The liberal media is all a flutter on the latest primary results showing Nikki Haley with a chunk of 20 percentages. The problem comes that committed to this as a news story of import, they are committed to reporting the reporting the ten percent she garnered in the very definition of Trump Country — the state of West Virginia — where whether the vote is significant elsewhere, it is not particularly of at significance there. I assume the bulk of the lising January 6th convict House candidate’s vote did not go to Haley. For his part, Biden’s challengers wound up at 29.5 percent of the Democratic primary vote — the interesting there that the 3rd and 4th place candidates had already dropped out of the race and endorsed the second place candidate, Jason Palmer, after his triumph in American Samoa.

Biden is right now stuck laughing off the personal outlier New York Times poll results, and issuing a perhaps purposefully cringey “gauntlet dropped” on debate reformatting. There is a gambit here — reshuffle the news cycle to recapture the State of the Union magic at key intervals as too defeat whatever truth there is in New York Times outlier polls.

The story of the 2016 election was one where Hillary Clinton went back and forth from a sliver of a poll lead and opening up a larger poll lead depending wholly on the last news cycle item. Always at the ready to drop a thing in against Hillary was Julian Assange with wikileaks and the Russian government through Facebook trolls and the National Enquirer. The next thing that was to drop for Trump upon recovering from Access Hollywood was the Stormy Daniels story — and we are in a little bit of horrors on this score. Part of how Trump got past the Access Hollywood tape was a desire amongst the public to simply not get duped — look past a conveniently timed October Surprise. But the October Surprise happened to just come too early. And if it were a September story they would get past it by the next round of Hillary dumpings.

The fascinating thing I cannot get past on Stormy Daniels in this case is that the veracity of her story and the details of it do not matter, details only important in that there are details — which needed to get squelched and squelched to win an election. It is fallsifying records to squelch a story for an express political aim. Whatever the story is. So Stormy Daniels is simultaneously the least important and most important person in the case — she just happens to be it. The story goes that one of the three stories the National Enquirer bought and killed was pure b.s. I guess the detail of important is Stormy Daniels conveying that Trump waved away any concern on Melanie — a loveless marriage and all — but even that would not really mean anything as such could be said by a cheating spouse as a regular cheating lie. Hell! I know the couple in a break-up that happened after the guy cheated with the insistence that “we are in an open relationship — she’s okay with it”. Of course, according to the Trump defense, a sexual rendezvous did not happen — period — so I guess this needs be brought out.

I stumble to a point of discomfort. In the waning days of the 2020 election, an attempted October Surprise of limited meaning got squelched on social media. Information free and all that, the stupid story of Hunter Biden’s laptop ought be releasable freely. But it also should clearly be seen by an educated public as b and s, slimy attempts at public manipulation The haunting thing is that this “news” dissemination would have successfully swaying a few thousand votes in Wisconsin and Arizona and etc. The short attention span nightmare we are trapped in electorally is our downfall.

I see Donald Trump is going to speak at the Libertarian Party convention. The Libertarian Party invited both major party candidates, as well as Robert Kennedy jr. I guess they drew the line at Jill Stein, even though from their perspective Stein would be just as statist as Biden. Trump too, but apparently not. The Reason comments section is always a doozy of Trump fans clamouring against any suggestion of criticism or opposition from the article under the banner of Libertarianism. For their part, post takeover from the ‘Mises Caucus’, put off by Gary Johnson and I guess the woman they ran last time, are selling Trump t-shirts and mementos in honor of Trump’s appearance. So. Apparently Trump has a constituency there. Actually, a quick look see on what Ron Paul is up to these days shows him harping against the most recent Trump rejected and so killed Lankford immigration Bill for not keeping out enough immigrants, so it is not like there is any beacon from the past and this Trump Libertarian confab may just as well be.

For his part, Trump’s motive to go to this convention — a constituency sits there, surely perhaps, but also stated as — needing to stop Robert Kennedy jr. Or get to the voters who are flipping between the two. An odd one. Apparently the person who actually might win the Libertarian Party nomination is not really even a factor.

