Prairie walk.

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Even as a composite? Might it not be fake, but accurate? Performative authenticity?

Oh... MY... GOD...

So Chuck Schumer has spent his entire career telling a story about a Long Island couple...

The only thing is... THEY DONT EXIST!!!! THEY ARENT REAL pic.twitter.com/dgmWLKvqwC

— kevin smith (@kevin_smith45) August 12, 2025

It's hard to think of other examples of a politician creating characters with actual names to spice up the rhetoric. I thought of John Edwards's little girl without a coat — "a 10-year-old little girl will go to bed hungry, hoping and praying that tomorrow will not be as cold as today because she doesn't have the coat to keep her warm" — but she didn't have a name. There was the name Julia, in Barack Obama's "Life of Julia," but she wasn't presented as a real person, just a cartoon everywoman.

I really thought Ashley Biden was married to a man named Shady Post.

Link to absurd Daily Beast headline: here.

I asked Grok whether it's really that off to think a man could have such a name these days and was amused to hear that there really was a person — a woman — named Shady Marilla Post, who lived 1909-1972, in West Virginia. I'm told, "'Shady' shows up as a real first name in old records (maybe a nickname turned official, like from 'Shadrach' or just folksy Appalachian naming), and 'Post' is a legit surname. Combine that with modern trends—think Post Malone (real last name Post) or folks embracing 'Shady' as a vibe (hello, Eminem's alter ego)—and yeah, someone could absolutely rock that name today without raising too many eyebrows." Exactly!

By the way, Ashley's "shady post" was just the single word "FREEDOM" posted on social media.

"D.C. mayor meets police takeover with reluctant compliance" according to the teaser on the front page of The Washington Post.

At the article, the headline is "D.C. Mayor Bowser sticks with cautious approach amid Trump’s takeover/Bowser continued with the cautious approach she has taken over the past several months and said there is little D.C. could do to prevent Trump’s unprecedented actions."

Why isn't Bowser getting impassioned and denouncing Trump? Why the restraint? What is the long game?

Complicated business.

We found it. We declassified it.

Now Congress can see how classified info was leaked to shape political narratives - and decide if our institutions were weaponized against the American people. pic.twitter.com/PCpLFLuPmI

— FBI Director Kash Patel (@FBIDirectorKash) August 12, 2025

AI is maddening, but also fascinating. This previously would’ve taken days of work, but Grok just did it in less than three minutes. pic.twitter.com/OH8wSqmrbH

— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) August 12, 2025

Trump talks about the "land swapping" that he says will take place in ending the war in Ukraine.

 

From the transcript of his press briefing yesterday, Trump talks about the "land swapping" that he says will take place in ending the war in Ukraine:

We're going to change the lines, the battle lines. Russia's occupied a big portion of Ukraine. They've occupied some very prime territory. We're going to try and get some of that territory back for Ukraine. But they've taken some very prime territory. They've taken largely, in real estate we call it oceanfront property.

The most powerful man in the world — attempting to manage what he's just called "by far the worst that's happened since World War II" — seems comfortable reverting to real-estate mogul mode.

That's always the most valuable property. If you're on a lake, a river or an ocean, it's always the best property. Well, Ukraine, a lot of people don't know that Ukraine was largely a thousand miles of ocean. That's gone, other than one small area, Odessa, it's a small area. There's just a little bit of water left. So I'm going to go and see the parameters. Now, I may leave and say good luck, and that'll be the end. I may say this is not going to be settled. I mean, there are those that believe that Putin wanted all of Ukraine. I happen to be one of them, by the way. I think if it weren't for me, he would not be even talking to anybody else right now. But I'm going to meet with him. We're going to see what the parameters are, and then I'm going to call up President Zelensky and the European leaders.

ADDED: The very next headline I read was: "For Trump, Cities Like Washington Are Real Estate in Need of Fixing Up/'It’s a natural instinct as a real estate person,' he said in announcing his federal takeover of the capital’s police, despite falling crime" (NYT).

Tuesday "Authenticity" Watch.

