The Phony Campaign

2020-06-21 Update

Our Eye Candy du Jour has nothing to do with anything herein, I just thought it was kind of neat.

The political market bettors continue to throw their money toward Wheezy Joe, and he improves his advantage over President Bone Spurs this week. The Wheez also picked up a lot of phony Google hits, but not enough to overcome the President's overwhelming advantage on that score.

Tweets like this helped a lot:

Candidate WinProb Change
Since
6/14
Phony
Results
Change
Since
6/14
Donald Trump 40.9% -2.3% 1,970,000 -20,000
Joe Biden 54.7% +3.1% 639,000 +133,000

Warning: Google result counts are bogus.

  • We open with breaking phony news: Trump Nominates Himself To The Supreme Court

    WASHINGTON, D.C.—Amid outcry from conservatives demanding Trump tip the balance of Supreme Court, Trump has nominated himself for a seat on the highest court in the land.

    "Sometimes, you just gotta do a job yourself," Trump said. "These other judges don't know the law like I do. I actually know all the laws. I know all the best laws, and some of the bad ones too. At least some people say they're bad. I think they might be right. We should stop listening to the bad laws. We shouldn't even have them, really. I will make all the best decisions as a judge. Some loser judges are taking advantage of this country and it's a total disgrace. I will make it all better, way better." 

    That's the Babylon Bee, which manages to find truth in satire.


  • [Amazon Link]
    (paid link)
    Jonah Goldberg's G-File makes a point about John Bolton's Trump-trashing memoir:

    Peter Navarro, the author of If It's Raining in Brazil, Buy Starbucks, whose grasp of economics was once described as “nuttier than Batman’s basement” is terrific sycophant for a trade economist.  

    There’s no need to dwell on him, but he did offer an interesting critique of John Bolton. He described Bolton’s book as “deep swamp revenge porn.”

    […] I shall refrain from checking Pornhub.com to see if that is an actual category of porn. Though Rule 34 suggests there should be scads of videos of vindictive sex in the Everglades.

    Now, I know that revenge porn is a thing. Mr. Pedia (Wiki to his friends) defines it as “the distribution of sexually explicit images or video of individuals without their consent.” Typically, it involves immoral men videotaping their sexual exploits and then putting them on the web. It’s a grotesque and shabby thing to do. And, if you’re a Trump lickspittle, the analogy has some merit.

    But here’s the problem. In most cases of revenge porn, the images in question are, you know, real.

    But Navarro, like most of the administration’s spinners, wants it both ways (another common leitmotif in porn, I’m told).

    After getting the revenge porn line out a couple times, he told Fox News “I do think the 'Big Lie Bolton' moniker does suffice.”

    So, which is it? Is it “revenge porn” or a “Big Lie?” It can’t be both.

    Well, maybe it's Revenge Porn on even pages, Big Lie on odds. Or the other way 'round.

    I haven't paid much attention, don't plan on even shelling out $19.42 for the book (Amazon's current pricing, link up there on the right). But I'm betting against the "Big Lie" thesis.


  • Speaking of memoirs, Power Line publishes a story from Stephen Silbiger, once a lobbyist for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). He recounts his 1982 interaction with at-the-time-Senator Joe. Who had sponsored a Balanced Budget Constitutional Amendment. Which AFSCME opposed. And (Silberger alleges) at the time, Biden was of the opinion that The American people are stupid

    Once I sat down, Biden got up and started to yell at me. He bellowed “you are going to lose this issue. You are going to lose this issue because the Balanced Budget Constitutional Amendment sounds good and the American people are stupid and will support anything that sounds good.”

    [Amazon Link]
    (paid link)
    As someone who's read, and largely agreed with Bryan Caplan's classic book, The Myth of the Rational Voter, link at right, I'm pretty sympathetic with Biden's (alleged) opinion. I'm also relatively unshocked that he was cynically offering his legislation as "boob bait for bubbas".

    On the other hand, if you had a higher opinion of Wheezy Joe, I hope (for your sake) this takes it down a significant number of pegs.


  • At the NY Post, John Podhoretz offers some unsolicited advice: Joe Biden needs a vice president who won't try to steal his job

    Joe Biden is 112 years old and can barely speak a coherent sentence. So it matters greatly whom he picks to be his running mate. The chances that his veep selection might end up becoming president during his term can’t be discounted.

