Run it by me, Your Highness….
When you reach a certain age, politics becomes fairly predictable. When the politics involve Trump, you don’t even have to get out of bed.
I tried an experiment to see if I could predict what Donald Trump would do with “his” war on Iran (well, it’s really Israel’s war on Iran, isn’t it? but Netanyahu, always the very image of the abashed introvert, has kindly let the US put Israel’s interests before those of the US, whatever they might be. Glad to get that out of the way.)
Casually pulling on my custom-made Nostradamus robes, I predict that Trump will block the Strait of Hormuz, for quite the schmooze and chest-bumpies on the evening nooz. Sorry, news. For exactly two weeks, then all hell will break out and the possible annihilation of the entire Iranian civilization (you know, those people Trump addressed to say, Take charge of your freedom, guys! Just don’t leave the house, it’s not safe. Because of us.) before extending the deadline and lying down for a nap.
Or just taking a nap sitting up during a cabinet meeting, while dreaming of pre-pubescent boobs. Tomato, tomato, pronounced differently.
And I was right! About at least one of those things. Instant pundit! You may now kiss the hem of my robe, or my Baroque pearl ring, that looks, as Nancy Mitford might have described it, like “pigeon mess”. So attractive.
You see? So I find that the results of my experiment, using NATO as the control group, suggest that, when Trump has no exit plan, entrance plan, or bit-in-the-middle plan, then he’ll just bluster, run his twiny hwands lovingly over the nuclear button, before someone, like Pete Hegseth, or JD, or maybe a high school student doing a quick tour of the White House, or the cleaning lady, snatches it away from him and feeds him a Big Mac, then turns his attention to something equally important, like taking a bath with some rubber duckies (“British Navy”), Jimmy Kimmel saying absolutely anything, or James Comey’s pictures of sea shells. Stay tuned.
Trump is still pissed that NATO won’t come to his aid. But run that by me again, isn’t NATO supposed to come to your aid if you’re attacked? Like, not if you, a NATO founding member, attack someone else, not in NATO, who wasn’t doing anything to provoke an attack? NATO isn’t supposed to be your very own marauding army of mercenaries, attacking anyone at all, willy-nilly, is it? Sorry if I’m getting too technical, here.
King Charles (attended by his Queen Camilla, you gotta hand it to her, she is obviously a tremendous sticker, and she stuck long enough to be Queen of England) addressed Congress and put some things in perspective.
For example, how HRH himself, as well as his grand-father, great-grandfather, and great-uncle Mountbatten, all served on those “toy ships” called the British Navy—you know, the navy that at one time was the greatest naval force in the entire colonizing world— at one time or other (and, for example, during two World Wars that the US joined at the last minute);
how on 9/11 — it being the twenty-fifth anniversary of that ghastly day — NATO did invoke Article Five (all for one and one for all) and was right by the side of the US, so that the UK was ready to go if needed, and let’s not forget the great people of Gander, Newfoundland, who took stranded Americans into their homes without hesitation, so, yes, NATO does work when you invoke its power for the appropriate situation, and will even fashion a Broadway musical out of that unpromising material;
how religion, Christianity primarily, unites the two great nations, but is greater when it is interfaith, that is, embracing people of all faiths, and even no faith at all; how Magna Carta was the original set-up, not the one-sided, contrived complaints of the Declaration of Independence, that set up including checks and balances on executive power; and how we all must be stewards of nature, “the original economy” as he put it…
Oh it was all quite a grand and inspiring speech by Canada’s Head of State. I wondered how Speaker Mike Johnson and VP JD managed to keep a straight face as they clapped away to underscore their approbation for all the concepts they revile. It was like an hypocrisy aerobics class.
It almost made me forget about the most recent staged assassination attempt against Trump! Said White House Press Secretary and starry-eyed daddy-lover Karoline Leavitt, “There’s gonna be a couple of good shots!”, oh, no, wait, actually, “What was supposed to be a fun night with President Trump delivering jokes and celebrating free speech was hijacked by a depraved anti-Trump lunatic who sought to assassinate the President, which is why Democrats had better 86 that free speech, OK?” Karoline, our little Mädchen with the whip!
Quick question: Is “a fun night with President Trump delivering jokes” meant to be a description of Trump delivering the State of the Union? I thought we had that already. I’m confused.
But on to important matters of humiliating your political rivals. James Comey is a big girl’s blouse who sells sea shells by the sea shore; he just can’t seem to resist being a smart-aleck. Does he not understand that Trump has had his sense of humor surgically removed?
Thus we have a second round, this one successful, at indicting Comey for a snarky, coded online post that seemed to imply “Death to Trump”, I guess, spelled out with cockles and winkles,with Todd Blanche, Acting Attorney General and Trump’s personal lawyer, then party boy Kash Patel, both solemnly intoning that threats to anyone Republican, let alone the Prez, will not be tolerated. Trump, for real, wanted Comey arrested and perp-walked while handcuffed for the bogus charges, but Comey opted to just turn himself in. What a party-pooper! What’s next? “Wuthering Heights” spelled out with candy bracelets? You better be biting that pillow tonight, that’s all I can say.