If the Libertarian Party had not reconstituted itself, and had a mind toward trying to push forward to the next election — I wonder if they ought as well nominate Vermin Supreme. Go back to the academic gadfly next time up, but in the meantime keep what faction of Trump appeal by way of amused clowning in line best they can. As were, they may just nominate Trump.

I see the flier posted to a pole. It is the uncommitted vote campaign. At the very least it gives some terms for opposition. Permanent cease fire. At least I think it spells out permanent — might be temporary.

I am not inclined for any symbolic opposition to Biden, as I would not have been in 2012 for Obama. Quite possibly the option looks intriguing with Clinton in 1996. But let us suppose hypothetically we transpose Clinton 1996 into this year or I were inclined to vote a line against Biden. Now I can’t. Because the vote has a signifier I disagree with. It is the attempted shut down of college commencement addresses and even broader disruptions, some holding up of traffic, a guy self immolating, all for a chant whose functional meaning is Death to the Jews. I suppose we move into general election territory on the sensation — a choice between ho hum and bad.

Currently much ink is spilled and bloviations are heard on the candidacy of Robert F Kennedy jr. Biden has an ad that largely missed the point — lining up all the Kennedys to pump him up. Trump is highlighting him as an extreme leftist environmentalist, the better to eat support into Biden. Polls show him right not eating into Trump — after all, it is failing against the establishment and Trump was very much pro vax. Joe Trippi warns such polls are fools gold — he still is trouble for Biden. A funny thing about the third party protest vote. Because the candidate is not winning anything, the entire exercise of a vote of support hinges on the same matter that collapses the “uncommitted primary” vote for me. This candidate signifies what exactly? I gather this is where the two sides battle it out with Kennedy — dump him over there and toss back like a hot potato grenade.

Poking about in right wing of the Internet, Biden has been given a moniker of “Cannibal Joe”, with a follow that the liberal media is not reporting on a goofy comment he made which caused a minor international kerplunk. Biden’s uncle was eaten by cannibals. And that I casually slide next to the revelation that Biden’s father had the most progressive attitude towards homosexuality of anyone in Scranton Pennsylvania in the 1950s. The neat trick on this one is we do have a great equivalency for Trump on the Stump — one that should show Trump is worse here than Biden. Trump, you will recall, claimed an endorsement from Hannibal Lector. Weirdly enough, he actually appears to have Hannibal Lector on his brain — came around later to reference Silence of the Lambs as the type of people coming in from South of the border. So on the Cannibal Beat, Biden remains in better standing. And the bizarre old man remark of a type that scuttled the resident’s presidential ambitions as far back as 1987 will continue to be more favourable than the in a sense similar but ultimately more psychotic old man ramblings of the former president.

On the defense, there is this somewhat amusing feature — necessary — where they use one of the same line as the prosecution but the line ends up with a different meaning. It is “use your common sense”. For the Defense, it is “stay cynical”, an attempt to get at an equivalency amongst all partisan factions — “I am shocked, SHOCKED”. So here “use your common sense” is affixed to the “it’s called Democracy”. And indeed, I do have the Prosecutorial frame of “election interference”, when the overall story is suppressing one real story that I have to tilt my head to figure why it matters amongst a sea of fake news (or whatever we should properly call it) from an outlet that has a lot of celebrity should-not-take-seriously stories, which now veered into the political.

The other day we had the anniversary of the day Donald Trump suggested drinking bleach to cure covid. It occurred to me that Vice President Biden, early in the Obama administration, made a real insane and instantly mocked by everyone comment on public health concerns. I think, if I recall right, Biden was comically overly protective — or maybe he was just prematurely prescient for covid. What this means is not all that much, other than to suppose that the Trip trial proceeds from the same basis as the Trump campaign — his path to victory is paved in forging cynical equivalencies every which where.

One other flash of familiarity on the Trump defense that stood out — a jocular refrain “We’re New Yorkers.”. Funny that. I remember Harvey Weinstein’s lawyer making the same appeal – – I am curious where that “be not afraid to f’ with the national consensus” is tried, like do they do that in Texas?

