Month: April 2020

Give and Take

Manhattan

Senate Majority leader Moscow Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has said a lot of dumb things in his years in Congress, but his comments the other day about the lack of money for state and local governments in the most recent bill for pandemic relief, and saying the federal government shouldn’t do a “Blue State bailout,” likely take the prize as the dumbest.

NY Gov Andrew Cuomo has efficiently and effectively ripped Mitch over the comments. It is worth watching and here it is even in the Trumpy NY Post. Besides just how much more money NY gives the Federal government than it takes out — in contrast to Kentucky — Moscow Mitch’s divisive comments also help highlight the inequality of our “democracy.” While Mitch sits in the leadership of the United States Senate, controlling legislation and generally taking stances on the legislation taking actions highly unpopular with the majority of Americans, and stuffing the courts with judges who positively view opinions with which a minority of Americans agree, he was only elected to the Senate by a state with barely the population of just two Boroughs of New York City, Brooklyn and Queens.

That representational issue is a bigger deal in the House of Representatives, however, and I don’t have as much issue with it in the Senate because that is how it was designed. But our Federal system was also designed that states in need received help from the Federal government regardless of partisan makeup. Republican Senators, especially those from southern states prone to be hit by hurricanes, should be concerned by the kind of precedent Mitch is pushing.

In response to Mitch’s comments, show your solidarity with New York and have a Manhattan cocktail tonight, preferable made with rye not Bourbon. I even made mine with Chicago-based (technically Evanston-based) Few Spirits Rye, one of my favorites. This is as classic as cocktails get, but if you’re interested in the history, I highly recommend The Manhattan: The Story of the First Modern Cocktail with Recipes by Philip Greene

2 oz Rye (or bourbon)

1 oz sweet vermouth

2 dashes Angostura bitters

Stir over ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass, garnish with cherries (don’t skimp, I always use at least 2 Luxardo Maraschino cherries.

Cheers!

 

Professor Trump’s Medicine Show

Snake Oil

For all of the appropriate criticism directed at Trump’s daily Coronavirus press briefings as nothing more than re-election campaign rallies, one important thing everyone is overlooking is that (at least for now), Trump still believes there will be an election in November that he has to campaign for. Otherwise, these briefings allow Trump to be the one thing he’s ever really wanted to be: a TV star. The largely fact-free daily episodes essentially take over evening newscasts, allowing him to pretend to be in charge and to rant about fake news (which of course is truer than ever as they carry whatever nonsense he is blathering about from the podium that day). But Trump knows how to entertain his supporters the way any good Medicine Show Perfessor knew how to draw a crowd no matter what town they rolled their wagon into.

The only thing really missing from those daily briefings is someone standing up and saying, “I used to have COVID-19, but after just one teaspoon of Trump Brand® Patented Chloroquine, I am virus free. Being able to siphon legitimacy from the real doctors and scientists standing next to him on the podium, is even better than having a shill in the audience, though.

Tests of Chloroquine are being halted due to fatal heart complications, but that is not stopping some of his supporters from believing there is an effective treatment, so why not open the economy back up? In typical Trump Grifter fashion, however, Trump figures that he will have gotten what he wants (cash from whatever financial ties he has to the drug, a reopened economy, etc) well before the bodies pile up enough to be noticeable.

While you are doing your patriotic duty and staying home and practicing social distancing, have a Snake Oil cocktail to remember why you’re not watching the Trump briefings.

From Kara Newman’s great book Night Cap, the Snake Oil is:

2 oz 100-proof Bourbon (115-proof Old Forrester)

.25 oz sherry (Lustau Amontillado)

1 mini bottle Underberg bitters

1 dash Bad Dog Bar Craft Fire & Damnation bitters (Scrappy’s Firewater)

1 dash Angostura bitters

Stir, strain into a Nick and Nora glass, no garnish

Cheers!

Dust, Wind, Dude

Arbitrary

Whether your Governor has issued a Stay at Home order or not, many Americans are staying at home to socially distance themselves during the pandemic. Some are “fortunate” enough to work from home, or as one twitter wag put it: stuck at home during a crisis trying to work. Others are trying to use this time to learn a language or learn how to bake bread. To these folks, I would remind them of Bill’s immortal words, “Dust, wind, dude.”

In Washington, we’d all be better off if they were spending their time learning to bake bread. Instead they are spending it thinking up unconstitutional ways to endanger people or enrich themselves and their friends with tax law changes.

The President* is wasting the time he should be leading the country through the crisis with by inappropriately using press briefings as re-election campaign rallies. We are also finding out more everyday about the administration’s ineffective use of time early on in the crisis, and the cost we will pay for that.

Our collective sense of time has gotten weird. But these strange days didn’t have to be this way. A properly functioning democratic government (like we used to have) works to prepare for a crisis. Even the George W. Bush Administration had preparations for a pandemic, but for King Donald I, who believes he alone can fix things, and dismantled those preparations that were in place, the cost of incompetence must be paid by the entire GOP.

As you go through another Blursday, make your plans to vote the Orange Disaster out of office in November, by mail if we can, or start sourcing your hazmat suit to go in person if necessary. Your cocktail tonight is The Arbitrary Nature of Time via Frederic Yarm at Cocktail Virgin, it is:

1.25 oz Wild Turkey 101 Rye (Rittenhouse 100)
1 oz Campari
.75 oz Cherry Heering
1 dash Regan’s Orange Bitters
2 dash Bittermens Mole Bitters

Stir with ice and strain into a rocks glass containing a large ice cube. Garnish with an orange twist.

Cheers!

Remember

Until Donald Trump, George W. Bush was slated to go down in history as the worst President ever. Now, Trump is making Bush look good by comparison. Trump isn’t even as good as Bush at the bad things about the Bush presidency.

Most recently we have sen this with ineffective attempts to use the Memory Hole. The Bush Administration was much more accomplished at making inconvenient facts disappear. To be fair – though –  because of the Bush Administration, people are on much higher alert for this type of activity. So when Jared Kushner took over a recent Virus press briefing and made ridiculous statements about the Strategic National Stockpile, and then went to the website to make changes aligned to Kushner’s comments, people caught that right away.