Author: Tom Darby

Trade War Turns into Staredown

From the desk of a humble observer–who once traded marbles for firecrackers and lived to nearly regret it.

Now, I ain’t one to say I told you so, but if you take a mule and slap it every morning ‘cause you say it’s stealing corn, sooner or later, that mule’s liable to kick—and maybe not in the direction you were hoping. Well, that’s more or less what’s happened betwixt-n-b’tween Uncle Sam and Old Man China.

They’ve been tradin’ slaps so fast and fierce these past months that it’s hard to tell which end is up. And tariffs flying left and right like a barroom brawl in a cyclone.

So it was with no small curiosity that the world turned its head–like a farmer who hears silence in the henhouse and knows something’s up–to hear that China may have blinked, winked, flinched, or just paused to adjust their spectacles.

The ain’t exactly clear–but rumor has it they’ve asked for all tariffs to end. All of ’em! Every last one, like a man with a house fire saying, “Let’s forget this whole matchstick business ever happened.”

The unexpected proposal was greeted by Washington like a dog hears a strange whistle—ears perked, tail twitching, but not yet moving forward. However, there’s no confirmation from the brass, no details, just the scent of possibility hanging in the air like a whiff of biscuits on a cold morning.

Now, if you’d been in a barrel the last fortnight, you might’ve missed how these two titans of trade been whuppin’ on each other. Tariffs have gone from respectable skirmish to full-scale economic cannonade.

China hiked their rates up to 125 percent, likely figuring if they had to shoot themselves in the foot, they’d at least make sure the other fellow lost a leg. Meanwhile, President Trump, having never met a tariff he didn’t fancy, slapped on more duties until they stacked higher than a politician’s promises during an election year—145 percent all told.

He said China’s been “ripping us off,” though one must wonder how a nation gets ripped off when it keeps going back to the feller who claims his barber cheats him but won’t let nobody else near his hair.

To hear the White House tell it, all this pummeling was for the good of the American people. It was gonna bring back jobs, fix the trade deficit, and keep those Chinese devils from outfoxin’ us. The fact that consumer confidence dropped like a bucket in a dry well and Wall Street started twitchin’ like a bug on a hot skillet was growing pains.

Meanwhile, businesses across the fruited plain, most of whom ain’t the faintest idea how to move a supply chain from Guangzhou to Gary, Indiana, started talking about “strategic patience.” That’s a rich-folk talk, sayin’ “We’re sittin’ on our hands until someone stops swinging.”

The Chinese, for their part, called the administration’s tariff policy “a joke in the history of the world economy,” which, translated into plain Nevada talk, means they think we’ve lost our minds but are too polite to say so.

But now, if this talk of blinking is true, maybe someone over there finally realized that you can only block so many exports before the fellow on the other end stops sending anything, including dollars, or they’re trying to buy time while they build up trade with other folks who ain’t threatenin’ to tariff their socks off.

President Trump says China “wants to make a deal” but doesn’t know how. Well, I reckon that’s like watching two proud old tomcats circling the same alley and expecting either one to roll over.

“They’re proud people,” he said, and that’s true enough.

But pride, my friend, is a strange kind of currency—it spends well in speeches but poorly in global markets. So here we are–two giants with clenched fists and bruised egos, squinting at each other across a chessboard where all the pawns are busted, and the rooks are pork bellies and semiconductors.

Will they shake hands or throw more punches? No one can say.

But if history teaches anything–it’s that when powerful countries start a game of chicken, it’s usually the rest of us who end up plucked and roasted.

Allows Trump’s Migrant Plan March On

In a curious age where the loudest voice in the room often wins the argument, it is rare and commendable to see the Law–yes, that old mule–bray with clarity. And bray it did, when U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, a man of the robe and, it would seem, the spine, ruled that the Trump administration may indeed proceed with its plan to require illegal migrants to register with the federal government.

