Sunrise — 6:00.

"Her emotions remain mixed: shame, fear of exposure, sadness and a sense of freedom. In her head the aborted fetus has grown into an adult man..."

"... who asks her why she didn’t have him. But... being able to end a pregnancy can be a necessary condition of women’s flourishing. Moore remembers reciting her 'matrilineage' in a circle with a women’s theater group in the 1970s: 'I am Honor, daughter of Jenny, granddaughter of Fanny and Margarett,' she declared. Moore wrote a biography of Margarett (the painter Margarett Sargent) and a memoir of Jenny, but she has not become a biological mother herself. After she recounted her inheritance, everyone in the circle recited the same sentence: 'I am a woman giving birth to myself.'"

From "At 23, She Had a Termination. 55 Years Later, She’s Ready to Write About It. In 1969, Honor Moore was granted an abortion by a Connecticut psychiatrist, and went on with her life. In 2024, she reckons with the fallout" (NYT).

Here's the memoir, "A Termination" (commission earned).

"Keanu Reeves plans to begin his Broadway career in the fall of 2025, opposite his longtime 'Bill & Ted' slacker-buddy Alex Winter in 'Waiting for Godot,' the ur-two-guys-being-unimpressive tragicomedy."

I'm reading "How Hollywood Glamour Is Reviving the Endangered Broadway Play/George Clooney, Robert Downey Jr., Denzel Washington and Mia Farrow are coming to Broadway, where some producers see plays with stars as safer bets than musicals" (NYT).

Just yesterday, I was scanning the New York theater listings, hoping to find things worth seeing next time I make it to New York, and "Waiting for Godot" caught my eye, because I've been a big fan of the play ever since I happened to see it on TV — the Zero Mostel/Burgess Meredith production — when I was a teenager. Then I saw this new production had Keanu Reeves, and my real-time reaction was "I’m a little afraid of Keanu Reeves fans ruining the audience."

From the NYT article:

"The DJ at Vice President Kamala Harris’s recent rally in Philadelphia turned up the volume on Ludacris’s 'Move B----!'..."

"... as the emcee encouraged the crowd to direct the song’s aggressive yet catchy lyrics toward Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. Cut through the 2024 election noise. Get The Campaign Moment newsletter. 'Move, b----!' the exuberant rallygoers chanted Tuesday. 'Get out the way!' A few minutes later, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro riled up the crowd by summarizing his governing philosophy: 'Get s--- done!' That motto was echoed verbatim the following day by Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer during a Harris rally that included audience chants of 'Hell yeah,' a reference to Harris as a 'bada-- woman' and at least one f-bomb from the stage.... Known to swear liberally behind closed doors, a practice she has said ramped up after she became vice president, Harris has used profanity both to express outrage and to create a sense of intimacy with her private audiences, according to aides and allies...."

From "Harris rallies get edgy with four-letter words/The vice president, known to curse liberally behind closed doors, is one of the few not swearing onstage at rallies that are growing in size — and spiciness" (WaPo).

I know that Ludacris recording with its "aggressive yet catchy lyrics" like "I been thankin' of bustin' you/Upside your motherfuckin' forehead." Years ago, I heard it playing over loudspeakers in Library Mall here at the University of Wisconsin, and I felt like suing the school for sexual harassment. It troubles me to think of it playing to a general audience full of women at a presidential campaign rally (even one that's trying to make a male candidate seem like the "bitch" the song is referring to).

"Minimal interference — that's my goal."

"[Trump] has found the change disorienting, those who interact with him say. Mr. Trump had grown comfortable campaigning against an 81-year-old incumbent..."

"... who struggled to navigate stairs, thoughts and sentences.... The people around Mr. Trump see a candidate knocked off his bearings... At the Aug. 2 dinner, Mr. Trump told donors that the news media had been incorrectly suggesting that he had mellowed since the assassination attempt. 'I’m not nicer,' he said, according to one person in attendance. Another said Mr. Trump described himself as 'angry' because 'they' — unspecified adversaries that the attendee took to mean Democrats — had first tried to bankrupt him and then to kill him.... He had been on a glide path to an all but certain victory. Now, he needs to work for it. But Mr. Trump has also been whipsawed by a seven-week roller-coaster-ride of events: an attempt on his life, the selection of a running mate, a nominating convention, his opponent’s withdrawal from the race, the entry of a galvanizing new rival, a potential Iranian assassination threat against him and new layers of security that have brought a bunker-like feel to his properties...."

Write Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, in "Inside the Worst Three Weeks of Donald Trump’s 2024 Campaign/People around the former and would-be president see a candidate knocked off his bearings, disoriented by his new contest with Kamala Harris and unsure of how to take her on" (NYT).

"Ms. Harris is ahead of Mr. Trump by four percentage points in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan, 50 percent to 46 percent..."

"... among likely voters in each state. The surveys were conducted from Aug. 5 to 9.... On question after question, the poll finds that voters don’t seem to have major reservations about Kamala Harris, Nate Cohn writes."

The NYT reports.

At the Nate Cohn link, the key point seems to be that Biden was a terrible candidate:

Views of Mr. Trump haven’t diminished. In fact, his favorability rating ticked up slightly, to 46 percent across the three states — just enough to represent his highest rating in the history of Times/Siena polling. It’s a tally that might have been enough for a clear lead against Mr. Biden, whose ratings had fallen into the 30s in early July. But for now it’s not enough against the surging Ms. Harris.

One way to think about her position is that she has become something like a “generic” Democrat.

"So you start to see the the trappings of this thing that was created in New York City, in the Bronx in the 1970s start to leave its beginnings a little bit..."

"...and become more of a competition and more of a sport through Red Bull and these other entities that are sponsoring it.... It's actually a bit of a wild story [how breaking went from a Red Bull event to the Olympics]. So nearly three decades ago, this global governing body of dance, international dance sport is recognized by the International Olympic Committee and they wanna bring dance to the Olympics. So they want to have ballroom dancing and they suggest that and they get rebuffed. So they eventually rebrand themselves as World Dance Sport Federation, and they find out that it's not foxtrot or salsa or ballroom that the Olympic thinks could have a shot. It's breaking. Breaking is highly watchable, easily viewable on social media. And it comes along as the Olympics is reevaluating what they're going to use as a sport to try and gain that younger audience. There was a testing period in 2018.... They debuted breaking at the Youth Olympics in Buenos Aires.... There was over 2.5 million social media impressions according to the International Olympic Committee. I mean, it seems like it aligns itself perfectly with the Olympics mission of trying to skewer to a younger audience. And once you see those numbers that pretty much locked up breaking for the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris..."

From the new episode of the NYT "Daily" podcast, "Breaking’s Olympic Debut." 

"Skewer" — sometimes the wrong word is the right word.

I could not tell what portion of this is humor. I had to do research.

