Dispatches from Vilnius

I was forced to sit through endless episodes of Friends because my two daughters loved the show.  They are 13 years apart so that meant I had to watch it all over again when my youngest daughter became a huge fan in her preteens.  I tried to avoid commentary as I didn't much care for the show but every once in a while I would blurt out something and be admonished for it.  So, I kept my thoughts to myself. My biggest problem with Friends was that it could have been set anywhere.  The twenty-somethings lived the lives of Reilly in what appeared to be a penthouse apartment with a balcony that looked out onto Central Park.  If they all came from wealthy parents, one could understand it, but here they were in an odd assortment of jobs trying to make ends meet.  I suppose the producers wanted to give their cast plenty of room to move around unlike the claustrophobic conditions of Seinfeld , which Friends was initially paired with on NBC. The cast were virtual ...

The House has been with a temporary speaker for more than two weeks now with nothing but toxic gas blowing from the Republican caucus that can't make up its collective mind as to whom to support for House Speaker.  First there was the little water rat from Louisiana, Steve Scalise, who went down in a floor vote and chose to abandon his bid.  Then came "Beavis" Jordan, the Ohio Congressman who appealed most to the insurrectionists but failed on three floor votes to be confirmed as speaker and has since stepped down.  Now, we have nine aspirants , only two of whom, Tom Emmer and Austin Scott, voted to confirm Biden's 2020 electoral college win.  The others "objected" to either Arizona's or Pennsylvania's election results. To be fair most of the the Republican members in the House objected to the election results, as they like to put it.  I suppose they thought it was their way of lodging a protest vote given that the Democrats controlled the House and ...

Marshawn Lynch certainly knows how to frame a story when he told Shannon Sharpe he laughed in Pete Carroll's face after that ill-fated call that cost Seattle Super Bowl LIX.  To hear Beastmode tell it , he headed straight for the locker room not wanting to see the Patriots kneel to close out the game.   The Seahawks were on the verge of establishing a dynasty, instead they became just another team to have won a single Super Bowl. To hear Pete  it was a good call just poorly executed, resting the blame on Russell Wilson.  I've re-watched that play any number of times and there is no way Russ could have seen Malcom Butler.  The small cornerback was lurking behind the much taller Lockette.  Russ assumed his man was open, only for Butler to perfectly time the throw and pop the ball right out of Lockette's hands and into his own.  Even if Ricardo had been able to hold onto the ball he would have been short of the goal line.  Everyone knew that pl...

Well, a few anyway ... Noted anti-vaxxer and conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has decided to drop out of the Democratic primaries and run as an Independent in next year's general election.  Ironically, he now poses more of a threat to Republicans than he does Democrats, as the RNC has released a list of 23 reasons not to support him .  The DNC has not released a similar list. I suppose the biggest worry came when RFK Jr. was invited to speak at CPAC .  He has also drawn a lot of conservative backers, although I imagine most of them did so thinking he would run as a Democrat and potentially draw votes away from Biden.  However that didn't happen.  He trails Biden by as much as 53% in the 538 polls  and is showing few signs of gaining traction.  Still, his 17% is higher than any Republican candidate running against Trump .  You have to wonder how he would do in the Republican primaries given that his signature issues are more in line with t...

Even in the best of times it is difficult to call out Israel for its heinous policies toward Palestinians since it annexed the territories in 1967, so it is not surprising that everyone is coming down on Cori Bush and Rashida Tlaib for the comments they made after the massive surprise attack by Hamas that has Israel scrambling to find dozens of hostages taken in the raid. But, if anyone is to blame for this violence it is Bibi Netanyahu.   When Bibi first came to power in the mid 1990s his goal was to fully absorb the Palestinian territories and make it all one Israel.  He has never had any intention of accommodating Palestinians, rather he imagined putting such a tight stranglehold on their divided territories that they would flee to neighboring Arab states like Jordan and Lebanon.  He pushed the Israeli settlements on the disputed territories until now we see half a million Israelis living on these occupied lands, most of whom are Eastern European and Russian Jewi...

I thought the Democrats might save Kevin McCarthy's hide by voting present during the snap vote on Wednesday but they let him hang.  Can't say I feel sorry for Kevin but I have to wonder if that was the wisest move given the next Republican speaker will be even more belligerent given the early choices .  Maybe the Dems have an alternative?  After all they only need 6 Republican votes to have a speaker of their own choosing.  However it is very unlikely that any Republican would be willing to serve as a Democratic proxy given the current political climate. McCarthy sealed his own fate when he conceded to the MAGA Republicans the ability to call a snap vote at any time during his tenure.  He probably thought no one would do it, but when all these indictments against Trump began rolling up this summer you knew the MAGAts would go to any lengths to try to close down the Justice Department.  Enter Matt Gaetz, a man who apparently bragged to his colleagues that ...

While I was waiting in the reception hall of the Counselor's Section for my appointment with the Federal Benefits officer I watched CNN news on the wall mounted television.  The embassy won't let you bring your cellphone into the compound.  I had to turn mine off and hand it over to security at the fortified entrance gate. The topic on the news was the imminent shutdown.  A relative handful of Trump loyalists were making all sorts of insane demands that had forced House Speaker McCarthy to approach Democrats for a compromise solution.  At the 11th hour yesterday an agreement was reached and a shutdown was averted .  Chuck Schumer is now seen as the man of the hour, but the temporary funding bill is only good for 45 days so we may repeat this ugly scenario in November.  I can only hope McCarthy won't let himself once again be led by the MAGAts in his party, as they only amount to two dozen at most, barely ten percent of his ruling majority.   These...