"When you walk in by yourself, the look on the host or hostess’s face changes. It is sometimes a look of panic..."

"... like ‘What are we going to do with this person?’ Or sometimes it is a look of sympathy. I am just so tired of being treated like a second-class citizen."

Said Rajika Shah, "a lawyer in Los Angeles," who "is often led to the worst table in the dining room, neglected by her server, and then rushed out at the end of the meal," quoted in "Why Is Dining Alone So Difficult? With solo reservations on the rise but many restaurants still restricting tables to two or more, solitary Americans often feel left out or stigmatized" (NYT).

The assumption that people need to be coupled or grouped goes beyond restaurants, said Bella DePaulo... author of the 2023 book “Single at Heart: The Power, Freedom and Heart-Filling Joy of Single Life.”... Dr. DePaulo also pointed to a recent, highly circulated article in The Atlantic, “The Anti-Social Century,” which links practices like solo dining to reclusion and loneliness....

“People who are lonely are going to stay home,” she said. “They are not going to go out to a restaurant. People who go out on their own are confident.... We are a nation that really romanticizes romantic coupling and marriage, .and stigmatizing people who are single or do things alone is part of that”....

Here's a picture of me 17 years ago with my fisheye-exaggerated hand on a Bella DePaulo book, "Singled Out":

Obviously, I'm not alone. I've got Obama! I mean, I've got my tablemate, my photographer, and he was audaciously hoping, while I was preparing to do a Bloggingheads with Bella. And that Bloggingheads turned out to be momentous. It played a role in connecting me to Meade, as I described a bit later in a post called "Flashback '08: The Audacity Althousity of Hope."

So I'm always happy to see Bella DePaulo's name come up in an article, even though the important matter of living well while single isn't my personal concern anymore. I still care about it! And you don't have to be single to find yourself in situations where you need to or would like to eat alone in a restaurant and you waste part of your mind on the possibly disapproving expression on a restaurant employee's face and the way the other diners might be thinking, oh, that poor woman, no one loves her.

At least Obama loves us!

"Is the Democrat message pure Jacobin hatred for anything pro-American and anything that could be considered pro-President Donald Trump?"

"They’re feral creatures now, lonely, isolated, frightened without leadership, desperate for relevance, without any cogent message, terrified at what’s to become of them."

Writes John Kass, at his own website, in "Democrats Locked in Their Own Hell."

I'm also seeing "Why Democrats Are Losing My Generation/Hint: It’s not because they didn’t go on Joe Rogan" by Joshua A. Cohen (at The Nation): "[P]ut yourself in the perspective of a voter my age; e.g., someone born in the early 2000s. When we grew up, the Democratic Party was defined by a charismatic leader who oversaw a growing economy and ended his term with strong approval ratings. When we came of age, we came to know a Republican Party defined by an unpopular, flailing Trump whose weak leadership defined the most traumatic period of our lives (the pandemic). We had never known a popular Republican president or an unpopular Democratic one. But when Biden’s administration burst into flames...."

And here's Victor Davis Hanson, in "Trump’s Democratic 'Allies'/Democrats’ obsessive Trump hatred blinds them to their own unpopularity, making his counter-revolution seem inevitable—and even normal" (American Greatness):

"A decade ago, cultural norms in elite American institutions took a sharply illiberal turn."

"Professors would get disciplined, journalists fired, ordinary people harassed by social-media mobs, over some decontextualized phrase or weaponized misunderstanding.... But... it isn’t happening any more.... The era lasted almost exactly 10 years.... The political precondition was the giddy atmosphere that followed Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection, which appeared... to reveal a rising cohort of young, socially liberal nonwhite voters whose influence would continue to grow indefinitely. The rapid progression of causes like gay marriage seemed to confirm a one-way ratchet of egalitarian social norms....

