Trump Tells US Allies Pay Up or We Hand You to Russia & Should Celebrities Be Fired for Voicing Opinions?
GOP Lawmakers Want to Force-Feed Students Anti-Abortion Video, Heart Disease is Number One Killer of Women in US, Michigan GOP Lawmaker's Racist 'Great Replacement' Post, Dusty Springfield Sings
What I’m Discussing Today:
Kareem’s Daily Quote: This quote from The Threepenny Opera nails the difference between the moral posturing of the haves over the have-nots.
NATO chief says Trump’s comments on abandoning alliance endangers US and European troops: When a presidential candidate openly threatens our country’s allies with Russian invasions, we need to wonder whose side he’s really on.
From The Mandalorian to The White Lotus: TV stars are getting sacked for their politics: Should actors get fired or blacklisted for public political stances?
Controversial fetal development video inflames debate over Baby Olivia bills: Republicans complain that students are getting brainwashed by liberals’ use of science and facts. They counter by mandating an anti-abortion video that disregards both.
Women say they’re stressed, misunderstood, and alone: Heart disease is the number one killer of women in the U.S. Yet, we ignore their healthcare needs and contribute to the stress that kills them.
Michigan GOP Lawmaker Disciplined for Racist ‘Great Replacement’ Post: I’m less irritated by his racism than his inability to understand why he’s a racist.
Kareem’s Video Break: I’ve returned to the startling starling formations that will leave you aghast and muttering, “How?”
Dusty Springfield Performs “You Don't Have To Say You Love Me”: She sang jazz, soul, country, and pop in an unforgettable voice that was part of the soundtrack of the sixties.
Kareem’s Daily Quote
First feed the face, and then talk right and wrong For even honest folk may act like sinners Unless they've had their customary dinners
The ThreePenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill
It’s nice to pontificate about morality, especially its abundance in oneself and the lack thereof in others. To sit in superior moral judgment is a favorite, though dangerous, pastime. It can lead us to rationalize our lack of responsibility in the corroding social structure, which only hurries the process along. I’ve often heard rich people philosophize on TV about how they deserve all they have because of their hard work while those who have less deserve what they have because of their lack of drive. This simplistic and self-serving view is what perpetuates the inequities in society. Self-made successful people with humility know that luck plays as much a part as hard work.
Society is a lot like city aquariums where you watch a diver swim among a bunch of sharks. “Don’t worry,” the tour guide assures everyone with a confident smile, “the sharks are well fed so they have no interest in our Jimmy there.” If the sharks ever figure out that Jimmy is part of the power structure that keeps them imprisoned for others to gawk at, being well-fed might not be enough to protect him.
I’m thinking about this because I see what used to be a War on Poverty started by President Lyndon Johnson in 1964 has become a War on the Poor by Republicans in 2024. What a difference 60 years makes. Over the past two years, I’ve detailed in my Substack various states that have deliberately refused federal money that would help feed families in need, that have made extraordinary efforts to make sure the poor have more obstacles to vote, have tightened state aid, and have gutted education so their children are less competitive. They do all this in the name of conservative values that promote hard work over handouts. Hand-ups are not handouts. Despite our fetishizing the myth of the Rugged Individualist, no one makes it in society on their own.
Conservatives often wonder why there’s so much protest about our culture and politics. Why 20 million people marched in 2020 during Black Lives Matter/police brutality demonstrations. People who don’t have a fair share of a country’s bounty or equality in pursuing its benefits don’t have a stake in conserving the status quo’s “values.” If the game is rigged, change the game. Either everyone playing acknowledges the rules are unfair and agrees to rewrite them, or the people destined to always lose will flip the game board and send the pieces flying.
Brecht’s social satire The Threepenny Opera has always made me remember how fragile society can be when it celebrates achievement through hard work but blocks various people from even joining the race. The “Let them eat cake” strategy has been the downfall of more than one country. Being fair is not being weak.