The plan, mind you, is no wild-eyed invention cooked up in a fever dream of tyrants but a fairly sensible notion–register those who ought not to be here, lest the whole enterprise of nationhood collapse under an accommodating weight. The folks bringing the lawsuit–the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights and the United Farm Workers of America — hollered like a cat in a rain barrel, claiming all manner of ills and injuries.

But when asked to show their bruises, they could only point at the wind and cry, “Look what it done to me!” McFadden looked at their claims and declared them “speculative,” which in legal parlance is the equivalent of saying, “You fellas don’t have a dog in this fight.”

In a passage that would make even Solomon nod in approval, he wrote: “Plaintiffs are not likely to succeed on the merits of their claim because they have failed to demonstrate that they have a ‘substantial likelihood’ of standing.” Or, to put it in the plain speech of the Truckee River: “Y’all don’t got a leg to stand on.”

Of course, the opposition was quick to unleash its usual assortment of dire warnings, suggesting this measure was merely the first stone on the road to concentration camps. The National Immigration Law Center, which represented the plaintiffs, cried that the plan is straight from the “authoritarian playbook,” and that soon we might see barbed wire and jackboots marching down Main Street.

Now, I have traveled this country north to south, east to west, from the hollers of Kentucky to the canyons of California, and I tell you plain–Americans are a generous people. But even a generous man locks his doors at night. The idea that a sovereign nation may not inquire who resides within her borders, lest it offend the sensibilities of those who arrived uninvited, is the notion that could only be cooked up in a parlor with too much tea and not enough firewood.

Meanwhile, the House has passed the SAVE Act, requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote–a proposition so stunning in its obviousness that one wonders if we will soon need laws reminding people to breathe.

So, it is a victory–not for cruelty or tyranny, but for the simple and enduring idea that a nation has the right to know who is living under its roof. And if that seems controversial, then perhaps controversy has lost all meaning–and common sense with it.

And that, dear reader, is the news from this strange and splendid republic, where we still believe–at least on some days–in the rule of Law.

Written by an Old-Timey Observer, who still reads the Constitution from a rickety porch with a view of common sense and knows snake oil when poured.

Now, friends, I’ve been around long enough to see a man claim the moon was cheese and another try to sell the Brooklyn Bridge—but I ain’t never seen a circus quite like Congress when it gets the notion to outlaw things it doesn’t understand. Here we are again, back in the echoing halls of modern-day Rome, with the Senators and Representatives of Nevada—Jacky Rosen and Dina Titus by name—trotting out their trusty old steed, the BUMP Act.

For those unfamiliar with the current parade of foolishness, a bump stock is a curious contraption—essentially a way to make a rifle jiggle like it drank too much coffee. It allows a semi-automatic rifle to simulate–-that’s the word the big city folks like to use–rapid fire. That right there is what’s got the busybodies in Congress tying their petticoats in knots again.

These same lawmakers are returning the BUMP Act, a legislative mule beaten more times than a rented burro. It comes after the Supreme Court gave the boot to the ATF’s ban, calling it what it was–an executive sleight of hand with no footing in federal law.

But what is the law, dear reader, when feelings are involved? You see, bump stocks gained infamy after the tragic One October shooting in Las Vegas—a horror no soul with a heart would ever shrug off.

But here’s the rub–the law ain’t supposed to get written in the tears of tragedy. It’s supposed to be stone carved in reason, liberty, and sense. When our Constitution guarantees the right to bear arms, it doesn’t sprinkle fine print saying, “unless something awful happens, in which case we’ll burn the Bill of Rights and start fresh.”

And let us not overlook the peculiar irony that bump stocks are for the disabled shooter—folks who lack the full use of both hands or suffer from tremors. For them, it was a workaround, a way to enjoy a right granted not by man but by God and affirmed by the Founders.

