"Super Dave was puffed up with misplaced confidence as he plunged himself into one death-defying stunt after another."

"Although modeled on the real-life daredevil Evel Knievel, Super Dave was more like the ill-fated Wile E. Coyote, who would snap back from being crushed by a boulder or falling off a cliff in the Road Runner cartoons. 'People loved the character getting mauled,' Mr. Blye told the Television Academy."

From "Allan Blye, 87, Dies; ‘Smothers Brothers’ Writer and ‘Super Dave’ Creator/In his wide-ranging career, he also helped write Elvis Presley’s comeback special and appeared on an early version of 'Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood'" (NYT).

And, re the Smothers Brothers show:  "Mr. Blye and his writing partner, Mason Williams — best known for writing and performing the hit guitar instrumental 'Classical Gas'— worked on the deadpan editorials delivered regularly by Pat Paulsen, a mournful-looking cast member who used the show as a platform to run for president in 1968 as the candidate of the S.T.A.G. (Straight Talking American Government) Party."

"In a few days, the voters will go to the polls and elect a man to ruin the country. I mean run the country. All the other candidates are making 11th hour appeals seeking a convincing mandate from the people and the people are making 11th hour appeals for a convincing candidate. Polls show Nixon leading both Humphrey and Wallace with 14 undecided and 36 percent disgusted."

"I deleted a tweet that in retrospect was mean spirited. I’m mad at myself for commenting on someone’s looks..."

"... instead of their ideas, especially so because I didn’t realize their identity, which obviously could make my comment more hurtful," tweets Thomas Chatterton Williams, who wrote that "Letter on Justice and Open Debate" we were all talking about last week.

So what was the tweet? Whose looks did he disparage?

I don't think it's the "In the middle of nowhere expelling" tweet that became a meme, explored on Know Your Meme:

"In the Middle of Nowhere Expelling" refers to a tweet by Harper's columnist Thomas Chatterton Williams. In the tweet, he relays a story about "expelling" a person from his house because they insulted New York Times opinion writer Bari Weiss. Many parodied the tweet online as a phrasal template, replacing elements of the tweet with various other absurd situations....

Hilarious. Though he deleted that post too, it's not what I'm looking for. Whose looks did he take a shot at? I'll just take a shot at his looks — he reminds me of Pat Paulson and Taylor Mead...



... but I'm going to guess that his target was Robin DiAngelo, because that's someone he's been tweeting about substantively lately:

How many "white" people can really relate to earning up to $150,000 per month from one of their revenue streams?

"during the year preceding Covid-19 [she] gave eight to 10 presentations a month, sometimes pro bono but mostly at up to $15,000 per event." https://t.co/kmKPKAQNm3

— Thomas Chatterton Williams 🌍 🎧 (@thomaschattwill) July 16, 2020

I think DiAngelo looks great in that picture. Just perfect for what she is and what she's purveying. So maybe it's someone else. Maybe Mary Trump? I tried to watch some of her interview with George Stephanopoulos and got a little absorbed in her looks...



I think it's good, if you're a writer, to have some lines about how a person looks, but I can certainly see pushing back your antagonists for talking about anybody's looks in a negative way. And there's a certain conventional etiquette that forbids speaking about looks, even in a positive way. Thomas Chatterton Williams wants to be a public intellectual, but he's showing how easy he is to push back. Stand your ground!

"Mark Sanford kicked off his presidential campaign against Donald Trump in Philly. One person showed up."

Headline at The Philadelphia Inquirer. The reporter was the only person.

“Nobody knows me in Philadelphia. I get it,” Sanford said. “I think in life we all do what we can do, what’s within our power to have an effect. So we’re just sort of moving along as we go along.”

ADDED: This made me think of Pat Paulson.


Pat Paulsen For President from The Hammer Works on Vimeo.