On this week’s ‘Not My Job’ segment of the NPR quiz show Wait, Wait…Don’t Tell Me!, the guest is Fred Schneider, the original front man of the rock band, the B-52s. Unfortunately – and yes, this is my personal bias creeping in, so it might be unfair, but I think accurate -- Negin Farsad is back as guest host, and she’s her regular giggly, much too overly-enthusiastic, fangirl self, but happily the panel jumps in more than usual to ask questions, so the interview is more listenable than it might have been otherwise, particularly with his self-effacing and sardonic responses.
This is the full Wait, Wait… broadcast, but you can jump directly to the “Not My Job” segment, it starts around the 18:45 mark.
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The guests on this week’s Al Franken podcast are the bestselling authors on The Trump Indictments Andrew Weissmann and Melissa Murray. As Al writes, “The first criminal trial for Donald Trump is underway. The hush money trial over Stormy Daniels might be the first, but it won’t be the last. But will we see the other trials before the election? And what are the consequences if Trump is found guilty? We talk to Andrew Weissmann and Melissa Murray.” I thought of posting this on the first night of Passover, but since it’s called Saturday Night Seder, I figured it’s best to wait until tonight. This is a wonderfully entertaining “Seder” that was done four years ago, on April 11, 2020 during the very early days of the pandemic, when people couldn’t gather for their traditional Seder service. It’s made with a seriously impressive cast – complete with a lot of humor, original songs, and traditional Seder songs – and put together with notable writers. I should add that while much of it is very funny, it’s also (in part) serious with the inclusion of several rabbis and the telling of the Passover tale and its meaning. But it’s the entertainment that stands out. The cast, not shockingly, is mostly Jewish – it is a Passover Seder, after all… -- but not exclusively, with quite a few invited guests. Among the many participating – and this is only a partial list -- are (in alphabetical order): Pamela Adlon, Jason Alexander, Skylar Astin, Mayim Bialik, Rachel Brosnahan, Andy Cohen, Fran Drescher, Cynthia Erivo, Beanie Feldstein, Harvey Fierstein, Ilana Glazer, Whoopi Goldberg, Josh Groban, Richard Kind, Nick Kroll, Dan Levy, Judith Light, Alan Menken, Idina Menzel, Debra Messing, Bette Midler, Isaac Mizrahi, Ben Platt, Billy Porter, Sen. Chuck Schumer, Stephen Schwartz, Sarah Silverman, Shaina Taub, Henry Winkler, Finn Wolfhard, and many more. Not a bad cast. And not shabby, either, are those who put it all together. The head writer of the hour-long event is Alex Edelman – who I wrote about here the other week. He’s the star and writer of the hit one-man show on Broadway, Just for Us, that HBO recorded and is currently airing. Also, some of the original songs were co-written by Benj Pasek – part of the Oscar-winning songwriting team that wrote the movies, The Greatest Showman and La La Land, as well as the Broadway musical Dear Evan Hansen, which won six Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Original Score. Saturday Night Seder was also done as a fundraiser for the CDC Foundation COVID-19 Emergency Response Fund. So far, it has raised $3.5 million. From the archives. This week, the contest is Jason Carr from Philadelphia. In the early stages, I could hear the theme, but couldn't make out the hidden song -- but not long after it became quite clear to me. The composer style is obviously from a distinct period, though it's a period I always have a toss-up because about three or four people. And my toss-up guess was wrong.
