DEMOCRATS IN DISARRAY: DNC Vice chair Tulsi Gabbard resigns, endorses Sanders. “Things have been fairly rocky on the DNC ranch through most of this election cycle. This was, in no small part, due to the continued erratic behavior of their chair, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz and her mystifying public statements and decisions on how best to win an election. Her endless efforts to stack the election in Hillary Clinton’s favor have not only raised the hackles of her opponents, but some on her own team. She’s got a few lieutenants who will toe the party line and repeat all the talking points – Donna Brazile is an excellent example – but there’s been trouble among the rank and file. One of her other committee vice-chairs, Hawaii Representative Tulsi Gabbard, had her invitation rescinded for one of the few debates originally scheduled because she dared to suggest that there should be few more. That relationship apparently hasn’t gotten any better since then.”
Archive for 2016
February 28, 2016
AT AMAZON, bestsellers in Cooking, Food & Wine.
BYRON YORK: What We Don’t Know About Super Tuesday.
MICKEY KAUS ON THE GOP’S TRUMP PROBLEM:
The GOP establishment has an almost-religious attachment to open immigration. It appears to be their only firm principle. It’s what led to Trump’s rise.
CHRIS ROCK SPARES NO ONE IN OPENING OSCARS MONOLOGUE, MOCKS ‘SORORITY’ RACISM OF WHITE HOLLYWOOD LIBERALS: “He later recalled what he once said to President Barack Obama while at an event filled with Hollywood writers: ‘You see all these writers and producers? They don’t hire black people. And they’re the nicest people on earth. White liberals!’ Rock said.”
The media should demand that Hillary and Bernie renounce and return such racially-tainted campaign contributions at once.
NEWS YOU CAN USE: Who is Stacey Dash and why did she just walk across the #Oscar stage?
DER SPIEGEL: Merkel’s Humane Refugee Policies Have Failed. In truth, they weren’t really humane; they were just about looking that way.
TWO BIDENS IN ONE!
● Biden: Denying climate change ‘almost like denying gravity.’
● Biden Jam! Oscars traffic chaos as Joe Biden is set to introduce Lady Gaga’s performance.
With only 10 months remaining for this carbon-destroying administration, it’s truly remarkable that it never discovered the value of telecommuting. An administration truly committed to climate change would have shouted its benefits to world, in much the same way that FDR went on television to calm the American people after the stock market crashed in 1929.
Exit question: how “handsy” will Biden get with Gaga?
SALENA ZITO: Awaiting The Earthquake In American Politics.
Many Americans feel the government is working against them. They see the Obama administration as rudderless on the international stage with Iran and Russia, as well as at home with our economy.
When people feel the gap between the nation’s richest and poorest is widening under this administration’s “recovery,” and that distressed areas are doing worse instead of better, their anger and resentment build. The result is more economic and political polarization and more people feeling left out — which is why you see so many voters looking to shake things up.
Take, for example, last week’s primary results here; most analysts were shocked that Trump won a majority of evangelical voters over Ted Cruz. They didn’t understand (some still don’t) that these are the same voters who supported Mike Huckabee in 2008 and Rick Santorum in 2012, and they’re tired of losing. These voters hear Trump shouting about strength and winning — and they run toward the light for the win, ignoring the consequences.
The sources of today’s pressures on Americans have existed for a long time, but the fault lines are finally shifting. Today’s political realignment is very much akin to the slow, grinding, opposing forces of abutting tectonic plates, but the earthquake has not yet hit. In fact, we haven’t even hit midstride of our populism.
I think that’s about right.
NEWS YOU CAN USE: How To Make Your Coffee Filter Fit Right.
THE OSCARS AREN’T RACIST – THEY’RE STUCK IN THE PAST, Patrick T. Brown posits at Acculturated:
Hollywood, as an industry, had its peak of creativity and influence during the middle of the last century and now sees its stature declining. Returning to mid-20th-century dramas and stories of institutional decline is a two-way mirror that studio executives can’t look away from. Looking back, they remember their glory days of being unchallenged tastemakers and cultural arbiters. At the same time, they see their declining influence foreshadowed in the lost luster of other former titans, such as newspapers, Wall Street titans, and can-do government agencies.
This fading hold on popular culture is seen in the endless iterations of movie franchises. The overwhelming glut of superhero sequels isn’t just indicative of a lack of imagination – it’s an admission that studios are rarely able to bring attendees to theaters without a “pre-sold” property. In the age of iPhones and Netflix, movie releases with Happy Meal tie-ins keep the lights on; and movies that trace the decline of once-powerful institutions are nominated for golden statuettes.
