At left is something from pro-democracy activist, influencer, and writer Andrew Wortman, who started ‘America Rises’ to help inform others how to save U.S. democracy, which is not only the only way to save our country, but a necessary precursor to stopping the climate crisis.
A reader sent me the rendering at left. Funny, I didn’t think he knows any more than I do on the multi-national economics of food, which isn’t much.
Looking it up just now, it does appear that the U.S., does in fact import many foods from China, including fruits, vegetables, spices, tea, snack foods, fish, and shrimp. In turn, the United States exports many foods to China, including corn, soybeans, wheat, rice, dairy, beef, pork, tree nuts, and sorghum.
Is this a bad thing? Is it some sort of tragedy that the layout and skill set of the U.S. makes us better at growing bumper crops of corn, where the Chinese are better at harvesting and processing shrimp? Or is just another attempt to upset ill-informed people?
May I submit that it’s humor?
Everyone’s so serious about everything. Sure, it’s hard to find things that bring smiles to our faces under the present circumstances, but it’s not impossible.
Just ask the guy on the left.
I hear you, David. A couple of comments in return:
1) I readily admit that you deserve better than this at this stage in your like, though I suppose that could be said about all of us who can perceive how completely malicious Trump and this administration is. Speaking for myself, soon to be 70, yes, I too am angry and stressed, but I feel most sorry for the young people who will live long lives in a country that, for decades to come, will be desperately trying to rebuild its democracy and fight its way back to some level of sanity and normalcy.
2) If that’s a recent picture of you at age 80, you look great.
Thanks for the note.
To the reader who sent the meme at left, I respond as follows:
A few of those who voted for Trump have realized that they made a mistake, but there is certainly no avalanche. The president’s supporters still deeply revere the values we see in Project 2025, and that applies to both the MAGA lowbrows and the amoral rich: the dismantling of the federal government, the consolidation of power in the executive branch, unquestioned loyalty to Trump, the appointment of unqualified (though loyal) hacks to key cabinet positions, reprisals against those who supported prosecution of Trump for attempting to overthrow the U.S. government, the criminalization of abortion, white supremacy, environmental deregulation, the defunding of public education, and certainly the abolition of wokeism/DEI.
In terms of apathy, I have to agree that many Americans believe they are powerless to turn any of this around. For example, a huge portion of this country has turned off cable news in a desperate attempt to preserve its sanity.
What this Navy admiral says is true, but it goes straight over the head of the typical American voter, who is incapable of seeing that Trump is diminished, ill-informed, untruthful, etc.
In large measure, the United States got exactly what it wanted and deserved.
Sure, Trump is hostile to environmental health, but even we progressives don’t care too much about that right now.
That’s because the collapse of the environment is a slow process that’s happening over decades, and may, with luck, be avoided. But the death of the American experiment with democracy is imminent, and may be completed in the next few months or a couple of years.
By the time Trump finishes remaking the United States according to his thirst for absolute power, he’ll have very little public support; even the true MAGA idiots, for the most part, will have realized that they’ve been conned.
But by then it will mean essentially nothing that the support for the world’s newest dictator’s will be so badly eroded. As we look around the globe at the dozens upon dozens of autocracies, the support base of their leaders is totally irrelevant.
This quote from Volodymyr Zelensky reminds us that if we’re looking for heads of state who are actually decent human beings, go to out-of-the way places that are fairly inconsequential in terms of international politics and commerce, e.g., New Zealand, Iceland, and Scandinavia. If you’re trying to find some true monsters, on the other hand, look in the big places: Russia, China, or the United States.
Holy cow.
