A couple days ago, I posted an odd, very funny, off-the-cuff presentation by Seth Rogen at the Critics Choice Awards on Sunday. I thought it only appropriate to round out his goofy persona with something I posted nine years ago. Seth Rogen testified before the Senate in 2014 about Alzheimer's Disease. It was an often very touching and occasionally funny presentation. But make no mistake, it was all totally serious. So, here are those six minutes again.
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Yesterday, police in New Mexico made an arrest of a Republican who ran for office there, lost, didn’t concede – because he probably said that Trump didn’t concede, so he wouldn’t either because he was a MAGA King – and visited the homes of several Democratic public officials to yell at them and then organized a plan where these officials and other Democratic officials (six in all) had their homes shot at, including that bullets went through the bedroom where one of their 10-year-old daughters was sleeping.
Oh, and the Republican candidate was a felon, with 17 felony convictions, who spent seven years in prison. Because, yeah, that’s who the GOP is okay with running for office in their party. And as far as I can tell, there has been no outrage or outcry or criticism from Republican officials in Washington. Because, hey, why would they? It was too on-brand. Meet your 2023 Republican Party. Is it fair to tar the entire Republican Party because of the horrific actions of one local candidate? If I was doing that, no, it would not be fair. But that’s not what I’m doing. What is fair is to point out that this man was the nominee of the Republican Party in New Mexico who was okay with a GOP candidate with 17 felony convictions whose actions stem from a foundation of what the Republican Party has been pushing – election denial, refusal to concede, the entitlement of MAGA, the use of guns to settle your difference, and that the party leaders are being near-silent and not making clear as loudly as possible that shooting up the homes of Democratic officials is horrifying, wrong, and criminal, and almost killing a child is ghastly. And something else to consider, as the GOP takes this all in stride: No one was killed. But that’s only from luck. A child could have been killed. It could have been a massacre. But if only one Democratic official would have been killed, that alone would have been brutally grim enough. We’re all taking this story calmly and analytically for the pure reason, for the sole reason that everyone in these six families is alive. But just imagine if even one person died, and then, after you get past that horror, imagine if they all did – the officials, their spouses, their families, that 10-year-old girl. It's not an outlandish thing to imagine. It's outlandish not to imagine it. An organized gang intentionally shot up six houses. And Republican “leaders” are near-silent about it all. And I only say “near-silent” to be fair, uncertain if there’s a few, or just one Republican in a leadership position who said, at the very least, “Oh, my, that’s bad.” There is an expression, “We sure dodged a bullet on that one.” The Republican Party sure dodged a bullet on that one. And it’s fair to paint the Republican Party with this, too, because – as much as this story can just been seen as an isolated incident (because, after all, who could have foreseen that running a candidate with 17 felony convictions who spent seven years in prison could have gone wrong…) – it’s not an isolated incident. The Republican Party bears responsibility for it, and more. For starters, there was that whole January 6 Insurrection thing, breaking into the Capitol, looking for members of Congress to kill, a hangman’s noose built outside on the grounds. And the incident where Speaker Nany Pelosi’s home was broken into, and her 82-year-old husband was beaten and put in the hospital. And the incident where a Democratic campaign office was firebombed. And violent threats against mother-daughter campaign workers in Georgia who had to move out of their homes to safety, after Trump publicly attacked them for non-existent campaign fraud – and he’s still attacking them, only two weeks ago. And threats of death against Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell after new Speaker Kevin McCarthy smeared Swalwell with lies about being under FBI investigation from contact with a Chinese spy – when the FBI has not only publicly stated that Swalwell was cleared of all wrongdoing, but had privately briefed Congressional leaders that Swalwell had done nothing illegal and even properly cooperated with the FBI. Yes, yes, I know there was a crazy, lone gunman who shot at Republican Congressmen playing baseball, putting Rep. Steve Scalise in the hospital about six years ago. It was awful and widely condemned by Democrats. But this isn’t a “both sides” thing. Democrats don’t push guns, they aren’t election deniers, they don’t rile up their base to overthrow the government, they don’t target Republicans to be threatened. It was a terrible, isolated incident six years ago that was condemned. But this – and all the others? One of the several reasons Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) was kicked off House committees was because she threated the lives of some Democratic members of Congress. Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) put out an anime video that show Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez being brutally killed. And President Biden being attacked. Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) sent out Christmas cards with her family proudly surrounded by rifles and firearms, and made threats against Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar who she suggested was a jihad terrorist. When Rusty Bowers, Speaker of the House in Arizona, testified publicly before the January 6 Select Committee he spoke about threats that have become a “pattern of our lives” by groups that have set up outside his home, with guns brought into the neighborhood. Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger testified before the January 6 Select Committee about how he and his family have had to deal with ongoing violent threats, including a home break-in. During the time Trump was in office, he regularly declared groups he didn’t like as Enemies of the People and would energize his base about the supposed dangers of these “enemies.” On the night when Trump debated Joe Biden, he was asked about condemning white supremacist groups and instead looked into the camera he directly told one of the most prominent, the Proud Boys, to “Stand back and stand by.” Regularly we’d read about another gun massacre when the shooter made clear he was driven by manifestos founded on the rantings of Trump. When Kyle Rittenhouse traveled across state lines and killed two people in a protest, he was invited to meet with Trump Mar-a-Lago and lionized by the GOP – and still is. And so much more. This isn’t a both sides issue. And yes, yes, there are threats made by Democrats against Republicans. But nowhere even remotely on an equal basis, and not at all on this violent level – let alone with the actual shootings and home break-ins. After all this pattern began with Trump prompting his base about enemies of the people, stolen elections and summoning his party faithful to Washington for an Insurrection to overthrow the government. This isn’t a both sides issue. The NRA isn’t on both sides either. And they can’t dismiss the shootings in New Mexico as just a sick, crazy person. He was a GOP candidate for public office – who put together a team to commit the shootings. And the Republican Party is “near-silent” about it all. Except when making the threats. It is their Language of Violence that sets the spark, that tells people that the violence is all right, indeed necessary, and when the leaders of the GOP say nothing when the violence occurs, that only serves to confirm that the violence is all right. And when Republicans took control of the House by a razor thin majority, what did new Speaker Kevin McCarthy do? The House leaders of the Insurrection weren’t penalized, no, instead he rewarded them -- people who enabled the effort to overthrow democracy -- to positions of important committees. Jim Jordan was made chairman of the Judiciary Committee. Marjorie Taylor Greene was put on Homeland Security. (No, that isn’t a typo.) Lauren Boebert was named to House Oversight that handles investigations. And Scott Perry, one of the most aggressive Insurrectionists, is also on House Oversight. So, the message of this Language of Violence from Republicans is clear. Violence against your opponents is to be embraced. Of course it is -- it's one of the core tenets of fascism. For all the GOP's silence after there are shootings and violence against Democrats, they speak loudly to ensure it keeps happening. This is today’s fascist Republican Party. This is a wonderful and special video – a 50-minute collection of performances by Peter, Paul and Mary at the Newport Folk Festival between 1963-65. It’s at the height of their popularity, when the folk music revolution broke through, before rock music took over the music landscape a few years later. The vibrancy of the performances are impressive. As a long side note: I posted this tale almost a decade away to the day, so it's probably due for a repeat at this point. Many years ago when I was a wee kidling, I actually crossed paths in the oddest way with Paul Stookey. One Sunday when I was probably around eight, my folks took my brother and me for a day jaunt to O'Hare Airport. (Yes, there was a time when a family might go to the airport simply to watch the planes and see the bustle of people.) As we were wandering through, my