​For the past half-year or so, a friend and I have pondered when Trump would finally give "that" speech.  A meltdown on camera so out-of-control that it would be hard to ignore as opening the door to serious discussion about his early dementia, so pronounced that it couldn't be dismissed as just a "gaffe".  Something like the A Face in the Crowd moment.

That's the climactic scene when the main character, a former prison bum who's become an out-of-control, political powerful, homespun Bible-hugging TV star,  doesn't realize that a microphone has been intentionally left on at the end of a live broadcast as he reveals his true self, going on a megalomaniacal rant about his disdain for the public, most notably his adoring fans, destroying his political support.

Presciently written by Budd Schulberg.  Eerily so.
​
On Friday night, Trump gave a speech at a Turning Point Action event in West Palm Beach, Florida, that -- though it wasn't "that" speech -- opened the door to get there.
 
No, it wasn’t a hidden video, and no, it won't destroy his support, but it was live on national TV, said the quiet parts out loud, and exploded all over social media and newspapers, and was covered yesterday on the Sunday morning talk shows.  The only shame is that when he made the speech the weekday TV shows wouldn't be on for three days.  But I suspect that it will still be covered today, still news, even with that much time passing.  Not only because of how delusional it was, the lunacy of a sociopath out of control, unable to stop himself, distraught and breaking down begging, but perhaps more because of what it says foundationally about Trump right now.

The problem for MAGOP campaign officials, beyond having to run with a candidate who not only says but believes this sort of thing, is that they really don't have an answer for it.  When asked on Sunday morning about Trump's comments, the best that Trump surrogate John Sununu could offer was that it was just "Trump being Trump."  Fortunately for Sununu, ABC host Martha Raddatz didn't follow-up on that and just moved on.  Unfortunately for Sununu, "Trump being Trump" means a white supremacist, fascist, anti-Semitic, pathological lying sociopath with early dementia.  And enough people know that, which is why his favorability rating is only 36%.

This may not have been Trump's A Face in the Crowd moment.  But he's standing in the pathway, and you can see him profusely sweating.  Screaming into the night.

We spend most of the day watching the Olympics, so you don’t have to.
 
Rowing events began yesterday, and I heard a great comment by the analyst.  She said that while there are superstars in individual rowing, “There are no superstars in team rowing.  In team rowing, you do exactly what the person in front of you is doing.  If you stand out, you’ll screw up the team.”  Rowing is an event I like, in notable part for the pastoral serenity of it.  The one problem is that it doesn’t translate especially well to television.  There’s no perspective on where the boats are in the race in relation to the finish, and depending on the angle of the camera, it can give a false sense of where each team is.  However, this year NBC got smart and did a couple of things that helped a great deal.  First, they added a box on the screen that show how far behind the leader each boat was, and second,  they added a “Distance to go” box that changed every second.  Those two additions were wonderful.  The only strange thing they don’t do, though, which is inexplicable, is that they don’t put both box on the screen for the full race.  They tend to kick in the second half of the race, which is okay, but still a poor decision, and the boat-order box only pops up occasionally, which is less okay.  I don’t see any significant reason to not have them on-screen the entire race, but at least especially for the second half.

I also enjoyed watching the women’s mountain bike competition.  It is so rugged what they do, the terrain they go through is pummeling – up steep grades, through forestland, across rock beds, downhill around sharp curves.  Why everyone doesn’t crash or at least blow out a tire is beyon me.  It’s seven laps of about 2-1/2 miles each.  The leader, Pauline Ferand-Prevot from France was so far in front that after a while, there was no competition for the Gold.  However, the American rider, Haley Batton, came from behind to make it to third place and a chance for the first-ever U.S. medal– but then the rider in second place, her friend Jenny Rissveds of Sweden did blow out a tire and lost enough time for Hetton to catch up, and the two were neck-and-neck for the Silver, with one lap to go.  At the time, though, I couldn't tell you the result, but that’s because of a stupid error on my part --
 
The race had been on during the middle of the night, and I recorded it.  But I didn’t do what I know to always do when recording a live sports event – and I didn’t add extra time.  So…the recording ended with the two riders almost wheel-to-wheel on the final lap!  That cry of angst you may have heard was mine.  Happily, the Peacock streaming service has massive Olympic coverage, including replays.  And I have an account – but they hadn't put up the race’s replay yet.  It kept showing “Replay available soon.”  So, I had to wait.  And wait.  Yes, I know I could have just checked online, but I wanted to watch the exciting conclusion to find out.  And happily, Haley Batten did pull away, and won the Silver medal by a whopping five seconds!
 
