The Army will remove a Confederate memorial from Arlington this week and the wingnuts are having a hissy fit, as usual:
A woman representing the American South, standing atop a 32-foot pedestal, lords above most other monuments within America’s most revered resting place. It portrays, according to the cemetery’s website, a “mythologized vision of the Confederacy, including highly sanitized depictions of slavery.”
This month, 44 Republican lawmakers cautioned Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, the first African American to hold the post, that the Pentagon would overstep its authority by removing the memorial, and they demanded that all efforts to do so stop until Congress works through next year’s appropriations bill. The memorial “commemorates reconciliation and national unity,” not the Confederacy per se, the group led by Rep. Andrew S. Clyde (Ga.) claimed.
The Army, which operates Arlington Cemetery, informed lawmakers Friday that it would proceed with the monument’s removal, officials told The Washington Post, because it was required by the end of the year to comply with a law to identify and remove assets that commemorate the Confederacy. A congressional commission had previously decided the memorial met the criteria for removal.The task will cost $3 million.
These officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. They said that out of an abundance of caution, security at the cemetery would be enhanced when the work begins in coming days.
Glenn Youngkin will put the monument somewhere in Virginia so all the Lost Cause fanatics can still go and pray in front of it or whatever it is they feel they need to do.
The Lost Cause movement, which recast rebel traitors as morally righteous warriors defending states’ rights and spread the false belief that slavery was benevolent, is evident in the memorial’s bronze panels. A weeping Black woman, described by cemetery historians as a stereotypical “mammy,” clutches the baby of a White officer, and a camp servant dutifully follows his enslaver toward battle.
The memorial’s Latin inscription directly references the idealized mythology of the Lost Cause, the cemetery’s historians say, further underscoring the deliberate historical distortion.
The marker was erected in 1914, part of a constellation of Confederate markers that rose throughout the early 1900s to cement the ideals of white supremacy as Black Americans demanded equal rights.
That context must be understood, said Ty Seidule, a retired Army general who was the vice chair of the congressional commission that recommended the monument’s removal from Arlington. While Republican lawmakers described the marker as an ode to reconciliation, it was installed in what was then a racially segregated cemetery and molded in celebration of an emerging racial police state in the South.
“It’s incredibly ironic the party of Lincoln is the one doing this,” said Seidule, a historian and visiting professor at Hamilton College, describing the GOP effort to stop the marker’sremoval. “It is the cruelest monument in the country because it is so clearly proslavery.”
These people can bellyache all they want but there is zero reason to keep such a grotesque celebration of white supremacy, installed at the height of the propaganda push to re-imagine the civil war as a righteous philosophical disagreement over states’ rights, anywhere near the national cemetery. In fact it’s disgraceful. As far as I’m concerned all the 20th century Lost Cause monuments can be melted down for scrap iron. It was nothing more than a political gambit to justify slavery and Jim Crow and there is no reason to valorize them.
This one is from Hussein Ibish in The Atlantic who notes that we are seeing a ton of polls that show Biden in deep trouble and that everyone is on tender hooks, praying that things turn around and quickly. His analysis, however, asserts that Trump is going to lose, full stop.
As he says, “Democrats, and any other sensible voters who oppose Trump, need to forcefully remind the American people about how disastrous he was as president and inform them of how much worse a second term would be. Thankfully, that is not a hard case to make.” He points out that Trump has many advantages, starting with his cult (my word not his.) And the tribal nature of politics dictates that most Republicans will vote Republicans no matter what. And then there’s the right wing propaganda machine, particularly Fox News which will help his press his case that he’s a victim of persecution by the “deep state.”
The electoral college advantage is obvious and Biden is old and has left some segments of the Democratic coalition dissatisfied so there’s that. However:
Trump’s flaws look far worse today than they did eight years ago. To take one example that should concern conservative voters: his behavior toward and views of service members. In the 2016 campaign, Trump’s attacks on Senator John McCain and on the Gold Star Khan family were bad enough. Now we have a litany of testimonies that he expressed contempt and disgust for wounded veterans—demanding that he not be seen in public with them—and that he debased fallen soldiers, describing them as “suckers” and marveling, “What was in it for them?” According to an Atlantic report, when he was scheduled to visit a World War I–era American cemetery in France in 2018, Trump complained, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” Trump has always posed as a patriot, but he has proved himself unpatriotic, anti-military, and ignorant of the meaning of sacrifice.
