Fighting on Various Fronts
In response to a rocket attack launched by the Iran-backed militia in Iraq that killed two Americans and a Brit, we hit back with that the Pentagon called a “defensive and proportional response.”
In response to a rocket attack launched by the Iran-backed militia in Iraq that killed two Americans and a Brit, we hit back with that the Pentagon called a “defensive and proportional response.”
Why on earth would we strike back in a proportional manner? A proportional strike doesn’t bring back those three people. Since when is our mighty military supposed to be engaging in a game of tit-for-tat? Were we thinking in proportionate terms when we crushed Germany and Japan 75 years ago?
Could this possibly explain why we are still in Afghanistan for all these years, unable to defeat tribal herdsmen?
Why on earth did President Trump insist on all that money to rebuild our military? Was it all to be spent purchasing more medals and providing larger pensions for all those armchair generals at the Pentagon?
For a while, I thought I was the only person who recognized Anthony Fauci as a dedicated Never Trumper who seemed to see his role to be spreading fear of the Chinese virus rather than calming the panic and bringing logic and information to the problem.
It seems that Ralph Barnett agrees with me about the 79-year-old head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases: “We are taking advice from the guy who heads up the department that is responsible for testing the diseases but is not prepared to test for diseases? And on top of that, he’s throwing Trump under the bus for not being prepared?”
“Exactly,” I replied. “I think Trump is very impressive, but I don’t expect him to keep track of how many bandages or facemasks are on the shelves at Bethesda. In addition, although we keep hearing that we know very little about the Chinese virus, including whether it is seasonal or how long the virus will remain contagious on, say, a table top or a file cabinet, Fauci keeps reminding us that things will get a lot worse before they get better. How the hell does he know? The fact is, Ralph, that we’re both in the high risk group, both of us being over 70. So, speaking for myself, I don’t mind dying. But I’d sure hate to have my death blamed on Trump.”
In a similar vein, one of my readers found it amusing when I pointed out that when people like Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris blame their failed campaigns on sexism and racism, they seem to forget that it’s only Democrats who get to vote in their primaries.
In response, I wrote: “These ignoramuses have grown so accustomed to blaming Trump and other Conservatives for everything, including their hangnails and their hangovers, that it becomes a habit with them. So it’s not too surprising they don’t even notice when their actual targets are their own voters or non-voters, as the case might be.”
Nancy Thorner passed along a meme that showed senior citizens Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders in adjoining hospital beds. The caption read: “New Democrat Debate Format.”
Jack Hughes wrote to say: “Regarding Daylight Savings, Alabama lawmakers have pending legislation to keep it all year long, so no more changing the clocks every six months. Every now and then, politicians get something right!”
“Sometimes,” I replied, “they get it right. More often, they just let it pend.”
Back in the 1940s, when I was a kid, I recall people talking about how stupid and short-sighted this country had been in the ‘30s when we’d sold scrap metal to the Japanese, which they’d then returned to us at Pearl Harbor in the form of planes, bombs and bullets.
If we were stupid then, how much dumber have we become in the intervening years that we’d turn over entire industries, including the all-essential pharmaceutical industry, to Communist China?
When one of my subscribers referred to a relative of his as a wino, it occurred to me that the difference between a wino and a cork-sniffing connoisseur is the price of the stuff they guzzle.
The same fellow related that he always brings mini eclairs and cream puffs to the various Masonic functions he attends and that his fellow Masons invariably complain because they can’t resist eating them.
I advised him to remind his friends that everybody dies of something and that eclairs and cream puffs are a pretty sweet way to go.
After I reported that the Girl Scouts of America were closely affiliated with groups promoting homosexuality and abortions, Dan Parker wrote to say: “I guess they have it all covered. Either turn the girls into lesbians if they can or murder their babies if they can’t. One wonders if the Left wants to annihilate all of humanity. Why not let coronavirus do it?”
“The virus,” I explained, “isn’t efficient enough. It can’t compare to viral stupidity.”
He replied: “My son Seth read once that evil exposes itself once in a while, but stupidity is everywhere. What can you do when the teachers teach stupid?”
“My solution is to revise Shakespeare slightly, so before you kill all the lawyers, you first kill all the teachers.”
Occasionally, I hear from readers who enjoy my Hollywood anecdotes. Two that were related to me personally came from George Kennedy and Billy Wilder.
Because I had been friends with Kennedy for several years and heard him rave about virtually every star he had ever worked with, one day I asked him if he’d ever worked with anyone he didn’t like. It turned out there were, not one, but two.
The first was John Gielgud, with whom he’d worked in the musical remake of “Lost Horizon.”
As George told it, even though the cast included the likes of Peter Finch, Liv Ullmann, Michael York, Bobby Van, Sally Kellerman and Charles Boyer, every chance he got, Gielgud would remind everyone that he was accustomed to doing Shakespeare, not this slop. Kennedy, ever the professional, always had the attitude that once you took the money, you kept your yap shut. If you thought the material was beneath you, you didn’t take the job.
The other offender was, not too surprisingly, O.J. Simpson, with whom George appeared in “Naked Gun.”
Kennedy reported that Simpson was so selfish that when he’d finish reading his morning newspaper (probably the sports section), he would ball it up and shove it down into a trash barrel so nobody else could read it.
Not too surprising that a few years later, he would murder his ex-wife and her boyfriend.
The story I remember best among the many that writer-director Wilder told me was how a question he’d once jotted down on a piece of paper led him and his friend I.A.L. Diamond to write “The Apartment.”
He wrote the note in 1945 after seeing Noel Coward’s “Brief Encounter.” That English film dealt with two ordinary people, housewife Laura Jesson portrayed by Celia Johnson and Dr. Alec Harvey portrayed by Trevor Howard, who fall in love, but it’s not to end happily because she’s married.
But for a while, they carry on a clandestine affair in the apartment of a very obliging friend of the doctor’s.
Wilder’s note read: Who is this friend?
Fifteen years later, he and Diamond answered the question. He’s C.C. Baxter, portrayed by Jack Lemmon, who lends out his bachelor apartment to his bosses for their sexual liaisons.
Among my favorite memes of the past week are the following five:
“What can we do to stop mass shootings? Shoot back.”
A photo of polar bears accompanied by a caption reading: “When Al Gore was born, there were 7,000 of us. Today, only 30,000 remain.”
A photo of masked Antifa thugs: “We cover our faces so our parents don’t ground us.”
“What should we do with people who rely on government handouts but are too lazy to work? Kick them out of Congress.”
“Who was responsible for protecting America from Russian interference during the 2016 election? CIA Director John Brennan, DNI Chief James Clapper, FBI Director James Comey, Attorney General Loretta Lynch and President Barack Obama. But Donald Trump is the only one who has to answer for it?”
