A brilliant friend from college just posted on Facebook, “Mitch McConnell froze twice and nobody suggested that he should step down.” And got dozens of “likes” and “loves.” It’s a moronic, silly argument. He’s far too smart to think it’s valid, unless bias has literally made him stupid. Or he’s deliberately trying yo confuse people dumber than he is, which is despicable. I just commented, “(Come on.)”

To state the obvious:

• Many did suggest that McConnell step down.
• Mitch is too old too, and should have retired years ago. The fact that Mitch, a jerk, has hung around way past his pull date is not an argument for why other elected officials should do the same.
• Being a Senator, however, isn’t like being President. At all.
• How does the Senate leader displaying an alarming cognitive episode have anything to do with the copious evidence of Biden’s progressive dementia? The McConnell episode doesn’t make Biden’s performance less serious, and the response to it, adequate or not, doesn’t  justify pretending Joe’s meltdown was just a “bad night.”
• There is literally no critical thinking path or logical process that makes my friend’s  infantile “whataboutism” response defensible or persuasive, except to fools clutching at straws.

It’s very depressing.

Again, not unexpected, just wildly depressing.

I really don’t have time this morning to do the analysis of yesterday’s latest SCOTUS decision that it deserves, or even to complete the deserved excoriation of the liars, hysterics and morons have made utter asses of themselves while making ignorant and gullible members of the public more ignorant still. I was grateful to see Prof. Turley’s essay this morning, which is exactly what I expected it to be.

But all anyone had to do was to read the damn opinion, which you can and should do here. It is a moderate opinion. It is a careful opinion, and it was an unavoidable one. It is also an opinion that would never have been necessary if the totalitarian Democrats hadn’t decided to weaponize the criminal justice system in a last ditch effort to stop Donald Trump from defeating their demented, puppet President.

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I know this is Nelson’s second visit in less than a week, but it’s still the most appropriate reaction.

This news just came to me from the New York Times. I have a gift link for you here, to get you past the pay wall.

The quick version is that the party was counting on the Biden family to sit old Joe down this weekend, tell him they love him, and convince him to drop out of the Presidential race. Instead, sayeth the Times (which itself had issued a panicked call for Joe to leave)…

“…President Biden’s family is urging him to stay in the race and keep fighting despite last week’s disastrous debate performance, even as some members of his clan privately expressed exasperation at how he was prepared for the event by his staff, people close to the situation said on Sunday. Mr. Biden huddled with his wife, children and grandchildren at Camp David while he tried to figure out how to tamp down Democratic anxiety. While his relatives were acutely aware of how poorly he did against former President Donald J. Trump, they argued that he could still show the country that he remains capable of serving for another four years.”

Amusingly, Hunter is reported to be the most adamant that Biden stay in the White House until they carry him out. Of course! Joe is his meal-ticket. Without him, Biden’s black sheep son is just another junkie.

Again, I feel nothing but pity and embarrassment for our President (and contempt for his selfish, irresponsible family), but as for the chaos this development inflicts on the Democrats, good. They deserve every bit of it and more. The party’s self-made crisis is what George Will used to call “condign justice.”

I wasn’t going to do one of these today because I really don’t have time, but this comment from Althouse today isn’t worth a whole post but can’t be allowed to pass. She wrote,

“By the way, is it “entirely possible that Biden could have a much stronger debate in September”? Not only is it entirely possible for Biden to have a much stronger debate in September, it’s entirely possible that if you calm yourself, clear your head of preconceptions, and cue up last Thursday’s debate and watch it again, you will perceive it as a much stronger debate than it seemed on first watch.”

Oh, Ann, Ann. What the hell is the matter with her? She’s still flogging her initial reaction that Biden was “bad” but not “that bad.” Sure it was “that bad.” Even if there had been just a single attack of confused gibberish like the one that prompted Trump’s killer line about Joe not even knowing what he meant, it would have made the debate a historic political disaster. What part of “All Biden had to do was show he wasn’t too addled and feeble to be trusted to lead the nation, and he couldn’t do it” escapes her? That quote makes me wonder if she’s losing it.