My friend Rob Hedden, who I've occasionally mentioned here (often for his deep, abiding love of squirrels...) wrote and directed a movie called You May Not Kiss the Bride. The movie had a nice cast, starring Dave Annable and Katherine McPhee, with a supporting cast of Kathy Bates, Tia Carrere, Rob Schneider, Mena Suvari, Vinnie Jones and Stephen Tobolowsky. The story mostly takes place in Tahiti, and at one point in the film, Rob wanted to have a South Seas-type song to play. There was a piece of music they wanted, but couldn’t get the rights. They ended up getting an original song instead – and the story about how it came about is fascinating. I’d never heard the story, but it came up the other day when Rob was telling me about a family trip he’s about to take to Tahiti, and mentioned the song they got, called “Te Mama Tahiti.” It's a very good song, and it’s remarkable who wrote and recorded it (under a pseudonym), and how it came about. I don’t want to give it away, but here’s a link to the song. Listen to it (at least for a minute, so you can get a sense of it) before I tell you who did this for the movie, which I’ll explain below. Though you might want to listen to the whole thing. It's not that this was done for Rob's movie -- I honestly really like it, and I never would have guessed the artist who wrote and recorded it for them. Okay, the person who wrote this song, arranged it, sang the lead, sang all the background vocals and also played the music for my friend Rob Hedden to use in his movie was --- Rob Hedden! I knew that Rob wrote and sang music. He had a fun, goofy band for a while, Quayton and the Maxiwhackers. But when he sent me this song, I had no idea it was him. About half-way through, I did begin to suspect it might be him singing the lead – but I didn’t think he was all the background vocals (especially since at a few points it sounded like a woman singing, and wasn’t completely sure that he wrote it, or arranged it. The fun story to it is that after the production couldn’t get the rights to the song they wanted, Rob wrote, arranged and did this – but didn’t tell the producers it was all him. He just said that he had a friend who did this and would give it to them for free. (He said the producers really liked the song…but they especially loved that it was free!!) After the producers said that they liked it and agreed that it should be in the movie, only then did Rob tell them that it was all him. And he said that they didn’t believe him! He had to keep trying to convince them, until they did. By the way, the words are all gibberish. They’re real Tahitian words, but don’t mean anything. Which Rob (who is incredibly self-effacing) said is perfect for him. I honestly like the song, a lot. I’ve listened to it at least a dozen times. And I should append one thing I mention above – though it takes place in Tahiti, the movie was filmed in Hawaii. And if you want to see the trailer (it does a reasonable job), here’s the link – Okay, and just because we're honoring Rob today, what the heck, just for the pleasure of the good fellow, here's another squirrel video. Twitter has really been going Full-MAGOP Crazy the past week, not just far more than usual, but overwhelmingly more than usual – which (in addition to Trump melting down) is, it seems another indication of how the trial is going. But also how the comfortable, ordered MAGA world -- where black history doesn't exist, books you don't like are banned, the womenfolk can't get abortions like it was in 1864, law and order existed only to keep minorities in their place, science isn't real, and Trump wasn't showing early signs of dementia, and more -- is going in general, spinning more out of control than they like. And that’s the point here. Not that there is all this “outrage,” but that it’s grown so pronounced within such a short period of time as a touchstone for getting a view into the MAGOP mindset.
And further, to be clear, I don’t just mean the general public MAGOPs ranting and lying and howling at the moon, but well-known Republican figures with their hair on fire, picking on anything even remotely connected to Biden to slam him, no matter how insignificant, and often quite-literally lying about anything they can. Because they seemingly have nothing else to offer. Thoughtful debate is one thing, is something else. This is grasping at whatever they can, no matter how small, holding out hope that it’s a lifeline as they tread water in the middle of the ocean. [UPDATE: After writing that about "no matter how insignificant," just this morning I see that the latest line of outrages MAGOP attacks at President Biden are about the shoes he's now wearing.] This will be long, but that’s because the examples are need to at least give a hint of the depth and spread of it all. And even that won’t come close to doing justice to this new spurt of wailing For instance, there’s a video of a speech that President Biden made on Wednesday where he screwed up reading the TelePrompter and read the word “Pause.” It was pretty poor, though amusing. However, high-visible Republicans were picking on that as if it was the end of the world – including Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, Richard Grenell (Trump’s former Acting Director of National Intelligence), Don Jr. and Megyn Kelly. Actually, Ms. Kelly went even above and beyond most when she commented on the video: “He might have just lost. Seriously.” I wrote back -- "Seriously"?? Because of that??! You think saying “Pause” will actually lose President Biden the election? And you want us to take you “Seriously”? It's telling that misreading a TelePrompter bothers you *THAT MUCH*!! -- but not Trump and his mental breakdown gibberish saying made-up words like "illegal adlinthin" and “Weak niks.” And him being found liable for rape. And found guilty of 10 years of business fraud. And saying he wants to be a dictator. And saying he wants to throw out some of the Constitution. That latter paragraph, by the way, is