I watched the Superman movie, which was kind of as good and meaningful as a Superman movie could be.  And I don’t think that’s damming with faint praise.  (To refer Alan Moore on the appeal of Superman — you have Krypto the Superdog, and he wears a mask.)  And I think there was one superhero and special effects laden fight sequence which I cannot narrative follow — no clue what everyone is supposed to be limited to or has what great ability — close your eyes and wait two minutes, I guess.  Looking at it in the cultural zietgiest, I remember hearing ponderances of the superheroes at the time of the Heath Ledger as Joker Barman movie (having watched it for a second time, not since it was released, I don’t think much of that one now) — that Superman comes off flat in current times, we are too cynical for this depiction of a pile of goofy altruisms.  And somewhere after a bunch of dark depictions of a Superman breathing his words as heavily as Batman, the Joker movie which gets a pile of “story for our times” and alluded to as some character study of the Trump age (but which I squint at asking “Doesn’t everyone remember ‘Falling Down’?) — (I never saw The Joker, incidemtally, but all the commentary I saw seemed just a rehash of that for the 1993 Falling Down.)  I actually don’t know how extensive the right wing “Superman so woke!” commentary i , being that I stare at a liberal ecgo chamber ready with pithy lines for sources they are at the ready to seek out.  I was actually a little on guard for on the nose tie-ins.  But if you want to do “Orange Man Bad”, Lex Luther is not really the characterization.  And in this realm, a Putinish figure invading a Ukrainiish country is kind of a stock plot in history — if you want to read this into this, go nuts.  Likewise the rest.  Somewhere in the zietgiest you land on the immigrant fantasy from the eve of ww2 trying to bring light to the world as opposed to the warmed over pulp vigilante stalking the night — surprise twist from 2008 to now.

Meanwhile Disney / Marvel has its slate of movies which look as uninteresting as ever.

It is that place where the right wing conspiracy mongerers lose the script, or are too myopic and self-interested to proceed with the script. Remember that line about the black helicopters? Yeah. Here they are now. Flying about the city. And it is indeed the Feds. Because the President has declared war, or has a conception of war, or wants to enforce power. And he is able to cite visuals from five years back of a Quarantined and George Floyd protest era — no great truck with them, though I guess amusing to watch them scuffle forward to duplicate the stupid “police free city-state zone” of Seattle’s Capitol Hill — and more so some weird street scuffles before that between some weird trolls of Vancouver and … Indeed, there they, antifa — vegan shake dealing antifa.

Conservative journalist Andy Ngo pushed back early Friday morning by claiming the costumes in Portland “serve the function of masking the violent extremism to make the direct action appear like a family-friendly gathering on camera, and to whitewash the past ultraviolence.”

“Conservative journalist” does some heavy lifting. He knows of the ultra-violence. When last I thought of that guy, he was showing up on Fox News with a neck brace and talking of “quick drying cement” that the vegan shake thrown at him was masking.

The other place where your Alex Joneses fall away from their line — we get ourselves some new Reichstag Fires. Or apparently not. We have to enforce standards and law and order after Charlie Kirk’s shooting. In a prior era, before a political figure had glad-handed him, Jones might piece in a lightly non-partisan bit in Andover contradictory and partisan conspiracy on this. But now? — nah.

After Portland had become boring and moved off of being “cool”, and then moved into and then out of a pretty rough patch, the President has made Portland cool again.  He is at war with us — seemingly the one white city in a list of other cities with large black populations he is at war with.  Funny thing now — simply existing in a physical space has become a revolutionary act.  Hard to figure what to do with that.

And The problem with nodding at “rough spot” is it would give at least some credence of justification that if a situation were that — then answer: national guard, military. And welcome to a two front propaganda war. Like, there is more warrant for civil disobediance at the ice facilities now than six years ago — but what we are down to is just public opinion supported dozen or so keeping the vigil demonstrators shouting slogans at the feds there.

I am reminded of a sickening sensation of having to play that game in trying to put myself in parts of the electorate’s imagination on Kamala city centric “we’re detroit!” ” we’re philly! ” ads.  Yeah, as meth and then fety sweep through rural America, they seem to have a different idea on it there versus it here (and Detroit and Philly). 

Another thing is gritting my teeth at a distinctly “America Fuck Yeah!” undertones on some commercial I see in a baseball game – – trying to place it against, oh, post 9/11 into War on Terror “Madison avenue takes the pulse of the public and sells back to us” manner.  Curious this has not quite popped up on what limited ads I have seen in football — at this point broader public for that after all as against the stuck in the ways and holding baseball audience? Or it is probably just one car ad and I missed it in football.

