Freakout sets in
I had faith in humanity. I had faith in there being more sane American voters than rubes and dupes and fascist bigots. I believed in the ability of adult human beings to empathize with women stripped of their rights and dying in ER parking lots. I believed enough Americans were smart enough to know when they were being lied to and what propaganda was sheer bullshit.
Turns out I was wrong about all of it.
There was election interference and intimidation fuckery in several swing states, Russian interference again favoring the fascist candidate, yet turnout was impressively high. And the incompetent criminal Hitler-loving authoritarian bigoted idiot got more votes.
Even if things take a turn overnight and swing state totals narrow and perhaps even flip in a miracle of miracles, the reality still exists that this country isn't populated by good people. This country is full of stupid, disengaged, and/or evil people.
We're in for a very rude awakening indeed.
I've not processed this yet, really, so I'm just going to share what Ben Cohen wrote over at The Banter.
Enough Americans have been taken in by this extraordinary cult of personality and have voted in a madman to be their president. The mainstream press failed spectacularly, again, to focus on the danger Trump posed to America. They turned the presidential contest it into yet another horse race where the reds were fighting the blues in battle to the finish. Trump was sanitized, repackaged, and finally thrust back into the White House with barely a scratch on him.
The polls, having been basically wrong about everything since 2016, were far more accurate than I and almost everyone in the media anticipated. They did not overestimate the Democrats, and they appear to have correctly gaged Trump’s almost mythical ability to activate his base and bring low propensity voters out to the polls. And that really is the story of the race. Despite having run one of the most racist, deranged, insane campaigns in modern history, Trump pulled out the victory again.
He massively over performed with Hispanic men, and shockingly made the huge gender gap irrelevant. It is the comeback of all comebacks, only it isn’t the good guy who has won, but the convicted felon and sexual abuser who tried to overthrow the US government only four years ago.
Sane, well adjusted people know that Donald Trump should not be allowed anywhere near the White House. He should be in jail for the multiple crimes he committed while in office, including his attempted coup. Now he will grant himself immunity and no doubt commit more crimes during his second term in office.
We are headed to a very, very dark place right now, and those who enabled, funded and voted for this despicable charlatan will have to own what is about to happen.
. . .
This is a war that cannot be ceded. We cannot allow Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Fox News to destroy reality and decimate truth. He does not get a grace period, and he must not be respected. Donald Trump is a fascist, and fascists must be defeated. His lies will be countered with truths, and his disinformation will be fought with facts. This is war, again.
And here's the reaction from Craig Calceterra, which I don't think I could improve upon:
America just enthusiastically voted for a violent, lying, bigoted, misogynist, insurrectionist felon who promised it nothing but destruction and misery. It is a damning indictment of the country and its people.
Unlike in 2016, this was no fluke. This was no low-stakes leap of faith by some fed-up people hoping that an uncouth maverick might make their life better and might not cause much harm. This vote was made with eyes wide open. After all that’s been said and done over these past nine years, millions of Americans have decided they don’t care what Donald Trump is, what Donald Trump does, or who Donald Trump hurts. And make no mistake, he will hurt many. He has specifically and repeatedly promised to do so.
Donald Trump has harnessed a longstanding ugliness in this country. He has given voice to the desires of the tens of millions of people who want to round up, brutalize, and deport immigrants and they, in turn, have now given him the power to do so. He’s given voice to the tens of millions of people who want women to be, for all practical purposes, the property of men and, they in turn, have given him the power to do so. He’s given voice to the tens of millions of people who are just fine with abolishing democracy and instituting an authoritarian regime because they believe that regime will favor them and will punish those who they hate and they, in turn, have given him the power to do so. There is something very real, very large, and very ugly in the American body politic and there always has been. And America’s body politics has given Donald Trump power once again.
There is no coming back from this. America, the nation-state, will carry on in name as long as it has more bombs and missiles and money than anyone else and that may well be a very long time. But the ideas and values which all of us were brought up to believe in and that we have always called America is over. What is about to happen in America’s name will represent a perversion of every value I hold. The fact that it will be done with the country’s eager blessing means that the crimes will be committed with malice aforethought and that the damage will be permanent.
Tagged
Politics,
President VonClownstick |
Posted on November 5, 2024 at 11:28pm | Permalink | 
| 
Travelogue VI: Ghosts of 9066
Return trip leg 2
Today is election day and at this moment polls are beginning to close in the eastern time zone. But I'll leave it to others to blog about today's critical decision-making, at least for right now. Erik has a final note on the subject, Mary Trump had a few words on it. Even Andy Borowitz chimed in to lighten the mood.
Instead, this will be the penultimate travelogue post from my trip to SoCal.
Manzanar
In 1942, a few months after the United States' entry into World War II, a stretch of desolate land in eastern California where a long-abandoned township once stood was chosen as one of ten sites to be used as "relocation centers" for anyone of Japanese descent living on the West Coast. Executive Order 9066, issued by FDR of all people, gave in to the paranoia and racism of the day and forcibly removed Japanese and Japanese-Americans—U.S. citizens and non-citizens alike—from their homes and businesses. This unconstitutional violation of rights and ethics was based on the concern that these people would be loyal to the Empire of Japan simply due to their ancestry, that some of them would use their knowledge and existence in the westernmost continental United States to supply an enemy nation with intelligence or act as saboteurs. Because racism. (Notably, German- and Italian-Americans were not similarly treated on the East Coast even though the U.S was also at war with Germany and Italy.)
