Adrastos, Campaign Notes, COVID-19, Political Crack, Television, The Darnold, Twitter

The Joke’s On Them

I had not originally planned to spike the ball over the Tulsa fiasco but it’s turning out to be a landmark in the decline and fall of the Trump cult.

I received a nearly hysterical fundraising email from Move On yesterday. It proclaimed that Trump *would* win if I didn’t give them money. The timing was bad after only 6,200 people attended what I will hereinafter refer to as the Tulsa Trainwreck. I feel a segment header coming on.

The Tulsa Trainwreck: The excuses are flying. This admission of failure made me chuckle. No, make that cackle:

Now, some White House officials said the campaign was being dishonest about what had gone wrong, and they conceded that many of the president’s older supporters had decided attending the rally was too risky amid coronavirus fears that Mr. Trump has repeatedly played down.

Dishonest? Ya think? Dishonesty is a given with these people. Delusional is more like it.

Team Trump also trotted out the “it’s just a joke” defense over this comment:

This time the joke’s on them.

The Tulsa Trainwreck is a signal that the vaunted Trump base is neither as dedicated nor as large as everyone claims it is. It’s also a signal that some of them are starting to realize that they’re being used and that President* Pennywise does not give a shit about them. Stay tuned.

Pirating Bolton: In my John Bolton Can Go Fuck Himself piece I urged people to post pirate copies on the internet. Apparently, I missed the fun this weekend as my wish came true. If anyone has a copy they’d like to share, please let me know.

It reminds me of the days of Pirate Radio:

Be Careful Out There: COVID-19 numbers are on the rise. Magical thinking seems to have seized the populace as reports of large gatherings became ubiquitous this weekend. New Orleans is particularly vulnerable as drive-in tourists from Texas, Mississippi, Alabama ,and Florida are showing up to party like there’s no pandemic. Playing American Roulette is for suckers.

This Twitter exchange sums up my feelings as this point:

We’re in the wack-a-mole stage of the pandemic, which is made worse by all the wishful thinking. At least we know who to blame:

Perry Who? I was excited about the Perry Mason reboot with Matthew Rhys in the title role. I even thought I might recap it. Then, I saw the first episode.

It was a trainwreck; there’s that word again. Other than the character names, it has nothing whatsoever to do with either the Erle Stanley Gardner books or the teevee series with Raymond Burr. I *expected* it to be different but not disconnected.

HBO’s Perry Who is a sleazy gumshoe living on his deceased parents’ farm outside Los Angeles. Worst of all, despite being played by a smart actor, he came off as a depressed dolt. Perry Mason was always the smartest guy in the room, not the most depressed.

If anything, Dr. A hated it more than I did. I’m willing to see if the series gets any better because it has such a stellar cast but whatever it is, it’s not Perry Mason. I’ll try and watch it as a period private eye show. Hopefully, future episodes will be better, they can’t get much worse.

Whoever thought that Perry Who should be a mediocre private eye, not a lawyer should have their head examined. Then there’s the matter of character age, Perry Who is a depressed Great War veteran in a series set in 1932. Matthew Rhys is 46 and Raymond Burr was 40 when cast as Perry Mason. In the books, Perry read for the law in his twenties. That makes sense. Perry Who as a 40-something gumshoe does not.

There was a lot of room left by the Gardner books and the Burr teevee series to do something interesting with the Perry Mason characters. The makers of Perry Who dropped the ball.

In the immortal words of the Men on Film of In Living Color fame:

That brings us back to the post title. The joke is a sick one and it’s not only on them, it’s on all of us.

The last word goes to Steve (not Steven) Miller:

 

 

 

4 thoughts on “The Joke’s On Them”

  1. Oh boy. I was so excited for the new Perry Mason until I saw the first preview and thought “How bad is this going to be?”. I guess you answered that question.

    So tired of 21st-century mopey boy semi-anti-heroes.

  2. Regards Perry: If E.S. Gardner were alive today, he’d be spinning in his grave.

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