The Dallas Cowboys have not been to the Super Bowl in 25 years. In that span of time 20 different NFL franchises—one of them, the Rams, from two different cities—have advanced to the Super Bowl. About two-thirds of the NFL have gone to the Super Bowl since Dallas last played in one in 1996, and yet television executives and fans and ESPN, judging from the coverage the Cowboys continue to garner, treat them not as their true selves but as their vestigial selves.

In other words, the Dallas Cowboys are trudging past on their prior reputation. They truly are America’s Team.

For America, if the past six weeks has taught us anything, is not as great as it likes to think it is, which is to say that we beat our chests at every opportunity and call ourselves “the greatest country in the world.” Are we? I’ll spare you the Will McAvoy lecture unless you explicitly want to click on it, but yes, the U.S.A. is tops in military expenditure, gross national product, gun deaths and incarceration. We are the most ROBUST nation in the world, and certainly the most violence-oriented. We’ve become the Empire from the Star Wars saga, which makes Washington, D.C., the Death Star.

We’re STRONG, but we’re not necessarily smart, not self-aware, not insightful and definitely, under this administration, no longer ethical. For the last one, just look at the stimulus bill the Republicans are attempting to pass in Congress. Huge money to major corporations with no tags attached as to how the money will be spent and who (the Trump Corp.?) would not be allowed to have access to it. A slush fund for the uber-wealthy, in essence.

As for the rest of it, last night the numbers were released: by the end of February, only a little more than three weeks ago, a grand total of 352 Americans had been tested for the coronavirus. Here we are three weeks later and more than 100x that have tested positive and some 537 Americans have died. By Thursday more than double the Americans who had been tested, in total, by March 1 will have died from the virus.

This wasn’t hard to see coming. The White House and the Senate Intel Committee was briefed on the virus a full month earlier, in January. Some Senators were smart enough to unload their stock—in February. But shore up the nation’s health care services in that month of time? Nope.

Last night New Mexico governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, who looks a lot like Katie Couric’s not-as-cute sister, was on The 11th Hour with Brian Williams. In her brief five-minute hit Grisham was able to explain that all New Mexicans are able to get tested free and she also explained the logistical problems with the testing process, how different companies provide either different materials or services so that you need to keep all of them up to date in order to get a single test through. A process not unlike being Red Panda spinning multiple plates.

In Grisham’s brief interview, I came away feeling that New Mexicans can feel confident in their leadership. Why? Because 1) she grasps the intricacies of the problem, 2) her priorities are in order: battling the disease as opposed to battling the stock market and 3) she came off as a person who’s interested in doing their job, not in her own glory.

I thought, How many of the 50 governors are worse than the president when it comes to dealing with this crisis? Maybe Florida’s, Texas’ and Oklahoma’s. All big Trump states, of course. Everywhere else, I’d trust the governor of a state (Andrew Cuomo, Jay Inslee, Grisham, just to name three) to handle this crisis far better than Trump is doing.

Meanwhile, this morning’s news tells us that Donald Trump is “losing his patience” with Dr. Fauci. Apparently, our president feels that Dr. Fauci is making him look bad. No, Donald, you’re doing that all on your own.

We’ll have 1,000 U.S. deaths by Sunday. Meanwhile, the President and his aides are preoccupied with keeping their stock portfolios or those of their major supporters robust.

How ’bout them Cowboys?

Social Media Distancing

I’m practicing it.

This is the only place where any of my feisty, condescending, arrogant and smug thoughts will be seen for the foreseeable future. Why battle all of Twitter when I’ve got Susie B.? I’m sure I’ll miss a lot of clever takes and other current thoughts, but it was time for me to go. Like an alcoholic, I found that Twitter was controlling me and not vice-versa. And if you’ve ever broken up with someone because you didn’t like the person YOU were when you were together, then I hope you can understand.

Namaste, bitches.