Australia has lost the plot. For the breakdancing competition at the Olympics they put this woman with a PhD in breakdancing up as a competitor. She admits that she barely ever trains and complains that she doesn’t fit into the hierarchy of merit, which she considers to be a form… pic.twitter.com/zrmIhPZLjt

— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) August 10, 2024

 

I'd seen the video yesterday and believed — though it's hard to believe — that this is a real Olympic performance in what is the sport/"sport" of breakdancing. But what about the rest of that — the PhD in breakdancing and the critique of hierarchy? It's too good as satire. True?!

I found this: "Raygun, mocked on internet for her routine, is Sydney professor with PhD in cultural studies/In what is a young person’s sport, the 36-year-old Raygun was mocked on social media on Friday for her attire and routine. In her day job, Rachael Gunn is a lecturer at Sydney’s Macquarie University with a PhD with her thesis focusing on the intersection of gender and Sydney’s breaking culture" (Indian Express).

Sunrise — 6:00.

"A mechanical issue caused former president Donald Trump’s plane to be diverted Friday as he headed to Montana for a rally, according to airport staff at Billings Logan International Airport."

 WaPo reports.

Strange to see that on the same day I'm seeing "That Time Trump Nearly Died in a Helicopter Crash? Didn’t Happen. In a news conference, the former president recounted a brush with death alongside Willie Brown, the former San Francisco mayor. A few aspects of the story don’t hold up to scrutiny" (NYT).

Imagine all the things that "Didn't Happen."

I'm curious how the NYT established that something didn't happen:

"Republicans are attacking...."

From the Washington Post "Fact Checker," Glenn Kessler: "Assessing claims about Tim Walz’s military service/Republicans are attacking the Democratic vice-presidential nominee on his retirement timing and with allegations of 'stolen valor.'"

There's no "Pinocchio" rating. I'm not going to expend one of my gift links on this piece. I don't think it says anything inconsistent with my effort at reading the news yesterday, "The New York Times and The Washington Post address J.D. Vance's attack on Tim Walz's military credentials."

There may be some new info, such as:

"You tell me how and why corporate media constantly speaks from the same exact script this way, verbatim. #KamalaIsJOY"

Not even herd animals are this flagrant about it. You tell me how and why corporate media constantly speaks from the same exact script this way, verbatim. #KamalaIsJOY pic.twitter.com/AHSE9Im1GL

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) August 9, 2024

ADDED: Byron York has "Joy! Irrational exuberance soars to new levels" (Washington Examiner). Excerpt:

"For more than 30 years, the world’s largest iceberg was stuck in the Antarctic. Five times the size of New York City’s land area and more than 1,000 feet deep..."

"... the mammoth piece of ice finally became loose in 2020 and began a slow drift toward the Southern Ocean. Now, A23a, as it’s known, is spinning in place. After leaving Antarctic waters, the iceberg got stuck in a vortex over a seamount, or an underwater mountain. Imagine a piece of ice about 1,500 square miles in area and as deep as the Empire State Building spinning slowly but steadily enough to fully rotate it on its head over the course of about 24 days."

The NYT reports.

Haven't used my "vortex" tag in a long time.

Were you aware of the "Southern Ocean"? "The Southern Ocean, also known as the Antarctic Ocean, comprises the southernmost waters of the world ocean, generally taken to be south of 60° S latitude and encircling Antarctica.... The National Geographic Society recognized the ocean officially in June 2021...." 

How do we speak of the ocean/oceans? "The ocean is the body of salt water that covers approximately 70.8% of Earth. In English, the term ocean also refers to any of the large bodies of water into which the world ocean is conventionally divided...."

"We’re Having the Wrong Argument Over the Olympic Boxers/Questions about unfair advantage won’t just go away."

By Helen Lewis, in The Atlantic.

Please read the whole thing before commenting and restrict comments to the issue framed in the article, which I am not going to attempt to summarize. If you don't know what 5ARD is, please don't comment.

ADDED: If you have trouble accessing that article, try "What does science tell us about boxing’s gender row?" (BBC).

"Adopting joy as a political shield has also allowed Ms. Harris and Mr. Walz to throw some bare-knuckled punches at Mr. Trump and his running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio."

"Ms. Harris, a former prosecutor, has targeted Mr. Trump for his many legal problems — 'I know Donald Trump’s type,' she now likes to say, to uproarious applause and chants of 'Lock him up' that she only recently began to discourage. Mr. Walz has castigated Mr. Trump for 'servicing himself' instead of helping others, and made an off-color reference to a debunked rumor about Mr. Vance and furniture. Both Democrats do it with a smile, and the crowd eats it up.... Of course, Ms. Harris’s joyful-warrior approach has so far not been substantive from a policy perspective...."

Writes Katie Rogers in "Harris Used to Worry About Laughing. Now Joy Is Fueling Her Campaign. Democrats are smiling again, and so is a vice president who once weighed the political risks of cheerfulness. The high spirits are also providing air cover for scathing attacks on Republicans" (NYT).

But maybe get-happy is policy enough: "In 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt adopted the song 'Happy Days Are Here Again' to offer a promise of a bright future to Americans stricken by the Great Depression.... In a time of war and economic recession, Barack Obama’s likeness was plastered on a poster [with] the message... 'Hope.'"

"Is Donald Trump 'quiet quitting'? Here’s what his 'meltdown at Mar-a-Lago' reveals."

AlterNet analyzes that press conference Trump did yesterday.

Trump is not “campaigning a lot,” but in that statement Trump made big news. He casually announced he will continue to not, or to barely, campaign for another two weeks. Trump is also not “leading by a lot”... Trump’s winding and unfocused hour-long news conference led political experts to express grave concern. “Trump looks ill,” observed The New Yorker’s Susan Glasser.... “Trump is completely whacked out. He’s terrified,” remarked Obama 2012 campaign manager Jim Messina....

I know you're going to say "Experts!" etc. etc. But look seriously at the performance. I think he did seem tired... if not exhausted.  

Maybe it's a clever plan. Some sort of rope-a-dope. He announced all these debate proposals. Maybe the idea is to lure her into risking all by getting trapped on camera where he can try his various well-honed tricks to rattle and confuse her. 

"And over 26 years of marriage, Gail played housewife. But in the early years it was for a house full of groupies."

"'A diverse array of horny dreamers, oddballs, misfits, and sycophants freeload on heavy rotation,' Moon describes in her memoir. (They included longtime Zappa bassist Roy Estrada, who was later twice convicted on charges of child molestation.) 'I still wear my pacifier around my neck for security, never knowing who’s safe and who isn’t, who my dad is humping and who he isn’t.' In a 1971 documentary, Frank was asked about his affairs on the road. 'I like to get laid,' he said. What about your wife, the interviewer asked? 'She’s become accustomed to it over a period of years,' says Zappa.... In fact, Gail was bitterly unhappy about his extramarital pursuits and could explode into rages. Moon writes about the time her father asked her to find the gun so her mother couldn’t get her hands on it. 'Gail is on a rampage,' he said. 'I didn’t even know we had a gun,' she writes.... Even after the groupies drifted away, nothing much changed. There was no structure, no family vacations, no PTA meetings. None of the four Zappa children graduated from high school.... Ahmet and Moon... each ran away from home only to find that nobody seemed to notice."