an adaptation of what’s now become my standard reply on social media to extreme-right “outrage” at something they find so despicable and apparently the end of democracy as we know it about President Biden. Debating such an over-the-top reaction has no point. Nor does explaining why they’ve misunderstood the horror they’re reacting to. Instead, saying that "You’re supporting someone found liable for rape, who said he wants to be a dictator” seems a more pointed way to reply. Kari Lake has been especially prominent among the outraged, repeatedly trying to infuriate her supporters, without really having a strong grasp on facts or policy…or what position to take (witness her first being for Arizona’s 1864 total abortion ban, than against it, and now for it) – though in fairness, she’s so deeply reality-challenged that it seems like she’s more trying to audition to be Trump’s VP choice (which will never happen because in her one and only race, she lost – and “loser” is the most damning word to Trump). More troubling for her is that her flailing comes across as desperate, so totally off the ledge, which appears to be an indication of her concern about her Senate campaign against Ruben Gallego is going. As just one example, she wrote – “Joe Biden and Ruben Gallego want to raise our taxes by 5 trillion dollars! They've spent so much time in the swamp that they're completely out of touch. Ruben, not all of us can be bankrolled by DC lobbyists. Why are you supporting this attack on American small businesses & families? Of course, what the truth-challenged Ms. Lake left out (not shockingly) is that this tax hike is over ten years. And half of that is for the very wealthiest Americans who've been underpaying for decades. (A Forbes article noted that billionaire on average only pay 8.2% in taxes.) The other half of that tax hike is for corporate taxes. None of the raise in taxes is for most Americans. Moreover, the proposal actually bring down deficit spending! Ms. Lake also posted a video of her Democratic opponent celebrating after the House passed its Ukraine aide bill passed by a massive 311-112 majority. And so, her only response was to trod out a Trumpian attack -- “Ruben Gallego parading around the floor of Congress waving a foreign flag tells you all you need to know about his priorities. 60 billion of our taxpayer dollars to secure Ukraine's border. Zero to defend our own. Radical Ruben will NEVER prioritize your safety.” Of course, in reality, Rep. Gallego was supporting a democratic ally that is under attack by one of America's top enemies -- celebrating a House vote passing overwhelmingly by a 3-to-1 margin that actually benefits American security in many ways. Not only is Ms. Lake ignorant of that and in the vast minority, and not only does she leave out that it’s Republicans who blocked the border security bill, but given her flip-flopping all over the room about Arizona’s 1864 abortion law, she has a personal challenge when it comes to prioritizing -- deciding what if anything her priorities should even be. I didn’t mean to skim over the aforementioned Charlie Kirk earlier, since he has been active doing what Charlie Kirk does, being outraged, going so far over the top you fear for his safety, trying hard to regularly “trigger the libs” and if it helps him to outrage his base, just lie. In another of his efforts, he wrote that “Biden just banned TikTok,” adding that “He is so controlled by the tech companies that he is risking his support with Gen Z.” Except, well, no, of course that isn’t true. After all, no, it’s the Senate and House (the Republican-led House, by the way) who banned TikTok and passed the law. President Biden signed it. But even more to the point, the reality is that it's not "banned" at all -- the company has 9-12 months to sell it. Either Charlie Kirk doesn’t understand all this and is just being his normal divisive self, or he don't get how bills work or what they say. Oh, by the way, you know who has banned this international version of China’s TikTok? China! (Yes, really.) This MAGOP “outrage” does sometimes reach comical levels. Like with Laura Loomer, a party mouthpiece of growing notoriety who Trump loves, who pulled out an old chestnut for some reason and then ratcheted it up, if only to express her head-exploding outrage at Democrats – and please Trump. “Hillary Clinton belongs in hell.” Okay, so that seems a bit hyperbolic, but hey, that’s just me. Even Rudy Giuliani popped up from hibernation to help Trump by pulling out an old chestnut, although he was almost beyond pathetic, when he weirdly cried out, “The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election was stolen. Change my mind.” (Okay, I couldn’t let that one pass. I replied, “You were convicted of defamation, ruining two women's lives, for saying lies like this, and fined $148 million. No one has to convince you of anything. Rather, what you have to do is pay the $148 million fine (after appeal) because of your lying and defaming about the election.”) Coming out of the woodwork, Newt Gingrich jumped in, as well, with a desperate effort to be “outraged” by the Manhattan election interference trial, although he avoided all reference to the concept of evidence, and the best he could offer was just to thrash for the sake of thrashing, “The cost of Trump’s New York trial should be charged to the Biden presidential campaign! It is all politics and no law.” This from the man reprimanded with an ethics violation when his own party was in control of the House. Never mind that his lie about “no law” being involved in the trials against Trump distracts from the reality that The Law actually found Trump liable (twice) for the equivalence of rape, and also found him guilty of business fraud. That’s largely the running theme in so many of this recent spate of “outrages.” Not that serious arguments for debate are made to support a position, but spewing out anger (some faux, some it seems out of insecurity) that sounds substantive, but is