Saturday Morning Coffee (May 25, 2024)

Axios copes as Trump rallies, rumors turn to requests at the ICC, and times are tough in Hollywood. Grab a cup of coffee and sit a spell.

Photo by Julia Florczak on Unsplash

Is that really a win?

So this should have been a FFSF entry, but it came out on Friday morning and I didn’t want to hold on to it until next week. It’s too good.

Trump held a rally in the Bronx, and everyone seemed a bit surprised by the attendance, including Axios. But being a good little minion, they tried to downplay it. Notice the headline.

I’m trying to figure out what they were thinking. Are they trying to go for the “Trump is violent” theme, or are they hoping that readers will misread the headline as “Trump bombs [in] the Bronx” and move on?

But what I loved about the article was the “rebuttal.”

• The Biden campaign put out a digital and television ad that begins: “Trump disrespecting Black folk is nothing new.” The campaign posted on X: “Let's remember that Trump is a lifelong racist.”

It’s almost becoming a prayer these days: “Please remember. Please remember.”

And also please forget the many times Biden’s mask has slipped: “you ain’t black” and “poor kids are just as bright as white kids.”

But the most hilarious part:

• [Richie Torrees] noted that the Biden administration has invested more than $100 million in the redevelopment of Huntspoint Terminal Market in the heart of the South Bronx as well as $150 million to upgrade the Cross Bronx Expressway.

Yup, Biden loves the Bronx so much he spent $150 million to help drivers not have to stop there at all.

Do these people not listen to the words coming out of their mouths?

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People say their financial situation is “okay,” but that overall the economy is bad. How do you explain that?

If Donald Trump wins the election, the main reason will surely be that a majority of voters believe that America’s economy is in bad shape. And no matter how much you may dread a second Trump administration, electoral defeat for an incumbent who is seen as presiding over a bad economy is, at least in one sense, politics as usual.

By normal measures, however, the U.S. economy isn’t in bad shape. In fact, it’s doing quite well, better than almost all its global peers.

So much, you may say, for official statistics: If people feel that they’re doing badly, well, when it comes to the economy, the customer is always right.

But here’s the kicker: When asked, most Americans don’t say that they’re doing badly. On the contrary, survey after survey finds that most voters are feeling positive about their personal financial situation, even as they insist that the economy is terrible overall. Some surveys also ask an in-between question: What’s the state of your local economy? And respondents are typically much more positive about the economy in their own state than they are about the nation’s as a whole.

That author of the article is Paul Krugman, and he’s very frustrated because this seems totally inexplicable to him, and it could cost Biden the presidency.

So let’s suppose this is true for a moment and not an artifact of how they’re asking the questions. What could explain it?

I can come up with a few scenarios:

(1) After four years of economic gains, the reversal during COVID was so sudden and so painful and so disproportionately born by the lower and middle classes and, even though Trump started the lockdowns and the “great giveaways,” they are primarily associated with Biden that people are just that pessimistic. They also know that the government can upend the economy for what looks like no reason at all (at least in the rearview mirror). So their negativity about the economy comes from a bit of nostalgia and a whole lot of feeling like they’re living in a precarious state one half step from insolvency.

(2) Just because we say we’re fine doesn’t mean we’re okay with where we’re at. Let’s take health for a moment. I have chronic issues, but you ask me how I am, and I’ll say I’m fine, because I know it could always be worse and why kvetch? But does that make me really optimistic about my health? No, not at all.

(3) People feel like they’re being told to settle for less than they could have because their well-being is not the priority of the ruling class but they’re still expected to give them deference.

Do any of those sound plausible, or do you have your own ideas?

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ICC Prosecutors Seek Arrest Warrants

So I had to record and load this video here because between the time I started this and Saturday morning, I went from being able to embed the video from YouTube to this . . .

I’ll let you judge if there’s anything in here that would warrant that. It’s Reuters for goodness sake. But “age-restricted” is a way of restricting access to information. They did this with the Matt Orfalea video I showed you a while back.

So there are a lot of caveats to my opinion on this: No, I don’t believe any country should subsume its sovereignty to any international body. Concentration of power is the bedrock illness of our time. Cooperation within an international body is fine. Subjugation to an international body is a death sentence for any kind of true individual (much less national) freedom. That’s true for the UN, the WHO, the ICC, or the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, whom the Republicans think it’s somehow a good idea to allow to define “anti-semitism” for legal purposes for Americans.

