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.