FUBAR
and other acronyms
Let’s hope that my title is overstating our current situation. If you aren’t familiar with this acronym, it stands for “fucked up beyond all recognition” although the more reserved speakers may say “fouled up” instead. I’ve never been shy about so-called cursing when appropriate (which if you ask my family seems to occur quite often). But I was also considering the title “Unintended Consequences” which also seems appropriate today. How did we get into this mess?
Well, first of all, since Watergate I have been fascinated with watching the political system in action. Obviously, we have had rough times before. However, there were a lot more adults in the room back then, and money was a less obvious factor. And even Nixon had some modicum of decency left when he resigned. Of course, we all thought that nothing could beat that horror.
But speaking of horror, my latest New Yorker issue has a fascinating article about how our sitting president learned his devious ways from Roy Cohn—and the article features a large black and white grainy photograph of its subject. I had to cover it over as I read my print edition. And I know others have mentioned the physical likeness of Stephen Miller to Cohn, which is strange since he appears to be providing the same sort of support to the warped and devious behavior now evident at the White House.
The other rabbit hole I have been going down this morning is in response to once again reading Imprimis for opposition research. With the latest AG saying that he will make Dobbs the law of the land, I was aghast to see a quote in this article calling a Supreme Court justice “unhinged” in the 1992 ruling on Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Hillsdale College and The Federalist Society have no interest in a women’s bodily autonomy. Interesting that the only two Republicans to vote against Blanche were women.
Enough about politics for now. A big thank you to my faithful reader, Freddie, for gifting me a very interesting article in the latest issue of The Atlantic. The article by Walt Hunter is entitled “The Blue Book Is Back” and discusses a return of colleges requiring students to take their exams in person and actually write their answers in the traditional blue books. I was thrilled to see the mention of cursive writing and hope that it will continue to be a trend. A bit sad that its resurgence is fueled by the rampant cheating being enabled by AI though. Various colleges have operated on the honor code for years, and I certainly hope that we can return to that instead of the current climate of presumed criminality.
Hope springs eternal . . .
RESIST ALWAYS
TTFN
Like SNAFU, FUBAR is said to have originated in the US military during WW II. These concepts are woefully inadequate to describe the state of affairs in USA today. Katharine, do you watch movies at home? "The Apprentice" came out a couple of years ago. Roy Cohn is the mentor, Trump his apprentice. I was able to borrow the DVD from the public library system. If you don't have a DVD player--I'm assuming you do have a TV!!--you might find it available for streaming. If streaming video is something you do.
Having completed my schooling before the widespread availability of the Internet -- I had to submit a stack of punch cards to run a job on the Cyber 6400 computer -- I never had the opportunity to be examined by anything but a Blue Book or an answer sheet for multiple guess exams. So I have no sympathy for those who have learned that they have to be able to think for themselves with very little time allotted. Also I am pretty sure that FUBAR predated the sanitized version; at least it did in my experience.