by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
V-Log: Trump’s Impeachment Strategy
Month: September 2019
#Novel Notes For September 14th, 2019
Some thoughts.
‘The End’
by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
The America I grew up in is dead. The dystopia is here. I don’t know how long it will last, but if we’re lucky somewhere around 40 years. But it could be I’ll never know if and when it ends because I’ll be dead.
It’s over because no matter what happens with Trump, the forces in America society that caused Trump remain. And if it’s not Trump, it’ll be Don Jr., or Tom Cotton or someone equally authoritarian and nefarious. The chief reason why the dystopia is here is Democratic leadership did not take the rise if MAGA seriously. Though, in their defence, if Trump had not won in 2016, a MAGA-type person would have won in 2020 or 2024. It was simply a matter of time.
When one of a nation’s major political parties loses its mind, it’s inevitable that they will gain power at some point. And when they take power, they will never leave because they follow “new rules” that value power over everything else. Or, put another way, the intersection of power politics, absolute greed and Evangelical Christian obsession with bringing about the Second Coming produced a force of politics that only cared about obtaining — and keeping — power forever. Democrats are so busy worrying about their precious “agenda” and keeping moderates in their caucus happy that they’ll simply are not prepared to do what is necessary to defend American democratic traditions alive the 20 or 30 years necessary for the Browning of America to kick in.
So, really, the question is how quickly things go from simply norm destruction to actual changes in government. My guess is Trump is going to make a massive power grab at some point in the 2020 election cycle. If it goes wrong, there will be something of a revolt on the part of Blue States. He uses that as an excuse to abolish Blue State governments indefinitely. America will become a prison. The issue will become where all the creatives and information workers escape to.
Do they go to Canada or Europe? It won’t be thousands who flee, either. It could be millions. Until, of course, The Thousand Year Trump freaks over the brain drain and makes it impossible for the very people they hate so much to leave the country. Given human nature, of course, that won’t stop the United States from descending into something resembling modern day Venezuela. This will only hasen our collapse into authoritarianism. The camps for immigrants will simply become cames for anyone who crosses House Trump or its successor ruling family.
I used to think there was the possibility of some sort of happy endgame. I no longer do. At this point, I simply wonder if I die in a House Trump re-education came sooner or later. Will it be sometime in Trump’s second term or will it be closer to 20 years from now? Regardless, if Blue States try to leave the Union, House Trump will abolish their state governments. All those young hack parison judges that The Federalist Society has recommended to Trump will close ranks.
There’s a chance that freedom of speech will linger. But freedom of assembly definitely is done for at some point during Trump’s second term. There will be something akin to the failed coup in Turkey that Trump will use to purge the last vestiges of the “deep state.” Tyranny will descend upon the United States and we will be no different than the managed democracy of Russia. Remember, Putinism was originally a popular movement caused by divisions in Russian society. And to some extent is still is. The same with MAGA. MAGA doesn’t care about anything about absolute power. When a small — but wealthy and powerful — minority of your electorate no longer believes in the benefits of democracy, then there’s nothing you can do.
I knew the America I loved was over when I realized we have to fight so hard on a daily basis to simply have a functioning civil society. Darkness has fallen on the land. Democrats have failed us.
All I can do to vent my frustration over all of this is write a novel. That’s all I got. It distracts me from the political hellscape engulfing the country I love.
The end.
‘Hustlers’ Is A Major Flex By J.Lo
by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
I was really impressed with J.Lo’s performance in Hustlers. I was also impressed with her flex when it came to showing a woman at 50 can still be stunning. Da-ham girl.
She has a body that women half her age would die for. One thing I liked about the movie is how sly it was on its agenda. Men are not portrayed very well in this movie. In fact, the only really sympathetic male character to pop up during the second act gets prompted hung up on when our Heroine learns he’s married.
In a sense, the movie pulls men in with the prospect of T&A then promptly portrays that portion of the audience as either pieces of shit or fools easily distracted by the prospect of booty.
Melissa Villaseñor Should Be SNL’s New Trump
by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
How better to troll Trump than to have Mexican-American Melissa Villaseñor play him? But she needs to play him as completely deranged. Don’t even try to give an accurate impression of him. I might add guys in white coats and butterfly nets as his Secret Service protection. Really play up that the popular Trump narrative has changed significantly lately. I say this because Chevy Chase didn’t look anything like Jerry Ford and still managed to do an iconic impression of him.
