By Jon Bauer / Herald Opinion Editor
Fortunately for us, wiseacre satire requires no confirmation hearing before the U.S. Seante:
Shhh, you’ll ‘woke’ the kids: President Trump on Wednesday rescinded a directive issued Monday night that froze about $3 trillion in congressionally approved federal funding that threatened assistance programs including Medicaid, Head Start, Meals on Wheels, suicide call lines, substance abuse treatment, food banks and more. The Trump administration sought to suspend the programs until they could be vetted for Marxist and “woke” ideology, but lawsuits from 22 states, a judge’s order and vocal opposition forced Trump’s reconsideration. Yet, Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary insisted: “This is NOT a recission of the federal funding freeze.”
Give Leavitt credit. It only took Trump 1.0 Press Secretary Sean Spicer two days following Trump’s swearing in to insist he had “the largest audience ever to witness an inauguration.” Leavitt lasted more than a week before rolling out an “alternative fact.”
In deep-something: The release of a Chinese-developed artificial intelligence chatbot — DeepSeek — sent U.S. tech markets tumbling early in the week, because the Chinese AI is on par with OpenAI’s and Meta’s most advanced models, yet was cheaper to develop and consumes less energy. This after President Trump announced Stargate, a $500 billion AI infrastructure investment involving OpenAI and others tech firms.
As it has with TikTok, Congress and the Trump administration may look to force the sale of DeepSeek to a U.S.-based company if it wants to operate here. But if it waits for four more Chinese-developed tech apps, it might get a better deal: With six you get eggroll.
Is there a vaccine for contradictions? During a U.S. Senate confirmation hearing, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., nominated for secretary of Health and Human Services, was challenged by Democratic senators over conflicting and controversial statements he’s made regarding vaccines, which he now says he supports. At one point, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., held up photos of infantware sold by an antivax organization Kennedy co-founded, with the messages including “Unvaxxed, Unafraid” and “No Vax, No Problem.” Asked Sanders, “Are you supportive of these onesies?”
Kennedy, who recently completed party-reassignment surgery, replied that he was supportive of both vaccines and the onesies because they’re made of organic cotton and vegetable dyes, and besides, “Babies can’t read, especially upside-down.”
Water’s for fightin’: President Trump, who has said that federal disaster aid to California may be conditioned on that state’s reform of water policy, apparently believes that Gov. Gary Newsom can turn a large faucet in the state’s north to fill reservoirs and fire hydrants in the state’s still-burning south but refuses to do so to save a small fish, allowing “this enormous water supply to flow wastefully into the Pacific Ocean.”
In fact, if you want an example of how an efficient, nonwoke river should operate, take a look at the Colorado; by the time that it’s kept golf courses a lush green in Utah and Arizona and reaches the Gulf of California — sorry, Gulf of Melania — it’s barely enough to keep the mud damp.
Quick, boil some water, get some towels and order a dozen glazed: An Alabama woman who gave birth in her car at a Krispy Kreme doughnuts parking lot, when her partner couldn’t get to the hospital in time, has named the 5-pound, 14-ounce boy, Dallas “Glaze” Bennett.
Kid, just consider yourself lucky you weren’t born at a Cracker Barrel.
Fact Check of the Week; Make Love, Not War Department: No, the Biden administration did not send $50 million worth of condoms to Gaza, as President Trump claimed this week. U.S. foreign aid programs spent $80.8 million to distribute contraceptives worldwide last year, and most of that was sent to Africa. None was sent to Gaza.
Trump is obviously confusing the condoms with the 10,000 one-ton bombs — at list prices, $160 million for the lot — that the Biden administration “sent” to Gaza via Israel last year. Easy mistake to make.
Email Jon Bauer at jon.bauer@heraldnet.com. Follow him on BlueSky @jontbauer.bsky.social.
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