DR: Here’s how to misinterpret America, Americans, and the midterms

AUDIO NOTE: It’s a long post, today, and therefore a long audio. To save myself some time I did most of it in one take. It’s therefore bubbling over with mispronunciations, self-corrections, improvised riffs, and random musings that aren’t found in the text below. So it’s messy but fun. All you lurkers who come around…

“Half the Country”

Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton deleted confidential emails from the illegal server maintained at her private New York residence. Former National Security Adviser Sandy Berger was caught smuggling stolen documents from the National Archives by stuffing them into his clothes. President Joe Biden has been heavily implicated in the emails discovered on the laptop of his…

The Mar-a-Lago Mazurka

I had to scroll down quite a bit to reach Berlingske’s story about the FBI’s ransacking of Mar-A-Lago—an event unprecedented in American history. Republicans are furious: “When we get power back, people are going to be held to account”Sara Hodzic, Berlingske.dk, August 9 On DR’s website, the story was just beneath the metaphorical fold: Ransacking…

American Bogeymen

A project at the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics has been looking into the polarization of American culture and politics in the hopes of finding an antidote. In their own words, they hope to “use innovative polling and data analytics to identify America’s political fissures, and explain ways to foster compromise.” That’s fancy talk…

The Phantom Menace

G.K. Chesteron opens up The Superstition of Divorce with a passage I think I’ve already quoted somewhere on this blog: It is still in some strange way considered unpractical to open up inquiries about anything by asking what it is. I happen to have, however, a fairly complete contempt for that sort of practicality; for…

Bad News

Europe’s given up on America, according to an article today from Berlingske: Europeans Turn Their Backs on America after Trump, and Denmark Stands Out on a Decisive Point, Kristian Mouritzen, Berlingske.dk, February 11 The subhead spells it out pretty plainly: “Europeans simply do not trust that the new president of the United States, Joe Biden,…

Chronicle of a Death Foretold

NOTE: Danish coverage of recent American events has been universally awful: whether on television, radio, web, or print, it’s all had the calm tone of MSNBC, the editorial equilibrium of the New York Times, and the penetrative historical insight of Vox. That is, it’s been a dumpster fire of unhinged and often uninformed hyberbole. Rather…

Fingers and Stones

Sunday morning, fresh cup of coffee in hand, I start browsing Twitter and run smack into this at the top of my feed: The article linked in that tweet is here: Tusindvis af bevæbnede amerikanere gør sig klar: – Der kommer en krig til november. Here’s the lede: “Der findes formentlig flere tusinde amerikanere, som…