just misdirection at best, or lies at worst. Like when Ted Cruz (R-TX) disingenuously wrote the other day that “I could not support the foreign aid bill since it gave money to Gaza and did nothing to stop the invasion Joe Biden has allowed on our southern border.” Never mind, of course, that in reality President Biden endorsed the border security bill that Ted Cruz’s own Republican Party blocked. At the behest of Trump. Actor Kevin Sorbo didn’t have anything on topic to be outraged about, but when you see your well-ordered MAGA world coming apart, he threw in an old Republican lie to do his divisive, outraged part: “If you don’t pay taxes you shouldn’t be allowed to vote. Why should you have control over a system you don’t contribute into?” he wailed. “Why?” he asks – well, because it's in the U.S. Constitution. Because we aren’t a plutocracy, where only the wealthy get to govern. Beyond that, it’s just lashing out without even attempting to think, which is so much the foundation of so much MAGOP “outrage.” After all, of course, just because people don't pay income tax doesn't mean they don't pay taxes! Most people have withholding tax taken from weekly paychecks, so they don't "owe" income tax. And for that matter, everyone pays sales tax on everything they buy. Those are actually “taxes” that go to government to contribute into the system. This is basic -- and well-known. Except to MAGOPs grasping for something, anything to be outraged at and blame Democrats and minorities. And then there’s Joey Mannarino., a prominent MAGOP fundraiser who is furiously angry about near-everything related to President Biden. He wrote in his standard blind, lying rage: “If Joe Biden passes a 44.6% capital gains tax (think cryptocurrency) I will absolutely be renouncing my American citizenship. I hold another one already.” Well, oh, my. Heavens to Betsy. Of course, reality down on Earth tells a totally different story. After all, Joe Biden doesn’t “pass” tax law with a wave of his Harry Potter-style wand. Such a tax hike could only become law if passed by Congress – which would include Republican votes. But almost more to the point is that – Even conservative Forbes writes that this proposal is only "incremental, not revolutionary" and "no cause for alarm." It’s just a small increase over the existing law – and further, the rate would only apply to those "with taxable income above $1 million and investment income above $400,000." Forbes adds "That isn’t quite as cataclysmic a policy shift as referring to a blanket 44.6% long-term capital gains rate would suggest." Long as this list above was, the full list is overwhelming longer. After all, I haven't even included the pure, flat out, standard, time-tested, brazen lying on social media by MAGOP elected officials like Jim Jordan, Marjorie Taylor Greene, J.D. Vance, Lauren Boebert and MAGOP megaphones like Fox's Jesse Watters, OANN's Jack Posbiec, Franklin Graham and many more. It would not only make this go on almost endlessly, but would risk readers throwing objects at their computer screens. You're welcome. To be clear, when I saw far longer, I don't mean just from high-profile MAGOP public figures, but also the base they go out of their way to outrage with lies, misdirection, Russian disinformation and more. And while I know this is common these days, the point here is that all of this above is just within the past few days, when the MAGA world appears to be unraveling. And the biggest cause – since when such a phenomenon occurs, you have to look at what is different that might have brought the increase about – seems to be seeing their infallible cult leader actually in court on trial…but also, perhaps, seeing him at the courthouse and rallies looking frail, and old, and shuffling, and lashing out even more than usual, calling for bloodbaths, confusing Jimmy Kimmel with Al Pacino, and seeing what looks like to psychiatrists as early stages of dementia as he rambles off on tangents in more odd directions than before, while making up gibberish words when his mind can’t come up with the real ones he wants. So, this growing outburst of flailing MAGOP angst by Trump acolytes has to be, in part, related to Trump’s own concern about how badly the trial is going after just days, and all his other trials and how clear the profoundly losing MAGOP position of abortion is – to which can now be added this week the Pennsylvania primary where he lost 150,000 votes to Nikki Halley who dropped out of the race seven weeks ago! (To which one can only imagine how many others wanted to vote for Haley but figured “Trump is the nominee, she’s not in the race, why bother going to the polls?”) The election is still seven months away. Trump is not going to get any better. The Manhattan trial will continue. The other trials, even if none start before the election, all hang over him. If this is the level of MAGOP meltdown outrage already – and man, have I left out not only a lot, but a lot that just totally delusion in its fury and grasp of reality – I can’t even begin to imagine how MAGOP heads are going to keep from exploding. By the way, to be clear, none of this means that the Republican Party won't do well in the coming elections. Or collapse under its own weight. Just that whatever happens, they are on a loop de loop rollercoaster without a safety bar. Yes, I'm biased. But then, I'm not the one melting down. Which makes it easier to see clearly. And biased doesn't mean being wrong. Just that you can appreciate the angst of people trying to undermine democracy and make the United States fascist, supporting someone who says he wants to be a dictator, throw out parts of the U.S. Constitution, was found liable for the equivalence of rape, and found guilty of ten years of business fraud. |
AuthorRobert J. Elisberg is a political commentator, screenwriter, novelist, tech writer and also some other things that I just tend to keep forgetting. Feedspot Badge of Honor
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