Of Transgender Mice and Men

 

Oh! Those transgender mice.

President Trump lambasted our woke National Institutes of Health and the rest of the woke government for spending $8 million on "TRANSGENDER MICE!"

Can you imagine!?!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FspfF1N0LJQ

And behind him on the stage, were J.D. Vance (over his right shoulder) and Speaker Johnson (left shoulder), tut-tutting and smirking and shaking their heads in wonder at just how clueless and radical those Democratic medical researchers must be.  Let's get DOGE all over that transgender mice program!

Democrats are not content with grabbing your little Jimmy when he goes to school a happy beautiful little boy and doing a sex change operation on him so he comes home a girl--now they are after the mice! And they are spending millions on these mice.

And the transgender mouse program has exploded because those illegal Haitian immigrants have eaten all the cats!

Oh, wait!  

Actually, those were "transGENIC" mice not "transgender" mice. And memo to the President: those are two very different things, not at all the same, mice of a different stripe, you might say.

Transgenic mice, which are mice bred in the laboratory with specific genes are useful in cancer research--in a lot of different types of research--especially if you want to know whether a particular tumor which harbors a particular type of genetic mutation driving its growth might be susceptible to a particular drug. These are not mice with gender dysphoria, who have complained about feeling like a Minnie Mouse when, in fact, they were born as Mickey Mice.

So, $8 million spent on cancer research for a group of diseases which cost America billions and untold suffering may not be such a bad idea.

What Me Worry?

Does the White House not have any employees who check out these stories before they get stuffed into President Trump's speeches? Wait, no. They've fired the "fact checkers" in the government. Who  needs to check facts in Trump World?

The fact is, someone very well may have seen that line in the President's speech and tried to warn him not to say that, but the President does not care about details...like whether something is actually true. What he cares about is whether it can get a laugh. Never let the truth get in the way of a good story. I don't care whether there is a transgender mouse; I care whether we can talk about transgender mice. 

And, of speaking of bad ideas, when RFK JR shrugs off the deadly measles outbreak which started in Texas and has spread as far east as Florida, and when he says, "Oh, well, we get those measles outbreaks, you know, now and then."

Under Secretary for Vaccines, Dept HHS

Well, actually not. 

There have been measles outbreaks in cult communities, like the outbreak among unvaccinated Hasidic Jews in Brooklyn in 2018, but the only outbreaks we have seen in the US have been among the unvaccinated cults. Vaccines virtually eliminated measles outbreaks in this country, well, Until Now. 

So Bobby Brainworm has struck again. 

Yo! Where's Your Suit?

 

Stephen Colbert suggested that Volodymyr Zelensky might have replied to Brian Glenn's taunt, "Don't you own a suit?"  by saying "Oh, like your suit? Where did you buy it? Do they have a Men's Department in that store?"

Actually, Mr. Zelensky's riposte was not at all bad: "Maybe, when the war is over I will buy a suit like yours. Maybe a better suit."

Ralph Lauren:  Eat Your Heart Out!

This has become something of an on line sport: What would you have tossed back at Mr. Glenn?

Adrienne! Where's My Suit?

To People appearing in court in orange jump suits: Where is your suit?

To Supreme Court Justices in black robes: Where's your suit?

To Rocky Balboa, outside the Philadelphia Museum of Art, dancing around in his sweat pants: Where's your suit?

Puffy Pink Guy: Wimp Pride

You could not come to dinner at Downton Abbey in a tuxedo with a black tie--so de`classe`! You need white tie for dinner.

The Phantom has decried, on his blog, "The Phantom Speaks," the dressing down of American society, where people line up to board an airplane in what looks like pajamas for a sleep over party, but the idea of a war time leader having to "show respect" by dressing up in a suit was simply so frat boy it was hard to process.

Wimps Gang Up On a Real Tough Guy

President Zelensky has been living with the threat of imminent death for 3 years now,  and Mr. Glenn is currently whining about getting death threats because of his remark.

Ukrainian Formal Wear

 Well, welcome to Mr. Zelensky's world, Mr. Glenn.

Is Shame Stupid?

