It’s April Fool’s Day, and I wish I was fooling.
Israel
Let’s see: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had hernia surgery – Gaza was safe while he was under full anesthesia. Meanwhile the Israeli Supreme Court; the one that Netanyahu tried to emasculate, found a way to strike back. They ruled that Orthodox Jewish men, until now exempted from military service, are required to serve.
Their decision strikes right at the heart of the coalition keeping the Prime Minister in power, centered in Orthodox political parties. That and the mass protests in the streets demanding that Israel get the hostages back from the Hamas terrorists, are putting inexorable pressure on the government to hold elections, one that “Bebe” isn’t likely to win.
Germany
And the German newspaper Der Spiegel and CBS’s Sixty Minutes teamed up to finger Russian Intelligence for using audio weapons against US diplomats and intelligence operatives overseas. That’s something that the US government denies, for some reason.
We’ve all known about this for a while, the debilitating headaches, hearing loss, and memory issues; called the “Havana Syndrome”. It’s been going on for years, and while six of the seven US intelligence agencies think it’s a “low probability” that’s Russian Intelligence is behind it, Sixty Minutes and Der Spiegel says they’re wrong. “Who you gonna believe?”
Los Angeles
And the minimum wage for fast-food workers in California went up to $20 and hour. That sounds like a lot, until you realize that the rent in Los Angeles is 39% higher than the national average, $2100 a month (versus $1500). More specifically, a Big Mac costs $5.89 in California, a $1.40 more than it does here in Ohio (Mac Menu). Since the cost of living in higher, it seems reasonable that wages should keep up ($20/hour for 2000 hours a year-full time, $40,000).
Baltimore
They’re beginning to take apart the sub-surface jigsaw puzzle that is the Francis Scott Key bridge in Baltimore harbor, but there’s no estimate yet as to how long it will take to get the Port of Baltimore back open. It is a recognition of the urgency, though, that in five days they already have floating cranes in place to start the wreckage clearance.
And, by the way, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg didn’t call the bridge a “racist” bridge. That was “fake news”, now becoming more and more difficult to discern in our social media feeds. (Oh, and the Captain of the cargo ship that hit the Key Bridge wasn’t a Ukrainian either, he was from India).
Russia
Russian President Vladimir Putin called launching an attack on a NATO nation “nonsense”. Then he went onto say that any nation that had F-16 fighters bound for Ukraine were possible targets for Russian strikes. He didn’t seem to have a problem with the contradiction, though Putin’s well aware of the “cost” of an attack on NATO countries. No surprise that Putin wants to “stir things up” some more.
Ex-Presidents
But none of those important issues dominated the newscasts, either the Sunday news shows or April Fool’s Day broadcasts. Once again, the ex-President, running for re-election, is dominating the news-cycle with his new fundraising effort; $60 for a “Trump Bible” (AP). The world was quick to point out the contradiction of a man facing a criminal action resulting from an affair with a porn star “hawking” the Bible, but the real point is his “sale” confirms his strategy once again. And, of course, he’s attacking the family members of the judges in his trial in his Truth Social – faux Twitter, on Easter Sunday. But Trump knows that any news, any coverage, is better than no coverage at all. And he’s not paying a media fees for the lead in almost every newscast.
News sources try to be “balanced” (not “fair and balanced” – that was the Fox News Network, which wasn’t either). So they cover the ex-President. After all, he is the presumptive nominee of a major political party. That is supposed to “balance” the Biden coverage, where the President is getting things done in Baltimore, and raising a record $26 million with his friends, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Trump doesn’t seem to have those kind of friends (though “Proud to be an American” writer Lee Greenwood is standing with him selling Bibles).
It doesn’t have to be all about Trump, all the time. There’s a whole world going on outside of the election of November, 2024 — No Fooling.
