Change comes slowly

 In addition to dragging all those firsts around, Kamala Harris is the first vice president to be scrutinized over her wardrobe.  She apparently has been caught wearing clothes from Dolce & Gabbana despite the company's history of being accused of racism, homophobia and being Italian.  All these deficits, not to mention labor practices and workplace behavior of executives, must be vetted before you can buy a blouse that you really like.  Does she not know this?  Remember when Al Gore wore a Hugo Boss suit, even though they made uniforms for Hitler's Wehrmacht?  Who can forget the scandal of Spiro Agnew's cotton/nylon blend socks, which briefly drove Watergate from the front pages?   First the Vogue cover, now this -- is it time to talk about impeachment?

Or perhaps we could talk about something more important, like almost anything.  Like the military coup in Myanmar, or the jailing of Alexei Navalny, or even the snow event in the Northeast.  Or impeachment.  Jonathan Swan and Zachary Basu of Axios have an account of the Gang That Couldn't Coup Straight's December 18 Oval Office strategy meeting that is so rich and filling I may skip lunch.  I especially love the part where Trump wanders off to get a snack while Sidney Powell, Michael Flynn, Eric Herschmann, Pat Cipollone and Patrick Byrne (founder of Overstock.com, filling in for the pillow guy) scream about martial law and how every judge in the country is corrupt.  At one point Byrne offers, "I bribed Hillary Clinton $18 million on behalf of the FBI for a sting operation."  Nobody knows what he's talking about or why he's even there, but in the circumstances it doesn't seem all that bizarre.

It's strange to live in bizarre-free times after so long as hostages to madness.  More than three years after the devastation of Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico will receive the rest of the $66 billion voted by Congress and blocked by the previous administration on the grounds that those Spanish-speaking brown people would just squander it on lottery tickets and ivory dominoes.  Besides, the lady mayor of San Juan was very disrespectful about the paper towels.

"Loony lies and conspiracy theories are cancer for the Republican Party and our country," said Minority Leader Mitch McConnell today, and since he didn't name names I won't either, but I think we all know who he meant.  "Somebody who's suggested...that horrifying school shootings were pre-staged and that the Clintons crashed JFK Jr.'s airplane is not living in reality."  So the Deep State got to McConnell.  He still hasn't apologized for posing in front of a Confederate flag.

McConnell went on to defend Liz Cheney, as did Lindsey Graham.  But Graham then refused to schedule a confirmation hearing for Attorney General-designate Merrick Garland because the re-impeachment is taking up all his time.  At this point Judge Garland must be thinking, "Is it me?"  It's not clear why Graham still thinks he's chairing the Judiciary Committee, but it is clear that all the happy talk about unity and healing is over.  President Biden sat down with some Republicans and explained where they can stick their cheese-paring objections to his $1.9 trillion covid relief package.  Nicely.  Then he told ICE to get all those parents and kids reunited like TOMORROW.    

When Vice President Harris meets the leaders of China, and she must, it's even more important to dress carefully.  The Chinese are a tad oversensitive about symbols only they can interpret.  Back in 2010 David Cameron led a delegation to Beijing in November, when every self-respecting Brit wears a Remembrance Poppy, even to play football.  To the Chinese, however, it was not a memorial to Flanders Fields but a taunt about the 19th century Opium Wars.  Now Canada is in hot water because a diplomat in China ordered -- but has not yet worn, as far as I can tell -- a Wu-Tang Clan shirt with a stylized W which resembles (to some) a bat.  This was taken as an accusation about the coronavirus which supposedly originated in bats sold in a wet market in Wuhan.   Never the twain shall meet, or it is racist even to quote Kipling?

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a survivor of sexual assault who used to tend bar in the Bronx.  She probably thought she would feel safer as a member of the US House of Representatives.  She was wrong.   Everyone should read her story of January 6 before Tin-tray Tucker laughs at her fears tonight.  I wonder what the thugs and bullies would say if AOC started carrying a gun.  And we still don't know who ripped the alarm out of Ayanna Pressley's office.  

People are spending days on the phone and hours in line to score a single shot of covid vaccine but Steven Brandenburg took it upon himself to destroy 570 doses in Wisconsin, where he used to work as a pharmacist.  Brandenburg checks all the usual boxes -- survival supplies, multiple firearms, being divorced by frightened wife, microchip panic, immanent eschaton, flat-earther, sky isn't real -- huh?  That's a new one for me -- he believes the government created the "sky" to keep us from getting a look at God.  This is the man who filled your prescriptions, Badgers.  Sleep well.