Return with me now to the 2020 election campaign, where one Donald John Trump daily ridiculed the Democrat Green Energy nuts with vignettes such as, “Darling, turn on the TV.”  “Sorry dear, you can’t watch TV today because the wind isn’t blowing.”  We laughed back then.  Trump may have lost the election, but as it turns out, he was proven right once again.  We saw a glimpse in February 2021, when frozen wind turbines in Texas of all places, stopped working, thereby contributing to widespread blackouts.  After that episode, so-called environmentalists were forced to choose between their Save the Whales mania and their Carbon Footprint psychoses, as the prevalence of offshore wind turbines appear to be causing the deaths of scores of whales all along the Eastern seaboard.  These obvious problems did nothing to stem the Biden Administration’s mindless push to destroy the oil and gas industry in favor of “the transition to renewable energy.'”  Despite the fact that wind turbines can’t replace so-called fossil fuels, and may do more harm than good, they are a large part of Biden’s renewable energy agenda.  Presumably this is because building these monstrosities requires multi-billion dollar government subsidies, along with the obligatory sweetheart contracts and graft attendant to all governmental boondoggles.  The truth is, we don’t have to build our own large-scale wind farms to prove they don’t work, because Germany has already shown us the proof.  For ten years, Germany has been pursuing its Energiewende policy.  Wind power was supposed to replace German dependence on imported Russian oil.  It didn’t work.  Germany still relies on Russian oil to meet 78% of its energy needs.  And wind power can’t replace the more than 6,000 products that are made from petroleum, including drugs and chemicals.  Petroleum is needed to manufacture the wind turbines themselves.  Some 70% of the components that go into the electric vehicles Green Whackos think we’re all going to drive are made from oil.  Without oil, your electric car has no tires, and for that matter, no road to drive on.  But we were talking about wind, right?  Biden and his henchmen have been touting wind power projects as proof of the success of Bidenomics.  The Administration hailed proposals for new wind turbine projects off the coast of New York called Empire Wind and Ocean Wind, which were supposed to produce enough energy to power 700,000 homes, but the companies building these projects just cancelled them.  The companies cited negative economic conditions, but just as easily could have said they just won’t work.  In Biden La-La Land, renewable wind power will do away with the need for oil and gas electricity generating plants.  Dream on Joe.  Let’s forget about the whole country for a moment, and consider just New York City.  If the proposed wind projects had been built they would have powered only 20% of the 3.6 million households in New York.  And the renewable energy dreamers really haven’t done the math, on little details such as, where to put all these turbines and how much land is needed to support them.  If we really could build these monsters, each turbine requires 1.5 acres of land.  For a farm of 150 turbines, you need 225 acres of ground.  How about enough to power New York City?  5700 acres, which is more than 40% of the land area of Manhattan.  You may not have noticed, but there is precious little undeveloped land around New York.  Can’t we build them in rural areas?  Unfortunately, no.  The transmission lines would have to be too long to make them efficient.  Oh, and by the way, if the object is to protect nature from the nasty fossil fuels, wind farms aren’t the answer, because they won’t work in wooded areas where trees create wind barriers.  Building turbines will require clearing all the trees, which is likely to dislodge the tree-huggers.  So just build them in the ocean, then.  Well, the problem there, apart from the dead whales, is that salt reduces the efficiency of the turbines up to 30%, and they’re more costly to build and maintain than land-based turbines.  The sad fact is that wind power, as  a way to move away from oil, is at best a fantasy, and at worst simply a new way to steal government money.  The turbines contain 8,000 parts, so what could go wrong?  Plus, you can’t transition away from oil, by building things that require massive amounts of petroleum to produce.  Manufacturing the steel requires oil.  Moving the components to the construction sites requires diesel powered trucks, cranes, and other heavy equipment.  There are no electric alternatives to these vehicles.  Construction of one foundation requires 750 cubic yards of concrete, that’s 60 diesel powered truck loads, and one way or another, you’ll wind up paying the Mob a premium for each truckload.  And you need oil to make the concrete, it can’t be made electrically.  Even if you manage to build these turbines, each one requires 80 gallons of lubricating oil a year.  There aren’t enough rare Earth metals available to make the batteries for electric cars, never mind the components of wind turbines, and mining for them destroys the environment we’re supposedly saving.  But say, we manage to build all the 300 foot tall towers we need.  Well, there are still several problems, most importantly the fact that, as Donald Trump noted, the wind doesn’t blow all the time.  Due to this immutable law of nature, you need some kind of battery to store enough power to keep the lights and heat on.  Right now there’s only one technology that can store enough power to last one windless day – Sodium-Sulfur batteries.   Except, each one weighs 450 million tons, takes up 923 square miles, and needs to be replaced every 15 years.  If the wind stops for more than 24 hours, I guess we put all the migrants on bicycle generators and yell, “Arriba! Arriba! Andale!”  And as it turns out, even high winds defeat the wind farm system.  The turbines operate best with a steady 20 MPH wind.  If the wind gusts to 55 MPH, you have to shut down the turbines or they’ll be damaged.  And of course, as Texas learned, cold temperatures lead to icing, and deicing requires using oil-powered helicopters.  So, against this backdrop, my suggestion is, the next time some environmental whacko tells you that wind will replace oil, tell him to blow it out his ass.

