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JUNE 26,  2022

JOE, JOE, WHERE'D YOU GO?  Direct from Roe v. Wade, here's Joe Biden.  Yup, right in the middle of the Roe v. Wade psychiatric breakdown, the president flew to Germany for the G7 conference, and will later go to a NATO conference.  Best way to get away from a hot issue – go to a conference.   

We were excited to learn that global warming will be a big item on the agenda.  Of course.  Didn't you see that huge wave coming toward our Atlantic Coast this morning?  It's the new Pearl Harbor.  Forget the old one.  It's so pre-Roe.

Ukraine?  Is there still a war in Ukraine?  Remember, just weeks ago, when it led the news?  But there was no quick victory, and Biden has barely mentioned it.  It's that dynamic leadership style.  The Russians are advancing in the east of the country, and may well soon secure that section.  The Ukrainian resistance is as spirited as ever, but the Russians now have got their act together.  They're taking ground, and suddenly no one's interested.  Russian units struck the Ukrainian capital this morning.  From Reuters:

Several explosions shook Kyiv's central Shevchenkivskiy district early on Sunday, causing a widespread damage and a fire at a residential building, officials said, in the first assault on Ukraine's capital since early June.

Emergency services said that as a result of the Russian shelling a fire broke out in a 9-story residential building that had been partially damaged in the attack.

Kyiv's mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said that residents are being rescued and evacuated from two buildings.

"There are people under the rubble," Klitschko said on the Telegram messaging app. He added that several people had already been hospitalized.

"They (the rescuers) have pulled out a seven-year-old girl. She is alive. Now they're trying to rescue her mother."

Air raid sirens regularly disrupt life in Kyiv, but there have been no major strikes on the city since June 5 when a rail car repair facility was hit on the outskirts and a late April shelling when a Radio Liberty producer was killed in a strike that hit the building she lived in. 

The Shevchenkivskiy historic district, one of Kyiv's central, is home to a cluster of universities, restaurants and art galleries.

Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, but abandoned an early advance on Kyiv in the face of fierce resistance bolstered by Western arms.

Since then Moscow and its proxies have focused on the south and Donbas, an eastern territory made up of Luhansk and its neighbor Donetsk, deploying overwhelming artillery in some of the heaviest ground fighting in Europe since World War Two. 

COMMENT:  Our attention span is awfully short, even shorter when there's no leadership by the president of the United States.   There is a war on in Europe.  The side we favor is starting to lose.  Reliable reports tell us that many of the weapons promised to Ukraine have never been delivered.  We're told that the West Europeans, especially Germany, are losing interest.

There is a catastrophe in the making. 

June 26, 2022       Permalink

JUNE 25,  2022

THE FIRST DAY:  Well, I see we've gotten through one day without Roe v. Wade, and there's been no increase in global warming.  They are related, aren't they?  Or is it Covid 19 that's related to abortion, and to global warming.  Whatever.

You all know the basics of what happened yesterday.  You don't need a review from me.  There will be no pop quiz.  However, I spent most of the day monitoring television and internet coverage of the Supreme Court's decision, and would like to make the following observations:

1.  The event:  We must realize that the decision did not come as a shock.  It was expected, by press, by the public, and by the advocates on both sides.  A draft of Justice Alito's opinion had been outrageously leaked. Thus, I don't recall anyone fainting when the decision was announced yesterday, and threats of suicide by the anchors at MSNBC were subdued.

2.  The media did a passable job.  No medals here, but, with the exception of the usual fringe characters and mental-home escapees, most journalists seemed to take the story seriously and tried to report it reasonably well.  A larger than usual contingent of journalists tried to explain what the decision said, and what it clearly did not say.

3.  That noted, I was surprised at how unprepared the media was with background material.  The story of Roe v. Wade started in the 1960s with the rise of the women's movement.  Abortion was always at the center of its demands.  Yet, I saw and heard little history of that period yesterday.  When Roe was handed down in 1973, TV news was well into the era of videotape.  The archives contain any number of items that could have been shown yesterday – marches, sit-ins, speeches, debates.  Again we saw what we often see in TV news, a real shortage of basic research.

4.  Similarly, and shockingly, there was no real attempt – from the examples that I monitored – to explain and portray the medical developments that have always been critical to the  abortion debate.  I would have liked to have seen examples of sonograms then (in 1973) and now.  I would have liked to have reports on progress in pre-natal medicine.  What happens to abortion when physicians can save a baby in the womb at one month?  What will the debate be like, if there's still a debate?

5.  Also, there was virtually no mention of religion, which has played an enormous role in the history of the abortion debate.  Attitudes toward life, often taken from religious doctrine, are at the very foundation of the discussion. 

6.  The political aspects.  Will this decision affect how people vote in November?  The reporters I saw delving into this arena were properly cautious.  We don't know yet.  The initial, emotional reactions, on either side, may fade away under pressure from higher prices and other economic setbacks, and foreign crises. 

7.  How do men feel about the decision?  Properly, most interviews were with women.  But men vote too, and one Fox reporter noted that only, in his estimate, five percent of the demonstrators he witnessed were male.

Those are some of my observations from yesterday.   Obviously, I could not see and hear every part of the action.  If you've seen anything that contradicts what I've written, please let me know.

June 25,  2022     Permalink

JUNE 24,  2022

NOTE TO READERS, AT 7 P.M. ET:  Of course we're aware of today's Supreme Court decision on abortion, and the reaction.  I've been monitoring as much coverage as possible, and will have some comments later. 

I HOPE THE BACKLASH TURNS INTO A DELUGE:  We're starting to see a backlash in Hollywood over censorship and woke demands.  May this grow.  Hollywood can play a major role in a march of sanity if it rejects, once and for all, the curse of cancel culture.  From Fox: 

Paramount CEO Bob Bakish declared Monday that his company will not censor its old content for material that may offend modern audiences.

Bakish made the comments as the Paramount+ streaming service launched overseas and he discussed the company's large and historical catalog.

"By definition, you have some things that were made in a different time and reflect different sensibilities," Bakish explained, according to a June 20 piece by The Guardian.

He went on, "I don’t believe in censoring art that was made historically, that’s probably a mistake. It’s all on demand – you don’t have to watch anything you don’t want to."

Paramount has recently seen that there is big money in appealing to American nostalgia, as "Top Gun: Maverick," a sequel to Paramount Pictures' "Top Gun" (also starring Tom Cruise) in 1986, smashes box office records.

As streaming services featuring classic films have risen in recent years, many have grappled with the rapidly changing social mores of modern society.

HBO Max briefly pulled "Gone with the Wind" from its programming in the wake of George Floyd's death in 2020, causing "The View" co-host Whoopi Goldberg to slam the idea of censoring older films about America’s past.

"Personally I think if you put things in a historical context — because if you start pulling every film ... you're going to have to pull all of the blaxploitation movies because they're not depicting us the right way," Goldberg said at the time.

Netflix made some recent changes to distance itself from a liberal agenda after figuring out it was hurting their bottom line with a loss of subscribers. In May, the streaming service laid off 150 employees, canceled several woke projects and sent out a memo telling employees to quit if they’re offended by content the company produces.

COMMENT:  More and more we hear people say that they want the real America back, the America they remember.  Now, I admit that memory can be deceiving, but I think we know what these folks mean –they want back an America that believed in itself and in the founding values, and were proud of those values. 

Hollywood has a significant role in projecting an image of this country's greatness.  Maybe we're seeing that role returning.

June 24, 2022       Permalink