I worked three days in a dental office this year, and it barely paid. Corporate dental is now trying to normalize 40-60% pay cuts for contractor dentists, under increasingly hazardous & exploitative work conditions. COVID-19 has killed dentistry, and my heart goes out to all those who still work in it. If you own a practice, or are staff, you don’t have much of a choice, as there are always bills to pay.
I’m strongly considering not renewing my DEA # & malpractice insurance. I’d like to get paid for being a musical artist or dental health educator, but it’s the corporate blacklist that’s in the way. Who knows what tomorrow will bring?
I spent much of my free time in 2020, stretching out my back, hips & core at home, while walking & hooping downtown. It’s almost all blacks at the courts, young & old, and they’re playing better-than-ever. At this point, I get a lot of love & respect down there, which I appreciate. Basketball players are like a tribe, so it’s like the people in this video.
Including this write-up, I managed to publish 69 blog posts this year (winning number), including new classics such as “DIY Haircuts” and of course “Donald Trump, ‘You’re fired!'” I also recorded some new music with a little help from my friend in December. Tom & I released two new songs this year– “Road Rage” and “Patch Me Up Doc,” which are already among my most popular songs on the streaming services. I have great help.
We have three more new songs coming in 2021. It’s nice to know I’m still not a dinosaur. I have new musical ideas, but no access to venues, or star artists, so options are limited for me until I can find a manager I trust. I think it’s a woman.
Blacklisting is the power of the ruling establishment to censor ideas & artists. This is conflicting with the masses, who are being depressed & under-represented during this pandemic– by the fake media. This coming year portends revolution, as the masses won’t tolerate being told they can’t survive, due to a virus which is spreading out of control because of the bureaucratic policy of “herd immunity,” which is malign neglect by any medical standard.
It’s time for doctors, nurses, and all health care staff to re-take the initiative on the handling of this global pandemic. When the U.S. first went into a lockdown back in March/April 2020, it was because doctors were calling for it. No one else knew what to do, and people were panicking everywhere. Compliance was high because many people understood the seriousness of the situation.
But political leaders of every nation have forced their economies to re-open, schools to re-open, through a campaign of lies & misinformation, under conditions where a killer virus is spreading with no vaccine. This was all to meet the demands of Wall Street & the banks.
Now at the end of 2020, the vaccine roll-out has been sluggish & disjointed, obviously by design. This will maximize corporate profits, and create black markets with protected stockpiles in place. It will make sure the wealthy get vaccinated first. It’s not about saving lives, it’s about maximizing profits for corporate, and protecting the rich.
These are the conditions myself & humanity face rolling into 2021.
I’m from Wisconsin and went to college at Marquette, so I’ve been to a lot of parties & bars. As a musician you spend time at bars. Before the coronavirus pandemic struck, I had just invented a great two-person drinking game. The problem was I never found the right partner to play it with. Since who knows when all this is going to be over, I’m publishing my newly-invented drinking game, with all the rules. Here’s the official song.
You do this with someone you really like on sight. Go up to her and be nice, offer to buy her a drink, etc, and if you can get her semi-alone, then start this game. “Would you like to play a personal drinking game I just made up?” The yes/no reply is the first test. If she’s not game, then she probably lacks courage & imagination. That’s what I say, and it makes the rejection easier. This game will weed-out the wrong ones, one way or another.
Okay she’s beautiful, and says yes. Now you’re cookin’. Tell her, “The name of the game is ‘I’m not looking for that,’ and I’ll start to demonstrate.” Gaze around the bar/party, and start surveying people individually. Begin with something like, “You see that 200-pound girl over there, showing us WAY too much gut? I’m not looking for that.”
Rule: If the listener laughs, or is amused, then they take a drink. Now it’s her turn to tell you what she’s not looking for…
I’ll list a few rounds to illustrate a typical society-party situation for me.
ROUND 2: “Do you see that guy who’s been looking at me since I walked in here? I’m not looking for that.”
ROUND 3: “Do you see that 55-year old lady who’s pretending she’s 28? I’m not looking for that.”
ROUND 4: “Do you see that pretty thing who has destroyed herself with drugs & alcohol? I’m not looking for that.”
ROUND 5: “Do you hear that girl who has no sense-of-humor at all? I’m not looking for that.”
Once you’ve taken-out all the easy targets, it’s time to deliver a few sobering thoughts. If she’s hanging in there, and making YOU drink, it means she’s a good woman. Now is the time to get specific on lying & other big turn-offs.
ROUND 6: “You know those people who think lying, to the one you love, is okay? I’m not looking for that.”
ROUND 7: “You know those women who are just in it for themselves? I’m not looking for that.”
These are the brutal advanced rounds, where you need to keep your head, while inebriated with alcohol & enchanted by beauty. This is graduate-level drinking & partying. If you earn a PhD here, you’ll probably find your life partner, because everyone is looking for this. To those who can’t handle this, I’m not looking for that.
When an artist dies, the inheritors are often not equipped to deal with the responsibility of owning such valuable work. The estate inheritors almost always end up selling this intellectual property to a conglomerate, and for less than the artist would have received, because they don’t know the business, or have the clout. This is why Bob Dylan just sold his entire song catalog of over 600 songs to Universal Music Group, for reportedly over $300 million.
Bob Dylan is 79 years old, and he lived a hard life, which means he knows his death is near. Selling his song catalog makes inheritance easier, as an artist can’t control their music when they’re dead. I’m guessing that’s Bob Dylan’s primary motive for selling out at this time. A lot of other prolific musicians have been doing the same lately, and it’s because they need the money.