brother (he was probably about 11) said, "I think that guy we just passed was Jerry Lucas." Not many people would have recognized Jerry Lucas, though he was a fairly successful professional basketball player. He had been an All American forward on Ohio State and was now a pro, though his professional career didn't reach the renown of his college days. Anyway, we wandered on and ignored it. But a little while later, it was still bugging my brother. He was sure it was Jerry Lucas and wanted to go back and find out. So, he headed off to search, and like a good little brother, I followed. Now, consider two things: 1) That this was a time when parents were fine letting their two kids go running through an airport, and 2) my brother actually thought he'd be able to find one person he thought he might have spotted five minutes earlier in O'Hare Airport, the busiest airport in the world. And we found Jerry Lucas. It was him. He was surprised and pleased to be recognized, we got his autograph, and then headed back to find our parents. Very excited, we were a bit tired, so we found some chairs and all four of us sat down to rest. And sitting down, we turned our heads and noticed a guitar case and bass case next to us. There was a tag on both of them with a logo that said, "Peter, Paul and Mary." It will not surprise you that we chose not to go anywhere for the time being. We had no idea what would turn up at the other end of this adventure, but we were going to find out. And so, we waited. Eventually, the owners of the instruments showed up. One was Paul Stookey. The other, if I can recall correctly, was their longtime bassist, Dick Kniss. We got the autographs. It was, as yo might guess, a swell day at the airport. And memorable. (I even kept both autographs for a very long time, but alas they are no more.) By the way, consider one more thing: This was a time when a major musician felt no qualms about leaving his instruments unattended at the world's busiest airport. We have a weird story today about a tech support problem. It’s a really easy one to describe, and sort of funny, so no need to go rushing off screaming in fear of high tech gobbledygook.
The story concerns a friend who had a Kindle Fire that he likes a lot. Though its main feature is as an ebook reader, it also has basic functions, mainly for browsing the Internet and streaming video. He’s had an annoying problem for a while though where the screen goes black far more often than ideal. (One time is less than ideal, but such hiccups do happen.) He went online to see if others had the same problem, and if so were any solutions offered. And, in fact, it turns out to be a very common problem, with many hundreds of people complaining. And no serious suggestions. He even tracked down tech articles written about the problem – that’s how prevalent the issue is. (One loony suggestion was that the device was likely overheating, so put it in the freezer to cool down. And this was from a tech journalist.) My friend finally called Kindle Fire tech support, and they were as bewildered as my friend and spent a long time on the phone trying to fix it. To no avail. So, in the end, they said they’d send him a new unit, because this one was still in warranty. A few hours later, my friend – who is pretty adept at technology – thought he’d check into something. He went into the Settings option and then Video section, and began searching through the various areas…until he found something SO basic, and SO obvious that he knew he had to be right. It was that there is a setting for when the screen should blank out after a certain period of time when there was no usage – and the default was set for just one minute!! This is to save battery power, but “one minute” is incredibly much too fast. So, he just changed it to 30 minutes – and it’s worked perfectly since there. He never has gone a half-hour with accessing the device. Either there’s TV news video streaming or a TV show or something like that, or he’s checking his email or browsing the Internet. But such an easy solution isn’t the weird thing. The weird thing is that Kindle tech support didn’t know this was the easy fix. It’s not that the guy on the phone didn’t know, but this sort of thing – especially an issue that has SO many user complaints online (and therefore, no doubt, phone calls to tech support) – will always have the fix noted in the official notes every tech support person has at their finger tips. And it’s not even “a problem,” it’s just a matter of changing the default setting. How in the world tech support doesn’t have this in their manual is just plain weird. Weird, too, is that when my friend checked online complaints, he didn’t come across anyone explaining the easy fix. I’m sure that out there across the Internet there probably were people who gave the fix, since my friend didn’t check out hundreds of complaints, but given