Similarly, in 2016, Trump’s campaign was briefly rocked by the Access Hollywood videotape in which he boasted about grabbing women by the genitalia. He survived, in large part because many voters chose to accept his comments as “locker room” bluster. Several women accused him of sexual misconduct, but Trump fended off their allegations too. Now he has been held civilly liable by a New York jury for sexually abusing the advice columnist E. Jean Carroll in 1996. A federal judge has said that the jury concluded that what Trump did to Carroll was rape in the common sense of the term. Some Americans will shrug that off, but many won’t be able to.
Trump hopes that his legal troubles will prove a boon to his campaign, allowing him to paint both law enforcement and the judicial system as part of a massive conspiracy against him. He has even requested that his federal trial regarding efforts to overturn the 2020-election results be televised. That’s unlikely, but the more airtime these prosecutions get, the better. Among Republicans, Trump’s polling has improved since his indictments, but many other Americans simply won’t be impressed, inspired, or persuaded by someone who faces 91 felony counts, in addition to civil cases. Trump already has been found liable for fraud and sexual abuse in New York. To that may well be added a criminal conviction at the federal level. Even if none of the trials has concluded by next fall, much of the evidence that prosecutors have accumulated is already in the public record and will be powerful fodder for anti-Trump attack ads. And Democrats will benefit from the attention Trump draws to the election-subversion cases. Even many of Trump’s most ardent supporters are tired of relitigating 2020; voters would prefer to focus on the future, not the past.
On top of all this, Trump has a strong record of electoral losses, with his 2016 upset, which apparently surprised even him, as the lone exception. His party suffered the standard midterm defeat in 2018. Then he lost the 2020 election. Then Republicans lost control of the Senate after Georgia’s runoff in early 2021. Then his party was denied the standard midterm victory in 2022, barely eking out a four-vote House majority thanks in large part to his own handpicked, election-denying candidates, almost all of whom lost in competitive races. There is no obvious reason that 2024 should constitute a sudden break from this pattern of MAGA defeat.
Presidential elections are usually decided by a relatively small group of swing voters in six or seven swing states. The most important are independent voters and suburban voters, two groups that appear to have turned away from Trump since 2016. He hasn’t done anything to win them back since 2020, instead running in recent months on a platform that’s more radical, extreme, and openly authoritarian than ever (except on the issue of abortion, where he is less extreme than his Republican-primary competitors). With Trump promising vengeance, retribution, and dictatorship, at least on “day one,” as he recently told Sean Hannity, will these swing voters be wooed back into his camp? Are Americans so fed up that they will want to elect someone who has advocated for the “termination” of the Constitution in order to keep himself in power?
Recent polling suggests that Biden is in real trouble, including with a number of core Democratic constituencies, which is leading many Democrats to yearn for a different candidate or to despair that Trump will be reelected. In fact, Biden has a strong record to run on. In his first two years, with a tiny House majority and only a tiebreaker in the Senate, he managed to pass more progressive, consequential economic legislation than, arguably, any president since Lyndon B. Johnson. Unemployment is low, and inflation is cooling. Perhaps the public has not fully felt these positive developments yet, but they will almost certainly have registered by next November.
Americans have reported to pollsters that although they believe that the economy is bad for others, they themselves feel economically secure. Biden should ask voters Ronald Reagan’s classic question: Are you better off today than you were four years ago? The answer can only be yes, given the dire situation the nation found itself in during the early months of the coronavirus pandemic (to say nothing of the general sense of chaos throughout Trump’s presidency). But Biden and Democrats need to make this case. Without prompting, voters might not readily remember how challenging a time 2020 was.