As for Dylan’s legacy, he did his part as an artist, and more. A major reason Bob Dylan turned towards the mainstream was because there was no politically organized “left” back in the 1960’s. The Trotskyist movement itself was splintered, and needed to be ridden of Pabloists, Stalinists, and worthless middle-class radicals.
Bob Dylan was so far ahead of his time in 1965, that in many ways, the world has yet to catch up. That’s why “It’s Alright, Ma”, “Like a Rolling Stone” and “Visions of Johanna” lead his list of timeless classics. Find those albums and you will discover the meaning of art in songwriting.
This brings up the issue of artists becoming dinosaurs. “Dinosaur” is an industry term for a performer who can no longer adapt to the current culture, and gets left behind. It’s partially a misnomer, as the real dinosaurs didn’t go extinct because they failed to adapt, they were wiped-out by an asteroid impact which changed the conditions of life on our planet. In truth, they survived in miniature form, as birds.
With that anthropological understanding in mind, it can be said that all artists eventually become dinosaurs, because no one can stay current & relevant forever. Once you become a dinosaur, your priorities change from being an artist, to making a living & survival. Bob Dylan is the most extreme example of this phenomenon. Fans can debate when he became ossified, but by the 1980’s (for sure) Bob Dylan was a dinosaur.
This is what capitalism does to all artists. You have a choice of “playing ball,” or being left out in the cold. By orienting towards a genuinely revolutionary organization such as the Socialist Equality Party, an artist can remain relevant much longer than most contemporaries, because that artist is staying in-tune with the times for inspiration. It’s reactionary politics which overwhelmed & ossified Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Madonna & the rest. The price of remaining a true artist is the lack of money, sponsorship & venues to perform. That’s the lesson to be learned here.
This crazy, unbelievable & inexplicable play happened during Sunday Night Football last night, Denver vs Kansas City. I don’t watch a lot of NFL anymore, but when I do, and I see something this crazy, I feel compelled to publish my thoughts here.
Kansas City WR Tyreek Hill is a speed demon, and has his man easily beat with the throw there, but he jumps too early as a showboat maneuver, allowing the defender a swipe to dislodge the slightly underthrown ball, which is better than an overthrown ball. The point is that it’s a professional throw from QB Patrick Mahomes, and should have been an easy six points.
Tyreek Hill actually makes the juggling catch but is unaware of it, because he knew he blew the easy catch, while hitting the ground hard which jars the senses. That’s why Tyreek Hill didn’t call for a challenge, he’s on a knee trying to recover all his senses. If you want to say this is another ego-centric brain-dead jock, who got popped for hot-dogging it, I won’t argue.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PV_-I6MotMs
In total, the wide receiver, the referee, and head coach all blew this play. Andy Reid inexplicably rushed his punt team out, and the ball was snapped just as the replay came up. I thought Tyreek Hill caught it while watching live on TV, because I never saw the ball pop out. At least burn a time out (especially in the first half) to give your coaching staff upstairs time to review the play.
You need at least two looks at replay to confirm it’s a catch. If Reid thought the Broncos might challenge it as an interception, instead of an incompletion, it’s still a touch-back the same as punting into the endzone on 4th down. I know Andy Reid is a great football coach, but sometimes even the best make mistakes under speed & pressure, and it happened here.
It’s the referee who makes the biggest mistake, by making the wrong call. He’s in good position, but the bodies collide, twist, and fall away from him, so the official doesn’t really see what happens. He instantly has to make a call by ‘best guess’ so he signals incomplete pass. His real mistake is in what he DIDN’T do next.
What he should have done next was signal to a colleague that he needed replay confirmation on that call. If that had been done, it would have been overturned as a touchdown. That’s where the entire officiating crew blew it, with most of the blame going to the guy on the call & the head official. Wide receiver hot-dogging, then bad officiating, followed by poor decision-making by a Hall-of-Fame head coach, are all part of one of the craziest football sequences you will ever see.
NBC aired the game with Al Michaels & Cris Collinsworth on the call. Al is old & Cris never says anything that stays with you. They just sound good, while not telling you anything you need to know. They were behind on this entire sequence as it unfolded. Mike Tirico & Tony Dungy are NBC’s best NFL broadcast team, and IMO are even better than Jim Nance & Tony Romo on CBS. Fox’s broadcasts are a distant third in the NFL watchablility race.
And finally, as a musical artist, I don’t care much for the NBC Sunday Night Football theme song, sung by Carrie Underwood. It’s too vicarious, clichéd & processed for my taste. The biggest thing to ever come from American Idol has a great voice, so she doesn’t need all that sound processing, but Carrie Underwood isn’t a songwriter, so she does need a good song.
This theme song is too much of a rip-off of Hank Williams, Jr’s “All my rowdy friends are here on Monday night” from ABC’s Monday Night Football of yesteryear. It also mimics Joan Jett & the Blackhearts’ “I hate myself for loving you.” Pure formula.
Here’s my anti-Grammy winning NFL theme song for 2020
On Friday, November 6, by ~1:00 PM ET, Georgia & Pennsylvania had grown to an insurmountable lead for Biden, as the votes continue to be counted. Both states can be called for Joe Biden with 100% certainty, putting him over 270 in the Electoral College. Arizona & Nevada will also go to Biden; with Alaska (for sure) & North Carolina (probably) going to Trump. That’s all that was left in play. It appears the final Electoral College totals will be Biden 306, Trump 232, or somewhere in that vicinity.
