Hispanic Fanatic

Yes, we could have done this months ago. And yes, Trump can still win.

But for the first time in this election cycle, Democrats are feeling a little jaunty, a little hopeful, and slightly less terrified.

We have no idea if Kamala Harris will defeat the third incarnation of Trumpian fury. However, it was clear that Biden wasn’t going to win. His supporters could never explain how a guy who had been trailing in the polls for months, coming off the worst debate performance in history, and getting older by the second, was going to suddenly surge to victory. Who the hell was he going to persuade at this point?

By stepping aside, however, Biden has become a revered figure, the courageous leader, even “the Democratic party’s Yoda, and no one ever complained about Yoda’s wrinkles, age, ponderous pauses, or bizarre speech patterns.”

The GOP knows this. Witness their idiotic threats to somehow force Biden to stay on the ballot. They are shitting themselves in fear because suddenly they are the ones saddled with an ancient, rambling, incoherent candidate who “looks older and more deranged” than any presidential nominee in history.

Biden “understood his limitations and, in an act of patriotism, selflessness, and party unity, decided to step away from power,” while Trump is a doddering lunatic “clinging to power, holding on desperately to the myth of a lost election, evoking the same predictable descriptions of carnage and disaster he served up eight years ago.”

Trump will no doubt rant about Harris and make up whacked-out lies about her. He will throw racist and misogynistic insults her way while his handlers insist for the 10,839^th time that he didn’t mean what he clearly said. He will threaten and prophesize and whine. He will babble nonstop in a jumbled cacophony of illogic and garbled syntax. 

And the rest of us will witness this sad display, and with hope, we will give it the only response that it warrants:

Just shut up already, old man.

An inch to one side, and he is unscathed. A couple of inches to the other side, and he’s a dead man. A few inches lower, and he’s seriously injured and off the campaign trail for a while.

But no, that shot had to nick him so precisely, so exactly, that he could claim a war wound but still be back on the golf course the next day. 

He could wave his fist around, blood on his face, with the American flag fluttering in the background in an image guaranteed to sway a million voters who base their decisions on random feelings and gut reactions. 

He could escape injury while his followers get killed. 

He could claim that he took a bullet for America when all he really did was take a bullet from a white male Republican lunatic opening fire with a legally purchased AR-15. 

No one who gets shot at benefits from the experience, except this guy.

It is astronomical how that bullet had to nip his ear but not actually harm him. How the slug had to cause just enough blood to flow that he could use the incident to boost fundraising. We’re talking millimeters that could decide an election.

Of course, he’s always been lucky. He was born a millionaire, for starters. And who else goes bankrupt multiple times, displays the morals of an alley cat, and spews idiotic lies and pathetic excuses nonstop, only to become more popular with each deranged act or massive failure?

Who else violates several federal laws in a blatant mockery of our system of classified information, but then gets the case against him dismissed because of a motherfucking footnote?

This election was “already shaping up as a symbolic contest between an elderly and weakening liberalism too frail and uncertain to protect itself and an authoritarian, reactionary movement ready to burst every barrier and trash every institution.”

Now, it looks like it will be a referendum on just how vile, incompetent, and cataclysmic one man can be without any comeuppance or hint of karma. 

The only person who might be luckier is some politically inexperienced buffoon who parlayed his hillbilly upbringing into a brand, sold out his semi-moderate values to fall into line with right-wing insanity, and is poised to become president if a certain obese septuagenarian wins an election but then suffers a fatal heart attack or chokes on a cheeseburger in two years.

Yeah, these guys have used up all the good luck for the entire country.

Recently, I wrote about the business leaders who see Trump as a threat to the economy and, by extension, to their company’s bottom line (and isn’t that what really matters?).

However, other business execs are pretty chill about the possibility that a man who doesn’t understand basic financial principles and is prone to reckless, impulsive decisions might be in charge of the world’s largest economy.

At the Davos conference, where the richest of the rich gather to hobnob and cavort, many business leaders said the media has exaggerated “the threat of a Trump presidency,” insisted that the GOP nominee is “all bark and no bite’” and implied that “many of his policies were right.”