The abortion issue, opened up by the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, has consistently played in Democrats’ favor, and that’s unlikely to change next November. If the Republican nominee were former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, women might not rally so powerfully to the Democratic side. But Trump claims responsibility for the decision overturning Roe by virtue of his Supreme Court appointees. That, plus Trump’s treatment of women, gives Biden a huge opportunity with female voters.
Biden’s pro-Israel policies during the ongoing war in Gaza might cost him support from Arab and Muslim Americans, but probably not enough for him to lose Michigan, for example, to Trump. Voters in those groups seem unlikely to support the author of the “Muslim ban,” who is threatening to reimpose similar restrictions, and the “Peace to Prosperity” Israeli-Palestinian proposal that invited Israel to annex 30 percent of the occupied West Bank. Some will stay home—a potential danger for Biden—but many will, perhaps reluctantly, turn out for him despite what they say now.
The 2024 election will be a referendum on democracy, with both candidates claiming to stand for freedom and American values. On this matter, Biden’s claims are obviously stronger: He has been governing as a traditional president, whereas Trump promises authoritarianism and openly says he wants to be dictator for a day to accomplish certain policies, namely restricting immigration. But what if his plans take more than a day? What if his one-day dictatorship extends to a year and then never ends? Americans know that strongmen don’t keep their promises.
Biden is old, but so is Trump. Biden has grown unpopular, but so has Trump. Biden has liabilities, but Trump’s are considerably worse. Biden has lost the backing of plenty of voters, but the results of the past few elections suggest that Trump has lost more. Meanwhile, Trump’s record as president and since—January 6, the devastating testimony from his former senior officials, the ongoing trials, and whatever additional self-inflicted wounds he delivers—will contrast very poorly with Biden’s track record and steady leadership. By November, enough Americans will surely understand that they aren’t voting for Biden over Trump so much as voting for the Constitution over a would-be authoritarian.
The case against Trump’s reelection is obvious and damning. As long as his opponents prosecute that case—and they will—Trump isn’t going to win.
I certainly hope he is right. I suspect he is for all the reasons he cites. But I don’t think we can count on that at all. There are so many variables, as you can see in his essay, that it’s clear anything could happen.
For me the one variable that seems most likely to hurt Trump’s chances beyond the generalized terror and specific fears about what he’s going to do: the trials. I just don’t think America is so far gone that it’s going to be ok with what the prosecution is going to lay out about his behavior leading up to January 6th. Sure his cult will stick with him no matter what. And who knows? Maybe a jury will feel that the crimes were proven beyond a reasonable doubt. But I have to believe that among those who aren’t inexplicably in his thrall, this whole event is going to be a sobering exercise. Is this really what it comes to?
Yeah, that all might be hopium. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t also true. At least I hope so… 🙂
Thank you to everyone who has contributed to Happy Hollandaise this year. As always, I’m incredibly grateful for your support.
I’m also incredibly grateful for Tom Sullivan, the man who writes two elegant and important posts here each morning, 7 days a week without fail. While I’m still sleeping out here on the west coast, Tom has already started the day with fresh insights, good humor and principled, meaningful analysis of our chaotic political scene. And then he goes out and works on organizing North Carolina into the blue state it’s meant to be.
I’d met Tom and his lovely wife at Netroots Nation years ago and we hit it off right away. But when I came across a great post on his old blog Scrutiny Hooligans I realized that I really needed him over here. I asked him to fill in for me for a few days and the rest is history. I cannot thank him enough. There is never a day that I’m, not reminded how lucky I am that he said yes that day.
As you no doubt realize, this is not exactly a big money enterprise. When I moved over to WordPress a couple of years ago I made the decision not to run ads anymore. There was a cost to that but I just felt that we are all bombarded with them all the time and I just wanted a nice, clean blog without a lot of bells and whistles. In recent years as people have suggested that I move to a Substack, I have balked because this format allowed for several articles a day without crowding anyone’s email boxes.