Well believe it or not, 2023 is coming to an end in a couple of days.  I don’t know where the year went, but now that it’s over, I thought we should assess some of the vital statistics that might reveal the state of our nation.  On a national level, we’re confronted with the Biden effect, which has devastated everything it’s touched.  Let’s look at the economy.  Corrupt Demented Imbecile Joe Biden, who as this is written is ensconced in the luxury estate of yet another billionaire toady on St. Croix, far from the pressures that life in the U.S. places on the little people, continues to insist that “All is well,” and the economy is great.  He even tried to use the catch-phrase “Bidenomics” to show what a great job he’s done.  The problem is, as with most things Biden, it was all lies, and even the compliant media now consider the word “Bidenomics” a joke.  And given the fast-approaching municipal debt crises left over from the Wuhan plague and the ever-growing housing bubble, which must burst some time soon, Bidenomics may soon become the 21st Century version of Hoovervilles.  All truly is not well in the economy.  No matter what number the Dow Jones Average reaches, people are hurting, and there’s just one man to blame – Joe Biden.  He insisted on spending money we don’t have, to boost federal spending beyond the highly inflated Wuhan virus spending years.  The deficit this year is $1.7 trillion.  The national debt was $27 trillion when Joe was elected.  It’s now $32 trillion.  Joe’s borrowing money from the Chinese to make up the difference.  This wasteful spending was absolutely unnecessary, as Biden appeared on the scene after the Wuhan plague was over, making the 2021 American Rescue Plan spending unnecessary and the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act spending as useless as the Act itself, which even Democrats now admit did nothing to curb inflation.  On the contrary, the profligate spending was the cause of the record inflation that has cost American families $700 more a month, just to pay the bills.  Inflation, less than 2% under Trump, ballooned to 9%.  In 2023, we’re told the rate is down to 4.5%, but that’s the rate of increase.  The $2 container of oatmeal is still $5.  The prices of everything are up, and they’re not coming down.  But it’s all in a good cause.  By robbing you, Joe Biden was able to give more than $100 billion to Ukraine.  Your pension may be gone, but your money is funding pensions for deserving Ukrainian bureaucrats.  Joe also needs the money to fund his illegal Student Loan bribe, eh, forgiveness program.  Fear not, though.  The Federal Reserve is on the job fighting the inflation Biden caused.  They raised interest rates 11 times in 2023.  Mortgages went from 3% to 8%.  This burdened the already overheated housing market.  Prices were sky high before the rates went up.  Now there’s little housing inventory available because people can’t afford to replace a house with a 3% mortgage with one at 8%.  Millions of people may be unable to move, but they have the comfort of knowing that even living in their old house may become unaffordable.  Biden Administration regulations are trying to outlaw gas stoves, ranges, boilers and water heaters.  Climate change you know.  Gas appliances emit CO2, and we can’t have that.  Biden says we must replace the appliances, and all our cars, trucks and buses, with electric, which is cleaner, because they will be powered by “renewable energy.”  Now, nobody has explained where this miraculous energy source is coming from, and it really doesn’t exist, but that’s not Joe’s problem.  Heating costs in New York are expected to double from what already are among the highest in the nation.  Your government at work.  The jobs picture for 2024 is equally unsettled.  It depends on who you ask.  Harry Truman once said, “If you placed all the economists end to end, they would point on all directions.”  He was right.  Forbes expects more hiring in 2024.  The Federal Reserve, which crippled us with high interest rates, unsurprisingly predicts that their actions will stem inflation and cause hiring to slow.  Take your pick.  But enough about money, how about population trends?  According to the Census Bureau, the U.S. population increased by 1.6 million in 2023.  Of course, that number doesn’t count the more than 10 million invaders who Joe Biden has let in since he took office.  And 10 million is what they admit to.  It’s much more than that.  Illegal border crossings in Texas topped 14,000 in one day just last week, and a massive caravan of deserving “migrants” is marching through Mexico as I speak, headed for the border.  Fear not.  Biden says the border is secure, and that’s good enough for me.  On the local level, the FBI tells us that, according to their figures, crime is down.  Someone once said figures don’t lie, but liars figure.  Anyone who’s been to any city knows crime isn’t down.  Arrests are down, because police have been handcuffed.  Prosecutions are down because enforcing the law has become unfashionable.  Fear and insecurity are up, and respect for the government is down.  Closer to home, New York City is in an uproar, experiencing budget cuts, which Mayor Adams blames on the 135,000 “migrants” who have come to NY in response to his invitation, as the Mayor of a Sanctuary City.  Adams says he must cut at least 5% from every department, and cancel planned Police Academy classes needed to replenish the dwindling Police Department.  The migrants aren’t the whole reason for the cuts.  Post-Wuhan, workers have not returned to NY 5 days a week.  Commercial real estate is in crisis.  Tax revenue is down from rents, and from loss of business.  No workers in the office, means no workers to patronize restaurants and shops.  The City is dying, but it’s fighting back.  How?  It’s passed a congestion pricing plan, that would charge a $15 a day tax on any car traveling below 60th Street in Manhattan.  They claim it will raise $1 billion to bail out mass transit losses of $2.5 billion.  Ridership is down due to remote work and the fact that some 40% of riders don’t pay the fare.  The City Counsel decriminalized turnstile jumping.  No crime, no arrest, no prosecution, no fare revenue, and soon, no city.  Adams wants Biden to just give him more money.  Biden declined, and instead has the FBI investigating Adams.  That’ll teach him to complain.  In short, the numbers of 2023 reveal that we are on the brink of a series of looming disasters, any one of which could be devastating.  Threat of global war, burning cities, a housing bubble about to burst, a potential economic crash, millions of hungry illegal alien invaders, lingering inflation, and a brain-dead government intent on making simple existence even more expensive.  Add to all this an upcoming election that’s bound to tear the country apart, and look out, here comes 2024.  Hold onto your hats.