From "Frank Zappa’s kids are still grappling with his legacy — and each other/Like their dad’s oddball rock songs, their family defied description. His music, and their pain, has endured" (WaPo)(free access link).

"[Nixon's] men broke into the Democratic National Committee in 1972—so what?"

"Lyndon B. Johnson’s men almost certainly bugged Barry Goldwater’s campaign plane in 1964. The John F. Kennedy administration authorized the wiretapping of Martin Luther King Jr. for its own political reasons. The Franklin D. Roosevelt administration surveilled Charles Lindbergh when the famous aviator led the America First Committee and contemplated a presidential run in 1940. Did Nixon try—albeit unsuccessfully—to obtain the tax returns of political adversaries? Well, Roosevelt successfully ordered the Internal Revenue Service to investigate opponents such as William Randolph Hearst, Huey Long, and Charles Coughlin. Nixon operated a clandestine unit inside the White House—the so-called plumbers—to trace and stop officials who leaked to the media, you say? Under previous administrations, the FBI acted as a giant government-plumbing agency, surveilling troublesome journalists such as Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson. Indeed, a probably core reason for the exposure of the Watergate break-in was that the long alliance between Richard Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover faltered after 1971, for complex reasons, obliging Nixon to use amateur investigators for the Watergate burglary and other black-bag jobs that, under past administrations, the FBI would have conducted for the president...."

Writes David Frum in "Richard Nixon Was Unlucky/The Watergate scandal forced his resignation 50 years ago. Today, he’d probably have gotten away with it" (The Atlantic).

Nixon gave his resignation speech 50 years ago last night.

ADDED: The Atlantic homepage has a link to Hunter S. Thompson, "He Was a Crook/A scathing obituary of Richard Nixon, originally published in Rolling Stone on June 16, 1994."

Sunrise — 5:49, 5:59, 6:01, 6:02.

"The vast majority of the memes circulating this week are in praise of Walz’s masculinity. Stereotypical masculinity, even."

"The kind conservatives perpetually worry that Democrats are trying to erase — the kind classically defined by such traits as stoicism, reliability, leadership and physical strength.... He is... offering to snowblow your walkway, map out the best driving routes to the airport and wait in the car until he’s sure you got inside safe.... The outpouring of love Walz is receiving — and the specific form it’s taking — makes it plain that masculinity isn’t under attack. Masculinity can be celebrated; people are longing to celebrate it. It’s the weird masculinity — the 'He-Man Woman Haters Club,' as Walz put it during an interview a few weeks ago — that people have a problem with. The kind that confuses leadership with authoritarianism, strength with domination, and protection with control.... I’d been trying to think of a better descriptor than Midwestern Dad to get at the aura Walz projects.... Soon I realized the perfect term had already been coined. 'Tim Walz has tonic masculinity,' I saw several fans write online."

Writes Monica Hesse, in "Masculinity’s check-engine light is on. Let Tim Walz have a look. Vice-presidential nominee Walz’s 'Midwestern dad vibe' comes with opportunities to rethink a whole tool kit of types" (WaPo)(free access link).

"Tonic masculinity" — did you know that term? My link goes to a Google search for the term, which doesn't have a Wikipedia article. I can see that it's one letter away from "toxic masculinity." And I can see that "tonic" can mean — to quote the OED — "Pertaining to, or maintaining, the tone or normal healthy condition of the tissues or organs." So... get your masculinity into a wholesome, healthy form, like that which his fans perceive in Tim Walz.

"[Jason] Reitman’s first production company was even called Hard C, based on the linguistic comedy theory..."

"... that k sounds make the best punchlines. ('I don’t know if you can print this, but my example was always: "Punched in the dick" is nowhere near as funny as "kicked in the cock."') Saturday Night originated in the same lifelong curiosity. 'Anyone who is a self-described comedy nerd—you’re interested in the weird chemistry of what makes something funny,' he says.... 'We interviewed everyone we could find that was alive from opening night,' Reitman says. 'Every living cast member, every living writer, people from the art department, costumes, hair and makeup, NBC pages, members of Billy Preston’s band—I mean, anyone we could find.'... [Laraine] Newman’s anecdote about guest host George Carlin... objecting to a sketch about Alexander the Great’s high school reunion became a key part of the film, and she’s grateful that Reitman focused on the strange mix of stakes they faced that night. 'We were led to believe that nobody was watching—11:30 p.m. was considered just a dead time,' she says. 'There was no expectation that the show would last. So really, it was like we were doing the show for ourselves....'"

From "Saturday Night First Look: How the SNL Movie Captures 1975’s Wild Opening Night/Director Jason Reitman calls it a 'thriller-comedy' that counts down to the very first 'Live from New York…'" (Vanity Fair).

Here's the trailer that came out today:

"ABC says Trump and Harris have agreed to debate on Sept. 10."

The NYT reports.

The 90-minute debate is expected to be held in Philadelphia, according to two people with knowledge of the plans. The ABC anchors David Muir and Linsey Davis will serve as moderators. The debate will probably be held without a live audience, but the exact format and ground rules are still being determined, the people said.

Remember my prediction, 5 days ago, when I ranked the likelihood of the possible outcomes:

1. The originally planned version of the debate takes place, with one change: a live audience.

2. The originally planned version of the debate takes place, unchanged.

3. There is no debate.

4. A third version of the debate is hammered out.

5. The Fox News debate, as proposed by Trump, actually happens.

The originally planned debate had George Stephanopoulos has the moderator, so there has been a change, though not the one I predicted. But the live audience is still a possibility. I'm glad Harris is exposing herself to the risks of debate. It is a big risk for her, and it's not for him.

"My concern is this is instrumentalizing the dog. This is not giving the dog any choice in the matter."

"If your dog wants to rub itself in coyote scat or fox scat, that’s the dog’s choice. But if it gets a spray of Dolce & Gabbana on it, that is not its choice. We need to be far more respectful of dogs and their wishes."

Said Daniel Mills, a professor of veterinary behavioral medicine, quoted in "Dolce & Gabbana Has New Dog Perfume. Veterinarians Turn Up Their Noses. An extravagant scent might seem like the height of pampering for your pup. But veterinarians are raising red flags: 'Overall, it’s a very bad idea'" (NYT).

"That Tim Walz falsely believes the free speech guarantee doesn't include what he considers to be 'misinformation' or 'hate speech' will bother almost no Dem supporters, since the vast majority of them want the state to be empowered to censor dissent."