how incredibly easy and (even more) basic this fix is – changing the default – it’s a bit surprising that it wasn’t given every time. Mainly, though, it’s amazing that Kindle tech support didn’t just say, “Change the default for screen time.” In their favor, they are sending a new Kindle Fire to my friend (though it’s under warranty, so they pretty much have to, but still, they did so without any hesitancy). So, that’s a good thing. And in the end, here’s a Tech Tip for you: if you have a Kindle Fire, and the screen keeps going to black – just go into settings and change when the default is set for the screen timing out. Ben Franklin was born on this day, January 17, in 1706. And as I like to do to celebrate, I thought I'd post a few songs with the good fellow from a couple of Broadway musicals. Yes, a couple -- there are two musicals I know of that feature Benjamin Franklin, which is probably two more than most people would have guessed for a very long time. While I'm certain that 1776 comes first to mind for most people, instead we're going to start with another. It's a show that opened in October, 1964, called Ben Franklin in Paris. And it had an impressive lead -- Robert Preston, in his first musical since The Music Man. It had music and lyrics by a fellow named Sidney Michaels and also starred Ulla Sallert. The show didn't have a long run, though did play for 215 performances, which is half a year. I'm not bowled over by the score, but it does have a few nice things in it. And happily, my favorite song even has video of it when the cast appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show and performed the song and the scene that leads into it. This is "Half the Battle." The other song, "Look for Small Pleasures," is quite nice, in a small, charming way. In fact, it even had a bit of life outside the show and was recorded by several people, with moderate success. And of course we have to follow that up with something from 1776, with music and lyrics by Sherman Edwards. So, here then is "The Egg." And...oh, okay, let's throw in an offbeat bonus. No, it's not a musical about Ben Franklin, but how can we end a celebration of the good fellow without this song from Mary Poppins?! There’s a song I love which I’ve posted a few times, like here, “It’s Not Where You Start, It’s Where You Finish,” from the musical Seesaw. And while it’s a wonderful sentiment, and pretty close to spot on most of the time, there are times when “where you start” sets the table and explains what your intentions are.
And the Republican Party has apparently chosen to join that club bigtime. I thought about holding off writing this article for a while until more examples crop up, which they undoubtedly will, but since this is about where they start, I decided that it’s just to jump in at the starting gate, and so have picked three prime examples. For some reason, Republicans like to squeak in with a narrow victory and think it gives them a “mandate.” George W. Bush sneaked in for his second term, beating John Kerry with 50.7% of the votes and winning the Electoral College by just 286-251 – and famously said “I've earned capital in this election, and I'm going to spend it.” It didn’t work out well for him – he left office with a 34% approval. This past election, Republicans did win back the House – but they were expecting a “Red Wave” and winning 60-70 seats. Instead, they barely won a majority and have such a small margin that they can only afford to lose four votes out of 435. And they not only didn’t win control of the Senate, they lost a seat. Yet not only do House Republicans seem to be acting like they won a mandate and “earned capital,” but so too do Republicans outside of Washington. It starts with House Republicans, who for no sane reason known to Man, stunningly passed as one of their very first official pieces of business, two anti-abortion bills. Passing one would have been enough to question their sanity, but…two? Clearly, of course, this was just to appease their base – after all, they know it won't pass the Senate and will go nowhere. It probably won’t even get brought up for a vote in the Senate. So, of course, we get that. The thing is, what they also know – for absolute certain – is that the public hated the GOP anti-abortion stance SO MUCH that it, perhaps more than any single issue, helped crush the Republican Party in the Mid-terms. Even before the Mid-terms, Republicans had an anti-abortion state law proposal on the ballot in a special election for Red state Kansas – and it lost, badly. Yet here are House Republicans, overflowing with hubris, passing two anti-abortion bills in one of the first acts to identify who they are and say, “Here, World! Take a look at us! This is what we stand for! Bring it on!” As the expression goes, be careful what you with for, you might get it. If Republicans think that women (sorry, I mean, “the