    Democrats have spent the Trump years talking about the virtues of the 25th Amendment. It lays out a process inside the executive branch that would temporarily and, if necessary, permanently replace a living president deemed by his Cabinet to be too infirm to serve as the most powerful man in the world.

    Some podcast I listened to months back said that too many Americans viewed Washington shenanigans as a movie plot, with good guys and bad. But I have to say that Biden's cabinet pulling a 25th Amendment move on Joe would be an awesome movie plot.


  • And the Cambridge chapter of America's Red Guard successfully executed a re-education campaign on Lawrence Tribe, as reported at Campus Reform: Harvard prof apologizes for saying Biden VP pick should center on their 'results'

    Harvard Law School professor Laurence Tribe faced backlash and has apologized for his comments about presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s running mate choice, saying that when Biden picks his running mate, he should do it based on each contender's qualifications and reputation, not skin color. 

    Tribe was among the signers of a letter addressed to Biden, urging the vice president to choose Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) as his running mate. While America currently faces “lawless authoritarianism,” Warren would help rid the country of “the two twin pathogens of Trump and Trumpism.”

    What was I saying about the 25th Amendment movie plot? I have an easier time imagining Kamala orchestrating that scheme than Liz.


  • Andrew Malcolm pleads with advises any readers persuaded that the election is a done deal: Don’t count Trump out

    We have 20 weeks until Election Day. Twenty weeks ago, more than 40 million people now receiving unemployment had jobs. Twenty weeks ago, Trump had been acquitted of impeachment (remember that?) and was cruising to reelection atop an amazingly rapid economic recovery from all those “shovel-ready jobs” that Biden promised were just around the corner in 2010 but never arrived. And many of us thought a pandemic was a special at IHOP or Olive Garden.

    The next dictionary edition should have a MAGA hat by the definition of “loyal.” Nothing can dissuade them from election confidence. Never mind factual evidence. They’ve stuck with Trump through thin and thinner. And still do because “he’s a fighter,” because “the media is biased” and because “polls are always wrong.”

    True, they often are wrong if you read them as predictions. Exactly four years ago this week, someone named Hillary Clinton surged to an enlarged 12-point lead over Trump, who was mouthing off again about a biased judge. Even more ominous though, 55% in that Bloomberg poll said they would never ever vote for the billionaire.

    I'm guessing Trump is toast, but if you want to see how good a prognosticator I am, just look at my 2016 archives.


  • And let's not forget this blast from the 1988 New York Times: Dukakis Lead Widens, According to New Poll

    Fifty-five percent of the 948 registered voters interviewed in the poll said they preferred to see Mr. Dukakis win the 1988 Presidential election, while 38 percent said they preferred to see Mr. Bush win. The poll had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus four percentage points.

    Ah, President Dukakis. I remember him well.


Last Modified 2024-01-23 5:12 AM EDT

The Monkey's Raincoat

[Amazon Link]
(paid link)

I started a new reading project: the novels of Robert Crais. Back in the day, I read his early stuff via Dover (NH) Public Library, then switched over to buying them as they came out. About time for a retrospective. I grabbed the Mass Market Paperback edition, and…

It's the first (1987) outing for wise-cracking L. A. private eye Elvis Cole and his taciturn partner Joe Pike. He's hired by Ellen Lang, who is missing her husband and young son. Hubby is a struggling Hollywood agent, and he could be mixed up with some nasty types. A sordid tale of drugs, gangsters, and violence unfolds. It's an excellent page-turner, and it's interesting to contrast Early Elvis with Modern Elvis. Early Elvis is funnier, and arguably less ethical. But that's OK.

It occurred to me that if an Aspiring Young Writer wants a free lesson in how to build suspense with a violent climax: study chapters 34-37.

Consumer note: there were a few glaring typos in this 2019 edition. Example, page 266, where Elvis is considering options for an assault on enemy territory: "It was through the door or across the fawn." I think you mean "lawn", Elvis. (This error doesn't appear in the pirated Russian version. Just sayin'.

Or is this some kind of publisher's gimmick? Where they can search for this mistake on the web to nab the intellectual property thieves?

Second consumer note: I don't get the title. It's from a haiku by the Japanese poet Basho (1644–1694), but … no monkeys, no raincoats. I suppose I'm dense.


Last Modified 2024-01-23 2:06 PM EDT