"Fifth"

If the average American doesn't know anything else about the Constitution, he (or she) knows two things: (1) the Second Amendment grants the unrestricted right to pack iron anytime, anywhere, for any reason; and, (2) the Fifth Amendment protects one from being compelled to provide self-incriminating evidence.

Of the two, belief in the sacred nature of the Second Amendment is generally more highly prized and vigorously defended, but for many Americans, it's the Fifth Amendment that is more useful. Here's what the Fifth Amendment actually says (emphasis added): 

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

The Fifth Amendment, in particular the highlighted clause, has entered the common vernacular through the expression "taking the Fifth," in which a witness invokes their Constitutional protection against self-incrimination.

It seems to me, based on observing the actions of Der Furor and many individuals in his orbit, that this fundamental right of American citizens - while quite useful - is not properly respected for what it is: a vital personal right not guaranteed to most people in most countries. Indeed, invocation of the Fifth Amendment has become little more than a truncated Pavlovian reaction to unpleasant questions one might otherwise be compelled under oath to answer. Consider the video testimony of lawyer John Eastman and retired general Michael Flynn played during the January 6th Committee hearings ... when asked questions they did not wish to answer, each man simply said, "Fifth" or "The Fifth." Occasionally, they became positively loquacious by saying "Same Answer."

On the other hand, blowhard political troublemaker Roger Stone was a bit more voluble, repeatedly saying, "On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer your question on the basis of the Fifth Amendment." This is perhaps the only time the adverb "respectfully" might ever be applied to Roger Stone's behavior. 

No less a well-read and educated Constitutional scholar than Der Furor himself used to scoff at the exercise of the Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination, saying on one occasion,

“So there are five people taking the Fifth Amendment, like you see on the mob, right? You see the mob takes the Fifth. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?”

Of course, now that the law is finally catching up with many of the actions he's gotten away with in the past, his attitude has changed. Now, he says 

“I once asked, ‘If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?’ ... Now I know the answer to that question. When your family, your company, and all the people in your orbit have become the targets of an unfounded, politically motivated Witch Hunt supported by lawyers, prosecutors, and the Fake News Media, you have no choice.”

During a deposition in August, Der Furor followed the lead of Messrs Eastman and Flynn by invoking the Fifth Amendment at the outset, then answering all subsequent questions with "same answer."

Now, in the great scheme of things, this may seem like a minor point to you, but it's a big one to me. While the exercise of a person's rights under the Fifth Amendment is perfectly legal and guaranteed by our Constitution, choosing to exercise it by simply saying "fifth" or "the fifth" or "same answer" in bored tones is the verbal equivalent of flipping the bird to the court. Roger Stone, whatever his failings (and they are many), at least pretended to pay proper acknowledgement to a fundamental right. 

Of course, the way things are going, taking the right fifth isn't necessarily a bad thing ...

Have a good day. Respect the freedoms you enjoy ... all of them.

More thoughts later.

Bilbo

Poetry Sunday

Today is the second of this month's three Halloween-themed Poetry Sundays, and we turn to poet Louise Glück for this eerie and unsettling poem ...

All Hallows

by Louise Glück

Even now this landscape is assembling.

The hills darken. The oxen

sleep in their blue yoke,

the fields having been

picked clean, the sheaves

bound evenly and piled at the roadside

among cinquefoil, as the toothed moon rises:

This is the barrenness

of harvest or pestilence.

And the wife leaning out the window

with her hand extended, as in payment,

and the seeds

distinct, gold, calling

Come here

Come here, little one

And the soul creeps out of the tree.

Have a good day and enjoy the rest of your weekend. Beware of souls creeping out of scary trees.

More thoughts coming. 

Bilbo

Cartoon Saturday

Just when you thought it was safe to come out from under the covers ...

Beloved actress Angela Lansbury died just five days short of her 97th birthday; screaming blowhard Alex Jones was ordered by a Connecticut jury to pay nearly $1 BILLION to the families of children murdered at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012 who he said were "crisis actors" hired as part of a plot to seize guns from Americans; the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol held its final public hearing on Thursday, presenting damning evidence of Der Furor's central role in the insurrection and culminating with the approval of a subpoena demanding Der Furor's testimony and documents* ... in response, Der Furor responded with a childish, rambling fourteen-page letter attacking the committee, ten pages of which were attachments regurgitating the usual litany of long-debunked election fraud claims; a Florida jury sentenced the man who murdered 17 students at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in 2018 to life in prison; and in Missouri, Planned Parenthood is responding to a surge in requests for vasectomies following the Supreme Court decision that removed abortion rights by announcing that a mobile vasectomy clinic (called "The Nutcracker") will offer free snips to interested men in three Missouri cities during the first week of November before going on the road to other midwest cities the following week.