Deconstructing ‘Don’t Call Me Angel’
by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
I am pleasantly surprised by the latest banger Don’t Call Me Angel. But you have to admit that there’s a lot going on with not just this song but the fact that Charlie’s Angels is being rebooted again.
First you have to accept that this is an Ariana Grande jam. Miley Cyrus and Lana Del Rey are pretty much just fortunate to be involved. Grande is a beast in pop culture while the other two women are mid-tier performers in comparison. Or put another way — the audience is coming to hear Grande. And I suspect Grande is a sufficient diva that the only way she get involved in the first place is if she had a dominate role. I don’t know what Lana Del Rey is even doing in this song. She’s kind of out of place compared to the other women on a thematic level.
I find it amusing that Tay-Tay, despite her best efforts to update her public persona still can’t hold a candle to the mass sex appeal of either Grande or Cyrus. Del Rey is hot, yes, but in more of a serious, smoldering way. The other two women seem like they’d be a lot of fun on a date. But Tay-Tay simply can’t embrace her sexuality in a conspicuous manner. It would be so off-brand for her at this point as to be near career suicide. Tweens wearing training bras need music to listen to, too, you know.
It’s telling how different this incarnation of Charlie’s Angels is to the original. Each of the various versions of the franchise definitely tell us a lot about the cultures in which they were produced. I look forward to seeing the new Charlie’s Angels. But it will also make me feel very, very old. You could do a pretty long New Yorker think piece about why, exactly, Charlie’s Angels keeps getting rebooted. What’s the appeal?
I would say more, but I’m a dude and what do I know.
One last note — we need a female supergroup. There are all these talented solo female singers floating around. It would be great if they would come together to produce an album instead of just having a lot of floating camos. It’s time for something like that, at least.
A Modest Proposal: John Bercow For The President Of The Republic Of England
by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
I’m an American nobody in the middle of nowhere. Don’t listen to me. It’s not much country and I have no place talking about the fate of another country’s people and or government.
Having said that, let’s have some fun.
As any American will tell you, for about 24 hours on 9/11 the effective leader of the United States was not George W. Bush, it was Rudy Giuliani. It became America’s Mayor on that fateful day. It was a huge crisis and the actual president wasn’t doing a very good job of leading the country so power devolved to Giuliani. That he would turn into a raving nut about 20 years later is a different story.
Anyway, Great Britain is in a crisis. The toxic authoritarian politics of Trumpism has jumped the pond. The Queen is being forced to become a political figure in a way that does not bode well for her future ability to rule. One person who is — finally — stepping up to the place is John Bercow. Just from what I can tell, he’s becoming an able leader in the UK’s time of need.
While I really would rather this not happen, the worst case scenario is the only way to revoke Article 50 is for to overthrow the monarch. Who better to rule the new Republic of England than Bercow. He has all the necessary skills necessary to pull it off.
But hopefully, he won’t be called upon to do anything so drastic. Yet keep an eye on him. With Trump’s mini-me Boris Johnson talking about simply ignoring the will of Parliament, anything is on the table.
Silly Mulling Of C2019Q4
by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
I have an extremely active imagination. So much so, I spend most of my time daydreaming about scenarios. Lately, of course, I’ve started to use this knack more productively by writing a novel. The point is — do not take the following seriously. It’s meant to entertain the way a History Channel program about “ancient aliens” is meant to entertain you while you’re high / drunk both after a party.
So, there’s this thing zooming towards the general area of Mars. It’s called C2019Q4. What makes it unique is it appears to be interstellar in nature. It’s also apparently reasonably large and going faster than it should otherwise. And it’s set to reach the Mars area Dec. 7ths of all times.
The thing about this type of space event is the lay person simply doesn’t have the context to properly know what’s going on. And given that any suggestion that the object may not be purely of a natural origin is enough to make “serious” people think you’re nuts, the natural inclination is to do everything in your power to suggest it’s just another rock from outside the solar system zooming towards us.
I’m not prepared to suggest that it’s some sort of alien probe sent to take a looky-loo at us. But that won’t stop be from simply running the scenario because, like I said, I have a very, very over-active imagination. So with that in mind, let’s take an enormous leap into every scifi fan’s fever dream — what if C2019Q4 was to become an object that was difficult for us to deny some sort of extraterrestrial involvement?