So, one might ask, in all earnestness, whether banning the bump stock runs afoul of another statute—the Americans with Disabilities Act. We make ramps for wheelchairs and talk-to-text for the mute, but Heaven helps a disabled man who wants to go plinking cans with dignity.

Rosen called the Court’s ruling a “brazen reversal.” But some might call it a welcome return to the law as written, not as dreamed.

If it means anything, the law must stand even when inconvenient. Otherwise, we ain’t a nation of laws—we’re a nation of moods.

Now, I ain’t saying bump stocks are good or bad. That’s a matter for each man to chew over himself. But when Congress starts snipping at the Constitution like it’s trimming a rose bush, you’d best keep one eye on your liberty and the other on your lawmakers.

In the end, my friends, when the righteous fervor has passed–and the headlines have faded, it’s not just a hunk of plastic on the chopping block—it’s the notion that rights come first, even when tragedy tempts us otherwise.

A Tale of Stubborn Justice in the Silver State

Now you must understand, dear reader, that once upon a spring morning, not too long past, the gentlepersons in starched shirts and wire-rimmed spectacles over at the Internal Revenue Service did something most unusual–they hitched their wagon to a posse of law officers from Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Signed a memorandum, plain as day, sayin’ they’d share their trove of tax secrets with the good folks tasked with keepin’ this country from turnin’ into one giant, unsupervised barn dance.

It caused no small amount of caterwauling from the ivory towers of academia and those finely dressed advocates with names longer than a prairie train. A whole slew of ‘em rose, hems flapping, to declare it an outrage, a scandal, a breach of trust, and—perhaps worst of all—a blow to the “feelings” of folks who ain’t even supposed to be here.

Now, don’t misunderstand–I’ve got no particular grudge against the man who crossed deserts and rivers to feed his young’uns—no sir. But there’s a vast difference between a man who comes a-knocking with his hat in hand and one who climbs in the window and helps himself to supper.

So when the Trump administration, much maligned by city scribes and supper-club socialists, declared they were fixin’ to let the tax department lend a hand to the border wranglers, it seemed to me a matter of simple common sense. For years, the IRS had been playing host to a curious game–asking folks without papers to hand over their taxes under a promise of secrecy, as if Uncle Sam were running a confessional booth instead of a government. That might pass in fairy tales and faculty lounges, but out here in the real world—where a fence still means no trespassing—it’s a different tale entirely.

They say Nevada’s got more undocumented folks per square mile than sagebrush, and a great many of ‘em pay something in taxes, they claim—though no one rightly knows how much. Still, the numbers get tossed around like poker chips: “$500 million in 2022,” they say, as if that settles the matter. Well, if there’s one thing a miner knows, it’s that numbers dug from the ground ain’t always gold. Some is fool’s gold—shiny but worth less than the dirt clinging to your boots.

Critics argue the new agreement might scare folks from filing their taxes, and that’s a curious complaint. In most parts of this country, filing taxes ain’t a matter of comfort—it’s a duty, and evading it’s a crime. If a man fears filing because the law might notice him, the law should take notice.

They said the acting IRS commissioner resigned over it, bless their heart—some folks aren’t ready for the rough-and-tumble of governance. The new administration, bless it, wasn’t built for the cocktail set or the rubber chicken circuit—but to do a job, and that is to restore a little law, a little order, and a whole lot of common sense to a system that’s spent too long upside-down.

Now, some folks are mighty worried about “mixed-status households,” where a U.S. citizen marries someone not yet invited to the party. And that’s a pickle. But if we’re to keep the lights on and the borders open and ignore the laws we already have, we might as well invite the whole world in for Sunday dinner and hand over the deed to the house.

Secretary Bessent says the agreement protects the privacy of law-abiding Americans while helping the law deal with folks who have outstayed their welcome. It sounds fair, as you don’t get to borrow a man’s shovel, break his fence, and then ask him to look the other way just because you were polite.