I served on a jury once. Something like an 8-4 decision to find the guy liable for the car accident but nothing more. You win your damages owed, but quit crying about it was the message, I guess.

On Trump. I ponder whether I would land on a jury. Probably not, but if you are rolling through some stray internet ramblings, I do say Kyle Rittenhouse will be acquitted as he should be — which I see here and there makes me a white supremacist. (Also proffer unsolicitated advice that if he is serious about a nursing career, probably stick to rural “red” enclaves and above all get the hell out of politics). That should signal I am able to give an acquittal to someone I think is a jackass. Probably the defense and prosecution doesn’t have the time or patience to get that far though. At best the prosecution could argue against dropping me from a jury in pointing to an anti-anti Trump response on a New Yorker article on why Trump’s diet habit matters with an “It really doesn’t matter”. Because beyond that you land in an “uh. Yeah”. I suppose at this point you would have a better chance with a batch of liberals to reach a deadlock than a batch of maga devotees — the political desire to not be political, remain impartial, able to defend Nazis so to speak — possibly to the bending over backwards to do so. I almost think that is what Representative Bryon Donalds — one time speaker hopeless hopeful — intuitively understood when making comments to the effect of reaching the just verdict “no matter what they think of Trump”, and that university’s Trump formula is one where he gets off and it is all rigged if he does not.

On the list of political affiliations for the jury survey which skip about Proud Boys and 3 percenters and the like, “antifa” gets tossed in at the end. Or. The group that vandalized and ransacked the Multnomah Democratic party headquarters shortly after the 2020 elections. The chaos bias works whatever manner.

From what I see of the case, the prosecution has him dead for rights. Which doesn’t matter too much — the Fox News hosts become very defense oriented, not a deference they give Joe Blow accused of a crime. A deadlock is as likely as a guilty verdict. I would like to think that the whininess that Trump exhibits right now would permeate and maybe it has — not like the man has sky-high approval ratings. I do cynically think the cry out “think of this as election interference case” is a strain — like, yeah that is what a campaign works to do — get rid of unwanted information from public view. It was blatantly obvious the National Enquirer was in the tank for Trump through 2015 and 2016, though I can never understand what that means for the public at large. It is like hearing the other explanation on Trump’s need to suppress Stormy Daniel’s affair — it interfered with the image he wanted to cultivate, “Family Values”. I throw my hands up in the air.

I stare and scratch my head at a Huffington Post. “John Bolton Reveals Who He’ll Vote For and… Um…” . The answer is Dick Cheney. He is writing in Dick Cheney. I don’t understand from whence comes the “um”. If you asked me who John Bolton was voting for and gave me a chance of three guesses, Dick Cheney would be one of them. And it such that if he could clear himself to Joseph Biden, it would be probably be prudent to hide this information, lest that turn away voters in the Democratic base. The story headline is a not a story.

If John Bolton is a bridge too far, we are a couple steps from basically about the only issue that could drive a Nikki Haley primary not Biden voter already to Biden. International affairs, NATO, Ukraine. I find the Biden Haley seeking ads obnoxiously ineffective, back to the easily rationalized as “just mean tweets”. It may be the case that the split of the vote will go its way no matter what Trump or Biden do.

I overhear the conversation amongst a group of sports fan and Catholic religious parents. A man is morally upset by a fundamental unfairness of Biden’s student loan forgiveness plans, and the manner he went about it. Another guy here chirps “One of the proudest days of my life is the day I got in my last payment on that and I got that paid.”. It is possible that some other issue will be the last issue on their mind when they turn in their ballot but at this moment I don’t see them not voting in something other than a maga mindset for Trump — a stopover of thought before to apolitical conversations on seeing a daughter off to college. Meanwhile another group, older than them, that I hear from time to time speak of friends, associates, who voted for Trump in 2000, and not doing it again because, duh, January 6. The hope in the hands of this demographic that they hold the line in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and surge ahead to keep the ironically diciest enterprise of Michigan.