The charges have no chance of success, but the point is simply to ruin lives, which is a Trump specialty. Just sit in the same room, or marry him, or try on some culottes at Bergdorf. Jimmy Kimmel is scheduled once again for demolition, Jimmy, whose actual job is making jokes; forgive me if I seem to recall the First Amendment you’re always on about, which is specifically about how you can’t be punished for criticizing the government; and elaborating on this fact, a famous little Supreme Court opinion, New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964), which arose during the civil rights movement.
Mr Justice Brennan delivered the opinion of the Court. Allow me to very briefly quote (emphasis mine):
Thus we consider this case against the background of
a profound national commitment to the principle that
debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and
wide-open, and that it may well include vehement,
caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on
government and public officials.
The case in its entirety is stirring stuff. I invite you to read it and meditate on how far one has travelled from the ideals, whether on a toy ship or a submarine, maybe. Basically, absent actual malice, frankly impossible to prove, public officials just have to put up with sharp, vehement attacks, even those not at all in good taste, and absolute accuracy is not a requirement; because if you had to have all your facts totally straight before your “unpleasantly sharp attack” you wouldn’t speak up; you’d be afraid of being sued. In other words, you would exercise prior restraint, self-censorship. You get the idea.
One more quote, emphases once again mine:
Authoritative interpretations of the First Amendment
guarantees have consistently refused to recognize an
exception for any test of truth—whether administered
by judges, juries, or administrative officials—and especially
one that puts the burden of proving truth on the
speaker. Cf. Speiser v. Randall, 357 U. S. 513, 525-526.
The constitutional protection does not turn upon “the
truth, popularity, or social utility of the ideas and beliefs
which are offered.” N. A. A. C. P. v. Button, 371 U. S.
415, 445. As Madison said, “Some degree of abuse is
inseparable from the proper use of every thing; and in no
instance is this more true than in that of the press.”
4 Elliot’s Debates on the Federal Constitution (1876),
p. 571.
Donald, Melania, JD, Todd. Republicans! Chill, OK? No, wait, I mean—suck it up, girlfriends. Yeah, that’s what I meant. Suck. It. Up.
Did you know: Clarence Thomas would like to “revisit” NYTimes vs Sullivan. Maybe you were right to keep Black people poor. I mean, toss ’em a few billion dollars in bribes and they just turn into uppity white supremacists!
Canada has a new (but shhhhh, secret) power couple
Avi Lewis and Naomi Klein are the beautiful people du jour of Canadian politics, the new power couple (that’s what I’m calling them, and I’m sticking to it until one of them gets stroppy about it, and surely not Naomi, because I bought her books.)
Naomi Klein, (not Wolf, not Campbell), of course, is not a politician, as much as anyone who deconstructs the horrors of late-stage capitalism and corporate fascism and climate catastrophe is not literally a politician, but really. She’s just our best face forward, our greatest public intellectual, not just “world-famous in Canada” but a true progressive and a global citizen. It’s Naomi Klein, not Mark Carney, who makes me proud to be Canadian.
So, power couple. This is because Avi Lewis—or “Mr. Naomi Klein”, if you prefer—just got elected national leader of the New Democratic Party! Did you hear? Did you?
What a coincidence, we didn’t either! The NDP has been so long in the dark, dark woods, many Canadians have stopped thinking about them. But not in Manitoba! I did another rough experiment, and a friend of mine who has campaigned for the NDP hadn’t even heard of Avi Lewis’s win.
But getting ahead of myself, here. I know it’s weird to see the words “Canada” and “power” together in a sentence, and y’all just got over the shock of hearing them together at Davos (the place where bankers go to hang out and try ice skating on their collapsed ankles, and only know how to stop their forward momentum by running into the walls of the rink).
But there you go, and since we’re in a quiz mood—well, I am, so you could at least pretend, OK?—here’s your first question: How many political parties does Canada have? 1. Two; 2. Two and a half; 3. Infinity.
Now, no fair peeking! It’s really infinity, if you take for your model the last mayoral race we had in Toronto (which anyway, isn’t a partisan race, supposedly, and honestly I could barely keep a straight face typing that), where there were over 100 candidates. Over 100. On a provincial or federal level we have the Liberals (red); Conservative Party of Canada (blue); Green Party; New Democratic Party; Bloc Québecois; People’s Party of Canada…(and you gotta know that anything with “people” in the title means “white supremacist-type people” obviously, what other kind of people are there? Right? So calm down already!)
Let’s not forget, though of course I already have forgotten, the indigenous people of Canada: the First Nations, the Métis (French-indigenous), the Inuit. They’re not political parties, just the stewards of the land since forever, who should get, and are always promised to get, right of refusal, right of veto over projects that might affect them, and never, ever get even a look in to see if they’re tucked up in bed, scraping tar sands off a seagull, sniffing glue to numb the misery, or even chugging a glass of water you don’t have to boil. The mighty Gitchee-Manitou is still workin’ on that one! (Maybe Katy Perry has a bottle of Evian somewhere in her minaudière, it’s worth a shot.)
