Gail Collins: Bret, this is one of the mostinteresting openings we’ve ever had. Is this because you cancelled a summervacation reservation for the Trans-Siberian Railway? Or perchance the Russianreaction to your very powerful anti-Putin column?
Bret: I woke up on Saturday to the news thatmy name was on a list of 963 Americans barred for life by the Russian foreignministry from visiting Mother Russia. Which is about as upsetting as waking upto a call from your doctor who says, “It isn’t cancer” or a message from an exthat reads, “I was wrong about everything.”
Gail: You know, when people visit ourapartment, their favourite home decoration is almost always the letter DonaldTrump wrote calling me a dog “with the face of a pig.” If only you could getVladimir Putin to drop you a note saying “Looking forward to seeing you —Never!” it’d be the ultimate example of high-end hate mail.
Bret: I’m OK with the Russian sanction on meso long as it doesn’t involve poisoned underpants. Meanwhile, the war inUkraine rages on, abortion rights are on the line at the Supreme Court,inflation is high and the markets are tanking, and yet the most divisive issueof our time seems to be … Johnny Depp v. Amber Heard.
Are you taking a side?
Gail: Bret, I’m a big fan of Hollywood gossipas an antidote for dwelling too long on deeply depressing current events. Butthis one is pretty depressing itself and I kind of wish we could talk aboutsome other celebrity story. Hey, did you know Dick Van Dyke has signed up for afitness class at 96?
Bret: I did. Good to know we are bothattentive readers of The New York Post.
Gail: I guess everyone who watches late-nighttalk shows now knows that Depp is suing his ex-wife for defamation over a 2018op-ed she wrote in The Washington Post about domestic violence. Couldn’t be amore important topic, but the stories we’ve heard since — like the controversyover whether she defecated on their bed or if it was the dog — don’t reallybring a desirable kind of attention to spousal abuse issues.
Your thoughts?
Bret: Heard is a lot more convincing as anactress than she is as a witness. I also think the reason the trial hascaptured this kind of attention — aside from the pure entertainment value ofwatching two deeply troubled celebrity exes go at each other as if they werereenacting a scene from “Gladiator” — is that for many people it represents akind of corrective to the excesses of the #MeToo movement.
Gail: OK, we’re now at Disagreement Central.Men who are subject to those kinds of accusations obviously deserve to havetheir defences listened to. And nobody should automatically be seen as guiltyuntil the evidence is in.
Bret: Yes and yes.
Gail: But when it comes to issues of physicalabuse, a woman deserves immediate attention, partly just out of concern for hersafety. And because we’re trying to turn around a long human history in whichviolence against a sexual partner wasn’t seen as serious as violence againstanybody else.
Bret: Agree again, but while Heard has accusedDepp of being violent, she also said on the stand that “It’s always been my owntestimony that I hit Johnny.” I think the case serves as a reminder that thecurrent politicised vision of relationships — in which men always hold all thepower, including physical power; women are generally presumed to be thevictimised party, as well as the honest one; and romantic relationships aresupposed to abide by the dictates of a legal brief, not the alchemy of desire —just doesn’t conform to the way most people experience life.
Gail: If our readers want to mull this matterfurther, I really recommend our colleague Michelle Goldberg’s Heard-Depp columnfrom last week.
Bret: Michelle eloquently expresses the exactopposite of my view.
Gail: Speaking of eloquent, what about theprimaries that just occurred? The big one in Pennsylvania for the RepublicanSenate nomination, featuring Dr Oz versus Business Guy, is still unresolved.Which has got to be a plus for the Democratic nominee, John Fetterman. Anythoughts on that race?
Bret: My guess is that Fetterman will have atough time winning in November. He’s on the leftward side of a Democratic Partythat is struggling to overcome the perception that it leaned too far left inJoe Biden’s first year. Of course, Mehmet Oz and David McCormick, his closestopponent, could still tear the Pennsylvania GOP to pieces fighting for the1,000 or so votes that separated them in last week’s primary. The older I get,the more I realize that winning in politics is mostly a game of being slightlyless stupid than your opponent.