This shows how in touch these supposedly brilliant leaders are. If anything, the media has downplayed the potential catastrophe of a second Trump administration. An unrepentant authoritarian who instigated an insurrection is clearly not “all bark.” And Trump’s policies led to economic disaster.

But none of that has stopped billionaires from lining up to help the Republican Party. And really, if you can’t trust billionaires to do what’s right, who can you trust?

However, people “still operating under the impression that they will curry favor with a dictator are painfully unaware of how dictators actually operate.” If Trump comes back for round two, he “will use the power of the state to squeeze the wealthy as well as his political opponents, threatening them with investigations, audits, regulation—even criminal charges—unless they do as they are told.” 

It doesn’t matter if you donate a gajillion dollars to his campaign. A megalomanic focuses only on what you can do for him at that moment, and while demanding complete loyalty, he offers none in return. 

And when you have outlived your usefulness, or have been perceived as a threat, you will face the same fate as his enemies that you helped vaniquish.

And his followers have adopted this mindset. For example, let’s say that you are fervent Trump supporter living in a red state. You might think you are safe from MAGA rage. Unfortunately, all it takes is one misstep, such as acknowledging basic facts, to provoke your former allies into calling for your head.

Or perhaps you are a well-regarded conservative, someone whose GOP credentials cannot be denied. It doesn’t matter. If you say or do anything that The Leader doesn’t like, or that his flunkies find suspicious, you will be harassed, mocked, maligned, and threatened, with actual physical violence a real possibility.

Now, there is a reason why Trump’s most fervent admirers are white straight men. As the ultimate white straight guy with underserved power, Trump tells them that they are entitled to the disproportionate amount of influence they have in this country. They want to keep it that way, and they believe Trump will preserve their status. To some degree, they are correct. It’s not like Trump is going to promote the rights of black lesbians or Muslim immigrants.

But ultimately, if Trump fanatics of any color or gender think their authoritarian overlord will protect them, they are massively mistaken. He will protect himself, and beware anyone who gets in his way.

History shows that eventually, even cult members and party favorites make a mistake, and it doesn’t end well for them.

Sooner or later, the dictator comes for you.

It’s a very special Independence Day this year, because it will be our last.

You see, the Supreme Court has ruled that the president is a king, and can pretty much do whatever he wants (even assassinate his political rivals, theoretically) without fear of being stopped or punished.

Also, the Supreme Court has ruled that bribery is legal, federal agencies have no actual authority, and homeless people can be thrown in prison if they are inconvenient. So the justices had a busy week of right-winging it.

The counter to this unprecedented push into authoritarianism is a disorganized, freaked-out Democratic Party that even under the best of circumstances has proven itself unable to fight back against fire-breathing Republicans. It doesn’t help that the Democratic flagbearer has trouble staying awake past 4:00 pm.

Meanwhile, American voters are more predisposed than ever to choose an aspiring dictator for their leader because the other guy stutters. 

So yes, this might be it for American democracy. I plan to relax, barbeque in the backyard, and have a few beers this weekend. After all, by next July, I might be running for my life from jackbooted thugs who are rounding up dark-skinned people who are insufficiently Christian.

Happy Independence Day everybody!

As we all know, no institution is more radically progressive, left-wing, and woke than Moody’s Analytics. Sure, they conduct objective analyses and offer insights to businesses about financial risks, but the facts have a well-known liberal agenda, and helping major corporations navigate issues is just the kind of thing that a lefty would do.

Yes, I’m spewing nonsense, but I’m trying to help our Republican friends figure out how to denigrate and dismiss the latest report from a respected, conservative institution that their presidential nominee’s economic policies are idiotic beyond restoration.

You see, Moody’s Analytics recently compared the economic promises of Joe Biden and Donald Trump. The study concluded that “a second Biden presidency would see cooling inflation and continued economic growth [while] a Trump presidency would be an economic disaster.”