In 2016, I titled my election night write-up “Fascism Wins Election 2016.” I prefer this title much better, I must admit. The majority of Americans have wanted to say this to Trump for a long, long time. That’s what’s being celebrated, much more than a Joe Biden victory. Ironically, it was Trump being hospitalized at Walter Reed with Kung Flu that contributed in making him a lame duck. This made Trump appear weak & stupid when he most-needed to project strength & authority.
A huge round of appreciation & recognition is deserved for all the polls workers, ballot counters, etc, who had to do their jobs under the most extraordinary circumstances, including an uncontrolled coronavirus pandemic with intentional political intimidation & shenanigans from the right. The vote counting in Las Vegas, Phoenix, Philadelphia & Atlanta, which took days to complete, swung those states for Biden and determined the election.
ABC, CBS & NBC all cut-away from Trump’s press conference during the evening news Thursday night, another unprecedented episode in these unprecedented times. After tweeting “STOP THE COUNT,” and other cynical messages from his White House bunker, Trump still has lawsuits pending in a few states, and possibly a campaign to pressure electors in the Electoral College to flip to him, a violation of the US Constitution.
Recounts and/or litigation will be going on in Wisconsin, Georgia, Arizona, Nevada & Pennsylvania, so voters will need to keep an eye on all that for themselves, and not trust the Democrats to do it for them.
It was the Trotskyists led by the World Socialist Web Site, who did more than anyone in defending the US Constitution and democratic principles such as free speech during Election 2020. These fundamental democratic rights are still under attack, but now workers & youth are much more aware of them, which is half the battle. This was an ideological struggle where Trotskyists were the most adamant defenders of the right to vote, in an election where their candidates were blacklisted.
Donald Trump took an oath as US President to defend the Constitution, and only the Trotskyists held him to that oath. The Democrats insist only when it’s convenient, such as now. This is how right-wing Democrats flip to appear progressive, as needed. Bernie Sanders is the master of this type of chicanery.
It wasn’t anything close to the Democratic landslide which had been predicted in the fake media, as enthusiasm for the two-party system is flagging, and the slack is being picked-up by the Trotskyists, which MSM can’t acknowledge– out of fear. That’s the issue with all bourgeois political polling, the unacknowledged shift to the left by 90% of the population. This was a dump Trump vote. Nothing in the Biden-Harris campaign has anything progressive for the workers & youth of America which have been devastated by COVID-19 & inequality.
The Trump administration had help in unleashing its back-to-work, and then back-to-school campaigns, under the policy of herd immunity– all during the election. The Democrats rallied with Republicans to bail out ‘too big to fail’ zombies for the last time on March 27, 2020 with the CARES Act. The problem is that they’re bankrupt again already. The free money is gone and they need more, but there is no more. The Fed is tapped out, so it’ll be more money printing with hyper-inflation ahead. That’s when a general strike & educational sickouts will stop everything, and then politics enters the revolutionary domain, where Trotskyists will take the historical stage.
This repudiation of Trump is a devastating blow to the far right, which includes Nazis, white supremacists, Confederates, religious gun nuts & fascists. Their figurehead has been toppled, and more importantly, he’s about to lose his trappings of power. Without Democratic props to hold him up, and all means of violence at his command, Trump is nothing. Fascism has been democratically rejected by the American people, and that has serious implications for the incoming Biden-Harris administration as well. The people have moved far, far to the left.
It was the Trotskyists who warned the working class & youth of the dangers of fascism during this election, from Trump’s coup attempt in calling out the National Guard to suppress protests against police violence, to his plotting with armed militias to kidnapped & kill the governor of Michigan. The World Socialist Web Site led this effort in political educational for the working class & youth. Chaos & violence was the Trump election strategy because they knew he couldn’t win re-election honestly. Never in US history has an incumbent President run such a campaign. As the WSWS pointed out, Trump was running for führer, which is remarkable.
Trump is a sociopath with delusions of grandeur, and this is his Waterloo. Comparisons to Adolph Hitler’s last days in his Berlin bunker may be apt as well. History will tell, but this is what to expect, in one form or another. In 2016, Trump blew up the Republican Party in winning the nomination, then the US Presidency. In the four years since, he has divided Washington, the nation, and the world like no politician since Hitler. The Republican Party became the party of Trump, an elitist fascist gangster. Trump attempted to establish his own personal dictatorship, and failed. He will never get another chance. This is why fascists are so morose right now.
It’s also why the Democrats are trying to fix their relationship with the Republicans. Fox News flipped on Trump, and it was obvious early on election night, which is a huge story. It means Rupert Murdoch is abandoning the alt-right, Breitbart & Q-Anon. These outright fascists had been Republican Party allies, until very recently. The Republican Party has been irrevocably fractured by four years of Trump, and there is no putting Humpty-Dumpty back together.
The most politically far-sighted Democrats, such as Barack Obama, understand this is supposed to be an intramural scrimmage, and they are surely reaching out to Trump (behind closed doors) to be part of an orderly transition-of-power. Trump will acquiesce soon enough, because he’s weak-minded, defeated & hopeless. By February 2021, no one will care about Trump tweets anymore, and that is what kills him politically. Take away his big stage and Trump is nothing more than a blowhard conman. He has no intelligence or resourcefulness to fall back on, and apparently he’s over $400M in debt. All this has political implications.
One final media note, Russia Today (RT) took an openly pro-Trump line early in this election, and it hurt their journalistic credibility irreversibly. RT used to have some reporting, but pro-Trump bias has turned them into an open mouthpiece for reaction, a legacy of their Stalinist roots. Their articles are often lazy, their Op/Eds are all awful, and their commenters are now 90+% fascist trolls. It also needs to be said that since Biden won, there was no ‘Russian interference’ from bots in election 2020, according to the MSM.
Political ‘ground game’ is defined as how you do for your Party, on-the-ground, during election day & the crucial days leading up to it. As a rule, I walk all over people who deserve it, so the following is a sketch of my 2020 ground game.
I’m surviving in a Sanford apartment complex, with lots of people moving in & out during the past six months. I used to be a newbie, but now I’m the grizzled veteran here. That’s COVID-19. The county hospital next door is filling up with ICU cases.
Military jets are doing drills overhead, out of Sanford International Airport, the weekend before election day. They sound like they’re mobilizing for Iwo Jima, with cops all over the place, and rarely with a friendly face. Fire engines & ambulances are drilling & blaring their sirens to whip up support for Trump. It’s a total shitshow at the taxpayers’ expense.
It was the “Lockheed Martin Space and Air Show” at Sanford International Airport, which actually ran three days from Friday, October 30 to Sunday, November 1– a thoroughly Trumpian event. I watched & heard it all, for three days. I had no choice, they flew overhead so many times. Tight triplets strafing is their favorite Thunderbird maneuver. “Don’t be too proud of this technological terror you’ve constructed…,” I say out loud in my James Earl Jones voice.
Photographed above are the remains of the vapor trails from the military jets who made a heart symbol, way up in the atmosphere. I call it “Bullet the Blue Sky,” and sang that U2 song on my porch as I observed my tax dollars at work, “Peelin’ off those dollar bills, slappin’ them down, one hundred, two hundred…” I’m a big Brian Eno fan.
Later, in my best redneck voice, “Any one of them F-15 or Blue Angels boys could shoot down any Russian mig, and drop a big enough nuclear payload to light up them Ruskies until Kingdom Come.”
And my final Sanford Military Airshow riff, “Maverick just lost Goose, where are you Iceman?!!”
This was Friday mornin’. They’re either rentin’ or repossessin’. Aaron’s is their big competitor. To be fair to the police, they have a tough job right now. Beyond Trump’s fascist militia supporters in their ranks, there are a few boy scouts (& girl scouts) in law enforcement. I see them here often now, with their ‘community enforcement’ vehicles for domestic incidents. All races & ages are affected. Before coronavirus that almost never happened here. That’s how quickly it’s all collapsed.
Early voting at the public library (pic above) had lines everyday from start to finish. Political signs & lobbying on every street corner of 1st & Palmetto. Strong support for “Dump Trump.” The Democrats had the better music, I told a Trump supporter in his camping chair one afternoon, and he just laughed as I passed by. That’s what is was like downtown.
Sanford city landscaping took out the Coleus and planted these, I don’t know their name, but I think they’re nice– so I snapped a shot. Sanford ‘Parks & Rec’ keeps up with this, so the workers are doing a good job, meaning they aren’t they problem. It’s another class that is the problem. Another point here is to find the beauty where you can and acknowledge it. All this needs to be in your head while doing this, and if you do, you’ll have an unstoppable ground game.
Downtown Sanford, all around.
This is my favorite graffiti art around town. I have no idea who it actually is.
The Sanford Herald published all the local news that’s fit to print.
Wells Fargo are among the institutions which We the People need to directly talk to and demand accountability from. If they can’t deliver, then they must be declared bankrupt and arrested on the spot as criminals. These banks must be seized as public utilities by the workers & youth. Since big banks are transnational, this revolution will be international in character.
Wells Fargo & their cronies got Dems & Reps to unite & bail them out, with trillions of dollars in the CARES Act this past March, the largest swift transfer of wealth, to the extremely wealthy, in human history. Wells Fargo also financed this shitshow called Election 2020.
Other thoughts: How do voters make sure any recounts aren’t stolen? Transparency in the process, along with keeping armed militias & right-wing mobs from interfering, is essential. There can be no tolerance for criminal behavior against the US Constitution. This is how to defeat fascism. Knowledge is power, but it take principles & courage to act appropriately.
On profanity & bad language. Profanity means cognition is inhibited and replaced with emotional rage. That doesn’t help. Vulgarity just drags us down into the mud with Trump & his far-right filth. Get control of these powerful but dangerous emotions, and channel them into Trotskyism, as I did here. This is how a modern artist creates a meaningful political statement from anger.
Fri 06 Nov 2020 11:00 AM EST
I called Georgia for Biden on my Fakebook pages around 10:30 AM ET. Fakebook doesn’t like that. They have been censoring & meddling with everyone’s newsfeed because they hate free speech. When it’s down to a trickle with absentee & military balloting, along with ‘curing’ spoiled ballots, and they’re mostly going for Biden who has an insurmountable lead with well over 99% of the vote counted, you can call it with 100% certainty. That’s 16 Electoral votes for Biden, which put him at 269 or 270 depending on whom you follow.
One thing that needs to be highlighted at that point in time is the archaic nature of the Electoral College, where Nebraska & Maine split their votes for the actual election on December 14, 2020. These electors can be put under extreme political pressure to be ‘unfaithful delegates’ if it ends up 270-268. Or 269-269. There are 14 US states which have laws that allow Electoral College delegates to flip.