So here’s the plain truth, fit to be written in the back pages of some Nevada gazette and the front of every honest man’s mind–If you’re here legally, you’ve got nothing to fear, but if you’re here on borrowed time, and the taxman finds your name where it shouldn’t be—well, that’s just the echo of justice knockin’ at your door.

And as any good sheriff will tell you–When justice comes ridin’ through town, best step out of the way or start packing as there ain’t no sense complainin’ when the law finally does what it’s supposed to do.

Some folks in Nevada have taken to wringing their hands and writing letters since the federal government—under the careful broom of efficiency—decided to sweep away a few dusty grants that had long overstayed their welcome. The noise began after nearly fifty workers, hired with temporary dollars from the American Rescue Plan, became unemployed when the well finally ran dry.

That well, mind you, was never meant to be eternal. It was pandemic aid, not a family inheritance.

Senator Catherine Cortez Masto, whose politics lean like a Nevada fencepost in a one-way windstorm, took it upon herself to pen a letter to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is now heading the Department of Health and Human Services. Her note carried the tone you’d expect from a woman discovering her silver spoon was missing. She called the cuts “alarming” and claimed the programs were “critical,” which politicians always say when it’s someone else’s money.

The root of the matter lies with a freshly minted outfit from Washington called the Department of Government Efficiency—DOGE for short, and not to be confused with any kind of doge from Venice or dog coin from the internet. DOGE was put in place by the Trump administration to tidy up the federal budget and send unneeded government programs packing. And tidy they did.

Some folks out West claim the grants were “essential.” But let’s be plain–these were temporary funds meant to help the country weather the COVID-19 storm, not build a castle on borrowed bricks. If you construct your house on a sandbar, don’t complain when the tide rolls out.

Cortez Masto insists these grants weren’t just for pandemic cleanup but were helping communities and tribal lands across Nevada. No doubt some good came of them—but so does rain, and we don’t bottle that up and bill the government. It’s the nature of emergency aid to end when it’s over.

And here’s the part the senator might prefer folks forget–under the Trump administration, efficiency wasn’t just a word—it was a mission. They didn’t come to Washington to fatten the hog–but to trim it.

The DOGE directive—that the grants were “no longer necessary” isn’t some cruel twist. It’s a return to normal, where states care for their own, and Washington minds its purse.

Public health leaders may be fretting, and some newspapers fanning the flames with phrases like “devastating effect,” but every good manager knows when to stop writing checks. Nevada received $2.7 billion in flexible pandemic aid. If $114 million of that went toward mental health– the state should have something to show for it that doesn’t vanish the moment the checkbook closes.

Cortez Masto’s letter may rattle around the halls of government for a while, but one suspects Mr. Kennedy has a stack of such letters and only so much ink in his pen. Meanwhile, the Trump-era effort to cut waste and restore sanity to the nation’s budget continues—quietly, steadily, and much to the dismay of those who thought the river of federal dollars would never run dry.

And that’s the thing about rivers–they don’t ask permission before they turn.

Some days ago—never mind how long precisely—having little else to do on a dreary Sunday eve and finding my spirit weary from the endless scroll of screens, I thought I would bathe—take to the tub and scrub away the world. If they but knew it, almost all souls in their time, when the weight of existence grows too damp, seek the solace of warm water and a loofah.

I filled the tub, a porcelain vessel of modest girth, its white expanse marred only by a faint ring of scum from battles past. The steam rose like a ghostly shroud, and I lowered myself in, a captain embarking upon a voyage of suds. My rubber duck, a yellow sentinel, bobbed beside me—my first mate in this watery domain. All was calm until I spied it—him—the beast.

Beneath the surface, lurking amidst the bubbles, was a sliver of soap—a pale, elusive shard, slick as a whale and twice as cunning. Its whiteness rivaled the driven snow, and its refusal to grasp mocked my every effort. From the moment I saw it, an obsession gripped me—not to cleanse with it, no, but to conquer it, to seize it in my fist and prove my dominion over this miniature leviathan. I thrust my hand into the depths, fingers splayed like harpoons, but it darted away, a slippery phantom propelled by some unholy current of bathwater.

