A few kind folks have asked why the links to episodes of The Delano Rose are broken. They were removed from my feed due to copyright issues.
Each episode of the show was a soundscape intended to recreate a lucid dream of star-travel and weird memories mixed with random, sometimes freely-associated ideas. I used music in transformative ways, clips from television shows, news items, and commentary. My belief was that its status as a transformative use for my personal, educational, and non-commercial ends would be sufficient to give it a pass.
It did not. A soulless algorithm flagged the shows and they were removed.
I understand the reasons and, while I make no money from my podcasts or blogs, the protection of intellectual property must be honored.
Sorry, folks. I deleted the automatically-generated posts from my feed.
Amazon Prime is offering the first season of what it describes as an anthology series “that explores terror in America.” Following the success of supernatural series laced with effective commentary on American racism (Watchmen and Lovecraft Country on HBO) Prime brings us the story of the Emory family led by Lucky and Henry (played expertly by Deborah Ayorinde and Ashley Thomas, respectively) as they leave the Deep South of the 1950s for the promise of inclusion and prosperity in Compton, California.
Them is not a sequel to Jordan Peele’s Us, though you could be forgiven for assuming it based on the marketing AND the fact that Shahadi Wright Joseph is in both Us and Them.
It is a miserable experience that I gave up on* when it decided to stop thinking about HOW to hit me with its message but focused on how HARD.
SPOILERS TO FOLLOW
(*Update: I decided to work through it all and amended my review.)
Never served. Never worked a real job in his life. Inherited his wealth and security. Talks for a living. Holds a Bachelor’s degree in History. Never built anything. Never solved a major problem. He has essentially the same qualifications as a film critic for a newspaper owned by his parents.
(A young, confused-looking man enters a long room full of other confused-looking people mutter to one another. He spots an empty chair next to a young man who is staring at the far wall, head cradled in his hands.)
ED: Hey, do you know where, like, the cabinet is?
Secretary of Beans: What?
ED: A cabinet? Some guy ran out of here with a fist full of crushed papers. He pinned this thing on my shirt and told me to take over for him in the cabinet. Sounds sus, but I’m just an intern, so.
SOB: Oh, right. Welcome to the cabinet. According to your pin, you are….Acting Secretary of Defense. Congratulations on your promotion.
After destroying a platoon of Imperial Dark Troopers single-handedly (literally), a Jedi appears on the bridge of Gideon’s cruiser. He is drawn by the Force to young Grogu. He lowers his hood to reveal himself as LUKE EFFING SKYWALKER. Somehow, no one seems to recognize him, other than Moff Gideon who seems to evacuating in his suit. Cara Dune looks puzzled and curious.
Hey. Thanks for the assist. I was going to take the whole crew out myself. I need the steps.
Din: You’re a Jedi?
Luke: I am. Did you see the big green sword I used to slice and crush like 40 Doombots?
Din: Yeah, well, that guy isn’t a Jedi and he has a fancy sword, too.
Gideon: (mutters) Oh, shit.
Luke: What “fancy sword”?
Bo-Katan: NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS, JEDI! I mean, “hi!”
The election is over. While I am heartened that Trump was defeated (though he is still contesting the results as of Veterans Day) I am disappointed that it took the highest voter turnout in history and Biden’s victory was less than ten points. Trump earned the SECOND highest voter count in American history with 71 million people or nine million more than showed up for him four years ago.
To me, that number is horrifying and I thank everyone who met that challenge by voting and getting others to exceed that unsettling total by over five million votes. It was the greatest Presidential election drive in history to defeat the growing cancer of white fascism across the nation.
And those 71 million people who affirmed their support for this would-be dictator will milk this last gasp for relevance until adult professionals finally put it down. In the week following the election, Trump supporters deflected their candidates sins, failures, mistakes, and general unpleasantness by picking items from Joe Biden’s political career and in one case, I was informed that Kamala Harris was unsuited for the office of Vice-President because some blogger on a conservative website called her a whore in an op-ed piece which was later amplified as a fact by noted oxygen-thief Rush Limbaugh.
This is not a matter of Republicans saying this is their guy so they will be loyal to the party. No, this is an awakening of an extreme socially conservative beast born from the resistance to the civil rights movement and a denial of social injustice in this country.
