Can this Tangled web of political and criminal drama entrance for 10 episodes?
Emmy award winner, Bryan Cranston, most popularly known as his character Walter White in the television series “Breaking Bad” is back for a new series.
The upcoming dramatic crime limited series will be on the premium channel Showtime. The miniseries “Your Honor” premiers Sunday, Dec 6 at 10/9 c. Users that subscribe to Showtime via Amazon Prime video can also watch from there.
The premise of the show as provided by Showtime, is about Michael Desiato, a New Orleans judge played by Cranston, who is forced to confront his own deepest convictions when his son Hunter played by Hunter Doohan is involved in a hit and run that involved an organized crime family.
As a storm of vengeance, lies and deceit threatens his whole world, Michael faces a series of increasingly impossible choices. The show posits the moral dilemma, and uncovers just how far an honest man and father will go to save his son’s life.
“It’s never clean, and that’s what makes good drama,” Cranston says. “It’s a very exciting and compelling spiral of events played out in 10 episodes.”
The miniseries has already started to trickle out reviews, some of which have said that it is bad, however most are comparing apples to oranges to his extraordinary work playing a high school chemistry teacher turned drug lord. Check out this weekend and see for yourself.
New and interesting options for streaming entertainment coming 2021
Discovery is behind a handful of networks including: Discovery Channel, Food Network, HGTV, ID, OWN, TLC and Animal Planet. The company will be joining as a new contender in the so-called streaming wars with the big hitters like Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, Apple TV+ and Peacock. This year, the only new streaming platform, Quibi, launched and within the same year, rather tragically called in quits.
The service will be available among all the major device platforms that will include smart TV’s, web based, phones and tablets. There was no mention to specific platforms, more information will likely be disclosed closer to the start date. Those that are customers of Verizon unlimited wireless will be able to opt for 12 free months of Discovery.
Discovery+ is set to launch its new streaming platform at the beginning of next year on Jan 4, 2021. The monthly price will have the option of $4.99 with ads, or $2 extra for $6.99 a month without adds. Discovery+ launched last month in UK and Ireland, with plans to expand to more than 25 additional international markets, including the US next year.
The new streaming service will have over 55,000 episodes of TV in its arsenal. Discovery will provide of entertainment with a wide mixture of shows in its library, as well as movies and new and exclusive original content. There are reports of plans for shows including the likes of Chip and Goanna Gaines (Fixer Upper), David Attenborough, comedian Kevin Hart, and big name chefs like Bobby Flay and Giada De Laurentiss.
“We’ll see, but people love our channels… We’ve never been stronger to the cable bundle.” he continued to say about the networks are “effectively like the NFL times five right now for women.”
-CEO David Zaslav
Haven’t joined in on a Watch Party?
Amazon Prime Video and Netflix have had watch party features for a while now. Hulu and Disney+ are now rolling out its own versions, to allow for friends and family to share some entertainment connectedness.
Hulu started testing the new feature back in May for select users that allowed for a group up to eight people to watch TV shows and movies together. Through the website, the party can chat with one another throughout the videos, commenting in real time, even allowing their own playback feature (in case you have to grab a snack).
The then limited feature is now fully functional and available for all on-demand Hulu subscribers (those that have ad-free or ad-supported options). There should now be a “Watch Party” icon on Hulu’s main page, once in, you will be provided a link that can be shared to up to seven other Hulu subscribers. When all members have joined, the initiator (the host) starts the show or movie. The feature is only supported on Hulu.com, so it will not be accessible through the app.
Disney+ also recently rolled out its own version of a watch party, called “GroupWatch”. The main difference, however is group members are limited to reacting through emojis, with no options yet for written communication.
Witnesses of Evil and survivors deserve a decompression phase
For nearly all of 2017 the word “lie” rarely if ever appeared in an article written about the president. The reasons for this are more complex than it would first appear, and relate to the history of political journalism reaching back at least 50 years. The reason why, beginning in 2018 and early 2019, “lie” became a daily and oft used word in connection with this lying-president is a more subtle and interesting story.
As of this writing it is 100% clear that Trump has lost the election (odd to even have to say that, considering how obvious it is to any sane, rational observer) and that, ultimately, we will all benefit from forgetting about this attention-addicted-sociopath. However, with regard to something we all experienced, witnessed and endured over a period of four plus years; before forgetting there must first be a remembering.
And, for the benefit of those of us who have various forms of PTSD as a result of what he perpetrated and what we had to witness, that remembering is a healthy, necessary step.
For nearly all of 2017 the word “lie” rarely if ever appeared in an article written about the president. The reasons for this are more complex than it would first appear, and relate to the history of political journalism reaching back at least 50 years. The reason why, beginning in 2018 and early 2019, “lie” became a daily and oft used word in connection with this lying-president is a more subtle and interesting story.
As of this writing it is 100% clear that Trump has lost the election (odd to even have to say that, considering how obvious it is to any sane, rational observer) and that, ultimately, we will all benefit from forgetting about this attention-addicted-sociopath. However, with regard to something we all experienced, witnessed and endured over a period of four plus years; before forgetting there must first be a remembering.
And, for the benefit of those of us who have various forms of PTSD as a result of what he perpetrated and what we had to witness, that remembering is a healthy, necessary step.
Perhaps rushing forward to “fix” everything he broke, destroyed or tried to destroy must be combined with looking back.
Seeing some of the events that shaped the last four years through the eyes of the media and the press
The public perceptions and reactions to history during significant and extreme events are shaped over time, and meaning are not always clear until we look back. If this article was a typical “2020 Looking Back” year-end recap, and did not run 5000 words or more it’d be about the coronavirus, the election, and a skim through the various events on the periphery. Instead, we must begin on June 16th, 2015 when Donald J. Trump began his assault on America.
And, as we all remember, it started with “Mexicans”:
“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best, they’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us [sic]. They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”
Donald J. Trump, as he descended on his golden escalator
This technique of viciously attacking a particular ethic group, generally, and pandering to negative stereotypes was just getting started.
Also couching broad statements, that often included boldfaced lies, within statements that could have a tiny sliver of truth would also be a propaganda technique he would use, sometimes dozens of times in a day, over the next nearly 4.5 years.
Then came the nicknames. Again, maybe “little Marco” was not the tallest guy and “Low-energy Jeb” was not the most exciting. But Trump’s character traits that would later expand and multiply were not pretty, and were on full display even during the initial phases of the election.
Belittling opponents in an ugly personal way, pushing all dialog away from substance and toward personal attacks of the lowest form was standard operating procedure. All the signs were there of a mental sickness, one that we would all later experience more intimately, but at the time it was all an amusing diversion, since most believed he had “zero chance” of winning the 2016 presidential election.
Phase 2, 3, 4 and beyond: testing the limits of outrage
Just making a laundry list of outrageous and disgusting behavior by this man is easy, but of little value, beyond our mutual sharing of “I was there” recollections publicly. More interesting, it seems, would be an exploration of how “we”, the media, and the public, reacted and adjusted to having such a malignant presence in the White House.
It’s easy to forget that, around the time of the 2016 inauguration, many in the media went on and on about how the outrageous tactics were just a ploy, and a successful one at that, for him to get elected, and now that the election was over, Trump would magically become “Presidential”.
Then the lies began to multiply. All during 2017, however, it was very difficult to find the word “lie” in any article from a mainstream outlet that was about Trump, well, lying. The lengths that journalists went to avoid that word was, in a word, incredible. To look further into the history of not saying the word “lie” when a president lies, this Politco article from 2017 is a great deeper dive.
In the final paragraph summation the overall view at the time was encapsulated:
“Using the word “lie” promiscuously may, in the short term, score a point against a president who has shown a contempt for the facts. But over the long-term, the authority and credibility of aspirationally objective mainstream news organizations like the New York Times are best served by scrupulously trying to report the news in ways that can be trusted by readers of any political viewpoint. And it’s by upholding and reinforcing that authority and credibility that the Fourth Estate will best guide readers to the truth amid the misinformation, propaganda and lies produced by the administration of Donald J. Trump.”
David Greenberg, a professor of history and media studies at Rutgers in Politico Magazine
This viewpoint, ultimately, disintegrated and was abandoned, generally, by the middle of 2018 into the beginning of 2019. Trump literally bashed down that wall of civility with thousands and thousands of lies.
Terms and phrases like “decorum”, “deference”, “non-partisan” and “civilized discourse” became meaningless in the endless assault of lies, hate speech and outrageous acts. At Lynxotic, we made a decision fairly early that this was not a “normal” president and these were not normal times. We seriously had to ask ourselves, if this was an emerging danger to this country and to democracy itself, who would we be serving by mincing words?
