“Water? What the heck is water?”

How Trump's outrages became normal; also, a Canadian former MP's deep thoughts on antisemitism, and Cleveland's QB curse.

So goes the punchline to an old joke about two young fishies, swimming along without a care in the world when they come across an older fish who says to them, “water’s really nice today, huh?”

The young fish, of course, have lived in water their whole lives and know of no other environment, so they don’t even know what this “water” stuff even is. (How the old fish figured it out, discuss among themselves.)

I thought about that after a few days’ worth of stories about the President of the United States which might have been a really big deal, even a career-ending scandal with “-gate” affixed to it, a decade ago.

In 2025, though? We’re all, “Yeah whatever that’s weird anyway what’s on Netflix?”

And when I say “we” I mean “we,” because I have a hard time writing about this. Because, what is there to even say about it anymore?

And could any other politician get away with this kind of behaviour? Hard as it is to believe, even Republican voters in the Trump era occasionally reveal they have standards for misbehavior by politicians who don’t happen to be The Donald. (Mark Robinson and Roy Moore, we hardly knew ye.)

Trump having been one of the most famous people on earth before his Presidential run helps, as does his undeniable charisma. (He can be very funny, sometimes even intentionally.)

But maybe it’s his sheer brazenness that’s let him get away with it. He denies his obvious corruption, of course, but never without winking at his audience.

The closest analogy might be former Louisiana Governor Edwin Edwards, who was famously corrupt and a philanderer but freaking hilarious about it. (When former KKK leader David Duke ran against him for Governor, Edwards quipped “the only thing we have in common is that we’re both wizards beneath the sheets.”)

They don’t make Democrats like that anymore, alas.

Well, there is one…

Speaking of things we never would have believed a few years ago, who would have thought Andrew Freaking Cuomo would be making a political comeback and using his fraudulent covid briefings as a goddamn selling point?

It won’t actually work, will it? We’ll see. (Honestly, this is NYC we’re talking about, so he could still be the least bad option by a wide margin.)

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It’s not because we hate Jews, it’s just because (insert BS excuse to hate Jews here)

When I saw that the right-wing clickbait account “Canada Proud” accused former Conservative-turned-Liberal MP Bill Casey of excusing and justifying blatant antisemitism, I figured they must be exaggerating or misrepresenting what Casey actually wrote.

I mean, despite my low opinion of former Liberal Members of Parliament (not to mention current Liberal MPs, and future Liberal MPs) surely none of them are so obtuse as to say targeting Jews isn’t antisemitism, right?

Right?