The annual schoolwide spelling bee!

THURSDAY, JANUARY 19, 2017

A fascinating post about health care: We're off on a mission of national import. We're headed south, by Amtrak no less, for the annual schoolwide bee.

Two years ago, when a certain unnamed relative was a mere third grader, we attended the bee for the first time. As we reported in real time, we were very much impressed by the greatness of the event.

Last year, we got blizzarded out. Tomorrow, as other ceremonies occur, we'll be in the public school auditorium, awaiting the word which was under review when we called the young scholar's home last evening:

"Promulgate: P-R-O-M-U-L-G-A-T-E. Promulgate."

(Journalistic definition: "Promulgate: A scandal involving trivial conduct committed by person or persons named Promul.")

We don't expect to post in the next few days. Under the circumstances, we'll have to postpone our final discussion of the scourge of Conwayism.

Upon our return to our sprawling campus, we'll discuss the role played by Anderson Cooper in the lengthy, ridiculous non-discussion we've been assessing this week. Our question:

Do people like Cooper really want to counter the noxious practices of this rhetorical style?

As we leave, we'll recommend two readings about people who voted for Trump:

In last Sunday's New York Times, Susan Chira offered brief interviews with several women who voted for Trump. Because we liberals are often so eager to cartoonize and generalize about Trump voters, it might be worth our time to consider the things these people said.

In a similar vein, we strongly recommend this fascinating post by Kevin Drum. We suggest you read it for what it says, and for what it doesn't.

Drum's post concerns another 50-something woman who has health insurance under Obamacare but can't afford to pay for actual health care. We strongly recommend Drum's post, and the first few ugly comments about the woman in question:

"Hard to feel sorry for someone who never asked for details. Ignored all his racism, misogyny, hate and out right lies and now is upset."

That was the very first comment appended to Drum's post.

Easy to be hard! All too often, that old bromide seems to capture the state of loathing which is so common in our liberal team's self-impressed soul.

For what it says and what it doesn't, we think Drum's post is very important. What makes our health care "system" so clownish, so awful? We'll discuss Drum's fascinating post upon our return.

We'll leave you with an important word:

"Tribalism: T-R-I-B-A-L-I-S-M. Ugly massive dumbness."

It savages our human functions. It blinds us to human concerns. It makes us very, very dumb. We tend to prove this in comments.