“The guy we need, the guy I hope the Democrats put up next time, is that Department of Transportation head during Biden — uh– what’s his name? Buttigieg! Pete Buttigieg. Hopefully the Democrats have him running because what this country needs as president is a manager, and he is good as we get there. Now who should the Republicans put up? I think the best Republican for after Trump is — because they will need to by-pass Vance — he’s not going anywhere. No. The best option for the Republicans is — oh, I think Marjorie Taylor Greene. Very telegenic. Buttigieg versus Marjorie Taylor Greene. That will make a great race.”

“I fear reprisals and counter-reprisals we are maybe about to see with Charlie Kirk’s death. Because you know, my son — young conservative. He is on about it. Because I don’t feel it but him, he dash his guy their guy. And we are getting so much blather. From both sides. Now you know who’s good at highlighting who is horrible all around the political map on this? Bill O’Reilly!”

Shame that I have actually lost the point in place I am going to be hearing this train of conversation, losing one more facet of incomprehension on the political moment. Like, I would hope you could somehow hold him to Buttigieg vote, even as he takes various positions on, oh, college loan forgiveness and gets knived as a less than masculine commie by…

I came around somewhat on Allan Lichtman, who was running around on many a media outlet with his “keys to the White House” presidential forecast — because watching his by-weekly streams he did out in the equivocation of “I am not all-knowing, I could be wrong.”. The problems of “the map is not the terrain” And more subjectivity than he wants to admit (what is a “foreign policy failure?”. Republicans were selling the Afghanistan withdraw as such, even though it is mostly just the case that you can see why President Trump scheduled it for the after the election. ) And within this I spotted one aside that I wanted to tack back on it it came to a Trump win, “something may be different and have changed than with every election since 1860.  If it is, I think I know what it may be — and I will get there if it happens.”. The tone goes at odds with this weird pile of YouTube clickbait images I was seeing for ” How Trump destroyed leftist’s career” (Never mind his fame of the moment came from predicting Trump winning in 2016).  (Incidentally, he predicted Gore winning in 2000, and sticks by that as accurate).  And “Lichtman Loses It” — though his election night feed showed nothing much off kilter — but it is where everyone gets “DESTROYED” or “Evisorated!!!!”.  His answer on why his “keys” failed and what “is different” — a broken scattershot news media and this is the first instance where the incumbent party trashed their incumbent president.  I do have an idea that if he were defining his terms from the perspective of after this presidential election and looking back at all the rest as opposed to right after Reagan, he might have a different definition for “Charisma” — understandably, Trump does not qualify ala broadly popular Reagan or Kennedy or Roosevelts — but if examining what it is that propels votes to him absent specifics in policy or politics, the thing they share along with war hero Eisenhower — is that they gobble up all the attention and exhaust the ability for an opponent to get a word in edgewise – – you have to think these things through on the particulars of causes and effects.

I listened to the “pod save America” “exit”/”autopsy” interview with two managers of the Harris campaign, and trying to digest meaning from it I may listen over it again. I have never listened to this one before — am familiar with its existence — only so much “dead center of the Democratic Party talk” I want to bother with. Overall in the weird electioneering a number of moments where I was thinking “I don’t think this is effective but I hope it is” (the “women winking at each other in the voting booth passing off their domineering husbands” “no one needs to know” ads which in terms of personal identities — you are putting people’s marriages on trial here) and things that depress me But no one else (noted the laste election eve campaign event in Philly. Ricky Martin was on stage. Opra came by. Mock Trump and his b-list celebrity has been but we are back in the same boat of micro-targeting no longer a -listers, whoever a-listers are these days.)

Looking over I see the next episode and something bothersome to possibly only me. The descriptor has “the hard questions about where the Democratic Party needs to go from here, the liberal media landscape, what the Harris campaign told us about why they lost, and yes, a jobs program for incels.”. Incel. Do words have any meaning anymore, because I have a feeling this in neither capturing either the narrow definitions first tossed out in a hyper-online subculture, maybe expanded to a still reasonably narrow definition of the literal oxymoron “involuntary celibate”. Here it seems to wash away into “non college educated man” broadly speaking, and taking in all assumptions of a broad sexual frustration. I suppose since the term “woke” had shifted some definition and then collapsed by broad use — and is now useless, the word “incel” might as well go the same route.

