Is it my imagination, or was Barack Obama starting to channel Keegan-Michael Key as Obama’s Anger Translator near the end of this video?
I’m proud to endorse my friend @JoeBiden for President of the United States. Let's go: https://t.co/maHVGRozkX
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) April 14, 2020
This comic from Garry Trudeau reminds me of the fact that back in 2014 — even before he was running for president — Donald Trump launched a panicked Twitter rampage (over 100 tweets!) about the Ebola virus. Trump attacked Barack Obama and other Democrats, and even called for Obama to resign.
Trump used Ebola as a campaign issue during the 2014 midterms, which was repeated by the media. This issue helped the Republicans gain 9 seats in the Senate and 13 in the House. But soon after the midterms, Trump stopped tweeting about it, because he didn’t actually care about Ebola other than as a political weapon.
Due to the competent and effective response from the Obama administration, nobody ever contracted Ebola in the US. The two deaths here were people who had contracted it in Africa, and who were quarantined so that they didn’t spread it to anyone else.
Today is the deadline for mail-in ballots in Wisconsin’s primary election, which happened a week ago. As you recall, that state’s Democratic governor tried to delay the election because of a stay-at-home order caused by the coronavirus. But the Republican-controlled legislature — led by Speaker Robin Vos — rebuffed that attempt.
Then a Wisconsin district court tried to extend the date for absentee mail-in ballots to be postmarked, so people could avoid exposing themselves by voting in person. This was necessary because there was such a shortage of poll workers that there very few poll places were able to open. In Milwaukee, the largest city in Wisconsin, instead of the normal 180 polling sites, only five were open.
But that attempt was overruled by the US Supreme Court (you guessed it, with a purely partisan verdict). In addition, with the large number of people trying to vote by mail, the system was so overwhelmed that many voters who applied for absentee ballots did not receive them by the deadline for getting them postmarked. And the Supreme Court decision meant that any ballot postmarked after that date would be thrown away.
The result was a horrible, dangerous mess, with long lines and large crowds. People literally risked their lives, by ignoring stay-at-home orders and going to vote.
But that’s not what this post is about. It is about Robin Vos, the Speaker of the legislature, who could have prevented this fiasco. Adding insult to injury, after voting had already started, Vos appeared on TV, and told people that if they didn’t receive their absentee ballot, they could still request a ballot via email. Watch him say that:
There’s just one problem, it wasn’t true. The only recourse if you did not receive your requested absentee ballot was to vote in person. Which Vos claimed was “incredibly safe” — despite the fact that he was decked out in protective clothing and a mask. And hypocritically, there was not enough protective clothing and masks to provide them to all polling site workers in the state.
I just hope the people of Wisconsin remember this the next time they vote. And everyone in America, when they vote for their Senators, remembers that a Republican-controlled Senate blocked Obama’s nomination for the Supreme Court, turning the court into an extension of the current Republican party, who suppress voter turnout by risking our lives.
UPDATE: It looks like their chicanery backfired on the Republicans.
8. Watch the April 11th edition of Saturday Night Live, completely created from the cast members’ homes. This turned out to be one of the funnier SNLs in recent memory. Here’s just one of the sketches:
And since this is supposed to be a political blog, be sure to watch the sketches featuring:
There are lots of good skits (I even enjoyed the Sport Report).
7. Enjoy satire about the coronavirus. Here’s a diagram of deaths by disaster, done in the style of Andy Borowitz:
In an interview on Fox News yesterday, Donald Trump said that he is going to make a decision on whether to recommend allowing normal working life to resume during the coronavirus pandemic “based on a lot of facts and instincts.” If we could open up Trump’s brain, I’m suspicious we would see the above diagram as one of the “facts”.
As for his instincts, we do have a great source for those. The actual Andy Borowitz is going strong, pumping out great satire. Here are the headlines from his most recent columns:
And that’s just from the month of April.
This is a good video showing how despite having a large number of cases of COVID-19 early on, South Korea was able to slow down the coronavirus significantly without having a full lockdown like most countries. This saved lives and protected their economy.
Trump seems to be dealing with the coronavirus as if it were a TV show. I guess that’s all he knows.
This is what a previous world disaster handled the same way might have looked like in real life:
A friend sent me an article written by Garrison Keillor (in case you live under a rock, he of “A Prairie Home Companion” fame). The article is “With your permission, I shall give a short speech“.
You should read it. To induce you to perhaps do that, here’s an excerpt:
… skipping the news lets you ignore a president who, as the British writer Nate White points out, “has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honor and no grace” and now, in a national crisis, shows himself to be an ignorant bumbler and con artist focused on weeding out non-yes-men in the White House.
The Founders never considered this. They provided for impeachment for high crimes and misdemeanors but not for blinkered stupidity. So we must depend on the heroes in our midst, the hospital workers and truck drivers and grocery clerks and crucial employees, the people the Queen thanked in her speech, to get us through the next few weeks or months until, God help us, the rate of infection declines and life can resume.
6. Dress up like a Dalek and run around your village (in England) warning people to “self isolate” (or maybe they will be exterminated?)
Not really at home, I guess, unless you consider the Dalek’s shell the home of the mutant alien inside of it.
Here’s an article from Sky News with more information about this.
Play the ukulele with Will Grove White from the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain (one of my favorite bands!).
This is an edited down version of an hour-long play along that was done on facebook on April 2. 1200 people joined in from all over the world to watch and take part in the UOGB’s first-ever live stream play along. You can even get chord and lyric sheets from their website.
If you’ve never heard of the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain, here’s two videos of them practicing self isolation because of the coronavirus:
If you want more of them, here’s one of my favorite concerts by them, called “Anarchy in the Ukulele“.
4. Make silly videos about the pandemic
And with lots of time on their hands, they made another one. If you have not had enough of the Sound of Pandemic, watch on!
One last thing, I was hoping that people would send me more things like this to post for everyone’s enjoyment. Send me videos, photos… heck, I figured out a hack to get videos out of Facebook, so send me even those!
Yesterday, I read the transcript of the address to the UK by Queen Elizabeth II, but today a friend sent me a link to the video, which the NY Times has graciously allowed non-subscribers to watch for free (after watching an ad).
I’ve lived in England, and (perhaps despite that) I’ve never been much for the British monarchy, but this is one hell of a good address. It brought tears to my eyes. It is fairly short. I highly recommend you watch it.
I’m thinking of starting a series of posts about fun or unusual things people are doing at home while sheltering in place. Of course, I could use some help from you, dear readers. Please post links in the comments. Some sort-of guidelines: they should have been done since the start of the pandemic, and they should be things that people probably wouldn’t do otherwise. It helps if they make me laugh. And only things that can be reposted please (so no videos locked up by Facebook, the bastages!)
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