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I was watching the trial by 7 (a joust of 7 men against 7 men) match in the new Game of Thrones iteration “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms” and it dawned on me on how attracted human beings are to violence even in our games. Think boxing, rugby, football, hockey. Think the games at the Roman Colosseum.

Even more interesting is that men will engage in these games, despite the very real danger which could include death. Think about in the modern world people continue to play football even after numerous medical studies have concluded that irreparable damage is being done to the brain. People continue to watch.

Vivid depictions of violence are seen every day in television shows and movies. People might complain but people, nonetheless, continue to watch.

Why is it so fucking attractive?

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Trump is contemplating military action with Iran. He has been thinking about it for some time. Clearly this isn’t an emergency as he has been thinking about it for some time. An emergency would suggest that something has to be done immediately. This means there is more than enough time to consult with Congress. Only Congress can declare war, right? I get that in an emergency quick decisions are necessary and sometimes the President has to act alone but this isn’t an emergency, not by any stretch of the imagination.

Why isn’t someone in Congress complaining loudly about this? As far as I can tell they aren’t doing much any way, this would be a good time to perk up and make your opinion known. So where is Congress? They could at least give an opinion on the matter. They are in session. Given the present makeup of the Congress, I suspect Trump might get a majority to go along with him. Fine. At least democratic norms were practiced.

Trump isn’t even going through the motions of democratic processes here. He is thinking about it and when he is through thinking about it, he will act and no consultive body like the Congress can do anything about it. I can’t say I am that disappointed in Trump. Trump is an ignorant asshole and always has been. But the Republican elders? What are you waiting for? I mean, for one, they are old. They have hit their pinnacle. People like McConnell, Grassley, and Graham are clinging to their power. But what real power do you have if you are afraid of Donald Trump? You can’t influence the man. You won’t say what you honestly think because you fear the man. This isn’t power, boys, this is keeping your position. Your power lapsed the first time you toadied up to Donald Trump.

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I am getting to an age where I just don’t want to be bummed out anymore. Life bums me out enough. Spending more time getting bummed out is a young person’s game. They have plenty of time to recover. I, at 68, am on a much more limited timeframe and I need to monitor closely what goes into this often bummed out mind so I prefer to be entertained as opposed to bummed out. Which brings me the movie Blue Moon.

I can say it is a great movie with great acting. It is clear that people involved in the movie put a lot of effort into it and they certainly were successful in bringing the story of song writer Lorenz Hart to light. Honestly the only thing I have against the movie is that it is a better play than movie as it all takes place at the Sardi’s bar in New York. There is nothing really cinematic about it.

Despite its many fine qualities, I am unable to recommend it because it bummed me out and, furthermore, I can’t see why I should spend my time being bummed out by it. There is no deeper message other than Lorenz Hart (Ethan Hawke) was depressed and desperate. He saw his successful partnership with Richard Rodgers (Andrew Scott) coming to an end and there was nothing he could do to stop it. What am I to make of Hart’s sad spiral into the gutter? He seemed like a charming but difficult man who was unwilling (or unable) to save himself.

The bartender and the piano player at Sardi’s are trapped by their paycheck to listen to Hart’s tales about his romance with a much younger woman. They listen but more out of boredom than genuine concern. They have to be there so let the tired drunk writer talk until I have something better to do. When his friends do arrive after the play, they acknowledge his past genius at the same time as they are distancing themselves from the non-stop bull shit that comes out of Hart’s mouth. Particularly cruel is his former writing partner Rodgers. He seems intent on both irritating Hart with his own present success without Hart and wanting to work with him again if Hart would only buckle down to their partnership. It is unpleasant to listen to Rodgers complaints about Hart — it is like listening to someone else’s bad job review. All right already, just fire him and put him (and us) out of our misery.

Then there is the younger woman, Elizabeth Weiland (Margaret Qualley). Hart, in yet another perverse display of masochism, sits inthralled by her stories of being seduced by her lover. This is the woman he is supposed to love and he joyfully hangs on her every word about a her man who treats her badly but who she would gladly drive hundreds of miles to be with again if he only he would ask. asked. Something, she also admits, she would never do for Hart. It is one awkward painful moment after the next. Why? Great acting. I guess. Whatever that is worth.

Watching a sad man’s self-destruction is really not worth my time. It is just sad. I can get more than my share watching the news.

