?  Well, apparently republicans no longer even notice Vlad’s latest outrage, so busy are they at trying to tear down Joe Biden.  Mitch even allowed as how, after seeing Ketanji Jackson-Brown approved for SCOTUS, that he planned to work especially hard to ensure that no other SCOTUS nominees from the Dems would ever see the light of day.

See, we as a people, no longer have anything in common, towards which we might work as a united Nation.  Maybe social media, that hotbed of hateful commentary, has really captured America.  We seem no longer to understand what is important and what is minor. Makes me wonder what might have happened had FDR’s various depression-era and Wartime initiatives been treated by Mitch McConnell.  Might he simply have objected to the CCC, the WPA, and even to our entry into WW II? Would he have treated Pearl Harbor as some Democratic plot to gain control?  Can’t you hear OANN and Fox reporting on Pearl Harbor, or the Nazi invasion of Europe and all those Death Camps, treating all that as Democratic hysteria?

Now to be fair, we as a Nation remain unsure how best to rein in Vlad. He seems completely over the edge of that madness line. And, worse yet, as his invasion efforts continue to fall apart due to the ineptitude of the Russian military and the fierce resistance of a united Ukraine, we cannot say with any confidence what path he may take up to and including nuclear war against Ukraine.  As we diddle and dither, using our limited financial toolkit, Vlad seems to be growing increasingly crazier.  So far, nothing, however horrific, seems to working to get the Ukrainians to accept defeat.  Instead, they keep punching Vlad in the nose.  Now, within Russia, Vlad has so secured the airwaves and the print media that ordinary Russian citizens seem to have no idea how awful has been the performance of their Russian military and their War Crimes approach to this invasion. Everything is lovely in the garden and all bad effects (i.e., dead people) are totally the fault of the Nazi Ukrainians. And if they can’t get their money out of their banks, that is also Zelinskyy’s fault.

And the fact that republicans seem to all have their collective heads up their asses seems to be going unnoticed by the world at large. We are too busy yelling about Will Smith and what our public schools are doing to brainwash our kids into becoming Gay.  Or, for heaven’s sake, why suddenly everyone seems to want to have an abortion.  So, all republican states are now focused exclusively on LGBTQ issues or on abortion, and none of them seem to care about actual mass killings in Ukraine.  Oh, and don’t get me started on that 1619 Project, where we teach children all about race and racism. Horrors, do we really want our children to know that we are a racist culture???

So, let’s instead, change the channel, let our republican leaders safeguard our ballots so no Democrats can win , and we will all send "Thoughts and Prayers" to Ukraine.  Now, can we get back to the Will Smith Horror story???