The deep breath analysis rejiggers previous stock analysis. When 3 out of a hundred voters walk across the aisle from Biden as against Trump over to Trump as against Harris, it is the sign that everything has gone haywire after all. And indeed, it kind of has. My bottom line is always going to be that — America now … joins… the list of countries… that have… popularly elected a leader… who was part of a failed coup attempt. What else is going to be the outcome beyond …

The humiliation is the point. The Republicans came back from a secret vote to cast their lot for Senate leader with the Senator who will gladly swerve off of Trump if he could happen to come the way at a minimal cost over the one who pledges total fealty. But the first chance of showing something… anything… for a historically mostly easy process of confirmation … no clear sign Thune wants to sidestep Trump’s desired “recess appointments” — the road to the rubber stamp role.

Okay, great, a new thinking goes. The Democrats have the soft power of celebrities and music stars. But. The Republicans have the streamers and podcasters. A batch of sub Joe Rogans along with Joe Rogan hisownself. Trump did that 20 something who sniffs the seats of interviews he considers Alpha-males. The best Harris had was the now more sedate Howard Stern and that show with a sexual euphemism name. In the social media sphere, eight years ago everyone was aghast at Russian incursions Facebook spaces. Today — who owns Twitter?

So the game recycles. Back to soft power. Cultural headspace. A manufactured counter-culture is Cooper than the culture, after all.

I do slide around some commentary by an apolitical podcaster/streamer that I listen to — an affected cynicism with his look see on goofy aggrieved liberals. He betrays his online-ness with his mockings. “Yeah, I know. Harris was ‘brat’, but … She wasn’t very interesting at all.” I forgot she was ever “brat”, and barely knew that in the first place. It was pretty easy to ignore. To him, the only thing Harris came out for was marijuana decriminalization, a last second issue tossed in a last minute campaign with two flaws in this complaint – – one: who cares how she came to it? Two: no, it is not all of her proposal and platform. I suppose there is a piecemeal element to Harris’s proposals, but I am not a fan of revolution. I’m a way, I guess the cynical apolitical podcaster showed the challenges to a run against a hothead, saying “Being ‘Trump is Bad’ is not enough.” Anything you say will end up sounding to an assortment of the 5 per cent needing to make the choice as though that is the message.

I’ve half whimsically slotted Joseph Biden as number seven in that great presidential rankings list. Right between John Quincy Adams and Chester Arthur. Am I serious? I don’t know, but I do want to take a thumping to the perennial — a list of requirements and plans any president needs to follow through over two terms in a pathway to one of the coveted top two tiers. And I may revise it based on recent events — a deep thought on the question of if there was anything he could have done differently to avert the election outcome, with America losing any claim of “exceptionalism” by joining that list of nations that have popularly elected leaders who previously were involved in a failed coup attempt. He does admit, accidentally in the Woodward book, that Merrick Garland was a mistake.

On the eve of the election, Bill Maher was onto one of his regular hobby horse stock. So, “If Kamala loses” it will be because “she failed to have a ‘Sister Souljah’ Moment.”. That case of candidate Bill Clinton making political hay by denouncing inflammatory comments by rap star Sister Souljah when speaking at Jesse Jackson’s event. In the context of messaging in 2024, I do not know what the Bill Mahers of the country wanted Harris to do. Deliver a 30 minute speech on stating that the word “Latinx” sucks? Rush into the prisons holding the two instances that fall somewhere in the vicinity of “sex change operations for illegal immigrants in prison” and not leave until the penis is removed from one and the breasts removed from the other? We demand performative symbolic political measures NOW!

Enter the MSNBC pile of Democratic chatterers, packed with a number of ex-Republicans who can slide back in. Donny Deutsch wants to move to the center. Surely somewhere between the extremes of not insulting the Haitian of small town Ohio and accusing them of eating people’s pets there is a sensible position all sides can agree? Joe Scarborough flips around either 90 degrees or 180 degrees to demand mirror looking.

Chris Matthews is always amazingly vacuous in his observations, and shot his wad (as though he hadn’t already) as a dead ender on Biden’s campaign. Understand, I have not heard one of these commentaries, but I close my eyes and think I can spot the words.

After any lost election, the losing party turns into cultural critics always. Or not always, sometimes they just claim a win anyways. I see Keith Olberman quoting Mencken. To be sure, his elitism is an interesting facet for him — a bit ago I found myself wanting to each across electronic devices and “rube-splain” against some derisive and seemingly not all in fun comments about tourist gee-shucking on tall buildings, like they have never seen tall buildings before. But he can keep his Mencken, I guess. The reality is you can probably keep the cultural criticism moving in winning elections. I myself would want to elect boring uncharismatic robots who fade out of view much of the time, but the public demands otherwise — and one way or the other. Maybe the Republicans will annoy me by succeeding with my strategum in four years — feed the public’s weary respond after a decade and a half of Trump, as the Democrats good by nominating to match a flashy celebrity.