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CNN’s Kasie Hunt interviewed RFK Jr and confronted him with his own words. As with Trump, he basically told the audience, you can believe me or you can believe your eyes:
KASIE: You said no vaccines are safe and effective.
Make polio great again! Please share this with any friend or family thinking of voting for this con artist! Any vote for him is a vote for Trump. https://t.co/tv828HO0UL
Kennedy also once compared COVID lockdowns to the Holocaust, which his wife called “reprehensible.”
He told me: "No, she's not right. But it was something that needed to be said at that time. … What you're doing is misleading the public right now." pic.twitter.com/d7uoEk4czC
I watched some “man-on-the-street” interviews at an RFK event the other day. Oh my god. The anti-vax crowd is well represented, of course, and some of them would otherwise be Trumpers.But there were some woo-woo lefties there too, so woefully mid-informed that it made my head hurt. (Did you know that Joe Biden is a criminal and lied about COVID on behalf of Big Pharma? ) So I’m not sure that this sort of interview will affect his potential voters much. They’re pretty far gone.
Right now some polls show him getting about 20% and pulling from both sides. But we really don’t need this conspiracy addled gadfly in there stirring the pot. This election is too important. But it doesn’t look as if anyone can stop him. Let’s just hope he doesn’t get on the ballot anywhere where it can make a difference.
The former president’s comments have ignited concerns from critics and scholars who have warned that a second Trump administration threatens democracy – even as his advisers push back on those fears, dismissing them as baseless.
Many likely Iowa Republican caucusgoers have no issue with several of Trump’s recent statements, a new Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom Iowa Poll has found, and, more often than not, they say the same statements make them more likely to support the former president.
Holly Rice, a 57-year-old poll respondent from Cumming, Iowa, said she was backing Trump for his policy agenda, saying “I don’t care what he tweets. It’s a little off the wall, but you know? A lot of them do stuff like that,” Rice said. “At least we know he’s not a polished politician. He reminds me of my father.”
June Koelker, a 71-year-old poll respondent from Monticello, Iowa, said Trump’s immigration plans made her more likely to back him, but she answered she was “less likely” to support him for his statement about those who enter illegally “poisoning” the country.
She said there is “nothing wrong” with immigrants who seek entry legally but expressed concern about America’s national security under the Biden administration’s current border policy.
Trump’s declaration that he would have to root out “the radical left thugs that live like vermin” in the U.S. prompts 43% of likely Republican caucusgoers to say they are more likely to support him − words historians said echoed language used by fascist leaders like Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini.
Rice said Trump is “good at getting people to come to the table,” citing his peace accords with Israel and tariffs on China as examples of negotiations with foreign leaders.
“Maybe he can put it back together again, I don’t know,” Rice said. “You never know. But he’s the most likely one to be able to do that. It’s like negotiating a business deal.”
Just one statement makes a plurality of likely caucusgoers less likely to support Trump: his suggestion that “fraud” in the 2020 election could justify terminating parts of the U.S. Constitution. Forty-seven percent of likely caucusgoers say that makes them less likely to support Trump.
Trump calling himself “the most pro-life president in American history” effectively elicits a shrug from a plurality of those surveyed, with 41% saying it would not impact their support one way or the other.
A similar share of likely caucusgoers (43%) say it doesn’t matter that Trump said he would have “no choice” but to lock up his political opponents.
It’s possible that a few Republicans will decide that voting for Hitler 2.0 might bot be the greatest thing:
Supporters of Haley have the most negative reaction to all eight statements polled compared with Trump and DeSantis supporters. Backers of DeSantis fall between the Trump and Haley supporters on every statement but trend closer to Haley supporters than Trump supporters on their level of concern for all but two statements.
For example, 71% of Haley supporters say they are less likely to support Trump because of his statement that he would have “no choice” but to lock up his political opponents; 52% of DeSantis supporters say it makes them less likely to support Trump.
Just 12% of Trump supporters say his consideration of imprisoning political opponents makes them less likely to back the former president.
Travis Webber, a 43-year-old independent from Creston, Iowa, who is leaning toward supporting Haley, said Trump’s past actions and remarks were “an embarrassment” to the Republican Party.