I watched a little of the surfing, which is being done on the French island of Tahiti, about 10,000 miles away.  SNL’s Colin Jost is the host there (apparently he surfs, and told an amusing story – amusing after-the-fact – about surfing once with Jimmy Buffet who had to save his life, cutting his cord after it got caught on some rocks), and does a solid, and not surprisingly amusing, sardonic job.  He’s not the play-by-play guy or analyst – that was two others who were dismal.  One was straightforward descriptive for a sport that cries out for “What is going on??!!), while the analyst reached the level of annoying.  It wasn’t that I had no idea who won – I had no idea who was competing.  What I did get was things like, “He already has two exits from the tunnel” and “He grabs for the rail.”  The only think missing was ending with “…dude.”  What I did after a while was watch, but turn off the sound, because the views were other-worldly spectacular, not just the scenery but watching them surf massive 20-foot waves.
 
In women’s team archery Mexico won its first-ever team Gold in the sport – but what made it particularly interesting was that they did so by shooting bullseyes in a row on its final four shots.

The U.S. women's soccer team won a big match against Germany, 4-1, and once again  -- with my Cubs' hat on -- Mallory Swanson (wife of the Cubs shortstop Dansby Swanson) scored another goal, giving her three for the Olympics.
 
And the Team USA men's basketball team had a big win over what was thought to be a tough opponent in Serbia, in fact falling behind 10-2 at the start, but the pulled away to roll 110-84.

​Let the Games continue...

If you didn't see "Last Week Tonight" with John Oliver last Sunday (sorry, the week got away from me, and there was a lot of news -- and the Olympics -- after this was made available online Thursday), his Main Story was a twofer:  both the Republican National Convention and Migrant Crime.  For the former, it must be mentioned that the show was recorded the night before President Biden dropped out of the race.  As for the latter, Oliver looks at where the idea of "Migrant Crime" came from and the reality, which not surprisingly is extremely different from most people (especially MAGOPs) think.  The overall report is very funny, very interesting and very funny.  And yes, I know that already said that.  But he deals with the RNC, so what do you expect?

We spend most of the day watching the Olympics, so you don’t have to.
 
NBC ran a wonderful and moving featurette on the USA Network about Ukrainian athletes at the Olympics.  I hope they run it again in primetime.  What passage (of many) that stood out was a young man explaining why he and other athletes came back to Ukraine to train.  It was because if they didn’t, then others would see that and think “Why should I stay?”, but if they did, then the others would see it and think, “Well, if they came back here and stayed, I should, too.”
 
In soccer, the USA men’s team had a pretty easy 4-1 win against New Zealand.
 
And speaking of soccer, there was an update on that odd story I wrote about where two people associated with the Canadian women’s soccer oddly used a drone to spy on New Zealand’s low-ranked team.  (Cool, a double New Zealand soccer reference today!)  Well, this morning, Olympic officials penalized Canada’s team with three “negative points,” making it possible, but extremely difficult to advance out of their group.  Given that the women’s team is ranked eighth in the world, this is a big blow to them.  They do have the opportunity to appeal the decision.
 
Now, if only the IOC put as much attention to the positive drug tests of the Chinese swimmers (which China says was just bad samples…) as they do about a drone spying on a practice, they might be on to something resembling credibility…
 
A lot of water sports in the morning.  Swimming, water polo and whitewater canoe/kayak.  I love whitewater (more on that in a moment), though the other two aren’t among my favorites. 
 
Yes, I know swimming is hugely popular, and I do like it.  Just not as much as some other top (and minor) events.  The two issues for me are first, that the athletes are largely underwater and out of sight, and second, the TV coverage is not great.  Unless they superimpose a flag graphic, I find it a little difficult knowing what swimmer is who in which lane.  (I have other issues with the coverage, especially long-distance races, but we’ll leave it at that.)  But I do like it – and like the relays the most, in part because, unlike track, there’s no risk and tension of passing a baton.  While a baton pass is certainly exciting, and I understand the critical importance,, my preference is to focus on the race, who’s the fastest, not “Who practiced handing off a stick the best?”  As for individual swimmers, I do like Katie Ledecky.  Not just for her greatness as a swimmer, but also her grace, joy and enthusiasm being interviewed, even after 12 years on the scene.
 