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When I attended the University of Kansas in the late 1970’s, a friend who was an actor got a small role in the Peter Shaffer play Equus. Equus had several nude scenes in it and he was looking forward to blowing the minds of the people in Lawrence, Kansas. Lawrence was playing its own role here instead of a university town with a mostly cosmopolitan population, it was taking on the the role of a small Kansas town rife with closed minds about nudity. I also was taking a course in Modern Theater. The professor encouraged his students to see the play because he thought it would blow our minds. Using almost the exact words as my friend. Hmm.

Blowing the minds of the audience was very much a part of the purpose of this play. To ensure that the damage done to our minds was not so severe, there were warnings about the nudity in the play so everyone who entered the theater was prepared for the genital reveal which , at least to my mind, spoiled the whole shock value of having nudity in the play. I was waiting for it.

Then, the type of person who would wander into a student play at a University is just not your typical small town Kansan. They would be more academic, more cosmopolitan, and more open to nudity in the theater. By 1979, even in Kansas, most people who followed the arts already had seen their fair of nudity before Equus exposed them to some more. But how do you get them into theater to see the nudity? Oh, yeah, why don’t we create a little controversy and, lo and behold, it worked, the controversy brought people into the show.

This is what I think happened with Bad Bunny’s Half-time performance. It was meant to provoke a certain segment of the population. It successfully provoked them. They lost their minds as they do and started demanding all kinds of things which cause the Media to follow the controversy. This created a demand to see the show. It was a genius marketing ploy — hyping the first Spanish language performer at the Super Bowl. The buzz was great, a lot of people watched it because most people had no idea who Bad Bunny was or what they were about to see. The television advertisers got their audience, so the money they paid was well spent.

Everybody is happy — particularly, I imagine, Bad Bunny who got a lot of free press and millions of potential new customers for his music. For the vast majority of people, though, it was a meaningless experience in a life filled with meaningless experiences. But no one’s minds were seriously blown here. It will hardly be a memory in a year or two.

But you have to give credit to the the organizers of the show, they certainly showed they knew what they are doing. If you got something to sell, I certainly would recommend them. Buzz is their middle name.

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The ever changing explanations for Donald Trump’s release of a racist video regarding the Obamas is a bit mystifying, at least, in regards to it being helpful in understanding what actually happened. I don’t think they really matter anymore because none of them give a good impression of the Trump White House.

First the idea that someone in the White House, up to and including the President, didn’t understand that depicting the Obamas as apes was racist is just a bit more bull shit than even some of Trump’s fellow Republicans are willing to swallow. But, say I am going to let you off the hook for being racist, it doesn’t let you off the hook for being ignorant of a common racist portrayal.

Is this really how you want to frame your mistake? Trump was using the Lion King characters as a funny way to express an opinion and had no racist intentions whatsoever. Well, then, why didn’t you know this? Since this history is common knowledge, is it really a good idea to have you managing the very country that has this complicated history? What stupid mistake are you going to make next because of your ignorance? It is hardly a reassuring answer.

Oh, then Trump says he didn’t watch the whole video so he missed the part where the Obamas were depicted as apes. Well, again, why not? If something is going out with your name associated with, it might be a good idea to watch the whole video. The video wasn’t that long — a full viewing by the man in charge could have prevented this embarrassing mistake. So we have gone from ignorant of a long standing racial stereotype to my team made a mistake because I couldn’t be bothered watching the whole video but I gave my approval any way even though I didn’t really know what was on the video.

Then there is the lack of an apology. If this was genuinely an honest error, what is the problem with saying you are sorry. Trump now claims he didn’t make a mistake, someone else did because he didn’t know about the Obamas as ape section of the video. That isn’t an excuse and failing to watch the whole video is indeed a mistake. He signed off on something that he had not thoroughly vetted.

It is mistake and he needs to say he is sorry. Is it really that difficult. I am sorry and I will try to do better next time. If this was an honest error then put it behind you already. Even if you aren’t genuinely sorry. An insincere apology is better than no apology. But no, Trump refuses to apologize because he, apparently, doesn’t make mistakes. Which, I might add, is also a troubling Trump characteristic.

This leads me to believe Trump simply doesn’t care that people think he is racist. Or stupid. Or incompetent. He thinks he should be able to say whatever he wants and if people don’t like it, tough shit. Just a reminder, he is the president of the United States something he has failed to understand since taking office. Don on a barstool in the local tavern can say anything he wants. The president of the United States has to think carefully before he opens his trap and, understandably, any person who is under such public scrutiny is going to slip occasionally, when you do, all you have to do is have the grace to say I am sorry.

So, to recap, the best case scenario here, is that we have an idiot as president who is unaware of the history of the country he leads, says whatever ill-thought out words come to his mind and isn’t going to apologize even after his mistakes are pointed out to him. The worst case is we have a racist who enjoys displaying his racism even when it is unnecessary and counter-productive to what he is trying to do. The truth probably lies somewhere in between but none of them really encourage me that Trump is worthy or up to the job that he holds.