Writes Jonathan Chait, in "How Liberal America Came to Its Senses/The period of left-wing illiberalism that began about a decade ago seems to have drawn to a close. The final cause of death was the reelection of Donald Trump" (The Alantic).

I'm not agreeing with the tale Chait tells. In fact, I find some of it hilarious. I'm presenting it for critical discussion. So let's continue. How did America "come to its senses"? Chait writes:

"A campaign has been constructed around a mood, rather than the other way around. The mood is Obamacore..."

"... the outburst of brightness and positivity that took over pop culture upon the election of our first Black president in 2008, and that continued until the wheels fell off eight years later. This was the age of Glee, Taylor Swift’s 1989, and Hamilton, seemingly disparate art born out of the same impulse: the feeling of a new dawn, a generational shift, a national redemption.... ... Obamacore positioned itself as sensitive, non-threatening, and relatable. It was Aziz Ansari writing a book on modern dating alongside a Berkeley-trained sociologist, porn star James Deen talking about bacon, Louis C.K. playing a cop on Parks and Recreation.... The fandom that had sprung up around Obama’s presidential campaign expanded to embrace New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and later, Hillary Clinton. For a moment, bodies as hidebound as the Supreme Court and the papacy looked as if they might be rehabbed into vehicles for social justice.... This summer’s sudden reappearance of hope and positivity has spurred split reactions. Do you embrace your inner cringe, or try to tamp it down?... The optimistic case is that, against all odds, we seem to have heeded the lessons of Obamacore. Generation Z is willingly climbing the coconut tree."

Writes Nate Jones, in "That Feeling You Recognize? Obamacore. The 2008 election sparked a surge of positivity across pop culture. Now hindsight (and cringe) is setting in" (NY Magazine).

See also "100 Pieces of Pop Culture That Defined Obamacore/You know them when you see them — whether they were genius or, well, not," by Nate Jones (in NY Magazine). Just to select one:

"Adopting joy as a political shield has also allowed Ms. Harris and Mr. Walz to throw some bare-knuckled punches at Mr. Trump and his running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio."

"Ms. Harris, a former prosecutor, has targeted Mr. Trump for his many legal problems — 'I know Donald Trump’s type,' she now likes to say, to uproarious applause and chants of 'Lock him up' that she only recently began to discourage. Mr. Walz has castigated Mr. Trump for 'servicing himself' instead of helping others, and made an off-color reference to a debunked rumor about Mr. Vance and furniture. Both Democrats do it with a smile, and the crowd eats it up.... Of course, Ms. Harris’s joyful-warrior approach has so far not been substantive from a policy perspective...."

Writes Katie Rogers in "Harris Used to Worry About Laughing. Now Joy Is Fueling Her Campaign. Democrats are smiling again, and so is a vice president who once weighed the political risks of cheerfulness. The high spirits are also providing air cover for scathing attacks on Republicans" (NYT).

But maybe get-happy is policy enough: "In 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt adopted the song 'Happy Days Are Here Again' to offer a promise of a bright future to Americans stricken by the Great Depression.... In a time of war and economic recession, Barack Obama’s likeness was plastered on a poster [with] the message... 'Hope.'"

"People are saying it feels like we’re sleepwalking off a cliff... The left is kind of despairing and divided and exhausted...."

"When you talk to people outside of politics — maybe you’ve had this experience too — they say, oh, I’m just pretending it’s not happening. I have to block it out for my own mental health.... This is a long, long time that we’re going to be living with this both extreme low energy but extremely existential fight.... A year ago, most Republicans wanted to move on.... And so what happened in between then and now? I mean, part of it, obviously, is the indictments and — I don’t know that it was preordained that he would come out of that with most Republican voters believing that he was a martyr.... There’s people who say, well, I did fine during the Trump years... but... people just forget how scary it often was to have someone so out of control in charge.... He has changed the culture. He has shifted our conception of what’s normal in a way that we might never get back the kind of innocence that many of us enjoyed in 2015 and 2016.... [I]magine what it will be like to see Donald Trump inaugurated again.... I strongly suspect that people won’t be able to say this isn’t who we are. It will manifestly be who we are. And I think people will just turn inward and try to shut it out...."