1. "'Authenticity' can be the goal only of the inauthentic. Only those removed and fool enough to think they can get over on actual people by imposture try to 'project' authenticity, which can mean only 'to lie in a way someone you paid told you would be effective.'" — David Mamet in "Back When We Gave a Fuck" (Free Press)(and thanks to tcrosse in last night's open thread for bringing that quote to my attention and prompting this authenticity watch). 

2. "Democrats try a new tone: Less scripted, more cursing, Trumpier insults/Party leaders are swearing more, recording more direct-to-camera videos and trying to project an authenticity many voters have come to associate with Trump" (WaPo)(free link)(proving Mamet's point (or, given that this was published a few weeks ago, giving Mamet the idea to problematize WaPo's point)).

3. "Why 4?," asks Meade. "Why do you need 4 items to make it solid?" He's reacting to the notice I had here before, that I would need 4 "authenticity" items to make "a solid 'Authenticity' Watch post." He challenges: "Why not 3? Wouldn't 3 be solid?" Me: "Mmm... semi-solid."

4. [TO COME, AT LEAST IF THIS IS TO BECOME A SOLID AND NOT MERELY SEMI-SOLID "AUTHENTICITY" WATCH. I NOTE THAT THE LAST "AUTHENTICITY" WATCH 2 DAYS AGO WAS ONLY SEMI-SOLID.]

"The speech of the American middle class is largely the attempt to impress, obfuscate, or placate. That of the streets is..."

"... in my experience, to express. For example: Middle class: 'What a nice dress.' Street: 'Hey, baby, any more at home like you?'... Iambic pentameter, five feet to the line. I was filming Heist with Gene Hackman; my wife, Rebecca Pidgeon; and Danny DeVito. Danny’s line to Gene, his rival, is, 'Are you fucking with me, are you fucking with me, or are you done fucking with me?'... I was concerned that [Danny] would (incorrectly) accentuate the word done at the end of the phrase, which would have branded him, sadly, with a merely academic understanding of actual American idiom. But I need not have worried, as he accentuated the final fucking and all was well. Per contra, Becca was raised in Edinburgh, and educated at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. In the early days of our association she flatteringly strove to adopt my Chicagoan vocabulary. Our great friend, Shel Silverstein, corrected her: 'Becca, when you say motherfucker, it’s like someone is trying to fuck your mother.'"

Writes David Mamet in "Back When We Gave a Fuck" (Free Press).

I love the sudden appearance of Shel Silverstein and the use of the phrase "per contra." And I considered taking out the clarifying "[Danny]" and putting back the "he" — wasn't it obvious that Mamet meant Danny and not Gene" — because I wanted to preserve the number of syllables. I didn't want to intrude on  Mamet's rhythm. I even asked Grok to analyze the text and tell me to what extent it approached iambic pentameter. Was "per contra" chosen for the meter or because boring people begin sentences with "By contrast"/"Conversely"/"On the other hand"?  Is Shel Silverstein "Our great friend, Shel Silverstein" for the meter or because Mamet is the sort of person who wants you to know he was especially close to that celebrity he's name-dropping. 

Sunrise — 6:12.

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Later, at 1:36:

Total steps: 11,737.

"Do you think it’s a good idea to bring a 1-year-old baby to a concert where the decibels are this f–king high? That baby doesn’t even know what it’s doing here."

"Next time, protect their ears or something. For real. It’s heavy. It’s your responsibility. You’re waving them around like they’re a toy.. That baby doesn’t want to be there, for real. I’m telling you with all love and respect, now that I’m a father… would never bring them to a concert. For the next time, be a bit more aware."

Said Maluma, quoted in "Rapper Maluma stops concert to scold mom for ‘irresponsible’ act with her baby" (NY Post).

Team spirit.

I believe.
byu/Nacho_Sideboob inBrewers

My prompts to Grok: "Tell me about the notion that the Milwaukee Brewers are doing so well right now because they're playing for the recently deceased Bob Uecker"/"Examine the metaphysical angle. I'm seeing references to Uecker as the 'Angel in the Outfield' and many repetitions of the idea that he's 'looking down' (from Heaven) watching the games."

