The Softie Media

Kid Gloves

Something bad is going to happen tomorrow night. I am not talking about Donald Trump’s primetime address to the nation about how the 2020 election was stolen from him. That is technically bad, in the sense that we will be lied to by a desperate, deranged despot -- but, you know. Something that is predictable, inevitable, and unpreventable can’t be really bad. Really bad things take us by surprise. Otherwise, they are merely … unfortunate things.

What’s going to be really bad is that the mainstream media is going to facilitate this liar and his lie. They won’t feel that they are doing that. They will feel that they are being responsible and respectful of the presidency, if not the president, and so they are going to prissily point out, with steepled fingers and eyeglasses down from the bridges of noses, that there is no evidence for what he is saying, and so forth, and then trot on to their next wimpy whitewash. Their maddening equanimity in the face of evil is worse than a reflex. It’s an addiction.

How do I know this? Because I was alive yesterday, and read the following on the website of CNN, one of the few remaining outlets with a spine. Even they, even now, still do this: (the boldface is mine, for emphasis.)

“President Donald Trump shocked Gulf allies and many of his own aides with his plan to impose a toll on the Strait of Hormuz, touching off an international scramble to convince him to reverse course on his demand, several sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

“The abrupt announcement on Monday came despite months of warnings from Trump’s own advisers not to pursue the idea, for fear it would undermine the US’s own war aims — as well as validate Iran’s purported plans to charge fees in the strait, which the administration repeatedly characterized as illegal.

“But as he surveyed the intensifying struggle over the strait that had drawn the US back into full-fledged war, a frustrated Trump pressed ahead anyway.

“The U.S.A. will be, from this point forward, known as ‘THE GUARDIAN OF THE HORMUZ STRAIT,’” he wrote on Truth Social Monday morning, vowing to charge a 20% toll on all cargo shipped through the strait.

“The surprise directive sparked a 24-hour sprint within the administration and across the Middle East to decode the specifics of a proposal that Trump had seemingly come up with on the spot. And while he reversed his plans on Tuesday, the episode further underscored the freewheeling, transactional nature of Trump’s approach to foreign policy, even in the midst of a prolonged war that he has no clear idea how to bring to an end.”

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See what they did there? They felt that they had to put Trump’s midnight mania, his spit-flying tantrum, into the genteel framework of a foreign-policy “approach.” He was not in an adolescent meltdown, he was “frustrated” by Iran’s intransigence, and reacted with a “freewheeling, transactional” — um — strategy.

It’s subtle but devastating. The term “normalizing” has been used for this, but I’d kick it up a little to “de-abnormalizing.”

We should be way past worrying about seeming to gang up on someone. Some people need ganging up on. Twenty-four states needed to gang up on the eleven of the Confederacy. In the end, arguably, they needed to burn Atlanta.

Should the media even live-stream and live-cover this travesty of a speech? Media critics will be debating this today. I think the media should cover it live — it’s breaking news because of what it appears to be: an opening salvo for Trump’s plan to rig the 2026 elections by declaring some sort of “emergency” over electoral integrity and use his ICE goons to terrorize voters. But I think the media should drop any pretense that it is about anything other than that. I think they should have people who know what they are talking about ready on the set to make exactly that point, and to back it up with facts.

In short, I think the media people should grow a pair. Balls and ovaries.

And I think you should watch them carefully — more them than the president, who will predictably lie, and lie again. He will probably present some bogus “report” that no one has heard about. Don’t watch all of that and grade him. Watch the media watching him, and grade them.

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Today’s Gene Pool Gene Poll:

Good.

Urgent update: The Evil Cantaloupe just unilaterally reversed the brand-new ICE policy of ending traffic stops that kill people. I kid you not.

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From The Mailbag:

Q: I am catching up on a few days of Gene Pools and you asked about things you learned without realizing it. Well, it seems I also unlearned something without realizing it.

I spent my entire life on the spectrum without knowing it. I wasn't diagnosed until after I had a baby.

Like a lot of autistic women, I learned to mask. I learned to copy what the people around me did. To fit in, I would unconsciously morph my personality into a version of myself that better matched the people around me. I had no idea I was doing it.

One of the things you have to learn if you want to fit in is how to sit properly.
Especially as a woman who occasionally wears skirts or dresses. You sit normally in a chair. You don't sit on one leg. You don't sit criss-cross applesauce. You don't bounce incessantly. You definitely don't drape yourself over furniture like a liquid.

Then in 2022 I landed a fully remote job. Suddenly sitting properly became completely irrelevant. Nobody could see me.

I could sit criss-cross applesauce in my chair. I could tuck a foot under myself. I could bounce my leg. I could put my feet on my desk. I could slouch. I could ooze over the armrest like a puddle. It was delightful.

Now, every year I help organize a large conference in my industry. It is two very long days spent in a room full of professionals wearing actual professional clothes and sitting in regular chairs. And I cannot do it. I cannot sit still anymore. I spend the entire conference fighting with my own body.

Every second I'm not focused on what the speaker is saying and developing backup questions in case the audience doesn't have any, there is a running soundtrack in my head:

"Sit still."

"Don't bounce."

"Keep your face neutral."

"Stop moving."

"Sit still."

It is genuinely one of the longest two-day stretches of my year. Trying to sit still for hours at a time makes me feel like my skin is too tight. I frequently fake phone calls so I can slip out of the room and go pace around the exhibit hall for a few minutes.

The funny thing is that now that I work from home, I have accumulated all sorts of accommodations without really thinking about them. I have a chair designed for neurodivergent people that adjusts to accommodate all of my weird sitting positions.

I have an under-desk elliptical, which is basically a fidget spinner for my feet. I have a wireless headset so I can pace, bounce, spin, and wander around while I work.

And somewhere along the way, I accidentally unlearned how to sit. It was a skill I never realized I had learned until it went away.

At 47 years old, I have become incapable of occupying a chair in the socially approved manner. Apparently my ability to sit normally was never a natural skill. It was just a mask I wore for forty years.

And once I stopped needing it, it disappeared.

— April Musser

A: Wow, April. That was beautifully told. Thanks.

All that, AND the eyebrows.

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Do you like this? Can you afford $5 a month for it? It’ll help keep this cranky old guy going.