Quick takes

• I can't help thinking that if the Inspector General investigated ten random FISA applications, he'd probably find the number of problems he found in the Carter Page application is about average.  The problem is that the FISA court is secret, so FBI agents can cut corners without much chance of getting caught.  Most of the fruits of FISA warrants remain secret, even after they're executed; and secrecy always invites abuse.

• The impeachment proceeding is just the latest manifestation of an epistemological crisis: apparently, Pat Moynihan was wrong, and you can have your own facts.  For godfather of the current crisis, I nominate Rupert Murdoch, who brought the spirit of British tabloid journalism to American television.  It's hard to stay involved in the ongoing "drama" in Congress when everybody's already guessed the ending.

• I'm curious to see how the Liberal Democrats fare in tomorrow's British election, with their straightforward, unequivocal support for remaining in the EU.  It wasn't that long ago that the LibDems propped up a Conservative minority government.  Might they do the same for Labour?

Catching up

There's been too much news lately.  As soon as you try to focus on one story, you're distracted by another.  Really, there's no time for analysis, and it doesn't help that so much of what's happening seems so totally bizarre.  It's been apparent for months that Our President is increasingly unstable, and that the opportunists, sycophants, and incompetents who make up the modern Republican Party will do nothing to restrain him.

So, I won't bother to comment on the Sharpie incident, the Taliban "peace conference," the Scottish golf course brouhaha, etc.  I'll just observe that "the leader of the free world" is out of control, and leave it at that.  Instead, I'll point to what may be some good news.

The craziness in the UK over the past week may have eclipsed the craziness in the USofA, but only because a sizable chunk of Conservative MPs broke with their leadership, throwing a monkey wrench into Boris Johnson's threat of a no-deal Brexit.  The outcome remains uncertain, but the willingness of those rebels to subordinate party loyalty to national interest was good to see.  Will they set an example for others?  (Probably not on this side of the Atlantic.)

Equally strange and wonderful was the ability of Italy's Five Star and Democratic parties to form a government, sidelining Matteo Salvini and his Leaguers.   — and, perhaps, slowing the distressing growth of ethnonationalism in Europe. Five Star and the Democrats will be strange bedfellows, but they may be able to weaken the League before they're forced to hold new elections.

As Emily Dickenson put it, "Hope is the thing with feathers - That perches on the soul."  There are a hell of a lot of hungry cats on the prowl these days, but hope flutters on.

Shorts

Mueller speaks
It's hard to believe that those who didn't read the Mueller Report watched him on TV for five hours.  The impact of the report on specific individuals will depend entirely on the video clips chosen by their news outlets of choice.  California Republican Tom McClintock's analogy comparing Mueller's report to a flaming sack of sh*t must have had the Congressman's aides rolling on the floor when they wrote it, and I'm sure it will get a lot of play on conservative media.  Less likely to get much play in those quarters will be Mueller's uncharacteristically biting reply.

Wrestling with hate
Watching some video of last week's North Carolina Tr*mp rally took me back to 1967, when I took a date to Pittsburgh's Civic Arena for a heavyweight wrestling show.  The villains back then still included a "Nazi" and a "Jap," along with a more contemporary "Commie."  My date and I left early, not because of the wrestling, but because of the fans — who were dead serious about what they saw in the ring.  Their howls and chants of pure hatred against the "bad guys" — the others — were genuinely horrifying.

The UK's new PM
There's an excellent chance that Boris Johnson will cheerfully lead his country into economic catastrophe with a no-deal Brexit.  Since Conservative MPs are every bit as spineless as Republicans in our Congress, a no-confidence vote seems impossible.  Johnson is far more intelligent and literate than Our President, to whom he frequently is compared; but they share a similar instinct for appealing to the basest populist instincts of their electorates.

Next?

Those who think a little disruption can be a good thing — or a lot of it, for that matter — now have an opportunity to test their hypothesis.  The most notable outcome of the Brexit vote so far is the disruption of British politics.  Both the Conservatives and Labour are split, and the British are not especially enthusiastic about either party.

In response, ECB President Mario Draghi is suggesting that the time has come to move away from the austerity policies that have crippled Europe since the financial crisis and emphasize growth.  Draghi knows that what underlies working class discontent across Europe is not immigration.