I do not remember a bizarre quirk of local news coverage on previous drug epidemics. As a whole, it is the Meth Panic of the oughts, the Opioid Epidemic of the tens, and now the Fentanyl Crisis of the twenties. I am somewhat needing to slide in that in the teens a former resident of the New England states, describing the drug epidemics there, said that he was surprised by how much Meth lurks about here, so some things never disappear even as one drug overtakes the others for dominance and media harping.

And maybe it is the manner in which I am gathering media that leads to note this quirk of happenings — prevalent in the past, but I am not seeing YouTube clips pass by me, and I was not sitting in for local broadcast news. But what I seem to be seeing is an action faction news that reports on which corner right then is the drug hotspot. And it works. The corner is cleaned out as the drug dealers and users hop over four blocks. So news story — residents and businesses are harping on the presence here. And again, maybe spurred by this news coverage, maybe just a parallel — and I sure hope it is the latter — the police chase everyone off — over four blocks, and we are running around in circles.

I am not a stickler on everything being “root causes”. There is much value in quality of life concerns where drug dealing fades away from your or my public purview and you can walk by in peace. Not everything is superficial. This chasing around in circles for an Action Faction News just might just be, though.

For the first time I found myself barking with agitation at the podcast of Matt Taibbi. To a good extent, the normals and liberals excoriate him as horse-shoe theory in practice, and tack him to Glen Greenwald. But although they play the same terrain, I see a dishonesty and fracture point in Greenwald that I have not seen in Taibbi — and there are definite points of disagreement on their “Twitter files” loading of you care to bother with them. But. Within lodging some points on the Insta-hit piece positioning in from the start and not waiting to the two thirds point for the basic negative line for interviewing Robert F Kennedy jr — and they do have a good point that Kennedy’s Independent run came after the Democratic Party worked to bar him off any Democratic primary run (Don’t know if one foreclosed the other but it is a thought experiment on if that does them in somewhat as that bid leads to its inevitable nowhere) , Taibbi and his associate make the equivalence statements on how all the parties challenged all the elections — and here while there is some bit of truth in “Russian collusion” as Democratic Party cope on 2016 (The thing was ultimately our own damned fault), he swirls 2020 and its lack of hope for success and the claims that came with it as one and the same.

I have been noting some oddly off-key points from msnbc. A casual dunking on Trump on matters that do not matter, and whose broader point either makes it awash or slants in that jackasses’s favor. So. The Democratic fundraiser. Clinton! Obama! Colbert! A couple contemporary music acts I didn’t catch the name of! And a good little brushing of how much goddamned money this raised. Maybe there is a message on surrogates of a couple politicians of the past, and this matter was harped on by Lawrence O’Donnell — laugh at how no Republican president or vice president or living nominee is endorsing the man — and here it is just a little weird to bring one more sentence in tracking Dan Quayle which serves to reinforce his point (in the lead up to January 6, Pence took counsel with Quayle on what he ought do and Quayle kept him on the straight and narrow). But the sort of gloating here on funds raised moves back to the point all the msnbc hosts are harping on with Trump — the levelling nature of horse-race coverage, and this focus on fundraising extravaganza is your horse -race. Further, we are are lost in the singers who I do not know, as they float a comparison to Trump’s New Years show featuring, horror of horrors, Vanilla Ice and a Ninja Turtle. The problem here is, and I do not think I am alone, is that if given a choice between these two stars I do not know and a kitschy Vanilla Ice doing his “Ninja Turtle Rap” for the fun of it, sans the political figures it goes to, I would choose the latter. Such is the price of the party of cultural cache against financial currency where everyone is by their nature out of touch kinda. More to the point, the gratuitous dunking on this score contradicted the coverage of a coverage on Trump’s music Spotify playlist — the question of why is anyone giving this fluff piece analysis? — which despite its subjective digging at the song selection as hinting at authoritarianism enough masse does indeed have the point in — who cares? There are more immediate signals to point at.

Incidentally, on that score — celebrity and it’s discontents, for whatever it is worth, Biden has lost the support he once cultivated of Cardi B, singer of the ode to … Female prostituion, I guess?… “Wap”. And maybe you would assume it would be over Gaza, but actually it is over Ukraine. Isolationist sentiments you may not figure her to have — but really, do we really know Cardi B?