by John Walters

Booker Takes Aim

MH’s Bluegrass State correspondent (and childhood friend) Matt Dacey informs us about Kentucky state representative Charles Booker (D), who is taking aim at Mitch McConnell’s Senate seat. The Dems already had a presumptive candidate, retired Marine pilot Amy McGrath, but Booker, who is black, launched a campaign anyway with just $70,000 in his war chest.

Well, Booker’s district is where Breonna Taylor was murdered and he was out with the protester. McGrath was not. In a recent PBS televised roundtable in the state, he wiped the floor with her. The Democratic primary is within 8 days and Booker is within single digits.

Winner takes on Mitch in November. This is a litmus test. Fifty-four years ago, the University of Kentucky wouldn’t even take a black man on its vaunted basketball team. Now it might have one unseat the most (visibly) racist Senator in the country.

Da 5 Bloods

Spike Lee’s latest film, Da 5 Bloods, has a trailer that completely drew me in. The story is sort of a reverse Saving Private Ryan (Exhuming Private Ryan?) with a trunk full of gold thrown in to the mix. And it takes place in Vietnam. And Spike says that every studio turned him down except Netflix.

And that infectious song in the trailer is “Time Has Come Today” from the Chambers Brothers, released in 1968.

Critics are calling this Spike Lee’s best film since 25th Hour (2002). Perhaps the best since his masterpiece, Do The Right Thing.

O’er The Ramp Parts We Watched

President Trump’s speech to the graduates at West Point was overshadowed by his slow and halting walk down a ramp afterward. Apparently those bone spurs have not fully healed.

No Bread, No Circus, More Racial Equality

(The Wendy’s in Atlanta. It’s not Sherman torching the city but it’s symbolically similar)

Call me crazy, but I don’t think the Ahmaud Arbery murder and the Central Park birder and the George Floyd protests and resignations of police chiefs and the revocation of choke holds, etc, is all happening in a vacuum. I believe that the absence, due to the pandemic, of all the distractions that keep this nation humming during its leisure hours (pro and college sports, movie releases, etc.) has provided more time for Americans, particularly African-Americans, to focus their attention on racial injustice.

Consider: Arbery was murdered in late February but his murder, which was videotaped, was not even investigated in depth until April.

Fifty-two years after the Chambers Brothers released it, The Time Has Come Today. Indeed.

And I’ll go further. Just as Rome, the world’s most powerful empire at the time and the people responsible ultimately for crucifying Jesus, eventually became the seat of Catholicism, I believe that one day the U.S.A., which brought black people over from Africa in chains and used their unpaid labor to help build this country (and make the South economically viable) will be a nation where the power rests with African-Americans. History and time have a funny sense of humor that way. One day far, far down the line men like Martin Luther King, Jr., and Muhammad Ali and Barack Obama and, yes, Colin Kaepernick will be seen as early and important figures in this movement. And I’m not equating the four in terms of historical import. But all four will be names worthy of mentioning.

As Charles Blow of The New York Times refer to it, “an insatiable rage” has finally reached its boiling point. And no wonder.

Stupefying

One of the WWWPs (World’s Worst White People) out there, Larry Kudlow, appears on CNN and tells Jake Tapper that it’s not America’s business which major corporations were giving seven- and eight-figure and even nine-figure bailout payments to as part of the coronavirus financial rescue. Sure, it’s our money but now it’s in their hands and they’ll do with it exactly what they want.

Dig, I agree with Kudlow that Americans who are working (many of us) should not be earning less per week than Americans who choose not to. I’m not against ending the $600 per week unemployment benefits. But if you want me to give you that, then in return I’d like a little transparency. As Tapper says, “That’s as swampy as you could imagine.”

He’s right.

by John Walters

Just listened to a few words from the president from West Point, a part of the country that in June is as lovely as anyplace else on Earth. Anyway, besides finding it comical that a man who spurned (and “spurred”) military duty on four (or is it five?) different occasions when he was their age gets to address the graduating class at West Point in 2020 (truly sad), I’m also amused by his touting Space Force.

Space Force is nothing more than an intergalactic symbol for what is wrong with Old White Republicans and potentially catastrophic for this nation. Here they are talking about owning outer space when anyone with half a brain can see that America is being destroyed from within. It’s like a father of six who decides the only car his family needs is a tricked out Porsche 2-seater because it’ll make him look good. And how will you get the kids back and forth to school and sports, etc? That’s their problem.

What.

A.

Dope.

by John Walters

Gone With The Winn Dixie*

*The judges will also accept “The Hazards of Dukes” and “The Color-Blind Boys Of Alabama”

NASCAR has banned the confederate flag.

Lady Antebellum is considering a name change.