The two Trump comments they don’t have a problem with are replacing Obamacare and that he’s the most pro-life candidate in history (which I’m happy to concede as well.)
These comments need to be relentlessly hyped by the Democrats and the media must continue to be vigilant in exposing them to the greater public. People need to see it and understand that it is beyond the pale. If Trump agrees to do debates in the fall (which I’m fairly confident he will not do) the moderators must confront him with them over and over again.
Those numbers really reveal the hardcore Trump cultists for what they are: a basket of deplorables, aka fascist cultists. They are unreachable. But it appears that buried deeply in the psyches of at least a few Republicans are some of the ideals that most Americans used to share (not that we ever fully lived up to them.) That may be the most hopeful thing I’ve seen in ages.
Who knows if they’ll actually defy the pull of the Trump cult in the end. I’d guess it’s probably a tiny total number anyway. But every vote is going to count and I just hope that a few of these folks continue to wince at hearing Trump casually spout Nazi rhetoric and decide that it’s just not worth the risk.
As we approach the winter solstice, things are not as dark as they seem. More sunlight is on the way. As I noted the other day:
I’m assembling mailing lists for the 5th Ed of For The Win right now. Two years ago 40% of Idaho’s counties either had no functioning Democratic committees (or no sign of them on the Net). Today all do. Two years ago an even higher percentage of Iowa’s counties were MIA. Today only 5 [of 99] are. Sure, it’s red Idaho and Iowa, but it’s dramatic progress in two short years. Nobody knows about that. Now you do.
Candidate filing closed at noon on Friday in North Carolina and I was thrilled:
Chided for absences across more than 25% the General Assembly races in 2022, Friday’s final half-day of election filing for the 2024 cycle brought a resounding end to the fortnight. All 50 Senate districts have a Democratic candidate, and 118 of 120 House of Representatives districts have one.
That’s a far cry from nobody in 15 Senate and 29 House races.
But let former Ohio Democratic Party chair David Pepper tell it:
The new North Carolina Democratic Party Chairwoman, in her mid-20s, didn’t just believe in running everywhere.
@abreezeclayton gave the candidates running in the toughest districts a name:
1/
“Champion Candidates.”
Because, as she says, by running in those tough districts, these heroes are championing the Democratic cause and values.
And from my standpoint, they’re championing democracy itself.
2/
Now THAT is how you show that you value running in these tough districts—which means you value running everywhere.
Well, Chairwoman Clayton got to work finding those champion candidates, in a state that’s seen a non-stop attack on democracy as brutal as any state.
3/
Chairwoman Clayton has been tirelessly circling the state recruiting ever since, and yesterday was the filing deadline.
And…WOW did she succeed!
4/
Only 2 years ago, North Carolina Dems didn’t field a candidate in 29 statehouse districts. That left about 40% of GOP members without opposition.
And THAT is an unacceptably high number of politicians feeling zero accountability to the people—exerting power with no democracy
5/
Well, here’s the headline in North Carolina after yesterday…
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That’s right, for 2024, Chairwoman Clayton and her colleagues now have a candidate in all but 2 districts!
From 29 to 2!!
And all 50 Senate districts have a Democratic candidate—in 2022, 15 seats went unopposed!
From 15 to zero!
7/
Incredibly, as a brand new chair, Chairwoman Clayton bested the Republicans in recruiting in a state THEY gerrymandered.
Republicans are leaving far more districts uncontested (25 statehouse, 8 senate) than she is!
8/
How is this success being treated in North Carolina?
“NC Dems have reversed the narrative…Chided for absences across more than 25% the General Assembly races in 2022, Friday’s final half-day of election filing for the 2024 cycle brought a resounding end to the fortnight.”
9/
This is how you go on offense in states, where democracy is most directly under attack!
Kudos to @abreezeclayton , all the other leaders and activists who recruited so vigorously, and especially to the many Champion Candidates for stepping up and providing this invaluable…
10/
and patriotic public service.
