Sep 18 2020
2 Comments
Adrastos, Campaign Notes, Fog Of History, Political Crack

Abolish The Electoral College

I realize that I’ve said it before and that I’m preaching to the choir but one of things the Biden-Harris administration should do is abolish the electoral college. It’s done nothing but cause mischief in both the 19th Century and early 20th Century.

The electoral college is not only anti-Democratic, it focuses candidates on specific often unrepresentative states. Just think of all the times candidates have been obliged to support ethanol subsidies to win votes in Iowa. It even happened to fictional candidates such as Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda) in The West Wing episode King Corn.

The loser of the popular vote has won the electoral vote five times in our history. It didn’t happen for 112 years after Benjamin Harrison lost the popular vote by 90,956 to Grover Cleveland. We all know what happened in 2000 when one of the best qualified candidates in American history, Al Gore, lost the electoral college to a dipshit named George W. Bush. History repeated itself in 2016 when Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by 2,868,518 to a criminal dipshit named Donald J. Trump.

The Bush-Cheney administration played favorites at times, but the Trump regime has gone to extremes in favoring “their people” and “their voters.” As we’ve seen time and time again, President* Pennywise only cares about his people, his voters. Any time there’s an issue in a blue state, he has no interest in addressing it. If the electoral college were abolished even Trump would have to think about Republican voters in blue states.

Here are the Top Six Trump Popular Vote States:

  1.  TEXAS                    4,685,047
  2. FLORIDA                 4,617,886
  3. CALIFORNIA           4,483,814
  4. PENNSLYVANIA      2,907,441
  5. OHIO                       2,841,006
  6. NEW YORK              2,819,557

If the electoral college did not exist, Trump would have been obliged to deal fairly with the states he won his 3rd and 6th most votes in instead of focusing on the 31.49% and 36.51% of the vote he received in California and New York respectively.

Democrats have suffered as a result of the current system BUT this is about democracy, not partisan advantage. The Republicans won’t see it that way, but this is about truth, justice, and the American way. I’m not sure what the exact mechanism would be but there’s a long article by Lee Drutman in the Washington Monthly that looks at the issue in historical context.

It’s time for the electoral college to go. It was nearly abolished in 1970 but fell prey to a filibuster by Southern Senators. It’s also time for the filibuster to go. It’s done in more progressive legislation than Mitch The Grim Reaper McConnell.

It’s time for a change. The last word goes to Sam Cooke:

 

Sep 18 2020
1 Comment
Adrastos, Campaign Notes, Fog Of Scandal, Political Crack, The Darnold

Quote Of The Day: Watch What They Do, Not What They Say

I’m alarmed by the number of people who are taking the wilder statements by Team Trump literally. I thought we’d gotten over it, but there’s been a widespread relapse of late. Perhaps it’s caused by the stresses of the campaign or the pandemic. Nonetheless it’s alarming. The default should always be that they’re lying. They’re the lyingest liars who ever lied, after all.

The quote comes from page 263 of Bob Woodward’s book Rage:

Kushner said one of Trump’s greatest strengths was, “He somehow manages to have his enemies self-destruct and make stupid mistakes. He’s just able to play the media like a fiddle, and the Democrats too. They run like dogs after a fire truck, chasing whatever he throws out there.”

Don’t fall for it. Don’t let Slumlord Jared and the Kaiser of Chaos play you. Set your bullshit detector to maximum the next time something crazy comes out of their mouths. There are plenty of actions to be alarmed about; don’t take the bait.

The last word goes to Rachel Maddow:

 

Sep 18 2020
1 Comment
Adrastos, Catblogging

Friday Catblogging: Claire’s Toys

Claire Trevor likes to leave her catnip toys in the doorway. Beats the hell outta finding a lizard, bird, or mouse there.