The ICC is also pretty selective in its outrage. At any given time, there are any number of “war crimes” and atrocities being committed (Armenian genocide of 2023 *cough*).

But all that aside, if one could take the ICC seriously, this is the appropriate move.

Why?

Because they’re going after both the leaders of Israel and the leaders of Hamas, so they’re going after both those who are killing the civilians and those who are hiding behind the civilians.

Of course, the reaction was about like you’d expect.

I know, isn’t all this “bipartisanship” making you feel warm and fuzzy inside? I know it is me. Don’t you find it amazing how they can unit in purpose for the people of another country entirely?

The reaction I especially liked came from the delicate little southern porkchop himself.¹

Let’s cut through all the crap. Mr. Graham isn’t worried about the ICC going after our soldiers. He’s worried about the ICC going after our lawmakers, even though we’re not a signatory, and Israel’s not a signatory, and no country is going to cause an international incident by arresting any of them. But the “optics” are bad, really bad.

Now however you feel about this, and for the record, I feel nothing because the only thing that is more a joke than the heavily politicized ICC is the US lawmakers’ reaction to it, but however you feel about this, I found one particular angle interesting: that the ICC (and by extension the US) set themselves up for this quagmire by misusing the ICC to go after Putin.

If you’re interested, Alex Christoforou of The Duran explains. The whole video is about forty minutes, but the part that relates here starts at the beginning and runs to the about the thirteen minute mark.

So what do you think? Have our leaders once again made a bed they’re not going to want to lie in?

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Zelensky is no longer legally president of Ukraine, and that has interesting ramifications.

So as of May 21, the date Ukrainian elections should have been held, Zelensky is holding office illegitimately, or so Russia claims.

From TASS, a Russian News Agency:

Azarov pointed out that the Ukrainian constitution was crystal clear about the five-year presidential term. "The constitution also makes it clear on which date an election is to be held, so no matter what decisions Zelensky makes and what decrees he issues, he is working outside the law after his term in office expires," the ex-prime minister wrote on Facebook (prohibited in Russia due to its ownership by Meta, which has been designated as extremist).

Now why is this important?

If they would do it or not is a huge question, but combine Russia’s argument that President Zelensky is now Private Citizen Zelensky, and at that point, are they really taking out a foreign leader if they—I don’t know—blow him up?

I suppose the really big problem for Zelensky is that he wouldn’t win even if the election were held, which just is one more knock against the idea that Ukraine is in any shape or form a “democracy.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky would lose to the commander-in-chief he fired if an election were to be held now, according to a poll.

Zelensky removed Valerii Zaluzhny from his post in February following months of speculation about a rift between the pair, likely exacerbated by the general's assessment to The Economist that the war in Ukraine had reached a stalemate.

Zaluzhny was replaced by the commander of Ukrainian Land Forces Oleksandr Syrsky but has continued to enjoy great popularity among the Ukrainian public.

Will anything come of this? *shrug* But it’s interesting.

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Winston Marshall Update

I don’t know much about Winston Marshall, so is he prone to exaggeration? *shrug* (I do a lot of shrugging it seems.) But I can imagine Pelosi freaking out because a dirty “nobody” dared to question her, so there’s that.

Thoughts?

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“Punching Left”

I have my problems with Briahna Joy Gray, but this monologue is illustrative of the anger of all of us who have this wild idea that the loyalty of a party should be to its voters and not the other way around. Rather than demanding obsequiousness, maybe offer something people might need.

If you want a similar take with a lot more humor, here’s Jimmy Dore . . .

Remember what I said about people’s attitude toward the economy? The only way we get out of this is if people get tired of settling.

So do you think they’re there?

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Marco Rubio, seriously?

Okay, you know what I said about settling.

I read this article . . . .

and . . .

1. [As in top choice] Florida Sen. Marco Rubio. Yes, one of them would probably have to change his residence (c’mon, Trump owns property everywhere). Yes, there’s some bad blood from 2016 still. But Rubio makes so much sense. He takes Florida off the board (to the extent that it isn’t already) and probably ices Nevada and Arizona as well. He might put New Mexico into play. He’s reassuring to suburbanites, and beloved of anti-anti-Trump Republicans. He sounded Trumpian themes on working class woes before Trump. The only downside is the address thing, and even if neither wanted to declare residency elsewhere (much easier today than in 1789) the worst-case scenario would be that the vice-presidential election would go to the Senate, which Republicans probably control if Trump wins the presidency.