From "Michelle Goldberg Imagines a Second Trump Inauguration/Sounding the alarm on 'the utter bleakness'" (NYT)(transcript of this audio).

1. "Imagine what it will be like," not would be like — Goldberg is already resigned to Trump's return to the presidency. 

2. "The kind of innocence" — what kind of innocence was that?

When Obama won the Iowa caucuses in 2008 — "It felt then as if we were embracing modernity and inclusion, moving away from the image of John Wayne’s America."

"How could we have gone from such a hopeful moment to such a discordant one? Of course, every time there’s a movement, there’s a countermovement, where people feel that their place in the world is threatened.... Trump has played on that resentment.... Trump is a master at exploiting voters’ fears. I’m puzzled about why his devoted fans don’t mind his mean streak. He can gleefully, cruelly, brazenly make fun of disabilities in a way that had never been done in politics — President Biden’s stutter, John McCain’s injuries from being tortured, a Times reporter’s disability — and loyal Trump fans laugh. He calls Haley 'Birdbrain.'... Obama’s triumph in Iowa was about having faith in humanity. If Trump wins here, it will be about tearing down faith in humanity...."

Writes Maureen Dowd in her column this week, "Here Comes Trump, the Abominable Snowman" (NYT).

To repeat the question: "How could we have gone from such a hopeful moment to such a discordant one?" Does Dowd really believe it's all Trump's fault? Couldn't Obama himself have used his presidency more effectively and built American optimism? He promised hope, but why didn't he deliver more of it? Why did we end the Obama years with so much division and strife? Dowd puts no responsibility on Obama. It's all about the reactionaries — the countermovement that automatically follows any movement. It happens "every time." Dowd chooses to portray the American people as a machine, behaving mechanically — and perversely. And yet somehow it is Trump who is devoted to "tearing down faith in humanity." 

"If Biden and Trump are the eventual nominees in 2024, Trump is slightly favored with 47%, while Biden is at 46%."

According to a new Emerson poll.

Among Republican voters, a majority (67%) said that they would vote for former President Donald Trump in a hypothetical Republican primary with 7 other candidates. When Trump was listed as a potential candidate, Governor Ron DeSantis was the only other candidate who got double digit support at 10%....

And look at how people assign responsibility for the war in Afghanistan:

I wish they'd asked, "Not counting President George W. Bush, which President holds the most responsibility for the war in Afghanistan?" I think if that were the question, Trump might have gotten as much as Obama or Biden or even as much as Obama and Biden added together, because the Democrats would go for Trump. What surprises me most is that Obama got so many votes. I'd been thinking that he bears so much responsibility for continuing the war after the death of Osama bin Laden, but that he'd been flying under the radar, by not making a big move to end the war, and because Americans — many but not all Americans — seem inclined to protect him from criticism and remember him in a golden glow of patronizing nostalgia.

"Although golf — the game of choice of most presidents, especially Donald Trump — is obviously the great signifier of wealthy indolence, tennis is not far behind."

"Until comparatively recently, and sometimes still today, it has been among the whitest of sports, a game of country clubs with restrictive admissions policies. And, weirdly enough, this is not the first time it has caused a presidential public-relations headache. In 1978, James Fallows — then a White House aide, now a longtime Atlantic contributor — described Jimmy Carter’s poor management skills with an anecdote about the president’s signing off on every appointment booked at the White House tennis court. (Carter denied it on-camera, but there’s a paper trail.) It became a memorable encapsulation of Carter’s flawed presidency: focused on trivia while the big sweeping visions and crises over the Middle East and the economy went unaddressed."

From "Here’s the New White House Tennis Court No One Has Been Waiting For" (New York Magazine). 

