CONVERGENCE

I am not much for astrology, but it does seem that the planets must be aligning in some peculiar ways right now.

Jerry Springer, whose show was at least 50% bleeped expletives has died on the same day that reports emerged that *ucker Carlson’s demise was attributable to vile and profane texts and emails he had sent — but redacted from the texts provided to the opposition during the Dominion litigation.

Allegedly, the executives at Fox knew nothing about this until after the case settled. That of course is poppycock. Fox’s lawyers did the redacting, and they obviously communicated their findings to the Murdochs who, among almost everyone else on the planet, were the subjects of *ucker’s verbal abuse.

Upon learning of *ucker’s derelictions, they knew they had to get rid of him — but they could not risk doing so before the Dominion case was resolved. The spectre of Carlson taking the stand with an axe to grind against Fox was both chilling and likely an impetus to reach a settlement.

But back to Jerry Springer. Whatever he may have contributed to the zeitgeist, he did find an amazing number of people willing to come on his show for the specific purpose of humiliating themselves on national TV. If you only watched the show once or twice, the image of the archetypical Springer Guest is seared in your mind.

And though the show has been off the air for a few years, its descendants live on in the halls of Congress. I am specifically referring to Marjorie Taylor Greene, Paul Gossart, Lauren Boebert, Jim Jordan, Matt Gaetz and Louie Gohmert.

Tell me that you can’t picture them screaming at each other (and that cheating Kevin McCarthy) on the Springer show.

The entertainment value quickly drops away when you recognize that these people wield power.

Yesterday the Montana House of Representatives Republicans exiled transgender state representative Zooey Zephyr from appearing on the floor of the House because she had had risen to defend transgender children from being denied medical care under a pending piece of GOP witch-burning legislation. As in Tennessee, Republican politicians will tolerate no debate or disagreement — preferring instead to oust the opposition for “lack of decorum.”

Lack of decorum. From the party which has given us Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert heckling President Biden during the State of the Union speech?

I can’t wait for Uranus to be in retrograde.