Somehow, 2023 is coming to an end, and the festive holiday season is once again at our throats.  It’s a time for celebration, and reflection.  Unfortunately, what we  have to reflect on is the disgrace and obscenity which is the Biden Administration.  If all the Democrats wanted was to rid themselves of Donald Trump, they got their wish.  A president who really wanted to do what Corrupt Demented Imbecile Joe Biden told us he wanted to do, namely, return to a normal, orderly government, without the painful Tweets and other emanations  (a/k/a truths) being uttered by Donald Trump, Biden would have left the perfectly functioning programs alone, and taken credit for everything Trump built.  If you’ve forgotten, what Trump gave us was, no inflation, higher wages, lower taxes, a secure border, energy independence, no trouble from Russia, China, Iran, or North Korea, a revitalized military, a stronger NATO alliance, greatly improved trade agreements, and fewer regulations.  Biden reversed all Trump initiatives, which has left us begging Venezuela and Saudi Arabia for oil, with record high interest rates, runaway inflation, 10 million illegal immigrant invaders, the threat of global war, an impotent military, and crippling, freedom stealing regulations, designed to end oil production, take away your gas stove and dryer, and balloon energy prices; the stated goal being “equity,” which I guess means all Americans will be equally miserable, cold, and destitute.  But enough of reality.  It’s Christmas, so let’s celebrate the joy which is the Biden White House.

