Category: Media

‘Lawfare’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There are a number of instances that have occurred during The Age Of Trump that makes one think about the dynamic between Trump the Man and Trump the Idea. It really makes one wonder about the rise of Trump and what that rise means in the context of American political history.

Take, for instance, what happened with Bob Mueller’s investigation. The case could be made that a lot of the pressure to hold Trump accountable was dissipated because all of our hopes and dreams about getting rid of Trump were wrapped up in the idea that Mueller would somehow produce a report that would force Trump out of office.

It’s possible that had Trump not produced the conditions that caused Mueller to be the Special Counsel that his first few years would have been a lot more turbulent. And, what’s more, I think all of us were very oblivious to how potent Trump the Idea was to millions of white Christians who felt disenfranchised for various reasons.

Now Trump is the subject of four different criminal cases. I have a far more conservative relative — whom I love dearly — who has gone totally MAGA now that their choice of Ron DeSantis is no longer a option. Talking to this relative gives me a general sense of what’s bouncing around the far Right podcast echo chamber and it’s clear that the idea that the evil (yet also incompetent?) Biden Administration is using “lawfare” against Trump.

When pressed, my relative says that there is only one case that they think Trump may be guilty off — the secret documents case — and yet because of the extensive permission structure provided them by all those MAGA podcasts they listen to, even that one they think is “lawfare.”

When asked if Trump murdering someone might be enough to dislodge their support for him, I did not get a definitive yes – or -no answer. Yikes!

There are two major take aways from this situation.

One, white Christian (men) are enraged by the “bad vibes” they feel in the United States at the moment. They don’t really know what is making them so upset, but they know there is absolutely nothing that would cause them to put aside their rage at the center-Left to the point that they might believe that saving American democracy is more important that crushing the “woke cancel culture mob.”

And, what’s more, my conservative relative completely dismisses the idea that Trump might go full tyrant if he’s given a second term in office. They point to how Trump was “all talk” during his first administration and believe the same will be the case in a second term.

Oh boy.

All signs point to that NOT being the case. Which makes me wonder what my conservative relative’s reaction will be when Trump gets into office and starts to do all the tyrannical things he clearly wants to do. Given that I could very well find myself in a Trump-branded concentration camp because I refuse to shut up about Trump being a fucking cocksucker, well, lulz.

The other thing to note is all of this bitching and moaning about “lawfare” will be a precursor to Trump going after anyone who opposes him with the Justice Department once he is in power again. And, really, the only reason why I think Trump might not be successful in this consolidation of power is, well, Trump. He is such a ding-dong — and a lazy one at that — that he could very well go full tyrant in such a way that principled Traditionalists — such as my relative — may sit up and take notice.

I continue to believe we are careening towards a very dark and turbulent future staring in late 2024, early 2025.

The America MAGA Wants

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

We have already as a nation collectively accepted that someone can lose the popular vote by millions and still win because they win a few states that are crucial to the Electoral College count. What MAGA wants is to take things to a step further.

MAGA craves an America where we just give up. What I mean by this is MAGA, once they have power again, will fuck with the administration of elections to the point that it’s clear that we’re a Russian-style “managed democracy” and MAGA will run the country for the foreseeable future.

Trump has already told us that he wants paper ballots and no mail-in voting. What’s more, it seems as though should Trump become POTUS again that he will actively use the Justice Department to go after any one he sees as a potential political threat. He will simply say, “the Democrats did it to me, now I’m returning the favor.”

And those possibilities are just the beginning. Under the right circumstances, it definitely seems as though as part of the MAGA consolidation of power, we might face a Constitutional Convention at some point in the not-so-distance future.

Now, there are some problems with this hysterical doom shit on my part.

One is, well, Trump.

Trump is so fucking lazy and stupid that if he becomes president again he will probably thrash around in such a tyrannical fashion that even Traditionalists, who would otherwise be the “Good Germans” of American autocratic life, might sit up and take notice.

It’s one thing to use the Justice Department to go after your political opponents, especially with its gospel on MAGA podcast that “lawfare” has been used against Trump, and it’s quite another to snatch people off the street and throw them into a Trump-branded concentration camp.

Another issue is the United States is a huge, diverse nation and it would take a deft political hand in the best of historical circumstances for someone to successfully transition the United States into what it seems we’re drifting towards at the moment — an autocracy.

