Pun Salad

Antonin Scalia used to joke that he needed a rubber stamp reading: “Stupid But Constitutional.” Many commentators at the moment seem to need something similar reading: “Stupid, Gross, Objectionable, Immoral, and Contemptible, But Not Actually Treason.” Unfortunately, even Mitt Romney has fallen into the bad habit of calling that which he detests “treasonous” — he is right to detest it, but wrong to call it treason.

I have covered some of this ground before. Whatever political disagreement you are calling “treason” — or “murder” or “genocide” — probably isn’t that.

The hosts of The View opened their show today with extended criticism of former congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard and Fox News host Tucker Carlson for allegedly spreading "false Russian propaganda" relating to Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine. They also called on the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the pair.

"They used to arrest people for doing stuff like this," lamented Whoopi Goldberg.

Perhaps Goldberg was referring to U.S. government efforts to root out Russian spies who fed information to the Soviet Union during the Cold War. It is a crime to share state secrets with hostile foreign governments. But that's not what Gabbard and Carlson are doing; it's not even close.

The development of COVID-19 vaccines is said to be one of the few successes during a pandemic that saw major failures in public health strategy and treatments. While the vaccines can’t prevent transmission, they have likely reduced mortality. Before the pandemic, there was almost universal trust in vaccines, and vaccine skeptics were a small but vocal minority.

With a life-saving vaccine during a major pandemic, one would expect more vaccine enthusiasm, but instead, it collapsed. What happened?

Ironically, the problem is vaccine fanaticism, which has caused vaccine skepticism, with problematic consequences extending beyond COVID-19 to trust in other vaccines. Vaccine fanaticism comes in many forms.

In their drive to increase uptake, the vaccine fanatics denied basic scientific facts, such as immunity provided by COVID recovery. This, despite numerous careful studies that showed that COVID-recovery provides better protection versus both infection and severe disease than the vaccine. Nevertheless, vaccine fanatics insisted that natural immunity shouldn’t “count” in the vaccine mandate schemes. By denying science, the vaccine fanatics created further public skepticism about the vaccines.

The runup to the Oscars is always filled with intrigue, as nominees try to cast themselves as victims or underdogs. For directing the woke Netflix Western The Power of the Dog, Jane Campion is the obvious choice to win Best Director this year (she would be only the second woman ever to take home the honor, plus the movie is about self-hating homophobia and so can hardly fail to win Best Picture) and got a major boost when her work was dissed by veteran cowboy actor Sam Elliott, who said her film was “a piece of sh**” and indicated he wasn’t fond of the movie’s “allusions to homosexuality.” Elliott looked like a bully (if not a homophobe), so things were looking brilliant for Campion.

But at the Critics Choice Awards last night, Campion made an ill-advised swipe at tennis’s Williams Sisters, who were present because the film about their family, King Richard starring Will Smith, was nominated for several awards (and won Best Actor for its star). Accepting Best Director honors from the critics’ group (don’t blame me; I voted for Kenneth Branagh), Campion rather arrogantly said, “You know, Serena and Venus, you are such marvels. However, you do not play against the guys like I have to.”