womenfolk”) aren’t going to notice this or will notice, but totally forget it, yipes, the GOP was not paying attention. As I said, though, this hubris was not limited to Republicans in Washington. No, no, Missouri Republicans tried their best to top that. They didn’t – it’s pretty hard to top abortion when a political party wants to mess up women’s lives – but they did a great job coming close on pure, meaningless, small-minded, unnecessary stupidity. That’s because the Missouri state legislature passed a ban on women (sorry, I mean, “the womenfolk”) wearing clothes on the House floor that exposes their bare arms. (Apparently women’s arms are okay in the Missouri Senate, since they didn’t pass the same rule.) Democrat Pete Merideth ridiculed Republicans for even bring this up as a topic of discussion, let alone passing it. He noted how the Republican caucus “that lost their minds over the suggestion that they should wear masks during a pandemic to respect the safety of others is now spending its time focusing on the fine details of what women have to wear (and specifically how many layers must cover their arms) to show respect in this chamber.” The new rule says, “Proper attire for women shall be business attire, including jackets worn with dresses, skirts, or slacks, and dress shoes or boots. For the purposes of this rule, ‘jacket’ shall include blazers, cardigans, and knit blazers.” No word on what colors are appropriate depending on the season, and how the legislature staff should respond if any of the elected female representatives get the vapors What’s inexplicable is Republicans thinking this rule not only was actually needed, but that it wouldn’t offend well-over half the electorate and make the GOP look Neanderthal. Ostensibly, the reason given for the new rule is that there is a current rule for what men must wear on the Missouri House floor (starting with a coat and tie), and Republicans wanted to balance matters. But the thing is, there already is a rule for women, and it was perfectly clear -- basically it said, "dress professionally." Which one would think is enough. It's that they're adding, "Cover your arms, ladies" that's make their level of swaggering look pathetic. What I would love is for women to come on the House floor in a cardigan – without sleeves. But the hubris winner in the “No, seriously, what are you thinking???” Category among this new crop of Republicans has to go to newly-elected Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders in Arkansas. In one of her first acts as Arkansas governor, when the state is looking to its leader for the direction of her agenda, on what she believes is most important for dealing with the economy, education, health, the environment and jobs, Sarah Huckabee Sanders decided to play her hubris card and actually ban the use of the word "Latinx" from government use. Latinx! Banned. Putting aside that beyond being utterly unnecessary, this action has the slight tinge of racist fascism by determining how women (sorry, I mean “the womenfolk”) of a minority culture must be identified by the state (which, for all I know, was the whole selling point to Ms. Sanders). By the way, what might leap out the most is, given that this is Arkansas, I can't imagine the word "Latinx" comes up much in their state government. Or…well, almost anywhere throughout the state. Female Hispanic population in Arkansas is a whopping 4%. (For the rest of the country, it’s four times greater, about 15%.) So, yes, without question, the “Latinx” name problem is clearly a significant, first-issue matter to sign when taking office. So, let’s define this minority group for them in Arkansas. So, yes, this is who today’s Republican Party is. Loaded with hubris, thinking they’ve earned a mandate, sure they’re on the path to righteousness with the country firmly behind them, making their first actions that they want you to know will define who they are, and what they stand for, mind-numblingly small, petty and hurtful. And notably, all of them demeaning to women. Sorry, I mean, “the womenfolk.” These are all the sort of little, unnecessary things that, while trying to appeal to their base, will infuriate the rest of the country and start to shift attitudes against the GOP. Not a lot, but enough were 1-2 points because significant. And subtle enough that Republicans might not see it happening. And we haven’t even gotten to the Big Things that Republicans have said they’ll dive into – like impeachment of Joe Biden and Anthony Blinken, investigations of Merrick Garland and Dr. Anthon Fauci, hearings on the FBI and CIA – and crashing the world economy by not raising the debt ceiling. The stupid, mindless, petty little things are just the opening gambit. It’s not where you finish, it’s where you start. |
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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