 

The MAGA respondent on this blog, Anonymous, has raised one point which has gnawed at me for some time now: Is my urgency to send arms and money to Ukraine every bit as foolish and ill considered as the impulse which drove America to intervene and send troops to Vietnam?

It's the old question of intervention, of the "foreign entanglements" which George Washington warned against. Of course, Washington was a slave holder who wanted nothing more than to retreat to Mount Vernon, where he had dominion over his world, and he wanted to be left alone so he could abuse his slaves in peace.

Reading, re-reading, "The Best And The Brightest," about how the bright boys, products of elite institutions, guided Lyndon Johnson toward war in Vietnam; it is clear that these self assured, arrogant, conceited men played on Johnson's insecurities that he was just an under-educated hick from Texas, vulgar, but most of all, they played on his insecurities about manhood and machismo. Was he brave enough to make the tough choices? Was he man enough to send American boys to die in the rice paddies?

Johnson did it because he was afraid. He was afraid of being accused of being afraid to take bold action, afraid of being accused of being afraid to do the manly thing.

As George Carlin said: "Pull out? You want me to pull out? That doesn't sound very manly to me!"

And what was the bold thing to do? To stop Communism in its tracks, to keep godless Commies from knocking down one domino after another, until all of Asia and South America were communist, and we'd have Commies knocking on our door? 

That bright and shining lie.

We know now that half baked ideas, that appeals to emotionalism can be filled with explosive land mines.

On the other hand, when something, even from a distance, is manifestly, undeniably evil, do we not ask ourselves how we could have sat on our hands because we had no skin in the game? Watching a playground bully beat up a defenseless kid because it's not me getting pounded--what does that make me feel like?

The last scene of the Godfather II movie shows the sons of the Godfather in their dining room, awaiting the Godfather's arrival and Michael announces he has enlisted in the Marines to go fight World War II. Sonny, his older brother, erupts in rage, storms across the table to pummel his younger brother: "You would fight for...STRANGERS?" he shouts. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=435mkg6_eGQ

For Sonny, all those who enlisted to fight are "saps" fighting for people not in their family. In that is Trump's echo of John McCain and all those who went off to fight in uniform were "suckers."

And that is the essence of the problem: For Michael, being an American means something, not to mention being his own man. For Sonny, there is no obligation to anyone but members of his own family, his own blood, as he puts it.

Sonny, like Trump lives in a feudal world where the strong take what they want, when they want it--a man can grab a woman by the pussy, to use Mr. Trump's language, if he is big enough and strong enough. He doesn't have to worry about a delicate concept like rape, if he's big enough. The powerful take what they want. The lions take what they want. The rest of the animals on the Serengeti plain are just prey.

But for many Americans the idea of being a superhero, of standing up for what is right, and coming to the rescue does not seem a fool's game. The calvary riding in are not "suckers."

The last scene ("Take Off") of the "Band of Brothers" first episode, shows Richard Winters, reaching out his hand and hauling each of his platoon members up to his feet, and watching them load into the airplane which will take them over Europe to fight on D-Day. It is simple and breath-taking. 

As Paul Krugman has said, that was what America once was.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOZUB0EHadw&t=177s

Another episode is called, "Why We Fight" about Easy Company stumbling into a concentration camp and liberating it. This has been set up by a scene of a veteran soldier, Frank Perconte, cynically berating a fresh replacement who is all eager to find some Germans to fight. For Perconte, who has fought from D-Day across Europe and into Germany, the best thing that can happen to him, what he's fighting for, is to sleep on a real bed with real sheets, under a roof, and to have real toilet paper. That is the height of glory for him. 

But it is Perconte who is staggered to  see what his patrol has uncovered--the concentration camp, with its skeletal survivors. 

So the episode was misnamed: none of the American soldiers had any idea how evil the forces they defeated were, until they defeated them. They had clues, but there was much cynicism, as one of the soldiers reads a passage from "Stars and Stripes" saying, "It seems the Germans are...BAD." And everyone laughs. Well, they weren't laughing after they found that concentration camp.