So, it seems reasonable to assume that because Trump is so dumb and lazy that he won’t even try for a Constitutional Convention to make it legal for him to run for a third term. He’ll just do it. And he could very well do any number of brazenly illegal things that will be challenged at SCOTUS. Because Trump is so outrageous and brazen in his tyranny, he will lose at SCOTUS. But it won’t matter because Trump will just ignore the decision.

As such, Trump could very well force the country to the breaking point. We will all collectively have to decide if we’re a nation of laws or if we have so given up that Trump can just be a tyrant and it’s all a big lulz. I think THAT is Trump’s ultimate historical purpose — to either destroy America as a Republic based on laws, or to cause us to fight it out in a revolution / civil war until one side or the other gets to run things.

I don’t want a revolution / civil war. That would really suck, as the movie “Civil War” proves. But, on an abstract basis, it definitely seems as though late 2024, early 2025 MAY be *IT*. We, as a nation, will be forced confront a fork in the political woods and I honestly have no idea which path we will pick.

A Lot Of People Are Missing The Point Of The Movie ‘Civil War’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Now that the A24 movie “Civil War” has gotten wide release, a lot of people online have felt compelled to give their hot takes on the most notable absence in the movie — any sense of who the “good guys” in the story depicted are.

The more I think about it, the more the absence of any thorough world building on the part of the producers of the movie is the only way a movie called “Civil War” might have any chance of being a success. What a lot of people interested in the subject of a potential second American civil war want in such a movie — a chance to see their partisan bloodlust on the big screen — they did not get.

The movie is not meant to be a roughly two hours of cathartic, violent hate for one side or the other. The movie is, at least in my view, is meant to be a warning to both sides as to how bad a modern civil war would suck.

And I say this, even as I note how the the civil war shown in the movie is probably a best case scenario. The lights are pretty much on for the entirety of the movie. And there was no talk of the use of WMD during the movie. And, what’s more, my dark fears about a fucking race war in the Deep South were also not included in the scenario.

So, I understand why people with a more critical eye may deem the movie “vacuous,” but that is a serious not seeing the forest for the trees evaluation. By simply presenting a scenario in as value-free way a possible, the producers of the movie ensure that it won’t be seen through a hyper partisan lens.

What The Fuck Are We Going To Do About AI-Generated Celebrity Porn?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I continue to grow ever more alarmed by the increase in AI-generated celebrity photos. I know there was something of a kerfuffle recently over some silly bad Taylor Swift “porn” that appeared on Twitter, but that’s nowhere near what we should be worried about going forward.

At the moment, AI-generated celebrity images are rather banal and easy to spot. What I see on my social media feed a lot these days is such imagines which usually only vaguely look like whatever celebrity they’re supposed to represent. An example of a picture that is supposed to be Margot Robbie is shown below.

An AI-generated photo of Margot Robbie.

The photo above at least attempts to replicate what Robbie actually looks like. Usually one of the big mistakes of AI-generated celebrity photos is they are clearly done in a way to show what men WISH the woman in question looked like. They’re usually a bit more curvy and symmetrical than the real deal which makes it easy to spot as a fake.

A sign of things to come.

My concern is what happens in a few years (months?) when we get passed the “uncanny valley” and photorealistic images of celebrities come common place. I know because of the silliness involving Tay-Tay that there has been a move to pass some legislation, but the wheels of government move very, very slow compared to AI developments.

Add to this how many “unaligned” people want the right do do whatever the fuck they want with AI and it definitely seems as though we’re careening towards a very, very dark and rather surreal future. We really need to start to work on developing watermark technology that will allow the audience to distinguish between AI-Generated photos and the real thing.

While we’re on the subject of such things, another development I’ve noticed on the AI image front is women using AI filters on their faces while leaving the rest of their body unaltered. See below:


I find this rather surreal. But this is definitely a development to keep an eye on. It seems very possible that there may come a time when AI-filters are so good that the causal viewer won’t be able to discern that a phot has been altered. This could lead to some rather surreal developments on dating apps.

Mistakes We Knew We Were Making

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The predicament I find myself in with my first novel is a prime example of what happens when you don’t have anyone around you to tell you “no.” The story I’ve come up with is compelling and intriguing enough — if you give it a chance — that you’ll finish it wanting more.

Mood.

But there are a few problems.

The most obvious one is, well, I’ve realized that it has a lot of “spicy” scenes in it because it deals with a woman who not only owns a strip club, but for the duration of the story, also, on occasion, is depicted stripping. If I had a wife or a girlfriend as a “Reader” there is a good chance she would put the kibosh on that particular element of the story.

It’s just too easy for the mythical “liberal white women” or the “woke cancel culture mob” to blanch at such a storyline, especially one written by a man. If I was an twentysomething undocumented trans woman then that would be a different story. (There you go, I’ve put all three of my running gags into one paragraph to trigger you when you do your due diligence on me.)

There are a few other problems with the nature of my first novel that are structural and existential so, lulz, I just have to accept them going forward. I really love this novel and the characters I’ve come up with and, I suppose, in the end, if nothing else, I’m the audience of the novel and as such am willing to expend the time and energy necessary to finish it.

I am WELL AWARE that if you don’t know me and you read this blog you will probably want nothing to do with me. Ok, I get it. So, in a sense, this blog is like online dating for me — absolutely no one will swipe right on me online, but if I was given the opportunity to use my “rizz” on you in real life, then maybe you might give me a date.

The last few days have been full of self-doubt about this novel. But I’ve concluded that the point of this novel is to prove a point to myself, if no one else. I know I’ve come up with a really good story, despite its obvious flaws, and I’m going to see this project to its completion.

Having said all that, I am still going to pivot — when I have some time — to a backup scifi novel that will be tailored specifically with marketability in mind. I need that type of insurance policy to give me the juice necessary to move forward with the main novel. I don’t like the idea of putting all my creative eggs in one basket.

The Final Countdown

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I know I’m about to wrap this novel up because I’ve decided to ignore a structural problem that could only be fixed by pretty much starting all over again — it’s taken me so long to finish this novel that I should problem move its events from the mid-90s to 1999 -2000.

If this was three or so years ago, I would have throw everything up in the air and totally re-imagine the novel. But it’s way too late in the process for me to do such a thing. So, onward I go.

And there is another reason why I don’t want to change the period this novel is set in — I like the idea that the last novel in the series happens in the days leading up to the pandemic striking the US. So, there you go. I’m happy with the state of the novel.

What’s more, there is the issue of the other novels in this series are just planned and rhetorical at this point. No need to waste another year reimagining the first novel when there are no assurances this first novel will ever be published.

I do have a scifi novel that I hope to start to work on in addition to this mystery-thriller, so I can use some of my frustrating on the existential problem with the main novel to use as energy to make sure the back up novel gets some work.

A Spoiler Review Of The Movie ‘Civil War’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

HERE BE SPOILERS
HERE BE SPOILERS
HERE BE SPOILERS

The interesting thing about the movie Civil War is how hard it works not to take a position on who the “good guys” are in the scenario it presents. And, yet, it does kind of slip up at one point when it gives us a bit of exposition about the current president of the United States.

The key element is the president “abolished the FBI.” That is very curious because that is definitely something that Trump rants about a lot. That is a very MAGA thing for a president to want to do. As such, I think it’s safe to say that the POTUS in Civil War is something of a proxy for Donald Trump.

Which makes on wonder if it’s possible that MAGA may latch on to this element of the story and flip the fuck out. It seems to me that the more popular the movie becomes, the more likely there is a chance for an angry MAGA reaction to the movie.

It is interesting how divisive this movie has become on social media. It makes you wonder what people were expecting. I really liked the movie — despite some obvious flaws — and I think it did a good job of puncturing some of the jingoistic, overwrought MAGA rhetoric about the need for a Second American Civil War.

I continue to believe that there is a chance the movie will be popular enough and culturally significant enough that it will begin to generate some significant Oscar buzz.

A Spoiler Free Review of The Movie ‘Civil War’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I listened to Vanity Fair’s movie podcast “Little Gold Men” this afternoon before going to see the new movie Civil War and it was interesting how harsh they were on the film. I was really looking forward to the movie and for a beat or two I wondered if it was going to suck.

I went to see the movie tonight and there were a surprising number of people in the theatre.

Anyway, my top line reaction to the movie is it’s far better than the snooty people of the Little Gold Men podcast would have you believe. And, I must note, these are the same people who were enthralled with any number of gay rom coms that tanked over the last few years. So, I think that gives you some sense of how clued-in they are to the appetites of the general viewing audience.

