Sometimes it seems like the talking heads aren’t zeroing in on the right issues. They harp on procedure, despite Trump putting procedure and protocol and proper channels in the rearview mirror a long time ago.

Everyone is insisting on having an exit strategy and an estimate of duration, re the war in Iran, as if war is characterized by tidiness and some sort of contractual agreement between adversaries (which usually comes at the end, after the carnage and ghastly loss of life).

It seems to me more appropriate questions might include, Why are we doing this? Is there anyone who knows the truth of the matter, Epstein, when it comes to motivation, midterms?

Do they have any concern for the well-being of the people who, most likely needlessly, are being put in harm’s way? Did they have the best intel going in? Could they not foresee, given the history of the region and the voluminous knowledge of Iran that already existed, that this incursion might be fraught with difficulty and serve as a catalyst for more widespread hostilities? Is Congress useful anymore? Does the black rain smell like victory? What role is Benjamin Netanyahu playing in this clusterf*!@? And is Donald Trump really just a doormat on which everyone wipes their feet?

Sorry. Inquiring minds want to know.

He keeps stringing us out. In fact, that’s been his MO for a long time now. He says whatever he thinks he needs to say in order to placate, or get elected, then resumes the agenda the Heritage Foundation wants him to push, throws around a few idle threats, or tries to sell another cosmetic fix like a ballroom, or marble in the Lincoln bathroom.

He’s playing a role, operates without convictions. Currently, he’s speaking out of both sides of his mouth regarding the war in Iran. He claims it’s going well (it’s not) but we may be there for a while, which makes sense if his sole objective is to create another Epstein distraction and chaos ahead of the midterms in November—you know, so there’s a perceived reason why elections couldn’t be held, even though they were able to hold a Presidential Election during the Civil War.

What’s it gonna take, folks? Can our election apparatus survive long enough to shift the balance of power in favor of people with a beating heart and a brain in their skull space? Even if legitimate elections are held, we know that Trump and the rest will cry foul and try to drag us into the weeds. We can’t let him do that anymore.

He’s such an unserious scumbag, incapable of assessing the damage he’s doing or the pain he’s causing. At a bare minimum, we need to show him the door.

Here’s a surprising development: the war with Iran isn’t going very well.

Wow, you could knock me over with a feather! Apparently, more Americans are being put unnecessarily in harm’s way, we’re losing critical radars, and our foreign bases are sustaining heavy damage. And Russia and China are feeding Iran real-time surveillance info re the whereabouts of our military assets.

The countries hosting our bases must be pleased as punch that they’ve become targets.

All in all, it’s been a great week-plus for Donald Trump, Pete Hegseth, J.D. Vance, and the rest of the pretenders who, maybe, are finding out that the real thing is yucky. They’re tired of playing war, still talking tough but wondering how to extricate themselves from the mess they’ve gotten themselves—and the rest of us—into.

What a crew we have at the helm— invoking Armageddon, trying to transform the country into a playground for ultra-rich white people, but having to spend so much time navigating in the bowels of the ship, dealing with pesty, self-inflicted wounds, and issues like war, cost of living and jobs numbers, and moral conundrums like having to shield their boss from bad press over a sexual abuse scandal that isn’t going away.

It all seems to be going south, which means we need to be on the lookout for the next dumb utterance, the next reactive order, the next round of firings, more tightening or loosening of restrictions, the next clash with protesters that turns deadly, the next order for more voting records, or plans to raze or rename the Washington Monument.

In any event, the next indications that the rat is cornered and desperate and ready to lash out in order to save his own ass.

When is Daylight Saving Time gonna go away? Every time the second Sunday in March rolls around, various media parade out their articles describing how it messes with circadian rhythms– how bad the leap forward can be for our bodies, our internal clocks.

These are usually accompanied by pros and cons of either doing away with DST altogether or making it the practice year ‘round.

For what it’s worth, returning to Standard Time year ‘round gets my vote. While gaining the hour in November is pretty nice, we’d just have to find some other marker for changing our smoke detector batteries. And besides, who wants an extra hour of scorching sunshine and ridiculous heat when the temps are hovering at such increasingly inhospitable highs?

Keep in mind that permanent DST means winter sunrises between 8:30 and 9am, depending on where you live. An extra hour of daylight in the summer isn’t the great bonus people make it out out be. Let’s dare to go with the science on this one.

This past News Year’s Eve, someone in the town across the river from us decided to celebrate with fireworks. I’m not sure if they were big-time fireworks, the kind people would have to drive out of state to find, or if they were leftovers from July 4th and purchased at one of the pop-up stands that show up in shuttered K-Mart parking lots– cheap explosives, mostly relatively mild and harmless, with adult supervision.

As the story goes, these folks had their fun setting off various incendiary devices, but decided to throw the spent pieces into the trash. In the house. These spent fireworks were apparently still very hot. They started the trash on fire, which spread to the rest of the house, burning it beyond salvageability. To add insult to injury, the fire was so hot and out of control long enough that it spread to the beautifully remodeled home next door and rendered it uninhabitable.

It seems someone was angling for a Darwin Award, though there were no injuries. At this point, all that remains is a pile of rubble sitting next to a partially burned-out, empty dwelling.

We seem to have reached the point when yesterday often turns out to be a relative cakewalk compared to today. Each new day, instead of providing a bit of respite from the torrid pace, seems to present compounded problems, thornier issues, and more reminders that we’re living in a nightmare, the product of horrendous leadership, poor decisions, and increasingly dire prospects.

From the perspective of anyone with a moral compass, the Trump administration is the worst thing to happen to this country in a very long time, maybe ever. And now, as if to remind us all just how terrible they can be, we are involved in “targeted military operations,” aka a war, with Iran.

Pete Hegseth, the self-named Secretary of War who was plucked from the proving grounds of Weekend Fox and Friends, touted the efficiency and brute force of the American and Israeli air attacks, bragging about the destruction and how things would probably be wrapped up in a few days. Meanwhile, people at home were concerned about a plan, a timeframe, and a reason for starting this assault in the first place.

Rationales have been plentiful, if not underwhelming and unsatisfying. And, to be fair, how does anyone know how long hostilities will last, once the cat is out of the bag? War isn’t a thing that neatly ends when the buzzer sounds at the end of the 4th quarter.

What’s happened since last weekend is that the fire has spread, as anyone with any knowledge of the region would expect it to do. We spent so much time telegraphing our intentions, between building up our naval presence and Trump being his usual stupidly bombastic self, that Iran had time to prepare for a counterattack which, as it turns out, would mean returning fire and going after American interests in several surrounding countries.

To top it all off, there is reason to believe that Trump and his stellar supporting cast have no intention of stopping this anytime soon. This unnecessary war kills three birds with one stone, pardon the expression. In Trump’s mind, trying to hold elections with a war going on just isn’t something that can happen. It’s great, ongoing cover and distraction from the Epstein files. In addition, everyone knows Iran was involved in election hijinks in 2020 and 2024, so precautions must be taken to “safeguard the election process” to ensure such involvement doesn’t happen again…

We’re gonna need one helluva fire department.