Closed Until Further Notice

We perfected mass-producing cars until the Japanese figured out how to mass-produce cars better and with less expense, we made the best movies until the French figured out how to make better movies, and we invented rock and roll but the British improved on it.  And now we Americans, having invented modern democracy, have seen other governments do democracy better than we have.

Yes, we have no Speaker of the House.  But we have many bananas . . . especially in the House.

Jim Jordan ended his bid for the speakership when it became apparent that he couldn't get the thin Republican House majority to support him.  Eight House Republicans put up their names for Speaker, and Republicans chose Tom Emmer of Minnesota as their Speaker nominee yesterday morning only to see Emmer drop out yesterday afternoon, with Mike Johnson of Louisiana standing for the speakership in his stead. It seems that no Republican can win the necessary 217 votes to become Speaker, and Republicans refuse to cut a deal with the Democrats that would allow a Republican Speaker but give the Democrats any leverage in helping to run the government.  (Republicans don't want to work with Democrats; they want to neuter them.)  There's a war in Israel, there's a war in Ukraine, China is on the march, the Islamic revolutionary government in Iran - made possible by the United States after we put the Shah back on the throne absent the wished of Iranians in 1953 to prevent a Communist takeover that would align Iran with the Russians - is now working in concert with . . . the Russians.  (Its funny, how foreign policy mistakes we Americans made seventy years ago still come back to bite us in the fanny.)  And we still can't get the House working again.

I'm thinking of taking a hiatus from this blog.  I comment a lot on current events, and these events going on at the moment are likely to stay current for awhile with no change whatsoever.