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The Conservative Press is agog at Jacob Savage’s the Lost Generation. Savage details the trials and tribulations of White men trying to break into Academia or Cultural positions right now. It is all DEI and racial discrimination. I am afraid they are emphasizing only one aspect of his argument while downplaying and missing some of his more salient points. They are going on about how lesser candidates who are women or people of color are getting the jobs that should rightfully being going to White men. This was not Savage’s point at all.

Savage points out that this problem exists for young white men and not older white men. Older White men already have their jobs in Academia and in Cultural institutions while younger White men are vying for open positions. The problem for younger White men is that these positions, in the past, skewed disproportionately to White men. This past discrimination worked against women and people of color. So if you presently have a staff of 10 and 7 of them are white men, what happens when a position becomes available and your institution is interested in diversity. The young white men are at a disadvantage. Not because of women and people of color but because the institution already has too many white men.

Is this unfair? Yes, absolutely. But how can you achieve two varied goals — a diversified work force and being absolutely fair to everyone. Conservatives say that diversity shouldn’t be considered a factor at all. The only thing that matters is who is the better candidate. Well, that would be nice but how exactly does the best candidate always get the job?

For example, Savage discusses the hiring of television writers. How does one determine who is a better writer? Particularly if one of your goals is to broaden the stories you tell to include more stories about women and people of color. Who better to tell these tales than women and people of color? White men can, of course, write women characters but then I am betting than women can write even better women characters. So, then, who is the best candidate for the job? The man or the woman?

How does one determine the best candidate in Academia? Is it teaching? Is it research? Or is it the old tried and true old boy network where connections with the people who make the decisions help you get the job? Why should groups who have been discriminated in the past, trust that you are hiring the best candidate? The word of the person making the decision? After how many white men are hired does one question the process? Five? Ten? Twenty? Never. And after twenty or so white men are hired and discrimination is determined, what happens to all of those candidates that were overlooked? Tough luck.

By the way, there isn’t only one perfect person for the job. Indeed this is rarely true. The difficult decision comes generally because there are several people who could do the job well. This is particularly true with jobs that everybody wants. Jobs in Academia and Culture have always had stiff competition. They carry salary, prestige, and power. In the past, a lot of white men vied with other white men for these positions. And a lot of white men were disappointed. Now the competition has expanded to include women and people of color. This means that the competition is fierce and there is even a bigger chance of not getting your dream job. Savage writes at the end of his essay: “The truth is, I’m not some extraordinary talent who was passed over; I’m an ordinary talent—and in ordinary times that would have been enough.”

The sad story is that talented White men are used to getting the job and they aren’t anymore. Their expectation did not match the reality of our present world. It is a difficult lesson to learn but life, as we are constantly being reminded, is unfair. Is it fair that some parents can afford private tutors for their children who may have fallen a step behind in class while poor parents with a child in the same situation can not? Is it fair that some schools are direct conduits to Ivy League Universities while other schools are not? Is it fair that some parents make a significant donation to a university which gets their children into an elite university while a poorer parent with an equally gifted child can not? Is it fair that some children are well fed when they arrive at school and poorer children are not?

I could go on but you get the point. Life is unfair in a lot of different ways. Why this particular unfairness is so important while other unfairnesses can be ignored is informative of the motives of the people complaining right now. I mean if the unfairness in the education a person receives throughout their life can be equalized as best we can then we wouldn’t have to discussing the unfair treatment of White men now. It wouldn’t be a problem because everyone would believe that everybody had a fair chance from the start. But we aren’t talking about the differences in education that people receive, are we? I wonder why?

We do not live in a perfect world. There are plenty of bigoted people in important position making employment decisions. Processes devised to protect groups who have suffered discrimination in the past skew the process against the people who did not suffer discrimination in the past. So maybe we look at how to do the process better as we learn more. But, please, please don’t talk to me about the loss of our meritocracy. Because it is bull shit and you know it is bull shit. We never had one and we never will. All we can do is continue to work at making it better. And we will never ever succeed.

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For those people, on both sides of the political divide (think Rob Reiner and Charlie Kirk), who feel the need to respond to the murder of someone you personally hated and you passionately disagreed with, try silence. I know this is difficult to understand in a world where we believe that people are waiting for our every word but it is true. You actually can choose to say nothing at all.

