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Me and Mo at the Halloween parade
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Thoughts on Weinstein and power
I think it was Kevin Williamson on his podcast that made the remark that while everyone in Hollywood claims to be scared of Trump, no one has a second thought about insulting him to his face and bring up any negative thing against, whether real or imagined. No one said anything about Harvey Weinstein for decades. Which would suggest that he is a larger power in his world than Trump is with the media.
It brings to mind a line from Sin City (distributed by Miramax, aka Weinstein) when the evil Senator Roark says this, thoughtfully put in a graphic.
His fall from grace is quite rapid too.
It also makes you wonder who else occupies these choke points, in the entertainment industry and others that are powerful enough to get away with horrible things with impunity.
Entertainment is probably different enough to make most comparisons useless. Personal relationships seem to be the coin of the realm, and the work product resists easy quantification, so rumors and allegations carry more weight there than in say, commercial welding. Weinstein was in a perfect position to use personal relationships, hence his power I suppose.
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Beach profile
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Russia’s bargaining position improves
Now that supporting North Korea has gotten too expensive for the Chinese (as judging by Russia taking over their internet connections), North Korea moves into the Russian orbit, and Putin now has several more bargaining chips he can use in his campaign to restore Eastern Europe to safe vassal states. It’s a bad time to be Ukranian (yet again).
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Well put from Williamson
We could do with a good deal less passion in our public life. The alt-right knuckleheads rallied behind Donald Trump not for reasons having to do with policy — they have no serious policy agenda at all — but because he gives voice to their passion, that passion being the desire to shock and annoy the politically correct busybodies and transnational economic elites by whom they feel condescended to.
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Recursive and foreshadowing
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The NFL and Trump
I’m amazed that my lack of interest in sports is now considered patriotic! One thing to remember is that in the age of revenue sharing you can’t watch/participate in anything sports related without supporting the NFL. Yay! Let us read more books.
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Quote of the day – podcast edition
From Kevin Williamson – one of my recent favorite pundits:
Congress can use a little less self-importance and a little more self-respect.
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Quote of the day – Joni Mitchell edition
Despite her prominence among the young musicians of the 1960s and 1970s, and her writing of “Woodstock” (where she was prevented from performing because her manager thought it was more advantageous to appear on The Dick Cavett Show[74]), she did not align herself with the era’s protest movements or its cultural manifestations. She has said that the parents of the boomers were unhappy, and “out of it came this liberated, spoiled, selfish generation into the costume ball of free love, free sex, free music, free, free, free, free we’re so free. And Woodstock was the culmination of it.” But “I was not a part of that,” she explained in an interview
Identities strike again I suppose. Making one’s costless opinions (on Climate Change, Trump, the Vietnam War in this case) of primary importance is perplexing, particularly when I do it. Granted people do talk a lot about parenting, work, etc (i.e stuff they actually do every day) the opinions are useful proxies for something I suppose.
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American in 2017, in one headline
also
crimes were committed by people who identified as Juggalos