Before we depart on our “relaxing” planes, trains, and automobiles to have Thanksgiving with people we ignore all year, let’s take a look at how the Sunday shows gave us a few tips on how to survive the holiday.
We begin on CNN’s State Of The Union with Jake Tapper, who interviewed GOP Senator and physician Bill Cassidy.
Tapper confronted Cassidy — the deciding vote on Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s confirmation to be HHS Secretary — about the CDC website promoting RFK Jr.’s false claims linking autism to vaccines.
But after playing clips of Cassidy being played for a fool by RFK Jr., and even reading statements from JFK’s granddaughter calling out her grand-uncle’s hand in stopping lifesaving cancer research, Cassidy had had enough of this persecution:
CASSIDY: So, Jake, clearly, clearly, this conversation, you want me to be on the record saying something negative. And, of course, it makes news if Republicans fight each other. I get that.
TAPPER: I don’t even know that he’s a Republican.
CASSIDY: […] [S]o, Jake, I know it’s titillating, but I think we need to move beyond the titillation and actually what matters to the American people.
TAPPER: I’m going to turn to your health care plan because I know you really want to talk about it, but I will just say, this isn’t about titillation. This is about the fact that you are the chairman of the Health Committee and you voted to confirm somebody that, by all accounts from the medical and scientific community and his own family, including his dying cousin, this health secretary is actually making America less healthy when it comes to vaccines and studies.
Meanwhile, on NBC’s Meet The Press, Kristen Welker interviewed Treasury Secretary and human “eat the rich” meme Scott Bessent.
Bessent, as we’ve stated many times, is an aloof and out-of-touch asshole who probably should never speak to the press ever.
This week’s soundbites from him do not change that assessment.
We had denying reality:
WELKER: And yet some prices are going up of course. […] It’s at three percent now up from two percent in April when the tariffs were imposed.
BESSENT: No, no, no, no, no. They weren’t. So inflation hasn’t gone up.
There was this brilliant retort when Bessent was confronted about the tacit admission that tariffs are inflationary, after Donald Trump rolled back some of the tariffs he himself imposed, in order to save us from the tariffs he himself imposed:
BESSENT: Kristen, how much does your arm weigh?
WELKER: That I do not know.
BESSENT: Exactly. But you know how much you weigh, and you get on the scale every morning. Inflation is a composite number.
What in the Jonathan Lipnicki is Scott Bessent talking about?
But the whopper was this suggestion to save Americans’ money:
BESSENT: You know the best way to bring your inflation rate down? Move from a blue state to a red state. Blue state inflation is half a percent higher.
Blue states also have higher life expectancy and wages. But, sure, let’s:
Go ahead and sell your homes or break your leases.
Quit your jobs.
Move your kids’ schools.
Hire movers for a few thousand dollars for a cross-country move.
Find a new job.
Find a new place to live.
Put first and last month, plus security deposit down. (Because good luck buying a new house!)
Leave your family, friends, and community behind.
All in exchange for a half percent lower inflation rate, and a few fictional massacres in Bowling Green, Kentucky.
Truly, we should all take advice from billionaire common soybean farmer Scott Bessent.
We conclude with Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, from a special aired this weekend called FOX Business In Depth: The Flight Path Forward.
After a brief discussion on safety, the main issue of this interview, the former MTV Real World/Road Rules “all-star” hunkered down on the other issues keeping air travel from improving: the passengers.
DUFFY: But the golden age in transportation truly begins with you, the traveler. […] People dress up like they’re going to bed when they fly. I see people getting on airplanes and they’re having a hard time taking their luggage and getting in the oversized or the above bin. […] Be nice. Be courteous. […] Be in a good mood. Dress up. Bring civility back to travel. And I think everyone’s experience is going to be that much better.
Is wearing our Sunday best gonna magically give us more legroom, or make it easier to redress ourselves at the TSA checkpoint, after whatever kind of unwanted nude body scan we were lucky enough to be picked of, and rush to our gate with our tiny carry-on to avoid extra baggage fees? The “golden age of transportation” was such because it was luxurious. If you want travel to be “luxurious” now, you pay a pretty penny. So we’ll wear our athleisure outfits and slip-on shoes until you pry them from our worn-down husks!
Duffy and Fox Business weren’t done fucking lecturing us how lazy-yet-spoiled we plebes are.
INTERVIEWER: During the Biden administration, there was this push for greater passenger rights. What they wanted to do is they wanted to have the airlines compensate people, give them money if there was a delay, if there was a cancellation. But that is something that the Trump administration has said they do not want to do.
DUFFY: We took a more common-sense approach to it. […] If your flight is cancelled and you’re stuck […] here, well, we think the airline should actually refund your flight […] But if they changed your flight number and it’s going to fly at the same time, that doesn’t count as a cancellation, and they don’t have to refund you.
The Biden-Harris rules were a modest proposal to give travelers recourse after getting treated terribly. If you’ve ever had to make your way from one end of the airport to the other because of a sudden gate change, or lost your luggage because it flew on your original flight and not your changed flight, you get how Trump’s solutions are only common-sense for airlines.
Enjoy your travels, good luck at Thanksgiving dinner, and have a week.
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