Even that has changed.  Here was the 2017 Trump White House at Christmas –

Classy and elegant.  Now here’s the 2023 Biden White House –

No comment.  But let’s get into the holiday mood with some Christmas carols, Joe Biden style.  Remember the promise of 2021?  Well, that went South pretty fast, so sing along with me –

It’s Beginning to Look a lot like Chaos

It’s beginning to look a lot like Chaos,
Everywhere you go,
Looters emptied the Five and Ten,
They released them on bail again,
And now they’re jacking cars and stealing dough.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Chaos,
No goods in any store,
But the most pressing sign to heed,
are the multiple locks you need on your own front door.

As election nears, four more years,
Is the wish of Jill and Joe,
But the working folk, who are going broke,
Just can’t wait for them to go,

It’s beginning to look a lot like Chaos,
Addicts line the street,
It may look pretty bad for Joe, Not for those who’re in the know, cause they know they’ll cheat.

Hunter the Blowman

Hunter the Blowman, was a crooked, stoned A-hole
With two bloodshot eyes, he made cocaine buys, then he smoked another bowl.
Hunter the Blowman, was a businessman they say,
People paid the dope, only in the hope his old man would grease their way.

There really was no magic in the deals that Hunter made,
there was quid pro quo, in return for dough,
and The Big Guy to be paid.

Oh, Hunter the Blowman
was indicted then you see, for the tax they say,
that he failed to pay, is he worried, no not he,
He just bobbed his chin, said, “The fix is in,
I’ll get off with one to three.”

Pad the Walls

Pad the walls, here comes Joe Biden
Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la
His trips and falls have been excitin’
Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la

He tries to speak, but only mumbles
Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la
Then walks away, but always stumbles
Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la

With a drooling fool to lead us
Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la
War and ruin soon will greet us
Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la

Follow me when voting draws nigh
Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la
And replace the senile Big Guy
Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la

CNN We’ve Heard You Lie

CNN we’ve heard you lie
Sweetly singing Biden’s praise
As you stifle all replies
That cut through the smoke and haze

Gloria, just keep shoveling bullshit
Gloria, just keep shoveling bullshit

Liberals why this jubilee?
What is there to celebrate?
What the gladsome tidings be?
Have you seen the interest rate?

Gloria, just keep shoveling bullshit
Gloria, just keep shoveling bullshit

Come to see reality
Him whose praise the liars sing
Addled mind, arthritic knee
Has your senile, thieving King

Gloria, we’re through buying bullshit
Gloria, we’re through buying bullshit

See the mammoth mess he’s made
Broken borders, prices soar
Next November, grant us aid
Throw Joe Biden out the door

Gloria, we’re through buying bullshit
Gloria, we’re not buying bullshit, again

Biden Claus is Coming to Town

You better watch out
You’re liable to cry
Your money’s tapped out
I’m telling you why, Biden Claus is coming to town

He’s got a long list
Of bribery and vice
He’s going to get rich
By raising his price, Biden Claus is coming to town

He’s harmless when he’s sleeping
He’s senile when awake
He wants to stay for four more years
Cause his family’s on the take

So, you better cash out
The market will tank
But Joe doesn’t care
He’s got a Swiss bank
Biden Claus is coming to town