Manzanar was the first of the camps, though not the largest. At its peak, Manzanar housed over 11,000 people in wood and tar-paper barracks over one square mile of area. Located on the eastern slope of a valley in the southern Sierra Nevada mountains, the environment was harsh and isolation was fairly severe. Yet, for three years the internees made the best of it and turned their concentration camp into a more livable space, planting gardens, running a school, publishing a newspaper, forming a baseball league, and gradually improving their living space structures as materials, such as linoleum flooring, became available over time.
Remarkable, really. The spirit to keep on and make whatever lemonade could be made form the rotten lemons given them impresses me no end. The injustice perpetrated on them was ever-present, and even when the war ended and the camps closed the internees were mostly returned to very little left from their pre-camp lives. It was one of the most abominable episodes in American history, the sort of thing modern Republicans would just assume no one ever thought about or remembered (even though they're now planning on doing this exact sort of thing again if they gain power after today).
Fortunately, the U.S. National Parks Service has taken over the grounds of Manzanar and has preserved what little remains from 1942-1945. They've built a small museum there and are using the few remaining structures as restored museum exhibits, and are slowly working to restore areas of the grounds that camp residents built themselves, like gardens and koi ponds and a small park. The barracks and other buildings are long gone (though one structure near what used to be the staff quarters remains in dilapidated shape), though markers for each "block" show where things used to stand. (Anyone who's watched M*A*S*H would have a sense of how things probably looked in terms of structures and what kind of comforts were available or not; the structures were more stable than tents, less so than the metal structure of the M*A*S*H hospital building.)
I had stopped by Manzanar once before, several years ago, but only had about 40 minutes then and wasn't able to see the grounds at all. This time I made sure to have an hour or so for the museum bits and at least that long to see the grounds themselves. It's actually rather pretty landscape there at the foot of the Sierras. I'd hate to have to live there in mid-summer or winter with no insulation and little electricity, though.
The few things still standing—which no doubt have been restored to some degree by the Parks Service—include the cemetery and the baseball field, as well as the entry gates and an ominous guard tower. Also a few signs at the perimeter warning of "sentry on duty" should anyone try to venture past the fencing.
It's a sobering and yet inspiring place to visit. U.S. Hwy 395 goes right past it, it's easy to get to. I overheard one guy in the visitor's center say to one of the park rangers, "this is the most horrendous place I've ever been, and I work in a prison." And what that place was used for is horrendous, and the conditions and all that surrounded 9066 that is there in the museum in its unvarnished historical accuracy show us how terrible our society has been and can be. But I'm also inspired by it, by the fortitude of the internees, and gratified that the National Parks service is maintaining and preserving this piece of ugly history.
We need these things to be preserved. We need to remember the ugly parts of our past in order to improve in our future. History often repeats itself—in Battlestar Galactica terms, this has all happened before and will all happen again—but it doesn't have to. We can learn from our mistakes, but only if they are remembered and preserved for our edification. And to bring this back to the election just for a second—if Trump wins, he's promised to create more concentration camps, for immigrants legal and otherwise, as a place to "store" them while he institutes mass deportations. We can make a different choice.
Entry gate with original signage
Restored museum exhibit of a typical barracks unit
Restored museum exhibit of Manzanar schoolroom
Restored museum exhibit of Manzanar mess hall and kitchen
The baseball field has had restoration on the wooden bleachers and dugout benches as well as fencing. I also doubt the traffic cone is original.
A small park area has been restored by the National Parks Service. The dates signify the attempt in 2023 to recreate what existed in 1943.
Part of the restored park
Part of the restored park
The environment is both desolate and picturesque at the foot of the southern Sierra Nevadas
Tagged
Traveling,
History |
Posted on November 5, 2024 at 4:02pm | Permalink | |
Travelogue V: F-word 150
Return leg 1
I have returned home from my road trip to southern California, and the time since I pulled into my garage and dragged myself inside Chez Tim has been largely spent sleeping. It's a long drive.
Not two hours after my departure from Dad and Marty's place, though, there was some minor drama. There's a point on the route I was on where the freeway splits off with a fork—take these lanes to go this way, these lanes to go that way—which occurred not long after a previous fork, and I missed it. I realized I was in the wrong lane just as I was too far gone to move over, so I instead got off at the next exit and sought to rejoin the proper road.
I was stopped at a red light and went to consult the map on my phone. In the few seconds my attention was on that, my foot had apparently let up just enough tension on the brake pedal for the car to start rolling forward and I heard a soft thump. I looked up and realized that I had rolled forward and impacted the truck ahead of me at the light.
Oops.
After a second of WTF? reaction, I backed up back to appropriate distance and thought, OK, embarrassing, but no harm done. A couple of seconds later, the driver of the truck got out and came toward my window. I rolled it down as he approached. "Apologies," I said, "I guess I let up—"
"Show me your license," the guy said. "And insurance."
I did a double-take. Yeah, I'd tapped the guy's bumper, but no damage done.
"Are you fucking with me?" I asked, a bit dumbfounded. Maybe he's trying to be funny.
"No!" he yelled. "Show me your license and insurance! You're paying for that!"
I showed him my license and insurance card. "What exactly are you expecting me to pay for?" I said, indicating the back of his undamaged truck.
Instead of answering, he mocked me as he photographed my insurance card. “‘Apologies.' Jesus." Would he have preferred I didn't apologize?
Instead of asking him if he'd like me to take the apology back, I just said, "Seriously?"
He pointed at his bumper. "That was PRISTINE. You'll pay for it!"
I looked at the bumper more closely. "I'm seeing maybe half an inch of a scratch if that," I said, still remarkably calm.
"It's going to have to be repainted! And it won't match, and I bet there's more damage—" he stopped ranting in mid-sentence.