They may have been fighting for many reasons--to protect their comrades in arms, to sleep under a roof, but until they found the concentration camp, they could not have known what other good their fight could achieve. 

Many of my friends have struggled to express how it made them feel to watch Trump snigger at  Zelensky in the Oval Office.  On PBS Newshour, February 28, 2025, a day which will live in infamy,  we watched Trump carry out his own Pearl Harbor attack,  berating the valiant President Zelensky, "You don't have any cards, without us!"  

We all felt it. We all were a little surprised to feel an emotion we had rejected as quaint: Whatever else that scene made us feel--anger, disgust, nausea--and we may have felt all those things--but overwhelmingly, what we felt was shame.

David Brooks said the same thing, on the Newshour: He stumbled through a gamut of emotions, but he wound up on "shame."

Ashamed to be an American. Ashamed that we were now with the bad guys. Ashamed to be on the Sonny Corleone side of the street, looking at those who enlisted, mostly driven by blind faith that America will take the good side of any fight, and Sonny calling all those men who signed up to fight, "Saps."

Not since Vietnam, when it finally became apparent we weren't saving the world, but immolating it, had I felt ashamed to be an American. 

Lee Greenwood can sing all he wants, but it will take a long time to wash that shame away.

BETRAYAL

 

Now the MAGA voters will see what they have wrought.

And, for most of them, they will not mind. They may not love it, but they won't mind, because what's the death of a distant democracy against the price of eggs?

And now Trump is stopping whatever arms and money the US was going to send to Ukraine, because, you know, President Zelensky did not wear a suit. 

HEY, BUDDY! WHERE'S YOUR SUIT?

It is difficult to know what pressures Mr. Zelensky may face at home, what the calculus for his military logistics is. 

Perhaps, without U.S. money, his cause is hopeless.

But maybe, the Europeans can fill in the gaps.

Although, looking at the Finish minister talk about how Zelensky can always go back and make up with Trump, the Europeans may be in deep denial, at least if one Finn is any indication.

Was North Vietnam dependent on Russian aid to defeat the United States? Or can a people dedicated to self determination and determined to not be enslaved simply soldier on, for as long as it takes?

What Mad Dog would dearly love to see is Zelensky giving Trump the middle finger, moving on and slogging through and eventually wearing down Putin in Ukraine as the Soviets were worn down and eventually left Afghanistan.

And, with the war won, President Zelensky can keep his rare earths and mineral rights and charge America ten times what they charge the Europeans, and they can reap the profits of their own extraction, rather than having to pay reparations to the United States for all that aid which President Biden provided.

Freedom Fighter

The problem is, Ukraine is just next door to Russia,  and Ukraine has towns and cities and a people who have lived in the 21st century, unlike the Afghans, who had less to lose, and who were living in more remote circumstances. That country, unlike Ukraine, was not "target rich."

Mad Dog can fantasize that Europe will congeal and step up, but the EU has never shown much capacity for resolve and concerted action.

Canada may do better. If the premier of Ontario is to be believed, he can make Trump suffer for those tariffs kicking in tomorrow.

Trump is all about deal making and eschewing moral stances for simple bottom line thinking. If Ukraine shows too little return on investment, maybe Canada can show how the wrong choices can backfire.

You Don't Hold the Cards

 

So Volodymyr Zelensky traveled to the Oval Office on a mission to pay the extortion, the protection fee, from the gangsta on his gold chair, and he got rebuffed.

He hadn't bent the knee quite humbly enough.

He didn't say "Thank you," nice enough.

So he got turned out, sent back to Europe to bleed there.

Not the first time, actually, America has acted so nobly.

In 1939, a German ship called the "St. Louis," carrying hundreds of Jews trying to escape Nazi Germany, arrived at American shores and were sent back because their papers weren't in order. They needed notes from the Gestapo back in their home towns, certifying they were solid citizens, and the Gestapo was not inclined to provide them.

The Ship St. Louis, 1939

So, the ship was turned away, sailed back to Europe, where just short of 300 of the passengers wound up with a one way ticket to the concentration camps and all perished there.

Hitler, when questioned later about why he did not simply expel the Jews from Germany, alluded to that incident saying, "America did not want them. Nobody wants them."