Green Christmas
A solo by Joe Biden –

The sun is shining, the grass is green,
The muggers and migrants play.
There’s never been such a spree
in Old Washington, D.C.
It’s more than an 80 year old can bear —
And so I’m leaving for Delaware, oh

I’m dreaming of a green Christmas
Just like the ones I used to know
Where the donors shell out, while you we sell out,
To yield piles of dirty dough

I’m dreaming of a green Christmas
With every crooked Hunter deal,
May the FBI remain blind,
And our kickbacks remain hard to find

Yes things are pretty grim for Joe Biden these days.  Democrats are hoping he doesn’t run in 2024.  They’re counting on a Christmas miracle.  Join us now, as the Democratic National Committee choir sings it’s Yuletide prayer –

O Come O Come Obama Michele

O come O come Obama Michele,
And rescue us, for things have gone to Hell,
Old Joe will F up everything here,
Until the wife of God should appear,
Come quick, come quick, Obama Michele,
Or Trump again will in the White House dwell.

Well that’s all I have, so Merry Christmas to all.  Oh, and our Chief Executive wanted to share his holiday wishes –

The stand-up comedian Robert Klein once did a routine about antisemitism on a college campus, recounting his own days as a student at Alfred University in western New York State.  In Klein’s telling, he was regularly chased across campus by students yelling “Jew boy, Jew boy!”  How much of Klein’s routine may be attributed to artistic license remains to be seen.  All good comedy springs from true to life experiences, many of which were traumatic.  I’m sure this story is no exception.  The problem is that Robert Klein did that routine some 40 years ago, long before the so-called liberals, or progressives, or whatever euphemisms by which you care to call them, had had an opportunity to expose past bigotries, and had instilled the supposed tolerance for minority groups which they’ve always pretended to champion.  The sad truth however, is that although the Left pretends to be dedicated to stamping out injustice, its true goal is the suppression of any opinion that conflicts with its agenda.  Witness the current disgraceful examples of rampant antisemitism on college campuses across America.  The U.S. support for Israel following the October 7th Hamas attacks, which resulted in the murders of more than 1,400 Israelis, the taking of hundreds of hostages, and the wholesale rapes and murders of countless Israeli women has sparked unprecedented antisemitic attacks and protests in cities and on campuses from coast to coast.  While most older Americans support Israel by a wide margin, most young people oppose Israel’s military response to the unprovoked attacks, in effect siding with the Hamas terrorists who butchered babies.  Jewish students on college campuses have reported fearing for their safety, as mobs of pro-Palestinian protestors have harassed them, chanting, “Kill the Jews!”  And such protests aren’t going on in some rural backwater location, but have happened in New York City, home to more Jewish residents than any place outside Israel.  This perverted generation gap, while disgraceful, shouldn’t come as a surprise.  Older Americans support Israel because they either lived through, or were taught about the Holocaust, and experienced events like the 6 Day War, at a time when the reporting of the news wasn’t distorted by Woke journalists, or the outright media liars who populate newsrooms today.  And you really can’t blame the young for having a distorted view of events, because they are the victims of decades of educational malpractice, courtesy of an educational system that hires only leftist ideologues, and teaches “history” from the perspective of Communist Howard Zinn, whose textbook, A People’s History of the United States, teaches American history from the Marxist perspective, as the struggle of the oppressed against the oppressors.  That’s not the way it happened, but these kids have heard nothing other than that tripe all through school.  