Writes Glenn Greenwald, at X, displaying this:

That Tim Walz falsely believes the free speech guarantee doesn't include what he considers to be 'misinformation' or 'hate speech' will bother almost no Dem supporters, since the vast majority of them want the state to be empowered to censor dissent.pic.twitter.com/z74vizL9HT

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) August 7, 2024

"Going high is the only thing that works, because when we go low, when we use those same tactics of degrading and dehumanizing others, we just become part of the ugly noise that’s drowning out everything else. We degrade ourselves. We degrade the very causes for which we fight."

Said Michelle Obama, at the 2020 Democratic National Convention.

Quoted in "Walz’s 'couch' quip, and Democrats’ growing comfort in going low/The Democratic VP nominee’s apparent reference to a lewd, fake internet story reflects a more bare-knuckle campaign against a GOP presidential nominee who has spent years plumbing new depths." That's an essay by Aaron Blake, at WaPo.

It gets my "civility bullshit" tag, because civility has been advocated in the past, and Democrats are in a phase where they see an entitlement to reject it.

This also gets my "masturbation" tag. Who would have predicted that Democrats would lean heavily into masturbation shaming? It's 30 years since Bill Clinton fired Jocelyn Elders!

"More than 20 States in our country have a Trump abortion ban, many with no exceptions even for rape and incest, and if he wins we all know he will sign a national abortion ban to outlaw abortion in every state."

Said Kamala Harris, at her Eau Claire rally yesterday, clipped below.

I was listening live, and this argument really struck me at the time. But, on reflection, I thought it was an inaccurate representation of what Trump has been saying. I think he's been saying that he wants to leave abortion regulation to the states and keep the federal government out of it.

But why should we trust him? Nevertheless, I do think it's wrong to say "we all know he will sign a national abortion ban." It's justified to scare us with the possibility, but "we all know he will sign a national abortion ban"? No, I don't know it.

At the Harris/Walz rally yesterday in Eau Claire, Bon Iver played "Battle Cry of Freedom."

Bon Iver — "bon hiver"/"good winter" — is native to Eau Claire, Wisconsin, and who knows what portion of the rally crowd was rallying 'round Kamala Harris and Tim Walz and what portion was rallying for Bon Iver, but you can hear the performance in a TikTok video after the jump below.

Meanwhile, Wikipedia says...

The "Battle Cry of Freedom," also known as "Rally 'Round the Flag," is a song written in 1862 by American composer George Frederick Root (1820–1895) during the American Civil War. A patriotic song advocating the causes of Unionism and abolitionism, it became so popular that composer H. L. Schreiner and lyricist W. H. Barnes adapted it for the Confederacy. A modified Union version was used as the campaign song for the Lincoln-Johnson ticket in the 1864 presidential election, as well as in elections after the war, such as for Garfield in the 1880 U.S. presidential election....

And here's a particularly evocative sample lyric:

Oh we're springing to the call for three hundred thousand more,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
And we'll fill the vacant ranks with a million freemen more,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom.

"[Chef Thomas Keller] inspired the chef Rob Rubba to display a plaque — 'always be knolling' — near the pass at his award-winning restaurant, Oyster Oyster..."

"... in Washington, D.C. The phrase, popular in the world of art and design, refers to arranging objects so they are parallel or at 90-degree angles. At Oyster Oyster, it’s meant to encourage chefs to organize their work spaces, and, by extension, their minds, 'like an opening yoga sequence or tuning a guitar,' Mr. Rubba said. 'As people in hospitality, we look to things to keep us inspired, to motivate us,' said William Bradley, the chef and director of the Michelin-starred San Diego restaurant Addison. Especially for a restaurant staff that is 'performing at the highest level.' After Addison earned its second star in 2021, Mr. Bradley huddled with his staff and agreed to install an engraved plaque in the kitchen with the Navy SEAL call and response, 'All in, all the time.'"

From "Live, Laugh, Lowboy: Fine Dining’s Love Affair With Inspirational Quotes/Sayings from Navy SEALs, furniture designers and Steve Martin are just a few examples of how restaurants use signs to motivate their staffs" (NYT).

It's funny to see these word wall signs presented as cool when hung by men in restaurant kitchens. For years, people have been mocking women who put up these signs in their homes. I can see from the article — not from my own TV habits — that the coolness has something to do with the show "The Bear" (the restaurant in that show has a sign that says "Every Second Counts").

Reminds me of: "I should get one of those signs that says 'One of these days I'm gonna get organizized...."/"... like those little signs they have in offices that say 'Thimk'":

About that new (to me) word "knolling": I found this, from last year, in Dwell: "The Life-Changing Magic of 'Knolling'/Before purging your belongings to tidy up à la Marie Kondo, consider this organizational tactic championed by two artists with ties to the American furniture manufacturing company."

"I know that Tom Sachs is where it proliferated," says Amy Auscherman, director of archives and brand heritage at MillerKnoll..... "It’s a point of pride to be able to say the company name is also a verb." While the blue-chip artist laid out the rules for knolling and championed the concept into the creative world, sculptor Andrew Kromelow originally invented it. Both men worked in Frank Gehry’s Santa Monica studio during the late 1980s; Kromelow was in charge of keeping the workshop tidy as a janitor and would feverishly organize so that workers could quickly and clearly see all the tools at once. At the time, the Gehry studio was constructing a bent-plywood chair for Knoll. The name stuck.

From the internal link:

HOW TO KNOLL

1. Scan your environment for materials, tools, books, music, etc. which are not in use.
2. Put away everything not in use. If you aren't sure, leave it out.
3. Group all 'like' objects.
4. Align or square all objects to either the surface they rest on, or the studio itself....

Sachs’ studio mantra was instituted - ABK - ‘Always Be Knolling', a riff on the salesmen’s ‘ABC - Always Be Closing’ recited by Alex Baldwin in the screen adaptation of David Mamet’s Glengarry Glen Ross. It is an exquisite subversion of the capitalist creed into a sense of creativity in the display of the tools of craft. It is a riposte to the real estate snake-oil sales culture in the form of a celebration of making and order.  

"We do have dedicated police officers who are scouring social media to look for this material, and then follow up with arrests."

This is actually happening https://t.co/50NdFdlZfi

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 8, 2024

Teen Vogue weighs in on "Why the Harris Walz Camo Hat Is Becoming a Status Symbol for Liberals."

"Nearly $1 million worth of Walz inspired hats have been sold through the Harris campaign" — by Alyssa Hardy.

On August 6, VP Kamala Harris posted a video asking Minnesota Governor Tim Walzto join the ticket as her vice presidential nominee. He gleefully accepted from his living room, where he was sitting on a wicker chair wearing a black t-shirt, khakis, bright white sneakers, and a camo hat.

The New York Times and The Washington Post address J.D. Vance's attack on Tim Walz's military credentials.

The NYT has this: "Vance Attacks Walz’s Military Record, Accusing Him of Avoiding a Tour in Iraq" (boldface added):

Senator JD Vance of Ohio accused Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota on Wednesday of quitting the Army National Guard two decades ago to avoid being deployed to Iraq and of exaggerating his service record to claim falsely that he had served in combat.... 

