Where We Are This Week
Gaza and the United Nations, presidential debates, and the misery of consistence.
I think it’s obvious I’ve taken a few weeks off. We’re solidly into the second year of this weekly column and my interest in anything is borderline moribund at best. At worst, I’m setting my computer out in the rain this weekend and forgetting the internet even existed.
Currently, I’m listening to Paul Simon sing the words, “wish I was an english muffin, ‘bout to make the most out of a toaster” and I couldn’t agree with him more. Breakfast has a point to it, doesn’t it? Does the newsletter anymore? I have no idea.
I’ve indulged myself with a few poems as of late and the frivolity of whatever last week’s fever dream of a story was, but this week, we’re back to business as usual and I couldn’t be less thrilled about it.
This is the banality of perseverance; the point in every long bike ride past halfway but well away from home that you wonder, “why did I think this would be a good idea?”
Somehow, you always find the motivation to at least pedal your way home — if only less enthusiastically than when you headed out in the first place. Afterward, in what feels like a few fleeting moments, you forget the aches in your legs, the heat of the sun, and the unyielding nature of the local landscape and you start to plan your next ride.
Back in the saddle, you’ll wonder what you were being such a baby about, and if you’re lucky, you won’t find yourself in the doldrums of endurance once more; working your way from fun, then pain, to satisfaction and back to fun again.
For now, however, I’m forty miles from home convinced that not only am I not having any fun right now, but nothing will ever be fun again.
The No Debate State Gets…A Debate?
At long last, the debate drought appears as though it may be ending. Come next month, the two top minds of American politics will take center stage to discuss the future of the country.
Policy positions and philosophical hypotheses will be tested as these two titans of wisdom and poise confront each other, and the nation, in the most important two-event series of 2024. The first of the two debates will be held on June 27th on CNN; yes, the beleaguered network’s first big move at entering back into the good graces of the American public. Hosting the epitome of high-minded discourse will only help in legitimizing the formerly respected cable news channel.
Some of the cynics out there may be writing this off as unbridled naiveté and delusion. If you’re one of those, you’d be correct.
Upon further review, I retract everything I said in the first two paragraphs. Nothing of the sort is happening. Though surprising — by the fact that it looked as if it wouldn’t happen at all — presidential debates between Donald Trump and Joe Biden will be taking place this June and September. Let’s be honest with ourselves, instead of the ‘highlight of the 2024 campaign season’ it ought to be billed as the ‘biggest disappointment of the 21st century thus far.’
The world is at our fingertips, the fruit is ripe for the plucking; we are Americans after all, who or what would dare to stop us? Given the opportunity to choose a candidate who’s actually worthy of the office, Americans, once again, eagerly declined. Electing one of these dullards and expecting justice, liberty, and democracy to ensue is about as hopeful as banging two rocks together expecting a fire to break out.
Nevertheless, here we are. (As promised, despite the naysayers, I managed to answer the title of this column.) I can’t remember if I predicted publicly that Joe Biden wouldn’t debate the most popular defendant since O.J. Simpson (too soon?) but I certainly thought as much. Biden took to social media to challenge the former president to not one but two debates in a bizarre attempt to come off as some political strongman.
The fact that Biden is now willing to face Trump mano a mano on the debate stage is a terrible sign for the incumbent. Both candidates set the precedent earlier in this campaign season of not debating their competitors (democracy is obviously not for everyone) and it seemed a logical assumption that this would be the new status quo moving forward.
Desperation from the Biden campaign, however, has taken hold. When Biden successfully was elected president in 2020, it was in large part due to his effective ‘basement campaign.’ The longtime Senator — and perennial also-ran until that fateful November — barely emerged from the sequestered privacy of his Delaware home. And to great effect. Taking the daunting task and burden of public speaking off the table, at least half of the American public was convinced, however inaccurately, that he had sufficient mental faculties to be the commander-in-chief.
Conversely, former President Donald Trump has had a sort of basement campaign imposed on him by his abundant legal troubles. Out of the constant spotlight, and still off Twitter, foggy recollections of the former President’s temperament and fond memories of pre-covid America have bloomed in the American mind allowing Trump to take a rather commanding lead in the polls.
It says a lot about our candidates that the prospect of a debate is more of a trapdoor for their opponent than a boon for their respective presidential bids. Biden will be hoping he gets the fever-ridden, prone-to-shouting, version of Donald Trump that he got in 2020. For the love of God, don’t let anyone sneeze around the man. On the opposite podium, Trump will be hoping whatever amphetamine cocktail administered to his opponent won’t be enough to conceal Joe Biden’s dementia and utter decline.
A debate isn’t good for either one of them, but the flagging Biden campaign has been backed into a corner. They’re sending the goalkeeper up for the corner when the second-half whistle has only just blown. Of course, the event won’t be revelatory for any undecided voter. The only topics that will be discussed in any meaningful way are January 6th and a stolen election — both politicians will claim to have saved the nation from the pandemic. Afghanistan, Israel, and Ukraine will likely only be subplots for the two-part event.
