Before you begin reading this column, let me ask you to go to Youtube, find the video of Ray Charles singing “Oh Happy Day” in front of a choir of the happiest dashiki-wearing folks you’ll ever see, and start that playing softly in the background. Because a column this happy requires a soundtrack. (Also, don’t miss the awkward yet adorable little dance/walk thing that Charles does at the end of the song. Because that is the same exact awkward dance/walk that I did in my living room – with Cassie the Wonder Dog watching me in confusion – as I watched Nasty Nancy P tearing up Trump’s SOTU speech on Tuesday night.)
Was this last week the happiest week in our nation’s history? I can’t say that definitively. I got married 30 years ago, and that was a pretty good week. I’ve been present at the birth of two daughters, and those were pretty good weeks.
We adopted Cassie, the Bears won the Super Bowl in 1986, Trump thumped Cankles McPantsuit in 2016 like a 19-year-old Mike Tyson knocking Eddie Richardson into the troposphere in the first round, and George Washington crossed the Delaware and whipped some German mercenaries at Christmastime.
Those were all pretty good weeks. But this week was right up there.
On Sunday, the Kansas City Chiefs won the Super Bowl. I love Mahomes, the Chiefs hadn’t been on top for 50 years, and though it’s not the 49ers’ fault, they represent the most far-left, feces-filled (but I repeat myself) city in the country.
On Monday, the Democrats ran the greatest caucus in the history of caucuses… right into the ground! Move over, wax-winged Icarus, and step aside, unsinkable Titanic, because we have a new, perfect illustration of human hubris leading to a disastrous face-plant, with extra points added for sheer hilarity!
Four years after Bernie’s people insisted on changes after Iowa was corruptly and/or incompetently given to Hillary, the woke whiz kids came up with an app that was guaranteed to streamline the process, and demonstrate the flawless efficiency that is the hallmark of leftist rule.
And boy, did it!
End result: 5000 years after the invention of the abacus, 2200 years after the invention of paper, and 350 years after the invention of the pencil, the Democrats are still not able to count a small number of white people in a very small state.
And these white people weren’t hiding in duck blinds, wearing camouflage. They were standing around in well-lit gymnasiums!
If you haven’t been in a Midwestern gym lately, they have tan-colored wood floors, and dark wood bleachers. White people in that environment are pretty easy to spot. Unless you are a leftist bureaucrat with a killer app, apparently.
How bad was it? After three days, we still aren’t sure who won. In fact, on Wednesday (and I am not making this up), the state Democrat party said that the partial totals had been certified as accurate, and then later in the day had to admit that some votes that were cast for Bernie had been erroneously counted for Butch Patrick.
I know, that’s what I thought, too: Are you telling me that tv’s Eddie Munster got some Democrat votes in Iowa? I mean, it makes a little sense, since tv’s Herman Munster won the Iowa caucus in 2004. But still, I don’t think any pundits were expecting Eddie to have such a good showing.
Wait a minute. My crack research staff informs me that it wasn’t Butch Patrick, but MA governor Deval Patrick. Also, Herman Munster did NOT win Iowa for the Democrats in 2004 – that was John Kerry. Honest mistake. And by the way, I would sooner vote for the ticket of Herman and Eddie Munster in 2020 than whichever two boneheads the Dems end up nominating from their current field. (Also, Uncle Fester would make a better Attorney General than Obama’s Steadman Holder or Loretta Lynch.)
Ironically, the biggest winner from Iowa’s Cluster Caucus™ may be Joey Gaffes, because the lack of promptly announced results dampened the effect of his terrible, 4th place finish. And he didn’t help himself by his performance when he showed up at one gym in Cedar Rapids:
Biden: “Hello, Boise!”
Voice in the crowd: “That’s Idaho. This is Iowa!”
Biden: “I know that. I’ve always loved the amazing potatoes you folks grow here.”
Voice: “That’s still Idaho.”
Biden: “Thanks for coming out. Go Utes!”
Voice: “That’s Utah.”
Biden: “Listen, fat—”
Biden’s handler (whispering): “These are supporters.”
Voice: “Why are you bleeding from the eyes?”
Biden: “You want to do some push-ups with me? Let’s go.”
Handler: “Please don’t do that.”
Biden: “Do you want to compare IQs? Come on, man!”
Handler: “Okay, we need to get back on the road.”
Biden (waving): “I love the Green Mountain State!”
Voice: “That’s Vermont. This is Iowa.”
Biden: “Give me a break! Get your facts straight, Jack.” (his handler starts tugging him toward the door.) “No Mularkey! 23 skidoo!”
Handler: “Okay, Mr. Vice President—”
Biden (as he’s pulled outside): “Tippecanoe and Tyler too!”
And, scene.
