The judiciary, academia, and the legal profession are pushing back against the worst excesses of the current administration which, of course, is leading to doubling down and further testing of boundaries by various executive branch agencies. This week, we’ve seen DHS and DOJ declare that the 4th, 5th, and 15th amendments to the constitution do not constrain executive power in its zeal to pursue undocumented immigrants and remove them post haste without due process. At least one American citizen, and probably more has been deported without any legal proceedings whatsoever which is blatantly unconstitutional.
The DOJ continues to be politicized into a weapon to threaten critics and opponents of the administration with the latest test being the arrest of a sitting judge for actions in her own courtroom. DOJ also seems to be doing its best to cow the legislative branch and attorneys of all stripes who might object to any of the motions they are making. We’re getting to the point where people who do not agree wit the direction policy is going are going to have to start getting uncomfortable in their stands. If they don’t they’re going to have some serious explaining to do to their children and grandchildren. Go along to get along has never been a great choice during times of conflict and it certainly doesn’t end up in the history books. There’s not a whole lot this soon to be sixty-three year old academic geriatrician can do other than continue these writings which are my version of speaking out against injustice. I don’t know what I’m going to do with this phase of my output. It’s too diffuse to make a good book or three, unlike the covid writings which covered a single topic in depth. I’ll repurpose some of it for other things and some of it will just be out there in various forms for people to discover… at least until dissenting opinions are made to vanish from various archives.
In health news, we’re likely to return to an age of endemic preventable disease again. The first to do this is likely to be measles due to its ease of spread and high risk of contagion. Herd immunity requires a 95% vaccination rate in the population and there are certain individuals, such as infants, who cannot be vaccinated so it needs to be pretty universal to keep it under control. The rate at which vaccine misinformation is spreading and antivaccine ideas are taking hold, including at the highest levels of DHS, means we’re well on track to falling below the vaccination rate where measles can be contained. Children will die. Fortunately polio does not require quite as high a population vaccination rate as it is less contagious.
DOJ operatives are attacking medical journals, including the New England Journal of Medicine, perhaps the most prestigious medical publication in the world, for having bias by reporting on science rather than on ideology or allowing in alternative facts which might fit a political narrative. They’re also going after Wikipedia for not conforming to ideological and political narratives, claiming that anything with which they do not agree is propaganda which should be kept away from the unsullied minds of Americas children or some such. But these are also the people who are busy removing the North Carolina Woolworth counter which was the site of a famous civil rights sit-in from the Smithsonian. You an try to deny, erase, or falsify history, but eventually truth always emerges to bite you in the butt.
The thing I’m waiting for is the full impact of the idiotic tariff/trade war with China to emerge sometime between mid May and mid June. The tariff announcements of April 2nd, which became a major bone of contention on April 9th, have led to a drastic drop in imports, canceled orders, decreased cargo handling and the like. It takes about four to six weeks for goods to arrive in bulk from the far East and make it to store shelves. Expect your local big box to have a lot of empty spaces in the very near future. It’s been about eighty years and four generations since Americans last had a time when they couldn’t get exactly what they wanted when they wanted and I don’t think they’re going to take kindly to a world in which that may not be possible.
A major story that everyone is ignoring is the serious and growing tensions between India and Pakistan. A Pakistani ‘terrorist’ attack on Tuesday targeting Indians and tourists in Pahalgam, Kashmir, is blowing up into a major crisis and confrontation between two nuclear powers with Pakistani forces opening fire and India threatening to withhold Himalayan headwaters from flowing into Pakistani river systems. I’ve long thought that if we were to have a World War III, that it wouldn’t begin in the Middle East, but rather in the Himalayas where India, Pakistan, and China all come together, dependent on water from the mountains which is decreasing due to climate change just as all of their populations are burgeoning and demanding higher standards of living. I don’t think the current administration’s eviscerated state department in which many of the senior diplomats have been summarily cashiered is going to be up to the delicate negotiations necessary to calm this particular trouble spot down. And god help us all if the president starts to notice and begins tweeting.
One of my regular readers complained to me yesterday that there had been no update on the cats. Binx and Edward are both fine. They seem to occupy themselves doing various cat things which include lying comfortably next to each other on the bed to having some sort of vituperative hiss and yowl fight under the dining room table at 3 AM. I rolled over and went back to sleep on that one. The one human occupant of the household has a busy weekend planned. Dinner and a show last night (Tiny Beautiful Things at Terrific New Theatre – great performances. Had some issues with the script structure). Errands this morning. Dramatic improv class this afternoon. Opera Birmingham dinner tonight. Brunch with friends Sunday. Opera vocal competition and banquet Sunday afternoon and evening. And I have to squeeze in working on lines for Second Samuel (first act is there. second act needs help) and finishing my last dozen progress notes. It will all get done. It always does.
Life, The Universe, and Everything 