The allegedly pristine bumper post-bump. Before sending this to State Farm, I noted that of the various mars on his bumper, some must have been preexisting. A Ford F-150 bumper is anywhere from 19-24 inches off the ground; the foremost part of my Prius is the license plate frame, which spans 15-21 inches off the ground. The area I circled in gold contains two tiny mars potentially caused by the bump at either side of the reflection glint; the red circles indicate areas unlikely to have been caused by the bump as the point of impact would not have stretched that far; the blue circles note mars that are impossible to have been caused by the bump.
I stopped short of telling him that I, myself, had been looking into touch-up automotive paint for my own new-to-me car that came with some small paint nicks and thus knew that if he really cared about his tiny bumper mar that a bit of sandpaper and a can of touch-up automobile spray paint can be found at AutoZone in matching colors to various vehicles including Fords for about $25. And if it's a color that isn't standard, one can be ordered online for about $40. He clearly wasn't interested in anything I might have had to say. Meanwhile, the passenger in his truck (wife?) got out and took photos of the back of the truck.
I held out my hand, indicating I wanted my cards back. He handed them to me and ranted some more about how I'd hear from him and regret it. "You do what you feel like you need to do, fella," I said. He walked back to his truck ranting.
The light changed and he took off. I followed and he preceded me onto the freeway before he then got off again at the next exit. I went on my way.
Not 40 minutes later my phone rang. Thinking it had to be about this, I pulled over—I was on US 395 by then, a two-lane road with wide shoulders—and answered. It was a rep from State Farm. "Wow, that guy wasted no time," I said the the rep, who identified herself as Hannah from State Farm and I briefly flashed on those dumb State Farm commercials where a guy has to explain to his wife that he's not cheating on her, he's just talking to "X from State Farm."
Hannah was quite pleasant and asked for my version of the story, what I estimated the speed was (based on time of the event and typical distance between vehicles at a red light, I said it was about two feet per second) and if there was any damage to my car. "No, none," I said as I got out to verify that was correct. Hannah and I covered some more information and she anticipated that, given the claimant's belligerence, he might try to harass me but if he does, "just send him my way and hang up." Points to Hannah from State Farm.
Surprised as I was to get that call as quickly as I did, I was glad of it. After it was done I was able to put the incident out of my mind for the most part, while before the call I was, of course, rehashing the whole thing in my head over and over. Yes, because the guy was an asshole, but also because I was embarrassed. In 40 years of driving this was the first and hopefully only time I'd found myself in a situation where anyone's insurance came up.
Anyway, that's how the return trip started. From there on it was non-confrontational.
I was on that particular route only because I wanted to make a particular stop and wanted to make the best possible time getting there. That's the topic for the next travelogue post: Manzanar.
Posted on November 4, 2024 at 10:07pm | Permalink | |
Wrapping it up
The calendar has turned to November, which historically has been my least favorite month of the year but lately hasn't been any worse than others; whether that will hold true this year depends a hell of a lot on next Tuesday's results.
Down do just a few days in Schrödinger's Ballot Box, soon we'll know if Americans chose a live Constitutional democratic republic or a dead rule of law and a new despotism. It's tough not to obsess about the latter possibility and worry about what to do then, but I nevertheless really do think we won't have to face that because I really do think the forces of good will triumph and President-elect Harris will emerge from the fallout of this ugly election campaign.
In just the latest outrage, Donald Trump has insinuated that Liz Cheney should face a firing squad. Add that to the ever-growing list of things that guy has done that should have destroyed his candidacy and yet somehow barely registers at all. Last weekend's version of the latest thing that should have destroyed his candidacy was the hateful screed and grievance rally at Madison Square Garden. It's hard to imagine any other presidential candidate in the history of presidential candidates that could walk out of that and not take a politically-fatal hit, but here we are.
Here's the great satirist Andy Borowitz on that:
PALM BEACH (The Borowitz Report)—With just four days until the election, Donald J. Trump is running out of time to alienate the few demographic groups he has not already offended, campaign sources revealed on Friday.
Though Trump has acknowledged that he did “an amazing job” of repelling Blacks, Latinos, Jews, and Arabs at his Madison Square Garden rally, he has groused that too many other cohorts remain unscathed.
In a heated meeting with aides on Friday morning, Trump banged on a table and shouted, “We need to go after the Inuit.”
“When did they become Inuit?” he demanded. “They were always Eskimos, and then, suddenly, they turned Inuit.”
Trump also expressed a desire to “do a number on the Amish” because “none of them watch me on TV.”
I also recommend spreading around Robert Reich's list of The 101 Worst Things About Trump's Shambolic Presidency. How people have memory-holed all of that heinous incompetence and treachery I will never understand. What makes it all the more remarkable is that one could probably argue an entirely different list of 101 things and still not reach the end of the list of Worst Things.
As the election campaign wraps up, so does my trip down to Southern California. I shall be heading home tomorrow, taking a different route that is more direct but still favoring non-Interstate roads (mostly). Meantime, Dad and Marty and I went to the weekly street fair thingy that happens in downtown Palm Springs last night, and as it was also Halloween there were lots of people in costume. Some of the outfits were pretty cool—in addition to the standard witches and ghosts and vampires, I also spotted a couple of Mandalorians, some stormtroopers, and a Princess Leia to represent the Star Wars crowd; several Dr. Seuss characters; two Velmas from Scooby Doo, but only one Daphne; plenty of Village People (it is Palm Springs); kids in store-bought Superman outfits; a giant Snoopy; one gender-bending Wonder Woman; and two guys in Next Generation-era Starfleet unis.
The stage lights were cool, the band wasn't bad, the volume was oppressive.