Sep 17 2020
Leave a comment
Adrastos, COVID-19, Fog Of Scandal, Political Crack, Stupid Republican Tricks, Television, The Darnold, Your President Speaks

Herd Mentality

The Impeached Insult Comedian gave another incoherent teevee performance this week. This time, it was not in the friendly confines of Fox News but on ABC. The host was my diminutive countryman George Stephanopolous who was able to get Trump to repeat his COVID disappearing act. If you pretend it’s not there, it’s gone.

The post title is the latest Trump malaprop. He said, “herd mentality” when he meant to say, “herd immunity.” That seems to have become U.S. policy by stealth as the Shrugging Doctor, Scott Atlas, and the White House Coronavirus Task Force have told states with high infection rates to cancel mask requirements. Midsommar In America has arrived. Freedom, man.

Pondering the presidential* malaprop made me realize that herd mentality describes the entire Trump phenomenon. Hardcore Trumpers are an unruly group when it comes to “owning the libs”but submissive to the whims and wishes of the Kaiser Of Chaos the man whose only plan is to foment enough confusion so that he can stay in office to avoid federal criminal charges. Freedom, man.

Team Trump seems to have given up on conventional campaigning in favor of tweeting out nonsense and holding super-spreader rallies for the foolish faithful. I’m on the record that the Trump cult is smaller than believed. There are, however, lemmings among them:

Freedom, man.

Younger Trumpers think that prancing maskless through a Target is a cool thing to do:

Florida Man meets Freedom, man.

Team Trump is blowing a lot of smoke right now but there’s one positive development.  Crazy Caputo at HHS has taken a 60-day leave of absence. This is the bozo who talked about armed scientists taking to the streets if Trump is re-elected. Despite working with the CDC, Caputo obviously hasn’t met many scientists. They’re not exactly a group of gunslingers. Caputo turned out to be too crazy even for Team Trump. That’s what happens when you let a Roger Stone protege enter the corridors of power. Mercifully, Caputo is Kaput.

Things are so nutty right now that I have a sudden urge to rake the forests, commit election fraud, or do something equally Trumpy. That’s what happens when you’re caught up in the herd mentality. That would also be a swell name for a band: HERD MENTALITY.

The last word goes to the Beatles with some advice we should all heed:

Sep 17 2020
Leave a comment
Michael F

Grotesque

I did not know this, but Grotesque is an architectural term, a sort of generic Gargoyle, i.e., not all Grotesques are Gargoyles, but all Gargoyles are Grotesques…

And what’s a more appropriate monument to the Trump era?

His policies and rhetoric are political runoff waste…sewage…bilge water.

Just add some gold paint that looks like gold leaf…paint because he’d peel off actual gold leaf and stuff it into his pocket or under the first available mattress.

The election will be more than just the cult of Trump versus, well, those of us who aren’t brainwashed.

It’s grotesque superstition versus the modern world.

Not really much of of a choice if you think about it, no pun intended.

Sep 17 2020
Leave a comment
Adrastos, Books, Diary, Pulp Fiction Thursday

Pulp Fiction Thursday: The Old Battle Ax

In my extended family battle ax is an affectionate term. My favorite aunt prided herself on being a battle ax and a tough broad. This post is a tribute to all the battle axes out there. Long may you run.

I just gave myself an earworm. This is a song about a car but it works: my Aunt Mary had a radar detector in her car when she was 80.

 

 

Sep 16 2020
3 Comments
Adrastos, Fog Of Scandal, Political Crack, The Darnold

Free Chicken

I was an Alexander Vindman fan boy during his testimony to the House Intelligence Committee. He’s the poster for bad shit happening to good people in the Trump era. Telling the truth cost him his military career, but not his integrity. That’s something the Trumpers will never understand because they haven’t got any.

It’s been a big year thus far for Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg. First, the “losers and suckers” story. On Monday, he published the first post retirement interview with Lt. Colonel Vindman. Vindman let it rip calling the Impeached Insult Comedian, “Putin’s useful idiot” among other things.

