Ready, Willing, Enable

by John Walters | 5 Comments

by John Walters

How far? How far does Donald Trump have to go before he crosses some type of Rubicon beyond which even his most loyal GOP supporters in Congress at last concede that his ideas are beyond the pale? The answer, I fear, is at least two miles farther than Elon Musk’s red convertible.

“Leaders” such as Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell this week are taking a pass on criticizing a masturbatory military parade thrown by a man (but paid for by you and me) who on five different occasions avoided military service as a young man. I had a conversation with someone a couple months back who, explaining their support for Trump despite ceaseless self-incriminating and hypocritical gestures such as this, explained, “The ends justify the means.”

They don’t, though. They never do. The “ends” in this case are lower taxes (for the 1%), deported illegal immigrants and a more white, more WASPy USA. The framers of the Constitution were able to envision a charismatic tyrant gaining control of the White House. What they were unable to foresee is both other branches of government being completely corrupted due to complicit senators, reps and judges who’d sooner abandon democratic principles than exist in a racially diverse USA.

Look at what is happening in Oklahoma, as the prez forces his military parade upon us: teachers at public schools are working four-day weeks because the state does not have  budget for a five-day week and the teachers can use the Monday off to work an extra day at Walmart. Really.

This is not a happenstance occurrence. The GOP gameplan is very transparent: the wealthy, the 1%, are not being educated at public schools. So let those children in the bottom 50% receive crappy educations, thereby eliminating them as an economic threat (for the most part) in the succeeding generation. Poor and uneducated people are easier to manipulate as voters if they’re white (MAGA!) and easier to imprison if they’re not white.

We’re incarcerating people at a record-pace, and we’re ramping up our military for a foe that doesn’t even exist (Unless the war is against illiteracy, OxyContin or school shooters). And where are those soldiers coming from? Mostly from the undereducated ranks. It’s about maintaining the status quo: Keep the white wealthy folks wealthy and keep the poor, uneducated folks out of the social contract. “I love the poorly educated,” Donald Trump once said, and for once, I believed the words coming out of his mouth.

Trump is a narcissistic clown, of course. The tragedy is that men who know better, chiefly Paul Ryan but also John Kelly (what is it with the Irish?), are enabling all of it. And that’s not sad. That’s tragic.

IT’S ALL HAPPENING!

by John Walters | 2 Comments

by John Walters

“I think confidence is silent, and insecurities are loud”

–Sen. John Kennedy (R), Louisiana, on Trump’s proposed military parade

Starting Five

1. Weave Only Just Begun*

*On second thought, the judges prefer “Trump Comes Unglued”

This is why you never leave the White House without your MAGA cap. Sure, it is juvenile and crass to mock someone’s physical features, particularly those of a 71 year-old man. But then you remember that Donald Trump has a Ph.D. in schoolyard bullying (“Little Marco,” “Pocahontas,” etc.) and you think that turnabout is fair play. When they go low, we go, “Hey, dude, where’s your hair?”

 

2. “Oh, Robbbbbb!”

Does it elicit more than even a yawn that White House Staff Secretary Rob Porter is accused by both of his ex-wives of physical and mental abuse, that he denies the charges, that the White House spends the first half of the day attempting to preserve his job until it realizes only worse news will be released, so then his current squeeze Hope Hicks, who also works in the White House, helps him draft a letter of resignation?

Oh, by the way, he’s totes innocent. It’s all the left-wing media’s fault (so why is he resigning?). And how come Donald remains impervious to sexual assault allegations, even though there have literally been ten times as many directed his way and aren’t you tired of reading about this?

3. The Kings of Queens

Ponds, 2, has been lighting it up of late

Has this ever happened before? In a five-day span St. John’s exorcises an 11-game losing streak by first taking down the nation’s most talented team, Duke, 81-77, and then knocking off its top-ranked program, Villanova, 79-75. The Johnnies’ hero? Shamorie Ponds, who drained 33 on Saturday and 26 last night.

Chris Mullin‘s Queens squad is now 12-13, but shouldn’t there be room in a 68-team field for a team with two of the nation’s most impressive W’s this winter?

4. Q-Trip!

84 year-old music impresario Quincy Jones tosses off his give-a-f*** cloak and gives a hilarious and candid interview to Vulture in which he claims to have 22 girlfriends across the globe, that Chicago mobster Sam Giancana killed JFK, that the young Beatles were horrible musicians, particularly Ringo (everyone already knew this) and that Marlon Brando was both extremely charming and extremely horny. Q says the erstwhile Stanley Kowalski/Don Corleone had relations with, among others, Richard Pryor, James Baldwin and Marvin Gaye, and that he’d “(bleep) a mailbox.”

Giancana, Sinatra. Horse head not pictured.

But do read the entire interview. We loved how Quincy would ask the interviewer, David Marchese, questions, such as “What’s your sign?” or “Where you from?” This interview is every reporter’s dream.

5. Release The Mama

 

The highlight of National Signing Day: four-star wide receiver Jacob Copeland commits to Florida as his mama, clad in an Alabama sweatshirt and a Tennessee ball cap, is seated next to him. And then she storms off.

Mama did return a few minutes later and give her baby a hug.

Reserves

Not-Breaking News: The staff of MH LOVES animals. Here’s just another reason why:

 

***

Great night for late-night visits, as former SNL writers’ room staffers Seth Meyers and John Mulaney converse….

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCj6DeokBHw

….and former Daily Show second-bananas Stephen Colbert and John Oliver dialogue it back and forth….

Mulaney and Oliver are the two funniest comedians we’ve got going now in a world where Louis C.K. no longer exists.

