THE BIG MAD ANTI-PROGRESS Deworming COVID, Kolten’s curse and St. Louis County’s slap fight Compiled by
RFT STAFF
W
elcome back to the Big Mad, the RFT’s weekly roundup of righteous rage! Because we know your time is short and your anger is hot: HORSE DOCTORS: If the good people of Lake Ozark are determined to have a complete dipshit as their mayor, could they just stick with one? There was the old mayor, Gerry Murawski, who admitted on tape to local news site LakeExpo that he paid for a prostitute but insisted he didn’t know she was sixteen. And now his replacement, Dennis Newberry, is on record, via his own public (now removed or set private) Facebook post, saying he has “procured” some ivermectin for a longtime friend who he says is deathly ill with COVID-19. (Sidenote: He put quotes around ivermectin, which also worries us a bit.) Newberry mentions that his friend is in the hospital, but the mayor is asking for prayers in hopes that trained healthcare workers will stand aside and allow his friend to be dosed by amateurs with a drug commonly used to treat parasites in horses. If you are not typically in the horse-deworming business and are just hearing about ivermectin, the FDA has made a point of saying it does not approve it as a COVID-19 treatment. “You are not a horse. You are not a cow. Seriously, y’all. Stop it,” the agency tweeted over the weekend in a plea to those planning to dabble in a little ivermectin self medication. Really, the main problem isn’t one (or two) clown mayors; it’s that politicians far above them and merciless grifters have been so effective in undercutting the advice of experts that frighteningly large swaths of the population are scared of a vaccine that millions have safely taken, but will raid veterinarians’ supplies in desperation. The Newberrys of the world aren’t the genesis, just the manifestation, played out to tragically absurd ends. The Curse of Kolten: Hey, John Mozeliak, remember Kolten Wong? He’s a two-time Gold Glove winner who can hit, run fast and jump high. Even better, he’s an actual delight of a player, who Cards fans adored — someone who genuinely seems to love to play baseball and doesn’t need to pretend that wearing a
“You are not a horse. You are not a cow. Seriously, y’all. Stop it,” the FDA tweeted over the weekend. bowtie or a plaid blazer every once in a while is a personality. Anyway, we were thinking about him recently because he returned to St. Louis (where he would have stayed if someone hadn’t cheaped out on picking up the very reasonable option on his contract) with the Brewers and reminded us that he’s fun to watch and baseball should be fun. Did you catch the moment when he stole second on Yadi and Yadi enjoyed it because everyone likes Kolten that much? Seems like a good guy to have in the clubhouse. THE FOREVER SLAP FIGHT: It’s hard to remember who was supposed to learn what lesson in the ongoing fight between St. Louis County Council members and County Executive Sam Page. After a couple weeks of meetings, letters, snide tweets, radio talk-show interviews and the county’s entry into the increasingly crowded “We’ve been sued by shameless culture warrior Eric Schmitt” club, the county has accomplished approximately nothing. Honestly, it probably lost a few steps. It has managed to unite anti-vaxxers, who have taken to comparing proposed requirements to wear masks at the grocery store to the atrocities of the Holocaust. So good job encouraging that element while arguing points of order. Meanwhile, the delta variant rolls on through another deadly summer toward another fatal fall. Hospitals are filling and more kids are getting seriously sick. At least the county’s elected officials will have shown other county officials … something. AIR FRYER: Outside sucks right now. A week of temperatures in the 80s ruined us for this week of approximately 1,000 degrees. Why do you do this to us, Missouri? What are we supposed to do with roasting heat and 90-plus percent humidity? Last week, we were drinking beers on patios. This week, we’re peeling our bare legs off of vinyl seat covers. It’s miserable. But, hey, you could always go cool off at the Lake of the Ozarks where you can count on good friends to bring you horse dewormer if you catch COVID and become mortally sick. n
riverfronttimes.com
AUGUST 25-31, 2021
RIVERFRONT TIMES
11