There was also an additional stage setup a block or so away that is part of a larger to-do being prepped for next weekend's Gay Pride Palm Springs event that Dad and Marty wanted to see, so we wandered over to that for a bit; it was basically a stage with a band, with the accompanying deafness-level speaker system blaring. I can't stand such things. I will never understand why it is standard practice for any rock show in a club or arena or even outdoor stage venue such as this one to amplify the volume to damaging degrees. If it is expected that one should bring ear plugs to an audio-focused event, then something is fucking wrong. I already have tinnitus, why in the world would I voluntarily exacerbate it for "enjoyment"? I once went to see one of my favorite bands, Fountains of Wayne (RIP, Adam Schlesinger), at a club on Capitol Hill somewhere and found it to be a real drag that I couldn't enjoy hearing them play because of the pounding being inflicted on my eardrums. I don't get it. Anyway, I finally dragged Dad away and we returned to the street fair proper and then made our way back to the house. Aside from the aural assault (and the band wasn't bad, by the way, just fucking loud), it was a nice enough time, though on prior visits when going to the street fair there were more interesting things being displayed and offered for sale. Off week, I guess.
It's been a decent week-plus down here, always good to visit, but I'm missing my cats and, frankly, I'm not used to such arid weather anymore and I look forward to being back among the raindrops.
Tagged
Politics,
Traveling |
Posted on November 1, 2024 at 3:13pm | Permalink | |
World Series notes
How stereotypes are made
The New York Yankees staved off elimination for a day by winning World Series Game Four last night. They did so despite falling behind early on yet another home run from Captain Marvel Jr. and with no help from two guys in the right field seats that stole a foul ball out of the glove of Dodger right fielder Mookie Betts.
You will occasionally see a fan reach into the field of play to catch a ball; you will occasionally see fans and players both angling for a catch once a ball clears the wall and enters the "out of play" territory. You never, until last night, expect to see fans grab a players arm and pry a ball out of his glove. Only in the Bronx, man.
Those guys, who have been banned from attending the remainder of the World Series, give form and substance to the generalized image of the Yankee Fan: Obnoxious, rude, hostile, selfish, and all that is wrong with humanity. Well played, asshats. From The Athletic's account of the theft:
Austin Capobianco, 38, from Connecticut, was ejected after the incident in the first inning of the Yankees’ 11-4 win in Game 4 on Tuesday night. Another fan, who ESPN identified as John Peter, was ejected alongside Capobianco.
...
Darren Capobianco said his brother, Austin, is a Yankees season ticket holder. A team spokesman said that it has not been determined what — if any — further action will be taken regarding the future of their tickets. Austin Capobianco didn’t respond to text messages from The Athletic seeking comment Wednesday morning.
After the play, Capobianco tried arguing with stadium security that Betts’ glove had reached into foul territory.
It's that last bit that was really the chef's kiss of Yankee fan assholery, visibly arguing with stadium security that because Betts had reached into the seating area to catch the ball, he as a fan was entitled to forcibly pry Betts' glove open and steal the baseball. I looked for a still photo of the argument but couldn't find one; it was only on the Fox TV broadcast for a second or so, because Fox is terrible at broadcasting baseball.
Several times in this World Series has there been something of relative import happening on the field that the Fox crew—including the announcers, Joe Davis and John Smoltz, and either the director or the camera operators—failed to notice or acknowledge. Game One had the catch-and-throw by the Yankee outfielder that resulted in runners being awarded a base that you'd only be aware of if you (a) knew the rule about having to reenter the field of play before throwing the ball, and (b) saw the gesticulations of the third base umpire in the background of the camera shot in the second or so it was onscreen. Game Two had something I now don't remember the details of but commented on in real time, Game Three had a defensive replacement we weren't made aware of, and last night there was several seconds in which the home plate umpire was having a confrontation with someone about something, but damned if anyone watching the broadcast knows what it was about or who the confrontation was with because the Fox director chose to keep the closeup shot of Garret Cole in the dugout onscreen for the entire time.
Also, Smoltz is ridiculously bad at this. It is fun when the players will do something 180° from what Smoltz said would happen a second prior, but really, dude, finish a thought rather than just let things hang there and maybe be less oblique when you reference something from your pitching career. Or just keep quiet, that'd be fine.
I am rooting for the Dodgers in the Series, but kind of glad the Yankees won last night because (a) more baseball is always good; and (b) the Dodgers went in with a planned bullpen game, and bullpen games when they are not necessitated by immediate circumstance are stupid and any team that deliberately plans to have one—or several!—in the postseason deserves to have it bite them in the butt.
LA is heavily favored tonight despite the fact that Cole will be pitching for New York because history decrees it to be so. Never, in 122 years of World Series (two years there was no Series played), has a team that lost the first three games come back to even force a Game 6, let alone brought it to the maximum length, let alone come back to win. They just became only the third such team to win Game 4. Still, to quote Mr. Spock, "for everything there is a first time," so all hope is not lost for those jerks in right field.
Tagged
Baseball,
Yankee fans |
Posted on October 30, 2024 at 3:36pm | Permalink | |
Travelogue IV: LA Living
Yesterday was my dad's 82nd birthday, so we drove from his place in the Coachella Valley to my sister's place in Los Angeles (well, Van Nuys; she lives in the Soup Nazi's neighborhood, I'm told, which is cool and all, but not nearly as cool as when my eight-year-old self learned that my grandpa lived a couple blocks away from Batman). So Dad got to hang out with everyone for his birthday—his hubby, his sister-in-law, his kids, his son-in-law, and his grandson. (And a friend of my sister's that was visiting, but I don't think he'd met her before.)
