The Fortnightly Rant

We have good news, and bad news. That, in itself, is not news, of course; the news is always good and bad, commingled. Such is the human condition. Limited by the subjectivity of our own perceptions—not to mention the disorientation caused by an unending current of events frog-marching us into the future—we lack the chutzpah to declare whether this fortnight’s mix trends towards one pole or the other. We can say with confidence that every day, in every way, the news keeps getting more absurd. The good news is that 81 percent of people around the world believe that democracy is important. The fourth annual …

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President Biden vowed last week that he would pull all U.S. troops out of Afghanistan before September 11th. Pointedly, he chose to speak from the White House Treaty Room. It was there, he noted, in October, 2001, that President George W. Bush “informed our nation that the United States military had begun strikes on terrorist training camps in Afghanistan.” Twenty million Americans have been born since Bush made that announcement. They can truthfully say, “we have always been at war with Central Asia.” When Bush spoke, operations had already been underway for 11 days. A Soviet-built helicopter with a CIA pilot had flown in-country with …

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For one reason or another, spring has returned to the northern hemisphere. Some may say it’s the will of the Lord: the warming earth and returning birds are a manifestation of His infinite grace and wisdom. Perhaps so; it’s certainly not for the likes of us to say. That will, though, if indeed it exists, seems so wildly unpredictable, the regularity of spring’s arrival raises our suspicions as to His involvement. Others ascribe this recurring phenomenon to the slightly more scrutable laws of physics. Because those laws are contingent upon verification through experimentation, this argument has won fairly widespread acceptance. It’s a bold strategy, though—at …

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Since we last went to press—well, since we last published—two apparently deranged men have allegedly gone on separate killing sprees, in Atlanta, Georgia, and Boulder, Colorado. We regret having made that sentence less succinct than it might have been, but the nation’s laws pertaining to libel are more stringent than those on guns. It may be disconcerting, but it cannot be denied: America is getting back to normal. Democratic legislators are calling for a ban on assault weapons, while Republicans are focusing their attention on the Democrats’ choice of words. The Republicans do have a point here. A number of Democrats have called the Boulder …

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Bye-bye, former guy. We are now seven weeks and change into a new era. You can tell things are different now; it’s actually quiet enough to think. This is not to say, of course, that everyone will take advantage of that opportunity. It’s just to say that one of reality’s fundamental switches has been reset to the default position: no longer is the most powerful position on the planet being exploited solely to create and foster a certain brand of American Carnage™. Now that all of us have been blessed with a greater degree of mental freedom than we’ve had for over four years, we …

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The Conservative Political Action Conference [CPAC] for the Year of Our Lord 2021—we hope they appreciate that pious flourish—began yesterday in sunny, socialistic Orlando, Florida. Say what? Socialistic? Sure—what else would you call a place that requires everybody to wear a mask, just to keep the rest of its puny citizens alive? Orlando is the Seat of Orange County, which is ruled—with an iron fist, of course; mustn’t leave out that important detail—by an elected mayor and six commissars. They claim to be “commissioners,” but let’s keep it real: only one of those seven is a Republican. It’s probably safe to assume that the true …

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