Anchor Struck

There’s so much going on south of the 49th Parallel that I’ve been waiting for some of it to resolve before I posted again: Trump’s “really great” news about the stolen 2020 election; the confirmation hearings on Todd Blanche and the even more obnoxious Jay Clayton; ICE’s pathetic spin on the murder of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo; catastrophic flooding in Texas again; Agent Orange’s teleprompter operator being investigated for insider trading; the ever-sprawling Iran not-a-war; and, of course, lethal lettuce.

But — because I have taken semi-solemn vows as a satirist and Saturday Night Live is on hiatus — I’m obliged to weigh in on Pete Hegseth’s newest transgression: testosterone testing. SNL‘s Colin Jost would have a field year as the Secretary of Defense/War on the brink of detonating into a million manly fragments. The bit writes itself. Hegseth is inspecting the troops. “Sergeant!”, he bellows, “Can you explain why your testosterone level is so low?” “Yes, sir!”, the sergeant replies, unruffled, “I’m a woman.”

Hegseth’s clunky brainsquall must have come to him after a night of not drinking with Kash Patel. An endocrinologist on CNN is dismantling the idea as I type. I understand Pete’s logic: if the DoD falls for it, he could be a major provider of the man sap.