Don’t let ‘Dirty Rotten Scoundrels’ spoil the ending

Although some of my happier-go-luckier friends would disagree, during this pandemic it seems some of us have too much idle time on our hands.

I am constrained to plead guilty to a charge of using this extra time to consider issues and themes that during normal times most people wouldn’t have the interest nor the inclination to pursue. But the plea comes with an explanation.

You see, I am an optimist, which is a condition that these days could prove figuratively fatal. Or, at the very least, way out of touch with society’s fringes.

Being optimistic means that in 2021 a person must look past the craziness, the inanity, the hypocrisy, the mean-spiritedness and the downright malevolence that seem to define who and where we are if we are to envision all that is, can and should be good about this great country.

This is a long way of saying that perspective in today’s world is essential for a state of mind that is needed to see our way into a better tomorrow. I have always drawn on the movies and entertainment — art, if you will— to imagine life as I wish it could be.

For example, I thought of one of my favorite movies the other day when the U.S. Senate voted to acquit Donald Trump of inciting an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Actually, a bipartisan majority (a rarity these days) voted to convict Trump.

The 57-vote total included “The Magnificent Seven”Republicans who did the right thing but get —in today’s timid world — credit for being courageous.

The original movie was about a bunch of gunslingers who gave their lives to save a village of people unable to defend themselves. It was an act of nobility. And far more courageous than just a vote to convict, if you ask me.

Another classic, sort of, was

“Dumb and Dumber.”

It doesn’t matter what the movie was about because I use it only to define Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who is the “dumb” part and the rest of America — all of us, if Abbott convinces us he is telling it straight — are the “dumber “part.

Texas is facing two major disasters. The first was a snow and ice storm the likes of which few people could have contemplated before global warming and the resulting climate change. Few people in Texas, that is.