The silver lining for this one, it should be pointed out, that in losing the Republican + 10 states in the Senate, the political identities of every Democrat no longer lies in figuring out how to win over a sizable chunk of Trump voters.

There was one weird note from the “14 Keys” guy, Allan Litchmann, a month ago in his twice weekly streams. He said he does not pretend to be infallible, and should be be wrong despite one hundred years it suggested some new dynamic has entered the picture, and he thinks he knows what it would be. But leave it there and get back to it after the election.

Social media? The collapse of a news media into disparate narrative lines removed from any perspective or need for truth? I listened to some European observers make a comment on just how little foreign policy figures in American political elections, a spot where I am kind of stuck because in consideration of the new Republican Party, it slopes into and merges in with “democracy” in a manner that Abortion does for the vast liberal assortment. The next statement from the European was the dagger — “or domestic policy, for that matter.” Not wholly accurate –Trump did have an economic proposal, panned by All economists everywhere, of 19th century tariffs. Kamala Harris had some modest price controls, more performative than anything, for

Observing a shot in the dark from the Russian government — Hoax bomb threats, many of which appeared to originate from Russian email domains, were directed on Tuesday at polling locations in five battleground states – Georgia, Michigan, Arizona, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania – as Election Day voting was underway, the FBI said. The Georgia locations temporarily closed. Tried to extend the hours, but Republicans got the court injunction to stop it. “Jim Crow on Steroids”, I guess. The Comey letter, your long anticipated October Surprise. Or that stray comment from Biden against the backdrop of a constant insult stream from a doddering Trump.

Watch the county returns. Florida skiddaddles to the right. Unimportant except in as much as you try to figure any bleedover into Georgia. It gets hilariously dark when noting the Venezuela ex-pats on Miami-Dade, voting an masse for the clearest American copy of Hugo Chavez. A couple hours later I sit unsure how the NY Times was casting Pennsylvania to the Republicans against a county percentages that held up against 2020. Skipped over to Wisconsin. Shuddered. Razors edge of tens and thousands, needing a bank-shot across the 3 rust belt states and the percentages were not holding here. Go to bed now, knowing the Russians won the race and half the country wants to inflict the rest of us with a senile bad insult comic in our constant face.

I know nothing, but my prediction is Harris sweeps the 3 rust belt states and wins North Carolina and Georgia, and loses Nevada and Arizona. All of which is a meaningless prognostication I stand behind not at all unless by some fluke I am correct. For what it is worth, that great political guru of Nevada has chimed in with his sage declaration — Kamala will win the state. By .3 percent of the vote. He has crunched the numbers and has seen the results coming into clear view. Point three percent separation. Yes, it is that asinine.

Bopping about, I find a Douglas MacKinnon, opinion contributor for The Hill chime in with this opening to a piece

Not a single Democrat I speak with believes that Vice President Kamala Harris will win on Tuesday.

I see no evidence of anything of the sort, but matching forward.

All hoped for an open convention in August to identify and select the best candidate possible, but they were denied. To that point, this past Thursday, The Hill featured a piece headlined, “Democrats start to point fingers even as they hope for Harris win.”

He then proceeds harp on the decision to pluck in Walz as running mate, which all strikes me as if we enter an alternate universe where things went down as he argues they ought have — an open convention and a vice president Shapiro, he would be taking the “Democrats in panic” line arguing they ought have tapped the vice President and gone with a different vice president. Curious on this guy, I look about to see what else he has opined, and see this:

When honest historians once again venture upon our shores, they will record Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as a true Statesman, a Patriot, and one who has continually given voice to the voiceless. My latest column for THE HILL on this “Man of the People” is below.

Tells you what you need to know.

This is the woman who ruined a ‘Wrinkle in Time’ movie project by stripping it of its Christian subtext and making it with a broadly defined “spirituality”. To get credit, she did guide a Disney ‘Frog and the Princess’ movie with its black princess character to something good, but I am always stick on the problem — I am supposed to like the celebrity entres for the political figure? Yeah, sure — you look over to Trump and see… Hulk Hogan say even less and even more.

This is the moment that Trump responds favorably to someone in the crowd offering that Kamala Harris is a prostitute. I can’t decide what to do with such a thing — calling politicians prostitutes is a well trodden insult, in this century especially with the caveat “apologies to sex workers”, and we do enter the terrain of — what is the caricature or insult of a prominent public woman that will be viewed as sexist? — and in Kamala Harris in particular we enter a terrain where the person in the audience has in their mind an obnoxious back-story making hay of her relations with Willie Brown — so you can toss it aside immediately anyways.