The Times We Live In

It’s been a bit since I posted anything. I didn’t have much to say.

We all wrestle with time. It breaks us down. I did a tile job for a contractor friend who was going on vacation, and that took a nearly three weeks, and then I signed on for another friend to replace his enormous deck, and that has been an ass-breaking two weeks plus, so far. I try to be grateful that I’m able to do these things. I have the tools and the time, but more important, I have the physical ability and my marbles. I’m a spry 64, and it isn’t due to clean living. Shit luck. Genetics, maybe. Nothing I planned or prepared for.

For about a year and a half now I’ve been sticking to my plan. Sit back, pay attention, and do not become overly concerned about the crisis du jour as they stream out of Washington one after another. I knew what was coming. Since Biden assumed office and the bureaucratic class came to power, I didn’t expect anything good, but I have to say it’s turning out even worse than I’d anticipated.

I’ve often noted that as November approaches, and the mid-term elections loom, the Democrats are going to become increasingly aware of their dire situation and desperation would begin to color their decisions. It’s happening in spades. It look like a total freak out. Three cases in point.

1) The laughably titled Inflation Reduction Act, written by Chuck Schumer and passed in the Senate via reconciliation along partisan lines last week (Kamala had to appear to cast the tie-breaking vote), is a $700 billion disaster. The bill doubles the size of the IRS, marks the largest “green” investment in US history, and makes major changes to health care. Even the Boston Globe has noticed the bill does nothing to reduce inflation or stimulate the economy. By all accounts it will make everything worse, for everyone.

It is, however, being touted as a “major win” for Biden because, the thinking goes, passing anything is better than being seen as accomplishing nothing. I’m not so certain this is true. “You know what we really need in these difficult times? We need to double the size of the IRS!” said no sane person, ever. I could be wrong, but my suspicion is that the effects of this will kick in and be felt by the public just in time for the next presidential election. Does this sound like a good plan? Think about it. At the same time they are calling for the police in crime-ridden inner cities to be replaced by unarmed social workers, they are asking for tens of thousands of armed IRS agents. This strikes me as a profoundly bad idea, born of desperation.

2) The January 6th Commission. Many people really, really dislike Trump, but even they are hard-pressed to not see a kangaroo commission when one is flaunted before them. The chair, Nancy Pelosi, hand-picked the Republicans who were allowed to sit on the commission, rejecting any voice that might be inclined to fairness. No cross-examination of the witnesses has been allowed. And, to date, all of the testimony has been of the third hand, lets throw shit at the wall until something sticks variety. My guess is the American population is not nearly as stupid, ignorant, and unwashed as the inside the beltway crowd believes, and understand that this clown show is an unprecedented and dangerous exercise. All of this kabuki has amounted to nothing. No crime has been identified that Trump can be charged with.

3) Which brings us to the elephant in the room: the FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago. The politicization of the FBI is now complete and it seems unlikely that it can ever recover its reputation as an independent, top tier law enforcement agency. One or two politicized actions might be written off as the actions of a few rogue players, but the pattern is now undeniable. Consider: In 2016 then director James Comey announced that Hillary Clinton had destroyed subpoenaed emails (likely a felony) but spoke for all of the government and declared that because she was a presidential candidate she would not be charged.

Jump ahead (and over the fraudulent FISA warrant used to spy on Trump’s campaign) and we find the FBI conducting a predawn raid on James O’Keefe because someone had passed him the lost diary of Ashley Biden. While they were going through O’Keefe’s private correspondence, they were actively hiding the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop and studiously ignoring his use of crack, his connections to foreign countries, and touting the story that the rumors of Hunter’s laptop were Russian Disinformation.

How can we ignore the ignominious manner the FBI descended upon Trump ally Roger Stone, the destruction of Michael Flynn on the thinnest of contrived accusations, the raid on the offices of Rudy Giuliani, the public shackling of Trump advisor Peter Navarro? The FBI persecutes Biden’s political opponents while the southern border remains a porous playground for the cartels.

And now? Now they raid the home of a former President on the thin pretense that he may not have turned over all of the documents required by the National Archive. This is nonsense, of course. The purpose of the raid was to find anything, anything at all, that can be used to charge Trump and prevent in from again becoming President in 2024. The people can not be trusted, the thinking goes. They might elect him again if allowed. This must be prevented. If we have to destroy everything to prevent this from happening? So be it. Like the cliché from Vietnam—We had to destroy the village to save it.

So where does this leave us? I have no idea. My suspicion is that the people are going to reject progressives in general across the board because their ideas are silly and make things worse. In a perfect world, this would lead to serious oversight and the disbanding of the FBI. As Victor Davis Hanson recently put it:

Mueller's team deleted critical cell phone evidence under subpoena that might well have revealed systemic FBI-related bias.

The FBI interferes with and warps national elections. It hires complete frauds as informants who are far worse than its targets. It humiliates or exempts government and elected officials based on their politics. It violates the civil liberties of individual American citizens.

The FBI's highest officials now routinely mislead Congress. They have erased or altered court and subpoenaed evidence. They illegally leak confidential material to the media. And they have lied under oath to federal investigators.

The agency has become dangerous to Americans and an existential threat to their democracy and rule of law. The FBI should be dispersing its investigatory responsibilities to other government investigative agencies that have not yet lost the public's trust.

Will this happen? I don’t know. It should. But those weak in courage and principle are often strong in cunning. I don’t know how the chips will fall. What I do know is that our government has to relearn a lesson should never have been unlearned: If you want to be trusted? Be trustworthy. If you want to be respected? Be respectable. Honored? Be honorable.

I’m angry and sad that our government has lost sight of this, and it bothers me to discover that I no longer honor, respect, or trust the people in charge. But I’m also fully cognizant of the limitations of my personal power. I can speak out and vote as I see fit, but little more. There are hundreds of millions who feel exactly the same way, though, and we are going to see this power in November.

Be prepared. It’s going to get crazier and uglier before election day. The desperate do not give up easily. I’d call them rats, but that would be a disservice to actual rats, who just want to live their lives.