George Orwell, Joe, And Carl May 28, 2025 If you’re short on time, the new book by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson is perfectly summed up in its subtitle: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again. A Shakespearean tragedy, complete with an epigraph from King Lear: “They told me I was everything. ‘Tis a lie, I am not ague-proof.” Knowing many of the players first-hand — one has been a friend for more than 30 years — I’ve been riveted. That friend is SO smart, SO decent, SO focused on doing good for the world . . . . . . and it would have been SUCH an obvious win for Joe to have quit while he was ahead, as I wrote after the debate (and would have written much earlier, had I known) . . . . . . that I keep thinking as I turn the pages: how could this have happened? A clue comes right up front, where the author’s quote George Orwell: We are all capable of believing things which we KNOW to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield. It may apply to the people in Joe’s inner circle who didn’t persuade him to step aside sooner . . . . . . and it definitely applies to the tens of millions — like Carl — who believe Trump won the 2020 election. That he had the largest Inaugural crowd in history. That Democrats hate America. Et cetera. (He, of course, would say I have it exactly backwards: that the Orwell quote applies to the tens of millions — like me — who believe Biden won the election. That he made America stronger by passing the infrastructure bill and the CHIPs act and strengthening our alliances. That Biden finally solved the border crisis with a durable bipartisan immigration bill — only to see Trump kill it.) I get emails from Carl after every post — sometimes more than one — where he tries to get me to see the light. A small recent sampling: > In response to Sunday’s post: You and your heroine Marilyn Kunce conveniently ignore the law-fare your communist Democrats and the bias press put this country through. You and she conveniently ignore the moral depravity of antisemitism your communist Democrats ignore and put this country through. You and she should move and live in the cartel run Mexico. (Carl frequently calls me and others Marxists and communists without, apparently, knowing what Marxism or communism is.) > In response to the one about kids now being able to buy machine guns: This is why Jewish kids need machine guns! [Photo of the terrorist who murdered two outside Washington’s Jewish Museum last week.] But your silence confirms you don’t give a Schiff! And earlier that day: << Kids can now buy machine guns! >> Everyone needs them now since Democrats opened the border and let in millions of unvetted criminals! (Carl believes “millions” of undocumented immigrants are criminals — a wild, preposterous exaggeration. In fact, the undocumented are less likely to commit crimes — and crime is way down from when Carl was in his heyday.) << Ten who got $365 billion richer last year may now get a huge tax cut! >> The top 1% of taxpayers paid 40.4% of all federal income taxes. But you knew all that and just don’t give a Schiff! Andy you’re still a Schmuck and sadly will never change. (The top 1% paid 40.4% of all federal income taxes. But if you add payroll taxes and sales taxes to the total tax collected from Americans each year, their share drops to 22%. And in any event — so what? The top 1% own something like 31% of our collective net worth . . . so should perhaps shoulder 31% of the overall tax burden?* Or even more, because they can so much more easily afford it? And have so much more greatly profited from the America’s system and infrastructure?) > In response to 1.0 Actually Wasn’t That Bad, Other Than . . . (“I don’t know who wrote this,” it began) Carl entirely ignored the endless list of horriblenesses and offered, instead: I don’t know who wrote this… [seashell photo] But THEY do: << The Secret Service is investigating after ex-FBI Director James Comey posted an Instagram photo of seashells arranged to make the numbers “86 47” — a message that White House officials swiftly condemned as an attempt to put out a “hit” against the 47th president. >> And THIS is the type of people you are proud to be associated with! Andy you were so much better than this. What happened? (I’ve never met James Comey but would be proud to be associated with him.) There must be more than a thousand of these — he’s been sending them for years. And I take them to be well-intended. Having accepted the Trump reality, he believes that it is I, not he, to whom Orwell’s observation applies. Carl knows we should have secure borders (and we all agree he’s right) but ignores the fact that Trump killed the bi-partisan bill referenced above . . . and the fact that a decade earlier the Republican House speaker killed the sweeping immigration reform act approved by the Senate 68-32 that Obama was eager to sign and that would have passed the House had he allowed it to come up for a vote. Carl knows crime is bad (and we all agree he’s right) but believes we want to “defund the police.” Many of us want to improve policing — bodycams, for example, have become widely accepted across the political spectrum as a good idea. But defund the police? Virtually no Democrat is or ever was for that. He knows men shouldn’t be allowed to compete against women in sports (and of course, again, we all agree). It’s just around the edges that many of us would rather leave these determinations to the NCAA and the Olympic Committee, for example, than to the federal government. We are not likely to change Carl’s mind. But only 23% of adult Americans voted for Trump. Some who did, believing his promises, now feel betrayed. And the huge percentage who voted for no one — who simply stayed home — might now be motivated to save our precious democracy. We can do this! Join . . . Indivisible! Join Field Team 6! Spread DIS-disinformation! Support the opposition! Join a No Kings protest Saturday, June 14 — or organize one of your own. Use ChatGPT to make a clever sign; then the nearest FedEx to print it on posterboard. You’ll be a star! *Perhaps, in meaningful part, by raising the estate tax on billionheirs and closing generation-skipping loopholes?