And further, the news has always been, to a certain degree, opinion infused facts with a, sometimes, thin veneer of artificial authoritative eminence. And wasn’t the media often guilty of using “impartiality”, similarly to an arms dealer, selling ammunitions to both sides in a civil war?
As time went on, the incredible border “cages” scandals, then the impeachmentdrama came and went and on and on, until Trump’s massive coronavirus failures, and finally the election madness.
In the end all pretense of, and use for civility, any belief that a non-corrupt outcome was possible, revealed a truth that the choices for the nation were, and are, to jail the man famous for chants of “Lock her up” or let him continue until he destroys the democracy and possibly, ultimately the country itself.
The good thing that was bestowed upon all of us by a bad man
Of course, in all of this, he did do one good thing for the media and journalism. Not “ratings” or prosperity through scandal. No, what he did was to help us to remove the hypocrisy of the long standing “deference” to any and all sitting in the White House, just because they are there.
“When he “won” in 2016 it was on the shoulders of Russian hackers and social media “bots” that influenced the thinking of real, living, breathing humans. In 2020 those real humans showed up, 80 million strong, and took back the country.”
D.L.
The blurred lines between observation, opinion, facts and fiction are ones that have, in reality, always been blurred. To face that fact, and to grapple every day with the issues of how to communicate the hard truth, is also a legacy of this evil man.
When he “won” in 2016 it was on the shoulders of Russian hackers and social media “bots” that influenced the thinking of real, living, breathing humans. In 2020 those real humans showed up, 80 million strong, and took back the country.
That is also a lesson we owe to “The Donald”. That, if a pretender rises up, the rest of us have to rise up as well, to put him down.
The favor he did us all was to force us to examine the real facts, and make the real news and not the fake news matter, even if that news is that he is a liar, a grifter, a cheat and a criminal. And if any of his ilk come to power again, or continue to remain in power, they should be treated the same way, as needed.
If you like winning, this is your chance to do it, over and over and over…
Never before has a presidential candidate won his election so many times. Never before has a loser found so many ridiculous ways to avoid conceding to the winner. Of course, it is the very fact that a loser has brazenly lied and fabricated nonsense reasons and accusations to contest at every opportunity that has created the possibility for Biden to win, again and again.
First, Joe Biden won what appeared to be a relatively narrow victory on election day with enough confirmed electoral votes, along with a lead in enough other states to create an impossibility for Trump to get to 270, the margin of votes needed to prevail.
Next Biden was declared winner in states which had held back in declaring a projected winner. Then the re-counts, court challenges and and final tallies commenced.
Pennsylvania gave him a win. That was a big win and he became President-elect. Then the Georgia re-count was another time to celebrate his victory. And Arizona, a state he flipped for the first time since 1996, and before that a Republican won there since 1948.
So, get ready everyone, on December 14th there will be another win for Joe Biden. Tired of winning yet?
In the end Biden will have, barring any absolutely and totally unlikely changes, 306 electoral votes. “A landslide” according to Trump when it was his exact winning number. Of course he did not get more than 80 million popular votes, or vanquish his opponent by more than 6 million. That’s only another unique and first in all history – big big win for Biden.
Trump lost the popular vote by 2.9 million votes in 2016.
So far, 54 of his 306 Electoral College votes and Trump 73 of his 232 votes have been officially certified by a total of 16 states. They have awarded President-elect Joe Biden 54 of his 306 Electoral College votes, and Trump has been awarded 73 of his 232 votes.
Florida is the only one of the four most populous states that has, as of yet, already been certified. Early in December there’s a deadline for the other large ones: California, Texas and New York. None of them are at all in doubt, of course.
Talk of “faithless electors” being put into action by Trump is becoming les and less likely by the day. Not 100% off the table but around 99.9999% not gonna happen.
I wonder if Trump is tired of losing yet? Gas-up the private jet. Moscow’s waiting.
Electoral College meets on Dec. 14, and all states must be certified before that, while any challenges to the results must have been resolved by Dec. 8.
Trump’s continued efforts to overturn election results: …laughable (literally)
Most of us know, that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris won the 2020 election. With the records showing the President-elect reached 80 million popular votes, with still more counting to be done. Yet, even though the electoral college votes, which determines the White House winner have been clearly laid out on Nov. 7 with the resounding 306-223.
Trump has done almost everything in his power to deny the facts. The “red mirage” has yet to fade for 45. He’s been seen tweeting from the rooftops that the election was rigged and riddled with fraud, he’s flat out tried to deny it, he has refused to concede or peacefully transfer power, Trump even begged battleground states for a recount of votes. None of the above was the truth; the simple fact is, he just lost.
Yet, the American people have had to bear witness to just how badly of a sore loser Trump has been. Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, all reconfirmed that Biden is the victor.
On Nov. 23, head of the GSA Emily Murphy formally approved for the transition, pushing reality even that much further, that now, perhaps the 2020 presidential elections can be finalized.
As a result, “Joe Biden winning” memes have been spreading throughout the internet wide and far, showing Biden winning multiple times while highlighting a range of feelings – hilarity, relief, to just plain absurdity of how this presidential election year has gone down.
The inauguration isn’t until Jan 20, 2021 and if you are like the majority of us, that means there, unfortunately, is still two more months of having to deal with Trump’s antics. It’s far past time for Trump to end his delusional battle and come to some sort of acceptance of the obvious election reality.
Above: Photo from “Happiest Season / Courtesy of Hulu
Praise for Stewart in first “Out and Proud” Christmas movie
Around this time of year, there are usually a handful of beloved holiday movies like “Home Alone, “Family Stone” and many more. Today, a new Christmas romantic comedy has dropped, “Happiness Season” just in time for the long 4 day Thanksgiving holiday. This film is a little unique in that the focus centers around two lesbian women.
The now streaming movie was originally meant for a theatrical release, yet due to the current climate, found its way to the Hulu streaming platform.
Kristen Stewart (in real life openly gay) plays Abby and Mackenzie Davis plays Harper, a happy couple, whose relationship is put to the test. Harper invites Abby back to her parents for the holidays. Only during the drive is it revealed that her family doesn’t know she is gay and hasn’t yet come out to anyone in the family. Abby has to pose as a straight friend. Bonus, the hilarious Dan Levy, plays John, Abby’s best friend.
“it’s really nice to watch a movie that you get to completely rid yourself of that [feeling] knowing that you can laugh at that experience and that catharsis knowing that what you’re getting is an earned happiness. You get to laugh at these weird fears of saying the wrong thing around someone’s family or not being able to lie very well so maybe they’ll know I’m gay.”
-Kristen Stewart
Director Clea DuVall, who is openly out herself, commented on the film, “I love Christmas movies but I had never really seen myself represented in one before”. Her take away goal was “wanting to feel like I was seeing me in a movie like this, which I had never seen before. And my experience is not unique. I’m not the only one going through it. So there has to be a lot of other people who are also feeling underrepresented.”
'Twas the night before #HappiestSeason, when all through the house, We're gathering our chosen family, or even a spouse, We wrapped the opening credits up nicely just for you, To tell you our movie is now streaming, only on @hulu! pic.twitter.com/4ck1oHKYo6
Biden transition team reveals multiple top position picks, NYT reveals
According to a New York Times article, Joe Biden’s transition office said that they plan to announce multiple new top national security picks on Tuesday. The news will be accounted officially at an event in Washington.
The picks are said to include Alejandro Mayorkas, who will be the first Latino to head the Department of Homeland Security. Additionally, Avril Haines is slated to be his director of national intelligence and will become the first woman to head the intelligence community.
John Kerry will be nominated to for climate czar. Kerry, who was formerly secretary of state, will also will be on the National security council, which, since it is not a cabinet position will not need to be confirmed by the Senate.
Janet Yellen will be Treasury Secretary & Antony Blinken and Jake Sullivan in cabinet positions
Janet Yellen, formerly chair of the Federal Reserve, from 2014 – 2018, is said to be on the list and expected to be nominated for head of the treasury depart. and would therefore be the first woman Treasury secretary of the United States
According to the transition team President-elect Biden also plans to nominate Linda Thomas-Greenfield, an African-American woman to be ambassador to the United Nations and, as a result of his intention to restore the position to cabinet-level status, will thereby also give Ms. Thomas-Greenfield a National Security Council seat.
These picks follow the announcement that Antony J. Blinken will be nominated for secretary of state, Jake Sullivan is to be White House national security adviser, also reported through sources from the transition team.
