February 18, 2023

As a dauntless opinion writer I was tempted to join Truth Social

By Hal Brown

Above: Truth Social is America's "Big Tent" social media platform that encourages an open, free, and honest global conversation without discriminating on the basis of political ideology.

Caricature by DonkeyHotey

Currently I depend on various websites to report on what Trump posts on his Truth Social platform. For example Raw Story has a story about a particularly unhinged and wack-a-toon post:

Trump obviously hoped to make money from Truth Social.

He also no doubt wanted bragging rights about how many millions of followers he had there compared to when he was on Twitter.

The failure to achieve these goals have turned out to be irrelevant because Trump now has his own megaphone. He totally controls it. While not everything he posts there is widely shared in the media he can throw random shit at the wall and see what sticks in the media.

Trump isn't on Twitter. Elon Musk, no doubt wanting him to start tweeting again to boost Twitter's statistics, reinstated him. His most recent tweet is from January 8, 2021 when he was supposedly permanently banned.

I doubt Trump would go back to making Twitter tweets because he has an agreement with Truth Social to post there six hours before he posts anywhere else. Not only that, but he would have to admit that Truth Social failed and Elon Musk had more business acumen than he did.

Just as all major media outlets have staff assigned to watching Fox News and keeping up with other right-wing media, and finding tweets to add to articles which are relevant to the subject being covered, they have staff assigned to monitoring Truth Social. It's nice work if you can get it, and can stand watching Tucker Carlson if you're assigned to Fox News, since you can do it from home.

I could get on Truth Social for free. I could watch Fox News. I could check out all the online right-wing websites. I probably would come up with ideas for what I hope would be an original and perhaps particularly snarky take on something for this blog.

This would mean devoting a lot of time suffering through watching and reading, to put it bluntly, a lot of crap. I am retired and nobody has decided offer to pay me to do this, plus if they did it would have to be lot of money for me to even agree to devote a few hours a day to doing this.

If I joined the platform, aside from writing about Trump's Truth Social posts, I might wile away some time screwing around with Trump by replying to his posts with over-the-top fawning replies dripping with thinly veiling sarcasm aimed at stroking his ego. I wouldn't be critical of him, what's the fun in that? He'd probably never see my posts. All that would accomplish is trying to see if I could get kicked off the platform and that would only get me a subject for one blog.

The fun of flippant fawning would be to try to get Trump to "re-Truth" (his version of a re-tweet) a reply he thinks is complementary to something he posts when in fact it comes from someone who thinks he might be gullible enough to believe I am a member of his cult.

Therefore, here's my decision:

Sorry, MSNBC, Raw Story, HUFFPOST, Daily Beast, et. al, I'm not going to accept bundles of cash to be one of your work-from-home right-wing media monitors. Besides, I figure most of you are using interns to do this.

Tempted as I am, I won't join Truth Social, and "truth" be told, part of the reason is that I am a little afraid I might enjoy posting there so much I'd become addicted to this useless endeavor.

Addendum:

Remember this guy?

Truth Social is run by Trump Media & Technology Group, and headed by Devin Nunes. In 2022, Talking Points Memo stated Nunes' remuneration was $750,000 per year.

From Newsweek:

Devin Nunes' Cow Celebrates Congressman's Resignation

You can read a lot more about Truth Social on Wikipedia here.

I'm (almost) 80. I want to die knowing America is safely a democracy.

By Hal Brown

Click above to enlarge

Reading the following got me to thinking about being a year shy of my eightieth birthday and not living to find out if America as been plunged into a fascist dystopia.

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough doesn't think Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis will run for president in 2024, and he doesn't think he should.
The Republican governor has generated some excitement among donors and has polled strongly against the former president, who has already entered the race, but the "Morning Joe" host cautioned DeSantis against launching a challenge.
"Why in the world would it make sense for Ron DeSantis to run in 2024 if Donald Trump is running?" Scarborough said. "Here you have a guy who is raising hundreds of millions of dollars. He's got the stage in his state that he completely dominates. He won by a landslide in 2022 because the Democrats didn't challenge him. He now has a run of the entire state top to bottom. He could serve his second term, keep holding his press conferences, keep raising money, keep upping his game, let Donald Trump run in '24 and lose yet again, and then Joe Biden leaves and the '28 election -- I'm just speculating if people are advising him." (Raw Story)

I think that the current most likely GOP candidate, Trump, is the most beatable if he runs against President Biden. Despite his cult following he is becoming more and more deranged and his unhinged behavior is turning off moderate Republicans and Independents. Put another way, the nomination is his to lose and he is well on his way to losing it.

I also don't think DeSantis, who is the second most probable GOP candidate as things stand now, would prevail over Biden. Trump had the star power but DeSantis is as bland as unseasoned tofu. Flo from the Progressive Insurance TV commercials has exponentially more charisma than DeSantis.

This doesn't mean that he couldn't hone his act to appeal to a national audience if he doesn't run for president now and, as Joe Scarborough suggested, run next time.

My biggest fear is that Joe Biden won't be able to run again. The Democrats obviously don't have a viable backup candidate. The likely choice would be Kamala Harris. While she was the obvious choice to represent the United States at the Munich Conference I hate to say that the interview she gave with Andrea Mitchell, one, wouldn't reach a huge audience, and two more significantly while she demonstrated the chops to be president she wasn't, dare I say, on fire in her delivery.

Since I am currently physically and mentally healthy I expect that I have a good chance of living with my cognitive faculties intact for a few more years.

