Trump and his family are self described business folks. While their legacy in business is debatable, that they come from the corporate world not political becomes more obvious everyday. We don’t know yet if Trump or his campaign colluded with Russia last year but the Trump family isn’t making it easy for innocence to be considered.
This week Donald Trump Jr. became the center of the Russian storm. After days of having his ever changing story disproven by leaks, he released the emails in question. They did not vindicate him. When asked if he would like information on Clinton gathered by Russia to aid his father, he says he would love it. He brought Kushner and Manafort to the meeting, the Russian lawyer ended up not having anything on Clinton. Leaving us in a situation where we know that the Trump campaign would have colluded but not if they did.
Ignore the discussion of impeachment for a moment. What other implications are there? One is a revelation behind the curtain. Political operators have long been portrayed as ruthless anything goes types in movies but the real political world always had norms and bounds. I’m not saying they are knights of the round table. Yet even the Gore campaign called the FBI when someone leaked Bush’s campaign bible to them. This event shows the business world core of the Trump universe one where damning emails end in a fine and mea culpas but in politics things end differently just ask Abramoff.
The anti-left media keeps yelling Ukraine like its Benghazi (as a waste of time). A low level former staffer is not the same as a high campaign advisor and candidate’s child. Manafort did in fact lobby for pro Russia candidates in Ukraine and was unable to hide it. Whether the decision to remove support for Ukraine in its war against Russian invasion from the GOP platform came from Manafort is unknown. In the end, evidence from a foreign public investigation is not close to the same as a foreign nation stealing documents from a political opponent to aid a candidate. As Watergate taught us having your own countrymen steal documents is damning without foreign involvement.
The emails aren’t a smoking gun for criminal proceedings but they without a doubt bolster Mueller’s investigation. One can only wonder what subpeonas will uncover.
-E.C. Fiori
Tag: america
Day 151: Found Them
Day 145: Humans After Humanity
This New American Life
I write this in a booth waiting for my current delivery order to be prepared in an empty restaurant that ten years ago would have been crowded. The music is a soft bossa nova and the kitchen while busy is careful to avoid clangs. The decor is standard a medium brown stain colors the wood and the carpet is green and clean. A mother and her retired son are the only other customers. She is dancing while waiting for the spring rolls to arrive. The owner hands me a thai tea on the house while I wait. I can’t help but worry for the fate of America. I can’t help but wonder where do we go from here.
The internet has redefined what and why we eat. It’s less about what we like and having haunts we return to but posting from the current trends to be considered a cool kid. Even those who do not post on social media still Google and Yelp their choices based on the impression that the best rated by those apps have more value experience wise for their dollars. The hive mind that is social media causes attention inequality and narrows culture especially food culture.
Speaking of the Hive Mind. What do we talk about when we say we shouldn’t give someone a platform. As in the current uproar over Megyn Kelly interviewing Alex Jones, a man who has been paid to spew filth since my childhood. He long ago built his alternative media platform and give a place for wayward views. He helped Trump win without a doubt and his org Infowars will have white house press credentials. He doesn’t need an interview on NBC but NBC and those who oppose his views do need these kinds of interviews. Darkness cannot be allowed to fester. Pre-internet denying mainstream outlets was a good way to slow repulsive thought but now mainstream media is one if the last shared spaces in American life and is more effective as a means of exposing.
The tendency of the internet to drive conformity from food and fashion trends to preventing public discourse is disconcerting to say the least. Humanity’s story is one driven by innovation through diversity not just the kind on a college application check box. How much have we lost? What will it take next?
-E.C. Fiori
Day 121: Something is Rotten in America
Chaffetz is stepping down.
The Trump team knew of the Flynn investigation before hiring him.
Comey kept a paper trail.
I don’t want to leap off a cliff of fancy but it isn’t hyperbole to say something is very wrong.
Chaffetz fleeing the spotlight is like canary dying. He showboated his way to the top of the DC attention heap. Backstabbing his mentors at each opening. His claim that he never planned to spent a lifetime as rep. doesn’t explain why he won’t finish his current term. His position as chairman on the House oversight committee does. Trump is too beloved by Chaffetz’s base to investigate but too hated by the general voter to ignore. Will voters remember his yellow streak in 2028? His url thinks not.
In the White House, more light is being shed. Trump’s team knew Flynn was being investigated for undisclosed payments from a foreign government when they chose him to head the National Security Council. Trump did fire Comey due to the Russian collusion investigation and told the Russians as much. Sessions who lied in his nomination hearing about meeting with the Russians is still AG, the one who ensures the President stays within the law. We do know Trump has business with Russian entities. Any Russian deals done through a shell are still unknown.
We still don’t know a great deal. We can’t say anything criminal has happened but there is enough evidence for cause to investigate. I think a rush to impeach or remove Trump would backfire. He has been the most damning witness in his own scandal. But we also can never take him at his word. You could at least trust Nixon to look out for Nixon but Trump seems to be unaware of the lines he crosses. Its like how the wall was going to be like the one from Game of Thrones magic and all but really is a chain link fence, congress won’t fund.
I think Trump is unfit and mentally inept for the standards of the presidency. He doesn’t need to be a criminal to be removed but the country would need to be united in chorus for it to happen. Rush Limbaugh changed the title from Advanced Conservative Studies to Advanced Anti-Left Studies. Our democracy has become a sport and religion. We no longer debate policy but preach to hostile converts. We don’t fight in an agreed arena and at some metaphysical level lost our American social contract. This is not a first or a last. The Civil War was the first re-negotiation. The second took place over 25 years beginning with Theodore Roosevelt’s Fair Deal finalized with FDR’s New Deal. Republicans and neo liberals since the Reagan revolution dismantled that agreement. They bring no replacement to the table.
