The Imperial Presidency, Part 2

[Labster]

Now "conservative" means "not liberal" and "liberal" means "not conservative". Nobody in politics stands for anything any more, just against things. I for one have more important things to care about, such as finding a decent daily-jigsaw-puzzle app.

I find it's easy to get physical jigsaw puzzles from thrift stores fairly cheap.  When they have their sale days, you can pick one up for something like $2.  And apparently there's an exchange library for puzzles in the city somewhere.

Going back on topic, I'm not sure what it says about our economy that I'm now within five-minute walking distance of two thrift stores, a dollar store, and a last-chance store -- but I'm sure it's not good.  The houses here may cost a million dollars, but that doesn't leave much for discretionary spending.

And a bingo card update: One of them this year was "Pope excommunicates Vance", which hasn't happened yet.  But, uh, brace yourselves... The Pentagon Threatened Pope Leo XIV’s Ambassador With the Avignon Papacy, which was rightly taken by them to be a military threat against Rome. The Pope canceled his trip to the U.S., his home country, to spend July 4 on the immigrant island of Lampedusa.

Some thoughts.  First, I'm kind of impressed that our military people even know about Avignon.  I suppose they picked it up from playing CK3?  Also picking up a polearm to threaten a bishop-ambassador is totally fucking metal.  Second, this is what I mean about unlikely things happening.  I thought there was an outside chance of an excommunication, and put it into one of my four sacrificial slots on the bingo card.  And here we are, four months later, and we're in the realm of the U.S. Armed Forces seriously considering installing an antipope.

Some things are predictable, like that You-Know-Who wants a cut of Iran's sound toll to get through Hormuz.  I mean, it's weird that the President suddenly wants to do a business deal with an enemy state, to make people pay him for something that used to be free... but man, that guy.  Behind every fortune is a crime.  But is it still a crime if you do it in public in broad daylight?