Sinking

 

The Encyclopedia Britannica says it's impossible to sink in quicksand.  So what are we standing on?

Sometimes sheer vileness is not just the point, it's the only point.  At home between stops on his hopeless campaign, Ron DeSantis signed a bill that allows construction companies to use phosphogypsum for paving roads.  The byproduct of phosphate mining emits radon and contains uranium, radium and thorium, all carcinogens.  I choose to believe that the mining company, Mosaic, made a staggering contribution to his campaign because it's less awful than the alternative -- that he's a Bond villain who wants people to sicken and die.

A January 6 insurrectionist was arrested near the Washington home of Barack Obama with firearms and bomb-making materials, and to all intents and purposes he was sent by Trump.  Taylor Taranto saw a Ministry of Truth Social post which gave the addresses of Obama and other Democrats.  He promptly re-truthed it with the comment "Got them cornered!" but there was an outstanding warrant and soon the Secret Service and DC Metro Police had him cornered.  Taranto has been living in his van near the jail so he can be close to his fellow oppressed patriots.  Now he'll be closer still.

The Alito Court hates the powerless and the non-rich so much, it will happily strip them of rights based on fiction.  Lorie Smith is a self-described evangelical graphic designer who challenged Colorado's anti-discrimination law and today the Sick Six assured her that she cannot be compelled to design a website for a same-sex wedding.  Of course, nobody asked her to, but in case it happens she's covered.  Also, in the event minority students get into big-deal colleges, the government can't forgive their massive loans either.  Poor people, curl up and die.  The Court will be adjourning soon so their sugar-daddies can take them on cruises and buy them pretty things.  "The First Amendment envisions the United States as a rich and complex place where all persons are free to think and speak as they wish, not as the government demands," wrote Neil Gorsuch in Smith.  Not all persons, though.  Only religious bigots.

The Second Amendment solution to school shootings -- armed guards and teachers -- was dealt a blow when Scot Peterson was acquitted of all charges in the deaths of seventeen people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.  Peterson was the armed "school resource officer" who ran away when the shooting started in 2018.  It's Florida, Scot.  You're supposed to stand your ground, especially when it's your damn job.