Then came Tuesday, and the best SOTU speech ever.
I don’t care for the modern tradition of the televised SOTU. They are always a bit of a dog and pony show, with guests used as props, awkward applause from one side and poker faces from the other, and a whiff of monarchy about the whole thing. I’d rather we went back to George Washington’s practice, and had the prez deliver a letter to be read by a faceless functionary: “Interest rates are low, employment is high, we’re working on a treaty with the Turks, and #wemustneverstopmocking Liz Warren. The state of the union is solid, and if we could throw some of these leftist bums out in the next election, it would be even better. Good night, and God bless America.”
But if we have to have a SOTU, THIS is the SOTU we should have.
Trump was at his showman-like Trumpiest, showcasing an effective line-up of guests: the Tuskeegee airman survivor; the non-commie, legitimate leader of Venezuela; the Army wife and kids with the surprise reunion with their vet dad; the black girl who gets to escape her crappy public school. All of those people should have been non-controversial applause points for both sides, and yet the Dems were grudging at best.
And Trump was also at his trolliest: he had Melania give Rush Limbaugh the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Rush Limbaugh! At the SOTU!
And the Dems played right into his hands. A bunch of them walked out like pouting children. AOC ostentatiously did not attend. Which is par for the course for her, since all of us look at America and see the greatest, richest, most free country in the history of humanity. But when She-Guevara looks at America, it’s all helipads and ringworm as far as the eye can see. (I know that doesn’t appear to make sense. But read my January column at Martinsimpsonwriting.com about her interview with Ta-Nehisi (gesundheit) Coates, and it will.)
And just when you thought that the Dems couldn’t come across any worse, Nancy Pelosi said, “Hold my canopic jar.”
She looked like a crazy lady during most of the speech, alternating between fumbling with the speech pages, staring vacantly, and shaking her head and apparently talking to herself. When it was over, she famously ripped up the speech, in a graceless gesture that made her look like a petulant child. Which is ridiculous, since she was actually a child during the Ptolemaic dynasty in ancient Egypt.
Trump’s ability to draw his opponents into unforced errors is really amazing. He has strengths that none of them have. He also has some glaring weaknesses – a bullying and petty streak, an instinct for childish insults – but those are baked into the cake re: our view of Trump. People have been so glad to see a Republican who will fight back and get into the mud with sleazy Dems, they forgive him for flaws that would doom another candidate.
The Dems’ only possible path to defeat Trump would be to stick to the high ground, and let his less appealing qualities alienate moderates, independents, RINOs, and suburban women who are offended by them. But I can’t think of the last Dem who has consistently taken the high road (Obama only seems to have done so in comparison to the latest gaggle of Schiffs and Tlaibs and Ilhan Omars), and Nancy can’t help herself.
Her attacks on Trump as childish and petty are totally undermined by her tantrum after his speech, and Schiff’s wild warnings that Trump’s going to give Alaska to the Russians, and the various Dems’ shrieking about him being Hitler and a fascist and etc. (I’m assuming that some folks at the RNC are even now cutting some “take back the House” ads featuring Pelosi’s shenanigans at the SOTU. If any of them are reading this, I’d like to suggest a possible slogan for the campaign: “De-gavel the Mummy in 2020!”)
Similarly, the Dems seemed to be making some political hay a while ago by pointing out the chaotic goings-on in the White House, with appointees being hired and fired and thrown under the bus on a regular basis. “We,” the Dems tried to argue, “would be a return to normalcy and competent, orderly governance.”
But have you noticed how smoothly Detroit is run? And San Francisco? And Baltimore, and Philly, and New Orleans, and Chicago, and every other city and state that the Dems have had one-party control over?
And did I mention Iowa, where it seems like just this Monday when they couldn’t do a simple head count? These dopes couldn’t pick the winner of a one-horse race. They couldn’t manage a three-car funeral. They couldn’t find their Nadler with both hands and a topographical map. If these guys were coroners, half their patients would survive the autopsy!
And then it was hump day. And the Dems in the Senate began humping a table leg they’d mistaken for an interested partner, while the bad orange man was acquitted.
They needed 67 votes to get rid of Trump. They got 48. As the Democrat leadership in Iowa could tell you, that’s 115 votes less than they needed. Or, wait, 7 votes. No… hold on…. By their calculations, Robert Duvall is now president.
No, it’s Patrick Stewart. Make that Danny Partridge. Or Danny Patrick.
NO – Deval Patrick. He won Iowa. And Cousin It is leading in New Hampshire.
Can you hear that sound? It’s Ray Charles, laughing softly as his head bobs back and forth, and his gifted fingers start dancing lightly across a keyboard.
“Oh happy day…”
Avenatti/Eddie Munster 2020!
Martin Simpson 