Which is not to say that the United States should open its borders right now, but when Donald Trump plays that card about shit-hole countries, and shit-hole people, we all ought to know to what tradition he cleaves.

FRAT BOY TAUNT: DON'T YOU EVEN OWN A SUIT?

 

When Brian Glenn, who's main claim to fame is he is now Marjorie Taylor Greene's new squeeze, cat-called out to Volodymyr Zelensky at Friday's Oval Office frat boy party, "Don't you even own a suit?" Trump World came into bold focus.

   

DON'T YOU OWN A SUIT?

How do you even unpack this one?

Trump and Vance orchestrated a virtual smirking Greek Chorus of their frat bro's, and the whole mob sneered as the attempted slap down of Zelensky went down--for...not wearing a suit and tie?

Redolent of those British officers who sneered at the Minutemen because those embattled farmers did not wear spiffy uniforms.

Mr. Glenn ought to come to our town meetings in New Hampshire, if he wants to see some serious people who don't wear suits.

One thinks of that quaint idea we want to be judged by the content of our character, not the color of our skin, or judged by the cut of our clothes. But that's just so yesterday in Trump World.

Here you have the guy who famously said, "I don't need a ride. I need ammunition," when the Russian hordes in their tanks were headed toward Kiev, and various powers offered him prompt escape out of harm's way.  Here is Zelensky, who has evaded Putin's assassination squads, who has literally been under fire for 3 years, facing a pink puffy American, who tries to engage him in a frat taunt.

MTG in her Gandhi Outfit

Most American boys knew this scene from growing up--getting taunted by some dweeb who's rich daddy gave him status and protection, a guy solid with the in-crowd, trying to put you down.

Respect for the Institution

But the fun irony:  here is the guy who's buying celeb status from his girlfriend--and look at what she wears on solemn occasions. And look how she acts.

Georgia Formal Prom

And Glenn is trying to invoke respect  for protocol?

Here we have the essence of Trump populism.

Not a suit among them

Of course, Zelensky's answer was completely lost on Glenn: "Maybe, when the war is over, I'll buy a suit like yours." You see, Mr. Glenn, let me speak really slowly, so maybe you can get it: The fashion statement you are making with your suit is you are in the fraternity, in the in-crowd, that you are in power. That's a "power suit," as if dressing up can actually make you a bigger, more important man. But I am dressed like this because I have work to do. I am in my battle fatigues. I have a war to win and a battle to brave.

But we all understand if Mr. Glenn cannot grasp that subtlety.

Mad Dog Is Not Alone On Saturday Night

 

Did you ever have that moment of self doubt, when you wondered, "Is it me? Maybe I'm just not seeing reality. Maybe I'm missing something here."

And then, you see someone else say just what you were thinking? It may be that "consensual validation" thing.

So, for a little over 24 hours after Friday's ambush at the Oval Office, Mad Dog wondered what he saw was real, or some Saturday Night Live skit foisted on him along with an unwitting public.

But no, the real Saturday Night Live skit came the next night, and it confirmed to Mad Dog, he is not living in an alternate universe. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUpOMSJ1MdU

Oh, what a relief it is.

And, oh, by the way, Mad Dog just caught a glimpse of some Puffy White Guy (PWG) asking President Zelensky why he doesn't wear a suit and then asks if President Zelensky even owns a suit. To which Zelensky has the presence of mind to reply calmly, "Maybe after the war is over, I will wear a suit. Maybe better than yours. Maybe cheaper."

Which is to say, yes, my clothes are a statement about my own perception of where I am right now: in a battle for my life, in a battle for my country's life. Superman, Batman and Spiderman do not where suits when battling evil; they wear their battle fatigues, their olive drabs. The PWG cannot understand that, never having been on the front lines. In fact, as far as Mad Dog can tell, this particular PWG (Brian Glenn) has never even owned a uniform, combat or otherwise, never fought a war, never had a bullet fired at him in anger, not even from an assassin. His patriotism is the cheap type, trying to take cheap shots from the safety of the Oval Office, behind the couch. A frat boy with small balls.