“You abandoned your unit right before they went to Iraq,” Mr. Vance said. Mr. Vance based his accusations on a Facebook post from 2018, and a paid letter to the editor to The West Central Tribune that same year in which the writers, Thomas Behrends and Paul Herr, both retired command sergeant majors in the Minnesota National Guard, accused Mr. Walz of “conveniently retiring a year before his battalion was deployed to Iraq.” ... 

Sunrise — 6:02.

"Can I make a suggestion — as a marketing professional — what about licensing the Sheena Easton tune 'Sugar Walls' for use in the Harris/Walz campaign?"

"The line, 'Come spend the night inside my sugar walls' — how about: Come spend 4 years inside my Harris/Walz."

 

Here is your source material, written by Alexander Nevermind (AKA Prince):

Devastating... or is there an answer to this? Better get it out quick.

You know what really bothers me about Tim Walz?

When the US Marine Corps asked me to go to Iraq to serve my country, I did it.

When Tim Walz was asked by his country to go to Iraq, he dropped out of the Army and allowed his unit to go without him. I think that's shameful. pic.twitter.com/Dq9xjn4R51

— JD Vance (@JDVance) August 7, 2024

I love that Kai Cenat used the word “blogs” in his rant.

Have you noticed "Kai Cenat Claims Kamala Harris, Secret Service Are Attempting To Contact Him/'I don't know goddamn sh*t about politics.... I don't know nothing!" (Vibe)(" I’ve never done anything with politics and these blogs are like 'Yo, you’ve got to do this sh*t Kai'—And it’s all the top blogs")?

I remember 18 years ago, when blogging was new and the high-level bloggers got in line:

Bill Clinton, lunching with the bloggers.

Come on, you'd fly to New York City, to eat "southern chicken" with Bill Clinton and pose for a group photo, wouldn't you? And then you'd go home and blog about how he's good on your issues and how you're totally impressed, right? And, omigosh, "He's got beautiful blue eyes."

I tried to warn them, but my message — stay independent, preserve your authentic voice — got overwhelmed by some very weird stuff. I got — as we used to say back then — swarmed. But I've survived, in my own way, all these years, on my own terms.

Good luck to Mr. Cenat, who is only 22. He was 4 when Bill Clinton was wrangling the bloggers, so social media was always a normal part of life for him. How can someone so young have any idea of the difference between real and fake and to know how precious real is? I wish him well.

"Back when Lyndon B. Johnson was president and the latest dance craze was the Frug, Washington high society was transfixed by..."

"... Barbara Howar, a sparkling socialite from North Carolina who helped the first lady do her hair, mingled with a visiting Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon and turned her Georgetown home into a center of Swinging Sixties entertainment.... Defiantly unorthodox, she wore pajamas to an embassy gala, drove an orange motorcycle through a Georgetown park and had a barbed wit that brought her a reputation as the enfant terrible of the capital’s social scene. Reflecting on the private life of Henry Kissinger, one of many diplomats and politicians who frequented her parties over the years, she quipped, 'Henry’s idea of sex is to slow the car down to 30 miles an hour when he drops you off at the door.'..."

From "Barbara Howar, whose hit memoir dished on D.C. society, dies at 89/Initially known as a Georgetown hostess, she became a best-selling author with her candid 1973 memoir, 'Laughing All the Way.' She later interviewed celebrities for 'Entertainment Tonight'" (WaPo)(free access link).

Howar launched her writing career with a 1968 Ladies’ Home Journal story called "Why LBJ Dropped Me." Looking (unsuccessfully) for a copy of "Why LBJ Dropped Me," I stumbled into this cool photograph, "Singer Bobby Darin sits with his girlfriend, Barbara Howar." I love her shoe. Grommets — so 60s! Ah, well, the 60s are long gone, and here I am, a creature of the 60s, entertained by obituaries, saying goodbye to everyone who was tormented by LBJ and danced the frug.

You don't see the phrase "enfant terrible" so much anymore. The OED says it's "A child who embarrasses his or her elders by untimely remarks; transferred a person who compromises his or her associates or his or her party by unorthodox or ill-considered speech or behaviour; loosely, one who acts unconventionally." We used to celebrate the enfants terribles. Didn't we? Do we still? Answer without saying "Trump" or you are too boring to wear pajamas to an embassy gala and drive an orange motorcycle through a Georgetown park.

"Donald Trump Plays Describe Them in 1 WORD."

Donald Trump, the fiction writer.

"What are the chances that Crooked Joe Biden, the WORST President in the history of the U.S., whose Presidency was Unconstitutionally STOLEN from him by Kamabla, Barrack HUSSEIN Obama, Crazy Nancy Pelosi, Shifty Adam Schiff, Cryin’ Chuck Schumer, and others on the Lunatic Left, CRASHES the Democrat National Convention and tries to take back the Nomination, beginning with challenging me to another DEBATE. He feels that he made a historically tragic mistake by handing over the U.S. Presidency, a COUP, to the people in the World he most hates, and he wants it back, NOW!!!"

Written by Donald Trump, at Truth Social.

He's pretty creative.

I like the locution "What are the chances." Start like that, and you can say anything. And it's good — not because the chances are zero — because it's got an element of truth in that guess about Biden's feelings. I would have thought no one cares anymore about Joe Biden's feelings. But Trump took the time to think about Biden's feelings and to spin out a story where the man who got knocked so far down, got back up:

"So the Trump campaign and its allies moved to quietly kneecap [Josh] Shapiro."

"It did so by forging a de facto alliance with the enemy of its enemy, the progressive left, which opposed Shapiro—the only Jewish candidate on Harris’s shortlist—largely because of his pro-Israel stances. The result was a swelling of progressive opposition (some of it organic, some artificially fed) that, among other things, saw Shapiro’s online critics dub him 'Genocide Josh.' 'Where we could, we amplified the leftists on Twitter....'... On Tuesday, after the vice president announced her pick of Walz, there was a sense of relief.... Publicly, GOP operatives flooded social media and the airwaves with criticisms of Walz’s record on transgender therapies for minors, his progressive views of criminal justice and immigration, and his leadership of the state amid the Minneapolis riots after the 2020 police killing of George Floyd....."

From "Trump World Fueled an Anti-Shapiro Whisper Campaign/Now that the Pennsylvania governor is out of the way, are they ready for Walz?" (Bulwark).

At the 6:05 PM Café...

... you can talk about whatever you want.

"[Tim Walz] jumped to the top of Ms. Harris’s list in a matter of days, helped by cable news appearances in which he declared that Republicans were 'weird.'"