How can this be? Polls show that more Americans trust Trump on economic policy, and a majority view the Trump years as successful. Well, on the first point, Republicans have never (as in never never never) been better at handling the economy than Democrats. And on the second point, Trump left office with the economy in a crater and fewer jobs than he started with. So maybe Americans don’t know what they’re talking about on this topic.

According to Moody’s Analytics, the convicted felon who fronts the GOP has promised to slash taxes on the wealthy, increase tariffs across the board, and deport 11 million immigrant workers. These policies would trigger a recession by mid-2025, increase the costs of consumer goods, boost inflation, eliminate over 3 million jobs, increase the unemployment rate, and add trillions to the national debt.

What’s not to love about that?

The chief economist of Moody’s Analytics said, rather plainly, that “Biden’s policies are better for the economy.”  

I told you they were left wing.

But if you still want to dismiss this report as liberal fear-mongering, consider that studies show that Trump “continues to suffer from the lowest level of corporate support in the history of the Republican Party,” despite the fact that an estimated 60 to 70 percent of chief executives are registered Republicans. It’s almost like these guys, who live for tax cuts and prize the bottom line over everything, are recognizing that enacting the half-baked notions of an addled criminal with multiple bankruptcies is a little disconcerting for business.

According to the historian Heather Richardson, the GOP is made up of “MAGA extremists and junior varsity opportunists” who are waving “red flags to business leaders.”

To be clear, these fat-cat execs don’t give a damn about wealth inequality, the rights of ethnic minorities, or democracy. But they do care about money. And if even these guys are shouting, “Don’t vote for this lunatic or the economy will collapse,” maybe we should pay attention.

Oh, and sixteen Nobel Prize-winning economists have signed a joint letter stating that “Joe Biden’s economic agenda is vastly superior to Donald Trump’s” and that GOP proposals are “fiscally irresponsible.”

 But none of those guys are stable geniuses, are they?

Here’s an interesting statistic for you: 

When pollsters asked Republicans in April whether someone convicted of a felony should be allowed to be president, just 17% said yes. But when the same pollsters asked Republicans the same question this month, 58% said yes.

That’s a 41-point swing, from fringe idea to majority opinion, in mere weeks. I wonder what happened in the time between the question being asked again. Yeah, that’s a stumper.

I also wonder how anyone can say with a straight face that Republicans are a serious political party with ironclad principles. Maybe next you’ll tell me that they are not in a cult.

In any case, I will be offline next week, but I will resume posting the following week. Until then, make sure that nothing interesting happens because I don’t want to miss it.

Thanks

What more can we say?

We have the first ex-president to be convicted of a felony (or 34 of them, as the case may be).

We have the first convicted criminal to run for president under the banner of a major political party.

We have that political party, which long championed “law and order,” now saying law and order is no big thing, or more likely, doesn’t apply to them.

We have religious conservatives, who want us all to worship Jesus or have our citizenship stripped, lining up to proclaim the holiness of a man who paid a porn star to keep quiet about his infidelity to his third wife.

We have half of Congress insisting that Americans can no longer trust the courts, the electoral process, or any political institution that doesn’t align with the whims of their jabbering, addled messiah.

We have conservatives who told us that “This should be decided at the ballot box” then when the voters decided, changed it to “If he broke any laws, let a jury decide,” then after a jury decided, changed it to “This should be decided at the ballot box” in a circle of mesmerizing gaslighting.

We have people who don’t even know what the charges were screaming that he is innocent of whatever they charged him with, while conservatives who know the law perfectly well proclaim that the law is not what it actually is.

We have a man who “has spent decades on the edge of legal trouble,” whose life goals consist of delaying legal problems for as long as possible in the assumption that he could ride it out, who has finally been judged a criminal.

And we have pollsters telling us that this, like every development under the sun, will inevitably be bad news for Democrats.

We have all this and more.

And we have nine undecided voters in swing states who have actually changed their minds.

Hey, it’s something.

My first novel, which has never been published, began with the following line:

This was by far the worst he had ever cut himself.