For more trashing of the tennis court — really, it's a new building, a pavilion replacing a shed — here's "Melania Trump faces backlash after revealing new White House tennis pavilion/First lady’s announcement sparked a slew of Twitter responses including a terse ‘282,345’ from Washington DC journalist David Corn." 

I see the pavilion was privately funded, but there's a pandemic, so it's supposed to be an outrage. That is, there's a pandemic, and Trump is President. If the pavilion went up during the Biden presidency, the stories would be about Joe's impressive physical fitness that inspires us all to keep in shape, which is so especially important in Covid times. And if Obama were President, the pavilion would inspire people of all colors to take up the ancient sport, heretofore associated with white people. But it's Trump, so it's reprehensible — unempathetic and... racist, because who can think of any black tennis players? 

How ancient is tennis anyway? There was something like tennis in the 12th century and the use of a racket and playing within lines evolves by the 15th century.

"Publishers Fret Over Obama’s ‘Failure to Perform’/Michelle finished her book. Why is Obama having trouble living up to his part of their lucrative contract?"

Headline at American Spectator.

Contracts that come with a reported $65 million advance, such as the one signed by Barack and Michelle Obama in February 2017 with Penguin Random House (PRH), will inevitably include [a "failure to perform" clause].... At the time the Obama deal was made in early 2017, insiders were telling Publishers Weekly that books by both Michelle and Barack would be released in fall 2018. Michelle’s book, Becoming, was released by PRH’s Crown division on schedule in November 2018 and has exceeded expectations. Barack’s book will be released at least two years behind schedule with no publication date in sight....

Time for everyone to feel nice and warm!

Happy Valentine’s Day, my loves. You make even the coldest days feel warm. 💕 pic.twitter.com/COOIOCgVdh

— Michelle Obama (@MichelleObama) February 14, 2020

"Through Mr. Obama, I have been hipped to the Congolese singer Jupiter Bokondji... His prose, always electric, assumes an extra whiff of fire when applied to music."

"'American history wells up when Aretha sings,' Mr. Obama wrote to The New Yorker in response to an email query about the artist in 2016.... 'That’s why, when she sits down at a piano and sings ‘A Natural Woman,’ she can move me to tears,' he said... United States presidents tend not to be celebrated for their groovy record collections. The current officeholder’s favorite Beach Boy is most likely Mike Love, which alone should qualify him for yet another impeachable offense. If this is a bewildering time to be an American, so, too, is it a disconcerting time to be a fan of rock and pop, among the country’s maddest and most characteristic concoctions. Barack Obama, music critic, has become an unlikely balm, his beautifully detailed lists acting as strange flickers of continuity and survival."

From "In Praise of Barack Obama, Music Critic/The former president’s annual year-end playlist never fails to delight" by Jim Ruttenberg in the NYT.

"Balm" is aromatic ointment. Is it strange to say that a person is balm? Perhaps it's wrong, more wrong than calling him a nonhuman animal. He's a gooey substance, to be spread on the skin, for comfort. So weird! But "balm" has long been used figuratively. It can be anything softly soothing. No one, even his fans, would call Donald Trump "balm."

Did you know that in Jamaica, "balm" is "A faith-healing ceremony typically involving drumming, dancing, and ritual feasting; a herbal bath or other treatment administered during this" (OED)? There is a sense that Obama had healing powers, and yet where was all the healing? Why did Obama lead to Trump? It's a strange mystery!

The link on "is most likely Mike Love" goes to "Mike Love to Trump: ‘You Tried Your Best to Help Whitney Houston’/You’ve always been a big supporter of some of the best music that America has ever made,' Beach Boys singer told president" (Rolling Stone, October 2018). Love was at the White House for Trump's signing of the Music Modernization Act, which aimed to protect the rights of artists in digital media.

I love the idea that loving Love is "another impeachable offense." It underscores Trump's characterization of impeachment as "Impeachment Lite." Everybody's doing it, defining impeachment downward. It seems peachier than ever. And now, we're adding Love.