Pretty low-key, my brother-in-law made a kind of Mexican buffet and we had cake and I quizzed my nephew on what episodes might have been shot at Vazquez Rocks (he failed the quiz and agreed to study up). Dad had a good time, which was the most important part of the day. I hadn't seen my nephew in a while and as per usual he failed to match his prior physique by becoming something like two feet taller in the interim. Plus he's growing his hair out like Shaun Cassidy for some reason. I dig it, it's retro.
Around the corner from their house is a home that traditionally does a huge Halloween production with their front yard, so we went and had a look at this year's edition. Pretty impressive, though I think I would have preferred last year's, which my sister described as having a kind of "Area 51" theme. Still, a lot of work going into this one, which apparently is still being added to judging from the tools and materials seen on site here and there.
My brother-in-law does a smaller-scale Halloween yard every year, which is also in progress. Sadly, my photo is poor, but anyway:
Of course, we also had to get the marking-of-time family photo, and whenever we do these I am struck by the fact that I actually do look my age, which kinda bums me out. I mean, for the longest time I was the skinniest of skinny dudes, the beanpole, the stickman, and now I have a gut and my face is considerably pudgier. At 150 lbs, I don't think anyone would judge me overweight except me, and that only because I didn't crack 115 until my thirties and thus my baseline self-image norm is, well, less than 150 and without a belly and flabby pecs that can be discerned through my T-shirt.
I cropped the lower part of the pic a bit to eliminate the worst of it. Everyone else looks good, though. :)
On the return drive, which is considerably more than 100 miles, we encountered the only truly bad traffic of my trip thus far. Much as had happened that same day (or the day before? I read about it the same day, anyway) on I-5 back home, someone was on foot in the Interstate and was fatally struck by a car at freeway speed. We didn't know that in the moment, though, all we knew was that five lanes of traffic had come to a standstill, with sporadic movement of a few feet at a time. It took about an hour to cover six miles, then we arrived at the accident site, which by then had been largely cleared except for some late examinations to make sure nothing potentially important to investigators was left behind.
When in Los Angeles, do as the Angelinos do and spend an hour in your car to travel six miles.
Back here on Dad's street there aren't many kids for whom to decorate yards in Halloween regalia, but there is one house across the street that has some pretty frightening stuff displayed for the season:
That's a damn sight scarier that any goblin or ghost you could conjure.
Tagged
Traveling |
Posted on October 28, 2024 at 11:59pm | Permalink | |
Anxiety today
Hanging out here at my dad's house there's usually some news program or other on the TV, and so I'm absorbing a lot of the coverage of Former President VonClownstick's American Bund Hate Rally at Madison Square Garden yesterday. I'm glad to know that people started streaming out of the arena after all of his opening acts of racist asshats gave way to the main racist asshat, but it's still—even now, nine years after this putz entered the political fray—difficult to wrap my head around the concept that so many tens of millions of American citizens are eager to put this aspiring despot back in power, even after suffering through the multiple disasters of his 2017-2021 term.
I mean, Trump is a loathsome criminal idiot that leaves more destruction in his wake than a category-5 hurricane or 9.9-scale earthquake, but he's one guy; his immediate circle of enablers and cronies and puppet masters are a relatively small group.
The number of people that have voted for and will vote for him again? Not small. Some of them are true believer Nazi types, but most? Unlikely. It's a damning indictment of the manipulability of the American people and a troubling look at the real power of propagandists.
I would so like to believe that the results of next week's election will be a profound repudiation of the hate and ignorance Trump and his cult represent, but last time—in the midst of a pandemic he enabled, a crashing economy he orchestrated, a diminishment of this country's international reputation that runs counter to the very "We're Number One" attitude the Republican Party used to exude through its pores—seventy million people voted for him. In a country of 350,000,000 with 240,000,000 eligible voters that might not seem like too troubling a figure, but fewer than 160,000,000 people bothered to vote at all. So that 70,000,000 figure is scary as hell.
Those 70,000,000—and the 80,000,000+ that didn't think it worth their time to cast a ballot—need a reminder of what the Trump term was like.
Fortunately, JoJoFromJerz has posted a bit of a recap, a personalized "Last time, on The Trump Administration Horror Show..." that is free for all to see. I share a few bits from it here.
I remember waking up every single morning bracing for the new crazy. What had he done? What had he said? Who had he attacked, mocked, demeaned or made fun of? What new layer of awfulness was on display that day?
I remember what it felt like to watch Republican after Republican, bending the knee to a bully. Excusing an idiot. Watching them accommodate, embolden and excuse the worst behavior possible. Watching them abandon democracy for a wannabe despot. Genuflecting for a mind-numbingly stupid, autocrat-curious, reality tv star who painted himself orange.
He’s fucking orange.
...
I remember feeling perpetually trapped inside an insane asylum with a monster. I remember feeling like there was no escape.
I remember feeling as if half of the country had lost its damn mind. That people I loved had lost their damn minds. Like I was surrounded by racists and sexists, bigots and xenophobes.
...
I remember watching the country turning on itself. George Floyd’s murder. Kyle Rittenhouse’s murders. I remember it feeling like we were being ripped apart from the inside. All while a madman held court from a goddamn golf course.
I remember living in fear. What crazy person might call me to say they were coming to “Paul Pelosi” me next?
I remember watching him send our National Guard on horseback to tear gas protestors in Lafayette Square. Watching him shaking a fucking Bible that wasn’t his in front of a boarded up church. I remember feeling helpless and hopeless. All the fucking time.