Above: Photo Collage showing the 4 Georgia Senate runoff election Candidates & Mike Pence
Critical Georgia Senate race seeing possible coronavirus impact early
After a campaign event for the upcoming Georgia run-off election that will decide which party controls the senate, and where Ms Loeffler was seen with primarily “unmasked” crowds, she tested positive on Friday. An initial, less reliable, test was “inconclusive” earlier in the day.
Though often seen wearing a mask in public, and wearing one during a post-rally series of meetings with a line of voters who had, lined up to greet her.
According to the New York Times, After her initial “rapid test” came back negative, she was “cleared” to appear at event on Friday, including a Rally that also had Georgia Senator David Perdue and Mike Pence in attendance. The second test was a so-called P.C.R. test, considered more accurate, was positive.
Ms Loeffler and Mr. Perdue are facing a runoff election in January against Democrats Dr. Raphael G Warnock and Jon Ossoff, respectively. The runoff is certain to attract intense national attention, due to the fact that, if Democrats are able to prevail in both cases the Senate will have a 50 – 50 split with VP-elect Kamala Harris as a tie-breaker, effectively putting the Democrats in a position to marginally control both the House and Senate.
…No surprise, yet another of the Trump clan has covid-19
Asymptomatic but in quarantine, one more of the anti-mask Trump crew has been added to the list of those that have tested positive for the Covid 19 virus. It’s unknown whether the public would have been informed by either Trump Jr. or the White House without the story from Bloomberg broken.
“Don tested positive at the start of the week and has been quarantining out at his cabin since the result, He’s been completely asymptomatic so far and is following all medically recommended COVID-19 guidelines.”
Spokesperson for Donald Trump Jr.
Also On Friday, a White House aide who is also Rudy Giuliani’s son Andrew Giuliani, put out a tweet that was also positive. In addition, an aide to aides to VP Mike Pence, including, Hannah McInnis, was also positive surrounding to the Bloomberg article. Other aides of the VP were previously infected, such as his press secretary and chief of staff. Pence himself has not yet announced any positive diagnosis.
It’s unknown whether the public would have been informed by either Trump Jr. or the White House without the story from Bloomberg broken. This is a developing story and will be updated as news breaks.
As follows, a list of various other Republican establishment figures that have tested positive as well;
Melania Trump (First Lady)
Ronna McDaniel (Republican National Committee chairwoman)
Hope Hicks (White House communications aide)
Kellyanne Conway (Former White House counselor)
Bill Stepien (Trump campaign manager)
John Jenkins (University of Notre Dame president)
Chris Christie (Former New Jersey Gov.)
Nick Luna (Director of Oval Office operations)
Karoline Leavitt (White house assistant press secretary)
Chad Gilmartin (White House press office staffer)
Kayleigh McEnany (White House press secretary)
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah)
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.)
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.)
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Nothing in the memoir can compare to the chaos and carnage of the lame-duck-disaster of today
The 44th President, Barak Obama’s memoir, “A Promised Land” comes out today, November 17th. And what better time than now as 45 (aka Trump) is nearing the end of his term, than to reflect on the better days, when the nation had an intelligent, articulate, drama-free leader in the White House. Includes and updated preface – looking forward to the future, when President-elect Joe Biden will be sworn in.
This will mark Obama’s third autobiography. His first book, “Dreams from My Father” published back in 1995 and The Audacity of Hope in 2006. In Promised Land, he focuses on his children, political life starting out in Chicago, his rise to the nation’s top elected office and events leading up to the killing of Osama bin Laden. Readers will get an insider account of Obama’s thinking during this political journey, as well as a look inside his personal life.
Obama made reports that he planned, at least initially to write a 500 page memoir within a years time, he instead wrote a whopping 700 pages. It will now be the first of an anticipated two set volume, as the book ends with bin Laden in May of 2011.
My memoir, A Promised Land, is out today. I hope you’ll read it. My goal was to give you some insight into the events and people that shaped me during the early years of my presidency. Most of all, I hope it inspires you to see yourself playing a role in shaping a better world. pic.twitter.com/hdZysCpCN9
To read more information Barak Obama’s book, please see publisher details below. His book is available for purchase as of November 17, 2020. Click here and help independent bookstores, also available on Amazon and Walmart.
A Promised Land
A riveting, deeply personal account of history in the making–from the president who inspired us to believe in the power of democracy
In the stirring, highly anticipated first volume of his presidential memoirs, Barack Obama tells the story of his improbable odyssey from young man searching for his identity to leader of the free world, describing in strikingly personal detail both his political education and the landmark moments of the first term of his historic presidency–a time of dramatic transformation and turmoil.
Click here to See “Shade“ in Paperback and Hardcover versions and help Independent Bookstores. Also Available on Amazon.
Obama takes readers on a compelling journey from his earliest political aspirations to the pivotal Iowa caucus victory that demonstrated the power of grassroots activism to the watershed night of November 4, 2008, when he was elected 44th president of the United States, becoming the first African American to hold the nation’s highest office.
Reflecting on the presidency, he offers a unique and thoughtful exploration of both the awesome reach and the limits of presidential power, as well as singular insights into the dynamics of U.S. partisan politics and international diplomacy. Obama brings readers inside the Oval Office and the White House Situation Room, and to Moscow, Cairo, Beijing, and points beyond. We are privy to his thoughts as he assembles his cabinet, wrestles with a global financial crisis, takes the measure of Vladimir Putin, overcomes seemingly insurmountable odds to secure passage of the Affordable Care Act, clashes with generals about U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, tackles Wall Street reform, responds to the devastating Deepwater Horizon blowout, and authorizes Operation Neptune’s Spear, which leads to the death of Osama bin Laden.
A Promised Land is extraordinarily intimate and introspective–the story of one man’s bet with history, the faith of a community organizer tested on the world stage. Obama is candid about the balancing act of running for office as a Black American, bearing the expectations of a generation buoyed by messages of “hope and change,” and meeting the moral challenges of high-stakes decision-making. He is frank about the forces that opposed him at home and abroad, open about how living in the White House affected his wife and daughters, and unafraid to reveal self-doubt and disappointment. Yet he never wavers from his belief that inside the great, ongoing American experiment, progress is always possible.
This beautifully written and powerful book captures Barack Obama’s conviction that democracy is not a gift from on high but something founded on empathy and common understanding and built together, day by day. Click here and help independent bookstores, also available on Amazon and Walmart.
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The Origin of Everything is Shrouded in Mystery – looking at Apple’s history yields many clues, however…
PART I of a 3 PART SERIES:
Given the sheer size, breadth and power of the various “Tech Giants” as they have become known, many, if not most would be skeptical if an assertion were put forth that all of them were a direct product or outgrowth of Apple.
Click to see “Steve Jobs” and help independent bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
Although there is almost constant complaining that Apple is not the innovator it once was, or that they sell overpriced and overrated products, with more marketing than substance, tracing back through the history of tech a very different story emerges. Further, all the way to the present a pattern holds true that traces all big tech back to Apple in a direct route from at least 1984 or earlier.
The whole story is long and somewhat hidden; and it diverges from the accepted notions of how the massive empires of tech came about. In the end it is almost impossible not to see the behemoths now known as Microsoft, Google, Facebook and others as little more than incidental occurrences, spawned the wake of Apple’s growth and innovation.
Apple is an entirely different company from what it seems from the point of view of the masses & the media. For example, just as now we have Biden vs. Trump we once had Jobs vs. Gates. You can decide which is which. Perhaps today it seems like a stretch, but up until around 1998 the two were considered opposites and as compatible as oil vs. water.
Above: vdieo Clip from the “One More Thing 2020 Event and Video Still Photo Collage / Lynxotic
There have always been a huge number of people who are offended by the high-price high-quality ethos that Steve Jobs created and that the company carries forward to this day.
Steve Jobs Steve Wozniak with the Apple 1 prototype
Much like Tesla owners are heckled by Toyota, Ford and Chevy pick-up truck owners, Apple has always had an army of detractors. And while for many years it was Windows / PC users now it is Android and Samsung. But if you set aside the Apple-derangement Syndrome, sister affliction to the fabled “Reality Distortion Field” there are some fascinating theories that could be put forth showing that Apple and Steve Jobs are the ultimate source of all tech since the Garden of Eden, or at least the 70s.
[Readers note: there are many accepted truths and fabled stories that will be addressed in this article. These are, at times considered “fact” and at other times questioned openly. If it bothers you when either of those choices are made to suit the narrative, you may, of course, opt-out at any time. All attempts have been made to remain true to historical fact, but no claims or guarantees are made of perfection.]