"The new, clear articulation of why voters should reject Mr. Trump caught on fast and turned the spotlight on the plain-spoken Midwesterner behind it.... Mr. Walz leapfrogged better-known contenders in part because Ms. Harris viewed him as an Everyman figure from Minnesota whose Midwestern-dad-vibe balanced out her Bay Area background, according to three people familiar with the vice president’s thinking...."

I'm reading "Tim Walz Is Kamala Harris’s Choice for Vice President/The Minnesota governor, a former high school teacher and National Guard member, brings to the ticket Midwestern appeal and a plain-spoken way of taking on Donald Trump" (NYT).

It's so embarrassingly lightweight! He's the guy who thought up "weird" and reminded Ezra Klein of a "dad." 

"I was in my kitchen and he said something, and the minute he said it, I knew what he’d just said. And every window and door closed. And that was it… He knows what it is; I know what it is."

Said Sandra Lee, to US Magazine, quoted in "Andrew Cuomo uttered mystery remark to ex Sandra Lee that ended relationship, famous chef reveals" (NY Post).

This was a 10-year relationship, but he said something wrong. Sure, there were other problems, but there was that one thing he said that the minute he said it, she knew that was it —  every window and door closed.

Ever say something like that? You might have continued in the relationship, working out your difficulties, but then you went and said one thing. What was the thing? Do you remember the thing or have you shut every window and door on it? And is there one thing — never yet said — that if it were said, it would shut every window and door to your heart, even if it were said by the most dearly loved person in your life?

You know, it's pure chance that Andrew Cuomo came up in 2 posts this morning. Remember when he was idolized, when famous people called themselves Cuomosexuals, and when some members of the party that's supposedly "saving democracy" had the idea that the Covid emergency created a way to oust Trump from the presidency and install Cuomo?

Then, a year later, in 2021, we got things like "The ‘Cuomosexual’ phenomenon was disgraceful. We’re politicians’ bosses, not their fans" (by Alyssa Rosenberg in WaPo). And look at us today —  not me, but maybe you — fans of Trump/Kamala. 

Walz has the issue that tripped up Hillary Clinton in the 2008 primaries.

My son John just texted me this:

Here's the WaPo article, "Tim Walz is a bold, smart choice for Harris’s running mate/The Minnesota governor rightly argues that many progressive ideas are good and practical" by Perry Bacon Jr.

Did Bacon have a "Josh Shapiro is a bold, smart choice for Harris’s running mate" draft ready to go?

"Eyeliner"/"Yeah, I can work that into a post about JD Vance."

Meade gave a 1-word response — "eyeliner" — to this longish quote I'd texted him:

"Harry Truman, with bipartisan support, militarized the economy so that we might be forever at war. It was just decided that we were going to stay in the war racket -- that's how we went broke. Now we have an enemy-of-the-month club. If it's not Noriega, it's Bishop in Grenada; Qaddafi, whose eyeliner is very ominous; Saddam, just like Hitler. When they get into their bunkers they always find a copy of 'Mein Kampf,' a portrait of Hitler, women's underdrawers — which they wear —  a couple of dead Boy Scouts and three mistresses, because they do both terrible things."

Is "eyeliner" what jumped out at you in that feast of words — "Qaddafi, whose eyeliner is very ominous"? Who speaks like that and drops in a phrase as apt and poetical as "whose eyeliner is very ominous"? It was Gore Vidal, in a 1995 NYT piece called "Gore Vidal Receives a Visitor," which I'm reading because... it doesn't matter why I'm reading that! It's full of great stuff. I just wanted to give you those 3 sentences."

Anyway... eyeliner. Are you up to speed on the subject of JD Vance wearing eyeliner? Let me help:

Why is Trump suddenly calling Kamala "Kamabla"?

I had to look it up and found "Donald Trump Launches Two New Nicknames for Kamala Harris in 24 Hours" (Newsweek).

In a string of Monday evening posts on Truth Social, Trump intentionally misspelled the vice president's first name as "Kamabla" after a series of posts earlier in the day calling her "Kamala Crash" and accusing her of bringing about the "Great Depression of 2024."... Trump used the "Kamabla" nickname in a variety of contexts across four posts on Monday, first in relation to food prices, writing: "food is now at an all time high because of Kamabla/Biden INCOMPETENCE."He then used it in the context of debate scheduling "Kamabla Harris is afraid to Debate me on FoxNews," before using it too attack her record: "Kamabla is the WORST V.P." He also used it in a description of what he said were Harris' views on policing and fracking: "Kamabla has stated, over and over again, that she wants to DEFUND THE POLICE AND, WITHOUT QUESTION, BAN FRACKING. "NO MORE FOSSIL FUEL."

I still don't get it why he's saying "Kamabla." Is he being silly/nonsensical?

I asked Meade and he had an immediate guess that sounded good to me: "Kama-blah, like blah blah blah." If that's right, it's a reference to her much-mocked speech patterns.

Trump tries out different nicknames for people. I doubt if this one will last. He has a trial and error approach to nicknames. This one did get Newsweek to repeat a whole series of Truth Social mutterings (and yellings). So it's at least that successful. As for "Kamala Crash," that won't last if the stock market picks up, so I hope it fails.

ADDED: "Blah" can also mean boring and bland. Did you know that "blah" was a noun before it was an adjective? First recorded in 1918, it meant "Meaningless, insincere, or pretentious talk or writing; nonsense, bunkum." I'm quoting the OED, which has these historical examples:

KH picks Walz.

"Harris picks Tim Walz as VP ahead of multistate tour" (WaPo).

ADDED: This was expected, and what can we say about it? 

1. If it were a race for the presidency, Josh Shapiro would be the stronger candidate, but for that reason, I'm happy to see him left out of the position of subordination to the already subordinate person, Kamala Harris, the sitting Vice President, sitting in the shadow of the barely-there President Joe Biden. Better for Josh Shapiro to remain active and independent, accomplishing things in Pennsylvania, and to launch a presidential campaign in his own right in 2028 or 2032. He'll have a stronger position than Tim Walz, if Tim Walz is the sitting Vice President, hoping to run in 2032. A Vice President always looks inert, and he tends to have been chosen to strengthen someone else. Do you realize how rare it is that a sitting Vice President gets elected President? It's only happened twice in U.S. history — 4 times if you count the first 2 Vice Presidents (which you shouldn't, because they did not get there as the winner's running mate).

2. What does this say about Kamala Harris's position on Israel? Is she appeasing the pro-Palestinian forces within the Democratic Party? Was anti-Semitism involved or some kind of idea that Kamala Harris, being triply intersectional, needed a running mate completely composed of traditionally privileged elements?

3. I'm interested in watching the onslaught against Walz. In the last couple weeks, Democrats have unloaded on JD Vance, so it's time for the retaliation. What form will it take? How intense will it be?

4. Or is it better to yawn? From my morning textings:

5. Do I hear a Walz?

6. Is there something about "Tim"? Hillary picked a Tim too. Did you know that "tim" was "A term of personal abuse" in the 1600s (according to the OED). From Ben Jonson's "The Alchemist": "Then you are an Otter, and a Shad, a Whit, A very Tim." 