I realize that famous people are often asked to respond in situations like this but that doesn’t mean your response is required. This is particularly important when you don’t like the person in question. If you must say something, try: I need to gather my thoughts about this and will be issuing a statement soon. Then, for God’s sake, come up with a polite neutral statement that is vetted by a hundred or so people before releasing it to the public.

Let’s try to avoid: He was a son of a bitch and I am happy he drowned in a pool of blood. Yes, you may feel that way but you can wait a few weeks, or better still months, before actually saying it. But, please, please wait until the wound is a little less fresh. No one looks good gloating over a murdered body.

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Quentin Tarantino bad mouthing Paul Dano bothered me for some reason. Tarantino has every right to criticize someone’s work. It is part of the risk artist takes. Critical feedback is a gauge of how effective the artist is so I am not opposed to criticism per se. Tarantino’s criticism, however, was unnecessarily mean spirited. He sounded like he wanted to hurt Dano more than let a colleague know how to improve his work.

More worrisome is this has become the environment we live in. I disagree with you has become more than a difference in opinion or taste. If I didn’t like your performance, you didn’t get it wrong, you are a bad actor. Or a stupid person. Or an evil person. The press eggs this on because it loves a disagreement and have a gleeful willingness to spread the absolute worst thoughts that people have to their readers and viewers. So if a famous person burns another famous person, you can bet your house that there will be a reporter sticking a microphone into the burn victim’s face asking for his response. Retaliation is inevitable.

I wish I was above it all but, I have to confess, I am right in there slinging mud with the best of them. I try to be conscious about it but I fail. Almost all of the time, I fail. A simple a thing as a Trump supporter with a misspelled protest sign is enough for me to forward to Facebook and Instagram so everyone can see how Trump supporter’s are so dumb. I am laughing at one person’s mistake and implying that all Trump supporters are the same which means they all potentially are bad spellers. Uneducated and stupid, right?

The problem is that in a few minutes, I will receive a post from a someone showing a misspelled sign from a left winger. Am I supposed to make the same sweeping assumption about all left wingers based on the one left winger who can’t spell? Of course not. It is just one person’s mistake. The question, for me, then what was I hoping people would think when I sent the post about the bad spelling Trump supporters? It was unfair of me to provide this false depiction of Trump supporters.

Making fun of people is all a lot of fun when you are speaking with people who agree with you but, in the social media world we live in, we no longer have this luxury. Everyone, including the people we are making fun of, can read your thoughts and know what you really think of them. People rarely change their minds if you are calling them stupid. Yet we keep calling each other stupid. Quite loudly at that. How then can we expect people to listen?

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I don’t know why I never realized this before now but butter is absolutely the best addition a person can make to any food. The best. It can make a stale piece of bread taste delicious. Maybe there can be too much butter but I seriously doubt it. I have never had that experience. Too much pepper yes, too much salt, an emphatic yes. But butter never. Even if I don’t like the taste of something, or I think I won’t like it, I can be persuaded to try it if this thing is slathered in butter. So I have tried snails and oysters but the only reason I even attempted a taste was because of the butter.

This is an irrefutable truth.

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I admit I haven’t been paying much attention to the news lately but U.S. troops took over a Venezuelan oil tanker today. I am so confused.

So Putin can invade the Ukraine and act like an all around asshole, killing Ukrainian civilians this way and that, and this isn’t worth one American life while the Venezuela government, who, at worst, may be complicit in the illegal drug trade, is getting direct American military intervention.

There simply is no sense of proportion here. Putin, a nuclear armed, political opponent murdering, kleptocrat supreme, war mongering dictator has to be given at least a small bit of the country he invaded unsuccessfully to whet his appetite while Venezuela can’t even ship a legal product, oil, because it is propping up a Latin American dictatorship who, as far as I know, has made no threats against the United States or any other country for the matter.

And people in the news are talking about a shooting war with Venezuela. A fucking war with Venezuela. Over illegal drug shipments? The world’s foremost military power is going to go toe-to-toe with a military lightweight over little more than a nuisance.

I am pretty certain the reason Trump is taking action against Venezuelan oil tankers is he thinks he can win. Taking on a much weaker nation doesn’t make you look like a tough guy (see Putin and the Ukraine for further information about this). It does make you look like a bully. And it runs the risk, particularly if things don’t go according to plan, of making the U.S.A. military look bad or ineffective (see Putin and the Ukraine).

The thing is you don’t risk your reputation on something that doesn’t really matter and I’m pretty sure the Venezuelan drug trade is secondary, at best, to U.S.A.’s larger interests. But, yeah, ok, let’s invade Venezuela. Go get them boys. I certainly feel a lot safer.