One reason I liked Vindman as a witness so much was his utter lack of guile and cynicism. That made smears against him ineffective except among the Trump cult. Fellow witness Fiona Hill summed it up brilliantly to Goldberg:

It is noteworthy that two other key witnesses in the impeachment—Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, and Fiona Hill, formerly the senior director for European and Russian affairs at the NSC (and Vindman’s boss)—were immigrants. Yovanovitch was born in Canada and grew up speaking Russian at home; Hill came from England. “The truth is that Masha and Alex were very good in their roles, but they were in shock much of the time as this all unfolded,” Hill told me. “Mugged right outside your own door. You can’t quite believe it, because this is not the America that they idealized. I idealized it too, when I got here. There’s no Rudy Giuliani playing this kind of role in your American dream.” William Taylor, who served as acting ambassador to Ukraine after the Trump administration removed Yovanovitch, said of Vindman, “One thing Alex Vindman is not is cynical. I’m absolutely convinced he’s a patriot, to the point where he’s a bit Boy Scoutish.”

Vindman is an intellectual and a straight arrow. That’s why he was such a breath of fresh air even for a hardened skeptic like me. Trump and his minions are incapable of understanding the Alex Vindmans of the world. They cannot be bought, which is a rarity in Trump’s Washington.

My favorite Vindman quote from the Goldberg article is in the second paragraph below:

But do you think Russia is blackmailing Trump? “They may or may not have dirt on him, but they don’t have to use it,” he says. “They have more effective and less risky ways to employ him. He has aspirations to be the kind of leader that Putin is, and so he admires him. He likes authoritarian strongmen who act with impunity, without checks and balances. So he’ll try to please Putin.”

Vindman continues, “In the Army we call this ‘free chicken,’ something you don’t have to work for—it just comes to you. This is what the Russians have in Trump: free chicken.”

I wonder what kind of chicken: Kiev? Pot pie? Tandoori? Kung Pao? Popeye’s? KFC? Super Chicken? Foghorn Leghorn?

Or is there a musical component? There’s always a musical component with me. That’s why the last word goes to Little Feat:

Sep 16 2020
Leave a comment
Adrastos, Bayou Brief, Gret Stet Politics, New Orleans, Political Crack

Bayou Brief: Stuck On Stupid

My Bayou Brief column is usually published every other Wednesday. That changed this week because of Hurricane Sally. I was concerned that many of our readers would lose power and internet connection. Instead, Sally decided to visit Alabama and Florida. My condolences to everyone in the impacted areas.

Here’s the tag line for this week’s column, Stuck On Stupid: “13th Ward Ramblings on the Louisiana Democratic Party, New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell, and wayward wingnut pundit Dan Fagan.”

The part about Gret Stet Dems has received the most attention but my favorite bit is about former Picvocate pundit Dan Fagan. That’s Fagan with an A, not an Fagin with an I like this guy:

Sep 16 2020
Leave a comment
Adrastos, Album Cover Art, Film, Music

Album Cover Art Wednesday: Stop The World- I Want To Get Off

Stop The World- I Want To Get Off is a title for our times. The stage show premiered on London’s West End in 1961. It told the story of a young man’s rise from lowly tea boy to rich dude. The setting was a circus; every time something bad happened to the lead character, he said “Stop the world.” Disappointed that it’s not about the apocalypse? Audiences in the Sixties were not.

On to the covers, we have the original Broadway cast album and the 1966 movie soundtrack album:

There was a 1978 revival of the show on Broadway.  Here’s the revival soundtrack starring Sammy Davis Jr:

 

 

Sep 15 2020
Leave a comment
Athenae, JOEY B SHARK

Happy Biden/Harris/BBarryBamz Thing

There’s so much noise that we forget we can have any fun at all with the campaign. We need to have a little bit of fun.

I really wish I could take Kick to hear Kamala speak.

A.

Sep 15 2020
5 Comments
Athenae, COVID-19, Education, Kids Today

Maliciousness

I’m never one to credit evil as an explanation where stupidity will do nicely, but as this post points out, this is starting to surpass the “wishful thinking” phase: 

You pushed faculty to offer in-person classes or classes that could at least have an in-person component. Classes that drew students to campus and put butts in classroom seats were valued. You created all sorts of untested hybrid options with the idea that some personal interaction was better than none. Faculty objected and students went with online options when possible, but still you persisted.