I note that Ruttenberg did not say Trump's favorite musical act is The Beach Boys. He only said that Trump's favorite Beach Boy is probably Mike Love. If you pay attention at all to Trump's rallies, you would conclude that Trump's favorite music act is The Rolling Stones. Not only does he always end with "You Can't Always Get What You Want,"* the pre-speech song list of perhaps 22 songs may have 3 Rolling Stones songs — "Time Is on My Side," "Let’s Spend the Night Together," and "Sympathy for the Devil" — while having no repetitions from other artists, with exactly one exception, Elton John.

Hey, it's Christmas, so I feel I should say something Christmas-y... and that got me wondering whether it's true — as my instinct tells me — that The Rolling Stones have a never done a Christmas song. According to Showbiz Cheatsheet, I am right about that, but they did do this “Cosmic Christmas” in "a hidden coda" on "Their Satanic Majesties Request":



And their song "Winter" has this line: "And I wish I been out in California/When the lights on all the Christmas trees went out/But I been burning my bell, book and candle/And the restoration plays have all gone around."

And Mick Jagger, sans other Stones, recorded “Lonely Without You (This Christmas)." And before you say, But Keith Richards wouldn't do something like that, he recorded "Run Rudolph Run" in 1979.

Now, go slather yourself in balm and get some strange flickers of a merry Christmas!

______________________

* You know what I think about that. I wrote last year:

To me, this message, played at the end of a political rally, feels like a critique of all politics. Yes, I've stood here and promised the sky, but you must realize you might not get it, and what you do get may even be preferable. You're feeling your wants, and I'm stoking your wants, but I might have something else in mind, something that I think is good enough for you or actually better than what you want. And you really shouldn't be taking those drugs and drinking that wine or even drinking that soda. What kind of a thinking adult are you anyway, preferring "cherry red" soda? Grow up. You've had your fun at my rousing rally. Now, straighten up and try to see what you're getting as all you really need.

"Questions like 'Should Northam resign?' or 'Is the wall racist?' divide voters today by ideology far more than race."

"'White' is a description of a person’s race, whereas feelings about whether whites are privileged or whether diversity makes the country stronger are part of a person’s racial ideology. Liberal whites — not minorities — are setting the tone on these issues. Since 2012, white liberals have moved considerably left on questions related to race, reflecting both a campus- and online-driven cultural awakening that has accelerated in response to Mr. Trump."

From "Americans Are Divided by Their Views on Race, Not Race Itself/It’s a crucial difference — and grounds for optimism" by Eric Kaufmann (author of “Whiteshift: Populism, Immigration and the Future of White Majorities") in the NYT.

Why is this "grounds for optimism"? Kaufman asserts that "ideological differences... are less polarizing than racial conflict, in which whole communities mobilize against an enemy."

A mix of races are found in each racial ideology, preventing tribe and creed from pushing in the same direction, which might lead to civil conflict. This raises the hope that American political elites can one day heal the country’s divisions.

That's how the column ends, with hope in American political elites. Aren't they the ones stoking this ideological division? At least the masses of people aren't organized by whatever race they happened to acquire by nature. I get that. But I think the elites are choosing to manipulate people with racial ideas, which are interesting and exciting and sure get us going. Why would they stop what's been working for them? Why would they heal? Obama didn't take his fantastic opportunity to heal. Now, there was some high level hope in the elite...

And this "Whiteshift" author dangles "the hope that American political elites can one day heal the country’s divisions"? The elites are thriving in the wounds.

Whatever happened to The Utne Reader?