Real Clear Politics provides the best online return data for US elections, with 15-second interval updates, which is crazy. This allows anyone with the know-how to be an online expert in real time, from home. I don’t read any of the RCP articles, I just need their data. If you can be good with numbers and understand what they mean, it’s a nice compliment to a strong ground game. This gives you all-around political legitimacy that is hard to beat.
As far as network analysts go, one NBC politico nailed it when he pointed out the number of remaining ballots were all in urban Democratic strongholds, with their current & historical splits– going back to 2008. The splits were holding up, and mostly 70/30, with a few 85/15, for Democrats.
That’s all I needed to know from TV, besides the live reports & video from Maricopa County, Arizona, where Trump supporters descended like locusts on the vote-counting center, after Fox network declared the state (11 electoral votes) for Biden. This was Trump’s reason for wanting to stop the count. What did you expect, for Trump to be a good loser?
Fri 06 Nov 2020 11:30 AM EST
Joe Biden’s lead is increasing with about 350,000 votes to be counted, mostly in overwhelmingly Democrat strongholds.
The Democrats are milking this for all it’s worth, while Trump is in denial– as always. Everyone else wants it to be over. By 1:00 PM ET it’s mathematically over, so I fill in the few remaining blanks in the opening paragraph, and click publish. No more fake media for me. Over & Out
North Dakota House candidate David Andhal died a month ago from COVID-19, yet WON his election yesterday. Joe Biden can’t easily defeat the most unpopular president in US history for the same reason. “It’s a devastating indictment of the Democratic Party and its inability to present any progressive alternative to the fascistic politics of the Trump administration,” writes Patrick Martin of the World Socialist Web Site this morning.
There are 235,000+ dead (and counting) in the US from coronavirus, tens of millions of people out of work, schools in shambles as is the rest of the economy; and yet Biden can’t thump Trump on election day. This is because the Democrats ran a completely right-wing campaign which offered nothing to working people & youth.
Lots of silence on my social media feed this morning from vocal partisans yesterday. Most people are stunned. Dem & Rep voters only had a plan for November 3rd, while the Socialist Equality Party has a plan for November 4th and beyond. That’s the difference between revolution, and more of the same.
Trump won Florida, but Biden won Seminole County which includes Sanford, a traditional Republican stronghold. This concerns Republican strategists immensely. All the local channels noted & commented on it last night. It had virtually no effect down-the-ballot, as Republicans dominated as usual. This can be interpreted that votes for Biden, were at least 80% anti-Trump votes. Biden is a zombie who elicits no support from working people or youth, but people hate Trump.
Bernie Sanders would have done much better, perhaps won Florida for the Democrats, trounced Trump, and this horrible election would be over already. But Bernie was never serious about being president, or anything else he said. Kamala Harris had an effect, but it was negligible, as she is anti-working class through & through.
During this election campaign, I have read of Trump supporters stealing opponents political signs from front lawns, ripping-off stickers from cars, etc. ‘Trump trains’ of heavily-armed pickups & SUV’s are mobilized to intimidate opposition supporters. These are the methods & strategies of fascists, who have nothing but hate, violence & COVID-19 for the rest of us.
The question to all Trump voters is: Will you accept the results of the election, as you did in 2016? If you say, “No,” then you are definitely a fascist. We have a Constitution, and the people of this country will defend it, despite every effort by the Democratic Party to chloroform the masses of the dangers. What Trump does best is go to court, and he plans to take this election to the US Supreme Court, which he has packed with reactionaries.
It’s sick that we have this many so-called patriots, who haven’t read the Constitution, and yet presume to lecture us on freedom. What does separation of church & state mean? What is free speech? Answer that honestly, instead of always skipping the 1st Amendment, and then citing the 2nd. That’s how to handle Trump’s thugs.
Other the other side of the aisle, racialism is the Democratic Party construct. It’s defined as being obsessed with race, the liberal form of racism. Liberals don’t want to discuss class issues, so they accuse anyone who does, as being a racist. That’s the ‘Big Lie Technique’ straight from Langley. Those are the tactics of fascism, yet liberals never see it in themselves. This is why we are where we are right now.
Summary: This was one of those seasons where there was an unbeatable team, and it was their year. The last time it was this way in MLB was in 2018, when the Red Sox won it. Most of us didn’t know at the time that the Red Sox were using electronic devices to illegally steal signs, so that removes some legitimacy from their title. If they were so great, why did they cheat?
I don’t see any such issues with the Dodgers in 2020. They were clearly the best team, and did it the right way, since after Game 2 against the Padres in the NLDS. They have young pitching & players, so they’ll probably be back. The Rays went as far as they could go on a payroll of $58.3M. You need MUCH more to win it all in this era. Maybe Cash should have stayed with Snell a bit longer, but it felt inevitable that the final outcome would have been the same.
The Tommy Pham-Jake Cronenworth deal to the Padres for Hunter Renfroe was mandated last winter by ownership to stay under $60M in team payroll for 2020. It was a cheap-ass move, and it finally caught up with the Rays in the World Series. They couldn’t score runs, and were always a bat or two short against the Dodgers. Andrew Friedman won this World Series when he acquired Mookie Betts, David Price & Brustar Graterol in the off-season.
Game 4 of the 2020 World Series had the most unbelievable & exciting finish in baseball history. Francisco Cabrera in 1992, pinch-hitting for the Atlanta Braves in Game 7 of the NLCS is the only thing close, and it wasn’t as amazing as this. Here’s that heart-stopping baseball moment, with the classic call by Sean McDonough.