Add to this, the transformation of colleges from centers of learning and discourse to higher education brainwashing academies, and the shameful poll results make sense.  In the so-called elite colleges, only leftists need apply, only leftists are hired and advanced, and the narrow-minded faculties of these institutions stifle all dissent in the name of Woke purity.  Under these conditions, the students don’t have a chance.  But what of the professors and administrators?  As attorney Joseph Welch famously asked of Senator Joseph McCarthy, “Have you no sense of decency, at long last?” On a quiet Saturday morning, Hamas terrorists invaded Israel, raping, kidnapping and murdering as they went.  They killed infants in horrific fashion.  Try as protestors might to deny the truth, we know these things happened, because the murdering bastards videoed their deeds.  Then, released hostages recounted weeks of repeated rapes.  Last week, the presidents of Harvard, Penn and MIT testified before a House Committee about the antisemitic protests on campus.  Congresswoman Elise Stefanik asked the group a seemingly simple question, “Will admissions offers be rescinded or any disciplinary actions be taken against students or applicants who say ‘from the river to the sea’ or ‘intifada,’ advocating for the murder of Jews?”  Not one of them could bring themselves to condemn the student behavior.  None said disciplinary action would be taken.  One of them actually said, “It depends on the context.”  Please tell me what context in the world could possibly justify calls for genocide, accompanied by the blatant bias, intimidation tactics being tolerated by these schools.  Instead, these collegiate cowards hid themselves behind the First Amendment.  It’s funny how these Woke imbeciles only acknowledge a right to free speech when they’re the ones who are speaking.  Don’t forget, these are the same bastards who hound conservative speakers off the stage, and who have no regard for free speech, should someone dare to call a screwed up snowflake by the wrong pronoun.  Apparently a pronoun offense violates their precious college speech codes, but calls for mass murder – well not so much.  We really should have expected no more from this crowd.  After all, each of them came up through the same Leftist tenure system.  The truth is, if they condemned the student protestors, the Commie faculties probably would go on strike in solidarity with their fellow travelers.  Then again, is “fellow” appropriate?  Maybe it should be “non-binary travelers.”  Anyhow, the stupidity of this trio of college bigwigs was so stunning that even the leftist media had to admit they made a mistake.  Well, let me rephrase.  CNN said they “made a fatal error,” but not because what they said was outrageous and totally wrong.  The CNN take was that you “should know your audience.”  Translation – They could have crafted better lies and evasions, knowing they were before Republicans on the Committee who actually can tell right from wrong.  It had to be pretty bad though, because even the White House (not Old Joe, a spokesperson) called them out, “It’s unbelievable that this needs to be said:  calls for genocide are monstrous and antithetical to everything we represent as a country.  Any statements that advocate for the systematic murder of Jews are dangerous and revolting — and we should all stand firmly against them, on the side of human dignity and the most basic values that unite us as Americans.”  Such clarity and common sense can only mean one thing – an election is near.  There have been repercussions.  The Penn president was forced to resign that post when an incensed donor pulled a promised $100 million donation.  Free speech is fine, but business is business.  This shameful event exposes the the true face of higher education.  Simply replacing one Woke idiot with another isn’t a solution.  It took 100 years to reach this low point.  At least there no place to go but up.