I was wondering, because it came up in conversation here this morning with Meade. Both of us used to read that magazines years ago. What was it — the 80s? Anyway, it's still around, and of course, it's also a website. I checked it out. I was amused by what it picked out for me (because I easily go off into the fantasy of contemplating is this really me?):



Is there some book I've spent years looking for? Am I dithering over varieties of fish? Am I ready to become suspicious of soy sauce? No. No. No. But they're right to prompt me with "Ten Things to Do When You’re Feeling Hopeless," not because I'm feeling hopeless, but because it's a list of 10 things, which makes me feel hopeful — hopeful that I can easily upload 10 tips and ward off hopelessness. I note that the article is from 2011, but that's great because it means there's no chance it will be padded with anything about Trump. Tip #1:

Give up hope. That’s right, get off the hope/despair roller coaster and realize once and for all: It’s hopeless! You should have known when a U.S. presidential candidate won an election on a platform of mere hope that it was time to give it up. Embrace hopelessness! It’s OK! It makes sense. But we can, should, and must still be intentional, responsible, and joyful.

Ha ha. Confident that Trump would not appear, I stumbled into Obama. Hey, this is a good article. I recommend it. I also like these other suggestions that appeared in the sidebar next to the hopelessness article. I would click on all of this stuff:



Forest bathing is an old favorite topic of mine — see here and here. The new Utne Reader article is "Your Guide to Forest Bathing/Learn to take a step away from stress and towards the presence of nature, using mindfulness and meditation to feel peace while surrounded by the wild earth":

The sequence described [of 8 steps in the Optimal Flow] has proven over hundreds of walks to reliably create a strong sensory connection with the forests. It brings us home, opening our internal gates and inviting the forest to come meet our minds and hearts and spirits... The repeated use of these invitations will, over time, deepen your understanding and your capacity to fully “drop in.” Dropping in is a term I’ve often heard forest bathers use. Its origin is in surfing, a practice that’s related in many ways to forest bathing. Surfers wait watchfully for a wave; when one comes, they must paddle to catch it. At a certain point, the paddling gives way to the wave’s own energy carrying the board forward. The surfer stands and “drops in” to the wave and the flow of the moment. When your forest bathing practice begins to ripen, like a skillful surfer you will learn how to drop in, allowing the forest and your own embodied awareness to flow together....

Yes, dropping in. Works for web-surfing too. We're web-bathing here. Feel the flow!

"A Boring Presidential Nominee? Bring It, Democrats."

Writes Jonathan Bernstein at Bloomberg, reacting to the FiveThirtyEight "fantasy draft"...

Of the 24 candidates they drafted, somewhere between a quarter and half of the selections are basically nontraditional candidates. The theory seems to be: Now that President Donald Trump has proved it can be done, we should expect total outsiders and politicians without conventional credentials to win a fairly large share of future nominations.

Bernstein's not having it. He gestures wanly at Amy Klobuchar, John Hickenlooper, Martin O’Malley, Terry McAuliffe, Chris Murphy, and Jeff Merkley.

That reminds me. I have a tag, "I'm for Boring," which I introduced early in the 2016 campaign process. The first post with this tag came in July 2014:

I'm sick of inspiration and claims of historiosity. We should all be perfectly jaded by now. Inoculated. It's healthful and wholesome. And so what if watching the campaign day by day is "a boring, grinding affair"? That's a problem for [Buzzfeed's Ben] Smith, running his buzz-dependent website, [fretting about how Hillary Clinton "hasn’t unlocked the only thing that could really turn a campaign into a movement... authentic excitement among American women at her historic candidacy"], but it's a nonproblem for the rest of us. Think of the time you can save not reading the websites that try to make something out of the presidential campaign every damned day. What will you do with all that time? Instead of thinking about how what happened in the last hour might be history, you could, for example, read history. May I recommend the Amity Shlaes biography of Calvin Coolidge?



Coolidge was boring. Good boring. Let's be boring for a change.



I want a boring President. Stop trying to excite me.

Perhaps if Clinton hadn't tried to excite us, America wouldn't have opted for the insanely exciting Donald Trump. I do think an outright, openly boring person would be the best foil for Trump. But we saw how he took down "Low Energy Jeb," so....

Obama "is in advanced negotiations with Netflix to produce a series of high-profile shows" that tell "inspirational stories."

The NYT reports. It sounds like — as Oprah transitions to presidential candidate — Obama is transitioning into Oprah-esque TV personality. Why not?! What else is he supposed to do? Write serious books? Who knows how much of his personal time he will put into his TV show, his books, his speeches?

“President and Mrs. Obama have always believed in the power of storytelling to inspire,” Eric Schultz, a senior adviser to the former president, said Thursday. “Throughout their lives, they have lifted up stories of people whose efforts to make a difference are quietly changing the world for the better. As they consider their future personal plans, they continue to explore new ways to help others tell and share their stories.”

The most inspiring story Obama could tell is his own story, by living it, going forward, as an authentic and ethical person.

In one possible show idea, Mr. Obama could moderate conversations on topics that dominated his presidency — health care, voting rights, immigration, foreign policy, climate change — and that have continued to divide a polarized American electorate during President Trump’s time in office.

Another program could feature Mrs. Obama on topics, like nutrition, that she championed in the White House. The former president and first lady could also lend their brand — and their endorsement — to documentaries or fictional programming on Netflix that align with their beliefs and values....

Things that don't inspire me: Using the woman for the food segment.

The deal is evidence that Mr. Obama, who left the White House when he was just 55 years old, intends to remain engaged in the nation’s civic business, even as he has studiously avoided direct clashes with Mr. Trump about his concerted efforts to roll back Mr. Obama’s legacy. It is also a clear indication that the former president remains interested in the intersection of politics, technology and media.

A clear indication of what? How can you have a clear indication of something as fuzzy as "remain[ing] interested in the intersection of politics, technology and media." The indication I see is that he's making deals for money and what he's putting into the arrangement, other than his name, is a complete puzzle. And the name for the proposed product — if you'd dare to speak clearly — is: propaganda.

I don't give a damn if Netflix cranks out political propaganda, but for this historically monumental figure — Barack Obama — to take his still-young life and to sell it to the enterprise of cranking out political propaganda... ah, but I know you're about to slam me in the comments. I'm not as naive as you're about to tell me I am, because I know what you're going to say when you haven't said it yet.

Mr. Obama has long expressed concerns about how the flow of information — and misinformation — has the power to shape public opinion.... He has seethed privately and publicly, about what he says is the manipulation of news by conservative outlets and the fractured delivery of information in the internet age. 

The news is manipulated in all directions, including in this NYT piece about Obama's proposed entry into the manipulation game. The Obama Show will only be another manipulation, in the direction he prefers. The only question is whether his people can make it something that won't expose him as a propagandist and media concoction.

"Are there really a lot of people who find Trump refreshing, who found Obama 'glossily beautiful'?"

Asks Angel-Dyne in the comments to a post where I dropped an aside: "And by the way, maybe Barack Obama was too glossily beautiful and that's how we developed a taste for Trump."

I know the readership here is not a scientific sample, but I can't resist polling:

Did you find Obama beautiful and then develop a taste for Trump?

Yes! Too much glossy beauty gave me a taste for something different.

I never found Obama beautiful, but I do have a taste for Trump.

I found Obama beautiful, but I've never had a taste for Trump.

Both Obama and Trump have suited my taste, the same taste, for a distinctive character.

Obama is sometimes attractive and Trump has his good points, but I don't care in a personal way. Just get the policies right and spare me the showbiz aspect of politics.

pollcode.com free polls

ADDED: Poll results:

Obama — speaking at the Temple Emanu-El in NYC — says he's "basically a liberal Jew."

Is that cultural appropriation? It seems fine to me. I'm just asking because I've been following the culture of sensitivity to "cultural appropriation," and I need to put this post up, with the tag, because this is how I keep my notes these days.