JoJo's best description of the Trump years, though, was this: "I remember feeling like we were all trapped on the inside of a two-year-old’s tantrum and we didn’t have any fucking snacks."
We can't handle another tantrum.
Tagged
Politics |
Posted on October 28, 2024 at 11:38am | Permalink | |
Game One
This was one for the ages.
For the first time in a good many years [checks baseball-reference.com—just since 2013, not counting the mini-season of 2020, not as long as I thought] the World Series is between the teams with the best regular season record in each league, the first time in Commissioner Rob Manfred's even-more-playoff-teams era that no Wild Card teams are involved, and the first time since 1981 that the TV network got their dream matchup of bicoastal big market clubs the Dodgers and Yankees.
That last point is only important to marketers and Manfred (who is nothing but a money-grubbing shill of the highest Ferengi order), but the others are good indicators that we were going to get a solidly competitive Series, and, boy, did Game One deliver.
Scoreless through four and a half innings, Los Angeles finally broke through with a triple by postseason god Enrique Hernández and a sacrifice fly from Will Smith. Then the Yankees immediately came back when ALCS MVP Giancarlo Stanton crushed a two-run homer in the 6th off an inside-half-of-the-plate curveball with little to no break, no doubt causing Michael Schur—the great TV writer and co-host of The Poscast—to unleash a torrent of screamed obscenities at Dodger pitcher Jack Flaherty, who blithely ignored Schur's scouting report. That report has helpfully been transcribed by my friend and fellow Poscast listener Erik, please to enjoy and perhaps forward to Dodger manager Dave Roberts.
Mookie Betts drove in Shohei Ohtani with another sac fly to tie it in the 8th, and we went to extra innings at 2-2. New York took the lead in the top of the 10th thanks to a single, steal of 2nd, steal of 3rd, and hard grounder to short that was oh-so-close to being an inning-ending double-play. Then in the home 10th the magic happened.
Flyout. Walk. Single. Yankee manager Aaron Boone makes a pitching change, opting to bring in one Nestor Cortes. Cortes, the onetime truly awful Seattle Mariner but somehow great starter for two years in the Bronx before reverting to the mean, was fresh off the injured list, having had a flexor tendon issue and was appearing in a game for the first time in a month. Curious choice. Cortes' first pitch was a hanger he got away with, as Ohtani fouled out thanks to a fine catch after tumbling into the seats by New York left fielder Alex Verdugo—which still went marginally against the Yankees because Verdugo threw the ball back before returning to the field of play, which is illegal and awarded the runners an extra base, not that anyone watching the telecast knew that unless they were very keen-eyed and caught third-base umpire Mark Ripperger's gestures upon Verdugo's throw since Fox broadcasters Joe Davis and John Smoltz were blissfully unaware and said nothing about it and the broadcast's director chose to stay with closeup camera shots that excluded the baserunners and the onscreen graphic didn't change from showing runners first and second to runners second and third. The Yanks then intentionally walked Mookie Betts to load the bases for Freddie Freeman with two out (a questionable move, but I agreed with it from the New York point of view; the mistake had already been made by bringing in Cortes, first base was vacant thanks to Verdugo throwing the ball back from the stands on Ohtani's foulout, and bypassing Mookie for a lefty-lefty matchup and a slower batter-runner made sense). Cortes' second pitch was a midrange fastball to the lower-inside portion of the zone, aka the lefty happy zone. Belted into the right field bleachers for a game-ending grand slam homer. Pandemonium ensued at Chavez Ravine.
While reminiscent of 1988 Game One, with the iconic Kirk Gibson walkoff homer, this one was probably more exciting all the way from start to finish. Classic.
Game Two tonight. Rodon vs. Yamamoto. Advantage LA.
Tagged
Baseball |
Posted on October 26, 2024 at 11:08am | Permalink | |
Travelogue III: Lost on Capella IV
Day 3
(Or, "Which way to Raffi's camper?" Or, "There's never a Metron around when you need one.")
Thursday's leg of the trip involved boring scenery but high-speed traffic concentration on possibly the least pleasant stretch of Interstate 5 that there is, though there's competition for that. But I turned away from the Interstate to make a bit of a detour to a particular nerd attraction: Vazquez Rocks.
A favorite location for Hollywood studios to venture to, the state park has featured in roughly a bazillion TV and film productions—Westerns, mostly, but plenty of other things where a desert environment with some visual interest is called for—including, of course, Star Trek, where it has doubled for several alien planets as well as for itself in an episode of Picard. I can hardly believe I'd never been there before this.
I arrived at the little visitor's center a bit after noon and procured a map of the park, which noted the relatively small area containing the "famous rocks" and a short 3/4 mile trail leading to it. (You can drive to that spot, there's a large dirt parking area suitable for a big studio trailer and a production base to set up, but I preferred to hike it.) Soon I found myself wandering in the imagined steps of Bill Shatner as he tried to evade a Gorn and De Kelley as he tried to lead a pregnant wife of the Te'er to the safety of secluded caves.
It's impressive how little actual area can be manipulated by the camera to appear vast. The park itself is plenty big, but there's only so much of it one could get to with 1960s-era TV cameras and recording equipment. The same formations used in the "Arena" episode for the Metron planet appear in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, shot from slightly different angles, to form Vulcan cliffsides. The canyons of Capella IV from "Friday's Child" are a few yards from the ones in "Who Watches the Watchers."
And not for nothing, but props to young Bill Shatner—these things are not easy climbs. I went up to what I think is the spot he hurled the styrofoam boulder down on the poor guy in the Gorn suit from and it took some doing. Getting down was even more challenging. (Of course, if I were still 35, as I continue to be in my mind and am repeatedly frustrated to discover I am not, it probably would have been a breeze.)
