Tuesday Top of Mind 3/18/25- Where’s Buttercup?

This post is about our current political situation and the greatest movie of all time “The Princess Bride”. If you haven’t seen it, stop reading and go find it. It is probably playing on tv somewhere. And then come back when you have an inkling of what I am referring to.

You know when Wesley is panicked after being dosed with Miracle Max’s pill and he is demanding answers to, among other things who are you, are we enemies, why am I am on this wall, where’s Buttercup, why won’t my arms move? And Inigo Montoya calmly responds “Let me explain…” and pauses and continues “No, there is too much. Let me sum up.”

That is the mood today.

There has been an entire stream of shit decision and shittier actions from this administration. A firehose stream. The intention is to drown us. Or to give us so much information and things to react to that we cease to react.

The hits keep coming.

There are hits to education that are the 50% reduction in force to “return the education to the states”. Well and good, but there are states that are struggling with what the government gives them. West Virginia, are you paying attention? West Virginia is frequently 50/50 states, and not in a good way, in education.

There are hits to the healthcare industry. Medicaid is on life support at the moment. Reminder, there are over 72 million Americans on Medicaid. This pays for elder care, nursing homes, the children that are under treatment for all sorts of things. You know, like the children that survive being born at 23 weeks that are heralded as miracles. Miracles that will most likely need care for their entire lives. Medicaid also provides healthcare for at least 37 million children. These are vaccinations and well child visits. To lose Medicaid would put a double whammy on the hospital systems that are already struggling.

There are hits to the National Parks system. Not only did 1000 workers lose their jobs, but some parks had to adjust hours and are no longer allowing overnight visits. There are 63 named National Parks but that does not come close to explaining the breadth of what they do.

There is an unelected person who bought the election running around with a group of under aged 25 boys pulling the pieces of the government apart. A la the neighborhood bullies torturing the neighborhood pets.

There is the megalomaniac despot wanna be running a smear and revenge campaign against anyone he thinks has ever wronged him. Someone needs to remind him that it is speak softly and carry a big stick, not scream and shout and use the stick against anyone he deems as lesser. Psst, that is everyone who has less than $1 billion dollars.

That is where we are now. At the mercy of the man child.

I love that for us.

We need a Dread Pirate Roberts. Or, at the very least, an Inigo Montoya. Or a Brute Squad Fezzik.

I’m not picky.

But we need a Miracle Max, not a Prince Humperdinck flailing about.