And there is no chance, absolutely none, that Biden is going to improve in three months. How would that happen? I had an older friend a few years ago who showed symptoms similar to Biden’s in a da- long meeting we had about his play that I was preparing to direct. It was one of the longest, most depressing three hours of my life. Less than three months later, he could barely speak and was completely disoriented.

That was dementia, but what is Ann’s excuse? Excessive hope? A massive blind spot? Denial? Contrarianism? Her not-so-secret Democrat taking over, like Pazuzu?

It’s unethical for opinion writers who people trust to offer recklessly absurd opinions.

Meanwhile, counting down…

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This week’s highlighted question for Kwame Anthony Appiah, the NYU philosophy prof who serves as the New York Times’ Magazine’s first real ethicist to take on the role of “The Ethicist” in its long-running advice column, had me pausing to see if I could guess his response. I was wrong: maybe you can do better. Then try to guess mine.

Here’s the question:

“I worked part time for my granduncle’s business when I was 13 and 14. There were many times when we were alone, and he sexually abused me. I never raised it with my parents in those early years; I doubted I would be believed, and my granduncle was a ‘‘kind old man’’ who was very generous to my financially strained family.

In my late 20s, while in therapy, I began to realize the impact those experiences had on me. I told my husband and my parents what happened all those years ago. I received the essential support I needed from my father and my husband. But my relationship with my mother became fraught. When I shared the events with her, she told me that the same man sexually abused her when she was a teenager and that she never told anyone. At first, we were angry about the impact on both of us, but then I became angry at her for not protecting me. How could she have possibly allowed her teenage daughter to regularly be alone with this man? She said that because he was an old man when I worked for him, she didn’t think he would still do the same things. She also asked that I not share this information with my father, fearing that he would blame her for not protecting me.

Knowing that the truth might destroy their marriage, I have remained silent about my mother’s experience and have kept it a secret at her request. I encouraged my mother to attend counseling to address the issue, but she has never done so. Nor has she told my dad. I’ve lost a lot of respect for her over this; her decision seems a selfish one.

I am now in my 50s, my parents are in their 80s and the secret is still buried. My dad continues to ask why I don’t spend more time with my mother; it clearly bothers him. I wonder if it is time to share the secret with him. Is unburdening myself of this secret worth causing disruption and sadness at this late stage of my dad’s life and my parents’ 60-year marriage?“

OK, thinking music time!

Time’s up! Do you have your answers? What did The Ethicist say, and what was my (instant) response?

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I know that headline will get some heads-a-blowing. So be it. It’s true.

A CNN quickie poll of debate watchers conducted by SSRS found that the majority of registered voters who watched the debate believed that Biden lost in in a 67% to 33% split. 69% of Democratic debate watchers actually said that Biden won the debate.

There is no accounting for opinions or taste, but saying that Biden won last night’s debate cannot be defended except as dishonesty, denial, or insanity. If that performance won, how could Biden have lost? By simply lying supine on the stage, farting and drooling? With these people —69% of Democrats!—maybe they would have even called that winning. Fine, they could say that they won’t change their minds about the candidates just because Biden lost the debate, since they have been brainwashed into thinking Trump is Satan. They could say that Biden lost the debate but still has their trust that he can handle the job for four years, as absurd a position as that is. However, they cannot say that Biden won the debate unless they completely redefine “won” as “made a complete fool of himself and embarrassed his party, his supporters and his country.”

That 69% figure as well as 33% of the total group polled need to be immediately installed in the Bias Makes You Stupid Hall of Fame.

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He essentially used almost the exact same “kill line” on Biden that I recommended:

“I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence; I don’t think he knows what he said either.”

Of course, it’s a pretty obvious one, but at least he or someone on his team is alert.

And no, I am not watching this nadir in our democracy’s history. Someone who had read my post called me up to tell me about it.

Looking around the web and social media, it appears that the Axis will have a tough time spinning this. From S.E. Cupp, one of CNN’s token conservatives who hates Trump: