Protest vote

Nov 4, 2020. Sam, the noble social justice warrior, entered the voting booth. It was time to make a decision. Several, actually. Killing old people because they take up space … no. Fracking ban … yes. Referendum to not not defund the Everglades Restoration Plan. Uh … yes? So, like yes, no, yes, yes, no whatever. Checking all these boxes is a pain in the ass! But they did it.

And now it’s like the big choice. Who’s going to be President? Donald Trump and Mike Pence. Ugggh. Old white male fascists, gross, gross, no? Duh! But … Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. Old white male; young whatever-she-is female. Sam liked Kamala. But they didn’t like Joe Biden. He was old and reminded Sam of their creepy uncle. And who said they had to choose between two parties anyway? Donkey or Elephant? Paper or plastic? Uh-uh. No way. 

After much consideration and pencil chewing, Sam bravely voted for Jack Cluckster, the Chicken Party candidate. Yeah, of course he’s going to lose! They knew that, duh! It’s a protest vote, OK?

Later, in the reeducation camps, Billie came to regret their decision.

They never voted again.

Drive by Review Space Force

Space force is a good show, intelligent, well written, well acted and well thought out. Well, well, well. But? 

But they’ve made a few compromises. 

To please the Office fanbase, they don't stray to far from the office template. Steve Carrell gets a familiar playground for his typical shtick. Officer X fits the rough outline of Michael Scott, with a few difference. He's a well-meaning boob with a good heart, basically. But the show's creators know damn well an incompetent dumbass would rise to four star general, even if it's a token position. X isn't a wimp who folds under the first sign of pressure. A former pilot of the F series, and that takes a bit of the right stuff. He isn't an idiot, either. HE helps his daughter with her Trigonometry homework. 
But if he's too brave and competent, CArewll could do his thing. His macho is a way of sneaking hoin hilarious mitakes. But he’s not an idiot. But he let’s his macho code do the blustering thing. It’s a bit of a cheat, but it works.



 to please the Office fanbase stick to the office formula, and give Steve CArreell a familiar playground for his typical shtuck. Specifically character incoisnstenciues.
Ofciver X tifts the rough outline of Michael Scott, with a few differences. He’s a well meaning boob with a good heart, basically. 
The show’s creators wqise3ly thought, we can’t make him a completed dumass or he would rise tio the position he did evwenb if it’s a token position either. He’s also not a wimp who folds iunder the first sign of pressure. He’s a military man, a former piloty of the F series, and that takes a bit of the right stuff.

Carrell sells the character with a subtle imitation of Georce C. Scott’s Patton. 

They also sell the idea of his 2020 gut instinct and keen intuition. HE doesn’t scrub a launch under lousy weather conditions because he see a chinese scientist has brought an umbrella where theerwe’s a barely a cloud in the skyu. He’s not a fraid of risks. These scientist are reisk averse, too careful. He goes with his gut and laucnehs the rocket and it doesn’t blow up you expect it to blow up, but it doesn’t.
The definance of expectations. But that kind of thinking led to the Challenger disaster,and that pisses me off. 
In the second episode, he brushes aside a wise suggestion to push the panels back to the satellite with asolar wind. His first instinct is using a bomb. Failing that, he gets a srtranded astrochimp to grab a drill, go out ina spoace and fix it. Ain’t never going to happen — but the suspension of belief is OK. It’s a funny sequence.I’ll go with it.
And see if this series eve takes off.
Trump is never mentioned by name. Just references to POTUS. A trweeting, blustering, impulsiuve, PR-crazy POTUS. You know who the hell he is. 
The show also teases you with the knowed that his wife was sent to prison a year after he got the job. Doesn’t say why. A political action, oprbably. But it’sa  clever hook to keep you watching. Y

He orders her not to land on the helipad. She defies the order. It’s a nice character moment. 

So he knows trhelps his daughter No idiot he. But he makes rookie science mistakes that nobody with those math skills would ever make.

Fascism for Dummies

Umberto Eco has a concise definition of fascism.

Mine is even shorter:

Fascism is the political expression of Sadomasochism.

(To be nice and sparkling clear, I'm talking S+M in the original Marquis de Sade sense, not fun and games with safe words.)

First-edition Sadism. Ur-Sadism. The Sadistic equivalent of Classic Coke.

Defined as: Getting off on somebody else's pain. Expressing your dominance through cruelty. Defining your own superiority by selecting a victim, and putting them in a submissive, inferior position by humiliating, degrading and hurting them — up to the point of murder.

That's the original flavor.

I was slow to make the connection. I didn’t get it at first, even after reading about George Floyd's murder. But it started a slow train of thought. I got to wondering ...