European workers have suffered with wages that buy less every year, along with the erosion of the social programs that make limited incomes acceptable.  In the UK, unemployment is low, but wages have been stagnant or slipping.  In southern Europe, any work at all is very hard to find.  The problem has been austerity.

It is in the interests of banks, private equity and sovereign wealth funds, and other global capitalists to continue austerity, cutting government services to free up money that will be used to pay back risky loans.  It is in the interests of everybody else to renegotiate that debt and restore public services, shifting wealth from those who have accumulated entirely too much to those they robbed.

That will not be done by the current crop of disruptors — Farange, Johnson, LePen, Orban, Tr*mp, et al. — but sadly will not be done by the ruling Establishment either.  Mario Draghi offers some hope, and with backing from Christine Lagarde, Mark Carney, Janet Yellen, and others whose financial power does not depend on private capital, it is conceivable that something positive yet may be done.

The Riots Across the Pond

I've been listening to the BBC for coverage of the rioting/looting in London and other English cities, and I've come to think that nobody over there actually gets it. In case you hadn't noticed, the class system over there is quite pronounced (including "clahhss," "clawws," "clows," and several others.) The rioters, according to David Cameron's "clahhssmates" from Oxbridge, are the "lowest of the low." They are young, uneducated, and unemployed. They are white, black, and various shades of brown. They are just knowledgeable enough to realize that the only way they ever are likely to have a few nice things is to steal them.

I think it was my favorite senator, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who first coined the (now very politically incorrect) term, "underclass." Back in Moynihan's day, the "underclass" in the USofA was predominantly black, since race and class were even more closely correlated then. I know I heard that very term on the BBC today, spouted by some Tory twit or another, whose argument seemed to be that "the lowest of the low" are congenitally defective, with no regard at all for their lower-middle-class neighbors struggling to keep their beauty salons and falafel stands unburnt.

It's true. They couldn't care less. They'll never have a beauty salon or a falafel stand. A more upscale Blackberry or pair of sneakers is their height of aspiration.

Cameron and the Conservatives are committed to austerity. So are our homegrown plutocrats and their political allies, from both parties. Here in the USofA, as the rate of teen unemployment and the widening gap between rich and poor continue to increase, our ability to pretend that we really don't have a class system is falling apart. As state and local governments, strapped for cash, cut back on policing, fire fighting, and education, things can only get worse.

'Ow's 'at 'it ya, guvner?

Compromise

"I just said it was like a cross between a bulldog and chihuahua,
but what I meant is it will have a fantastic hybrid vigor."
Boris Johnson - Mayor of London

Most Americans are paying little or no attention to the recent elections in the UK. I might be among them were it not for the fact that I indulge in a bit of BBC on podcast while out walking off the pounds. What I've enjoyed most about the recent UK excitement is the way the right (Cameron and the Conservatives) have so easily found a route to compromise with the (sort of) left (Clegg and the LibDems.) (Please pardon my parentheses.)

Our own Barack Obama has been attempting to travel a similar course, with many unexpected and, doubtless, heartrending roadblocks thrown up in his way. Somehow, he managed to endorse offshore drilling for oil just in advance of the destruction of the Gulf of Mexico. Somehow, he managed to endorse the SM-3 missile interceptor system just before it was shown to be pretty-much worthless. Honestly, I don't believe the guy is an asshole — but I think he's been getting some pretty bad advice.

The Far Right has taken over the Republican establishment, and the Tea Party dorks are almost a breath of fresh air — kind of like a right-of-center LibDem-ish minority. There is nobody even remotely open to compromise in the GOP except for, perhaps, Lindsey Graham and those two women from Maine. Unlike just about all the other Republicans, they're not unmitigated opportunists — they say what they mean. (I especially admire Lindsey Graham, for his genuine respect for the law.)

Frankly, Mr. President, this might be an ideal time to be a one-term president, so stop trying to compromise and take a firm stand. Dump those Rubin relics, repudiate the remnant Clintonians, and just lose the goddamned election in 2012! The steps the new president will be forced to take — to deal with an ongoing economic crisis — will be so unpopular that his or her party will be pesonae non gratae for many subsequent years.

Take one for the team, and stop trying to be all things to all people. You're not.