Ultimate knuckleheads

 That's what my favorite governor, Phil Murphy of New Jersey, called anti-vax protesters in Union City yesterday.  The Murph was in town to sign a bill protecting low-income renters from eviction for the rest of the year, and he doesn't take crap from anyone.  "You've lost your minds!" he shouted.  "People are losing their life!  You have to know that."  Less than sixty percent of Garden State residents are fully vaccinated and I'm guessing most of the resistance is in the southern half, where it's 1953.  When Springsteen sang about Nebraska he meant Cape May.

But knuckleheadism is everywhere.  I was vaguely aware that Eric Clapton had become an anti-vaxer after having a bad reaction to the shot, and Van Morrison has sailed out of the mystic and into the conspiracy vortex.  When Pete Parada was fired from The Offspring my response was "Who?"  But today it got real.  The Baltimore Symphony dismissed principal flutist Emily Skala for consistently refusing to stop posting her objections to vaccine and rantings about Black Lives Matter and George Soros, positions which made for a tense work environment in the majority-Black city.  It's not just that guy on the loading dock who thinks Trump will be re-inaugurated by Labor Day.  The poison is everywhere, like the smoke from Oregon wildfires.

The emperor of the knuckleheads was delighted that the US women finished third in Olympic soccer.  After accusing the "Leftist Maniacs" of refusing to stand for the national anthem (lie) he gloated, "Woke means you lose" (lie).  No, eighty-one million votes for Joe Biden means you lose.  And if a social conscience means you have to settle for a bronze medal, well, gold is tacky.  If you don't believe me, I direct you to an eyesore where Bonwit Teller used to be.  Some things are more important than kicking a ball.  

His Rancidness got a gift from an old enemy.  Last week we were all pretending to be shocked, shocked, that Trump told his acting attorney general, "Just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and R. congressmen."  Then we learned that Jeffrey Clark of the civil division drafted a letter (apparently unsent) asking the Georgia legislature to set aside the result because of "irregularities."  But then New York Attorney General Letitia James called a press conference to read a damning and grimly detailed description of at least eleven cases of sexual harassment by Governor Andrew Cuomo, adding, "I believe these women."  Clear the front page, we got a sex scandal!  Cuomo's response was a bizarre slide show of him hugging and kissing various people, of other politicians like Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden hugging various people, and the lame excuse that he's a demonstrative Italian who automatically hugs and kisses everybody.  I hope Handsy Andy isn't planning to use this defense at his impending impeachment, assuming he ignores all but universal calls to resign.

I say all but universal because support is coming from the strangest quarters, none stranger than Laura Ingraham, who doesn't understand the concept of enforcing the law, much less taking the word of nearly a dozen women against a powerful man.  "NY AG Letitia James will cite Cuomo to show she's 'balanced' in her investigations as she continues to hound Trump, too.  She wants Andrew's job," she tweeted.  I didn't know "Andrew" and the Queen of Mean were first-name buds.  Nor how elevating Kathy Hochul to the governorship would enhance James's political ambitions.  Nor how this dumb virago continues in her Fox employment, but there are some questions science has not answered.

This is a real thing.  The first batch said "offical" but they fixed it, and now the Trump Card is welcome wherever they take Discover Titanium and Caesars Entertainment Master Card.  Trump Card!  Don't leave home.  Just don't.

Covid is tearing through Louisiana like a Category 5 hurricane, so Jeff Landry sent a letter to 11,000 state Department of Justice employees providing a template for not masking children.  "I do not consent to forcing a face covering on my child, who is created in the image of God," it says.  Superstition, creationism and stupidity -- there's an attorney general Ingraham can celebrate!  

Remember the Gulf Stream?  Time to learn a new acronym:  AMOC (Atlantic meridional overturning circulation).  Not to be confused with amok ("a psychic disturbance characterized by depression followed by a manic urge to murder").  Or is it?