To be able to quickly & precisely analyze the action, here are a few of my MLB viewing secrets. First, I mute the Fox broadcast because everyone sucks except John Smoltz, and even he was overwhelmed at the end of Game 4. I had the sound on for that, but 95% of the time I’m watching, it’s muted. This takes Joe Buck out-of-play, which always helps, and I’m especially grateful when I see ‘Ken Rosenthal reporting’ on the silent screen.
Secondly, I don’t watch a lot of the game anymore. I have alternate channels for commercial breaks, and often I’ll stick with that instead of going back to the game. I don’t want to watch the Dodgers pile on runs early, I’ve seen enough of that as a Padres fan, so for Game 4 I watched Bullitt (1968), and made the game my alternate channel during commercials. Great movie.
I prefer to have two alternate channels, in case of overlapping commercial breaks. A classic Columbo episode I hadn’t seen before helped during Game 4. If I miss something important in the middle, I can review the highlights & boxscore on the internet. With these tools at my fingertips, the game isn’t such an exhausting & emotional roller coaster. I’m relaxed & in-tune at the end when it’s all the drama, and all the chips are on the table. All this helps a sports blogger comment intelligently on the action. I don’t have the advantage of access, like so many of these flunkies I’ve mentioned, so I have to be A LOT better than them to have an impact.
I thought Dave Roberts managed his bullpen poorly at times, making this series longer that it should have gone. If Brustar Graterol starts the 9th in Game 4, he has to face at least two batters. Having Kenley Jansen ready if Graterol faltered, was the winning manager move for Dave Roberts in Game 4. The Padres had rocked Jansen a few times earlier in the season, and Roberts knew he was shaky. That was a high-leverage situation in which the manager MUST go with his best pitcher. Graterol is the Dodgers’ best reliever, and he had 0.1 IP in Game 4, on 7 pitches.
Rays manager Kevin Cash doesn’t make these types of mistakes because he’s not tied to a high-$$ closer, or sentimental about ‘his guys’ to a point where it clouds his judgment. Cash is perhaps too analytical, and not trusting enough of his guys. Both extremes can get your team beat, and it’s a razor’s edge. Instead of the Dodgers taking a 3-1 lead, and the Series basically over, they put themselves in a dogfight after they gave it away in the 9th.
The final losing nuance was that Kenley Jansen didn’t back-up home plate on the GW play, which makes him fortunate he doesn’t close for the Yankees. West Coast media is far more relaxed & understanding. When you do that for Steinbrenner, he goes directly to the NY media, “If that fat toad can’t get off the mound and back-up home plate, then blah, blah, blah… rant, rant, rant…” In contrast, Dave Roberts quietly never went to Jansen again in the Series, and that was that.
The Rays had a chance after winning that wild & amazing Game 4, but when Manny Margot got nailed trying to steal home in the 4th inning of Game 5, that turned the Series back to the Dodgers. It was a bad play, so don’t believe any of the media hype that excused it as a good attempt. Runners at 1st & 3rd, 2 out, Rays down 4-2, with Kevin Kiermaier at the plate against Kershaw. The upside if Margot makes it is the Rays are still down a run.
It’s the runner on 1st, and potential run at the plate that mattered more in terms of winning the game. Kiermaier is the heart & soul of the Rays, so what Margot is saying is that he doesn’t trust their team leader to do the job. If Margot stays put and Kiermaier homers, it’s 5-4 Rays.
The Rays were REALLY upset with Margot over this, and that’s why he had to say to the media it was 100% his decision. It hurt the team’s chances immeasurably. When it happened, I said to myself, “That’s why AJ Preller traded him. He’s got tools, but comes up short against the Dodgers. Stupid & selfish play.” The Rays committed zero fielding errors in 6 WS games, but that base running error was more than they could afford.
I snoozed on Game 5 shortly after Manny Margot got thrown out trying to steal home. The Dodgers were making the plays & getting all the calls, so I didn’t think the Rays had a chance. The home plate umpire was very generous with Clayton Kershaw’s strike zone as compared to Rays pitcher Tyler Glasnow.
I thought Corey Seager was out at second base on his 1st-inning stolen base attempt, even though replay upheld the safe call. That gave the Dodgers what they needed to win easily. East coast bias works against the Rays because Yankees & Red Sox staffers in the league office (& replay booth) despise them much more than the Dodgers.
It’s just as important to know when to give up, as it is to know when to pay attention. This video above at 2:04-05 shows Seager is tagged by Willy Adames just before he reaches second base, which means he’s out. Replay is there is correct that, but instead it upholds an incorrect call– because of human bias.
My alternate channels weren’t so great for Game 5, which was another reason I snoozed. Classic Columbo, ruined by that annoying dopey side-kick jerk Dennis Dugan, who got that part on every great 1970’s TV series– from The Rockford Files to any action show. He married Joyce Van Patten, so I think that explains it. Ghost Whisperer is always muted. I don’t know any of the characters names, I just like to look at Jennifer Love Hewitt.
All this made Game 6 feel like impending doom for Rays fans. Randy Arozarena homered in the 1st to put them up 1-0, and from there they tried to hang on. Trying win 1-0 games against $200M+ payroll teams in the World Series is next-to-impossible. Even when the Rays win, it’s often not an enjoyable experience, more a combination of surprise & relief. They’re amazing to admire & learn about, but painful to root for.
The Rays are locked into their 30-year lease on the Tropicana Dome in St. Petersburg. Tampa won’t build them a new stadium, so that means in 2028 they’ll be the Charlotte Rays. It sucks being a Rays fan for so many reasons.