[EDIT: In observing a still from "Arena," I now see that I was fooled by good camerawork and stagecraft; Shatner actually, it seems, pushed the boulder off from a relatively low point near the parking area, they merely made it look like it was up where I climbed to. Still, props to Shatner anyway, more to director Joseph Pevney and DP Jerry Finnerman.]
The real challenge, though, came a little later.
After satisfying my nerd pilgrimage, I headed back along the trail to the visitor's center. At least, I thought I had. At some point I inadvertently strayed from the trail proper, thinking I was on track but in fact was probably following the paths made by fellow wandering space tourists and soon realized I was not where I thought I should be. On the one hand, this was fine, I got to see more of the big park. On the other hand, I had only planned on a 3/4 mile hike back and I'd not brought any water with me.
This became a problem. I'd relied on my sense of direction to go at least toward the visitor's center, but my internal compass failed me and it was high one-p.m. PDT, with the sun directly overhead and offering no navigational help. Away from the "famous rocks" there weren't many opportunities for shade and I was getting dehydrated. At one point I neared some barbed-wire fencing, which I knew from the map was the border of the wildlife preserve and nowhere close to the visitor center. Shit.
Trail
Not a trail
Not from an episode. Probably built for some western film back in the day. It served well as a rest point while I tried to reorient myself.
I was completely turned around and had added a mile or more to my return hike if I could find my way. When I started to shiver a bit—bad news when it's approaching 100 degrees Fahrenheit—I had a brief fear of collapsing and becoming meat for a le-matya. But I pressed on and eventually came to a trail marker. Not the trail that would get me where I needed to go, but still a marker to refer to and a trail to follow. It led to a trail junction and I got to an auxiliary parking area, from which I just followed the dirt road back to the visitor's center, a little shaky but no longer in danger of being a meal for Vulcan predators. I downed half a dozen cups of water from the center's water cooler, used the facilities, and returned to my car only mildly worse for wear. Despite re-hydrating and eating half a sandwich from my cooler the dehydration headache persisted for the rest of the day and overnight, but a giant soda from AM/PM and a generous use of my car's A/C as I continued along my way served me well.
The remaining journey was through the high desert, near Mojave and Edwards Air Force Base and through some desolate blah California landscape between a few small towns. I chose to avoid Interstates again, adding maybe half an hour to the drive, but I wasn't in any hurry and arrived at my dad's place before dark, having survived the dangers of Capella and the hunting grounds of the ten tribes of the Te'er.
Tagged
Star Trek,
Traveling |
Posted on October 25, 2024 at 1:46pm | Permalink | |
Travelogue II: Rocks and Shoals and Redwoods
Day 2
I started my Wednesday in a Travelodge in Newport, OR, where they apparently rig the shower faucets to give juuuust enough hot water to make it tolerable. During the night a pickup truck parked directly outside my room had its car alarm go off repeatedly. Not a great night's sleep.
Anyway, first world problem.
The Oregon coast in the daytime is really something, and though I missed some of the best parts in the dark the night before, I made several stops off the 101 highway to Oregon state beaches and little towns. (A couple of fun notes from the road: An access street off the highway to a beach residential area was called "Lois Ln"; a coffee shop in Coos Bay is called "The Human Bean." Whatever, I was amused.)
Beaches in Oregon tend to be small but pretty, with giant boulder formations just offshore and varying scales of cliff formations not far up/down from whatever sandy area you may find yourself at:
The 101 highway here is a far cry more interesting than an Interstate, mostly a two-lane affair through little burghs all the way down to the California border, which gives way to a noticeable transition in scenery. From Crescent City, one enters the Redwoods State and National Park area.
Redwoods is beautiful, and to really experience it you'd need to stop and camp and spend a few days. I was just passing through in a matter of several hours, stopping a couple of times for short hikes on trails near the 101 that looped back around. The really good stuff would be away from the highway, but that'll have to keep for another time. I hiked, drove leisurely through scenic bypasses, hiked again, then it got dark and I made may way south to Eureka and beyond.
There will be a brief delay whilst we wait for a herd of deer to clear the roadway. Well, "brief"; maybe 20 minutes.
By the time I got to the Bay Area it was midnight or so, and I decided to just push on and make up some time by cutting over to Interstates. Boring stretches of road, but not a lot of traffic at that hour and it's dark, you can't see anything anyway beyond the semi trucks you whiz by at 75 miles an hour. I got too tired and stopped at Avenal for a few hours' nap.
Audio entertainment consisted of podcasts—Pod Save America, Poscast World Series preview edition (in which Mike Schur lays out the ideal life of Aaron Judge with blissful family fulfillment and old age and exactly zero World Series rings, plus plots how the Mets will wrest Juan Soto away from the Yankees over the offseason with several Brinks trucks worth of cash; and Jason Benetti waxes poetic about keeping an audience interested while calling games for the second-worst season of White Sox baseball in recent memory), Bob Cesca, Delta Flyers—and various mix CDs of 1970s pop/rock. Mileage report: Still frustrated by the whole gas-tank-not-really-full thing, but I think I'm doing about 50 MPG, slightly better than what the onboard computer readout says. (BTW, gasoline gets more expensive as you go south: $3.45 in Olympia, $3.69 outside Crescent City, $3.89 near Oakland, $4.09 in Victorville, CA (next day). Cheapest in Oregon, where one place had it under $3.00, but I didn't need to buy any there.)
OK, who names these things? How about "Giant coniferous wood-bearing plant, evergreen"? Or "Old Hoss Redwood?" But sure, fine, "Big Tree."