Gail: Embarrassing to look all around thecountry and see previously sane Republicans who now feel compelled to denyBiden won the election.
Bret: Those Republicans aren’t sane, but Itake your point.
Gail: Fetterman is overly colorful for mytaste, constantly showing up in shorts for public events and bragging about histattoos. But his policies are perfectly reasonable, and I think he has a realshot.
Bret: The other primary race that fascinatesme, Gail, is the one for governor in Georgia. Trump-favorite David Perdue ismaking a run for incumbent Gov. Brian Kemp’s job, and it looks like Perdue willlose in a rout. That’s all the more notable because Kemp stood by Biden’svictory in the state’s 2020 presidential election. It may be a good indicationthat Trump’s power in the party is finally beginning to wane.
Or is that just wishful thinking?
Gail: Maybe the rule on Republican primariesis that party voters will back the Trump candidate if they know virtuallynothing about the people who are running. If the endorsee is, say, Rep. MadisonCawthorn, the newly rejected 26-year-old congressional juvenile delinquent,they’ve got plenty of information to make a choice on their own.
Bret: On a related note, it will beinteresting to see if Marjorie Taylor Greene wins her GOP primary in Georgia.If she loses, maybe she can blame those Jewish space lasers again.
Gail: One primary that’s going to tell us alot about Trump’s ability to impose his will on an election where the votersare well-informed should be in Wyoming. Will Liz Cheney get renominated? That’dcertainly leave our former president gnawing on a Mar-a-Lago porch railing.
Bret: Whatever happens to Cheney — and thingsdon’t look great for her right now — she’s earned her own chapter in somefuture sequel to John F. Kennedy’s “Profiles in Courage.” After the recentshooting in Buffalo, New York, she tweeted that the “House GOP leadership hasenabled white nationalism, white supremacy, and antisemitism.” There’s a wordfor that kind of magnificent honesty, often associated with bowling, tennis orgolf.
Gail: Of course the Wyoming primary isn’t untilAugust. Plenty of stuff to look forward to before then. As well as watching theactual government in operation. How do you think Biden’s doing these days?
Bret: Well, he’s done a much better jobstanding up for Ukraine than I had expected he might, and I’ll give him and hisnational security team full marks for that.
On the other hand, homicide rates in majorAmerican cities were 44% higher in 2021 than they were in 2019, and there’s apalpable sense of lawlessness and urban decay in one downtown after another,including a random killing Sunday morning on the subway in New York. That isn’tBiden’s fault, but it adds to a perception of Democratic misgovernance.
Gail: Conservative refusal to control gunsales is my nominee for the Misgovernment Medal.
Bret: Inflation hasn’t been this high in 40years and it can cost more than $100 to fill a tank of gas. We may have beenspared a migration crisis this summer, but only because a Trump-appointed judgeblocked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s effort to end Title42. We also seem to be teetering on the verge of a recession, which would be …bad. Despite all this, the White House seems to think that Biden is a plausiblecandidate for reelection in 2024, which at this point looks about as likely asthat vacation I was supposed to take in Vladivostok.
My question for you is, when do Democratsstart panicking?
Gail: Well, the first panic-possible moment isthis fall, when we see how the midterm elections go. Can’t actually say I’mfeeling optimistic right now, but I do believe there’s a huge differencebetween Democrats Can’t Govern — the big issue this fall — and Who Wants TrumpBack?, which will be the big issue in two years.
Totally confident right now that mostAmericans don’t want Trump back. In fact that’s possibly the only question inwhich Biden definitely comes out the winner.
Bret: A decent strategy unless Ron DeSantis isthe nominee.
Gail: Not a fan of Biden acknowledging nowthat he won’t run again, as I’ve mentioned before, but I do admit one pluswould be bringing the race for 2024 up front right away and giving the newtalent a chance to show itself.
Bret: Glad to have possibly won you over onthat point. Last thing, Gail, our readers shouldn’t miss Dwight Garner’sobituary for Roger Angell, The New Yorker’s great baseball writer, who diedlast week at 101. Always good to see one magnificent writer do justice toanother.
Gail: Amen.
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