From there, the novel went on for about 200,000 words, mostly about how tortured I was in my twenties and how I felt feelings and had thoughts that none of you mere mortals could possibly understand.

Did I mention that this work has never been published?

Now, there is some good stuff in this ancient manuscript of mine, and I’ve pillaged some of the better sections for other novels and short stories over the years. Plus, I learned a lot about writing from this years-long exercise, so it wasn’t a total waste of time. 

And I still think that was a pretty good opening line. Hey, you know who agrees with me on that point? Artificial intelligence.

Yes, we have all seen articles and think pieces about how AI will foster creativity and allow artists to produce their best work faster, if only humans would get out of the way.

As a writer who has been known to dabble in creating web content, I have been inundated with emails from start-ups that promise their AI product will write my blog for me, redesign my website, and cook a four-course dinner for my wife and me.

These companies are basically saying, “Why write a post that expresses your thoughts on a topic, when you can have AI crank out derivative content in flat prose in mere seconds?”

Why indeed? You’ve got me there, tech bros!

To be clear, I am no Luddite. I’m intrigued with AI, especially its potential to eliminate repetitive tasks and speed up breakthroughs in science.

But I’m mystified why anyone would want a machine to write for you. Aren’t those your ideas? Why would you plaster your name on something that, by its very nature, is a hodgepodge compilation of other writers’ work?

Yes, I have posted the occasional AI-generated picture, like this beauty:

But I am always honest about the source of these images, and while I agree they can be cool, they are mere ornaments. I wouldn’t use one for, say, the cover of my next book (which is coming out later this year). For some things, you need the human touch.

Of course, maybe I am being narrow-minded, and I should buy into the hype that collaborating with AI is the next stage for writers.

So in the spirit of innovation, I asked an AI site for its reaction to the first sentence of my discarded novel. Here is the exchange:

Me — What is your reaction to the following sentence: “This was by far the worst he had ever cut himself”

AI — The sentence “This was by far the worst he had ever cut himself” effectively conveys the severity of an injury by comparing it to previous instances. It suggests that the person has a history of cutting themselves, but this particular incident is significantly more serious than any before. The use of “by far” emphasizes the magnitude of the injury, indicating that it is substantially worse. The sentence is concise and clear, immediately informing the reader about the gravity of the situation.

OK, that is very… analytical. It completely kills the vibe of the story, but it’s insightful. 

So I then asked AI to actively collaborate. Here is that exchange:

Me — Write the next sentence of a story that starts with this line: “This was by far the worst he had ever cut himself.”

AI — “The blood oozed between his fingers as he clutched his arm, the sharp pain a stark reminder of his vulnerability in the vast, unforgiving wilderness.”

I gotta admit, that ain’t bad. It’s a bit adjective-heavy, and my novel took place in New York City, while according to AI, my character should have been lost in the vast, unforgiving wilderness. But maybe there’s some way to reconcile the setting. Perhaps the main character gets lost in Central Park.

In any case, I still don’t see how AI will help me write this blog. No machine can access my combination of Gen X, Latino, Midwestern upbringing, SoCal living, progressive, classic-rock and horror-movie aficionado. Then it would have to filter those influences and churn out a viewpoint that could pass for my sincerely held belief. It just can’t be done.

At least not yet.

I’ll be honest. I had forgotten all about that smug frat-boy entrepreneur whose main claim to fame is dropping out of the GOP primary so that his idol Trump could coast to a nomination. This tech bro made some idiotic pronouncements, tried in vain to own the libs, then got kicked to the curb.

In any case, he recently resurfaced to interview a raging racist who was a big deal back in the 1990s, when GOP men thought she was still hot and mainstream media inexplicably labeled her a serious thinker.

Normally, I wouldn’t even notice what a couple of right-wing lunatics say to one another. But one exchange got my attention. That was when the woman said she would never vote for the frat boy because he is not white.

The guy sat there, stunned and stone-faced, as she merrily went on about America’s core identity, which in her view is strictly white, Anglo-Saxon protestant. By the way, this woman used to offer vague denials of her bigotry, but as her popularity dimmed, she dropped all pretense and more or less yelled, “white power” every chance she got.