President Kennedy’s Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission was an attorney by the name of Newton Minow.  I noticed that Mr. Minow passed away earlier this year.  Minow surveyed the content being broadcast on television in 1961, and was not pleased.  He’s best known for a challenge he made to TV executives, in which he urged them to sit down and watch their stations for a full day, “without a book, magazine, newspaper, profit-and-loss sheet or rating book to distract you.”  “I can assure you that you will observe a vast wasteland.  You will see a procession of game shows, formula comedies about totally unbelievable families, blood and thunder, mayhem, violence, sadism, murder, Western bad men, Western good men, private eyes, gangsters, more violence and cartoons. And endlessly, commercials — many screaming, cajoling and offending.”  I think we all can agree that, in the intervening 62 years, TV has only gotten worse.  In 1961 TV was an uncomplicated medium.  In the New York market, where I grew up, we had access to the greatest number of TV stations.  That number was 7.  That’s right, 7 different channels to choose from.  And better yet, we got to watch them on a grainy 19 inch (or smaller) black and white screen, on which the picture periodically jumped, rolled, or disappeared, necessitating the manipulation of rabbit-ear antennae.  We thought it was magical.  Now, I have hundreds of channels, broadcast in high definition, plus untold numbers of streaming services, and there’s still little content worth watching.  One of my many misapprehensions about the state of the world in general is the mistaken notion that, as the decades passed, Man would grow gradually more civilized.  There’s no evidence of that.  Quite the opposite.  The recent events in the Mideast, and the rampant violence in our own country lead one to the inevitable conclusion that the basic nature of Man has advanced little over the years.  For all the technological advancement, Man has simply traded his club in for nuclear weapons.  And television, in what some have called the Information Age, is less informative, and more mindless, banal, sadistic, violent, and offensive than it was when Minow panned it so long ago.  It’s really remarkable.  Newton Minow complained about 1960’s game shows, some of which were pretty silly.  Who could have predicted that in 2023, there would be a Game Show Network, dedicated to rerunning 60 year old games?  You’d have thought that today’s Woke leftist imbeciles would have cancelled game shows by now.  Games are contests, after all, and these are the same people who don’t let their children keep score in their games, lest little Johnny suffer a fatal blow to his inflated sense of self-worth.  The Left may reject the concept of winners and losers, but it occurred to me that just about everything on the air in our current Vast Wasteland has been turned into a game show.  There used to be cooking shows, where the hosts actually taught you how to cook.  Now every cooking show is a contest: Holiday Baking Challenge; Beat Bobby Flay; Chopped; and so on.  What’s the point of a cooking show where four strangers, using a strange kitchen, and limited ingredients, race to see who can make something edible in 15 minutes?  Nothing is learned, and then you’re one hour closer to death.  The History Channel used to air shows about actual history.  Not anymore.  Now, it has shows about lumberjacks and trucks driving on ice.  Instead of the shows about the history of weapons, there’s one where contestants vie to forge swords.  It’s a history game show.  But why?  Remember Minow’s complaint about formula comedies about unbelievable families?  The lack of imagination in Hollywood has led television producers to recycle the same sitcoms, again and again, with the same lame, tired situations.  Given current standards, The Beverly Hillbillies represented the height of culture.  And don’t get me started on the level of violence.  In the past, travel shows highlighted interesting locations.  Today, it’s The Amazing Race, where groups of annoying, insufferable people rush past all scenic and cultural sites to get the next clue, all in pursuit of the almighty dollar.  Travel used to be broadening.  Now it’s just another game show.  From the beginning of TV, there were soap operas on the air.  But now, even this genre has become a mindless contest, witness The Bachelor; The Bachelorette; and so on, ad infinitum, until you want to retch.  Romance is now another game show, only now so vulgar and graphic that even Jim Lange (The Dating Game) would blush.  Finally, remember the variety shows that used to be on TV?  Ed Sullivan, Dean Martin, and many others would host the biggest names in entertainment on a weekly basis.  Now, the most popular performers wouldn’t be caught dead on TV; not when their world tours bring in billions of dollars.  As a substitute for real talent, we have been given dozens of amateur hour contests, starting with American Idol, which wasn’t half bad, and devolving to such spectacles as The Voice, You Think You Can Dance, and an all-time low, The Masked Singer.  I regularly ask the rhetorical question, “Who watches this crap?”  But somebody must be watching it, because it keeps coming back.  I can only conclude that our society has devolved in the past 60 years.  In 1961, Newton Minow was speaking for the literate Americans of the day, who were being served what was decent programming, but who felt TV could provide more than it was offering.  The early programming must have been good, because people are now paying streaming companies to access decades-old reruns.  The difference is that the current crop of TV crap is being served to generations of dumbed-down, self-absorbed, semi-illiterates, many of whom, sadly enough, have gone to college.  This class of people, to whom the late writer Jean Shepard referred as Slobus Americanus, willingly consume this tripe, complete with an even greater number of screaming, cajoling, and offensive endless commercials, because they just don’t know any better.  They tolerate human waste on their streets, so why not broadcast waste on the screen.  Sad to say, television continues to be a Vast Wasteland.  The difference is that today’s viewers are content to watch the mindless sewage, as long as they can do so on an 82 inch screen.