I hope everyone manages to have the best, most love-filled, happy Christmas possible. Everyone but me and the dog are sick, depressed are both in my household, but I’m making it work. It will be a “Christmas Story”-style Chinese food Christmas, though, the way it’s shaking out.
1. Now THIS is an unethical home Christmas decoration…
…except that according to the story, the neighbors don’t mind. At great expense, Jason Pieper erected this 900 pound thing after purchasing it at an auction for over $2,000. He then decorated surrounding trees with blue and white lights to follow the theme: remember those blue light specials? To me, this would seem to be a bit out of whack with the spirit of the holiday, but perhaps no more than the giant Christmas Imperial Walker, the 20 foot inflatable penguin and some of the monstrosities in my neighborhood.
2. Workplace ethics. Jeffrey Toobin should feel too bad. An L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy had his radio mic open while he was in flagrante delicto. His sex partner was moaning over his panting as the dispatcher from the Sheriff’s station tried to get her deputy’s attention without success. “The deputy was immediately relieved of duty,” the Sheriff’s office informed the media.
Americans are becoming such prudes.
3. What George Will calls “condign justice”: California governor Gavin Newsom wanted to get credit for appointing longtime state pol Alex Padilla as the state’s first Hispanic U.S. Senator, but instead was criticized by other Democrats, like San Franciso mayor London Breed, for not appointing a black woman to replace Kamala Harris, a sort-of black woman, after she left the office to become the first female Vice-President of color. None of the discussions seemed to involve actual qualifications, just group memberships. That is to be expected, since demonstrated ability had nothing to do with Hariss’s selection by Biden, so there was no perceived reason to worry such trivia in choosing Harri’s successor in her Senate seat.
4. I know you’ll all be cheered to know that Kevin Spacey once again has left us an inspirational Christmas eve message on his YouTube channel. He says,
“If you’re standing in a place that you can no longer remain standing, if you’re suffering, if you need need help, if you feel guilt or shame, if you’re struggling with your identity, if your back’s up against the wall, or if you feel that there is no path for you, whatever your situation, I promise you there is a path. At this time during this holiday and beyond, even if you don’t feel it, there are people out there who understand and who can help, because you are not alone.”
Among those who have no need for the cancelled actor’s sympathy are Joe Biden , Governor Cuomo, and Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax, none of whom suffered any negative consequences after they were accused by named female victims of sexual assault and harassment, though Spacey’s career was destroyed without any of the accusations against him being proven any more than those against the three elected Democrats.
5. Update: the President is still threatening to veto the monster bill, having warmed up by vetoing the defense bill. . He should. Presidents should demand clean bills on such matters as the pandemic funds, and state as an unequivocal governing principle that it won’t matter what other provisions and dollars are involved, if it isn’t just addressing the matter at hand, then the bill will be blocked. [Correction notice: The earlier version of this item incorrectly stated that the President had vetoed the pandemic relief bill. As of this writing, he hasn’t. He hasn’t signed it, either. A pocket veto is a possibility.]
6. Good: The President pardoning his associates and others who were only targeted by law enforcement because of their connections to him or his campaign. In fact, it would be ethical for the President to pardon Michael Cohen, sleaze that he is, even though Cohen turned on his long-time client in a desperate effort to trade confidential client secrets for leniency.
7. Today’s Wuhan virus hypocrite: North Carolina county executive Dena Diorio, who, like Governors Gavin Newsom, Andrew Cuomo, Gretchen Whitmer, and J.B. Pritzker; Mayors Lori Lightfoot, London Breed, Bill de Blasio and Murial Bowser (D.C.), Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the recently disgraced Dr. Birx, showed her contempt for the “little people” be telling county residents they should stay home for Christmas and , almost immediately afterwards admitting that she would be traveling by car to Durham (142 miles) to spend Christmas with her family.
She wins special idiot points, however, by actually trying to explain why her decision was justifiable, saying,
“I know who the family is, I know where they spend their time, so I feel comfortable making that trip. It’s two people in a household, it’s not a group. It’s a very small number of people and I feel very confident about their safety. If I did not feel comfortable, I would not go. I’m making a personal decision based on information that I have, and so that’s the decision that I’ve made, and I think everybody needs to do the same.”
Except that she didn’t advise her community to decide on their own whether it was safe to travel for the holidays based on how “comfortable” they felt….
Merry Christmas, Jack. I hope everyone feels better soon.
I’m with crella. Nobody knows what’s gonna happen tomorrow, or, more likely, Monday. This whole clown-show…just ridiculous.
Merry Christmas Jack and family.
Re 7. Does travelling 30 miles to feed the feral cat colony (spay and release) after yesterday’s torrential rain count as travelling to visit family?
The 16 cats seemed very pleased that I came to visit as they all came to meet me on the WMDRT (rail trail). Social distancing was a bit of a problem as each felt it necessary to physically greet me in their own way and none of us felt the need to don masks.
As I laid out the Christmas buffet on the asphalt it was apparent that the previous day’s weather had prevented others from bringing breakfast or dinner.
A good time was had by all and no one will need to be tested. It was a good Christmas day.
5)Jack, where did you see that Trump’s vetoed the appropriation/Covid bill? I just looked on Fox News and CNN and didn’t see anything along those lines.
I know he did veto the Defense act, and I heard that they have planned a vote on overriding that one for next week.
My mistake; got the bills mixed up. Fixed.
Then I’m mixed up…I was under the impression that the Defense bill was mashed up with another massive bill including Covid stuff…and that the media has been broadly calling it the Covid bill…
You and me both.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/trump-again-calls-2-000-checks-covid-aid-bill-remains-n1252359
It is the National Defense Authorization Act, NDAA, that Congress has been passing each year for a while, usually with big majorities — a mere 4500 page bill for a measly $740 billion.
Trump was threatening to veto it unless they included language to repeal Section 230, forbid them from renaming bases named after Confederates, and it appears he wanted language allowing him to pull troops back from foreign bases. It passed earlier this month and he vetoed it Wednesday.
The other bill is the one he’s criticizing about not having enough Covid relief to individuals (the $2000) and for having tons of pork and money for various foreign countries. That is the conglomerate bill that was 5900+ pages and somewhere around $2,300 billion to fund the government through September 30th and provide the Covid relief.
They’re just all coming at nearly the same time.
Any update on the grand finale of “The Pandemic Creates a Classic and Difficult Ethics Conflict…”
Merry Christmas.
Merry Christmas to you and yours, Jack. Hope all are well soon.
Coming in just under the wire, Merry Christmas and good health to you and yours, and to all who haunt this space. “God bless us, every one!”
Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!