"This is a very significant choice, because it’s a vote against America since he has been a leading opponent of Donald Trump."

Said Franca Giansoldati, "a Vatican expert at Italy’s Il Messaggero newspaper," quoted in "Who is Robert Prevost? New Pope hit out at Trump administration weeks ago/Robert Prevost, now Leo XIV, is the first American chosen to lead the Catholic Church, having steered a moderate path with the Augustinian mission in Peru" (London Times).

How did Prevost, now Leo, "hit out"? J.D. Vance, justifying the adminstration's immigration policy, had said, "There is a Christian concept that you love your family and then you love your neighbour, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens, and then after that, prioritise the rest of the world. A lot of the ­far-left has completely inverted that." In response, on X, Prevost reposted a link to an article titled "JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn’t ask us to rank our love for others." And — with respect to the treatment of ­Kilmar Abrego Garcia, Prevost retweeted "Do you not see the ­suffering? Is your conscience not ­disturbed? How can you stay quiet?"

We discussed that Vance quote on this blog back on February 2, here. A podcaster, Rory Stewart, had said "Nowhere does Jesus suggest that love is to be prioritised in concentric circles. His love is universal."

Vance had responded to Stewart: "Does Rory really think his moral duties to his own children are the same as his duties to a stranger who lives thousands of miles away? Does anyone? This false arrogance drives so much elite failure over the last 40 years. Rory Stewart thinks he has an IQ of 130 when it’s really 110.'"

I'd said: "It's not a question of what Rory really thinks but what Jesus really said. What IQ does Vance ascribe to Jesus?"

Me and...

I wrote an elaborate post about what JD Vance said (on Joe Rogan) about "the normal gay guy," and the subject, in the comments immediately turned to pronouns. No, not the innovative pronoun usage that has come into vogue in recent years but old-time grammar. Vance used the objective pronoun as a subject: "I wouldn't be surprised if me and Trump won just the normal gay guy vote."

The first commenter, Ralph L, calls attention to it, and I, the second commenter, point out that Vance used "me" as the subject more than that one time." 53 minutes into the podcast: "So one of the big things that me and President Trump confront all the time is the accusation that we're somehow like in bed with Russia, which is like the, the dumbest thing in the world to me."

Naturally, I thought about the "Me and" playlist I put together on Spotify a while ago. I'll embed it at the bottom of this post, but the point I want to make is that the "Me and" form — used as a subject — works very nicely in the colloquial speech that is reflected in many excellent song lyrics. Not all of the "Me and" songs on my playlist use "me" ungrammatically. But the ones that do are:

"Wow. Not a word about Dilbert. I thought I could return to Althouse for the straight skinny on the bizarre Scott Adams meltdown. Guess there’s a lid on Dilbert."

Wrote jacksonjay, in last night's Sunrise Café.

It's more work to pick up an issue that is presented in audio. Am I supposed to transcribe and explain? It's not like blogging the written word, where I can cut and paste and edit down to what's important. When people speak in podcasts, they expand and repeat themselves, so even if I were willing to transcribe, I wouldn't get the kind of text I can get from the written word. So there's a big disincentive to blog.

As for this recent thing — which I take it is Adams's assertion the day after the debate that Trump just lost his vote by not denouncing white supremacy forcibly enough — I thought it was the audio equivalent of clickbait, so I had some resistance to it. I'm supposed to explain it and have a reaction to it? Why? Wait a day and everything changed. He explained that he didn't like that jerks of the left didn't welcome him into their fold, so he was back on Trump's side, because righties, being the unpopular kids, are happy to have anybody halfway like them.

Yeah, that's not a verbatim transcription. That's just my vague memory after listening to 2 or 3 podcasts. Podcasts are evanescent. The written word, now that's something. Just the other day on one of my podcasts — I forget which one — Meade and I were talking about how Trump has built real-world things that have to work and hold up, while the editors of the NYT could not even get from the beginning to the end of a single column without it collapsing into incoherence. The column metaphor was noted at the time. You see it when a physical thing like a building lacks structural integrity, but words are so strong, they stay there on the page exactly as written, no matter how irrational.

But in blogging, you can take that text and demonstrate what's wrong with it. You attack text with text. But if you're doing text — blogging — it's hard to get at anything other than text. It's a text-on-text endeavor, mostly. You could blog podcasts... but for the most part, that's a mug's game.

IN THE COMMENTS: Ralph L questioned jacksonjay's phrase "straight skinny":

The featured quote from Obama's graduation speech has Obama unwittingly complimenting Trump.

The NYT puts this gaffe in the headline, "Obama Says U.S. Lacks Leadership on Virus in Commencement Speeches/The virus has 'torn back the curtain on the idea that the folks in charge know what they’re doing,' the former president said...."

There's a problem with figures of speech: You might forget what they mean!

Here's Obama, looked to by the elite as a source of wisdom, and he's simply reading from a speech he had every opportunity to have edited by the most able wordsmiths, and he uses a cliché, and he doesn't notice that he's got it exactly wrong.

To tear back the curtain is to suddenly reveal what is really there! It was behind a curtain and you've torn — pulled —it back.

In Obama's botched figure of speech, the virus is tearing back the curtain — hard to picture that, but it's intended as a vivid image — and what is revealed — what had been hidden behind a curtain — is "the idea that the folks in charge know what they’re doing." So he's saying that it wasn't seen before, but now it's blatantly obvious: The folks in charge know what they’re doing!

