Friday for sure

 India's Hindu nationalist government thought it was more important to spend money on a nuclear arsenal,  a space program and a never-ending squabble over Kashmir than to beef up public health.  They may have been wrong.  There is no photographic record of fourteenth century Europe but it probably looked like New Delhi in 2021, with people dying in the streets or lying three to a hospital bed.  Only the cremation fires contrast with the mass graves of plague victims.  And Americans sulk about having  to wear masks, and demand their July Fourth fireworks.  Las Vegas is crammed with fun-seekers and some states are already wide open.  Which variant will we get this time?  What wave is it?

The narrative from the deniers keeps changing, from "the vaccine doesn't work" to "there's a microchip that will turn you gay" to "vaccines make you sick and also anybody who stands next to you."  A private school in Miami won't allow vaccinated teachers to have contact with students and of course, masks are anathema.  I hope AstraZeneca is working on a vaccine for stupidity.

Covid causes long-term effects in some people, ranging from loss of taste and smell to organ failure.  No one seems to have studied the consequences of tear gassing people who think they still have a Constitutional right to free assembly.  Nearly a thousand women in Portland, Oregon, reported menstrual irregularities after being gassed by police last summer, some serious enough to require emergency room treatment.  This would be a good place to start, with maybe a moratorium on chemical weapons, too.  (The NYPD have agreed to stop using their robotic dogs, which is something.)

With almost daily police killings of Black people and continuing attacks on Asian Americans, Native Americans were feeling overlooked.  So last week Rick Santorum decided to supplement his CNN salary with a speech to Young America Foundation, and told them the US is a pure product of white European Christians because "we birthed a nation from nothing...candidly, there isn't much Native American culture in American culture."  Now there's a little less, as vandals defaced the ancient petroglyph known as "Birthing Rock" in Moab, Utah.  (They initially wrote "WITE POWER" so draw your own conclusions.)  I'm sure it had nothing to do with Santorum's Aryan chalk talk and I assume CNN agrees, as they haven't shitcanned him yet.

What did I say about nationalist governments?  Covid is spiking in Turkey.  I hate being right.

A hundred days in, I think Joe Biden has begun to understand that Republicans will oppose anything he says, does, wears or eats, while whining about how "divisive" he is.  So he and Jill have taken on the easier task of reconciling their dogs, especially the fractious Major, with the new White House cat (unnamed as of this writing).  I've seen enough cat-dog footage on YouTube to believe this will be easier than making Republicans get along with one another:  Liz Cheney is under attack because she fist-bumped Biden at the SOTU speech.  Evidently she was supposed to spit in his face.

Yesterday the Bidens flew to Georgia for a speech and a visit with Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter.  Before they boarded the helicopter Biden picked a dandelion from the White House lawn and handed it to Dr. Jill.  Who could find fault with this simple, loving gesture?  Some asshole named Grant Stinchfield.  What a surprise -- he doesn't even know how dandelions work.

And speaking of weeds gone to seed, the FBI raided Giuliani's apartment and office.  I know, witch hunt, unfair, I'm tired of that song.  His son was appalled that a former mayor and presidential lawyer could be treated like a common mobster just for acting like a common mobster.  "They could do this to you!" he added, as it slowly dawned on him that the law applies to everybody.  So it was very entertaining, and we still have Statutory Gaetz to look forward to.  

M'aidez!  Mayday.  Either one works.