You created pokazukha websites and plans and fliers for your students and faculty, complete with testing sites and “dashboard numbers” of tests and cases. You told them that “We’re all in this together” and that things would be fine because you were locked and loaded for this war.

Then, you passed the buck to a group of 18-to-22-year-olds and told them, “We want you to have a normal college experience” in the same breath that you layered on admonitions and restrictions that made such an experience impossible. You also told these students to act in a fashion that belied your decades of experience observing students, even as you lacked the resources or structure to enforce such edicts to the extent necessary to avoid case spikes.

It’s becoming clear that the spike in cases in the Midwest is due to college reopening (not to mention GOP legislatures and GOP-appointed judges overthrowing safety measures in the name of having something to yell to their resentment-roided supporters about) and I’m about 100 percent done with blaming kids for not doing what grown-ass people cannot do without throwing a fit in the Trader Joe’s.

And let’s not let municipalities off the hook here. My entire neighborhood melted down over the weekend about a house party some high schoolers threw that infected a whole shitload of people and we were 100 comments into “when do I get my tax money back from the school since these kids obviously didn’t learn anything” by the time someone pointed out that Illinois is in Phase Four. Gatherings of up to 50 people are allowed. Legally.

Restaurants are open. Stores are open, and not just grocery stores. Bars are open, and you know, the longer this goes on the more sympathy I have for people who need a drink with friends. I’m more open to going to a bar where I know they clean the place, than I am to the HomeGoods where who the hell knows where half that stuff’s been, and do you really need a throw pillow at the moment? Sports are going on every single weekend on every single soccer and baseball field. Some schools are open, too.

So if a group of students does something perfectly legal, who are we to then take to the internet and shame them? You don’t like what they’re doing? THEN CLOSE THE FUCKING BARS. CLOSE THE FRATS. CLOSE THE DAMN CAMPUS. SEND EVERYBODY HOME. I hate this idea, I hate everything about it, I loved college and I still love my university more than anyplace else on earth including my current actual house. But I want everybody to live is the thing.

The post above references canaries in coal mines and to spin that out to its end, the canary didn’t lock itself in the cage and carry itself down into the dark. We are so busy yelling at the canaries that we let the company that built the mine pack up and leave without a single consequence.

A.

Sep 14 2020
4 Comments
Adrastos, Diary, Law/Justice, Legal Docket, Nature is Scary, Political Crack, Television

Sally Can’t Dance?

It’s time to sally forth on another week. There’s a storm in the Gulf, which will make landfall near me. It’s taken a jog to the East so New Orleans is  no longer in the bull’s eye but we could still lose power. If that happens, I wanted to chime in early as opposed to often.

I set a precedent with Hurricane Laura of using a featured image from the movie Laura. Today, I’m using my favorite fictional Sally. It’s Sally Rodgers as played by the late, great Rose Marie. She’s surrounded by Dick Van Dyke as Rob Petrie and Carl Reiner as Alan Brady. They’re three zany peas in a wacky pod. If the Van Dyke and Reiner clans were humorless, I’d apologize for using a picture in which Dick and Carl are semi-decapitated. It adds to the surreal nature of this Monday. We still can’t trust that day.

First, our good friend and beloved colleague Tommy T is having some health issues that prevented him from posting this morning. If you’re religious, pray for him but whatever you do, don’t prey on him. Get well soon, buddy.

Best wishes to my West Coast friends who are dealing with a deadly and smokey round of fires. They’re wearing masks for more than one reason today.

We continue with a quote from a Flynn case filing, which means we need a proper subject header:

Retired federal judge, former Gotti prosecutor, and all around badass, John Gleeson filed a brief last Friday blasting Bill Barr’s corrupt DOJ. Here are some snippets provided by TPM’s Josh Kovensky:

The Justice Department’s move to drop charges against Michael Flynn “reflects a corrupt and politically motivated favor unworthy of our justice system,” the court-appointed attorney arguing against the Justice Department’s motion to dismiss stated in a Friday filing.