Floyd's ugly killing is nothing new. That’s the ugly truth. White cops have slaughtered unarmed black people for a long, long time. Video records of this ultimate police brutality are relatively new. They’ve sparked street actions before — but not on this scale. Floyd’s execution pushed African-Americans over the edge — and ignited a gut-level reaction on a national scale. Why? What's the difference? 

The answer is dead-obvious, at least to black people. Being a sheltered white guy, I failed to see it, even after reading the news story. Then I clicked on the video of George Floyd's execution. Just a few seconds. Couldn't take any more. But that was enough.  

A YouTube video's worth a thousand words.

What's the difference?

After seeing Floyd's murder-by-cop with my own eyes, I finally got the picture ...

Officer Derek Chauvin didn't merely kill George Floyd. He took his time. Enjoyed it. Got off on it.

It was a classic act of sadistic cruelty. A kink. A form of sexual perversion. That's what I saw after more than a week. That's what black people instantly saw. And why America's streets are on fire. 

George Floyd was starring in a white cop's personal snuff film. Black people don't want to play that anymore. Then it hit me ...

This snuff film has a name ...

Fascism. The all-American franchise called white supremacy.

Slow learner that I am, I finally realized that fascism = S+M with parades, flags and uniforms. It's a sexual fetish. Duh. All the leather, jack boots, whips, and stomping. What else could it be? 

Not the most original observation, I know. 

Intellectually, I already knew it. 

It's a major theme in Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow. The ugly lesson of the movie Closet Land. And the nightmare takeaway of George Orwell's 1984 ...

"If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face — forever."

This kink is global. And it's been around for a long, long time.

But in these United States, the face tends to be black.

And white people wear the boots.

"Rocketman" • Drive-by review

"Screw you, David Bowie! My astronaut song is better!"

Rocketman. Jeez Louise. This biopic rockstar movie-musical rubbed me the wrong way at first. Its indifference to facts, and whatnot. 

Full disclosure: Elton John was never at the top of my personal hit list. But even I know he didn’t play Crocodile Rock at the Troubadour in 1970. The song came out in 1972, man! C’mon! One of many inaccuracies. But freed of facts, the director just played around. Self-indulgent fantasy! The story beats are as obvious as the mile markers on Alligator Alley! You can see ‘em a mile away!

Yeah, OK. But the filmic result is a hell of a lot more entertaining than Bohemian Rhapsody. Once I realized that fact, I stopped grinding my teeth and enjoyed this counterfactual flick. It’s an interesting portrait of a singer-songwriter. Who is and isn’t a singer-songwriter. Which got me thinking ...

The A-list singer-songwriters all have a unique persona. Ian Anderson is the sneering pirate/troubadour/jester. Bob Dylan is the unwashed phenomenon. Mick Jagger is the androgynous Antichrist. David Bowie is the Man from Mars. Elton John is the flamboyant dude with big glasses banging on the old piano. The difference being …

Elton John didn’t write the songs. Bernie Taupin did.

For the Elton John persona.

Cool. So who the hell is Elton John?

The movie teases you with the question. Formulaic redemption aside, it never answers it.

But it’s damn entertaining.

"Rocketman" • Drive-by review

"Screw you, David Bowie! My astronaut song is better!"

Rocketman. Jeez Louise. This biopic rockstar movie-musical rubbed me the wrong way at first. Its indifference to facts, and whatnot. 

Full disclosure: Elton John was never at the top of my personal hit list. But even I know he didn’t play Crocodile Rock at the Troubadour in 1970. The song came out in 1973, man! C’mon! One of many inaccuracies. But freed of facts, the director just played around. Self-indulgent fantasy! The story beats are as obvious as the mile markers on Alligator Alley! You can see ‘em a mile away!

Yeah, OK. But the filmic result is a hell of a lot more entertaining than Bohemian Rhapsody. Once I realized that fact, I stopped grinding my teeth and enjoyed this counterfactual flick. It’s an interesting portrait of a singer-songwriter. Who is and isn’t a singer-songwriter. Which got me thinking ...

The A-list singer-songwriters all have a unique persona. Ian Anderson is the sneering pirate/troubadour/jester. Bob Dylan is the unwashed phenomenon. Mick Jagger is the androgynous Antichrist. David Bowie is the Man from Mars. Elton John is the flamboyant dude with big glasses banging on the old piano. The difference being …

Elton John didn’t write the songs. Bernie Taupin did.

For the Elton John persona.

Cool. So who the hell is Elton John?

The movie teases you with the question. Formulaic redemption aside, it never answers it.

But it’s damn entertaining.