Happily, two of the preliminary events this morning were the women’s 4x100 freestyle relay – both the USA and Australia won their heats easily, and the women’s 400m freestyle prelim which Katie Ledecky won.  However, she only got the bronze in the final, finishing behind her top rival Ariarne Titmus of Australia.  It should be noted, though, that Ledecky’s best events are the 800 and 1500 meter races, for which he holds something like the top 16 times in each.
 
My hurdle with water polo is that I find it difficult to watch.  Not only are the athletes largely underwater, as well, and most that you see of them is their head, but as a team sport, everyone on a team is wearing the same swim cap, almost-completely covering their heads, so they all look pretty much the same.  Anyway, Team USA handily beat Greece.
 
But the whitewater events are water sports I dearly love.  In part for them being so odd and so different from most other Olympics sports, including that slalom courses are different from one another, venue to venue – but also, on a purely personal level, the slalom races in particular (more than the sprints) remind me of a canoe camping trip I took long ago in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area National Wilderness (within Superior National Forest, which is why it’s a National Wilderness, and not a National Park).  These were the early heats for the slalom, which were great fun.  If you’ve never seen whitewater slalom, here’s video of a kayak run (not from the Olympics, but this year’s World Cup), with Jessica Fox of Australia, one of the world’s best.
 
(By the way, the difference between a canoe and kayak is that you kneel in a canoe and use a paddle that has a blade on only one end.  Kayakers sit and have a double-bladed paddle.)

For his regular one-day Monday hosting of The Daily Show, Jon Stewart didn't get a chance to talk about President Biden leaving the race, and Kamala Harris leaping to the forefront of the Democratic Party.  That's because The Daily Show was off that week.

However, Stewart also hosts his The Weekly Show video podcast one day a week, and not shockingly, that was the topic of the show.  And all the better, he had the wonderful historian Doris Kearns Goodwin as his guest.  No, this isn't as funny as what Stewart would have done on The Daily Show -- on the other hand, it's with Doris Kearns Goodwin and almost an hour of the two together!

 
We spend most of the day watching the Olympics, so you don’t have to.
 
Before we get to the Opening Ceremonies – yes, I know they’re on tonight, but that’s a replay, they were broadcast live this morning and early afternoon on NBC -- the preliminary rounds of certain sports continued overnight (well…overnight in the U.S).  Not necessarily the major sports, but most at least aren’t especially obscure.  So, as the expression goes, attention must be paid.
 
The USA men’s rugby team played Uruguay.  I’ve never quite figured out the rules, including its strange, undefended drop-kick extra point, which seems to take place from the point where your team crossed the end line.  It’s a bit of an odd sport that clearly was a foundation for football.  But it’s hard to watch a game and not think of the episode of Friends when Ross was trying to impress his girlfriend Emily, and got worked up enough to become “Red Ross” as he rushed in to play…and got pummeled.  In the game last night, the score was somewhat tight, until Perry Baker broke free, raced down the field and put the game away for the USA, winning 33-17.
 
The Team USA women’s soccer team beat Zambia 3-0.  But what stood out for me was that the final two goals were not only scored by Mallory Swanson…but about 30 seconds apart.  It was an emotional moment for her, since her career had been pummeled by injuries, surgeries and infections that, among other things, has kept her out of returning to the Olympics since she was a teenager eight years ago -- and scored a goal.  But notable for me is that her husband is the shortstop of the Chicago Cubs, Dansby Swanson!  And it’s clear that one of the reasons he signed a contract with the team last year was because Mallory plays for the Chicago team, the Fire.
 
There was an exciting women’s soccer game between host country France and Colombia.  The score was 3-2 when the game went into extra “stoppage time” for a whopping 10 minutes.  The home crowd was going crazy, with Colombia aggressively pushing to get the one goal they needed to tie.  But with the French crowd screaming them on, France held on to win.
 
There also was a women’s handball match between host France and Hungary.  While I like to watch most games, team handball is not one of my favorites, and even I have a limit how much I’ll watch of everything.  To be clear, team handball has absolutely nothing to do with the handball most people think of, smacking the ball ricocheting off the walls.  Rather, it is more like soccer, but with players running around and throwing the ball to one another.  I just find it a bit boring to keep watching after a while.
 
