Stromata Blog

Bizarre Subject Line of the Day: A Big Endorsement for Biden

“Only one person on that debate stage has the endorsement of their Vice President. And that's Joe Biden.”

That is really and truly the subject line of an email that I received minutes ago from the Biden-Harris campaign. The nominal sender is Kamala Harris. I wonder what her ghost writer was thinking.

That endorsement by the person whom a Presidential candidate has selected to run for Vice President is a rare and momentous accomplishment?

That email recipients need reassurance that Joe Biden’s Vice Presidential pick does in fact endorse him? After Thursday, there may be doubts in some minds.

That the absence of a Trump VP reveals that nobody wants to run with him?

That there is more than one Joe Biden? Note the conjunction of “one person” with the plural possessive pronoun.

That the campaign’s hack writers, who have sent me at least 20 emails since 11:00 p.m. last Thursday, are running out of material?

That Joe Biden has personally taken charge of writing campaign emails? This one makes as much sense as some of his answers to debate questions.

‘Tis a puzzlement.

Meme of the Day: Shades of Green

Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate for President, has posted her platform in easy-to-read format, suitable for socialists who haven’t yet mastered complete sentences:

A friend has modified it to bring out the Green Party’s true colors:

By the way, does anybody know what the Greens have against drones? 

Quote of the Day: Discounting Our Blessings

Cole S. Aronson, an American who lives in war-torn Israel:

Americans live free from armed invaders under a masterful, basically peaceful constitutional system. Things have been good for a long time. The republic’s achievements seem commonplace, so commonplace they aren’t even recognized as achievements. The instinct to rip it all down, the declaration that everything is broken – it’s difficult to credit either when the wretched of the earth hand over their life savings to violent smugglers for a chance to make it to America. America has responded to its generous inheritance with a listless hysteria, palliated by sweet poisons that, if we get the doses just right, may help us sleep without finally killing us.

Quote of the Day: “We May All Be Banana Republicans Now”

J.D. Tuccille:

“Prosecuting current or past top officials accused of illegal conduct seems like an obvious decision for a democracy – everyone should be held accountable and subject to the rule of law,” James D. Long, Morgan Wack, and Victor Menaldo of the University of Washington's political science department cautioned in 2022. “But there are consequences to prosecutions of these officials – not just for them, but for their countries…. If the prosecution of past leaders is brought by a political rival, it can lead to a cycle of prosecutorial retaliation.”

I expect we’re going to see exactly that in the U.S. It’s a regular feature of some other countries’ political systems. Costa Rica, for example, more or less offers prosecutions as parting gifts to its former heads of state. It’s still a lovely country. And the bananas there are delicious.

An unstable political system in which laws and regulations are weaponized by the powerful against opponents isn’t the end of the world. But it delegitimizes the system, turns courtroom proceedings into an expected part of the election process, and poses serious legal dangers for dissenters.

By no means are all Americans sympathetic to the GOP. But we may all be banana republicans now.