I stay cool as a rule, but sometimes bad is bad Huey Lewis and the News Sometimes bad is bad
I’ve been at this for quite a while now. In almost a decade of blogging on politics, this is the third GOP National convention I’ve covered. That being said, I’ve never seen anything like this in my life.
Normally, when I cover the RNC, the minute I finish typing for the night, I have to run in for an hour long hot shower with a gallon of brain bleach. I watch it so that you don’t have to, but think back to 2016, with the Ghoul Man standing there hooting like a dyspeptic owl, Mike Flynn predicting his own future by yelling, LOCK HER UP! LOCK HER UP!, and Melania sounding like the eastern European villainess in a James Bond flick. Now imagine four straight nights of three hours of that sh*t.
But not this time. Not this convention, and not this band of screeching howler monkeys.I can’t vouch for NBC, CBS, ABC or CNN since I’m watching MSNBC, but apparently somebody at MSNBC installed a nausea alert system in the control room at the convention hall, because this is almost bearable.
Most of the speakers so far in the first two days have speeches limited to about six minutes, which is far too long for a bout of verbal diarrhea, and MSNBC seems to know it. The average length of actual broadcast time for each speech on MSNBC has been about 60-90 seconds before they switch back to the booth to talk about something worth discussing. Even Traitor Tot’s own daughter-in-law, the RNC co-Chair didn’t rate a full two minutes.
Now, while this is just ducky by me, saves me on brain bleach, it’s a living nightmare for Trump and the RNC. As I wrote at the time, for both the Democrats as well as the GOP, these conventions are invaluable free time you can’t buy. Everything drops for four days while the party gets uninterrupted time to talk about their agenda and platform. This never comes around again, even for a sitting President with the bully pulpit.
I can only imagine that pretty much the same thing is going on at all of the major networks other than FUX News, and it’s a self inflicted gunshot wound for the GOP. The networks have obviously reached the sane and correct conclusion that while the Fairness Doctrine requires them to give equal time to opposing views, it does not require them to devote three uninterrupted hours a night to pure, unadulterated bullsh*t. So they tune in until the droppings start falling, give the audience about a 30 second sample of what they’re about to gratefully miss, and then go back to people who actually know how to speak in public.
The one speech tonight I can almost guarantee you will be carried fully is Vice President nominee Gomer Vance’s. And oh brother, won’t that be special? Just like his education. I caught about half of his first official campaign speech in front of a ballroom full of mouth breathers, and he sounded like an ass clown at an open mic night at a roadhouse that isn’t likely going to be invited back on stage anytime soon.
So, do yourself a favor. Unless you really love rachel Maddow, Lawrence O’Donnell, Niccole Wallace et al, don’t bother tuning in on MSNBC, because that’s mostly what you’ll be watching all night. And I assume pretty much the same for everybody else reputable. Just a word to the wise.
I thank you for the privilege of your time.
I thank you for watching this crap for us Murphy, I couldn’t stomach it. Just heard that President Biden tested positive for Covid. Can things get any worse?
I pray he recovers quickly and fully! No wonder he wasn’t feeling well!
To steal from Christopher Guest…I’d rather get a large box of thumbtacks, place them points up across the floor, strip naked, roll back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, and then sit in a tub full of gin. Ohhh that smarts! Yet…preferable to the nazi night of the living dead.
As I wrote earlier I watched Lara Trump last night by switching away from MSNBC. I’ll do the same if I have to in order to see Vance’s speech. Some of us have to see it the way the fifteen to twenty million viewers that tune in to see key speeches/moments in their entirety do. To see what the average voter who’s only now starting to pay serious attention to the stuff we political junkies spend most of our lives looking at.
As for MSNBC I still say marching orders from the top are being obeyed. Maybe less obviously than in the aftermath of the debate but instead of mostly covering the leadup to this week and relentlessly hitting up Republicans about issues instead they spend a LOT of time discussing polls with Democrats. And with Democrats worried more about their own seats/asses than the good of the country (ah, bi-partisanship!) it’s easy enough to scare the shit out of Democrats. And both inspire and spread panic. Which the reporters and then the talking heads, even on MSNBC mournfully expound upon.
Going back to my past life as an athlete, I’ve suddenly realized this is like a huge game against an opponent quite capable of beating your team. Might even at the moment have been playing better in recent games. It was always going to take a great effort, and then your team’s captain/most valuable player gets sick. They had a bout but quickly recovered but the OMFG what will happen without THEM feeling can take hold. And knowing it’s a big game and scouts will be there watching players on both teams including you, some players start thinking along the lines of “we probably will lose and with it the conference championship, so maybe I should go outside my normal role and “play for myself”. Pad my stats a little whether it be scoring more points than normal, abandoning the guy I’m supposed to be guarding to rack up more rebounds of missed shots etc.