It was an inexcusable & irresponsible act by Dodgers 3B Justin Turner, after being pulled in the 8th inning for testing coronavirus positive, to rejoin his teammates for celebrations after the game– without a mask [!] on top of that.
Dave Roberts lowering his own mask to spit (over & over) in the Dodgers dugout wasn’t good either. The final lesson is that these athletes (for the most part) haven’t taken this pandemic seriously. They are privileged jocks, so they ignore science because know they won’t have to deal with any of the nasty consequences. I hope there is no more baseball until this pandemic is truly under control.
Ratings Review: The Los Angeles Dodgers-Tampa Bay Rays World Series TV ratings average was 32% below the previous low, which had been the Giants sweep of the Tigers in 2012. The NBA, NHL, and the rest of sports are down too. What explains this?
I watched parts of the NBA Playoffs & Finals, so I can say the basketball was as well-played as I had seen in a long, long time. LeBron James & Jimmy Butler both performed for their respective teams, and it was a good series, more competitive than most had predicted. It was the same with MLB in 2020, all the way through the World Series, the quality of the games were the best I have ever seen.
This means the problem is NOT the athletes. The problem is the COVID pandemic which has wrecked so many lives, to the point where people don’t care about sports the way they used to. The corporate messaging & political virtue-signaling are HUGE turn-offs too. Whenever you read a mainstream article on the internet about the ratings being down for sports, they never tell you why, because they can’t admit they are the problem. One final fact, no one has lower ratings than Trump.
Since it’s so close to the election, I’ll shift towards politics for the conclusion. If you’ve voted, or are planning to vote for Biden because you hate Trump, then you’re wasting your vote. Biden & Trump are the same. They are rich, who represent the rich, and despise all those who work for a living. I’ve read more than a few partisan supporters (on both sides) framing this political position as that of a ‘Russian communist,’ who wants to destroy the American way of life.
That’s nonsense. I’m a baseball fan, as I have proven here, and there is nothing more American than baseball. The truth is capitalism is dead, and we need a revolution. This is a war they started, which revolutionary socialists are going to finish. Read the WSWS, and support them. That my political line.
This Conway/Underwood banner above is what Election 2020 is about to become, a real-life nightmare installment of Netflix’s original series House of Cards. We need a massive intervention of international youth & the working class. The Socialist Equality Party (SEP) attacks both Democrats & Republicans as fascists, which is correct. The SEP are the only ones who tell people the truth.
The Socialist Equality Party, which has sections around the world, traces their roots to the founding of the Fourth International in Paris in 1938 by Trotsky, two years before he was murdered by an agent of Stalin in Coyocan, Mexico. Troskyists are historical materialists, and insistent there is objective truth.
I don’t support either the Democrats or Republicans, therefore I’m a Russian bot. I criticize both parties for social inequality, global warming, their response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the rise of fascism– but this only means I’m a tool of Putin. It’s so easy when you turn off your brain, and think only in binary terms.
The title and above paragraph are, of course, satire. I’m not a Russian bot, I’m a US citizen. I’ve been across America & back; traveled to Canada, Mexico, and a few Caribbean islands–and that’s the extent of my worldly travels.
I’ve read English translations of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace (1869) and Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment (1867). I would compare the experiences to taking Organic Chemistry for pre-med/pre-dental students; it’s something you have to understand and get through in order to call yourself educated in the field.
The primary Russian authors I’ve read & studied are VI Lenin & Leon Trotsky. This is what makes me a “Russian bot,” according to official opinion makers at the New York Times. The Russian Revolution is a taboo topic for MSM. Trotsky is forbidden in bourgeois politics, and that’s why socialists are censored & blacklisted.
Reading Marx & Engels used to make you educated, but now it brands you as a Russian bot. When did this change & why? The collapse of the Soviet Union (1989-91) is another cataclysmic event which never gets seriously discussed in MSM. What it meant, and it’s implications going forward, are still relevant today.
The Russian Revolution of 1917 was an Earth-changing event, that transformed a 3rd-rate global power, a crumbling czarist regime, into the Soviet Union that defeated Adolph Hitler’s Nazis in WWII. The USSR engaged 80% of Germany’s war resources in WWII, at the cost of 27 million dead. Millions of others were purged by Stalin’s terror before the war. Trotsky himself was murdered by a GPU agent– in Coyocan, Mexico City in August, 1940. It was a Revolution Betrayed.
These issues are relevant today, because political revolution is on the table. The ruling class will never admit to that, and fights against it with all its being. They want COVID-19, wildfires, and economic ruin to continue for the great majority. They encourage you to vote for Biden-Harris.
As an independent contractor dentist in Florida, jobs are hard to come by, and they now pay half-to-one-third what they did. Most contractor dentists are paid on production, and it isn’t there anymore with COVID-19. Furthermore, the risks & expenses of working in patients’ mouths are much greater, with no real protection for the operator and everyone else in the office.
That’s why I’m a hopelessly out-of-work dentist, who is not officially unemployed. As for being a musical artist, Florida is trying to re-open its clubs, with mixed-to-poor results. No socialist artists are allowed a venue. This is the situation in the professional ranks, so it’s surely much worse for blue-collar workers.
So what’s coming? An election that Trump will lose in a landslide, yet he will claim it’s rigged. Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war. That’s Trump’s strategy to stay in the Oval Office. The question is not who will win the vote on November 3, but who will be President on January 21?
The Trump White House cabal of fascists are organizing right-wing militias to be his shock troops. Their objective is to sow fear & intimidation into the population. They are also meant to eliminate socialist leaders. The Democrats pretend like nothing is happening, because they are fascists too. They are helping Trump get his right-wing Supreme Court nominee rammed through before the election.
