The Mel Brooks musical (based on the classic Mel Brooks film) The Producers is being updated. Here are some excerpts well worth a look:
Link: https://youtu.be/OemqVWi_R0k
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Link: https://youtu.be/OemqVWi_R0k
by Link: https://youtu.be/OemqVWi_R0k
by The day before Super Tuesday (Mediocre Monday?) Jackie Broyles and Dunlap released this short video (running about 3 1/2 minutes) to plead with fellow Southerners not to vote for Donald Trump. If only they had spoken up louder and sooner! (You can say that of a lot of people.) Funny and a little sad, especially at the end.
Link: https://youtu.be/qPqviv-Bsh4
Jackie Broyles and Dunlap are in real life Travis Harmon and Jonathan Shockley, a comedy team from Tennessee. The Red State Update website is here.
by As previously noted, Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz likes to claim that climate scientists have in “the past two or three years” switched to talking about climate change rather than global warming. In reality, of course, both terms have been in widespread use since at least the 1950s. (See for example the scientific paper titled “The Carbon Dioxide Theory of Climate Change” published in 1956.) Human-caused global warming is the underlying problem, and climate change (including changing wind and rainfall patterns and the like, not just warmer weather) is the result.
The three-minute video below brings this home by showing a series of political leaders talking about the reality and danger of human-caused climate change, a list that includes British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and U.S. Presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush. This demonstrates not just that Cruz is wrong about a supposed change in terminology, it also shows him to be in disagreement not just with the scientific community but with conservative statesmen of the recent past, including the last two Republican presidents. (Unfortunately, John Kasich is the only current GOP presidential candidate who doesn’t join with Cruz in denying established science.)
The video below suffers from annoying background music at the start and insists on beating its point so deep into the ground that it risks hitting magma, but it certainly does get across the complete absurdity of Cruz’s claim.
Best of all, we get to see President George W Bush in June of 2001 talking intelligently about climate change and explaining how human activities cause it. If you don’t have time to watch the whole thing, skip ahead to the 2-minute mark by sliding the little marker on the timeline. For all President Bush’s flaws, he was well ahead of the current leading candidates of his party. (You can read a transcript of Bush’s speech here.)
Link: https://youtu.be/xJsbCblesCk
If you didn’t see it already, you can find a clip of Cruz trying to dispute global warming with a former Chief Oceanographer of the United States Navy in this earlier post.
(Updated 2016 June 3 to add a link the the 1956 Gilbert Plass paper on climate change.)
by It’s amazing how seemlessly Donald Trump would fit in on this series:
Link: https://youtu.be/I0tE6T-ecmg
by Music associated with positive emotions — love, happiness, and so on — tends to be written in a major key, and minor keys are used for music meant to sound sad, eerie, or menacing. This is of course very rough notion of a subject that’s quite complex and well over my head, and beyond major and minor are things calls musical “modes” that are used in everything from classical music to pop. (This introduction to modes is relatively comprehensible to those of us not well-versed in music theory.)
Anyway, what happens if you take a piece in a major key and shift it into a minor one, or vice versa? Here are two examples, first the happy version of “The Imperial March” from Star Wars (which sounds like it should be the title theme of a classic adventure film), them the creepy stalker version of “All I Want for Christmas is You.”
Link: https://youtu.be/B9MShtCg4fk
Link: https://youtu.be/SDACj0tkD-s
The second version reminds me a greeting card that read something like “I’ve made up my mind. I want you, I need you, it’s got to be you you you!” and on the inside said, “If I can’t have you, I want an owl. Or a dirigible.”
You can find more examples of major-to-minor adaptations by searching YouTube for “major to minor” (link to search results). There appear to be a lot fewer examples going the other way. That’s a shame. I was hoping to find some cheery, upbeat version of funeral dirges. (I’d like the last hymn played at my funeral to be this one.)
by In the most recent Republican debate on CNN, Marco Rubio went after Donald Trump over something called “Trump University,” which I suspect most people have never heard of. Someone might be forgiven for thinking it was something like Harvard University on a lesser scale, an institution of higher learning named for a generous benefactor. Actually, it was a lot closer to those get-rich-through-real-estate seminars you see advertised overnight on television. Here are a few news articles about it. (You can find plenty more with a web search.)
- CBS News: “Trump University under renewed scrutiny after GOP debate”
- CNN: “Trump University fraud case becomes campaign issue at GOP debate”
- CNN: “Trump University fraud claims follow Donald Trump on campaign trail”
- New York Daily News: “Trump University was ‘classic’ fraud, says prosecutor”
- The Washington Post: “Donald Trump billed his ‘University’ as a road to riches, but critics call it a fraud”
- The Daily Telegraph (London): “Donald Trump sued for fraud in California and New York”
- Time: “Trump University Was A Scam, Say Former Students: People say they paid $35,000 for next to nothing.”
- The National Review: “Did Donald Trump Run a Scam University?”
- Mother Jones: “The 9 Wildest Complaints Against Trump University”
As the last article notes, a lawsuit filed by New York’s attorney general alleged that Trump University “repeatedly claimed that prospective students would be taught by successful real estate ‘experts’ who were ‘handpicked’ by Donald Trump. In fact, respondents lacked substantiation for the claims that their instructors and mentors were successful real estate entrepreneurs. Not a single one was ‘handpicked’ by Donald Trump. Many came to Trump University from jobs having little to do with real estate investments, and some came to Trump University shortly after their real estate investing caused them to go into bankruptcy.”
Another complaint: “Trump University also claimed that Donald Trump was not profiting from Trump University and founded it solely for philanthropic purposes. According to Trump University speakers, students’ payments for the three-day seminars would not go to Donald Trump. In fact, Donald Trump netted about $5 million in profit.”
And: “When students reached Trump University’s three-day seminar, they learned that contrary to what they had been promised at the free seminars, they were not going to learn everything they needed to know to start investing. Instead they were told they had to purchase additional programs to get the help they would supposedly need — and that they would fail if they did not continue at Trump University.”
Instructors were even said to have “urged students to call their credit card companies during a break in the sessions, requesting increases to their credit limits … Trump University even provided handouts with scripted talking points for students to use in their phone calls with credit card companies, explicitly encouraging people to falsify their current income … Trump University misrepresentations regarding credit limits had the effect of damaging students’ credit scores, contrary to the claims made at the free seminars that Trump University would help increase students’ credit scores.”
Keep in mind that the guy behind all this is currently the leading candidate for the Republican nomination for president.
by In a post yesterday I wrote in passing, “Anyone who buys into the myth that Trump is a successful businessman needs to do a little reading.” Of course, Donald Trump himself would assure you he’s “great” and “yuge,” but an article in Tuesday’s issue of The New York Times points out that “His real estate holdings in New York are modest; he did not make the top 10 in lists of major condominium developers and power players in real estate in the city, as judged by several publications.” Worse, “The major banks, for their part, say they are leery of lending to him after having lost millions of dollars on past deals. Lawyers and contractors he has hired in the past say he is slow to pay his bills, and often shortchanges them.”
Early on Trump was a moderate success in real estate, back when it was easier to get rich that way, thanks to a million dollars in seed money from his father. He later inherited an impressive fortune. But as those bankers and contractors discovered, his businesses quite often fail or are only modestly successful. His real talent is in self-promotion, exaggerating his wealth and success, starring in reality shows, and licensing the Trump name. Like the Kardashians, he’s famous mainly for being famous.
Kevin Drum amplified on this a bit in a blog post the same day, pointing out that in the early 1990s Trump was reduced to liquidating a lot of assets because his businesses were in serious trouble and he needed the money. Of course he didn’t say that, he declared that “cash is king” and that selling off assets was merely a brilliant business move. “And since he was still desperate for money,” Drum continued, “he cranked up up every penny-ante, late-night shill he could think of to bring in a few bucks: Trump water, Trump vodka, Trump magazines, Trump steaks, Trump mortgages, Trump university, Trump energy drinks. As near as I can tell, they were basically all failures. If they weren’t, surely Trump would be trumpeting how much money he made from them.”
Trump University wasn’t entirely a failure, at least not for Trump, but ex-students reportedly called it a ‘scam’ and a New York prosecutor characterized it as a “fraudulent bait and switch scheme.” More on that tomorrow.
Trump more or less promises his supporters that he’ll make America as successful as he is. The danger is he might be right.
by The GOP establishment has lately turned to Marco Rubio as the only remaining plausible alternative to Donald Trump or Ted Cruz. Trump they worry would cost them the general election in a landslide or — worse — be elected. Cruz is simply hated by his Senate colleagues and popular only with a few dozen members of the House Tea Party Caucus. He might do even worse in the general election than Trump, and it’s apparent most Republicans in Congress despise the idea of having to work with him should he actually manages to be elected. Even Trump might prove more open to compromise.