7. The name Hillary has been uttered, and she is summoned. Up she pops, and she is thrilled:

Sunrise — 5:59, 6:01, 6:04, 6:08,

"Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly."

Wrote Judge Amit P. Mehta of U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, quoted in "Google Violated Antitrust Laws in Online Search, Judge Rules/The ruling by Judge Amit P. Mehta was the first antitrust decision of the modern internet era in a case against a technology giant" (NYT).

The government argued that by paying billions of dollars to be the automatic search engine on consumer devices, Google had denied its competitors the opportunity to build the scale required to compete with its search engine. Instead, Google collected more data about consumers that it used to make its search engine better and more dominant....

"The bronze sheen on our presidential candidates... used to be organic: the result of hours spent in the sun rallying crowds and shaking hands..."

"But even if the campaigning is done in the confines of a television studio, you’ll still see sun-kissed skin, glowing just the right amount for the HD cameras.... Makeup telegraphs the way politicians see themselves — or how they want others to see them. The men on Harris’s short list for vice president have portrayed themselves as middle-of-the-road, no-nonsense everymen, an image complemented by their polished but natural makeup looks. The Republican National Convention in July brought forward a different kind of male face: Kardashian-bronze, a look favored by party standard-bearer Donald Trump.... This parade of copper-colored men were a united front of Trump aesthetics: highlighting the strange cocktail of masculinity favored by Trump himself — a mix of swashbuckling American masculinity and Hollywood sensibilities, expressed in deep tans and bandaged ears, a kind of gilded populism."

From "Color theory for male politicians: Am I a gold, copper or bronze? The 2024 presidential election season has given us an eyeful of the glorious highs and perilous lows of men’s makeup" (WaPo).

Are the 2 parties really doing different colors? Here's Josh Shapiro as he appeared last week:

Is he not orange? Seems to me all the men have adopted the ridiculous color Trump has used all these years — to endless mockery. 

"Former U.S. President Donald Trump has claimed that Iran is planning to attack Israel tonight."

"This assertion has been widely discussed on social media, with various sources reporting on the potential for an attack and the U.S. government's efforts to prevent it...."

Grok summarizes the discussion on X.

"Are we just alternating between weird and normal — perceptions of weird and normal? If so, then 2024 is Trump's turn again."

That's the last line of a post I wrote on May 23, 2023 — "DeSantis uses Warren G. Harding's word, 'normalcy': 'We must return normalcy to our communities.'"

That was back when DeSantis was endeavoring to replace Trump by being essentially Trump minus the weirdness. Yes, there was talk of weird-versus-normal just like there is today. I said:

I myself am hungry for normality, but I don't trust people who keep saying "normal." I always think of Peter Sellers as Clare Quilty in "Lolita" — "It's great to see a normal face, 'cause I'm a normal guy. Be great for two normal guys to get together and talk about world events, in a normal way...."

"Is Joe Rogan good at standup comedy?"

Asks Jason Zinoman in "In His Stand-Up Special, Joe Rogan Plays Dumb/On his podcast, Rogan indulges his own obsessions and eccentricities. But in 'Burn the Boats,' his Netflix comedy special, contempt for the crowd is a theme" (NYT).

I like Joe Rogan's podcasts, though I skip ahead in 5 minute jumps when he starts talking about drugs or aliens, and I skip whole episodes if it's about martial arts. But I've never been able to watch more than a minute or 2 of his standup, and I didn't watch his new standup when it aired live the other day.

So I'm interested in Zinoman's opinions:

"To become a bird, pull an oversize T-shirt over your arms and torso. Hide your legs. Let your hands stick out like claws and your empty sleeves flap like wings."

"Now use your claws to grip some kind of railing. Take a selfie and upload it to social media with a chirpy caption. Some young people in China are pretending to be birds as a way of dealing with the pressures.... Many young people in China are becoming disillusioned because the story they were told from a young age — that they would have a bright future if they studied and worked hard — looks more doubtful as China’s economy slows.... '.... 'They started asking: "Why did I study so hard? What for? I sacrificed so much joy and happiness when I was young."'"

From "Why Some Young People in China Pretend to Be Birds/Some people in China flap and squawk on social media as way of escaping hustle culture. We can explain" (NYT).

Zhao Weixiang, via Douyin

"It was incredibly different and it was incredibly painful and hurtful, this division of Americans that he has embraced of normal people and everyone else."

"I am a normal person. Queer people are normal Americans. I, I mean, I don't, whatever, I don't, I don't divide the world between normal and abnormal people. I don't think that helps anyone. And in a lot of ways, I think I lead a much more average life than he does. I am not a millionaire. I lead a private existence. And, and specifically the term 'normal' really scared me because he has set up a war between 'normal' people and those who are trying to attack them. You know, I, I'd shared some pretty personal stuff with him about my experience as a trans kid, because I know what it's like to sit and cry as a kid and think I have to fix myself. There's no way that I can be this person and be loved and have a job and be accepted and be okay. And that is a devastating experience. And I was so hopeful that it would be easier for future generations...."

Says Sophia Nelson, in the new episode of the NYT "Daily" podcast, "She Used to Be Friends With JD Vance."

She's speaking to the podcast host, Michael Barbaro, who had just said, based on Nelson's text exchange with Vance, "You say to him... 'The political voice you have become, seems so, so far from the man I got to know in law school,' and JD Vance replies to you, 'I will always love you, but I really do think the left's cultural progressivism is making it harder for normal people to live their lives.'"

Here's the background article, by Stephanie Saul: "JD Vance, an Unlikely Friendship and Why It Ended/His political views differed from a transgender classmate’s, but they forged a bond that lasted a decade — until Mr. Vance seemed to pivot, politically and personally" (NYT)(free access link).

I avoided that article because it seemed like a politically motivated betrayal of a private, personal relationship. I almost avoided the podcast.

"Biles wore her goat necklace as another GOAT, Tom Brady, was in attendance to support her."

From "Simone Biles falls off balance beam to cost herself Olympics medal" (NY Post).

Maybe humility will make a comeback.

I've been observing the Olympics from afar. I don't even know where to find them on the mishmash of TV services I'm subscribed to, but I see the headlines. From the headlines, it seems that there are several American women who keep winning the medals, and as for the men, there's one very handsome swimmer, a gymnast whose glasses make him interesting, and a pole vaulter whose penis hit the pole crossbar.

Sunrise — 5:42, 6:11.

Marginalia...

... was the original name of this blog and the subject of the first post on it, so I'm always delighted to find something bloggable that can take the "marginalia" tag.

I love this one, from the biography "John Adams" (pp. 763-764)(commission earned):

Unlike [Thomas] Jefferson, who seldom ever marked a book, and then only faintly in pencil, [John] Adams, pen in hand, loved to add his comments in the margins. It was part of the joy of reading for him, to have something to say himself, to talk back to, agree or take issue with, Rousseau, Condorcet, Turgot, Mary Wollstonecraft, Adam Smith, or Joseph Priestley.

