KAFKA'S DESCENDANTS: "Strategic ambiguity," she should have said!

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 2026

The "clown show" to which he referred: AOC went to Munich last week. While she was there, at least one "stumble" occurred.

At this point, full disclosure:

On balance, it wouldn't really have occurred to us that Rep. Ocasio-Cortez would be viewed as a serious contender to become the next president. But that's the way her most-hyped stumble is being played across our nation's pseudo-discourse, wherever the "clown show" is performed.

Yesterday, it was widely performed on the Fox News Channel, by a succession of corporate messenger agents. But first, a word about the gong-show Valhalla to which "cable news" has long since flown.

We'll start at 4 o'clock yesterday afternoon, with The Will Cain Show.

The program appears on the Fox News Channel. Wisely or otherwise, the first 58 minutes of yesterday's show was dedicated to the search for Nancy Guthrie. Nothing beside remained!

At 4:58 p.m., Cain devoted the last two minutes of his show to the mocking of AOC. He mocked her for a remark about cowboys, and then it was time for The Five!

Harlequins tumbled onto the set of our most-watched "cable news" program. The children devoted their first segment to—of course—the Guthrie search. Then the real clowning began, the daily imitation of life:

Segment One: The search in Tucson for Nancy Guthrie
Segment Two: The stupid thing Obama allegedly said
Segment Three: Schumer, HRC launch dumb attacks
Segment Four: The stupid thing AOC allegedly said

In all honesty, Obama hadn't said a stupid thing—but this, after all, was The Five. 

In the podcast discussion under review, the former president had referred to the "clown show" with which we're all currently saddled. Almost surely, he wasn't thinking of The Five, or even of the Fox News Channel, when he made that remark.

Yesterday, though, the wider clown show just kept rolling along. During Segment Three, the children could have tried to explain the contents of the SAVE Act—but, this being The Five, no such attempt occurred.

On the Fox News Channel, but even more so on CNN, the focus on Tucson was considerable. Wisely or otherwise, CNN devoted its time to little else as the afternoon and evening proceeded. 

CNN made the rest of the world go away as its hosts, and their expert guests, yammered about the search and about little else. But let's return to AOC—to the stumble in which she engaged.

Full disclosure:

By now, our next presidential election is less than three years away. Given the (intellectual) "wickedness of the times," that means we need to start wasting our time yammering about possible White House contenders!

On cable, we'll make the rest of the world go away in deference to the Tucson search. But as an additional part of our national foolishness, we'll also make the world go away in deference to stumbles like this, as reported on page A6 of Sunday's New York Times:

Ocasio-Cortez Offers a Working-Class Vision in Munich, With Some Stumbles

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, a progressive who made a name for herself focused on economic problems at home in America, might have seemed an odd fit for the Munich Security Conference, an annual gathering of foreign leaders and diplomats focused on international security.

But at two Friday panels, she tied worsening income inequality to the rise of authoritarianism, weaving her working-class worldview into a broader message about combating far-right populism and strengthening relationships with Western allies. Everyday people, she argued, were turning away from democracy because wealthy elites had failed to address their needs.

[...] 

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has stepped up her visibility in recent months as a leader for Democrats as they oppose President Trump. Speculation about her future political ambitions—she has long been considered a potential presidential candidate—was rife in Munich. Her mere presence was scrutinized as a hint that perhaps she was considering a White House bid and brushing up on world affairs.

"She has long been considered a potential presidential candidate?" 

To us, that seems remarkably premature. But in Munich, as of course on The Five, "speculation about her future political ambitions was rife!"

Eventually, the New York Times got around to reporting the most prominent of her stumbles. With respect to what AOC said, the Times quoted the part of her statement which it viewed as a stumble, then paraphrased the rest:

Questioned about whether the United States should send troops to defend Taiwan if China invaded the island, she stalled for roughly 20 seconds before offering a substantive response.

“I think that, uh, this is such a, a—you know, I think that—this is a, um—this is of course, a, uh, a very longstanding, um, policy of the United States,” Ms. Ocasio-Cortez said, before saying that the country should try to avoid reaching that point with China in the first place.

It was a striking moment from a self-assured legislator who is normally nimble at answering impromptu questions from reporters on Capitol Hill, and conservative critics seized on the stumble online. Earlier in the day, she also made a reference to the “Trans-Pacific Partnership”—later correcting that on social media to “trans-Atlantic.”