In The Beginning there was… XEROX?
In the beginning there was Xerox Parc. From that private think-tank of a copy-machine company emerged two incredible discoveries; the Graphical-User-Interface (GUI) and the Mouse (mouse). In the fable Steve Jobs is invited to visit in late 1979, to gather knowledge from the computer scientists and R&D gurus and later decides to “steal” everything he sees. Xerox, on the other hand, continues to believe that copy machines are the real future.
Click to see “iWoz” and help independent bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
This fable / anecdote is often used to illustrate that Steve Jobs and Apple deserve no credit for the ultimate ubiquity of the software that emerged from the GUI concept and, the mouse that came about cause of the… mouse. It is also said, or at least implied, that Microsoft was fully justified in stealing anything and everything they could from Apple software innovations because “Steve did it first to Xerox”. These kinds of rationalizations are the reason why Apple is still, to this day, not recognized as the source for all tech in the universe.
The more accurate take on this origin story is that Steve Jobs was the first to recognize the ultimate importance of the GUI and mouse combo (after all Xerox never made any real commercially viable attempt to make and market the discoveries from its own R&D) and that the future of the tech world would be built on the bedrock of these early innovations.
“…In fact, turning expensive, hard-to-use, precision instruments into cheap, mass-producible, and reliable commercial products requires its own ingenuity and creativity. This marketplace intelligence is different from, but not inferior to, the intelligence of the laboratory; it just gets far less attention by journalists and historians. In the case of the relationship between the work at PARC and the development of the Macintosh, this blindness leads us to underestimate the originality of Apple’s own work, and the differences between the Alto and Macintosh. “
Further, at the time Bill Gates was madly in love with the wonders of MS-Dos and in particular the money he could bank in licensing it to IBM and all bidders… It was only years later in 1985 when he famously decided to steal the GUI_ Mouse based system software apple was using, in spite of his promises to refrain from stealing when he was shown the secrets during his fabled meeting with Steve Jobs to discuss word and excel, early versions of which were already on the Macintosh. Hence the echos of “Steve did it first to Xerox” became the rallying cry for all those that seemed to justify the direct theft of Macintosh OS to create the clunky-named system called “Windows”.
This story carried on throughout the 80s and 90s and, all the while, a 1988 lawsuit was pending resolution, which has at its center the accusation, by Apple, that Windows 1, released in November 1985, was directly copied, a.k.a. inspired by the Macintosh OS. In the end, in another famous fabled incident, the suit was settled out of court in 1997, by then obscenely rich Bill Gates, for $150 million, thus rescuing Apple from almost certain Bankruptcy.
Moral of the story? Windows, PC’s and everything Microsoft ever became, can be directly traced back to Apple. This is the most obvious of the various lines of creative attribution leading back to Apple and Steve Jobs.
The next saga: Google’s connection and the debt owed to Anti-trust and Apple, will be more subtle but all the more timely. Timely as in right now this minute. Stay tuned for Volume II of “How Apple Created the Entire Tech Universe and it Finally Makes Sense”
Arduous production and distribution woes make for a slimmer Holiday fare: we found the best hopes for 2020
Because of COVID-19, 2020 will go down in history as one of the most unique years for movies. With theaters closed, blockbusters delayed, and dozens of highly anticipated films getting siphoned off to streaming services, there hasn’t been any major box office highs or prestigious content for the big screen. Given the state of the world, this reality will likely continue through December, robbing the holiday season of its traditional major releases.
Nevertheless, a handful of pictures are still pushing for late 2020 premieres. Not all hope is lost for a Christmas-time movie watching experience. Here are a few anticipated films that plan on coming out before the end of the year…
Wonder Woman: 1984
Patty Jenkins’ sequel to 2017’s “Wonder Woman” was originally slated for a June release, but got perpetually pushed back because of the virus. Now, it is holding onto a Christmas Day theatrical debut. Gal Gadot returns as the titular heroin alongside Chris Pine and Kristen Wiig in this ninth installment to the DC Extended Universe.
Above: Photo “Coming 2 America”
Coming 2 America
After returning to host “Saturday Night Live” and starring in Netflix’s “Dolemite Is My Name,” legendary comedian Eddie Murphy effectively reentered the zeitgeist in 2019. Therefore, hopes were high for his late sequel to the 1988 classic, “Coming To America.” Although made for the theaters, this 2020 film will now be available exclusively on Amazon Prime starting December 18th.
Mank
A film historian’s film if there ever was one, the David Fincher-directed “Mank” stars Gary Oldman as real-life screenwriter, Herman J. Mankiewicz. Shot in black-and-white, the biopic focuses on Mankiewicz’s alcoholism and tumultuous experience writing “Citizen Kane” during Hollywood’s Golden Age. This Oscar-bait movie has already started its limited theatrical run, but will find a home on Netflix come December 4th.
Pixar’s last theatrical release was terribly timed. The critically acclaimed, but commercially underwhelming “Onward” hit theaters the same weekend that the pandemic heated up in America and moviegoers were urged to stay at home. This next Disney-Pixar outing will thus go directly to streaming via Disney+. Available on Christmas Day, “Soul” is the first Pixar feature not to have a big-screen premiere.
Midnight Sky
Netflix went all in for this George Clooney-directed science fiction adaptation. It’s a story about a man (played by Clooney) living on post-apocalyptic Earth and communicating with astronauts as they make their way back to the shambled planet. The film will stream on December 23rd and in this unique case, 2020 might actually add some timely relevance to the plot.
Above: Official Trailer of Free Guy / 20th Century Fox
Free Guy
Riding on the coattails of “Deadpool” and “Detective Pikachu,” Disney’s “Free Guy” is the latest action-comedy to star Ryan Reynolds as a happy-go-lucky protagonist. With a plot involving virtual reality, the movie puts an ordinary guy in extraordinary circumstances for some hilarious thrills. Carried over from 20th Century Fox and not based on any pre-existing IP, “Free Guy” is a bit of a gamble. We’ll find out if it pays off on when it hits theaters on the eleventh.
Another prospective theatrical release for December, Sony’s “Monster Hunter” plans to premiere on the 30th. Based off of the popular video game series of the same title, “Monster Hunter” promises a hybrid of war, science fiction, and fantasy delights. Director Paul W.S. Anderson has missed the mark with his video game adaptations before, but we cannot deny that huge spectacles projected on the big screen are something we’ve been deprived of this year, and therefore deeply crave.
What does it take to expose the tactics of online hate mongers?
Talia Lavin, describes herself as a “schlubby, bisexual Jew living in Brooklyn” and as an unapologetic anti-racist. She has contributed her writing on right-wing activities to major publication outlets including The Washington Post, The New Yorker, New Republic and more. As a result, Lavin describes having been a frequent target for extremists. For her latest book, “Culture Warlords”, she created fictitious online characters and identity in order to infiltrate and better understand how and why this radical subculture (i.e. white nationalism) is started and expose it.
Click to see “Culture Warlords” and help independent bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
In an article for the Daily Beast, she told the reporter: “There is no economic class, education level, or geographical region that is not part of the organized racist movement,” and continued “These people are from every walk of life. There are a lot of reasons for anger, and the people I have reported on take natural feelings of loneliness and turn them on vulnerable and marginalized people. And that’s what makes me angrier. They are human people making human choices to do evil.”
Her success in being accepted into the community, and with key members, was based on using one of her created characters, a sexy, blond, alter ego to gain trust and pry honest statements from her targets. The shockingly racist and extreme admissions of hate and even criminal “dreams” they expressed seemed to more than make up for the unorthodox catfish-like charade she used to gain their trust.
Needless to say with her real identity now known, and her first hand descriptions in the book out in the public sphere, she has all the more reason to fear backlash or acts of revenge. Her courage in taking on this dangerous task, and then speaking and writing about it, is heroic, to say the least.
Her wish for readers to take away from her book is this is an important issue and something that can and should be fought for, as Americans, it is our responsibility to speak out. She ends her interview saying, “we need a lot more anti-fascists out there.”
To read more information about Talia Lavin’s book, please see publisher details below. Her book is available for purchase as of October 6, 2020. Click to see and help independent bookstores, also available on Amazon.
Culture Warlords: My Journey Into the Dark Web of White Supremacy
Culture Warlordsis the story of how Lavin, a frequent target of extremist trolls (including those at Fox News), dove into a byzantine online culture of hate and learned the intricacies of how white supremacy proliferates online. Within these pages, she reveals the extremists hiding in plain sight online: Incels. White nationalists. White supremacists. National Socialists. Proud Boys. Christian extremists.