“Aha!” I cried, “Thou art mine, thou wretched flake!”

The duck bobbed in silent judgment as I lunged again, splashing water over the edge, soaking the bathmat in my fury. The soap evaded me, sliding beneath my palm, taunting me with its silence—for soap, unlike whales, utters no bellowing cry.

Days it seemed, I pursued him—though the clock claimed mere minutes—my knees pruned, my temper frayed. I cursed the fates that made soap so slick, the cruel chemistry of lye and fat that birthed this foe.

“All the tubs in the bathrooms could not contain thy insolence!” I roared, though Spanish Springs was but a shower stall in my mind. The water grew tepid, my resolve hot. I devised a stratagem: a towel draped over the tub’s edge to corner the beast. With a maniacal grin–I drove it forward—closer, closer—until, with a triumphant splash, I seized it!

Victory! I held the soap aloft, dripping and diminished, its once-proud form worn to a nub by my relentless chase.

“I have thee now,” I whispered, “and the tub is mine own.”

Yet as I sank back, triumphant, the duck floated near, its plastic eye glinting with what I swore was mockery. Had I won, or had it, in a final dissolution, claimed my sanity? The water stilled, the bubbles popped, and I laughed—a wild, watery cackle—for in the end, I was both conqueror and fool, adrift in a bathtub sea.

Then from a distant shore, from behind the bathroom door, my wife shouted, “Quit screwing around in there, you’ll getting water all over the floor!”

Written by an Ornery Observer of the American Fandango, from the dusty corner of a Nevada saloon, where the whiskey’s warm and the truth is optional.

Now, friends, sit back and gather ’round, for here’s a tale that may twist your whiskers and boil your grits.

It concerns a tribe of office-holders—attorneys general, governors, and other high-bred creatures of law—and their determined march on a mountain of missing money. The coin wasn’t buried by pirates nor stashed away by bank or stage robbers, but by none other than the U.S. Department of Education, or, under the Trumpian banner, “Ye Olde Vault of Vanishing Funds.”

T’other day, sixteen states—plus the District of Columbia, which can’t vote but sure can sue—filed suit in a Manhattan court, demanding that the Trump administration unhand their pandemic loot. Leading the legal posse was New York’s Letitia James, and flanking her like cavalry in a spaghetti western was Nevada’s own Attorney General, Mr. Aaron Ford.

Now Mr. Ford, a stout fellow with words hot enough to brand cattle, declared, “The cuts to these programs are unlawful, and they will have a devastating impact on Nevada’s children.”

He promised that every time Mr. Trump’s folk misbehaved, “my office will see him in court.” I tell you, if threats were horses, Ford’d be riding a saddle made of subpoenas.

The fuss began when schools were promised, during the dread days of COVID, a handsome pot of federal gold—$189 billion worth, if the scribes are correct—to heal their wounded halls, buy books, fix roofs, and maybe, if luck held, purchase a new swing set for the playground. The Biden administration told the states they had through March 2026 to spend the loot, giving them time to untangle bureaucratic knots, hire teachers, and procure enough hand sanitizer to flood the Carson River.

But lo! In a move slicker than a greased pig at the county fair, Trump’s Education Secretary—one Linda McMahon, better known in wrestling circles than academic ones—declared that schools had “ample time” to spend the cash and would now find themselves empty-handed unless they filed for special dispensation.

In Nevada, it left folks scratching their heads and counting their losses. At first, the state reckoned they’d be short $29 million, but after much cipherin’ and squinting at spreadsheets, Deputy Superintendent Megan Peterson said the figure now sat around $10 to $12 million. That’s still enough money to make a banker sweat and a schoolteacher weep.

