Wondering on Wednesday (v215)

Ready... Set... Wonder!

Where to start with today's wondering, I wonder? 

How about with the retirement of Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman? He was one of the people who responded to a Congressional subpoena and testified before representatives in the House impeachment hearings, compared to the lesser men who responded, well, lesser-ly. 

Here's an excerpt from a statement released by his attorney.

You'll recall that Senator Tammy Duckworth, a veteran, was holding up promotions to top positions, pending a response from Defense Secretary Mark Esper on whether it was going to go ahead or suffer at the hand of the president's interference.  We've learned that Vindman's promotion had been approved by the Secretary of the Army Ryan McCarthy, and by Esper, and it was set to go to the president by the end of the week. 

So, here's the wondering: Who has confidence that Trump wouldn't try again to interfere, I wonder? Not me.  And who thinks that Esper or McCarthy would leave their positions, as Vindman did, in the face of the president's interference, if it came, I wonder?  Again, not me.  

What else am I wondering about today?  How long before a business owner declares a deeply held moral belief for not requiring their employees and customers to wear a mask? Or, conversely, one declaring a deeply held moral belief that masks must be worn, no matter what, by everyone on their property?  And what happens when an anti-masker demanding their constitutional rights to spend money runs into a business with a constitutional right to have convictions?  What's that court case going to look like, I wonder? And let's have one of the aggrieved parties be LGBTQ - that'll really put a mess in the gears, don't you think? 

Attorney General Snitty Snitty Bill Barr has said he doesn't think that law enforcement is systemically racist, but he does "think it is a widespread phenomenon that African American males, in particular, are treated with extra suspicion and maybe not given the benefit of the doubt.  I have to wonder what, in practice, the difference is between the two?  Any takers? 

What else?  Mary Trump's book is coming out early - goody for us, or something like that. The race is on to get snippets of it out in the public domain, so we've "learned" that Trump had someone else take the SATs for him, unless of course he didn't; we learned that lying was the rule of thumb, and apologies and showing emotion were not.  That, I don't think we'd argue with. And why did Mary write the book?

Donald, following the lead of my grandfather and with the complicity, silence and inaction of his siblings, destroyed my father. I can’t let him destroy my country.

So. What's the wondering here?  Simply this: if anyone reads the book, I wonder if they'll believe what they've read? I'm guessing that's another no, but I could be wrong. My guess is this book will be about as exciting as learning about Trump's $130K payouts to the porn stars - 'wow' followed by 'eww' followed by 'ick, or something.  The other wondering on this? of all the folks who have written about Trump, which one will win the book sales race? 

And finally, it seems that the administration may be contemplating banning TikTok from America, even if we don't know for sure why. On the one hand, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said it's to protect American data and national security.  The president said it's being considered because of the coronavirus. The real reason might be something entirely different: Kellyanne Conway's daughter is apparently a #neverTrumper and a pro #BLM TikTok activist (unless she's just being a normal teenager).  So, which is it, I wonder - national security, coronavirus, or Claudia Conway?

What are you wondering about tonight?