And we move into week two of our annual Cartoon Saturday salute to Halloween with a collection of cartoons featuring terrifying bloodsuckers. No, not IRS agents - vampires ...

It's a twofer! ...

He's now a veganpire ...

It's one way to keep from having to share your favorite snacks ...

I can see that. No, wait ...

He needs to try Vlad's blood oranges from the second cartoon ...

I can see where a Bit-bit would be useful for vampires worried about their level of fitness ...

It's an interesting approach to acquired immunity ...

He's been watching too many Internet videos ...

At least you can step away from the camera and nobody will notice ...

It was worth a try ...

And that finishes the bite we've taken out of my collection of vampire cartoons ... I hope you enjoyed them. Humor in a jugular vein, as it were.

Have a good day and a great weekend, and come back tomorrow for our second Halloween-themed Poetry Sunday for October. More spooky thoughts then.

Bilbo

* Yeah, good luck with that.

Great Moments in Editing and Signage

Yes, Dear Readers, it's time for another collection of Great Moments in Editing and Signage! Don't thank me, it's all part of my humble attempt to get you through another month of sucky news.

Must have been during a search at either Hannibal Lecter's place or Jeffrey Dahmer's ...

It's good to be specific about what you want ...

Yes, I'd say that was a pretty good sign ...

There are days when I think it's true ...

Dumbass criminal #286,947 ...

Looks like I went to the wrong school ...

I know there are a lot of very intelligent and capable dogs, but this one could probably run for Congress as a Republican ...

Sadly, they are not being elected to Congress ...

Stop playing games! ...

Uh, what was that again? ...

And there you go with the latest batch of Great Moments ... you know you needed the laughs.

Have a good day and be sure to come back tomorrow, when our annual Cartoon Saturday salute to the Halloween season continues with a collection of cartoons about terrifying bloodsuckers ... no, not useless politicians soliciting for campaign contributions - vampires. See you then.

Bilbo

Musical Sunday

Welcome to the first of our Halloween-themed Musical Sundays for October, as we ask the musical question, "If there's something strange in the neighborhood, who ya gonna call?" The answer, of course, unless you are Ron DeSantis or Greg Abbott, is NOT "a charter bus company or some guy with an airplane" ... you're going to do like Ray Parker, Junior, and call Ghostbusters!

Have a good day and enjoy the rest of your weekend ... if you can't, you know who to call. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

Cartoon Saturday

And you thought Halloween season was scary ...

Country music icon Loretta Lynn died on Tuesday at the age of 90; at least 22 children were among the 39 people known dead in a mass murder at a child care center in Thailand; a truck bomb caused the partial collapse of the 12-mile bridge linking Russia to occupied Crimea; the Uvalde, Texas, school district has suspended its entire police force in the ongoing protests by parents whose children were murdered while police officers from several jurisdictions stood by and did nothing; and an Indiana judge has sentenced a woman to 115 years in prison for poisoning her ex-partners oatmeal in an attempt to kill him and, when that failed, strangling him to death with his favorite tie, although he did credit her with 748 days of time already served.

This week, our second October Cartoon Saturday salute to Halloween focuses on everybody's favorite man of many parts, Frankenstein*.

It's one way to be really popular at parties ...  

Well, yes, there's that ...

Another one of those religious complications ...

It's good to have an excuse for the dreaded ED ...

And fortunately, there are ways to get around it ...

I would, too ...

It's as good an alibi as any ...

Yes, that would explain it ...

Some relationships just don't work out ...

The untold backstory ...

And that's our Frankenstein salute to Halloween for this, our second Cartoon Saturday of October ... hope you got a monstrously good laugh out of it.

Have a good day and a great weekend, and come back tomorrow for our first Musical Sunday salute to Halloween. More thoughts then, bwa, ha, HAAAA!!!

Bilbo

* Yes, I know that "Frankenstein" is the doctor and "Frankenstein's Monster" is the ... well ... monster, but just work with me on this, okay?

The Right-Cheek Ass Clown for October, 2022

The decision on this period's award begins with a person who, as the saying goes, said the quiet part out loud. In the wake of the cascading examples of the gross unfitness for office of GOP Georgia Senate candidate Herschel Walker, Republican activist and former NRA talking head Dana Loesch made the following shocking, yet totally predictable comment on her radio program this past Monday:

"I don't care if Herschel Walker paid to abort endangered baby eagles. I want control of the Senate."