“In the United States, Presidents do not orchestrate pressure campaigns to get the Justice Department to drop charges against defendants who have pleaded guilty — twice, before two different judges — and whose guilt is obvious,” wrote John Gleeson, a former federal judge and prosecutor appointed to oppose the Justice Department in the case.

The extraordinarily scathing brief alleges in detail and with precision that the Justice Department broke from decades of procedure to help out a friend of President Trump’s. Dripping with contempt for the government’s position, Gleeson argued that federal prosecutors were too lazy to respond to earlier arguments he had made, including whether the content of Flynn’s lies was material.

He added that the DOJ typically does not “make a practice of attacking its own prior filings in a case, as well as judicial opinions ruling in its favor, all while asserting that the normal rules should be set aside for a defendant who is openly favored by the President.”

“Yet that is exactly what has unfolded here,” Gleeson wrote.

Tell us what you really think, Judge. John Gleeson is not afraid of a mean tweet from the Impeached Insult Comedian. He’s the guy who got Gotti, after all.

In other news, President* Pennywise is still holding super-spreader campaign events despite remonstrations from state and local officials. This 74-year-old man is acting like a rebellious teenager. His followers are even less mature. It’s time for them to go. Make it so, America, make it so.

I’m an avid consumer of local news during Hurricane season. I had this amusing exchange with a local weatherdude:

I am easily amused this morning. I tend to laugh in the face of disaster. So it goes.

There was much talk about Sally songs this weekend. Here’s a selection of them beginning with the song that gave this post its title:

The last word goes to Wilson Pickett. If he were still with us, he’d insist:

Sep 13 2020
1 Comment
Athenae, COVID-19, Kids Today

The Cannon Fodder Objects

My first newspaper: 

As more than a quarter of Wisconsin’s record-breaking 1,547 new daily cases came from UW-Madison students on Thursday, the situation in Madison is increasingly worrying. Continued spread among off-campus communities endangers all of Madison and Dane County, jeopardizing lives, local businesses and any return to normalcy. This doomed attempt to reopen will ultimately saddle local authorities with an outbreak that continues long after campus facilities close.

In short, what we all had feared — what we knew would be inevitable — has come true. The exponential growth of COVID-19 cases, the lockdown of campus dorms, with the misdirection of faulting individualistic behavior, UW-Madison has now fallen to the same fate as other universities around the country. And if leadership had made responsible decisions from the outset of this crisis, that is to protect its students and the greater Madison community, we would not be here, and we should not forget that.

My local Facebook group is a massive shitstorm of shaming right now because, get this, a bunch of high schoolers had a party and now two dozen of them are sick. I’m not immune to have side-eyed a dude or two (it’s always a dude, sorry) either not wearing a mask or taking it OFF once he’s inside (the FUCK, fellas) but let’s not confuse encouraging healthy behavior in our neighbors with collective action by our government.

People keep remarking on the lack of mourning for the COVID victims, especially compared with those of 9/11. It’s really not that hard to figure out why “we” aren’t “united” in our attempts to stop the virus and keep each other safe. There’s no incentive to do it. The point of things like that is to spur us to action. There was tremendous incentive to pull the country together after 9/11: it fed our need for a nice long war, in the endlessly good name of making sure this never happened again.

What is the incentive to collectively mourn the dead of coronavirus? It’s not like collective action to improve the lives of citizens by curing disease is something our GOP leaders are interested in. What purpose would it serve, for them? It would only remind people that when we’re not led by venal garbage trash we can do big things well and save one another.

There’s nothing in it for them.

And with the exception of kids like those above, nobody’s speaking up for those being fed into the woodchipper of this virus, whether they’re college students or delivery drivers. We need to amplify the voices saying this isn’t the way things had to be, and go to hell with the idea that it is.