Rubio’s positions aren’t really any more moderate that those of Cruz and in a few areas (abortion, for example), they may be even more outside the mainstream. In fact, his own campaign assures the Republican base that this is the case and that he only sounds a bit more reasonable.
But by managing to come across as not quite so crazy or so smarmy, Rubio might prove more electable in November, and Republican leaders may hope that once in office Rubio would listen to them. After all, his record shows no notable influence on public policy, and he doesn’t seem all that in interested in doing things as opposed to holding office.
(This isn’t to say that mainstream Republicans have good policy judgment. They have a lengthy record of blowing up the deficit with tax cuts for the rich, of getting the country into needless wars based on naïve ideas about how easy they’ll be. A majority oppose doing anything about climate change and promise to repeal the Affordable Care Act, costing millions of Americans their health insurance, a problem for which they still have no solution to offer.)
There’s no reason to think Rubio would be even a minimally competent president. Even George W Bush had achieved a few thing as governor of Texas. Rubio’s lack of basic organizational skill is a major reason Ted Cruz has run rings around him in ground operations and fund raising. If he can’t run a campaign, how can he run a country? But again it’s questionable whether he has much interest in governing. To paraphrase something Marion Berry once said (rather unfairly) of Jesse Jackson, it’s possible the only thing he wants to run is his mouth.
A December 23 article in The Hill reported that Rubio made the fewest floor speeches and cast fewer votes than any of the senators running for president.
Rubio made eight floor speeches this year, only two of which came after he launched his presidential campaign in April, and showed up for 64 percent of the votes. The Florida lawmaker has been criticized by Republican primary rivals for his poor attendance record.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) set the pace for senators when it came to delivering floor speeches, giving 37 throughout the year. He also attended 91 percent of the votes in the upper chamber.
Although he only spoke 13 times, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) had the highest attendance record, making 94 percent of the votes.
Paul called for Rubio to resign from Congress over his missed vote on the government spending bill earlier this month.
Rubio defended his absence from the omnibus vote, saying, “Not voting for it is a vote against it.”
Rubio also appears to have trouble managing even his personal finances. According to an analysis by Forbes, his net worth is the least of any current presidential candidate, about $100,000. He has a decent amount of assets, but they’re offset by huge debts.
At this point it doesn’t seem likely, but as I said Tuesday I’d prefer to see the Republicans nominate Kasich. He’s still too far right for my tastes, but he at least could do the job, more than can be said for Trump, Cruz, Rubio, or Carson. (Anyone who buys into the myth that Trump is a successful businessman needs to do a little reading.)
by In this brief clip novelist John Green points out yet another way in which the world is better and offers some thoughts (prompted by Bill Gates) on the importance of free time and (preferably less polluting) sources of energy. It’s worth 3 minutes and 50 seconds of your time. (The Hank he addresses is brother.)
Link: https://youtu.be/FiTQowlk1_k
The Bill and Melinda Gates annual letter he’s talking about can be read at this link.
Hundreds more clips from John and Hank Green are on their massive number of YouTube channels, and my other references to them (and in passing other things that are green) are here.
by Former Ohio Governor John Kasich is the only Republican presidential candidate still standing who’s actually qualified to be president. This isn’t to say that I agree with him about very much; I don’t. But his opponents are all pretty much nuts, including the apparent desperation choice of the GOP establishment, freshman Florida Senator Marco Rubio. (More about Rubio in another post.)
Though Kasich is well behind in the polls, he still attracts enough attention that someone created a selectively edited video in which Kasich talks about women coming “out of their kitchens” to work for him. It’s obvious what impression this is intended to create. But Kasich was actually describing one of his first campaigns almost 40 years ago, and what he said was this:
How did I get elected? I didn’t have anybody for me. We just got an army of people who — and many women who left their kitchens to go out and go door to door and to put yard signs up for me all the way back when you know when things were different. Now you call homes and everybody is out working, but at that time, early days it was really an army of the women that really helped me to get elected.
That is, he’s saying that when he first got elected a lot of his volunteers were in fact stay-at-home wives and mothers. “Out of the kitchen” (as opposed to, say, “their homes”) is still a clumsy and inelegant way of putting it, and Kasich later apologized for that wording. But it’s not fair to distort what he said to imply he was suggesting that women belong in the kitchen or are generally to be found there.
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