She went on to diplomatically add,

“If the Daily Beast story is true, you’re telling me Walker used his money to reportedly pay some skank for an abortion and Warnock wants to use all of our monies to pay a whole bunch of skanks for abortions ... I don't know if he did it or not. I don't even care.”

Yes, she said the quiet part out loud. "Paying off skanks" is irrelevant, as are honesty, integrity, and a coherent and clearly stated program of government. Power is all that matters. And so it is that we name as 

The Right-Cheek Ass Clown for October, 2022

for the eleventh time (17th if you count shared awards)

The Republican Party

As the midterm elections approach, the "Grand Old Party" has gone into high gear with an enormous barrage of fact-free ads, tweets, bilge, and general allegations designed to cast doubt on the achievements of the Biden Administration while obscuring the fact that the Republican Party itself has no ideas, no programs, no policies, and no responsible positions of its own. Even its much-ballyhooed "Commitment to America" is less a commitment than a plan-free list of conservative whines ... in case you missed it, my take on it's empty, vacuous text can be found in this post from last week. You may also be interested in historian Heather Cox Richardson's discussion of it. 

New analysis by Amy Gardner of The Washington Post reveals that 299 Republican candidates* for the House, Senate, and important state offices in the coming midterm elections deny that President Biden won the 2020 election. Many of those running at the state level are competing for positions that will give them oversight of state elections, ensuring that hard-core GOP functionaries will be in a position to overturn electoral results that don't favor their party.  

The traditional Republican Party is long dead, with its most rapid period of decline beginning with the presidency of Ronald Reagan and culminating with the disastrous administration of Der Furor**, who still holds the party in thrall despite the overwhelming evidence of his criminality, malfeasance, vindictiveness, and general unfitness to hold any elected office. The fact that so many Americans are willing to swallow the debunked conspiracy theories, provable lies, and gross distortions of today's GOP says much about today's America, little of it good.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Dear Readers, once again - and for the fourth time this year - the battered tinfoil and toilet paper Ass Clown crown is presented to the Republican Party ... and, by extension, to those deluded and bitter Americans foolish enough to vote for people like Der Furor, Herschel Walker, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Mehmet Oz, and the rest of the GOP's clown car.

Vote wisely next month ... the sort of government the GOP would bring in ... whether honestly elected or not ... is a frightening thought.

Have a good day, and come back tomorrow for the second Halloween-themed Cartoon Saturday of the month, when we'll visit with a man of many parts - Frankenstein. More thoughts then.

Bilbo

* 174 of them in reliably Republican districts.

** Time for a plug: if you've not read Andy Borowitz's hysterically funny yet heartbreakingly sad book "Profiles in Ignorance: How America's Politicians Got Dumb and Dumber," do it now. Only a comic and writer as talented as Andy Borowitz could describe Sarah Palin as "the gateway ignoramus who led to [Der Furor]."

Economics for Dummies

Last Monday I received an e-mail from our local trash and recycling contractor that reflects the reality of economics in the year 2022. Here's the key paragraph:

"Although we have done our best to keep our rates as low as possible, recent changes in disposal fees, rising costs of material, and increased service times are severely impacting our business. Reluctantly, we must pass on a portion of these rising costs in order to maintain the level of service that you expect and deserve from us. Customers should expect to see an increase of 10% per month on their upcoming billing."

This speaks clearly to a fundamental issue with our capitalist economic system: every business can raise its prices and blame it on increasing costs, but workers do not have the same option: their salaries stay low because it's the easiest cost for businesses to control to maintain profitability and shareholder return. I have to pay my trash contractor 10% more for what is, in effect, less service (this past summer, citing workforce issues, the contractor cut our weekly service from two trash and one recycling pickup to one of each). Granted, I’m still getting the same amount of trash hauled away in one pickup that used to be spread out between two, but the contractor has reduced their* operating costs while raising my rates with the excuse that their costs have gone up. Do you see the contradiction here? 

There's another aspect to this e-mail that is reflected in every other notification from every other business that is hiking its prices: couching the increase in terms of a benefit to the customer. The trash collector's email cites the need "to maintain the level of service that you expect and deserve;" a similar letter recently received from our pest control service says its very substantial price increase is necessary "in order to continue providing superior service." Neither one says anything about the benefit to the company of maintaining or increasing profitability or shareholder return.