Your service has already begun!
For more on recruiting success elsewhere, and what we need to do next, go here:
The lead organizer from RuralOrganizing.org e-introduced me to Anderson Clayton in August 2021. Like David Pepper, I knew with our first phone call Clayton was going places. By October, she was electing Democrats in a red county. When she ran for state chair last February, I may have been the only one on her campaign Slack over 35. The level of organization I witnessed there was super-impressive. Same-old was not going to cut it. Clayton won handily on reversing the the underperformance in 2022. Since then, she’s won over skeptics, including one close to home. Her team is bringing back the fight.
He’s stepped up to run in a county that’s R+20, and he knows it’s an uphill battle. But he’s ready to get out there and talk to voters about the REAL issues that matter to folks in our own backyard. #RuralMatters
Yes, I’m a fan. My generation can still be footsoldiers and advisers, but it will be this young cohort that will save democracy. Help yourselves by helping them. Stay hydrated, get good sleep.
David Hogg at the far end on the left, along with other GenZ activists at Netroots Nation-Chicago. Including Leaders We Deserve board members TN state Rep. Justin Jones, FL Congressman Maxwell Frost (1st and 2nd on left), and NC Democratic state chair Anderson Clayton (4th on right).
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, left, meets in Moscow with U.S. Republican lawmakers over July 4th weekend, 2018. AP Photo.
Not that long ago the American right was militarist, love-it-or-leave-it, and rabidly anti-Communist/anti-Russia. To a comical “no more than ten to twenty million killed, tops” and “Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran” degree, even. Fight ’em over there so we don’t fight ’em over here. War was good business, good politics, and a resume-builder for aspiring politicans. Americans of all political stripes reflexively pulled for the underdogs facing imperialist aggression (unless we were the imperialists).
Then came the BIg Shift. Now righties are fans of authoritarians and dictators. They’ve soured on all-American democracy and have turned fascism-curious. Let Russia have Ukraine, whatevs. It’s been in the making since the 1990s.
Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos take a swag in The New Yorkerat explaining why American conservatives have turned fans of Vladimir Putin:
The New Yorker staff writer Andrew Marantz joins the Washington Roundtable to discuss his reporting on CPAC Hungary, where far-right political figures gathered in Budapest last year, and on why American conservatives are gravitating toward figures like Putin and Orbán. “You don’t have to be a red-string-on-a-corkboard conspiracy theorist to see the connections,” Marantz says. “In Florida, for example, Ron DeSantis’s administration has admitted when they wrote the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill, they were modelling it on a previous Hungarian law, which was itself modelled on a previous Russian law. So, no one’s really entirely hiding the ball here.”
Year-end roundup time…here’s a few more recommended 2023 Blu-ray reissues for your creel:
Dance Craze(BFI; Region ‘B’ locked) – In the book Reggae International, a collection of essays compiled by Stephen Davis and Peter Simon, sub-culturalist Dick Hebdige writes about the UK’s short-lived yet highly influential “2-tone” movement of the early 1980s:
Behind the fusion of rock and reggae lay the hope that the humour, wit, and style of working-class kids from Britain’s black and white communities could find a common voice in 2-tone; that a new, hybrid cultural identity could emerge along with the new music. The larger message was usually left implicit. There was nothing solemn or evangelical about 2-tone. It offered an alternative to the well-intentioned polemics of the more highly educated punk groups, who tended to top the bill at many of the Rock Against Racism gigs. […]
Instead of imposing an alienating, moralising discourse on a popular form (alien at least to their working-class constituency), bands like the Specials worked in and on the popular, steered clear of the new avant-gardes, and stayed firmly within the “classical” definitions of 50s and early 60s rock and pop: that this was music for Saturday nights, something to dance to, to use.
In 1981, a concert film called Dance Craze was released. Shot in 1980 and directed by Joe Massot (The Song Remains the Same), it was filmed at several venues, showcasing six of the most high-profile bands in the 2 Tone Records stable: Bad Manners, The English Beat, The Bodysnatchers, Madness, The Selector, and The Specials.
