Ides of March Edition

The term for this morning has assumed, in our derivative language, a simple connotation of impending or immediate anguish. It is the “Ides of March.” In a more rigorous context, this is the 74th day in the ancient Roman calendar. It now has passed from Julian to Gregorian, as our 15th of March. The Romans marked the Ides with religious observances to their sundry Gods. It was also a fiscal deadline as well, one in which personal and governmental debts were settled.

It also gained a notoriety that continues today. In 44 BC a significant debt was paid. Julius Caesar was pierced by several blades in the Forum in an attempt to forestall a turning point in Roman history. Caesar summed it up himself as he lay dying, looking up at one of his former friends: “Et tu, Brute?”

That is Shakespeare’s version, anyway. Great Caesar was referring to Marcus Junius Brutus, whose knife had penetrated his white toga. We normally mark this as a casual turning point that marks the first appearance of blazing pink blossoms on both sides of our river. This year it seems to recall some of the drama playwright Will attempted to recreate, and ours have more people with knives than confronted poor Julius on the rostrum.

The Russians commemorate this day as one for elections, possibly due to the historic significance. There is no question of Mr. Putin’s re-election, since it is a certainty. That is not reflected in our system of governance, since there are some startling developments to report from both House and Senate.

We normally refer to the stuff that happens on the east side of the Big River as “On the Hill, they did some things incomprehensible to ordinary citizens.” But complex as things used to be, they are in real turmoil today.

Senior body first? Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is the first Senator of the Jewish faith to hold the position. Yesterday, he spoke for 40 minutes on the Senate floor calling for Prime Minister Netanyahu to be deposed. That could have repercussions not only with him, but also the Saudis, who had been cooperative in the Abraham Accords orchestrated in a previous administration. This is all remarkable, but reflects part of the major conflict in progress in the base of his party. He holds a razor-thin majority and confronts a sharp division between those who support Tel Aviv and Gaza.

In the Junior Chamber, an even smaller majority is threatened. Details first. Colorado GOP member Ken Buck had previously announced he would not seek re-election to the seat he has held since 2015. He stunned the chamber this week with a declaration that he would resign next week, shrinking the GOP majority to a single seat.

The five-hour testimony of former Special Counsel Hur regarding his investigation of the sitting President colored the whole day. He did a competent and professional job in a sticky situation. He wasn’t allowed to recommend prosecution of the sitting Chief, even if clearly guilty, while at the same time not asking the question about suitability for re-election. Hur came up with a plausible but awkward model. The one that seemed to work best was “guilty but unlikely to be convicted due to….” That left a plain question about cognitive ability to lead the Free World, but no one asked. Hur had a great performance on TV. Smooth, unrattled and prepared.

If we thought things were complicated today, on the 74th of the Roman year, we could see Democrat firebrand Hakeem Jeffries as the next Speaker of the House. There will be fireworks should that occur. In the meantime, a single seat majority requires all party members to be present and engaged to impact wherever it is we are going.

We took a vote a couple years ago in the Writers Section as a matter of attribution the Legal Section was yammering about. Most of us had stumbled through Government careers. We considered registering for either of the big parties to be a potential liability, depending on who was in charge. As a group, our inclination was normally to vote for candidates on the right, since they generally- though not exclusively- supported strong Defense and Veteran’s issues of immediate concern. The Social stuff just made us all uncomfortable, partly through past experience.

We should also point out that there used to be a sort of situational balance. We preferred to travel with Democrats like New Mexico’s Bill Richardson when the opportunity rose, since he was a great deal more fun than the somewhat staid GOP members. A lot of that inside-baseball stuff changed recently, and some of it did not make a great deal of sense in any context we thought we still understood.

Here’s an example: the term ‘RINO’ came into use to describe some of GOP leaders. That acronym refers to the term “Republicans in Name Only.” We thought it a comic term of disparagement, since we had previously voted for two of the ‘Saurs- John McCain and Mitt Romney.

As mentioned, some of us who were registered Democrats were old school. More interested in making things work more to their inclinations and usually in the majority. They were confident that Mr. Obama’s election represented the triumphant end of the Civil Rights struggle in which they participated most of their professional lives. As you may have noticed, it didn’t seem to have worked out that way.

At our informal internal poll, we came to a unanimous conclusion. We now are 100% Independent, a condition in which we recognize we have no power in whatever game is going on now. Our calculus is simple. We no longer worry much about the intricacies of the major players and relax until we can figure out who the least damaging autocrat might be. Others may feel the same way, and maybe there would be grounds for another Whig Party-style farewell.

Should there be a change and Rep. Jeffries become Speaker, all current investigations will be killed and legislative warfare will ensue. The Congresses we worked with didn’t play the game this way. It was high-elbows, sure, but not this visceral way. Based on rhetorical history, the House chamber is predicted to be thrown into total chaos. This, of course, is partly predicated on the results of the endless election season.

We knew this would be one of, if the not the most volatile and destructive election years in our lifetimes, though some of us are taking revisions to the one that elected- and abruptly terminated- that of John Kennedy.

Splash is our member without fear. He leaned back on his camp stool and said; ‘’Oh boy, are we in for an ugly and devastating election year and beyond. I fear for our republic.” Then he got a couple fingers of whiskey and made it disappear.

Rocket laughed. “I think we may already be past that part. But it is certainly going to be interesting.” He checked to see if Splash had left anything in the whiskey bottle.

Copyright 2024 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com