As for the Trump folks, they offered no number on what funds remain, only that exceptions might be made, much like giving out pie crumbs after the banquet has ended. So now the courtroom curtains rise, and the great American drama plays on—equal parts comedy and tragedy, with a dash of farce. And somewhere in the wings, students wait, schools wait, and one can only hope that justice arrives before the last bell rings.

If you ever doubted that the spirit of the Old West still lingers like a sunburn in July, look no further than the Bureau of Land Management, which has once again saddled up for a grand endeavor—this time to round up some 518 free-roaming horses out yonder, some forty miles east of Carson City. And in a rare and charitable mood, they’re asking for the public’s thoughts on the matter, which is about as common as a jackrabbit volunteering for stew.

According to the BLM’s finely printed papers—writ, no doubt, by a learned soul with a government-grade typewriter—the Lahontan Wild Horse Gather is “needed” to prevent what they call “undue or unnecessary degradation of public lands.” That’s government-speak for too many hooves making a mess of the scenery.

Their goal? Reduce the Lahontan herd to a polite dinner party of seven to 10 horses, give or take a neigh. And don’t be fooled by the flowery phrase “thriving natural ecological balance.” That means the horses are doing too well for their good—or ours.

The BLM has cast its eye over 9,687 acres of wild horse heaven, a patch of real estate officially dubbed the Lahontan Herd Management Area. But just in case the horses wander off-script, the feds are also eyeing a stage big enough for a Buffalo Bill show–304,705 acres stretching across Lyon and Churchill counties.

Miss Kim Dow, who wears Carson City District Manager like a freshly pressed sash, assures us the roundup will be “safe, efficient, and successful,” and that every four-legged participant will get treated with “humane care.”

The BLM’s also digging into the history books, invoking Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act. They aim to ensure no ghost towns, arrowheads, or secrets from the days of gold and silver and gunpowder are disturbed while in the process. If any old homesteader’s cabin or sacred Paiute ground gets trampled by bureaucracy—or worse, a helicopter—that would be an awkward footnote.

But hark! The citizenry has a say, or so they claim.

From now until May 12th–anyone with an opinion and a postage stamp—or better yet, an internet connection—can submit their thoughts, criticisms, praises, or poetic lamentations about the fate of the Lahontan herd. So, if you’ve got a soft spot for wild horses or a sharp tongue for federal plans, now’s your time to let it loose.

The West may not be wild anymore, but every once in a while, it still remembers how to ask for your two cents. Whether they listen after it gets ‘em, that’s another story entirely.

A Cautionary Tale of Political Resurrection

Written by a weary Nevadan, armed with a pen, a memory, and a deep mistrust of any man who says, “I’m just thinking about it.”

Now it came to pass in the year of our Lord two-thousand and twenty-six — or thereabouts, for memory is a slippery fellow and politics even slipperier — that a certain Steve Sisolak, late of the Governor’s Mansion and early of ambition, was seen peering out from behind the curtain of retirement like a groundhog sniffing the wind for relevance.

Now, Mr. Sisolak had once been the High Sheriff of All Nevada–Governor, they called it, but the job bore more resemblance to a carnival barker than any lawman I ever knew–and folks remembered him for it, though not always fondly. His tenure was filled with enough confusion, proclamations, and policy U-turns to make a jackrabbit dizzy. But no matter — in politics, memory is short, egos are long, and Mr. Sisolak, it seems, had both in abundance.

He was defeated once, mind you, and by no great landslide. Sheriff Joe Lombardo, a Republican of the RINO sort — meaning he can’t tell an elephant from a jackass — beat him in 2022 by just enough votes to hush the grumbling but not enough to crush Sisolak’s spirit. Some said Sisolak wept, some said he laughed, but all agreed he kept talking.

And talk he did.

“I ain’t sayin’ I’m runnin’,” he told the city paper, which says he was fixin’ to run. “But I ain’t not runnin’ either,” which is how a politician tells you he’s waitin’ for a pollster to let him know whether folks have forgiven or merely forgotten.