So how did the failed presidential candidate react? He stammered through the rest of the interview, then later went on social media to thank her for being “honest.”

Now, there are few things sadder than a person who gets slurred to his face, refuses to stand up for himself, and thanks the person for insulting him.

Among those few sadder things is an ethnic minority who has sold out his principles and bent over backward to gain the approval of white supremacists, who then discovers that they will never (as in never never never) consider him equal. 

Progressives were not surprised at this exchange. We’ve known all along that the hard right is synonymous with racism, and we’ve stated many times that any ethnic minority who votes for Republicans is setting himself up for rejection. A few liberals even said they felt sorry for the frat boy, which is on brand for a bunch of bleeding hearts, right?

Conservatives more or less ignored the racism (they have a lot of practice doing that) and praised the frat boy for not lashing out at the woman. 

Please note that conservatives are big advocates for turning the other cheek, having a sense of humor, or not being hypersensitive when it comes to their right to insult minorities. They are not so fond of those concepts if you, say, criticize organized religion or say trans people are human. Then it’s game on, bitches.

Conservatives believe that progressives must follow the lead of Dr. Martin Luther King, which is to refrain from violence. But they conflate this peaceful tactic with timidity. After all, King never screamed or fought with bigots, but he didn’t smile and say thank you to them either.

In any case, conservatives drop all that peace and love shit if they feel insulted. Then they can issue death threats and punch people out all they want.

As for the frat boy, I’m sure he will wander around the fringes of the GOP for a while, maybe pick up a few fans here and there, and gradually fade away as Republicans move on to another ethnic minority they can hide behind. And when the guy is dismissed and ostracized for the last time, and the Republicans shut the door in his face, he will smile and thank them one more time.

Don’t you hate when you hit “publish” on your post, and then 4.9 seconds later, you think of another point you wanted to make on the topic, but now you will wait a week to write that insight down, and the subsequent article will become sort of a delayed sequel to the first, because not only would editing the post seem odd to subscribers (thanks for subscribing), but you’re still on deadline for the latest draft of your book (shout out to my publishers), and you don’t have time to redo the post, and you have mild OCD that prevents you from screwing up your weekly writing schedule, even though it gets screwed up plenty due to the vagaries of life and haphazard technological issues and the black rage that overtakes you from time to time, so you just wait another week to offer your point in a new article.

We’ve all been there, right?

Yes, I wrote about the campus protests last week, but there is one more insight I want to present on the subject.

Middle-aged conservatives just love calling protesters snowflakes. They send out mocking missives over social media, deliver fiery speeches, and write lengthy op-eds in mainstream publications about those darn kids today.

Yes, right-wing fiftysomethings feel pretty smug in their mental toughness and steely machismo, especially when compared to those granola-chomping Gen Z liberal-arts majors who expect participation trophies.

But here’s the thing. The college students are enduring discomfort, risking expulsion, facing financial penalties, and occasionally getting beaten up. And they will receive no personal benefit from their actions. They are fighting for their principles—well, the vast majority of them are, excluding the vile antisemites, of course.

Meanwhile, their self-righteous critics are risking nothing more damaging than the occasional accusation of Islamophobia, which as we know, is not frowned upon in American culture and can actually be a source of honor in conservative circles.

More importantly, for all the talk about liberal kids being wimps, it is the old conservatives who are passing laws to prevent hurt feelings. Seriously, one of their proudest moments in recent history is when they banned teaching honest and accurate history because it might cause emotional discomfort to their children (who I suppose aren’t as tough as their steel-skinned parents).

The hypocrisy is glaring. It is so blinding, in fact, that I take no credit for pointing it out, because it should be perfectly obvious to anyone who thinks about the scenario for more than two minutes.

And yet, the old men have gotten away with it again. Once more, they have adopted the mantle of manly, strong dude, when they are exactly the opposite: scared, fearful and insecure.

You think we would have caught on to this fakery by now.