I found the movie a serious, compelling tale about a serious subject. It was very violent, but what else do you expect from a movie called “Civil War.” And I can understand why bloodthirsty MAGA people might find the movie “boring” because it refuses to take a stance on who the “good guys” are.

There is some hint of who the POTUS is modeled after, given his policy objectives. But there’s a chance that this will fly over the heads of most MAGA people. Add to this the seemingly surreal decision to have California and Texas on the same side and it’s easy to imagine that MAGA people might grow frustrated that they aren’t able to see their dreams of dead liberals show on the big screen.

But there was a specific reason for taking such a “value free” approach to the politics presented in the movie — the moment you grounded the movie’s scenario in reality, it would be seen through a very brutal partisan lens that would have people on both sides pointing fingers.

In general, I really liked the movie. It was really good. And I could see a chance — if the movie strikes the zeitgeist in just the right way — that it might become popular enough that it begins to generate Oscar buzz.

In passing, I will note that a real civil war in the US would be a lot worse than what is portrayed in the movie. The lights were still on for the most part. There was no talk of using WMD anytime during the movie.

Anyway. I liked Civil War. I just hope I don’t have to live in starting in late 2024, early 2025.

Feeling Better About The Novel

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

A number of things have come together that give me renewed confidence with the third draft of the novel I’m working on. The last few days, since an editor I was hoping to work with begged off after they read this blog, I have been feeling a great deal of existential angst.

But things have changed for the better.

I feel a lot better. One thing that happened is a random woman I gave the first three chapters of the novel to read it and didn’t say she hated it. In fact, she said, “keep writing.” That makes me feel a lot better. I was really sweating it there for a little while because I gave it to her and she had not emailed me back any reaction.

Another is, I was reminded yet again that just because ONE person thinks I’m too much of a freaky weirdo to work with, doesn’t mean that it’s totally impossible for me to find someone, somewhere who will find my kookiness endearing.

Or something. Something like that. I just can hinge everything on rejection from one person — even if I fear she does give me some sense of what “liberal white women” might think of the premise of the novel. As I’ve said before, I got no beef with liberal white women, I just see it as something of a running gag.

Anyway. With all that in mind, I’m going to throw myself back into writing the novel. *I* really like the story I’ve come up with, even if some members of the woke cancel culture mob (wink) might be aghast that my heroine is a part-time stripper. Ok, I get it. But I do think that if you give the story a chance — which I know is, unto itself, a big ask — that you will enjoy it.

Having said all that, I am really going to work hard to use some of my spare time to develop the backup scifi novel that I have been working on some. It’s really cool and I just don’t feel comfortable putting ALL my creative eggs in the lone basket of the main novel.

I’m not getting any younger.

But the key thing remains — I have to prepare myself for rejection –a lot of it — as I get closer to the querying process.

Contemplating Failure

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have decided that as part of the process of adjusting my expectations with this novel, I have to accept that there is a chance I will fail. It’s possible that not only is this novel just too “racy” for both the liberal white women who make up the majority of literary agents and the “woke cancel culture mob” but that I’m just too old and weird to ever be a published author.

Mood.

It’s possible that, by definition, anyone who does due diligence on me will want nothing to do with me — even if they like my novel.

This is bitter pill, but one I have to prepare myself to swallow. It could be that I’m a little bit *too* unique for my own good. No amount of meaning well or being self-conscious and hyper aware of my kookiness will change the fact that “normal” people with careers and money just will be aghast at what they find out about me when they do the obligatory due diligence.

This is very disheartening. My only consolation is I’m gaming out a future that may or may not come about. But I have to prepare for such a nightmare. The fact that the very thing I feared would happen — someone I wanted to work with decided they wanted nothing to do with me once they read this blog — did, in fact, happen, has left me rattled.

And, yet, as I keep saying, this novel is existential. I write because I have to, not because I want to and, as such, I want the satisfaction of knowing that if people would just give me a chance that they would see that I am, a good writer and that I don’t suck.

I also am going to TRY to work on my backup novel so there’s a chance that if someone doesn’t like how “racy” main novel is, I will at least be able to show them a scifi novel with littler or no sex. The scifi novel would also fit the modern conventions of novel writing.

And, come to think of it, if I was, like, 25 years younger, I might take the idea of screenwriting a lot more seriously. But the learning curve for that is just too sharp. Would take me years to get to the point that I am now with novel writing. So, I’m kind of in a corner.

Novel writing it is.