As is the last remaining Sambo’s which, yes, is a racial slur, but the restaurant name comes from the combined names of its co-founders (Samuel Battistone and Newell Bonnet). There’s a joke here involving a dude named Nigel that I wouldn’t dare make in this current environment.

There’s a movement afoot to rename 10 military bases named after Confederate generals which—WHY DID THEY EVER NAME MILITARY BASES AFTER CONFEDERATE GENERALS THE F**K?!?

And ABC has FINALLY cast a black bachelor and I might even tune in to this, especially if they insert clips of the Lilli von Schtupp line from Blazing Saddles (“It’s twuuuu, it’s twuuuu!”)

John C. Cash

Finally saw Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox story in its entirety last night. On the Netflix, I believe. Three favorite parts:

1. This duet, above, featuring John C. Reilly and Jenna Fischer which is just a bundle of double entendres, beginning with the title: “Let’s Duet.”
2. Every scene with Tim Meadows. He was never this strong on SNL. The recurring bit with the vices in the backrooms, which ends with Dewey, in the final scene at an awards show, saying, “I don’t want to succumb to these temptations” then closing the door and walking into the hallway where, who’s warming up? The Temptations.
3. The recurring sink bit, mostly for the payoff at the end in which Dewey, at his very lowest, walks into a public bathroom and spots five sinks. By this point we know what’s coming. I chortled, which is somewhere between a chuckle and a howl.

Stocks: TVIX

I can tell you with certainty that I don’t really understand how or why TVIX trades or is allowed to trade. The best I know is that it’s an index fund that measures volatility. To me it feels as if you’re not betting on the baseball game but rather how many pitching changes will be made.

Anyway, here’s where TVIX was on Wednesday:

$119

And here’s where it was this morning:

$234

And here’s where it was in September of 2015:

$392,500

And here’s where it was in January:

$39

So you know, I don’t know. But if you had it January you’ve quadrupled your money (it’s at $200 as I write this).

Warning: If it ever gets to where it was in 2015, I will be A) deleting my Twitter history and then B) running for president.

Donald’s Unintended Perfect Symbolic Gesture

So the President wasn’t having any of this social distancing malarkey at his big Republican convention in Charlotte, so he told the mayor to stuff it. I’ll find a city or state even more repulsively backward than North Carolina and hold my part of the convention there! A big, beautiful part of it. And so he will, in Jacksonville, Fla.

Which means that there will be a split Republican convention next month, which is a fitting symbol for a party that is nearly as divided as the country itself. Good job, Donald (really Stephen Miller, but you know).

Also, that Tulsa speech/visit to “commemorate” Juneteenth. Stephen Miller does understand trolling. When this presidency ends and these apostates get their Nuremberg-style trial, no one deserves a nastier punishment than Miller.

In Defense Of Tom Cotton (‘s Piece)

It’s a little long but on The New York Times‘ Op-ed page Ross Douthat makes the compelling argument that the NYT was right to publish Senator Tom Cotton’s Op-ed a week or two ago, even if you happen to disagree with Cotton’s arguments and solution.

We agree with Douthat here 100%. To those folks marching in the streets and kneeling during anthems: Your rights are extremely important but they are part of a greater right in this country: the right to free speech. The right to be disagreed with. Protest. March. Kneel. All of it. We’re with you. But the moment you say that those folks disagreeing with you should just shut up and not even be heard (e.g. Drew Brees), well, you’re just being the Intolerant Tolerant.

I don’t agree with Cotton’s point of view at all. I just endorse his right to express it and the NYT”s right to print it. And as Douthat points out, the two arguments posited by pearl-clutching NYT staffers turned out to be empty and/or without merit.

And as for Brees: I don’t know what compelled him to talk about the flag and kneeling/not kneeling just a week after George Floyd’s death. That’s the stupid part. But, I mean, if you have two grandfathers who fought in World War II, it’s understandable why the flag might mean something different to you. So, yeah, really, really bad timing, Drew. It’s kind of like extolling the safety of air travel cuz your dad was a pilot right after 9/11. But, and I understand I’m a middle-aged white guy saying this, I don’t think of Brees as racist. Just lacking in exposure, and thus appreciation and empathy, to what so many of his teammates have lived through.

And so they say, “That’s exactl what makes him racist.”

Umm, I dunno.

Isn’t Drew Brees the guy who founded The Dream Foundation and has arguably done more to bring New Orleans and the Louisiana coast back than just about anyone? But now Malcolm Jenkins has “lost all respect for him.” Okay.

I mean, just as it’s wrong to conflate Colin Kaepernick’s kneeling gesture, which was intended to bring awareness about police brutality to black people, as being anti-military, isn’t it just as wrong to conflate Drew Brees’ feelings about the flag, which are rooted in his adoration of World War II veterans, with bigotry? What’s the difference?