By the way, Obama looks fabulous in the pictures. Relaxed, happy — as he usually looks, but amped up a couple notches now.

ADDED: Is Obama all things to all people? And, by the way, where does that phrase come from? It comes from the Apostle Paul:

Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law.  To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

I had a dream about Obama.

I was walking with him in a group of people through some pleasant cityscape. He was looking great, showing his classic relaxed, happy demeanor. I said out loud "This is the Democrats' secret weapon." He heard me and wanted an explanation. I said: "Whatever happens, the Democrats need only bring you out again and parade you around and people will think 'This was a President. This is what a President should be,' and that will be enough." I saw the reaction on his face and added: "But if you ever believe that, it won't work anymore."

This dream was probably caused by something I'd been reading in Scott Adams's book yesterday. I'm thinking this:

On social media, and sometimes even in the mainstream media, Clinton’s supporters relentlessly compared Trump to Hitler. It was brutally effective persuasion when packaged with related accusations about his “temperament” and his strongman vibe. Fear is the strongest level of persuasion, and the Persuasion Filter would say the Hitler-related persuasion made a difference in the election.

You might wonder why I say analogies do not persuade while at the same time I say the comparisons of Trump to Hitler were effective.... Remember, analogies are great for explaining a new concept. And this concept of Trump as a new Hitler was filling an empty space for lots of voters who didn’t know much about Trump...

Let's watch Trump do his Halloween photo op with the children of White House reporters.

Of course, he'll get a few things a little off, and the game is, of course, to find them and use them as much as possible to prove, once again, what a bad person he is:



The New York Times puts it this way:

“I cannot believe the media produced such beautiful children,” President Trump marveled, surrounded in the Oval Office by the Halloween-costumed offspring of White House reporters. “How the media did this, I don’t know.”

The children stared vacantly. The candy had not yet arrived.

For some 180 seconds on Friday, these visitors inspired a quintessential Trump performance — part executive gripe session, part grandfatherly charm, part open-mic night for the under-12 set....

“These are beautiful, wonderful children,” he began, pausing for a beat behind his desk. “Ughhh. You going to grow up to be like your parents?”

When the candy arrives, he hands it out saying: “Who likes this?And you have no weight problems. That’s the good news, right?”

Yeah, but how did Obama handle Halloween? I looked it up. Oh, my...



That guy could be so beautiful (in a way Trump cannot begin to emulate). I blogged that a year ago under the post title "I'm going to miss this man." Seeing a tiny boy dressed as Prince, Obama sings "Purple rain, purple rain."

By contrast, Trump saw a little girl with purple hair and said: "I like that hair. Wow. What color is that? Is that purple?" The little girl just said "Yeah." She was the daughter of a journalist, and yet she politely refrained from retorting: "I like that hair. Wow. What color is that? Is that orange?"

ADDED: Let me pick on the NYT for this:

On the girl with purple hair: “What color is that? Purple?”

That makes Trump sound dumber than he is, because here's the girl in question:

It's a setup to call her "the girl with purple hair." Many girls, if asked "What color is that? Purple?" would give an elaborate answer like: "Well, it's sort of purple, but really, I would call it lilac or maybe lavender." Perhaps Trump has had conversations with his daughters about colors and thought it was giving the girl a good opportunity to say something cute or clever.

But she just said, "yeah," which is okay, but I don't think Trump should be made to look like he wasn't good at talking to kids because he just stated the obvious.

You could even say he was better than Obama, because Obama took the spotlight from the child by singing "Purple Rain," but Trump allowed himself to sound dumb when he was really giving the girl a chance to shine.

I've had many conversations with children over the years, and I think I'm kind of good at it. And I would use simple questions like "What color is that? Purple?" Or maybe I'd have said "What color is that? I've never seen that color before. Is that special color only for unicorns?" The idea is to give the child a chance to say anything and then to show interest in whatever it is and get some kind of riff going in any way that the child can do.