I could say more about "folks," but I want to talk about "torn." The cliché is to pull back the curtain. Pull, not tear. But "torn back the curtain" is comprehensible, just as "ripped back the curtain" would be comprehensible. It's a more aggressive pulling. (You know how viruses are, so impetuous.)

But one reason "torn" might have suggested itself to the speechwriters is the Biblical phrase "tear the curtain." (That must be the source of the Hitchcock film title "Torn Curtain.") When I googled "tear back the curtain," I couldn't get to an answer because the page filled up with discussion of Matthew 27 — the death of Jesus:

At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

I'm pretty sure Obama and his speechwriters had no intention of evoking that image. Anyway, I accept the use of the phrase "torn back the curtain." The problem is that when you pull or tear or rip back a curtain, you show what is really there. And it's just funny that he accidentally declared that we can all see clearly now that The folks in charge know what they’re doing.

IN THE COMMENTS: Ralph L finds the pop culture reference for pulling back the curtain. It's so apt for political discussions:



Do I presume to criticize the great Obama? So ungrateful! I should think myself lucky that I am permitted to hear his graduation oration!

More debates coming up next week. Try to predict which day will be more exciting. (And don't say they'll both be boring — that's boring.)

The Tuesday people:

Gov. Steve Bullock of Montana
Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana
Former Rep. John Delaney of Maryland
Gov. John Hickenlooper of Colorado
Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota
Former Rep. Beto O'Rourke of Texas
Rep. Tim Ryan of Ohio
Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont
Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts
Author Marianne Williamson

The Wednesday people:

Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado
Former Vice President Joe Biden
Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York City
Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey
Former Housing Secretary Julián Castro
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York
Sen. Kamala Harris of California
Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington
Entrepreneur Andrew Yang

Here's a boring reason for picking Wednesday. Kamala Harris is positioned once again to take a shot at Joe Biden. Have you noticed her bounce (from the last debate) is fading? Will she try to do the same thing again? Will Joe fight back this time? Will he fight back enough to get in trouble? As for Tuesday, there's hope that Marianne Williamson will be especially weird. Ugh. Something better needs to happen. Maybe Andrew Yang's microphone will work.

IN THE COMMENTS: Ralph L said:

Yang is going to yell "Fuck!" evocatively.

"Thousands of angry comedians protested outside the White House on Monday afternoon, demanding the immediate reinstatement of the ousted communications director Anthony Scaramucci."

"Chanting 'Bring back Mooch,' the irate funnymen and funnywomen argued that the abrupt removal of Scaramucci was akin to taking the food out of their families’ mouths.... Buddy Schlantz, the owner of the Bethesda, Maryland, comedy club known as the Laff Pagoda, travelled to the White House to protest what he called 'a direct assault on the comedy community. Most comics I know are in a state of shock,' he said. 'Years from now, comedians will be asking each other, ‘Where were you when you found out that Scaramucci was canned?'..."

Writes Andy Borowitz, The New Yorker humorist, who probably did regret losing Scaramucci as a joke target. Or maybe not. It was too easy to use Scaramucci for comic purposes. Anyone could directly observe him and find him funny. He was funny even to those who liked him. What can you do with that? How many times can you riff on "Bohemian Rhapsody"?



ADDED: Comedians : Scaramucci :: Forest Therapy guides : forests.

IN THE COMMENTS: Ralph L said:

One of these years I'll figure out this Comedia dell arte business. The English upper classes must learn about it in grade school, because it's in Christie, Father Brown, and nearly every other English writer I read. I fail to see anything funny in what little I know about it.

Here's the Wikipedia article on Commedia dell'arte (note the spelling).

Commedia dell'arte... was an an early form of professional theatre, originating from Italy, that was popular in Europe from the 16th through the 18th century.... Some of the better known commedia dell'arte characters are Pierrot and Pierrette, Pantalone, Il Dottore, Brighella, Il Capitano, Colombina, the innamorati, Pedrolino, Pulcinella, Sandrone, Scaramuccia (also known as Scaramouche), La Signora, and Tartaglia.

Clicking on Scaramuccia:

Scaramuccia (literally "little skirmisher"), also known as Scaramouche or Scaramouch, is a stock clown character of the Italian commedia dell'arte (comic theatrical arts). The role combined characteristics of the zanni (servant) and the Capitano (masked henchman). Usually attired in black Spanish dress and burlesquing a don, he was often beaten by Harlequin for his boasting and cowardice.

"Mr. Edwards once calmed an anxious Ms. Hunter by promising her that after his wife died, he would marry her in a rooftop ceremony in New York with an appearance by the Dave Matthews Band."

Poor Dave Matthews, getting caught up in that ghoulish slapstick.

IN THE COMMENTS: Ralph L said:

He'll need a big helicopter to lift the Dave Matthews Band bus over that rooftop.

(If you don't get that, read this.)

And William said:

I can sympathize with Edwards. My wife is lying in a coma, and the doctors do not expect a full recovery. The whole experience has been very traumatic, but I have learned a valuable lesson. When I get my license back there will be no more DWI on my part. And that's a promise.... But that's not the immediate problem. My wife has all sorts of hot friends visiting her, and you should see the nurse on the night shift. My problem is how do I approach the touchy question of post mortem dating with these attractive women. I don't want to appear insensitive, but life is for the living... I would welcome the advice of any Edwards' voters on this difficult subject.