***

Kelsey Grammer pays tribute to his TV dad, John Mahoney:

 

***

Certainly not the first time The Worst Wing has marinated in hypocrisy, and it won’ the the last. I actually had a Deplorable admonish me for being an elitist yesterday, thinking that the reason I RT’ed it was to mock Melania’s parents’ lack of education. This is The Great Big Dumb we are dealing with…

 

Music 101

Conquer Me

Would it shock you to learn that the members of Blues Traveler hail from Princeton, N.J. ? They would hit it big with their 1994 album, Four, but this gem off the 1993 record Save His Soul set the stage for all that was to follow. John Popper on lead vocals.

Remote Patrol

Olympics Opening Ceremony Figure Skating, Freestyle Skiing

8 p.m. NBC

Apparently, the Opening Ceremony is tomorrow night, AFTER this….

IT’S ALL HAPPENING!

by John Walters | Leave a comment

by John Walters

Starting Five

Falcon Quest*

*The judges will also accept “Deep Space > Deep State”

Ralph Kramden: “To the moon, Alice!”

Buzz Lightyear: “To infinity and beyond!”

Elon Musk: “To Mars and then the sun.”

I don’t understand everything that makes yesterday’s  Falcon Heavy rocket launch revolutionary, but I do know that there is now a red Tesla convertible cruising through  space with a mannequin astronaut, David Bowie‘s “Space Oddity” playing (eternal royalties!) and a sign that reads “Don’t Panic,” which is an ode to Douglas Adams’ A Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy (nerds, rejoice!).

Also, two of the three rocket boosters were able to land again with pinpoint precision.

Pretty, pretty good, Elon Musk. And now that’s going to be the bar set by The Worst Wing in terms of its merit-based immigration standard.

2. He Was Just Josh’in

Remember when Josh McDaniels was headed out of Foxborough to become the new coach of the Indianapolis Colts? Turns out he had a change of heart. I mean, this is not as bad as the Colts leaving Baltimore under the cover of darkness for fans of the franchise, but it is a little odd. Look for Josh to succeed Bill Belichick in New England when B.B. eventually melts when someone pours water on him.

 

Below: A Patriot joining the Union or the Rebels? Apparently, not.

 

3. Torn

Turns out unicorns have ligaments, too. Knick savior Kristaps Porzingis tears the ACL in his left knee and is lost for the season and beyond. The 22 year-old, 7’3″ Latvian leads the lead in blocked shots per game (2.4) and is 17th in scoring.

4. Cadet Bone Spurs Demands a Parade

Not long after Iraq War veteran, double-amputee and Illinois senator (all the same person) Tammy Duckworth referred to five-time Vietnam deferment recipient Donald Trump as “Cadet Bone Spurs,” his staff hustles across the Potomac to the Pentagon demanding a military parade. UPDATE: We may have that order reversed, but the point is the same: he’s an insecure little man.

On Monday he claims that failing to stand and clap for him at the SOTU is “treason” and on Tuesday he announces he wants a military parade down Pennsylvania Avenue. The biggest coward ever to serve in the Oval Office is demanding a military parade. We’d say this is shocking, but of course it isn’t. Just another vignette for The Worst Wing doc.

It’s kind of funny that Trump, aspirationally, is Kim Jong-Un. Someone referred to Trump as “a Napoleon in the making,” but that’s an insult to the French general. He actually participated in battles. How about, “Even Napoleon Had His Watergate?”

This parade will only work if someone gives Trump one of those silly military uniforms with medals and shiny things, none of which he had earned.

5. An Amazing Race

We went to the Millrose Games on Saturday, one of the best relatively hidden secrets in New York City these days. The annual indoor track meet used to be held at Madison Square Garden, but in the past seven or so years has taken place at the intimate but wonderfully outfitted Armory on 168th and Broadway in Harlem.

In the girls’ high school mile, Katelyn Tuohy, whom we had gushed about here last week after she broke Mary Cain‘s national high school 5,000-meter record by 8 seconds, was favored in the mile. Katelyn went out in record-pace, leaving the field behind after 150 meters, and for a few laps she kept augmenting the distance.

Tuohy led for 3/4 of the race….

Then, at around Lap 6 (of 8), they began reeling her in. By midway through the last lap Gabrielle Wilkinson of suburban Philadelphia had caught her and passed her. On the final turn two other girls would do the same. Wilkinson won in 4:42, while Tuohy ran a 4:47.

Despondent, Tuohy left the track and the meet almost immediately. She’s 15. Give her a pass.

Also worth noting: Tuohy, a sophomore, has a 102% average at her high school. Wilkinson, a senior headed to the University of Florida, has a 4.0 average.

 

In the women’s professional one-mile race, Olympian Colleen Quigley barely broke the team ahead of fellow Olympian Kate Grace. In another era, both of these women would be household names.

Quigley, a former model, finished 8th in the 3,000-meter steeplechase at the 2016 Olympics in Rio. Grace, a Yale alum whose mother was ’80s fitness icon Kathy Smith, finished 8th in the 800 in Rio. On Saturday, Quigley edged Grace by 3/100ths of a second, 4:30:05 to 4:30:08. Grace nearly stole the victory when Quigley raised her arms in triumph, unaware that Grace was closing on her so quickly.

Music 101

When The Night Comes

Joe Cocker was past his Woodstock prime when he recorded this tune in 1989, but he introduced himself to an entirely new generation of fans. And it’s a solid song that accentuates his vocal talents.

Remote Patrol

Animals With Cameras

8 p.m. PBS

Kitties!!!!

I love it, but how will the Teamsters feel about this? In my fantasy, a camera is affixed to the head of the lead of a pack of hyenas as they chase down a certain unarmed Minnesota dentist.