By Bob Gaydos

Special Counsel Jack Smith.

  The first season of Jack Smith saves democracy finally started steaming into our consciousness in Washington, D.C., this week as the special counsel (1.) leveled three federal counts against Donald Trump for attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election, a coup, in effect, to which the now thrice-indicted defendant’s lawyers (2.) kept arguing that free speech gave Trump the right to lie about losing the election, which Smith never denied or charged him with and which (3.) former Vice President Mike Pence suddenly realized he always had a right to when he said (out loud and in public) that Trump asked him to reject the votes of the legitimate electors on Jan. 6, which apparently (4.) prompted Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, whose bid for the GOP presidential nomination in 2024 has been a disaster, to also forget the see-no-evil, hear-no-evil, speak-no-evil GOP mantra and say, “Of course he lost the election,” when asked about Trump and 2020, even as (5.) other Republicans stuck to the script and plotted with the “conservative” Heritage Foundation to devise a “battle plan” for the first 180 days of a Republican presidency in 2025, including a strategy that would negate current efforts to slow global warming by eliminating regulations to curb greenhouse gas pollution from cars, oil and gas wells and power plants, dismantling most clean energy programs in the federal government and increasing the production of fossil fuels, even as (6.) the planet suffers through the hottest year on record, which, no one is admitting but seems at least plausible, (7.) could have contributed to flight controllers at NASA’s Cape Canaveral losing track of the Voyager 2 spacecraft for several weeks because they were, in effect, looking in the wrong place, which (8.) is what President Biden told Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville, who has been lobbying to move the new Space Force headquarters from Colorado, where the Air Force Academy is located and recreational pot is legal, to Alabama, where anything Republicans don’t like (abortion, LGBTQ rights, voting rights …) is illegal or tough to come by, when Biden rejected an order by Trump, who created the new military force, to locate it in Alabama, thereby also (9.) sending Tuberville a nasty message for his one-man crusade of putting a hold on hundreds of top Defense Department promotions, which has resulted for the first time in (10.)the Marines and Army both operating with acting commanders and the Joint Chiefs being short-changed, all because (11.) one man objects to a Pentagon plan to provide transportation to service members needing to go to another state for an abortion, a sensible plan in the same vein as (12.) a new Pentagon policy that places control over military sexual assault cases in the hands of a team of independent prosecutors, rather than base commanders, thereby eliminating coverups and favoritism, a policy which came in response to numerous complaints from female service members which led to (13.) legislation creating the new policy, which was spearheaded by New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, and which Biden signed into law, displaying a concern for the health and well-being of Americans in uniform that (14.) was seriously lacking in the case of Anthony Rizzo, who gets paid millions of dollars to put on the uniform for the New York Yankees, and was apparently allowed to play (poorly as it turned out) for two months while suffering from post-concussive syndrome and also sharing a locker room with Domingo German, who (15.), only four weeks after pitching a perfect game, proceeded to trash the Yankee clubhouse, fight with teammates, get suspended for the season and sent to alcohol rehab, which (16.) gives a whole new level of meaning to the concept of functioning alcoholic and is topped for a New York headline only by (17.) the crosstown Mets trading away Max Scherzer, and Justin Verlander, their two aging super aces, whom they’re paying tens of millions of dollars to apparently try to win the pennant for two different teams in Texas, (18.) and that’s why reading the sports pages first thing in the morning isn’t as much fun as it used to be, aside from the fact (19.) in the current stream of things, you can’t find them anymore, but then, (20.) there’s always Jack Smith, Season 1, episode 1.

      Binge.

rjgaydos@gmail.com

BOB GAYDOS

THE REPORT … bad loans, Beyond burgers, UFOs, takeout

      So the cardinal count at our bird feeders has doubled. We now have two males. I take that as good news, believing there have to be two families close by that these dads are rushing back-and-forth to feed. By the way, there is no social distancing at the feeders.

     — Also by the way … Super stock analyst, TV star, Philadelphia Eagles fan and world-class speed talker Jim Cramer raised an important point on his CNBC show when he said, “I just want to know who made the bad loans.” The loans he was referring to came from the Paycheck Protection Program, part of the $2.2 trillion rescue plan passed by Congress to help small businesses affected by the coronavirus pandemic. Anyone casually familiar with social media the past few days is aware that many of these loans went to large corporations which were never intended to receive the money. Smaller businesses were shut out. In fact, the fund ran out of its original $349 billion cache after just a few days. When Shake Shack, the Los Angeles Lakers and other well-heeled companies were embarrassed by the publicity surrounding their getting the loans, many said they would return the money. But others said they would keep it.

       Two problems here. One, why did these large corporations even apply for the loans in the first place? Two, as Cramer wondered, who gave them the loans? “I think that banks were complicit. I think banks gave loans to very good customers, maybe because they needed to keep them afloat,” Cramer said. He said Americans are “sick” of this kind of behavior from banks and he’s absolutely right. Penalize the companies, who must have supplied phony info to even apply for the loans, and the banks, who surely knew. Make the names of those banks who approved the loans public, as Cramer suggested. Congress should investigate.

      — By the way … we finally found Beyond Meat burgers at the supermarket and created our version of a drive thru treat at home. Delicious. Of course, now, having already decided the Impossible Whopper is also delicious, some serious taste-testing is in order in the plant-based food wars. Any personal reviews out there?

     — By the way … speaking of out there, did you notice that little UFO item the Pentagon slipped out in the midst of the pandemic, maybe figuring no one was paying attention? It declassified videos

The Navy released this video of UFOs this week.

showing swiftly moving UFOs with the soundtrack of naval pilots expressing, well, awe. The videos were actually made public a couple of years ago by a private group, but the Pentagon had no official comment on them at the time. Recently, the Navy announced a formal policy on reporting UFOs. Apparently, the brass decided to believe their pilots were actually seeing something that they could not identify or explain. The Pentagon had a classified program to study numerous reports of such phenomena from 2007 to 2012, but abandoned it for what it said were more pressing priorities. The former head of that program resigned in protest in 2017 over the secrecy surrounding it. Retired former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, of Nevada, who pushed for the original program, tweeted that release of the videos now “only scratches the surface of research and materials available. The U.S. needs to take a serious, scientific look at this and any potential national security implications.” Or we can let the new Space Force handle it.

      — By the way … folks in my neighborhood have been familiar with the UFO phenomenon for a long time. In fact, Pine Bush, N.Y., has an annual parade/festival to celebrate its designation as the UFO capital of the Northeast. Nice event.  Unfortunately, it’s postponed this year until fall. Of course, some folks may think we’re a bit out of it, but It’s hard for me to discount the idea that there’s something out there and it’s intelligent, because it’s smart enough to stay away from us right now. Make a hard left at Earth, captain, and get out of the neighborhood fast.

       — Finally … scenes from a pandemic: Sitting in the parking lot waiting for our Chinese takeout. Customers preceding us waiting at the door, socially distanced, all wearing some variation of masks. When they leave, a silver hearse pulls up, white skull painted in the rear window and a spooky ghost in one of the side windows. Normal-looking lady wearing a mask gets out the driver side, goes in, picks up her takeout and drives away expeditiously. GrubHub? DoorDash? Thinking I’m definitely in a Coen brothers movie. By the way … I had shrimp lo mein.

Bob Gaydos is writer-in-residence at zestoforange.com.

rjgaydos@gmail.com