He said others — unnamed and likely imaginary — had “encouraged” him to try again. I don’t doubt it. The sort of men who whisper encouragement to ex-governors are the same who carry ropes to a hanging and swear they’re only there to help the man down.

Mr. Sisolak isn’t alone in this sudden re-blossoming of civic yearning. Aaron Ford, the Attorney General and a man with the bearing of someone who never quite finished a thought before saying it aloud, was also said to be eyeing the race. Mr. Sisolak, ever the gentleman, desired him well — though the tone was akin to wishing your neighbor a safe voyage on a leaky boat.

Of course, the other side of the fence had something to say, too. John Burke of the Better Nevada PAC, whose job is to say unpleasant things with a smile, declared that Sisolak and Ford represented nothing but “failed policies and corruption.”

Meanwhile, the date looms: Tuesday, June 9th, 2026 — the day Nevadans must once again decide whether to return to the buffet of familiar disappointments or try something entirely new, like staying home.

If you ask me–and no one did–I’d say that watching Sisolak run again is like watching a man try to reheat old coffee and convince you it’s fresh. He might dress it up, add cream and sugar, maybe even pour it into a fancy cup, but it’s still yesterday’s brew–bitter, lukewarm, and with a faint aftertaste.

But who knows? Stranger things have happened in Nevada, where fortunes are lost overnight, ghosts roam the desert, and men like Sisolak rise from the political grave not once but as often as their pollster permits.

And so the tale goes on, the wheel turns, and the voters — God bless their weary souls — must decide whether to saddle up Old Sisolak again or leave him where he ought to stay–in the footnotes of a history no one’s eager to reread.

Well, I woke up this morning and found the world had turned itself clean upside down, again, like a cat chasin’ its tail. The Food and Drug Administration, that grand fortress of red tape and rubber stamps, has made a proclamation as bold as a rooster at sunrise–they say we don’t have to torment animals in the name of science no more—at least not for every newfangled pill that some chemist cooks up in his copper-bottomed laboratory.

In all its wisdom, The FDA has announced it’s phasin’ out the old requirement that drugs get tested on animals before being sold to that great experimental subject known as the American Public. They claim we now have better ways—”human-relevant methods,” they say. That’s government talk for somethin’ your aunt wouldn’t understand, but your nephew in spectacles might.

The alternatives are as curious as a three-legged horse in a footrace–computer simulations built with artificial intelligence (a fancy term meanin’ your thoughts are no longer your own) and somethin’ called “organoids,” which sounds like a disease but is a tiny human-like organ that don’t complain, bite, or sue for damages. They grow these wee lumps of human mimicry in dishes, and they can tell you if your new miracle medicine will cure the common cold or burn a hole through your liver.

Now, you might ask, “Why the sudden kindness to creatures great and small?” It turns out Congress, that pack of well-fed squirrels, passed a law back in 2022 sayin’ we could skip the critter trials if we had somethin’ better. And the FDA, in a moment of peculiar clarity, decided to go ahead and use the power granted to ‘em.

The commissioner said this’ll make medicine cheaper and get it to folks faster, which is a fine goal. Though I must say, the last time someone promised me somethin’ faster and low-priced–it was a bus ticket to Sacramento, and I ended up in the mud near the Feather River with a dog chewing on my boot.

Still, I suppose it’s a happy day for the rabbits and monkeys who’ve spent the better part of the last century takin’ experimental heartburn medication so we could eat spicy chili without fear. They’ve done their duty for God and country, and now they can retire with honor—perhaps to a peaceful life in some leafy glen or at least to a lab with less pokin’ and proddin’.

As for the rest of us, let’s hope the organoids and artificial brains don’t start unionizin’ or demandin’ benefits because once machines get a taste for bureaucracy, we’ll all be test subjects—willing or not.