Kamala Harris and the testicle deficit

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A slightly adapted/compacted version of this Brit’s Substack commentary.

July  24

In our heart of hearts we all know what will decide this election. It won’t be debates or speeches or experience or fitness to serve. Saving external catastrophe it’ll be whether a critical part of the US electorate can really imagine — even almost a quarter of the way into the 21st century — a woman being president. If they manage that hurdle, Harris ought to win. But if they can’t and find enough excuses for not liking her, then she may well lose.

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Death of a Salesman

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File under #Grabembythebigotry. [Copyright to John Haas.]

So, Donald “George Wallace” Trump enlightened us all on his racial views yesterday before a group of black journalists.

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Murder Tucker!

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Pierre—a rando from comedy show Kill Tony’s lot of amateur comedians—opens his set with “I’ve been working out lately, and I realized I could rape everybody here… if I wanted too.'” An outlier/success in ep. 669’s series of audience call ups, Pierre spins racial stereotypes/myths about black people, taking cues from the show’s host Tony Hinchcliffe—who’ll run with jokes about his homosexual life (clever ones, not hateful slurs). Before Pierre’s entrance, it’s hard to watch as Tony pressures one guest, after a lame set—enough humiliation already!—to detail his violent criminal conviction. Ali Siddiq‘s feature and follow-up in another episode—head in hands as Tony does in a newbie whose stand-up is impaired by a speech impediment—embodies every (sane) KT viewer’s dilemma: should I really be watching, participating in this? Comedian Bill Burr amps up such doubts by explicitly refusing the show’s premise in one ep., calling out Tony for abusing newer/younger comedians. Yet KT’s formula, the cringe (and/or occasional burst of talent), is almost addicting—the show gets millions of YouTube views and hundreds of thousands of podcast listeners.

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Turn, Turn, Turn

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I listened to the Trump-Biden debate with some kind of horror on BART. I’m not a fan of Biden but still, the shock of hearing him stumble through the event overrode any political disagreements. I felt a deep concern and pity for Biden (and all of us). What was it that was happening here? I left when they started talking about golf. The friend who I was staying with that night got a text from another friend about the debate. It simply said “haha, we’re all going to die.”

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Waiting (& Roosting)

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Originally posted on Sunday July 14, 2024.

One of the primary lessons I have learned after many years on social media is that it never hurts to wait before commenting. Waiting is usually the right choice. The wise choice.

Example: Within minutes of yesterday’s shooting, one of my Facebook “friends,” deeply mired in the Trump cult, took to my page to rage about “the liberal wacko,” “the liberal moron,” who, provoked by the “violent” rhetoric from the left, tried to assassinate Trump.

Then we wait.

Then it turns out the young man is a Republican. Who gave $15 to a Democratic Get-Out-the-Vote group. With a Libertarian father. A Democratic mother. And an AR-15.

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Counterlife

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Green Border, which is showing until Thursday in NYC, is my idea of counterprogramming to the RNC. You won’t get out of the flic without tears, but it’s not for goodies only. While the movie leaves the implication that human beings may be “cured by altruism” (per Stanley Corngold’s First review), it also implies that such cures are not matters of opinion. What’s “good for body and soul” is “to risk your well-being in caring for others.”

One Brit critic had caveats and I’ll allow Green Border might not be a work of art that will work a century from now. Director Agnieszka Holland hasn’t come up with a genius metaphor for Fortress Europa. (There’s no cinematic equivalent to the hi-tech marijuana factory run by gangsters in the Dardennes’ immigration saga, Tori and Lokita.) But right here, right now — as I flash on the charmer Nur (a Syrian boy who drowns in a Polish swamp) — Holland’s humanism without borders is undeniable.

What follows is the soulful song that soundtracks a minute of joy in Green Border. A couple Polish teenagers nod their heads with three African refugees who rap along to Youssoupha’s testament…

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The Delaware River is not running backwards

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The author posted this before the assassination attempt. It’s still on time…

Photo by Tracy Harris

I have been reporting on and writing about politics for 55 years, and I have never in all those years seen people so depressed about the state of our union, as they say.

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Some Thoughts on Trump

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The author wrote this post last month, before last Thursday’s debate, but his movement of mind is not only not out of time, it chimes with Cong. Jamie Raskin’s bracing clarities in a Q&A yesterday…
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It’s a familiar trope of old horror films. Everyone is aware of the fanged entity creeping up on the heroine, except the femme fatale herself. You might be tempted to point, or even scream “Behind you!” But, of course, you won’t be heard.

There is something strangely analogous to that frustration – not being heard – which might strike a chord with those who have tried to express their misgivings about Trump to those of other persuasions.

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A Fantastic Boxing Novel

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Let it be known that W.C. “Bill” Heinz’s “The Professional” is the best boxing novel ever written. He was the Balzac of boxing, a master of unadorned prose.

Let it also be known that Lucia Rijker, “The Dutch Destroyer,” was the best female boxer I ever saw, a stone cold Buddhist killer. I saw her once on the street in New York and she was a beautiful dark angel.[1] 

And let is also be known, finally, that Rita Bullwinkel is a young writer and I am an old reviewer.

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Ode to Joy

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Originally posted here seven years ago…

The other week, deep summer, we went to see David Johansen in his persona as Buster Poindexter. For many years now, Johansen, former New York Dolls lead singer and front flounce, has in his cabaret act been one of the great American songbook curators (Jonathan Schwartz wishes), lurking in the brilliant corners of U.S. pop. (Without Johansen I’d never have heard Katie Lee’s late-1950s pop-Freudian homage, Songs of Couch and Consultation, lead song “Shrinker Man.”) At the end of this particular set at City Winery, he called to the stage his wife Mara Hennessey, who announced that she had a particular favorite she’d like David to sing, whereupon she started to intone the line, “that summer feeling, that summer feeling, that summer feeling,” and Johansen took off into the lyrics. It was so haunting! I knew that song! What was it again? When I got home I looked it up and of course: Jonathan Richman’s “That Summer Feeling.” Astonishing song.

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Into the Tradition

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I perked up when “Taxi Brousse,” which sounded like a kora-cized version of “Can’t Buy Me Love,” came on Spotify’s Oumou Sangaré Radio. This 1 plus 1/2 minute song was put down a few years ago by 3MA — an Afropop supergroup made up of three players of different string instruments: Ballaké Sissoko from Mali on kora, Driss El Maloumi from Morocco on oud and Rajery from Madagascar on valiha. The band takes its name from the first two letters of each member’s country of origin in French: Madagascar, Mali, and Maroc.

One song led to another…

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In and OUT

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Pullen’s tribute to Monk (and Powell), which comes with his own perfect swirls, is echt modern jazz, like Monk plays Ellington.