I will most likely to be around blogging like a wordaholic and closely following the news right up to the election. I will find out who wins the next election for president and whether the Democrats maintain control of the Senate and regain control of the House.

If the next president is a Republican, any Republican, I know I will be scared shitless about the future of our democracy.

If, at the least, Biden or another Democrats wins I will be able to breathe a gargantuan sigh of relief even if it is a close election, which is likely.

February 16, 2023

Salon's Brian Karem's best line: "...extreme members of Congress, with their cocaine eyes and speed-freak jive..."

By Hal Brown

Photo is from "Cocaine Eyes: How Cocaine Effects Your Eyes" on Addiction Resource.

I am always on the lookout for writers I'd call snarky wordsmiths. They not only have a lot of original thoughts to express but they convey them in compelling, often snarky and clever ways. They often come up with an original turn of phrase which really grabs me as describing an individual or group in a way I'd say was deliciously nasty.

I think Salon has some of the best wordsmiths of this ilk. Heather "Digby" Parton and Amanda Marcotte are two of my favorites. (You can see their columns at the links.) I also particularly like Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank.

I am not meaning to suggest that there aren't superb writers posting online descriptions of people like, for example, Frank Bruni's of Ron DeSantis in The NY Times:

It brings me no joy to make those observations. It gives me the willies. I’m rooting hard against DeSantis, a flamboyantly divisive and transcendently smug operator with the chilling grandiosity to cast his political ascent as God’s will and a rapacity for power that’s one of the best arguments against giving it to him.

I am referring to the particularly powerful but also sarcastic, sardonic, and satirical ones.

Brian Karem (all columns) is another wordsmith like this who I admire.

Here he is on Twitter:

He is also on Mastodon where I follow him:

He has some really good descriptions in his essay today:

We went nuts over a balloon! Thank you for saving us, Rihanna

If I had to select one description from his essay which I thought was his best it is this:

... extreme members of Congress, with their cocaine eyes and speed-freak jive...

This struck me as a great way to describe the GOP zealots in Congress even though I wasn't sure whether cocaine eyes were those with tiny or enlarged pupils. I looked up the term (here):

The photo in the lower right is of a cocaine eye.

I assumed that I knew what "speed-freak jive" was, but I figured I'd look it up since I was writing this blog. I discovered it really was a "thing" in pop culture and more than just someone speaking very rapidly and incoherently.

Click above to enlarge. This is a web search on DuckDuckGo.

It is in the lyrics to The Rolling Stones' song Can't You Hear Me Knocking:

Yeah, you got satin shoes
Yeah, you got plastic boots
Y'all got cocaine eyes
Yeah, you got speed-freak jive, now

Note that both cocaine eyes and speed-freak jive used together comes from this song. Brian will have to respond to me on Twitter or Mastadon to confirm this is where he got the idea to use it in his essay.

Musician Howling Waters has a song with that title. You can watch the video here.

Other parts of the Karem essay I particularly liked in addition to the main message which is conveyed in the subtitle about the balloon hysteria that:

It ought to be a "teachable moment": This country is deeply unhinged.

It is possible to be sidetracked by the clever jabs. What he is saying is very important.

Follows are some excerpts that grabbed me:

Millions of people jumped to conclusions, declared themselves experts in downing high-altitude balloons or were too quick to blame Joe Biden for an overblown crisis that would've made a great plot point in "Seinfeld." It was like accidentally tossing a Junior Mint into an open incision during an operation. (Of course people not familiar with that episode wouldn't appreciate this.)

and...

Speaking of Ron DeSantis, that's why many people speculate he will upend Donald Trump and claim the GOP nomination in 2024. In other words, some are betting Ron DeSantis is the flatulence that is actually a bowel movement. He keeps smelling bad and won't go away, rather like Trump, but he's a fresher squeeze of the cheeks.

I like his describing Nikki Haley this way:

Nikki Haley has now tossed her political Medusa tentacles...

He also wrote about her:

She has a better chance of shooting down a high-altitude balloon with a Daisy Red Ryder BB gun...

I'd add to that reference that it is probably an homage to the line in the classic movie "A Christmas Story" when Ralphie says he was this BB gun for Christmas and is told he'll shoot his eye out with it if he has one.

Just for fun: Stephen Colbert on Trump's new name for DeSantis: Meatball Ron, plus Billy Joel video

By Hal Brown

Above: caricatures by DonkeyHotey, illustration by author, click image to enlarge.

I think that the Meatball Ron story was first reported in The New York Times on Feb. 12th.

Link above, subscription

Excerpt:

Since November, despite the criticism he faced at the time, Mr. Trump has periodically hit out at his potential rival, albeit to a relatively small audience. He posted his most recent innuendo about the governor on Truth Social, where he has just under five million followers. And he has insulted Mr. DeSantis in casual conversations, describing him as “Meatball Ron,” an apparent dig at his appearance, or “Shutdown Ron,” a reference to restrictions the governor put in place at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.

The media jumped all over this story so Trump got lots of free publicity (see news search for Meatball Ron)

Click above to enlarge image

This was covered by Fox News here:

Click above to read

Although I read that Trump was going to try out his new nickname for Ron DeSantis, Meatball Ron, I hadn't seen the Stephen Colbert segment about this where he sang the Billy Joel 1983 classic, Uptown Girl, with new lyrics. This was referenced with a link to the music video of the song in this article in Raw Story.

Click above to read article

I watched his 10 minute segment here, and then watched the Billy Joel version (scroll down). Colbert was very funny especially in his skewering of Nikki Haley. His singing his Meatball Ron lyrics to the tune of Uptown Girl was inspired.