In order to showcase them in their natural habitat, Talia assumes a range of identities, going undercover as a blonde Nazi babe, a forlorn incel, and a violent Aryan femme fatale. Along the way, she discovers a whites-only dating site geared toward racists looking for love, a disturbing extremist YouTube channel run by a fourteen-year-old girl with over 800,000 followers, the everyday heroes of the antifascist movement, and much more.
By combining compelling stories chock-full of catfishing and gate-crashing with her own in-depth, gut-wrenching research, she also turns the lens of anti-Semitism, racism, and white power back on itself in an attempt to dismantle and decimate the online hate movement from within. Shocking, humorous, and merciless in equal measure, Culture Warlordsexplores some of the vilest subcultures on the Web-and shows us how we can fight back.
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Melania Trump has been an unconventional and controversial first lady. Melania, 50, born in Slovenia is the first foreign-born FLOTUS in nearly 200 years, also the first for whom English was not her first language, and the first to be a president’s third wife.
Since her husband lost the election, social media, and Twitter in particular, has been abuzz with speculation and thoughts on her possible divorce and future, almost certainly, sans DJT. There were even tweets showing a moving van parked in Front of the White House with captions alluding to her wanting to leave the premises asap.
I’m taking this live shot of the White House, with a moving truck outside, as a good omen. pic.twitter.com/Uz4SuoU94N
With her stoic facial expressions and sometimes questionable fashion choices (the infamous “I Really Don’t Care Do U” jacket), the first lady has largely been out of view and is known for being aloof, preferring to avoid being in the public eye.
Click to See “Melania and Me” and help Lynxotic and Independent Bookstores. Also Available on Amazon.
Previously unknown personal information has recently been revealed about the soon to be ex-FLOTUS, with the September 2020 release of the tell-all book Melania and Me by Stephanie Winston Wolkoff. The former senior advisor to the first lady gave readers a first hand account of personal and quoted phone, email and text conversations between the two.
There was said to be audio recordings, dubbed Melania Tapes that the author kept to ensure she could back up all details in her book 100%. The book included salacious and juicy details about her relationship (often tumultuous) with Trump’s daughter, detailing the “Operation Block Ivanka” plan to keep cameras out of frame from Ivanka during the inauguration.
Wolkoff even alleges that the Trumps had separate bedrooms within the White House and was a “transactional marriage”. Another former White House official, Omarosa Manigault told Daily Mail “Melania is counting every minute until he is out of office and she can divorce,” she continued “If Melania were to try to pull the ultimate humiliation and leave while he’s in office, he would find a way to punish her.”
Moving on, while hubby stares down potential prosecutions?
With Joe Biden declared President-elect on Saturday, November 7th, Donald Trump, as he promised he would do, is not accepting that he lost the election and refuses to concede. He continues to toss-out allegations of “illegal votes” (even though there have been no indications or evidence of voter irregularities or fraud).
Trump has begun his attempt to fight his election loss through legal battles and more than likely will drag out any and all legal actions until he will be forced to leave the White House at the end of his term. A coup, though unlikely, is also being discussed in the media.
Soon, Melania will also have to start the process of vacating the White House and look to what her future will be after January 20th, 2021. Whether she continues alongside Donald Trump or not, the American People (at least 2/3 of them) are more than ready to say… Bye Bye!
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President-Elect Joe Biden and President Donald Trump disagreed on many points during their respective 2020 campaigns, but their most divisive opposition might have been on climate change. While Trump is an open climate denier who rolled back environmental regulations and posed no plan to combat the issue, Joe Biden vows to make it a central focus of his presidency.
Biden ambitiously promises to work towards 100% clean electricity in America by 2035. He also aims for carbon neutrality by 2050, which will keep global temperatures within 1.5 degrees Celsius of pre-Industrial averages.
Further, he has vowed to reenter the Paris Climate Accords, likely immediately following his inauguration. Getting back into Paris will rekindle America’s clean energy aspirations on the international scale, reopening conversations with other carbon emitting powerhouses like China and the European Union as we strive for a healthier planet.
First thing I will do as president is rejoin the Paris Climate Accord and rally the world to push our progress further and faster. #LJ19pic.twitter.com/oo1jgDBk0M
On that same international note, Biden also plans to follow up on (and perhaps inflate) an Obama Administration pledge of $3 million to the Green Climate Fund— a U.N. project helping developing nations create clean energy infrastructure. The first billion was already paid while Obama was in office, but since Trump came to power in 2017, the U.S. has not contributed a single penny.
This demonstrates that many of Biden’s environmental plans are contingent upon political cooperation now and in the future. Surely, he can set the seeds for fifteen or thirty year plans, but in order for them to have longevity, he will need consensus with his colleagues and successors, many of whom reside across the aisle.
Restoring environmental safeguards Trump abolished is Job 1 but may prove an uphill battle
Click to see “Humans” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
Similar to the Obama Administration, Biden will have to work with and through a Republican Senate to pass environmental laws. While the President-Elect can enter international agreements and revoke many of Trump’s deregulation policies from a solely Executive standpoint, his overall plan involves creating green jobs, decreasing dependency on fossil fuels, and investing in sustainable clean energy. The whole lot will cost $1.7 trillion and need approval from Congress.
Luckily, for all of its turmoil, the 2020 election taught America that climate change is no longer a superfluous issue in the minds of voters. According to the Sierra Club, tangible heat waves linked to global warming may have swayed Arizona to go blue this year.
Meanwhile, even capitalistic institutions are seeing the economic viability in green energy, as several automakers have backed California’s push for electric vehicles. Independents, Republicans, and Democrats alike are all starting to notice the unavoidable scientific evidence. For politicians to remain relevant, they can no longer ignore or deny such a bipartisan topic.
Of course, this is an optimistic viewpoint. After all, it was just four years ago when America elected Donald Trump. Since then, he’s managed to retract over a hundred environmental regulations.
Evidently, Biden’s election does not mean that America immediately becomes a nation united in conservation efforts. However, it’s a clear step in the right direction. Unlike many other presidents before him, Biden has a plan for climate change, and his election suggests that prioritizing the environment will be a political priority for many campaigns to come.
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Almost exactly four years ago to the day, on November 8th, 2016, Trump shocked America and the world by defeating Hillary Clinton. There was already a sense of foreboding among many, based on having witnessed Trump’s behavior during the campaign and throughout his public life before entering the political arena as a candidate.
The full extent of the danger and menace he would come to embody and represent was something that unfolded, nonstop, during the years he clutched onto power like a rabid dog.
Click here to see “The Truths We Hold” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
Like traumatic witnesses to a heinous crime, many of us who have wished for the day he would be defeated are experiencing a mixture of relief, elation and post-traumatic-stress on the news that his (first) day of reckoning has finally arrived.
On the announcement that Joe Biden had won Pennsylvania and its 20 electoral votes, and would be the 46th President of the United States, jubilant celebrations broke out across the country.
Starting around noon on Saturday, November 7th, the various news outlets began to confirm that the threshold of 270 electoral votes required for victory had been surpassed by the Biden-Harris ticket.
Unbridled joy almost instantly swept across the land, at least among the nearly 75 million that voted blue, and likely among many of those some 70+ million that did not take the time, or were unable, to mark a ballot.
Unlike other political victory celebrations, this was not a “lesser of two evils” situation for any of those mentioned in the previous paragraph. Some of the internet memes, like the brilliant “America Endgame” video mash-up that mythologizes the election as an Avengers inspired clash between ultimate good and almost unspeakableevil.
The clip, for many, was an emotional and inspirational confirmation of what they had been feeling for fourteen-hundred and fifty-nine days as a dark shadow of racist ignorance and hate cast a shadow across our lives.
Looking ahead: days to reflect, heal and rebuild
Next we must all begin to take the sudden feelings of empowerment and democratic vindication and apply that energy toward reclaiming and rebuilding all that the would-be tyrant had spend 4 years undermining and trying to destroy.
No small task, no easy road, but, nevertheless, a chance to learn from this close encounter with a near-collapse of our system and what it has meant throughout the best moments of our history.
The damage wrought by the 1,459 days of terror-tweets, and more dangerously, the behind-the-scenes dismantling of the skeleton that holds our system upright, can finally begin to be reconstructed and reclaimed.
Symbolically, the ending of our participation in the Paris Climate Accords, which ended, literally, hours before Trump’s loss was announced, marks the end of an era of destruction, and the beginning of one pointing firmly toward a possible future of survival and repair. Biden has pledged to re-join the accords as his first act as President.