A.

Sep 12 2020
2 Comments
Adrastos, Diary, Film, Music, New Orleans, Odds & Sods, Political Crack, Race, Sports, Television

Saturday Odds & Sods: Six Months In A Leaky Boat

Blue Painting by Wassily Kandinsky.

It’s September and it’s still hotter than hell in New Orleans. Pandemic fatigue is widespread here just like everywhere else. Unfortunately, America didn’t do the work needed to suppress COVID-19 so we’re still muddling through.

The NFL season opens this week and I find myself utterly indifferent. I’m mildly amused by wingnut fans who say that they’ll boycott the season because the NFL has gone BLM on their asses. These are the same people who claim they want sports and politics on separate plains, make that separate planets. The Saints will be playing on Sunday at an empty Superdome. It’s hard to get excited about any of this. So it goes.

This week’s theme song was written by Tim Finn in 1982 for Split Enz’s Time and Tide album. It refers to the amount of time that it took British pioneers to sail to New Zealand and is also a metaphor for the songwriter’s nervous breakdown. That’s a lot of substance for a song that still rocks like crazy.

We have three versions of Six Months In A Leaky Boat for your listening pleasure: The Split Enz original; a 2000 live version by Tim Finn, Bic Runga, and Dave Dobbyn and a 2006 performance by a reunited Enz featuring some stellar keyboard work by the great Eddie Rayner.

Kiwi singer-songwriter David Dobbyn has his own nautical classic:

Now that we’re all seasick, it’s time to don a life jacket and jump to the break.

Continue reading →

Sep 11 2020
Leave a comment
Adrastos, Friday Cocktail Hour, Music

I Got It Bad (And That Ain’t Good)

I Got It Bad (And That Ain’t Good) was composed in 1941 by Duke Ellington with lyrics by Paul Francis Webster. It’s been covered many times over the years and is one of Duke’s most beloved compositions. It suits my mood on this pandemicky Friday. Is that a word? Maybe not; it sounds a bit too much like Mantle, Dolenz, or Mouse…

We begin with an instrumental version from the 1956 Newport Jazz Festival. The standout is Johnny Hodges on sax.

Next up Friday Cocktail Hour regular Ella Fitzgerald backed by the Duke Ellington Orchestra:

As one would expect, Sinatra’s version is epic.

I heard Dianne Reeves’ fabulous 1987 interpretation for the first time last week.

It’s time to go avant garde on your asses with some Monk; Thelonious, not Adrian:

That’s it for this week. Pour yourself a beverage and unwind after another frenetic news week. It’s what Bogie, Betty, and Frank would want. Never argue with them, y’all.

Sep 11 2020
1 Comment
Adrastos, Books, Diary, Fog Of History, Fog Of Scandal, Legal Docket, Music, Political Crack, R.I.P., The Darnold

19th Nervous Breakdown

The slow news day seems to have been abolished. Hence another potpourri post in lieu of a stand-alone piece. I made the featured image after the Yo, Semite incident. It was more of a malaprop than an incident but having Yosemite Sam on my side is somehow comforting. Varmints, beware.

19 Years: It’s the 19th anniversary of a terrorist attack that led a previous lousy president to go off half-cocked and start a two-front war without paying heed to the consequences. We’re still paying for the Bush-Cheney administration’s folly.

I was on jury duty when the planes hit the twin towers. We were dismissed early and were only required to come in once more. The only good thing that came of that day.

For what it’s worth, the 19th is the bronze anniversary. To me it evokes this tune:

It may be a venerable song, but it’s still relevant. Who among us isn’t having our 19th Nervous Breakdown of the pandemic?

Trump-Woodward Followup/Fallout: When I first heard of the big COVID revelation in Rage, I was enraged. I almost wrote a post titled Bob Woodward Can Go Fuck Himself.

The more I thought about it, I focused my rage on Trump instead of Woodward. An earlier revelation would not have changed policy and saved lives. The Kaiser of Chaos was determined to fuck things up as shown by his insipid defense yesterday. Woodward’s defense was much stronger: he wasn’t sure if Trump was telling the truth. Holy credibility gap, Batman.

