The latest cache of Pentagon documents to be leaked to the Internet reveals that the government has been lying to us about all sorts of things, but that’s not what the media seems interested in covering. They want to know who the rascal was who leaked this stuff. Talk about missing the point.
A 23-year-old man was the latest mass shooter to make the headlines, this time at a bank in Louisville, Kentucky, where he was an employee. As usual, Democrats called for increased gun control. Republicans blamed the mental health crisis. Both parties have a point. But we also shouldn’t ignore something unique to America, a brutal culture of violence that permeates our politics, pop culture and our everyday lives.
This week it’s self-driving taxis in San Francisco’s famously hilly streets, but it could be just about anything these days: America has become an unwilling nation of beta testers as products that are not even close to being ready for prime time are released on an unsuspecting public.
Many states with abortion bans point out that those restrictions have exceptions for protecting the life of the mother. In practice, however, doctors believe they have to wait until the mother is actually dying before they can intervene to perform an abortion. There have been several cases where mothers nearly died as a result.
Donald Trump was indicted on 34 felony counts in Manhattan in an indictment that failed to specify the underlying motivation for falsifying business records. Whatever you think about Donald Trump, the fact that this is legal in New York reflects the fact that the system can be Orwellian.
Reparations for Black people is becoming a thing in the real political world. San Francisco is considering paying $5 million to eligible Black adults. California is thinking $1 million. Are you white and think that that’s too much money? How much would you take to be victimized by a life of racial discrimination?
Political attacks against the social media company TikTok are based on a lot of what-ifs with a heavy dose of racial bigotry. No evidence has been presented about the supposed “threats” other than theoretical speculation. Yet we are supposed to react to these paranoid delusions? This is the same thinking that got us into Iraq.
The Washington Post ran a shocking expose revealing that Florida governor Ron DeSantis, a possible candidate for the presidency, participated and legally justified war crimes including torture after having volunteered to serve at the Guantánamo concentration camp. Even more shocking than his disgusting actions, which should have landed him in prison for the rest of his life, is the lack of reaction by politicians of both political parties as well as other media outlets. A nation that normalizes torture to the point of shrugging its collective shoulders has lost its moral compass.
The FDA is poised to approve human food cultured from the cells of cattle, chicken and fish, and grown into artificial versions of those meals.
Of all the possible business and political crimes you could think of charging Donald Trump with, it’s hard to think of anything pettier than falsifying business records for the purpose of paying off Stormy Daniels to begin with.