Meanwhile, its grievance-mongers are also holding on to a fading past, as Kevin D. Williamson recently noted:
The activists will never be satisfied, because being unsatisfied — being outraged — is their business. It’s a good business: Universal Studios’ “chief diversity officer” holds the rank of executive vice president. The money in the diversity racket is big: Google is spending $150 million to increase the diversity in its work force, in which whites are slightly underrepresented while Asians are dramatically overrepresented — again, if we’re using U.S. demographics for our point of comparison. And it is by no means clear that we should: Google, like Hollywood, is global.
There is a certain irony to our historical moment: At the very moment when a black American family has reached the apex of American social life — the presidency, and a cute movie about their first date! — African Americans are as a group experiencing a stressful disorientation: The racial dynamic in the United States was, for many years, effectively binary. Not any more. In an increasingly multiracial society whose most prestigious institutions are truly global, African Americans are no longer the moral yardstick by which the American commitment to our liberal founding ideals is measured. In 30 years, it very well may be the case that African Americans are no more of a significant interest group than Vietnamese Americans or Norwegian Americans, and the social and economic success of Nigerian American immigrant families, among others, complicates the meaning of “African American” as a concept, in that these communities are likely to maintain a certain distinctiveness that renders “black” devoid of clear meaning.
That is a big, attractive lever for the Al Sharptons of the world to let go of, which is why we’ll see more #BlackLivesMatter and #OscarsSoWhite rather than less, even as the question becomes less significant nationally.
In a classic example of a blue-on-blue faux-protest, Comcast spokesman and NBC anchor Al Sharpton will be holding a ‘Tune Out Presser’ ahead of tonight’s Oscars.
I’ll avoid the middleman and tune both out, particularly since Hollywood’s retrograde views on race won’t be the only hypocrisy on display tonight: Celebrities to Wear Gun Control Bracelets at Oscars While Surrounded by Massive Increase in Armed Security.
JUST THINK OF THEM AS DEMOCRAT OPERATIVES WITH BYLINES, AND YOU WON’T GO FAR WRONG: Vice-Chair Tulsi Gabbard Resigns From DNC; AP Buries the News in a Timeline. “Hawaii Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard resigned her position as Vice Chair at the DNC and immediately endorsed Bernie Sanders for President… Perhaps AP is awaiting word from either Team Clinton or the White House as to what they’re going to be allowed to report.”
HOW RONALD REAGAN RESPONDED TO BEING ENDORSED BY THE KKK IS A LESSON FOR ALL REPUBLICANS.
On the other hand, perhaps having been a left-leaning guy all his life, Trump is still having a difficult time casting away all things “Progressive.”
YOU CAN’T TRUST THE GOVERNMENT WITH YOUR DATA: IRS Says 114,000, 334,000, 724,000 Taxpayer Accounts Were Hacked.
DRUDGE: Jeff Sessions to endorse Trump.
So can we call the GOP establishment preference cascade yet?
AS AMERICA INCREASINGLY RESEMBLES THE HUNGER GAMES: A Taxing Oscars: $232,000 Swag Bags (40% Increase Over Last Year’s).
It’s clearly time that we repeal the Hollywood Tax Cuts!
AT AMAZON, take 30% off Contemporary Jewelry.
IS TRUMP TRYING TO AVOID OFFENDING WHITE SUPREMACISTS? Trump disavows David Duke’s endorsement on Friday; doesn’t know who he is on Saturday.
NO, THAT’S NOT A MUSSOLINI QUOTE TRUMP RETWEETED. It’s from 1918.
UPDATE: From the comments: “Wonder how many who made this accusation thought that Evelyn Waugh was a girl?” Well, it’s Gawker, so probably all of them.
NEWS YOU CAN USE: Why Cranes Keep Falling.
SO MY OLD KEURIG FINALLY CRAPPED OUT, despite careful descaling and care. But it was nearly 5 years old and has seen heavy use. So I picked up a Keurig 250 and I like it pretty well. Upside: It has a “stronger” setting, and a separate cocoa setting that (I think) pumps some air in as it brews. Downside: The water reservoir is smaller than my old one. If I had it to do over again, I think I’d get the larger K350. It’s also cheaper, though.
THE 21ST CENTURY’S IDEA OF PROGRESS IS ONCE AGAIN LEAVING ME UNIMPRESSED: Men Can Now Experience Period Cramps From This Menstrual Simulator.