A person surely could see that as the first of a pair of stumbles. She did, in fact, stammer in a lengthy way, as judged by political norms.

On The Five, the channel went one step beyond what the New York Times did. On The Five, they played the tape of that first twenty seconds, then never mentioned the fact that AOC ever managed to offer " a substantive response" at all.

In all honesty, even her "substantive response" wasn't especially sharp. But what had she perhaps been thinking as she stumbled and stalled?

Who knows? But she may have been trying to recall a pair of words—a pair of words which has long been used to describe U.S. policy with respect to China and Taiwan. Here's the start of a second report by the New York Times about this recent underwhelming event:

After First Big Overseas Trip, Ocasio-Cortez Expresses Frustrations

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had anticipated a potentially frosty reception to her anti-establishment arguments at the Munich Security Conference, a venue she called “an elite place of decision makers that, frankly, are not responsive to a class-based message.”

And the visit to Germany felt high-stakes: It was the most prominent foreign trip to date by the progressive New York congresswoman, who had mostly focused on domestic priorities until now. Her remarks last week about addressing working-class concerns around the globe, and the reception from world leaders, were both eagerly awaited and highly scrutinized.

But rather than the substance of her arguments, it was her on-camera stumbles when answering questions about specific world affairs that rocketed around conservative social media and drove plenty of the discussion about her visit, as political observers speculated whether they would make a dent in a potential presidential run in 2028.

The most notable instance was when she was asked whether the United States should send troops to aid Taiwan if China invaded the island. She stalled for roughly 20 seconds before offering a response that reflected the United States’ longtime policy of strategic ambiguity.

"Strategic ambiguity?" Let us say this about that:

On this campus, we don't know diddly about foreign affairs. But even we knew that that's the phrase which has long been used to describe this country's highly nuanced stance with respect to that famously delicate policy question.

Even we knew—and yes, that has long been viewed as a challenging policy question. If memory serves, President Trump has even had some stumbles along the way with this knotty topic—and that's surprising, because on The Five, the former "wrestler" who now performs as "Tyrus" thoughtfully told Red America this:

TYRUS (2/16/26): The one thing that Barack Obama and President Trump had in common is that they are communicators of a higher— Like, their brilliance when they're called on something? You're never going to see Obama or President Trump asked a question that they can't answer...They're always prepared.

You'll never see President Trump asked a question he can't answer? The former "wrestler" went on from there, but the analysts were groaning so loudly that we couldn't quite hear what he said.

Before we try to summarize, we're going to tell you this:

Yesterday, the sheriff of Pima County issued a formal statement. In it, he said that members of the Guthrie family have been totally cleared with respect to the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie.

On this morning's Morning Joe, Mika and Willie dedicated their roughly two-minute discussion of Tucson to the praise they heaped upon the sheriff for having made that declaration. Yesterday, on the frequently maligned Fox News Channel, Will Cain articulated a different view:

He quickly noted, quite correctly, that whatever the truth may turn out to be, that declaration by the sheriff doesn't seem to make any sense. We'd have to say that Cain's view was right, and that Mika and Willie were simply reading from insider cable guild script.

Everywhere FDR looked in 1944, he said he saw "one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished." Everywhere we look today, we think we see a flailing nation profoundly ill-served by a collection of imitations of life.

The disorder is so general that it's hard to sum it all up. But what does that have to do with Kafka? Before the week is done, we'll try to spell that out.

That said, our own Blue realm is frequently involved in these "clown shows" too. As is the norm at times of tribal war, it's hard for us Blues to see that.

In closing, also this, as we noted yesterday afternoon:

AOC also said what's shown below. As the US seems to break away from the EU, this statement seems hard to deny—and in the possible clownishness of the times, no one is talking about it:

"[Our presidential administration is] looking to withdraw the United States from the entire world so that we can turn into an age of authoritarians that can carve out the world where Donald Trump can command the Western Hemisphere and Latin America as his personal sandbox, where Putin can saber-rattle around Europe and try to bully our own allies there," she said.

Is it possible that she was right about that? We say it pretty much is!

It's impossible to sum the clown shows up. We're trying as hard as we can, but the various floodings of the zone are inundating our sprawling campus.

Before the week is done: What might Kafka have seen?