And now for the 70 million + souls that, who, out of a susceptibility to propaganda and the spell of a fascist cult of personality, voted for Trump, the avalanche of lies will go silent (other than from the sycophants that remain in positions of power). Next, the country and media can, hopefully, allow real facts and information (remember those?) to flow again and reclaim at least some minds where possible.
Sadly after more than 4 years of hard-line indoctrination, only individuals under a certain age or who were only partially damaged, will be receptive to any kind of a return to a more civil national discourse.
These are all thoughts for a later date, but for now a well deserved moment of relief and celebration, and thank our stars for the 75 million of us that rose up and made it possible for the chance of a better future to emerge.
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One of the most shocking elements we witnessed during the dawning hours of the post-Trump era is how quickly the media is pouncing on the opportunity to restore truth and sanity, pivoting to reporting and observing what lies ahead.
Click here to see “The Truths We Hold” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
How disorienting it is to see reporters and opinion pundits speaking openly about the Trump induced horrors of the recent past, while simultaneously looking ahead to what the possibilities are, now that the constant terror-tweeting and chaos mongering has finally come to an end.
Seeing Joe Biden speak, uninterrupted by a raving madman, attacking his son and spouting made-up accusations is also a shocking experience. Many are likely seeing this for the first time.
And no “gaffs”, no stuttering just an eloquent “normal” victory speech, with special attention paid to the need to rise above the chaos of his predecessor.
After 4 years of Trump, amid massive and very real global threats, the path toward healing is not a simple one
Problems? Of course, possibly bigger and more than ever before – extinction-level threats from the climate crisis (not a hoax) amid a world-wide raging pandemic (also not a hoax) and, oh yes, the precarious financial recovery, all of these and more are looming and will not be easily or quickly solved, even without the madman-in chief harping in the wings.
But the strange custom of expecting attack-tweets and vile statements and actions round-the-clock, like some kind of cannibalistic-ritual murder-sacrifice of the ideals and norms of decent behavior, are GONE.
Trump can tweet but nothing he can say will be of any importance. The yanking off the air that took place on November 6th, as Trump was speaking in a prearranged press conference, while he veered deeper and deeper into irrelevant lies and insanity will be seen by history as the final moment of any mandatory coverage by the media.
The End is Neigh, but 73 Days of Trump’s antics remain
We may still see a Nixonian-peace-sign-wave goodbye-in-disgrace moment sometime before January 20th, and Trump may prove to be his own soothsayer and prognosticator, and “leave the country” sneaking away on his private jet to a country with a non-extradition treaty (my bet is Russia). However, it is already time that we must all live without his madness, and without using him to blame for all that’s wrong with our world.
Click to see “A Promised Land” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
As the feeling of relief recedes, the work on the first draft of history regarding the Trump era will begin. And, thankfully, it is taking the form, in these first fragile and dawning hours, of an immediate purge of the madness and the lies, finally without endless pushback from the liar and his minions. The propaganda machine has lost its all pervasive influence, at least for now.
Indeed, it was Fox News that famously projected Arizona as a win for Biden before nearly any other news outlet – rendering the madman furious and beside himself, and that fact is a harbinger of the enormous and necessary shift away from the psychotic empire of hate, and toward something at least slightly less toxic.
All the sycophants and hangers-on must look for other ways to get on. All the horrible useless “aids” and “advisors” that were only window-dressing for the plundering and inept “management” of a his self-serving agendas will soon be gone.
“Lies on a Loop” will recede but the truth takes time
Click to see “Humans” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
The post-mortem and dismantling of this massive historical mistake will be continuing round the clock for a very long time.
But let it come and let it flow. Stand up and Stand fast – let the voices that had once been drowned out by the sick-twisted machine-gun barrage of lies ring out loud and clear.
This is not only a time for us to repudiate the errors and intentional misrepresentations but , once and for all, to banish all the dangerous nonsense to the dustbin of history.
Windmills do not cause cancer, they do not kill millions of birds. Oil and coal are not the elements that will save mankind. The coronavirus, the climate crisis and his impeachment were not, and are not, hoaxes. Nobody who opposed him was ever “a terrible person” for doing so.
In an interview on the evening of November 8th, 2016, a famous political pundit was asked “after the results of tonight’s election are known, where do you predict Trump will end up?”. Without hesitation, the pundit calmly and confidently answered: “In the dustbin of history, where he belongs, of course”.
In the end he was absolutely correct, it only took 1459 days longer than he predicted.
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Bannon calls for Dr. Fauci and FBI’s Wray to have “heads on a pike”
Steve Bannon, ex-White House advisor and former Breitbart executive chairman seems to have gotten himself into some more trouble. His Twitter account @WarRoomPandemic for his podcast show has been suspended for violating the rules against glorifying violence.
The video in question, has Bannon, along with his co-host Jack Maxey, discussing hypothetical scenarios they would recommend for Trump if he were re-elected for a a second term. Bannon can be heard saying he would fire FBI Director Christopher Wray and Director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Next, Bannon took the talk much further, by bringing up beheading the men, “I’d actually like to go back to the old times of Tudor England, I’d put the heads on pikes, right, I’d put them at the two corners of the White House as a warning to federal bureaucrats.”
Steve Bannon calls for Dr. Fauci and FBI Director Wray to be beheaded "as a warning to federal bureaucrats"@youtube prohibits "inciting others to commit violent acts against individuals"
In addition to Bannon’s Twitter account being suspended, one episode from “Steve Bannon’s War Room” has been removed by YouTube. Alex Joseph, a spokesperson for the platform, says “We’ve removed this video for violating our policy against inciting violence. We will continue to be vigilant as we enforce our policies in the post-election period.” Bannon’s channel received a strike due to the policy violation and will be restricted from uploading any new videos for at least a week. YouTube gives channel operators three strikes before an account becomes permanently terminated and they are banned from the platform for life.
Facebook is the latest platform to have removed the video, having left the video live for a total of 10 hours, while it racked up hundreds of thousands of views. It remains unreported at this time if any other platforms including iTunes, Soundcloud, Stitcher, Google Play or Spotify, which also stream the podcast, have taken any action in the removal of the episode(s).
Bannon’s official website for his podcast “War Room: Pandemic”, up until November 5th, was powered by Mailchimp. The company took to Twitter to also confirm that the account has been closed and will no longer serve to host the War Room’s newsletter.
Back in August, Bannon was arrested and charged with fraud, he is currently out on bail as he awaits his trial which is set to take place around May 2021. Bannon did not take any precautions to self-sensor during his podcast, as one might think he would, given that he is currently on bail for federal charges. The latest podcast rant could easily be interpreted by the courts as threatening a federal official, which, if seen as such, could be grounds for revoking his bond and potentially result in his arrest on further charges.
Even actresses and comedian, Kathy Griffin weighed-in on Bannon’s violent ramblings. Griffin, back in 2017 shared the now infamous photo of herself carrying a decapitated head that resembled Trump. She received significant backlash for years after she posted the controversial image, which resulted in many lost career opportunities, along with receiving nasty messages and even death threats.
Well, well, well. Steve Bannon says regarding Dr Anthony Fauci and FBI Director Christopher Wray “I’d put the heads on pikes” https://t.co/hJrvZT2BPd
Made in secrecy during the past 6 months with interviews from administration insiders
The election is exactly three days away. The United States, in the past week, has recorded 500,000 new covid cases, which is the worst week ever. Therefore, this would seem the perfect time to watch, for free, the documentary “Totally Under Control”, which details the failures of Trump and his administration to handle the crisis.
Currently streaming on Hulu, for those that have a subscription, it is also available in case you don’t have a Hulu subscription, for free until November 3rd. Click here to watch for free.
Just when it seemed like 2020 could not get any stranger, President Donald Trump announced via Twitter on October 2nd that he and First Lady Melania Trump tested positive for COVID-19. In what some would see as a ‘karmic’ coincidence, within twenty-four hours of this breaking news, Neon media dropped a trailer for the new documentary “Totally Under Control,” which focuses on the President and his administration’s unsuccessful response to the coronavirus.
“Totally Under Control” is the second Trump-focused project from documentarian Alex Gibney. Earlier this year, the director released “Agents Of Chaos,” an HBO mini-series centered on Russian involvement in the 2016 election. Gibney is also responsible for the 2010 Oscar nominated doc, “Client 9: The Rise And Fall Of Eliot Spitzer” and the 2007 Oscar winner, “Taxi To The Dark Side.” Most of his films take on timely topics through an investigative lens. “Totally Under Control” will be no different.