All this recalls childhood memories with my mother. I would say something that gets everyone (kids & adults) upset. Mom gets a call, or whatever, and then has to have this discussion with me.
Mom: Eric, you can’t say that. Me: But it’s true. Mom: Yes, I know… but you can’t say that. Me: Why? Mom: Because people will get mad, and want to hurt you. Me: [wide-eyed stare] Mom: Eric, you can’t say that.
Classic rock fundamentalists claim Cream was the all-time greatest supergroup, but Van Halen in their initial incarnation broke rock music in half, with their amazing skills & originality. Van Halen was the greatest rock supergroup ever: with Eddie on guitar, brother Alex on drums, Michael Anthony on bass, and David Lee Roth as the vocal frontman.
Rock acts were either post-punk or a dinosaurs after Van Halen I (1977). David Lee Roth brought an obnoxious, yet hilarious, sense-of-humor & style, which further separated Van Halen from the rest of heavy metal.
Roth suggested to Eddie that the band be named Van Halen, when he joined. When Eddie Van Halen married TV-star Valerie Bertenelli, they became the biggest paparazzi couple on the planet. These pressures eventually tore the band (and their marriage) apart.
Van Halen was the original ‘hair metal’ band, eventually becoming a parody of themselves, like so many others in the industry. Ted Templeman was their ‘5th member’ for all six of the classic David Lee Roth records, a first rate producer whose credits include Captain Beefheart’s Clear Spot (1972). Van Halen was very much like the Velvet Underground & Nico with Andy Warhol, in that they had it all, until the egos blew it.
Supergroup means everyone is a star. Alex Van Halen pioneered the ‘double kick’ sound. Listen to his drum intro to “Hot for Teacher,” which he plays live. It sounds like Alex has at least one extra appendage. The way Alex & Eddie play together sounds like no one else.
On bass was Michael Anthony, a rock solid player with all the chops, and also their main backing vocalist. Classic songs like “Ain’t Talkin’ About Love”, “You Really Got Me”, & “Panama” are great examples of Michael Anthony’s backing vocals, and how it filled out their sound. “Eruption” is the all-time Eddie classic.
Here’s an explanation of tapping as an innovative guitar technique. As a right-handed player, such as Eddie Van Halen, it is possible to sound notes using only the left hand by applying hammer-ons & pull-offs. That’s traditional guitar playing technique. What Eddie pioneered was tapping, which is using his right-hand fingers to hammer-on & pull-off, higher up the neck– instead of picking. He’s doing this, while playing with his left hand simultaneously on the lower frets. This is almost impossible to do on an acoustic guitar. You need an electric, with a slim neck and a ‘fast action’ set-up. You also need a ton of practice, and some talent.
When MTV came along in 1981, Van Halen made their first video, “Intruder/(Oh) Pretty Woman” from Diver Down (1982), which was promptly banned from MTV– for it’s surprise ending…
Four amazingly talented people working together, Van Halen was even greater than the sum of their parts– through 1984.
Eddie kicked Roth out in 1985, and that was it for the real Van Halen. Van Hagar was mostly uninspired, and ‘Extreme’ Van Halen was terrible. Eddie bringing in his son Wolfgang, to replace Michael Anthony on bass, was maybe the worst. RIP Van Halen
This is such garbage. Among the profound Nobel Prize-winning insights of U.S. academics Paul Milgrom & Robert Wilson is the “winner’s curse,” which is when a bidder pays too much in an auction. It’s essentially the same as when the LA Angels overpaid for Albert Pujols in MLB free agency, to use one example. But everyone knew this already, so where’s the genius here?
Milgrom & Wilson are also noted for their various bourgeois theories on “perceived value,” which have little to do with actual value, since all the stock, bond & derivatives markets are divorced from reality. It’s the Federal Reserve that keeps these zombies upright, but academics never focus on those realities. These are pseudo-intellectuals who rationalize capitalism, by obscuring its horrible inequalities, and they are richly rewarded for it.
The amount of actual value in a commodity is precisely determined by the amount of human labor needed to produce it. Karl Marx published Capital in 1867, and since then, bourgeois economists everywhere have been unsuccessfully trying to refute it.
Paul Milgrom & Robert Wilson are professors at Stanford, one of the most prestigious universities in America. Stanford is also one of the most well-connected to the US deep state. These “auction theories” allowed broadband signals to be sold (cheap) by the US government to cell phone giants such as T-Mobile, Sprint, Verizon, AT&T, etc.
These corporations now have access to everyone’s data, which sells it to governments & other institutions around the world– for profit. No user allows this consent, but all cell phone users are forced to agree to a boilerplate policy set by corporate, which allows this.
As far as government protection for the consumer goes, there is none. It’s toothless alphabet soup oversight (SEC, FCC, etc…), where waste & bureaucratic incompetence are systematically encouraged. The same now applies with social media platforms & search engines, such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google & Yahoo!.
Paul Milgrom & Robert Wilson have provided finance capital with a post-modernist rationale for their monopoly of digital, internet & cell phone technologies. That wins the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2020.
Karl Marx was right. Today there are too many fake awards for fake theories to justify class interests. It’s the same deal with the CDC, NHS, etc, when it comes to coronavirus. The theory of all post-modernist award winners is: all profits go to the few, while the rest get hosed because they aren’t worthy. That’s nothing more than a pseudo-intellectual justification for fascism.