I’d heard about this Holy Grail, but it was a tough film to catch; outside of its initial theatrical run in the UK (and I’m assuming very limited engagements here in the colonies) it had all but vanished in the mists of time…until now.
This film is nirvana for genre fans; all six bands are positively on fire (this is music for Saturday nights-I guarantee you’ll be dancing in your living room). Thanks to cinematographer Joe Dunton’s fluid “performer’s-eye view” camerawork and tight editing by Ben Rayner and Anthony Sloman, you not only feel like you are on stage with the band, but you get a palpable sense of the energy and enthusiasm feeding back from the audience.
Luckily for posterity, Dunton originally shot the film in super 35mm. Coupled with the meticulous restoration (using 70mm materials), it looks and sounds superb (especially for a concert film of this vintage). Extras include a 34-minute episode of the BBC program Arena examining the 2-tone movement (from 1980), outtakes, previously unseen interview footage, and more. (Please note: This is a Region ‘B’-locked Blu-ray, and requires an all-region player!).
Inland Empire(Criterion Collection) – From Richard A. Barney’s 2009 book David Lynch: Interviews:
Barney: I’ve read some comments you’ve made about the pleasures of [writing a script ‘as you film’]. Can you talk about that and whether [working that way on Inland Empire] was a horror at other times?
Lynch: There’s no horror. The horror, if there is a horror, is the lack of ideas. But that’s all the time. You’re just waiting. And I always say, it’s like fishing: Some days you don’t catch any fish. The next day, it’s another story – they just swim in.
When I read that excerpt (featured in the booklet that accompanies Criterion’s Blu-ray package), a light bulb went off in my (mostly empty) head. Lynch’s answer is analogous to my experience with Inland Empire. The first time I watched it…he didn’t hook me. I watched it once in 2007, found it baffling and disturbing (even for a Lynch joint) and then parked the DVD for 16 years.
Being a glutton for punishment, I purchased the Blu-ray earlier this year (the extras looked interesting, and life is short). When I re-watched the film recently, I kept an open mind. This time, he caught me – hook, line, sinker and latest edition of Angler’s Digest. As I once wrote in a capsule review of his equally experimental Eraserhead:
I think the secret to his enigmatic approach to telling a story is that Lynch is having the time of his life being impenetrably enigmatic-he’s sitting back and chuckling at all the futile attempts to dissect and make “sense” of his narratives. For example, have you noticed how I’ve managed to dodge and weave and avoid giving you any kind of plot summary? I suspect that David Lynch would find that fucking hysterical.
In Inland Empire, Laura Dern stars as an actress (or is she?) who lands a part (or does she?) in a) a film b) her own nightmare, or c) somebody else’s nightmare. It’s Rod Serling’s Alice In Wonderland. Know going in that this is a David Lynch film; if you buy the ticket, take the ride.
While it’s odd to tout a “4k restoration” of a film that was digitally shot to begin with, I suppose the print looks as sharp (and at times, as purposely blurry) as originally intended by the filmmaker. There’s a generous helping of extras, including two documentaries about Lynch, a 2007 short by Lynch, 75 minutes of extra footage, and more.
Tintin and the Mystery of the Golden Fleece/Tintin and the Blue Oranges(Kino Classics) – Thundering typhoons! This “twofer” set features beautifully restored prints of the first two live-action feature films based on writer-illustrator Hergé’s classic comic book series The Adventures of Tintin (published between 1929-1986).
Interestingly, unlike a previous 1947 stop-motion film and an animated late 50s TV series, Jean-Jacques Vierne’s Tintin and the Mystery of the Golden Fleece (1961) was not adapted from one of the Hergé books but was an original story (co-scripted by André Barret and Rémo Forlani). Ditto Philippe Condroyer’s Tintin and the Blue Oranges (1964), which featured an original story by Condroyer, André Barret, Rémo Forlani and René Goscinny.