A related issue that has received recent attention is the concept of “shrinkflation” - the reduction in size of or quantity of a product (most frequently packaged snack foods and beverages) without a concurrent reduction in its sale price, as a way to increase profit margins or, at least, hold them steady in the face of rising costs. Pay more, get less. Don't like it? Too bad.

Defenders of the capitalist market economy argue that it has provided a historically high standard of living and delivered steady and bountiful supplies of products and services, and this is true, as far as it goes. However, it has also been fed by the fuel of greed at the expense of the consumer in order to deliver ever-higher profits to businesses and returns to shareholders. Low-income families and those living on fixed incomes (such as yours truly) do not find the system especially advantageous when businesses report record profits** while simultaneously jacking up the prices they charge to customers who do not have the luxury of arbitrarily hiking their income. 

And I won't even mention rents which go up each year, lately often by double-digit percentages. 

Welcome to the world of the 21st Century market economy. Bring money. Lots of it.

Have a good day. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

* I’m tempted at this point to go off on a tangent about the use of “their” as a singular collective pronoun, but that’s a rant for another day.

** The highest profit levels since the 1950s, by most estimates.

Poetry Sunday

There are three Poetry Sundays this month, and any number of Halloween-related poems to celebrate on them. Let's kick off October's poems with this eerie offering from Mary Karr ...

Field of Skulls

by Mary Karr

Stare hard enough at the fabric of night,   

and if you're predisposed to dark—let’s say   

the window you’ve picked is a black

postage stamp you spend hours at,

sleepless, drinking gin after the I Love   

Lucy reruns have gone off—stare

like your eyes have force, and behind

any night’s taut scrim will come the forms   

you expect pressing from the other side.   

For you: a field of skulls, angled jaws

and eye-sockets, a zillion scooped-out crania.   

They’re plain once you think to look.

You know such fields exist, for criminals

roam your very block, and even history lists   

monsters like Adolf and Uncle Joe

who stalk the earth’s orb, plus minor baby-eaters   

unidentified, probably in your very midst. Perhaps   

that disgruntled mail clerk from your job

has already scratched your name on a bullet—that’s him   

rustling in the azaleas. You caress the thought,

for it proves there’s no better spot for you

than here, your square-yard of chintz sofa, hearing   

the bad news piped steady from your head. The night   

is black. You stare and furious stare,

confident there are no gods out there. In this way,   

you’re blind to your own eye’s intricate machine   

and to the light it sees by, to the luck of birth and all   

your remembered loves. If the skulls are there—

let’s say they do press toward you

against night’s scrim—could they not stare

with slack jawed envy at the fine flesh

that covers your scalp, the numbered hairs,   

at the force your hands hold?

Have a good day and enjoy the rest of your weekend. Don't look for skulls.

More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

Cartoon Saturday

Where do we get these weeks, anyhow?

Russian President Vladimir Putin granted Russian citizenship to former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, who has been living in Russia to avoid prosecution for compromising US intelligence secrets; Putin also signed legislation which, on the basis of a "referendum" condemned around the world as illegal and a sham, incorporated about 18% of Ukraine into Russia; Hurricane Ian devastated large portions of Florida, then turned north to menace the Atlantic coast of the US; with hours to spare, Congress passed a "continuing resolution" to fund the government until shortly before Christmas, when the whole sorry kabuki dance will begin again; and just in time for Halloween, a snack food company has recalled packages of candy corn because the packaging failed to disclose potential allergens.

If you've been with me for very long, you know that October's Cartoon Saturdays feature our annual salute to Halloween ... each Saturday, we'll feature cartoons on the theme of terrifying, horrible things ... no, not Der Furor, GOP members of Congress, and an extremely conservative and self-righteous Supreme Court, but ghosts, goblins, and other things that go bump in the night. Or the day, whatever. First up: mummies - the original walking dead.

Where mummies go to unwind ...

There may be mummified children about, after all ...

The mummy's curse ...

The mummy's closet ...

Civic-minded mummies are always ready to help their neighbors who forgot their masks ...

Well, what else would a mummy listen to? ...

This one's dedicated to my friend Birgitta, who probably has the world's record for bizarre spellings of her name on Starbucks cups ...

Victoria's Secrypt ...

You knew this one had to show up sooner or later ...

Uh, oh ...

And that starts off our annual Cartoon Saturday salute to Halloween - hope you enjoyed it. Be sure to be back next Saturday for a visit with everybody's favorite self-made man - Frankenstein.

In the meantime, come back tomorrow for the first of three Halloween-themed Poetry Sundays ... more thoughts then.

Bilbo