Spring is in the air and it’s time to look back on the best of March.
But first, a brief note on the worst of March: nearly all factions of the right get together to repeal and replace the worst piece of legislation since the “Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever” platform that Democrats ran on every year for the first 60 years of the 20th century, and they find a way to botch it. Then they blame the one GOP group (the Freedom Caucus) who is least responsible for the debacle. I think it will still get done, and I think passing that bill would have been worse than killing it. (Even allowing for the corrupt MSM headwinds against it, it polled at 17%, which is down in the neighborhood of Obamacare, the mainstream media, and dengue fever.)
Leaving O-care in place temporarily might actually work out better, because when the new rates come out in the fall – huge increases in payments, continuing murderously high deductibles, and insurers fleeing like they just saw Hillary break out of a nearby upstate New York treeline, ravenous from months of feeding on beetles and grubs, bellowing with pent-up Hulkian fury and charging straight at them – people will not be happy. If the GOP can competently drive home that these are the predictable (and predicted!) results of Obamacare, the 100% Democrat-owned disaster, they should have enough room to get rid of it and replace it with something much more free-market-
oriented.
Anyway, let’s turn to happier news:
1.March 6th – Carson’s stumble. In a speech, Ben Carson referred to slaves as “immigrants who came to America in the bottoms of slave ships.” Not a smart quote, certainly. But the MSM, solicitous of the feelings of a prominent African-American, barely mentioned it at all, and then only in the context of “everyone makes mistakes.” Right? Not exactly. In fact, not even a little bit.
The left went on a days-long orgy of Ben Carson bashing. Moral paragons such as Cher, Whoopi Goldberg and Samuel L. Jackson called him various uncomplimentary names. Star Jones noted that Carson was an “[excrement] for brains Uncle Tom.” Chelsea Clinton (who I blame for nothing, because she had a horrible childhood at the hands of absolutely terrible parents) chimed in, “This can’t be real. Slaves were not & are not immigrants.”
The Anne Frank Center (whatever that is) excreted a calm little press release headed “TRAGIC, SHOCKING AND UNACCEPTABLE,” (because you’re not really outraged if you don’t roll out the all caps, dammit!), featuring lines like, “You do not get a pass because you’re African American.”
Then, because God exists, and He loves us, a video turned up of President Obama in a 2015 naturalization speech saying, “Certainly, it wasn’t easy for those of African heritage who had not come here voluntarily and yet in their own way were immigrants themselves.” Cher, Whoopi, Sam, Star and Chelsea were unavailable for comment. The Anne Frank Center issued a press release (in a tiny font) headed, “Not tragic, not shocking, and completely acceptable,” and noting that “President Obama gets a pass because he’s African American.”
2. March 14th — Maddow’s folly. I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for Rachel Maddow. Sure, she’s a leftist hack with a mean streak, and she’s got the haircut I had from grades 2-4 (post-buzz cut, pre-horrible quasi-mullet – those were dark days, my friends). But she can be witty, and she’s not stupid. On the other hand, she willingly works at MSNBC, so I could be wrong on that last point.
Anyway, on March 14 she put on an exhibition of comically exaggerated hype that could not have been more over the top if it had been emceed by Don King and that “Let’s get ready to rrrrrummbllle!!!” guy who announces fights in Vegas. She breathlessly announced that she had obtained Trump’s top secret tax returns, and would reveal them to the world that very evening!
The MSM went into a frenzy. For months leftists had been salivating over what Trump’s taxes would reveal. Some said he hadn’t paid a dime on his ill-gotten millions. Some said his net worth was really $28 and a box full of gold-embossed MAGA hats. Some said he’d written off repeated payments to a large dance troupe of urinating Russian hookers.
Then her show started, and she went into her tease. Then a commercial break, then more tease, then one more commercial break. And then, it was like she started wandering around in a room filled with rakes, and she stepped on one after another, with each rake handle smacking her right in her smirking face with a comical Batman-the-tv-show sound effect.
“In 2005, Trump earned $150 million.” (THWACK!) “He paid $36 million in taxes (POW!), amounting to a tax rate of 25% (CRUNCH!). Which is 6% higher than the rate paid by Obama (BAM!), and almost twice the rate paid by cartoon socialist Bernie Sanders (THWACK! POW! CRUNCH! SAD TROMBONE!) (I know, Batman never featured a sad trombone. And you can’t really put an exclamation mark after the words “sad trombone.” But how else could you audibly end Rachel’s big night?)
The obvious analogy cited by many commentators was to Geraldo Rivera’s flaming Hindenberg of a tv special revealing that Al Capone’s vault held several old bottles and the dessicated corpse of a squirrel who had once been a Democrat Alderman. But that comparison is not fair to Geraldo. At least he DIDN’T KNOW that the vault was empty. Maddow knew that Trump’s returns showed that he had paid a ton of taxes on a ton of income, and she still hyped and stalled for what felt like forever.
She received a much-deserved lambasting from all sides in the aftermath, and if we lived in a sane world, she would have had to slink off into obscurity in disgrace. Instead, she’s getting the best ratings of her career. On MSNBC. Which feels like another way of saying, “she has slunk off into obscurity in disgrace.”
3.The beautiful dawn of socialist triumph heralds a new day in Venezuela. Or not. I give you this headline, from March 14th: “Venezuela seizes bakeries amid bread shortage.” The subhead: “Arrests brownie and croissant makers.”
I’d tell you details, but do I need to? It’s pretty much the old socialist story: Leftist geniuses take power, take control over businesses, businesses collapse, lefties blame businesses. If it weren’t so tragic, it’d be funny: devious brownie makers team up with a shadowy croissant cabal, then join forces with – you guessed it – pastry kingpins, and all stick it to the little guy, satisfying their insatiable greed by… not having any bread to sell?
Milton Friedman (peace be upon him) said it best: “If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years you’d have a shortage of sand.”
4. On March 28th, Hillary re-emerges to give a speech. This was a highlight for two reasons: 1. It reminded us all that she is not the president. 2. She wore an outfit consisting of a pantsuit bottom, floral shirt and big gold medallion pendant, and a leather jacket. One unbiased media outlet (HA!) referred to this as “an edgy makeover,” for the former first lady, and approved of the way she “rocked… a leather blazer.” (Remember a young Marlon Brando in The Wild Ones? And how young women everywhere fell in love with his leather motorcycle “blazer?”)
In other news, Bishop Don Magic Juan (google him) called Hillary to ask for his clothes back. (Actually, her outfit wasn’t that bad. But I can’t resist the chance to sneak in a Bishop Don Magic Juan joke, and you’d be surprised at how rarely that chance comes along. But I really did like being reminded that Hillary is not the president.)
5. Second half of March: Gorsuch marches through the Senate like Sherman through Georgia, or Godzilla through Tokyo. (Wait… I just went online and registered a trademark on “Gorzilla.” Look for the t-shirts soon, featuring Gorsuch’s head on Godzilla’s body, crushing a tiny Schumer under his feet.) The Dems tried their same old smears – extremist, hates the poor, yada yada – and Gorsuch swatted them away effortlessly. Scalia is dead – long live Scalia.
Next up (I hope and pray): Anthony Kennedy announces he’s going to retire, and Gorsuch’s younger brother – Antonin Gorsuch – appears on the horizon…
Martin Simpson 