Both films star athletic Belgian actor Jean-Pierre Talbot as the titular globe-trotting boy-reporter/adventurer. Talbot is a ringer for the comic book character. Tintin’s stalwart (and perpetually half-in-the-bag) co-adventurer Captain Haddock is also on hand (played with appropriate bombast by Georges Wilson in the 1961 film and Jean Bouise in the 1964 film). The other iconic series characters, like bumbling detectives Thompson and Thompson, Professor Calculus and (of course) Tintin’s faithful dog Snowy are all rendered with equal aplomb.
I’m a fan of the books but had never seen these two films. Tintin and the Mystery of the Golden Fleece is the best of the pair; a delight from start to finish. While entertaining enough to hold your interest, Tintin and the Blue Oranges has a less cohesive story and leans more on slapstick (note how many writers toiled on it-usually not a good sign). That said, rest assured it’s not as manic and overcooked as Steven Speilberg’s animated 2011 entry The Adventures of Tintin.
No extras, but the prints are pristine, and fans of the books should get a kick out of this set.
Tokyo Pop(Kino Lorber/Indie Collect) – This 1988 film is a likable entry in the vein of other 80s films like Starstruck, Breaking Glass, Desperately Seeking Susan, Smithereens and The Fabulous Stains. Star Carrie Hamilton’s winning screen presence helps to buoy the fluffy premise. Hamilton (who does her own singing) plays a struggling wannabe rock star who buys a one-way ticket to Tokyo at the invitation of a girlfriend. Unfortunately, her flaky friend has flown the coop, and our heroine is stranded in a strange land. “Fish out of water” misadventures ensue, including cross-cultural romance with all the usual complications.
For music fans, it’s a fun time capsule of the late 80s Japanese music scene, and the colorful cinematography nicely captures the neon-lit energy of Tokyo nightlife. Director Fran Rubel Kuzui (who co-wrote the screenplay with Lynn Grossman) later directed the 1992 feature film Buffy the Vampire Slayer and went on to serve as executive producer for the eponymous TV series. Sadly, Hamilton (Carol Burnett’s daughter) died of cancer at age 38 in 2002.
This one has been on my reissue wish list for a while. Indie Collect’s 4k restoration is sparkling, and the colors are vibrant. Regarding the audio…it is nice and clean, but be ready to ride your volume control, as the music has about ten times the gain over the dialog (a noticeable trend in remastered film soundtracks that makes me crazy). There are no extras, but you can’t have everything, and I am just happy that I can finally retire my VHS copy!
Trump promises the federal government will indemnify all police and law enforcement officials for "strong actions against crime," and says this is "a big thing and brand new and so important." Which it is, if you really want to put a nation on the road to authoritarianism. https://t.co/n1yz4ftiWA
(That’s the plan to allow drilling in Alaska which he thinks will fully finance all American health care.)
Bold predictions:
After criticizing Biden on the economy, Trump tries to take credit for the economy and predicts a depression “the likes of which you haven’t seen since the depression of 1929” pic.twitter.com/hPMnrTgrW9
He has a novel (final) solution for Social Security funding
Asked in New Hampshire whether he plans to raise the retirement age he had some great news. It isn’t going broke after all!
“What I don’t think people are acknowledging the way they should is that life expectancy in this country is declining. And so, you know, we used to think it was just gonna keep going up. I mean, it’s been a pretty steep decline. So I don’t see how you raise it if life expectancy is declining.”
What a relief, huh? The old people are dying early! Whew!
DeSantis said that the decrease in lifespans isn’t “just from COVID,” but is “from a lot of other things,” including “deaths of despair, overdoses” and “other things, that have happened that I think the government hasn’t been willing to really be honest about.”
Apparently, he didn’t express any particular concern about this decrease. He clearly sees it as a big plus, saving him from having to support raising the retirement age. He’s here to tell you the truth which the government refuses to do! We’re all gonna be dead soon!
It also explains why a Florida Governor, of all people, would be so cavalier about a pandemic that was especially deadly for elderly people. There are a whole lot of them down there and I’m sure it saved the state some serious money. Who says he’s not a true conservative Republican!