If I haven’t decimated any hope you had left for democratic norms this side of 2020, you might want to stop reading now. Perhaps the most depressing part of the proposed debate schedule is that an independent candidate who is polling in the double digits won’t be appearing between the two major party candidates. Unless it changes, RFK Jr. won’t be joining the Democratic and Republican presidential nominees in the debate. It’s great to know these things still have the entirety of the American electorate in mind.
Sure, RFK Jr. may have had part of his brain eaten by a worm but I’d be willing to wager he’d wipe the floor with those two piles of bones and dust. Hell, my money would be on the worm at this point.
So, when you’re watching the yelling/whisper matches this summer and a deep depression sets in, just know that you’re not alone. There’s a place here for you amongst the dissatisfied and dejected. If we’re going to be miserable, we might as well have fun while we’re at it.
United Nations of Gaza
Last week, a coal miner reader of mine had a pretty bad day as a result of my choice of topics. If you’re reading this, and you know who you are, you can rest assured — we’re about to talk about Gaza.
I don’t want to. I’ve procrastinated for the last 45 minutes so that I wouldn’t have to write about the same depressing conflict another time but the time has passed, and I still have some work to do. The war in Gaza is an important one — of course, it’s paramount to the people who live in the area, but, globally, it’s served as a checkup of the moral compass of the West. The doc’s got bad news, I’m afraid.
On matters such as this, you’d hope the leading powers of the world — and their citizens — would have a little moral clarity. The Biden Administration’s is waning fast.
Joe Biden’s support for Israel up until the last couple of months had been relatively commendable. His rhetoric could have been improved, but materially, the United States wasn’t stepping in the way of the IDF in their goal of eradicating Hamas. This all changed last week when the White House announced it would be withholding the latest round of weapons shipments to Israel.
In Gaza, the IDF has successfully narrowed the scope of battle to the southern city of Rafah, and while many critics of the Israeli government have been demanding they refrain from invading the city, Israel has begun the first phases of clearing Hamas terrorists from the region.
In an effort that can only be described as an attempt to cater to the smallest, most radical part of its base, the Biden Administration has repudiated Netanyahu’s government’s continuation of the war effort, and thus, isn’t shipping this round of armaments.
This would all be well and good if it were a normal conflict between two independent warring nations — it would be different if there weren’t at least five American hostages being held by Hamas.
Let that sink in for just a moment. If you’re like me, you’ve heard a lot of serious language from the State Department, Tony Blinken and Joe Biden warning Israel to conduct itself appropriately — and under any circumstances, to not invade Rafah. References to the American citizens who are being held by the terrorist organization in Gaza have become exceedingly rare. And now, the US government wants to limit the capacity of the force that, presumably, would be intent on freeing them.
Maybe this is too strong a sentiment for 2024, but any country that isn’t willing to go scorched earth for its citizens isn’t a country at all.
Meanwhile, the United Nations continues to be an absolute farce of an organization. Throughout, the conflict, the UN has relied upon the Gaza Health Ministry’s reporting when compiling casualty rates and the death toll in the region. Unsurprisingly, they’re not advertising in bold letters that their stats are coming from Hamas. Yes, Hamas is the governing body of the Gaza Strip and that would make them the authority on such matters, however, none of that remediates the fact that they are a terrorist organization and any information they willingly hand over should be taken with a pillar-sized pinch of salt.
That hasn’t stopped the United Nations, though, and it didn’t stop the international agency from quietly adjusting the death toll in Gaza earlier this week. While the total body count hasn’t changed substantially, the deaths of women and children previously reported by the UN have been halved. It goes without saying that any innocent death is a tragedy but, regrettably, it’s a feature of a war that is being fought in urban areas — and particularly when one side has an affinity for hiding behind civilians.
The ratio of combatant death vs. civilian death caused by the IDF was already impressive by urban warfare standards, but if the new figures are to be believed, the IDF’s precautionary measures and slow-rolling invasions have proved to be largely effective — things the UN might want to consider the next time they’re going to rule that Israel is committing a “plausible genocide.”
The UN’s unsavory relationship with Hamas continues to disappoint. A couple of months ago, we talked about UNRWA — the UN agency in Gaza that had several employees participate in the October 7th attack on Israel — and its role as a subsidiary of Hamas. The progressive left deemed the idea preposterous that any United Nations agency could be used so inappropriately.
I recognize that as a society we’re past the point of changing our minds when new evidence is presented but allow me to offer a little more proof on the subject. On Tuesday, the IDF revealed footage showing Hamas combatants using UN vehicles as cover and operating from an UNRWA warehouse.
Any suggestion that the agency isn’t fully under the control of the terrorist organization at this point can be readily dismissed as well as any legitimacy the UN claims to possess in the region. Any attempt to hamstring our allies in retrieving American citizens and its own from Hamas should be interpreted as hostile, and any presidential candidate worth voting for should be willing to say as much. Bring our people home.
To a better next week,
Cheers,
~FDA