Joe Biden said it best in these two tweets:

A reminder that George W. Bush was a cheerleader at Yale. Sis-boom-bah. Boola-boola. Where the hell are the Whiffenpoofs when you need them? Perhaps one of them is a Whistleblower. You never can tell.

I missed something important in my D Is For Donald & Dumb post. One of the reasons Trump allowed Woodward to interview him so many times is that Woodward is a celebrity. I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump said this during one of their sessions, “Why aren’t you as good-looking as Robert Redford?”

Timesman Peter Baker has written an excellent piece about why Trump agreed to talk to Woodward. It’s summed up by this song title:

It’s surprising that Trump hasn’t assembled his own version of the Palmer Girls. He should hire a lame choreographer and put Melania, Ivanka, Tiffany, Hope, and Kayleigh to work. Imagine a rewrite of another Robert Palmer hit: “Might as well face it, we’re addicted to Trump.”

Sometimes I get carried away. This is one of those times.

One of the stories that got lost in the news blizzard requires its own featured image meme thing:

Bill Barr For The Defense: The news that the Department of Justice would defend the Impeached Insult Comedian in E. Jean Carroll’s defamation suit against him enraged legal eagles everywhere. The DOJ is not usually in the business of defending accused rapists in civil suits. It’s part and parcel of Barr’s degradation of the DOJ. He seems determined to prove that, unlike Tom Hagen, he *is* a wartime consigliere.

The sick Trump-Barr relationship reminds me of-you guessed it-an ancient Paul Simon song about a con man:

“Everywhere I go
I get slandered, libeled
I hear words I never heard in the Bible
And I’m one step ahead of the shoeshine
Two steps away from the county line
Just trying to keep my customers satisfied”

Just substitute client for customer and Bob’s your uncle or is that Bill’s your Attorney General? I confuse the two. Maybe one of them is actually Artie:

In Memoriam:  A quick shout-out to Tom Seaver, Lou Brock, and Diana Rigg; all of whom died recently. Tom was one of the greatest pitchers of all-time. Lou was one of the greatest World Series performers ever. And Diana was my first celebrity crush when she played Emma Peel in The Avengers. They will all be missed.

I could not find a decent animated GIF of St. Louis Cardinal great Lou Brock but Tom Terrific tips his cap to him:

Ny Mets Sport GIF by New York Mets - Find & Share on GIPHY

Diana Rigg as Emma Peel closes the door on this segment:

Finally, there’s a new Springsteen album coming out next month. That allows me to go out on a positive note in a week overloaded with scandal tornadic activity. The last word goes to Bruce and the E Street Band:

That was just what I needed. Thanks, y’all. Don’t forget to hang up the goddamn phone.

Sep 11 2020
5 Comments
Adrastos, Catblogging, Film

Friday Catblogging: Introducing Claire Trevor

We have a new kitty. She’s a two-year-old Calico whose previous person died. His family wouldn’t take her but we did.

She was rescued by the same person who gave us Paul Drake. The omens are good. In fact, if PD were still with us, she’d be his pesky kid sister. She was destined to join our family.

We named her after Claire Trevor one of my favorite actresses of the 1930’s and ’40s. She specialized in playing tough broads and femme fatales. Her namesake is on the shy side right now but she’s going to be something.