I have listened to and read opinions about Biden and his family that could swap out the surname Trump and be as accurate as the court records that factualize opposition’s fantasies.
Essentially, Trump supporters could only defend their choice by claiming that Biden’s entire career of gaffes and bad judgement equates to Trump’s four years of abject failure, poor character, infidelity, predatory behavior, disloyalty, lies, fiscal irresponsibility, and gross incompetence.
71 million Americans felt he is the best option we have to lead because while he used a beauty pageant for underage girls as his personal pedophile sex gallery and admitted on tape to using his power to sexually assault women, here’s a video of Joe Biden being weird with kids. They deny Trump’s racism even though he blanketed all Mexicans as criminals and rapists. He pursued a ban on Muslims. His supporters are so ignorant of their own racism that they don’t see banning all of one race, nationality, or faith because some might be bad people is the basic, most understandable definition of that term. They don’t understand that Americans pay the tariffs imposed on China, not the Chinese. They don’t see Executive Orders as despotic so long as they agree with what’s being ordered. What they see is an old man who doesn’t care who he insults, doesn’t bother with people who see the world differently, and does not have to worry about being held accountable for lies, ignorance, or failure because he’s doing right by those who believe and act as he does.
This is the America Trump supporters still want. And they hold the Senate. And they have the Supreme Court. And they have many state governors and legislatures, courtrooms, commissions, and school boards. If that doesn’t frighten you, you’re not paying attention.
Meanwhile, the US House of Represented lost seats to Republicans, though kept the majority. The Senate is, as of this date, divided 48-48 with two run-off elections scheduled in Georgia.
Local and state elections were not a mandate to oust the worst President of the Modern Era(tm). There is so much to be done and, frankly, undone. There was no blue wave. The queen has been wounded, but the hive is still active. The worm has not yet turned among the Republicans in Congress who have excused and defended this President for his actions, the least of which would have been an outrage had Trump been elected as a Democrat.
I am heartened if only because the voting patterns tell me that, in the privacy of the voting booth, Republicans joined Democrats and Independents in record numbers to record their conscience. They voted for their state and local Republicans, but chose not to renew their support for Donald Trump. Enough Republicans chose against straight party lines this time to put their trust in Joe Biden to restore dignity and confidence in the Office of the President of the United States. Some, perhaps most, held their nose making this choice, so I applaud their courage of conviction. I know they will not go easy on Biden in his term. Nor should they. The point is that they put country over party and those Lincoln Republicans are the anonymous heroes of this election.
We always focus on the big ticket elections and turnout for state and local elections benefitted from this additional attention. Off-year elections are often ignored to the benefit of the incumbents. The lack of a “blue wave” in this election in the US House and Senate shows that we have a lot of work to do to escape this trend toward a selfish, isolationist, and darker America.
So, we take a breath. The battle’s done and we kinda won, so we sound our victory cheer.
Edit: Shortly after revising this entry, I came across this video blog from YouTuber Steve Shives that shares many of these ideas along with the specific song that’s been playing in my head since Saturday’s projected victory. Check him out.
This is a common question among progressives who look at President Trump and suddenly see the conservatives of the past in a more favorable light. Myself, I would agree to swap Reagan or either Bushes for Trump if Trump agreed to tap out for a second term. Of course, I am fighting for a Biden win, but I would agree to any other reasonable Republican if it just meant the tangerine twatgoblin would pack up and go. I dislike him that much.
But why do people see a different, decent, even heroic man in our president? Some see him as the leader of their party and will never admit to anything other than his excellence and righteousness. He may be the worst Chicago Cub ever to throw a ball, but by GOD he’s still the White Stocking, win or lose. Others, like most of the working Republican Party, see him as a useful idiot. He occupies the office with a RED “R” and can be useful. As we have seen, the GOP rarely breaks rank with even the most absurd or vile Trump thought. Excusing Trump’s words and actions as a miserable human is the cost of forwarding their agenda.
But then, there’s the rest of them. The voters. The everyday folks who just need to get through this life without more to worry about than they have. They’re lower on Maslowe’s pyramid than most and just need to be led through this mess of a world they live in.
