November 24, 2019

by Steve Stofka

I’ll keep it short this holiday week and pass on a few things that caught my attention. The comedian John Oliver called it “whataboutism.” When accused of something, point to someone else and say, “What about them?” I thought the term was new, but Wikipedia says it goes back to 1960s Russia (Wikipedia, n.d.). I did it when I was a kid. My kids did it. In Russia, the practice is a national pastime.

In the impeachment hearings this week, several Republicans repeatedly defended their President of crimes by raising up the Steele dossier. Not familiar? There’s a book out by the two former Wall St. Journal reporters who formed Fusion GPS (NPR, 2019).  It’s the same argument Republicans gave to accusations regarding wiretapping at the Watergate complex.

Until the Supreme Court decided the 2000 election in Bush v. Gore, I thought the judiciary was above this. They were not. The decision was a rare one for the Supreme Court and it was careful to note that the decision set no precedents (Oyez, n.d.). A few months later, the stock market began its hard fall from the dot com boom, China was admitted into the World Trade Organization and later that year, the tragedy of 9-11. That election and the year 2001 marked the end of American innocence. By the time President Bush stumbled into the Iraq war, we were wearing the masks of our own folly.

Now Russia’s Putin smiles wryly as he watches the Americans behaving like Russians. When accused of something, point to someone else and say, “What about them?” Every week comes another revelation of secret visits to Ukraine by someone on the Trump squad. Devin Nunes, the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, has just been fingered by Lev Parnas, one of Mayor Giuliani’s indicted Ukrainian fixers. In a crowd of crooks, who knows what the truth is? Putin sees the arrogant Americans pointing fingers at each other and smiles.

Let’s move on to other news. County by county surveys reveal that half of single person senior households have trouble meeting basic expenses each month (Elder Index, 2019). Ouch. A quarter of two-person senior households have the same problem. I was even more surprised to learn that seniors can now live less expensively in Los Angeles than in Denver. Whether renting or having no mortgage payment, costs were higher in Denver. Another ouch. Denver has California-itis. Interested readers can check the web site in the notes below and compare counties of their choosing.

There’s got to be some good news in this week’s blog! Sales of existing homes climbed 4.6% in October. Hooray. On the other hand, less than a third of those sales were to first time buyers, who are getting left out of the market.

Ok. I’ll stop. Next week, I promise I’ll have some cheerier news.

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Notes:

Elder Index. (2019). The Elder Index™ [Public Dataset]. Boston, MA: Gerontology Institute, University of Massachusetts Boston. Retrieved from ElderIndex.org

Haddad, T. (2019, November 23). After Giuliani ‘Fixer’ Alleges Nunes Met with Ukrainian Officials to Seek Biden Dirt, Congressman Threatens to Sue Media. Newsweek. [Web page]. Retrieved from https://www.newsweek.com/parnas-lawyers-nunes-ukraine-officials-meeting-lawsuit-1473679

NPR. (2019, November 22). Book Reviews: In ‘Crime In Progress,’ Fusion GPS Chiefs Tell The Inside Story Of The Steele Dossier. [Web page]. Retrieved from https://www.npr.org/2019/11/22/781589327/bosses-of-fusion-gps-tell-the-inside-story-of-the-steele-dossier

Oyez. (n.d.). Bush v. Gore. [Web page]. Retrieved from https://www.oyez.org/cases/2000/00-949

Photo by Steve Stofka

Wikipedia. (n.d.). Whataboutism. [Web page]. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism#Soviet_and_Russian_leaders_usage