Here’s the Claire Trevor movie list I came up with for Saturday Odds & Sods last month:

My Top Ten Favorite Claire Trevor Movies:

  1. Stagecoach
  2. Key Largo
  3. Born To Kill
  4. Murder My Sweet
  5. Raw Deal
  6. Two Weeks In Another Town
  7. Crack Up
  8. Dead End
  9. Johnny Angel
  10. The High and the Mighty

Without further ado, here are some pictures of the wee lassie’s floor show. First, on PD’s favorite rug:

Here’s CT giving a dirty look worthy of the late great Della Street:

Sep 10 2020
3 Comments
Adrastos, Books, COVID-19, Film, Fog Of Scandal, Political Crack, The Darnold

D Is For Dumb & Donald

News of the new Bob Woodward book, Rage, landed like a scandal tornado yesterday. I have mixed feelings about Woodward’s withholding the fact that President* Pennywise understood the threat that the virus posed and lied about it instead. I’m uncertain if an earlier release would have changed anything BUT others have differing views including First Draft/Crack Van regular, Lex Alexander, who wrote a pithy post titled, Bob Woodward Has Blood On His Hands. He has a point but I think the focus should be on Trump’s conduct, not Woodward’s ethics.

Trump’s defense is typically preposterous. He didn’t want to cause panic? That’s rich coming from the guy I call the Kaiser of Chaos. Panic is his middle name. I want to shake him like Paul Douglas did to this small-time crook in the pandemic classic, Panic In The Streets:

Panic and pandemonium are hallmarks of the Trump regime as is stupidity. The Impeached Insult Comedian has done a lot of dumb things in his life but sitting for 18 interviews with Bob Woodward takes the cake. He somehow thought he could talk the steely Woodward into giving him good publicity:

CNN reported on Wednesday night that Trump was dead set on granting interviews with Woodward, who was working on a book about Trump titled “Rage,” to boost his image, with the President reportedly relying on his experience as a salesman to present himself in a positive light.

White House aides “repeatedly” warned Trump against speaking to the dogged reporter, a source told CNN, but as usual, the President ignored their advice and acted on his own instincts instead.

Once again, Trump’s instincts were wrong. He knew Woodward was recording him, but he babbled and bragged anyway. The presidency is not a real estate deal and, whatever his flaws, Bob Woodward is not an easy mark. Lordy, there *are* Trump tapes.

The right is flummoxed by this news. They’re blaming everyone but Dumb Donald for this latest catastrophe. My favorite is Tucker Carlson blaming Lindsey Graham:

I know who’s to blame: Donald Trump and his arrogance and stupidity. Make that tremendous stupidity. He’s too dumb to be president*. Believe me.

The last word goes to Todd Rundgren:

Sep 10 2020
1 Comment
Michael F

You Can’t Shred Digital Recordings

And you can’t erase 18 and 1/2 minute gaps when someone else has copies.

But let’s not slather Bob Woodward in praise while draping him with rewards and awards…as others note, he sat on quite a significant story for months while millions were infected and hundreds of thousands died.

For me, this is just another example of how deep the rot is. We all know Trump is the lowest form of lying scum, a con artist and cult leader (aside: Gret Stet Senator/Cletis-The-Ignorant-Yokel wannabe/and cult initiate John Neely Kennedy all but squinched his eyes shut and put fingers in his ears in denying Trump said what he said, and that it’s on tape), anyway, we’ve known Trump is a fraud, but the elite media, like Woodward, spent the entire 2016 political campaign sitting on story after story, while obsessing over the nothing burger of Hillary Clinton’s email server.

Then they spent the next four years normalizing an administration that wasn’t just criminally venal but remarkably stupid and inept. It’s as if Trump managed to combine Nixon’s evilness, Reagan’s vacuousness, Bush Senior’s creepiness, and Junior’s incompetence into a single flabby, vicious, amoral orange blob.

If the coronavirus hadn’t plunged the country into a genuine crisis, I’m guessing the odds are pretty good the chattering classes would be furrowing their collective brows over Hunter Biden and Burisma…and who knows, they still might, because, you know, both sides…

And while I suppose on the one hand it’s better-late-than-never that at least some of this is finally coming to light, and hopefully in a way that ensures Trump’s first term in office is his last/only term, it’s nonetheless troubling that it’s taken this long to expose what I believe is still just the tip of the Trump iceberg of fraud and corruption…

And what will come next?

Sep 10 2020
Adrastos, Books, Pulp Fiction Thursday Image

Pulp Fiction Thursday: Blood On The Mink

← Older posts