I think the first thing that would happen is all the government-funded telescopes looking at it would go dark. It would happen all at once. If the C2019Q4 started acting weird or became too conspicuous is its make up, the first reaction would be to go dark so as not to alarm the public. This would not stop amature observers from continuing to look at it.
The big wild card is Trump. Trump can not keep a secret to save his life. So there’s a decent chance that Trump would tweet something like, “You can’t impeach me, I have to speak to the aliens.” Or something equally crazy.
I guess the only reason why I even bring this idea up is it fits too much into how I imagine First Contact would happen. ET is more likely to zoom past Mars than it is actually land on the planet. That, in fact, might be any ETs way of preparing First Contact in the first place. Not do it all in one fell swoop, but give us a heads up of some sort that we’re not alone.
Anyway, this is just a daydream. C2019Q4 is not of any type of alien nature. It’s just a weird rock that we’ve noticed. This type of stuff probably happens all the time and we’re only just now figuring out how to detect it.
The Brutal Truth About Trump
by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
Donald Trump is the true successor to Ronald Reagan. Or, put another way, Trump is the second in a series of successors to the Watergate legacy of Richard Nixon. Trump is going to win re-election by hook or by crook. He’s going to have either an illegal third term or a de facto third term in the guise of a hand-picked successor. It’s probably going to be either Ivanka or Don Jr.
Our best bet is that by the 12th year of rule by House Trump, the ebb and flow of history will finally kick in and some sort of center-Left president will be elected. Of course, this is only likely if there’s any life in American democracy at all. More likely, we’ll simply have a series of Trumps for about 20 years until at some point the browning of America kicks in just about the time the youngest of the Baby Boomers die.
The worst part of all of this is the political center of gravity in America has again lurched to the Right in a big way. So the only way Democrats will elect a president is if they can find a very charismatic Bill Clinton type who is barely Leftist at all in his or her policies.
Of course, this is based on the assumption that the Union and or the Constitution survive in the first place. There’s a really good chance that if House Trump overreaches that either Blue States will attempt to leave the Union altogether or there might be some sort of military junta that keeps the Union together until things get sorted out.
There are no happy endgames.
The Case For Tay-Tay To Do An Answer To Britney Spears’ ‘Blackout’
by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
Now, let’s get some things out of the way. Taylor Swift is demonstrably a very awkward, sensitive and gentle soul. She also has a strangely turbulent romantic history. Also, Swift at least outwardly seems reasonably rock solid in her mental stability.
The case could be made that her being so “normal” is both a boon and a bane to her creativity. It helps her with maintaining her fanbase of absolute-center of pop culture grown up tweens who still need training bra music. Creative people, the ones who make a difference in culture are almost always completely bonkers. The thing about Tay-Tay is she is growing older and as such more self confident.
Either she gets married and drops a few kids or she risks alienating her fan base who are going through that particular significant change in their lives. The older women get, the more raunchy they become. There’s a good chance that the disconnect between Tay-Tay’s public persona and her fan base may grow so large that there’s going to be a pretty dramatic snap. To put it another way, Tay-Tay risks not seeming very…relatable.
So I propose that Swift let her hair down a little bit. It’s would have to be a strategic move on her part. She would need to do it on her own terms from a position of strength not weakness caused by being completely bonkers.
As such, sooner or later, she’s going to have to shake things up. She’s going to have to do an album like Britney Spears’ “Blackout” or Nelly Furtado’s “Loose.” In the short term it would alienate a lot of her fanbase. But long term it would definitely help her career. You can only be the definition of American wholesomeness and purity for so long before it grows tiresome. Or, put another way, if she wants a serious Hollywood career she’s going to have to change how people perceive her. I mean, I see Margaret Qualley as a serious actress because she seems like a normal human being who thinks about sex. Tay-Tay just isn’t very sexual. She’s the girl your mom wants you to settle down with, not the girl you meet a bar and think you actually have a chance of hooking up with.
She’s obviously very ambitious. Swift’s pretty safe for the time being. But as she approaches 30, things are going to change. Even her youngest original fans will be, like, women now. Swift is master of the sly discussion of her personal life and maybe it’s time for her to be a bit more aggressive with her lyrics.
But, meh. She serves her purpose in pop culture, I guess. She may simply always fill the niche of being the pop star that fits the MAGA dream but in her personal life is far more progressive. You do you, Tay-Tay.
You must be logged in to post a comment.