No, that is not the “only downside,” okay?

For once, I agree with Vox on something . . .

Vox gives three reason. The first is meh, the second is pure TDS, but this . . . this is accurate, despite the framing.

3) Trump’s age and corruption make it more likely he’d leave office involuntarily ahead of schedule: Finally, though veeps have often gone on to be elected president, the more common way they’ve ended up in the job is through its sudden vacancy, due to health or scandal reasons. Both are a bit more likely to befall Trump than the average president.

Look, it won’t be that he’s corrupt (or significantly more corrupt than any other president to justify what they’re doing). It will be that they’ll try to jail him and the man is knocking on the door of eighty. He won’t want to be facing prison once he’s out of office. (Honestly, really, who could blame him.) So he’ll ask for a pardon in return for stepping down. So whoever he picks as VP had better be someone you’d vote for, for president.

And Marco Rubio ain’t it for me.

He’s a swamp pachyderm when the vote counts.

This is the FISA “reform” that allowed for continued warrantless spying and gave the government expanded powers to force businesses to give the government access to their wifi.

It’s also the thing that was misused to spy on Trump, only on steroids.

And if you’ll notice the vote tally, there was no room for error. Rubio could have sunk it simply by voting “nay.”

But he didn’t.

That’s what kind of president Marco Rubio would make.

People want a change . . .

The politician who tops the list of preferred running mates for former President Donald Trump in a new poll in a key Northeastern swing state is not even a Republican.

Former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who ran for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination but left her party two years later to become an independent, stands atop the list in a new University of New Hampshire Survey Center poll.

Nearly a quarter (24%) of voters who indicated they are not supporting President Biden in New Hampshire named Gabbard when asked their preference for whom Trump should choose as his running mate.

I’m not saying that Trump will take on Gabbard, or even that when the rubber meets the road she’d accept. But Trump would be dumb to pick from the swamp.

Of course, that’s not stopped any politician before.

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Oscars are broke—sort of . . .

Okay, just a little fun with a point.

So it’s not quite what Dean Cain makes it out to be. There’s more nuance.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced a $500 million fundraising campaign Friday to ensure long-term, global support for its Oscar prizes, museum and educational programming in view of its 100th anniversary in 2028.

But it is true that viewership is down and Hollywood is struggling. I actually can’t remember the last time I went to a movie.

And everything they’re doing these days is just repeat and redo and sequels. Some I have a sort of cautious optimism about . . .

or the return of Axel Foley . . .

God, I loved the first Constantine, and Keanu Reeves tends to pick carefully.

However, with Beetlejuice and Constantine, I’m terrified that they’ll just go for special effects over actual story.

But others? They seemed doomed coming out the gate, like the new Roadhouse.

That one is going to flop (maybe? Hey, I don’t know much about your average moviegoer). They clearly never figured out what made the first one work so well.

Anyway, is there anything interesting coming out of Hollywood?

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Escapism

I prefer to read these days. So to that end, this week’s book was kind of . . .

I’m not a genre person, meaning I won’t read just anything because it’s a mystery or historical fiction or romance and so on. I tend to be a bit picky. I like twisty mysteries, and this wasn’t one, though I got fooled by the blurb. One could figure out the bad guy right from the beginning, and the “twist” wasn’t that much of a twist if a reader was paying any attention.

But . . . there was a bit of history, though at first glance it seems a conflation of the university and the very real neighborhood. The book is set in “Pan Town,” a St. Cloud neighborhood built by Samuel Pandolfo for his car company. (Think Fordlandia.)

The author put a series of tunnels under the neighborhood, which I can’t find evidence of online. (Maybe they’re a well-kept secret *shrug*).

However, there is a tunnel system under St. Cloud University.

So I learned something new and all was not lost.

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I have a “Pile of Things Left Undone,” so there won’t be a regular article this week.

What do you think about any of the above? Or anything else? Let us know in the comments.

1. If you can’t tell, I really don’t like Lindsey Graham.