That’s what I see Democrats doing. I suddenly fell really ill on the Thursday before the regional tournament my senior year in h.s. I wasn’t put in the hospital but our family doc (this was 1975) had me on bedrest I almost passed out in the hall before school shortly before the start of classes for the day and made it in there and into the coach’s office and he took one look at me, told another coach to call my mom and took me to the doctor. By practice that afternoon he told the team I wouldn’t be able to play the next week.
I wasn’t our best player but I was the captain and leader of the team and the reaction initially was “oh fuck.” But he told me the next day they’d decided to pull together and figure out how to make up for my absence. When, on Monday the doc said I might be able to at least dress out for the game, and if up to it play a limited amount word made it to the team and several came by our house and said “we’ve got your back. Even if you can only play a few minutes here and there just having you with us and leading us is enough. We WILL get it done. And by god the next night I attended a half day of school because our principal was a dick, didn’t like me and made up a rule saying I had to in order to play, and did play part of the game. Probably more than I should have but my team was on fire and I didn’t have to expend as much effort as I normally would have had to. We kicked the living shit out of our town’s arch rival, a larger high school I might add.
THAT is what good teammates do when a leader falters at a key moment. Process it. Get over the initial panic and start pulling together. I could give you some sports example from two professional sports in championship games where the leader, the heart and soul of their teams was injured and doubtful for the deciding game 7 for the championship. Willis Reed played only a few minutes but his teammates were inspired and won the Knick’s first NBA championship. Decades later, a Kirk Gibson who could barely walk made it to the batters box and belted a home run. No one who watched will forget the adrenaline rush that allows him to slowly trot around the bases. That was pretty much it for Gibson – his teammates carried him and the team to the win in that championship game.
THAT is what pisses me off so much about my Party. The President immediately rallied but unlike my teammates in h.s., the Knicks or the Dodgers have refused to rally. Instead they are angling to “impress the scouts” so to speak and if their leader goes down, are too blinded by their fear and/or ambition to see that if they DON’T rally behind their leader they will go down too.
“…to the win in that championship game.”
Nope, was a walk-off in the bottom of the ninth, Game 1, from wikip:
Kirk Gibson’s 1988 World Series home run was a baseball play that occurred in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series, on October 15, 1988, at Dodger Stadium
Only reason I mention it was I was living in Oakland, and an As fan, I was crushed that night, Gibson crushed it, too. Darn him! 🙂
I appreciate the analogies, do recommend correct ones though.
Your principal was a piece of work, even then.
What is it with these Democrats? They get the biggest grass roots campaign going and could blow it, because…?” It’s like trumpy and because, reasons… Sheez….
They blame it on the MSM and then shoot themselves in the foot?
Welcome back, Murf.
Sorry for getting my baseball history mixed up. I was never a Dodgers fan although for some years after Rick Monday (a very, very distant relative) was traded by mu Cubbies to them I didn’t follow them closely. And that time of life was one of turmoil for me and I didn’t follow any sports the way I normally did. But those Knicks? I grew up a town over from and went to SIU-Carbondale where Walt “Clyde” Frazier played his college ball. And his teammate Dickie Garret was a starting guard for the Laker. AND another favorite so many guys from my area looked up to, Bill Bradley (yes, the Senator) was from over in Crystal City, MO. I and all the guys I knew were riveted on that series and when Reed was injured we were in despair. But when Reed came out of the tunnel and on to the court is was like a bomb going off in Madison Square Garden. Not just his teammates but the entire crowd gave 100% of support and the Knicks won.
We Democrats COULD be like that. Except for people like Schiff, and to some degree I’m angry to learn Pelosi, Schumer and Jeffries are tossing turds into the punchbowl instead of rallying everyone!
by cutting the speechs off the non junkie viewers are missing the horrors and insanity of what the Republicans have planned if Trump wins. I think Denis is right, they’re cutting it short to mitigate the damage. not a good thing.
There is not enough money in the world that could convince me to listen to even one second of what these braying asses have to say during this 5 day attempt to make von shitzinpants any kind of a leader–hell, even a bad one. shitzi is the poster child example of someone not being able to find their ass with their hands tied behind their back and nothing these idiots spew is going to make him intelligent, brave, empathetic, or a leader. He does not have any admirable qualities-not a single one.
The day we are finally rid of this fool, be it prison, dementia institutionalization, or pushing up the daisies, ought to be a minor holiday–an add-on to april fools day of sorts. A day during which we are thankful we have one less fool embarrassing our country.