Unsurprisingly, Gibney latest movie condemns the Trump administration, as it chronicles how the President handled the coronavirus across the first half of 2020. Its synopsis states:
“On January 20th, 2020 the US and South Korea both discovered their first cases of COVID-19. However, nine months later, the novel Coronavirus has claimed the lives of over 200,000 Americans and caused staggering economic damage, while in South Korea, there were no significant lockdowns and, in an urbanized population of 51 million, only 344 lives have been lost. Where did we go wrong?”
The film aims to answer this question and shed light on America’s complicated, corrupted, and fruitless reaction to the global pandemic. To do this, Gibney uses news footage from the past ten months— much of it showing Trump’s early, woefully dismissive thoughts on the coronavirus before it hit the United States.
He also interviews experts from doctors, to scientists, to government officials, all of whom agree that the current administration’s reaction to COVID was absolutely abhorrent from the start.
The trailer plays out like that of a disaster movie, beginning with former Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority leader, Rick Bright explaining, “The scientists knew what to do for the pandemic response. The plan was in front of us, but leadership would not do it.” Bright goes on to recall how he tired bringing this vital information to the public, but was consequentially fired from his federal position.
As the trailer unfolds, the music gets more and more intense. The interviewees retell the all-too-familiar 2020 story of how COVID got worse by the day and the United States government did nothing to combat it. Meanwhile, quasi-apocalyptic images of ubiquitous ambulances, omnipresent sirens, medial personnel in hazmat suits, restless political rallies, and so on flash across the screen.
All the while, Trump’s voice comes in and out with infamous phrases such as “It will disappear,” “It will be wonderful,” and most egregiously, “I don’t take responsibility at all.”
Art imitates life as covid disbeliever enters hospital after contracting virus that affects ‘almost nobody’
Today, these statements are more ironic than ever before, as Trump himself has been checked into the Walter Reed Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland for COVID. The diagnosis occurred just two days after the first presidential debate, where Trump continued to downplay the coronavirus in favor of reopening the country.
“Totally Under Control” will be available On-Demand starting October 13th and will stream on Hulu starting October 20th. Although the film focuses on current (and ongoing) events, it is not the first piece of media to tackle the coronavirus, and it surely won’t be the last.
official trailer – “Totally under control” / youtube
Disinformation, Kooks and Dangerous lack of common sense
Conspiracy theories have been around as long as so called civilization, although they are not an artifact that exposes the best of our species. Some theories turned out to be real – such as the Watergate Conspiracy that was simply covered up, and those examples are what make it so hard, particularly for the average person, to differentiate between the “wacko” and the plausible.
Misinformation, disinformation and propaganda are having a virtual renaissance under the name “fake news” a moniker embraced by the most fake and most blatant propagandists. You can almost hear them chanting “I know you are but what am I” like some deranged schoolyard manic. Qanon, Cults and simple ignorant lack of recognizing simple lies, such as the “Michigan Man of the Year” award Trump has repeatedly claimed to have won (there is no such award) are seemingly everywhere.
The serious study of propaganda, particularly in Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia is a great place to start to unravel the mess that seems to swirl all around us. Many of these, mostly simple, techniques are being reused with a digital amplifier and algorithmic acceleration.
An Evergreen Concern, the Future is Remains Fertile Ground for even more Outrageous Theories
Regardless how 2020 and the US elections turn out, becoming familiar with the “dark arts” of how to initiate, propagate and benefit from “fake news” will be highly useful going forward.
To that end, we’ve assembled some suggestions for reading and reflection on the subject. Perhaps understanding the telltale signs of misinformation can be useful even if you are not considering a career as a CIA operative or anti-propaganda czar. Or maybe the past examples of extreme theories, and how they caught the imagination of so many, can serve as entertainment for any who are fascinated by the possibility of a trip down the rabbit hole.
Understanding Nazi Ideology: The Genesis and Impact of a Political Faith
Nazism was deeply rooted in German culture. From the fertile soil of German Romanticism sprang ideas of great significance for the genesis of the Third Reich ideology–notions of the individual as a mere part of the national collective, and of life as a ceaseless struggle between opposing forces. This book traces the origins of the “political religion” of Nazism.
Ultra-nationalism and totalitarianism, racial theory and anti-Semitism, nature mysticism and occultism, eugenics and social Darwinism, adoration of the Fuhrer and glorification of violence–all are explored. The book also depicts the dramatic development of the Nazi movement–and the explosive impact of its political faith, racing from its bloody birth in the trenches of World War I to its cataclysmic climax in the Holocaust and World War II. Click here to see “Understanding Nazi Ideology” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
Hidden History: An Exposé of Modern Crimes, Conspiracies, and Cover-Ups in American Politics
Click here to see “Hidden History“ and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
Starting with the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Don Jeffries chronicles a wide variety of issues that have plagued our country’s history. Whether it is the assassinations of MLK and RFK, Iran-Contra, the Oklahoma City bombing, TWA Flight 800, voting fraud, or 9/11, every major disaster or war that we’ve witnessed has somehow been distorted by those who are supposed to be protecting us.
Jeffries also delves into extensive research on the death of John F. Kennedy, Jr. – and what he finds will shock you. So whether you’ve only heard bits and pieces of these stories or you’ve read several books on the topics, Hidden History is the book that belongs in every conspiracy theorist’s library, as the information included here has never been collected together in any other published work available. So sit down, strap in, and get ready to be shocked and awed by how much has been hidden by our government over the past fifty years. Updated, this version features a new introduction by political insider Roger Stone. Click here to see “Hidden History” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
Conspiracy in the Streets: The Extraordinary Trial of the Chicago Eight
Reprinted to coincide with the release of the new Aaron Sorkin film, this book provides the political background of this infamous trial, narrating the utter craziness of the courtroom and revealing both the humorous antics and the serious politics involved.An afterword by the late Tom Hayden examines the trial’s ongoing relevance, and drawings by Jules Feiffer help recreate the electrifying atmosphere of the courtroom.
Opening at the end of 1969–a politically charged year at the beginning of Nixon’s presidency and at the height of the anti-war movement–the Trial of the Chicago Seven (which started out as the Chicago Eight) brought together Yippies, antiwar activists, and Black Panthers to face conspiracy charges following massive protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, protests which continue to have remarkable contemporary resonance. Click here to see “Conspiracy in the Streets” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents
Click here to see “Caste” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
In this brilliant book, Isabel Wilkerson gives us a masterful portrait of an unseen phenomenon in America as she explores, through an immersive, deeply researched narrative and stories about real people, how America today and throughout its history has been shaped by a hidden caste system, a rigid hierarchy of human rankings.
Beyond race, class, or other factors, there is a powerful caste system that influences people’s lives and behavior and the nation’s fate. Linking the caste systems of America, India, and Nazi Germany, Wilkerson explores eight pillars that underlie caste systems across civilizations, including divine will, bloodlines, stigma, and more. Using riveting stories about people–including Martin Luther King, Jr., baseball’s Satchel Paige, a single father and his toddler son, Wilkerson herself, and many others–she shows the ways that the insidious undertow of caste is experienced every day. Click here to see “Caste” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
Chaos: Charles Manson, the Cia, and the Secret History of the Sixties
Click here to see “Chaos” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
Over two grim nights in Los Angeles, the young followers of Charles Manson murdered seven people, including the actress Sharon Tate, then eight months pregnant. With no mercy and seemingly no motive, the Manson Family followed their leader’s every order — their crimes lit a flame of paranoia across the nation, spelling the end of the sixties.
Manson became one of history’s most infamous criminals, his name forever attached to an era when charlatans mixed with prodigies, free love was as possible as brainwashing, and utopia — or dystopia — was just an acid trip away. Twenty years ago, when journalist Tom O’Neill was reporting a magazine piece about the murders, he worried there was nothing new to say. Then he unearthed shocking evidence of a cover-up behind the “official” story, including police carelessness, legal misconduct, and potential surveillance by intelligence agents. Click here to see “Chaos” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
1984
Click here to see “1984” and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
1984 has come and gone, but George Orwell’s prophetic, nightmare vision in 1949 of the world we were becoming is timelier than ever.
“1984” is still the great modern classic “negative Utopia” – a startling original and haunting novel that creates an imaginary world that is completely convincing from the first sentence to the last four words.