And in interesting news, 2-1/2 years after having been cheated out of the Gold Medal at the 2020 Winter Olympics, the U.S. figure skating team, that had been giving the Silver Medal, will be presented with the Gold in a ceremony at the Paris Games.  The Russian team had gotten the Gold, but one of its stars later tested positive for illegal drugs, and they were disqualified.  That moved the U.S. team up to first place.
 
And that brings us to the Opening Ceremonies which were broadcast live earlier today, and as I said they will be re-aired this evening.  A few random thoughts about them –
 
The ceremonies are a truly impressive artistic achievement, taking place across all of Paris outdoors and mostly on the Seine (including having to take place in an ongoing light rain).  There is more usage of film edited in throughout than I prefer, but the footage is well-done and interesting.  The whole production is a bit frou-frou pretentious at times – including an overly-reverential, helmeted, phantom-like character weaving his way throughout, that has a nice, off-beat texture to it, though gets a bit annoying after a while -- but hey, that’s the French.  Also odd is the very first musical performer is Lady Gaga – one would think they’d have found a French artist to kick things off.  Overall, it’s an incredibly ambitious undertaking, successful, and very beautiful. 

I don't get many chances to make a pun in French, but this was a near-perfect example of Mise en Seine.​

(The event does end back in the Trocadéro Stadium for the official parts of the opening.  It’s a much smaller facility than the main Olympic stadium, the Stade de France, but it’s filled only with the athletes and officials)
 
Beautiful and impressive as it is, I was bothered by a significant part of it as a sports fan.  One of the joys of the Opening Ceremonies is that as teams march in and are spread out across the stadium track, the camera and TV announcers are able to single out athletes from around the world, and tell interesting stories about them, which is one of the important parts of the Games – not just the competition, but the humanity of the world coming together.  But with athletes all crammed together on their team boats, that wasn’t possible, and the “up close and personal” stories were borderline non-existent.
 
From the TV perspective, I thought the NBC announcing was lousy.  Mike Tirico is an excellent anchor host – but with no stories to tell about the athletes, he was limited in what he could say.  He filled in okay, but he’s so much better than okay.  He had two co-hosts.  Kelly Clarkson is a charming person who, here, was out of her depth, and the bulk of her commentary was “Oooh, that is incredible.  Incredible.  Wow.  Amazing.  That is incredible.  I love the rain.”  Fun Fact:  We can see it’s incredible.  But she was eloquent compared to (for some reason) Peyton Manning.  He’s a witty conversationalist, but as a former football player – not an Olympic sport – he had pretty much nothing to add.  He also has no connection to NBC – he’s on ESPN, owned by ABC – so I’m not sure why he was there.  Nor why Snoop Dog was either, especially since he doesn’t add much.  I assume that maybe, for some reason, he’ll do little features throughout the Games.
 
Throughout there were cuts to a fashion show going on in Paris.  I don’t want to even try to describe it.  So, I’ll just say it’s very weird and what most people think of the French when they have a nightmare.
 
There was one small sequence I especially loved.  It has to do with setting off flames and fireworks across what I believe they said was the Concorde Bridge, leading what was perhaps a museum or maybe an official building. 
 
And there was a long cartoon with the Minions.  Yes, you read that right.  I’m not quite sure what they have to do with France, though apparently Pixar has offices in the country, which is a bit of a stretch.  It was an absolutely silly thing to have during the Opening Ceremonies – and hilarious.
 
Ending at the Trocadéro Stadium, the Eiffel Tower nearby is decked out for a pretty nice light show.  Also, since the Trocadéro is just a smaller arena without a cauldron, there is a nice twist as an international boat ride of well-known Olympians is needed to take the Olympic Flame and head down the Seine for the lighting ceremony at what was still an undisclosed location.
 
But that’s not the end, because the organizers came up with a clever and moving way to continue the carrying of the Flame.  As for how the lighting is handled, I’ll leave that undescribed for those who plan to watch later, though I’ll note that, as part of it all, Mike Tirico is correct when he says it’s the most unique cauldron you’ll have seen.  And then that is continued with what I’ll only say is a beautiful and emotional surprise performance of the Edith Piaf song “Chanson d’Amour” – that co-host Kelly Clarkson was left literally in tears.
 
Let the Games begin, although they already did a couple days ago…