Tagged
Traveling |
Posted on October 25, 2024 at 2:46am | Permalink | |
Travelogue I
Day 1
Giving my new-to-me car "a proper shakedown," as Mr. Scott might say, I am driving my way down to southern California in my annual visit to see Dad and Marty over Dad's birthday. It can be done in a day and a half, and I have done, but I opted to take an extra day and take the coastal route, at least for the northern half of the trip.
Southwest Washington state is nice enough (though I could have done without the several TRUMP and REICHERT signs plastered near the roadways), but the Oregon coast is the reason for coming this way, along with the general appeal of passing through a bunch of small towns. Astoria was a nice stop, though I didn't see much of it. Driving along the north Oregon coast at night was nice, though a drawback that I hadn't thought of in advance made me question my decision: fog. Fog makes it pretty tough to appreciate the surroundings while passing through, plus it slows things down quite a bit.
Oh well, tomorrow will be Oregon in daylight, followed by a stop at Redwoods National Park for a hike, then a nighttime drive to the Bay Area and a start on the next leg of the drive.
The shakedown on the Prius is positive so far, having done some maintenance ahead of time including replacing the cabin fan, which wasn't hard and yet somehow still resulted in my bruising a rib. Not sure how that happened. But the car handles well, the cruise control got its first use since I've owned it (sweet!), the sound system is a big improvement over the old Subaru's.
I wanted to get a sense of the real mileage on the thing, but that's proving to be tricky. This generation of Prius has a kind of expandable bladder gas tank that when completely full is almost 12 gallons, but only fills to about 2/3 or 3/4 before a gas pump will stop because it's "full." So, based on info I gleaned form Prius folk on the Internet, I let the gauge get down to one pip, estimating that meant about 1 to 1.5 gallons remaining, then pumped past the "full" stop, forcing in 10 gallons plus a bit. It spit a little back out when I removed the pump thanks to the compression of the bladder, but I think I got it to actual full rather than nominally full so we'll see how far I get before the gauge goes down to one pip again.
Tagged
Traveling |
Posted on October 23, 2024 at 12:49am | Permalink | |
Election paralysis
It's T-minus 14 days. Two weeks until we start to get results from this, the latest in our series now of Most Critical Elections Ever. Will we retain our democratic republic, or will we slide headlong into fascist autocracy? Will the propagandists be successful in turning enough level-seven-susceptibles into enablers in their own downfall, or will the majority of sane Americans so dwarf the coalition of evil, dumb, corrupt, and easily-malleable?
The zeitgeist has it that it's down to basically a coin-flip's odds. So, you know, no pressure.
I want to believe the zeitgeist is giving us a picture skewed form reality, that the idea that this country's electorate is split 50-50 between competence and chaotic dictatorship is based on faulty data. The more rational parts of my mind think it's far more likely that this will not be as close as the prior two presidential elections and that Vice President Harris will carry the day with plenty of room to spare. The more emotional part of my psyche says, "never underestimate the misogyny and racism of the average American voter, to say nothing of the vast ignorance of so many US citizens."
I've alluded to how this has been producing enough anxiety to infiltrate other aspects of my daily life, but as we get closer to November 5th it's becoming more paralyzing. I can't even say "I can't wait until this thing is over with" because if it goes poorly the anxiousness will multiply a thousandfold. It's affecting me in a similar yet different manner to one of my clinical depression episodes, basically sapping me of energy and motivation to do much of anything.
Tomorrow I'm heading out on my annual trip to visit my dad and Marty for Dad's birthday, which always coincides with the World Series; it's thus become our ritual to hang out at Dad's Palm Springs-adjacent abode for a week to ten days or so, watch the Series, and take care of whatever odd jobs and repairs need doing at his house. Aside from watching the end of the baseball playoffs, all I've been trying to do the past few days is plan my route for the road trip and get things ready here for when I'm away, but I can't even seem to make headway on that. I've decided on and reconsidered and redecided on and reconsidered whether I take an extra day and hang out in San Francisco on the way; or use that extra time instead to go the back-road route, maybe along the coast; or just go direct and minimize drive time. The current decision is the back-road along the coast option, but of course, subject to change and subject to my actually being ready to leave tomorrow by the middle of the day.
Anyhow, my focus on that or anything else is transient as the anxiety kicks in again. Just gotta ride it out, I guess.
Meanwhile, I try to take some comfort in the guarded optimism of others. Here's Stephen Beschloss today:
If you’re measuring the election outcome by the current polling, you may count yourself among the worried Democrats. But I am increasingly convinced that the results will not be as close as many observers are expecting. The carnage-loving Trump may resonate with his cult followers, but that will never comprise a majority; the forward-looking Harris continues to have the ability to expand her voting population.
I still believe that most Americans yearn for a positive future characterized by humanity and decency, not one defined by grievance, degradation, and hate.
...But I also nod in agreement when reading things like this, from Craig Calcaterra today:
One candidate in this election has campaigned vigorously and competently, understands that basic civil rights and the rule of law is of critical importance to a functioning society, and has actual policy proposals. The other candidate has had multiple recent moments which strongly suggest that he is suffering from cognitive failure of some kind, has spent the entire campaign promising to usher in an unprecedented age of American authoritarianism, and is closing the campaign with hearsay about the size of a dead golfer’s dick.
The fact that this will be one of the closest elections in my lifetime says everything that needs to be said about the state of America.
My vote is already turned in. I'm going to attempt to enjoy a road trip and not worry about it. We'll see how that goes.
Tagged
The Black Hole,
Politics |
Posted on October 21, 2024 at 8:34pm | Permalink | |