So infinity, but, no, we have first-past-the-post, like you dudes, so it’s: Two parties! Liberals, the natural ruling party, and Conservatives, the party that’s for “lower taxes, tough on crime”, the only two “ideas” they ever have; what I like to call “the little black dress of conservative policy”: whether you dress it up with a string of pearls or just Jackie O it with a Birkin bag, you surely do not have to think twice about slipping it on for any occasion. Then, suitably attired, you snipe and sneer at everything the Liberals are doing, to hide the fact that you have no solutions for anything at all that might need a solution, because things that need solutions are all the fault of poor people.
The third party, though, is what I’m talking: the New Democratic Party (NDP) the socialist-democrat party that started, as did many such parties, in the dust bowl of the depression and in the Canadian prairies (similarly in the US midwest), before the Canadian prairies and the US midwest gradually ossified into carcasses of bigotry and just-plain-folks awfulness. Communities that are monolithically white, lacking diversity, are the bane of progress because what you don’t rub elbows with you can’t get to know, and what you can’t get to know you fear.
Yes, think of it—socialist-type parties were as plentiful as ground hogs back in the day when the hard facts of commodity farming, or just subsistence farming, bumped up against glut or famine, when the injustice of fluctuating prices and impending bankruptcy made everyone into a socialist; when the necessity of helping your neighbour, pitching in and raising a barn, dropping off a dish of scalloped potatoes for after the funeral, awareness of the precarity of prosperity was always right in your sunburnt face.
The New Democratic Party was founded in 1961 by the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and the Canadian Labour Congress, seeking to unite labor and the Canadian left. Tommy Douglas, the first leader of the party, is the heroic guy who fought for and gave us universal healthcare.
The NDP is centre-left or even left-left. It’s left of the Liberals, which, depending how you see Carney, maybe would only get it to just right of centre, so let’s say, left. You’d call it socialist, but you’re just a caution.
The NDP, has never held power as the federal government. Never. That’s first past the post for ya! Let’s detour and watch this little video about the drawback of our (and your) fucked up electoral system:
(You’ll note this video is twelve years old, which is the last time we discussed electoral reform in this country.)
The NDP came closest to federal power under the leadership of Jack Layton, in fact, it became official opposition in the early 2000’s. Then Jack Layton died of cancer. (His widow, Olivia Chow, who is a politician, and a most fierce and compassionate one, is currently mayor of Toronto.)
The NDP fell to its lowest point under the leadership of Jagmeet Singh, a Sikh, and a spiffing guy who drove a custom Mercedes, and appeared on the cover of GQ Magazine, wearing his signature pink turban, the first visible minority to be leader of a Canadian political party.
Although Jagmeet was a fairly inexperienced leader, it was rank prejudice that doomed him; in September 2019, eight former NDP provincial candidates in New Brunswick (Atlantic Canada) defected to the Greens, citing Singh’s lack of visits and voter reluctance to support a turban-wearing leader. The NDP held no Atlantic seats after the 2021 election (down from one) and zero in 2025, amid reports of anti-Sikh bias.
So Canadians will have you know that, though we’re hindered by sensible gun laws, and the Sikh community, brave warriors, fought in all of our wars, never doubt that Canadians can hold our own, quiet place in the racism stakes.
Since first-past-the-post reliably returns to power parties that have a mere plurality of votes, not true majorities, the NDP has had to be satisfied with holding the cojones of the ruling party to the manscaping razor, thus giving them a majority while insisting on policies such as the new Canadian Dental Plan, and steps towards a Pharmacare program.
But now, with Avi Lewis as winner of the unintentionally top-secret leadership race, and with Naomi by his side, maybe in a stunning, Ascot-type chapeau, made of spruce, fake beaver pelt and birch bark, perhaps there’s hope again. Avi is actually part of a left-wing dynasty, his grandfather, David Lewis, having been leader of the NDP in the seventies, and his father, Stephen Lewis, a brilliant orator, the provincial leader, before he set off to Africa to work tirelessly as a champion for women with AIDS. (Stephen Lewis passed away in March, just days after seeing his son become party leader. )
If it weren’t for the NDP, Canada wouldn’t have healthcare, dental care, rent controls, public utilities, a commitment to affordable housing and the prospect, under Avi Lewis, of publicly-owned grocery stores, indigenous rights and true reconciliation… We’d lose the chance to be an example, however imperfect. In the words of Governor General Georges Vanier, in 1966:
“Canada owes it to the world to remain united, for no lesson is more badly needed than the one our unity can supply: the lesson that diversity need not be the cause for conflict, but, on the contrary, may lead to richer and nobler living.”
We’d just have another bunch of bureaucrats named Carney, in shiny suits, throwing the people a few crumbs when convenient.
Electoral reform has to come first, or nothing will change. It has to. So listen up, Avi and Naomi, Canadian power couple—please work your democrat socialist magic, and work it fast, because I’ve waited seventy years to have a voice. And I want you to make me, and all of us, love you.
Note to Americans: Epstein files???? Hellloooo???
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