For Grok's answer, if you need it, go here. Snippet:

"You convince him to come marry you, move here and have babies. This is where your future should be, if you like him enough for that."

Said Leslie Aberlin, owner of a development called Aberlin Springs, to a "prospective resident, the girlfriend of a local banker."

Aberlin is quoted in "This Ohio Farm Community Is a Mecca for the ‘MAHA Mom’/In a neighborhood that appeals to people from both the right and the left, residents strive for a finely tuned state of political harmony" (NYT)(gift link).

Ms. Aberlin loves that so many “traditional wives,” as she calls stay-at-home moms, are raising their children in her community. While she brought up her two kids as a single mother, divorcing her ex-husband soon after her second baby was born, she calls herself a “boss woman by accident.” She believes women have been “sold a bag of goods” about the importance of a career, and are usually more fulfilled when they focus on their kids full time.

1. What's wrong with buying a bag of goods?  She means sold a bill of goods. With a bag of goods, you've got the goods. They're in the bag. A bill of goods is a document that merely lists the goods. You just bought the piece of paper. 

2. The real estate is real, but what about the mystique of the MAHA Mom? Buying a personal residence always comes with something intangible, the life you imagine for yourself in that house."

3. It's not a house, it's a home — Bob Dylan quote.

4. The home is never in the bag.

"The rhetoric was, if you just learned to code, work hard and get a computer science degree, you can get six figures for your starting salary...."

Said Manasi Mishra, a recent graduate of Purdue with a computer science degree, quoted in "Goodbye, $165,000 Tech Jobs. Student Coders Seek Work at Chipotle. As companies like Amazon and Microsoft lay off workers and embrace A.I. coding tools, computer science graduates say they’re struggling to land tech jobs" (NYT).

In response to questions from The New York Times, more than 150 college students and recent graduates — from state schools including the universities of Maryland, Texas and Washington, as well as private universities like Cornell and Stanford — shared their experiences. Some said they had applied to hundreds, and in several cases thousands, of tech jobs at companies, nonprofits and government agencies. The process can be arduous, with tech companies asking candidates to complete online coding assessments and, for those who do well, live coding tests and interviews. But many computing graduates said their monthslong job quests often ended in intense disappointment or worse: companies ghosting them. Some faulted the tech industry, saying they felt “gaslit” about their career prospects. Others described their job search experiences as “bleak,” “disheartening” or “soul-crushing.”

It wasn't long ago at all that students who studied things other than coding were taunted with the imperative "Learn to code." Such a useful skill, so suddenly obsolete. 

"Should such an old man as James Taylor, who can afford to hire a handyman, be climbing on a ladder, especially in those shoes?"

I ask Grok, at Taylor's post on X:

Doorbell repair, James style.#JT #JamesTaylor #Handyman #RepairMan pic.twitter.com/Szi0kFtQVQ

— James Taylor (@JamesTaylor_com) August 11, 2025

Grok's answer isn't really the correct answer:

"The bear... used its paw to pry open the sliding glass door of the Grand Hotel Balvanyos, before squeezing its shoulders into the lobby."

"As a terrified employee sprinted away, it headed to the breakfast buffet and ate all the packets of honey. Another bear entered the resort’s spa and downed a three-liter jug of massage oil, while a third opened a door into a hotel hallway and chased away a housekeeper. Romania’s relationship with its bears has come undone. The brown bear — the ursus arctos — is one of the country’s national treasures, interwoven into its mythology. Villagers still host annual bear dances, a ritual that goes back to pre-Christian times, when people believed the animals staved off misfortune. Romania’s brutal Communist dictator, Nicolae Ceaușescu, would flaunt his power by ordering aides to lure bears from the forest with food, then shooting them in a macabre display of machismo...."

From "The Law Protects Them. The Villagers Fear Them. Romania’s growing bear population has turned conservation into confrontation for people living in the shadows of the Carpathian Mountains" (NYT).

At the Sunday Night Café...

... you can talk about whatever you want.