I get in this debate with my boss (who asked my opinion… terrible move) about Kaepernick and it goes round and round. He and I have very different opinions about what the flag and liberty and allegiance mean. I’m of the old Andrew Shepherd in The American President school. He’s in the “failure to stop and stand is tantamount to treason” school. If America means anything, it means we have the freedom to disagree. Just like Malcolm is doing with Drew and I’m doing with my boss. The antithesis to that is to tell someone they’re lower than low simply because they don’t agree with you. That’s where the Malcolm Jenkins’ of the world get it wrong with Drew Brees.

And again, if I were Drew Brees’ agent… that’s not a stand you needed to take this month.

by John Walters

Rebel Rebel

NASCAR announces that it will ban the Confederate flag as a nation learns that a dude named Bubba Wallace is actually black. But anyway, NASCAR banning the Rebel flag? What was the headline of our lead item yesterday? (Answer: Good Luck With That).

Who wants to get paid to enforce this rule in the tailgate lots at Talladega, Bristol and Darlington? And what happens when some 280-pound lout in a T-shirt (tight) that has the Rebel flag plastered on its front tries to enter through the turnstiles with 150,000 other fans?

What I just don’t understand about these flag issues on either side: Why can’t you just let people be people? Folks ask why can’t Kap stand for the flag and I think, Shouldn’t the bigger issue (besides police brutality) be why he doesn’t believe in doing so? In other words, why does it make you happier if someone does something that you know they don’t believe in just so that they have the appearance of doing so?

Same thing with this Southern Cross. Why not just announce that it’s not welcome and that NASCAR is not in any way supportive of systemic racism? The reason you see the Rebel flag at NASCAR events and not in NBA arenas has nothing to do with one sport permitting them and one not. One sport doesn’t need to prohibit them, you know?

These Guys Got Off Clean

The syndicated television show Cops has been canceled. Amazon announced that it will not make facial recognition technology available to police departments for one year. Minneapolis is defunding its police department. Other departments nationwide are, or are being court ordered to, ban chokeholds.

And yet Sting, Stuart and Andy slip under the radar. When the world is running down, they make the best of what’s still around.

Green Day? Father’s Day

Here’s Billie Joe Armstrong with his two sons shredding Tommy James’ classic (later updated by Tiffany). It’s not only an apt song for the pandemic, but how many songs open with “Children behave!” when those lyrics are sung by a dude who spent his youth definitely not. Where did that get him?

Major Minor

We won’t print her name here, but the person who filmed the murder of George Floyd, which has become a landmark moment in race relations since it took place two weeks ago, was a 17 year-old girl. Imagine what happens if she does not record those 8 minutes and 46 seconds: Nothing happens.

She was the very definition of an innocent bystander, but you don’t need to be Clarence Darrow to realize that if she does not shoot that video, all four of those cops get a slap on the wrist at worst and a “died in police custody.” Smart phones have changed the world. And this girl’s action, while you can discuss amongst yourselves the bravery of it, is going to be responsible for a giant leap forward in race relations. Even ESPN is no longer sticking to sports.

One example: After Floyd’s death, CrossFit had a conference call with site managers and a Minneapolis employee asked CEO Greg Glassman about what the company should do to recognize George Floyd. His response: “We’re not mourning for George Floyd… Can you tell me why I should mourn for him?”

Hours later, Glassman, apparently still worked up over that question, tweeted, “Floyd-19.”

And now he’s resigned.

HBO’s Doing What Now?!?

So apparently HBO Max is pulling Gone From The Wind until it adds “historical context.” Historical context is something children used to learn in school but I guess no one does that any more.

This is only one of the universally acclaimed great American films (personally, I find it a tedious bore but no one is volunteering to add “excitement context” for me). If Americans cannot be expected to judge works of art via the prism of historical perspective on their own, we’re all done for.

In short: this is stupid and this is exactly where the Far Right wins (because they’re right). If a play or a movie is hurtful to you for any reason, don’t watch it. If it affects people in a positive or negative way, it must be saying something. You’re welcome to disagree. You’re not welcome to re-interpret the artist’s work. That’s bullsh*t.

Let’s start a line of women who decide that much of NWA’s and Naughty By Nature’s lyrics need to be rewritten because they’re littered with misogynistic lines. Let’s see how far that movement gets in this climate.

If you watch TCM, you may have seen this great little filler doc, no longer than 5 to 8 minutes, that they sometimes air between films. It’s all about black face in the movies, and they show that not only Al Jolson did it, but so did Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire (they also point to Shirley Temple, but she was probably only about eight at the time, so I’m not sure that’s quite fair… and no, this is not why she was later known as Shirley Temple Black).

