Remember when people on the right side of the political spectrum were so incensed about the left's "cancel culture"? It wasn't that long ago. Conservatives railed at how people were being held accountable for things they said by being "cancelled" in one way or another. They called the lefties "snowflakes" who couldn't take what they saw as merely robust and unbridled free speech. Any rightwing free speech should be consequence-free in the real world, they argued at the time.

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This week, scientists revealed what they feel is convincing evidence that life previously existed on Mars. But, rather astonishingly, "Life On Mars!" headlines weren't the story of the week.

What should have been the political story of the week is also largely being ignored by the media as well. Vladimir Putin launched almost 20 drones into Polish airspace, which is a serious escalation since it's hard not to call this an act of war. The drones reportedly weren't armed with explosives, and Russia isn't taking any responsibility; but even so, invading another country's airspace is still a hostile act. Especially when that country is a member of NATO.

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While the biggest story in the political world right now is the manhunt underway for the Utah assassin, there doesn't seem to be much more to say about it yet, so I decided instead to highlight two other stories today, on two of this week's developments in Congress. It's not exactly a "three-dot Thursday" column, since it only has two completely unrelated stories, but it's at least something else to pay attention to as we all wait for developments from Utah.

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A horrific act of political violence happened in Utah today. The leader of a group of young conservatives was assassinated, apparently for his political viewpoint. I say "apparently" since (as of this writing) the shooter is still at large, so for the time being all we are left with is assumptions as to motive.

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You may not have noticed it, what with all the other distractions in Washington, but we're fast approaching the possibility of another government shutdown. The federal fiscal year begins in October, and there is no budget in place yet. The two parties in Congress aren't even talking to each other yet about what to do about it, and they don't have a whole lot of time to get something passed. For Democrats, the question is whether they should shut the government down in what essentially would be an act of political protest, or whether they should just bargain for a few of their issues and accept pretty much everything else Republicans want to do.

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Donald Trump is driving the American economy straight into a ditch. That's a pretty simple concept, and it's (just barely) short enough to fit on a bumpersticker. Which makes it a dandy political slogan for Democrats to start hammering out relentlessly.

Doing so is pretty easy, since you can connect all sorts of dots to it: A soft jobs market. Inflation rising. Hamburger prices up. Electricity prices way up. Trump's tariff war, which has created a "Trump tax" on a whole bunch of products. Trump took hold of an economy that had achieved a "soft landing," and now he's driving us all right into a ditch. Everything he does seems to make things worse. See how easy that is to do?

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Will Democrats ever pull back from examining the individual political trees and grasp the nature of the whole forest before them? I wonder this because I see time after time the Democratic Party being shown exactly how they can win elections -- and then time after time they just flat-out ignore it. Or downplay it. Or attempt to come up with a solution that doesn't address the core problem but instead merely tinkers around the edges of it. Or bury it in wonk-speak. I have to admit, it is frustrating to watch.

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Congress is back in town, and so is the pressure to release the Epstein files. Immediately after the House of Representatives convened, Representatives Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna filed their discharge petition, which could soon force the speaker to hold a floor vote on their measure to force the Justice Department to release all its files on Jeffery Epstein.

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I'm not sure whether that title is the most apt, or if "Conventional Thinking" might have been better. Because it seems that both major American political parties are considering holding national conventions next year before the midterm elections. Which is indeed unconventional -- even thinking about midterm conventions. Semantic games aside, though, I do find myself wondering if it would be a good idea or not.

The idea was first proposed by the Democrats, who are considering holding a convention to showcase their up-and-coming prospective candidates and to whip up their base in an effort to motivate them to turn out to vote. I was actually surprised to read (in Axios, who got the scoop on this story) that it wouldn't be the first time such a thing has happened. As they report:

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Just before the 20th anniversary of the impact of Hurricane Katrina, a group of current and former Federal Emergency Management Agency employees have signed an extraordinary letter warning America that we could be headed for a similar disaster. Not the hurricane itself, but the man-made disaster which followed, as George W. Bush's FEMA proved to be completely incompetent at disaster recovery in a big way. They even called their letter the "Katrina Declaration," to amplify their warning.

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