Wednesday, February 12, 2020

Wednesday, February 12, 2020

 A little insight on how all this goes down if you'll indulge.



 I try to get this done every evening by no later than 8 p.m. Much like the 500-word count, it's an arbitrary rule more than anything else. Since no one's paying me, I'll do as I like, of course. That being said, I think having these little rules not only makes it more "professional" but also keeps me on point. It wouldn't do to get lazy.

 Of course, the downside of this is, of course, sometimes I miss things. With the way information speeds through the internet these days, it's easy to have world-shattering news to burn through the ether and become yesterday's wine by the time I get around to pounding out the next day's gibberish.

 Anyhow, in amongst of yesterday's nonsense on the whole Roger Stone business, I had to let a couple things go. Along with whatever I put here, I went on about the "Boiling Frog Moment" we find ourselves, in re: the 2020 election and how it will affect things from here on. It didn't come to me until I was in the editing process and wasn't inclined to rewrite the already overwrought polemic that just lacked pushing the "publish" button. So I put it on the Tumblr site. Check it out.

 What I didn't get into last night, of course, was the New Hampshire primary. The second in the nation's nomination process, it really shouldn't have shaken as many trees as it has. However, since Everyone On Twitter Is A Genius and, to be quite honest, we have way more political pundits than a healthy society really needs, everyone is flipping out for some dumbass reason. This is the rest of the year.

 New Hampshire is a fairly middle-of-the-road conservative state. I remember a friend of mine telling me he'd planned on moving there because of the relatively lax gun laws. This was 20 years ago. So, it's that kind of state. Plus, lots and lots of white people and little else. Not judging, that's just how it is.

 So, Bernie Sanders walked away with a fairly solid first place followed by Pete Buttigieg and so-far dark horse candidate Amy Klobuchar. In a less-than-expected showing, Elizabeth Warren came in fourth and Joe Biden got stomped down to fifth. Beyond that, who gives a damn.

 That being said, a fairly interesting night overall and Sanders got a little push he very much needed. It also seems to have scared the living hell out of "Never Trumper" conservative - i.e., still slimeballs - like Max Boot and Tom Nichols as well as billionaire dirtbags like Lloyd Blankfield, who as head of Goldman Sachs was in a great manner responsible for the 2008 banking crash and should keep his word hole shut about anything. This is a good thing. Frankly, if the smallish tax increase he and Warren are promising are given these shit-asses this much of the vapors, the more inclined I am for them.

 I may have pointed this out before, but I'm not particular hard for any of the presidential candidates. Part of it's my nature to not have much respect for authority and part of it is the old journalistic saw that the only way a politician should be looked at is down. Just pure politics, I'd consider both Sanders and Warren to my right and while I really can't sign onto Sanders' fanboys never-ending, protean conspiracy theories, one hopes this unclenches the buttholes of the big-time press over him.

 The next state that comes up is a caucus in Nevada. Speaking of caucuses, Iowa has agreed to recanvass the election spurned on by requests from Sanders and Buttigieg. We all know how badly it screwed up the first time around and one of the bigger issues is the thin split of first, which washes out to 14 delegates to 12 depending on who comes in first. This mess also lead to the head of the Iowa Democratic party falling on his sword over the mess, which is probably for the best. Poor ol' Troy Price, this is his 15 minutes.

 However the recanvassing washes out, Iowa and New Hampshire really don't have that much impact nor do they give any solid foundation with which to divine the electoral future. Biden, for example, is putting his money on South Carolina and having perhaps a leg up with the African American vote. We shall see. Frankly, beloved, anyone who tells you anyone is electable or unelectable or that they have a solid line on how the rest of the nomination will play out, or indeed, that voting for one candidate will bring the downfall of Western Civilization, hold your wallet.

 Maybe the most interesting aspect of last night's primary wasn't so much who won what but who got cut. Andrew Yang, Michael Bennett and Deval Patrick all announced today that they were suspending their campaigns. Now, let's all be real here, all right? No one had any idea Bennett was still in the race if, indeed, they ever knew who he was. As for Patrick, I'll be honest, I thought he was holding off starting his run until closer to Super Tuesday, existing in that nebulous realm with fellow billionaire Mike Bloomberg but without all the money spent on ads.

 I will admit to being a bit shocked that Yang threw in the towel, though. Again, being really real, I never thought he'd come within sniffing distance of the nomination and even had he won, Washington D.C. would've chewed him up into little U.S. Grant-sized bits. From what I gathered about his whole Universal Basic Income push, his plan had holes in it and would've probably been more like putting sneakers on a rooster than Medicare for all. I do think it's a damn fine idea, though. That's money in circulation and being actually used rather than sitting in some fat cat's offshore account.

 That being said, he had become the darling of the internet crowd, particularly those ex-Ron Paul humanoids for whom Sanders was just a bit too much, as well as celebrities like Dave Chappelle and Danny Glover, of all people. One assumes the bulk of his supporters will go to Sanders if, that is, they don't decide to throw in with Trump again. For his part, Yang isn't endorsing anyone apart from the eventual nominee, and one hopes the Yang Gang does keep that in mind.

 The last little bit of news we'll get to before calling it a night concerns a new wrinkle in the ongoing true-crime saga of Billy "The Pope" Barr and his attempts to put the muscle on the aforementioned "Fancy" Roger Stone business. Coming off such furrowed brows and light coughs from GOP congress critters over the four prosecutors resigning because Trump threw one of his little Twitter fits, Barr has agreed to meet before the House Judiciary Committee, putting close to that chapter of the year-long story. He initially came on board in the wake of the Robert Mueller business. In short, Mueller released his report and Barr spread enough whim-wham enough that the average Trump sycophant can claim the Blind Idiot God was exonerated.

 Some, including ol' sour puss Oliver Willis sees this as a mistake on the Democrats' part, as Barr isn't know for, you know, doing things in a non-thuggish way. He very well could be right, as we're seeing The Don brag about his boy leaning on the judge to help his other boy and no one with any power is so much even blinking. But that is the new normal unless we decided to change it.

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