Anyway, if you see the video, the people interviewed are very astute about it, particularly TCM’s own Jacqueline Stewart (who is black). They’re not all “Cancel Culture!” They’re more like, This is part of American history, it’s shameful, but it’s something that should not be altered and it helps us to understand the era in which it was made and what the racial sensitivity mores were of that time. In other words, LEARN MORE! Don’t cover your ears and shut your eyes and scream until something fits your own happy spot.

Or, as Stewart says, “Certainly it’s difficult to face things that are ugly in our history [full stop]. But denial is worse.”

Amen.

by John Walters

Good Luck With That

I get it. The fans want their sports to return. The ESPN talkmeisters are gong to cheerlead cuz they want sports to return as well. Certainly the hundreds of thousands of people who work directly in the sports industry want the sport to return.

And I don’t watch ESPN (or FS1) enough so maybe they’ve asked these questions, but my first Q is, Has anybody thought this thing through? The NUMBER ONE thing you hear from any league executive or spokesperson is how they have enough testing kits available. Great. Then what?

No 1: Who’s administering the tests? Is it a team official, a league official, an independent third party?

No. 2: What happens when, not if but when, a player tests positive? And, returning to Question 1, would we even ever find out?

Scenario: the Lakers and Clippers advance to the Western Conference finals (2,500 miles east of their mutual home floor, but whatevs) and LeBron tests positive before Game 6 or Game 7. He feels great but he tests positive. Now what? Oh, and what if he plays but then he infects 8 other players and someone’s grand mama who raised him dies? Then what?

The NBA (and other leagues) pay lots of lip service to testing. I haven’t heard (but then I haven’t really been paying attention) what they plan to do when a player tests positive. Especially if it’s during the NBA playoffs.

Further, and especially in the NFL: these players won’t be spreading the virus to one another in combat. They’ll be doing so in the locker room. If you think you can keep an NFL locker room virus-free, you’ve never been inside of one.

Magic Market Ride

Amazon (AMZN): Hits an all-time high of $2,664 this morning, up more than $1,000 per share (or more than 50%) since March 12.

Tesla (TSLA): Hits an all-time high of $1,004 this morning (first time breaking 1K), or up more than 180% since March 18 ($350).

Chesapeake (CHK): Down to $16.85 after hitting a high of $69 just two days earlier.

George Washington Owned Slaves, Too

Calhoun had what my friend Smo would call “Crazy Eyes”

Have you been following this Clemson kerfuffle? Makes you wonder if Alabama fans are behind it. See, former American vice president John Calhoun owned a plantation on the very site where Clemson now sits. And some of the school’s buildings, such as its Honors College, bears Calhoun’s name.

NFL stars DeAndre Hopkins and Deshaun Watson, former Dabo Dynamos, have spoken out in the past week saying that the school should disassociate itself from any connection to Calhoun. And you can imagine that Dabo is looking at this entire issue through the prism of ‘CRUITIN!

Calhoun had a highly decorated political career, one of the greatest in American history: Secretary of War (1817-1825), Vice President (1825-1832), Senator (1832-1850) with a short interregnum in 1844 when he was Secretary of State.

Calhoun was redolent of a South Carolinian of the present day, Lindsay Graham, a Republican whose beliefs and behavior changed almost 180 degrees when he suddenly realized his state’s ways were threatened. To Calhoun that meant become an entrenched pro-slavery hawk, saying that it was “a positive good” for master and slave alike. He defended minority rights, but did not extend that defense to slaves. Kind of a moral juxtaposition, but then when you’re the one in power you don’t have to worry about your ideas making sense. Or haven’t you been watching the news the past few years?

Whatever a 21st century person might think of Calhoun, he was a brilliant politician who was acting in what he thought were the best interests of South Carolina and the South. And oh, by the way, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson also owned slaves.

It’s a sticky issue. How do you judge a 19th century statesman through a 21st century lens? Hell, and I’ve said this before, why not throw out the entire lot of them for A) disobeying mother England and B) committing genocide to steal the land from Native Americans?

No one’s hands are clean here. I love democracy and the Bill of Rights as much as the next dude, but the country was founded by rich men who didn’t want to pay taxes and opportunists who took land away from its rightful inhabitants by use of superior weaponry. Let’s not sugarcoat this.

Finally, the other day I was in the post office and there was a (and I’m presuming here) very White Supremacist-looking dude wearing a tight T-shirt that read “Your 1st Amendment Rights Don’t Mean That You Have To Say Something Stupid” and it was all I could do to not approach him and say, “That’s an ironic T-shirt you’re wearing.”

But I let it go. Post-Twitter me is all kumbaya and stuff.