No one can deny this novel’s power, its hold on the imagination of whole generations, or the power of its admonitions – a power that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time.Click here to see “1984“ and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
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Longtime former Trump aide pens tell-all about his repugnant behavior
In 1980, Barbara Res became the first woman to spearhead a major construction project in New York City. The project was Trump Tower, and thus began a tumultuous partnership with Donald Trump, a professional relationship that Res relentlessly unfolds in her new book, “Tower Of Lies.”
For two decades, Res worked as an executive for Trump’s real estate company. In that time, she had nearly unparalleled access to the man’s business practices and (un)professional conduct. While working on Trump Tower—perhaps the President’s most famous endeavor before entering politics—she quickly learned who he really was.
Click here to see ” Tower of Lies“ and help Independent Bookstores. Also available on Amazon.
As the book makes clear, the President has always presented himself as an image of luxury, class, and business prowess. However, this image persistently strays far from his true nature.
Res explains, “He was able to control others, through lies and exaggeration, with promises of money or jobs, through threats of lawsuits or exposure. He surrounded himself with yes-men, blamed others for his own failures, never took responsibility, and always stole credit.”
Perhaps most distressingly, Res recounts instances where the President demonstrated unambiguous racism and misogyny. Reportedly, Trump did not want black people working on his Tower and even resisted letting them inside upon completion. He similarly made disparaging comments against his Jewish employees and constantly objectified the women around him.
Although hiring Res to oversee Trump Tower may have seemed like a progressive feminist action at first glance, the author shares how Trump constantly belittled his female employees by obsessing over their bodies and stressing the importance of looks.
The long list of Character Defining “bad acts” is virtually endless
Unsurprisingly, then, Res also exposes how Trump preferred to distance himself from the “common man”— the very constituents that he now claims to stand for in Washington. Apparently, he surrounds himself with powerful people to boost his ego, viewing average workers as inferior and those who disagree with him as blasphemous. Res further writes that Trump’s “regard for himself had increased exponentially” as he gained more power, and today, “these tactics are still at work, just deployed at the highest levels of the U.S. government, with all the corruption and chaos that necessarily ensue.”
Res is far from the first Trump insider to come out against the President. Just this year, Michael Cohen, John Bolton, Bob Woodward, and even the President’s niece Mary Trump, have all revealed hidden details about the POTUS’s seedy past. Most recently, even White House Biomedical Research and Development leader Rick Bright exposed the President’s shortcomings in handling the COVID-19 pandemic in the documentary “Totally Under Control.”
Naturally, the Trump administration has renounced all these claims against the president, playing the victim and calling the facts erroneous. Res’ new book will surely meet no different of a fate. In previous instances where Res has spoken out against Trump—such as when she endorsed Hillary Clinton in 2016—the President has lashed out against her, claiming that she should be grateful for the opportunities he gave her so long ago.
Of course, Trump Tower did indeed do a lot for Res’ career. Nevertheless, that same project also made her realize that the man in the White House is a con artist who continues living in his own one-track, uninformed, egotistical world. The only difference is that he now holds more power than ever before.
The electronic version of “Tower of Lies” goes on sale starting October 20th, just two weeks before Election Day, with the hardcover edition available November 30, 2020.
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Apple will revive and improve the past with non-stop music
In the 1980s and 90s, MTV and VH1 dominated television sets, bringing the novel concept of music videos to new heights. Today, those channels have gone in different directions, shifting their attentions towards reality television to near-humorous degrees. Meanwhile, like many forms of entertainment in the twenty-first century, music videos have been siphoned off to the Internet, finding homes on YouTube, Vevo, and Facebook.
Now Apple is trying to get in on and rekindle the music video action with a new project that feels both retro and advanced all at the same time.
Apple Music TV launched in the United States on October 19th, offering a twenty-four hour live stream of music videos and other music related content such as interviews, concert footage, and more. This is far from Apple’s first leap into the music industry, as it launched Apple Music and Apple Music 1 (formerly Beats 1) in 2015— not to mention that the tech company was once synonymous with iTunes and the iPod. However, Apple Music TV is the company’s first deep dive into music videos.
Introducing Apple Music TV: a free 24-hour curated livestream of videos including exclusive music video premieres, live shows and events plus more.
In many ways, Apple Music TV emulates old school outlets like MTV and VH1, as it streams content constantly like a visual radio station. Unlike its ancestral predecessors, though, it does not have advertisements (for now) and its accessibility is not tethered to a cable subscription. Instead, users access Apple Music TV through the AppleTV app, which already comes with most smart TVs.
Given the declining popularity of music videos over the past few decades, one must question whether or not Apple Music TV is a worthwhile investment for the company. Apple has recently put a lot of its eggs into the streaming basket, launching Apple TV+ in 2019 and emphasizing its new status as an entertainment conglomerate with the AppleOne bundle. The company has also gotten experimental on the streaming front with innovations like the Apple Fitness+ exercise app.
Exclusive video premieres, music documentaries and much more in store for Apple Music
In today’s age, a music video-focused channel is yet another daring outing for Apple. As aforementioned, though, Apple has some deep roots in music, and therefore goes into this world with a bit of preexisting infrastructure.
For example, Apple Music produces its own music, which Apple Music TV can help promote. The same concept applies to Apple’s radio stations like Apple Music 1, Apple Music Country, and Apple Music Hits. They can all work in tandem to raise Apple’s bar across all musical platforms.
Furthermore, although music television has been around for decades, the industry is ongoing. Apple Music TV aims to find new ways to celebrate and cover it. On Fridays, for example, the channel will focus on new releases, airing never-before-seen videos. This week, it will debut the music videos for Joji’s “777” and Saint Jhn’s “Gorgeous.”
Likewise, on Thursday, the channel will narrow in on Bruce Springsteen, playing videos both old and new, plus interviews and fan events, to promote The Boss’ new album “Letters To You.” These are the kind of special events that the channel will celebrate and distinguish itself through.
Such is the win-win nature of Apple Music TV— for every piece of new content, there is a backlog of old material; and for everything that is outmoded, there is always something cutting edge on the horizon. Evidently, even in today’s age, there is more than enough material to keep a music-streaming channel fresh and relevant.
Luckily, Apple also has enough name brand recognition to televise events and promote content for some highly influential artists. This reputation for quality and appeal might be Apple Music TV’s greatest tool in trying to resurrect a bygone kind of television.
A potent commentary on the Presidency — and our country
After a CNN documentary aired last Friday – centered on the official White House photographer during the Obama Presidency, Pete Souza; a funny thing happened on the bestseller charts.
Pete Souza’s #1 NYT bestselling coffee table book of photographs shot during his time in the White House, “Obama: An Intimate Portrait”, re-entered the charts at #3 and was followed by, not one but 2 other books at #1 and #22 respectively: the Hardcover (#1) and Paperback (#22) editions of “Shade”.
“Shade“, unlike “Obama: An Intimate Portrait” is a chronicle, not merely of the Obama years of yore, but a diary of sorts detailing the unfolding disgrace of the Trump years we’ve all endured since.
Having spent so many intimate moments with the Obamas, indeed years of close interaction and friendship, he is in a unique position to contrast the differences, not only of the personalities but also of the actions and acts of these two historical figures, and the vast differences between the two.
The virtually immediate and resounding success of the more recent, and more outspoken, tomes is a testament to how many of us share his frustration and outrage at what was, hopefully only temporarily, lost when Obama handed over the “keys” to the White House to its current resident. For a short time longer, perhaps?
Click here to See “Shade“ in Paperback and Hardcover versions and help Independent Bookstores. Also Available on Amazon.
From Pete Souza, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Obama: An Intimate Portrait.
As Chief Official White House Photographer, Pete Souza spent more time alongside President Barack Obama than almost anyone else. His years photographing the President gave him an intimate behind-the-scenes view of the unique gravity of the Office of the Presidency — and the tremendous responsibility that comes with it.
Now, as a concerned citizen observing the Trump administration, he is standing up and speaking out. Shade is a portrait in Presidential contrasts, telling the tale of the Obama and Trump administrations through a series of visual juxtapositions. Here, more than one hundred of Souza’s unforgettable images of President Obama deliver new power and meaning when framed by the tweets, news headlines, and quotes that defined the first 500 days of the Trump White House.
What began with Souza’s Instagram posts soon after President Trump’s inauguration in January 2017 has become a potent commentary on the state of the Presidency, and our country. Some call this “throwing shade.” Souza calls it telling the truth.
In Shade, Souza’s photographs are more than a rejoinder to the chaos, abuses of power, and destructive policies that now define our nation’s highest office. They are a reminder of a President we could believe in, and a courageous defense of American values.
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