Ah, John Adams was a proto-blogger! 

"After the rain, he went out in search of snails. He talked to them; they did not creep away from him. He held them in his hand..."

"... observed them and laid them to the side where no bird could see them. When he died, all the snails from the neighborhood came together to form his funeral cortege."

 
Wrote Elias Canetti, quoted in "A Nobel Prize winner’s brilliant tirade against mortality/Elias Canetti described 'The Book Against Death' as 'the only book that I was born to write,' but it was also a book he could not finish, or even properly start" (WaPo).

Some of Canetti’s meditations span several pages; others are brisk aphorisms. Many are straightforward; a handful are downright gnomic. “He only wants to be kissed by very old ravens,” one particularly mysterious entry reads. Canetti sometimes chronicles his personal life in the book — he writes wistfully about his first wife, who died in 1963, and he cannot resist a few joyful remarks about the birth of his daughter — but he also includes short, grotesque fictions. In one, he imagines “a people made up of individuals who have kangaroo-like pouches, into which they stuff their shriveled dead and carry them around with them.”

"In the past, campaigns and official party committees, which are subject to contribution limits, generally observed a firewall that blocked information-sharing with super PACs..."

"... and nonprofits that accept unlimited contributions. Now, campaigns and outside groups are free to share messaging and exchange data. That new opportunity has allowed the Trump campaign to supplement a bare-bones in-house field program with allied programs fueled by megadonors.... By contrast, the Harris campaign and allied outside groups said they are not changing their approach in response to the FEC decision...."

From "Trump team gambles on new ground game capitalizing on loosened rules/The campaign is joining forces with outside groups such as Turning Point Action after regulators cleared the way for more coordination. But it comes with the risk of untested outfits duplicating efforts or working at cross purposes" (WaPo).

"At a Turning Point Action office in Waukesha, Wis., in June, about three dozen newly hired full-time community organizers got together with poster boards and scented markers to brainstorm techniques to meet their targeted neighbors..... [Organizers were instructed] not to come on too strong by showing up with MAGA hats and fliers. Instead, they should research their marks and start reaching out through Facebook groups, community events, or neighborly gestures such as recommending plumbers or harp teachers. They could even arrange seemingly chance encounters on coffee runs or dog walks. 'Some of these things sound like stalking,' one staffer whispered. 'Professional stalkers,' his colleague joked back. As one slide from the training implored: 'BE NORMAL. BE NORMAL. BE NORMAL.'"

At long last: marriage for Tim Scott.

Tonight, we promised to cherish and nourish each other and our marriage for the rest of our lives.

Mindy, you've made me the happiest man alive. I love you.

"So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate."

Matthew 19:6 pic.twitter.com/tRjlffL0EE

— Tim Scott (@votetimscott) August 4, 2024

 

Watch Republicans pounce on whatever meanness or dubiousness or racism this elicits.

I need to decide if I care that Kamala Harris's husband cheated on his first wife.

I'm going to read the NYT article on the topic, live blog my reading, and come to a conclusion.

The article is "Doug Emhoff, Husband of Kamala Harris, Acknowledges Long-Ago Affair/The relationship with a teacher at his children’s elementary school occurred when he was married to his first wife, years before he met Ms. Harris."

A couple thoughts prior to reading the text:

1. Emhoff is the spouse of the candidate, and the opposing candidate — we've long known — cheated on his first wife. He also seems to have done some other cheating, perhaps a lot — more than I even want to waste my time to figure out.

2. Is the spouse of the President — the First Lady/Gentleman — supposed to be a symbol of purity? Does the old-fashioned demand for higher purity in women transfer to a man when he's in the classic "First Lady" position? I got distracted wondering who was the sluttiest First Lady, then annoyed by the answer the internet fed me: Melania Trump. Stupid internet mixes up sexual activity and posing nude. 

Now, let's read:

"Kamala is throwing a party. She doesn't believe in anything. Well, she's flip-flopped. It's not flip-flop."

"She doesn't believe... She wasn't for it before she was against.... It's nothing. It has no foundation in reality. None of it matters. The Democrats are living in a post-reality world of parties. People are twerking. People are singing. There's Yas queening. It it has nothing to do with anything.... You can't touch it it's The Sphere...."

Says Tim Dillon, a third of the way into his podcast that began with a description of his visit to The Sphere in Las Vegas. 

 

"Do you see? The people come in. They herd them in. Come in, fatty, sit in your seat and look: It's pretty colors. It's things that are flying by a mile a minute.... Yes,  play this, play this.... [Plays clip of women twerking at a Harris rally]... That's right, this is the campaign. These are the policies.... This is what you're going to get. These are the policies. This is what you're voting for... and by the way this is brilliant.... If Kamala Harris did not exist, billionaires would have to invent her.... She is hollow in in the best way...."

Dillon takes the position that the candidate that throws the best party will win, and he weaves that into a critique of the inane Sphere and the awful Darren Aronofsky movie — "Postcard from Earth" — he paid $300 to see there.

Dillon's comic rant merged with my own thinking on the subject — about why Kamala Harris avoids any substantive interactions with anyone. The lack of substance is her substance, and it is exactly what will work. America wants a show about nothing — to use the old "Seinfeld" phrase. Or... as I've said a few times around here: Better than nothing is a high standard. 

Nothing is a good bet. Stick to nothing. Trump has a lot of baggage. Kamala is unburdened by what has been.

People think they're attacking her when they put up a montage like that, but it is a testament to genius.

Trump loves bronze. Beautiful bronze. Beautiful everything — storefronts, so beautiful....

At yesterday's rally in Atlanta, Georgia, as he offered to protect us from urban crime and chaos, Trump fell into a reverie about beauty — the beauty of buildings and the tragedy of the desecration of the beauty of the urban landscape:

If Kamala wins it will be crime, chaos, and death all across our country.... They took over Seattle, 20%. If I didn't have the soldiers ready to go that morning... Seattle would still be occupied.... [W]hat they did with Portland... I was in the real estate business. I love storefronts. Beautiful bronze. I love bronze and beautiful everything — storefronts, so beautiful. In Portland... their storefronts have been so decimated they use old 2x4s with a wooden door — no glass no windows.... It's the worst looking avenue I've ever ever seen because, and I spoke to people that have shops there — they don't have many more—  they've all fled — but the few people that remain they have wooden storefronts made out of old lumber, and they said, no, anything we put up, including this, will be knocked down the next time, and it happens on a weekly basis and nobody does anything about it."

Background: "President Donald Trump’s bold plans didn’t change Oregon’s economic trajectory

What has President Trump done for Oregon? Here’s a breakdown on what he did and didn’t deliver" (OPB, October 21, 2020).