We need to have a society. No one desires the freedom of Somaliland. Community on a large scale is a tremendous gift of humanities. It doesn’t function without effort. It may be imperfect but the cruelties can be softened. If we believe modern is defined as higher quality of life, it should go beyond. Trump is not the Emperor, he is the child. He has shown the empty state of the government and no impeachment can reverse that. People trust a government when they trust their neighbor no matter where they lie on the political spectrum.
We cannot allow foreign influence in our process of rebirth. That’s why all the current investigations not just the search for criminal evidence matter. We cannot let others define us. Trump is the lesser consequence of the Russian interference.
-E.C. Fiori
Day 117: A Balancing Act
We’ve been getting emails from loyal audience members asking why Radical Centrists has been so quiet over the past week. Surely the waterfall of Trump related news and fiascos of historic proportions is decent fodder for articles, no? Well intelligent reader, you’re right, but we here at Radical Centrists like to offer something of a unique perspective from the partisan back and forth. And frankly, there have been many fine think pieces about The Comey Affair, the Russia disclosure, the WannaCry pandemic, and Jeff Sessions single handedly refusing bi-partisan support for sentencing reform in the criminal justice system.
At long last though, I think there is an argument that should be much more out in the open among democrats- mostly, how to react during and after the fallout of The Comey Affair. The idea of impeachment isn’t over the horizon, but in plain view as Trump continues to stumble through interview and conflicting statements over his apparent obstruction of justice. So what now?
One camp believes that Democrats should be as obstructionist as possible, throwing sand in the gears of legislature until, for example, a special prosecutor is appointed- basically give Republicans a taste of what they did for the past 7 years with Obama. Hey, two can play at that game, and the stakes are a lot higher now. Obamacare didn’t lead to death panels, the great depression was averted, we got out of Iraq… it’s almost hard to remember now why Republicans hated Obama so much.
The other camp feels that we should rise above, and that impeachment is impossible without the cooperation of Republicans in the House and Senate. Remember- impeachment is a political decision, not a legal one (which is exactly what Nixon meant when he said “when the president does it, it’s not illegal”).
If you had asked me two weeks ago when we were talking about Republican legislative policy, I was firmly in the former camp. Healthcare and their insane “tax reforms” would throw millions even further into feudal serfdom, hoping our corporate castles will provide protection when the storm comes. Resistance means more than just bearing witness.
Now though, more and more republicans are starting to feel that Trump’s very existence is anathema to their agenda (which, of course, he is). What has changed is that business as usual in government now could very well lead to Trump’s removal. Before, business as usual hurts our countrymen. Now, it could bring down the American Caligula. We Centrists shouldn’t make the mistake of hindering that.
-Jack Delaney
Day 110: The Incredible Smallness of the Modern World
It has been a struggle to post this last week. To find a purpose in doing so. In a world so determined to end itself, I feel attempting to stop the suicide to be a grain of sand caught in the oceanic drift.
On the right, a crowd whose empathy ends with their outer dermal layer. On the left, a crowd who see empathy as an end or rather see no further than feeling.
AHCA is a bad bill. It hasn’t been scored by the CBO and as such there is no analysis what it will do. It will cause people to lose coverage and thats enough for it to not live up to the GOP promise. They forgot the dead can’t vote.
P.C. Culture is a failed solution to real problems in society. After 27 years of academic witch hunts, it fractured the Dems coalition. Pushing former leftists into the Alt-Right. Kids still get gunned down by cops for no reason everyday.
The Alt-Right a vague coalition of reactionaries to whom 1950 is still hell. They are the product of the bubbles we built. Rejected by all, they have come to raze and pillage and rape. Armored in our beloved Irony, they are immune to shame and guilt. They are the priests and flocks of whataboutism and the ultimate product of the internet. They are something new. They wish to supplant democracy and install a CEO, one without a board to answer to.
Those of us outside their circle must decide if we wish to live in a society that self-governs or to bow. That decision must begin with real bipartisanship from both sides. ACA was always more conservative in its solution than progressive. The GOP could repair it and show alternative to single payer healthcare. Progressivism needs to promote concrete quantifiable solutions and worry less about when an ally trips. Those would be baby steps.
Art doesn’t function as a window and politics isn’t a football game. We can either accept the world and save democracy or drown in our own shit.
-E.C. Fiori
Day 100: The Sweet Medium
We are putting that to the test.
-E.C. Fiori
Day 98: No Country for Old City
Obsolescence of the City
It has to be said on of the strangest turns of the digital revolution is the revival of the American metropolis. In an age where physical location means less than any other period in human existence almost all opportunities are being concentrated in fewer locations. In an age where more options are available, more people eat making the same choices. Think of San Francisco. People pay the highest rent but are bused out of the city to their employer’s offices. Then at night, they bus back to their trendy luxury condo that matches all the others built recently across the world and consume the current global fads that score on social media by people who may or may not be near SF. How is that any different than living in a McMansion in the burbs and going to the office park?
Where is the disruption? Many gentrifiers will point to the homeless man on their stoop say his name and the cliffnotes of his life call him neighbor maybe give him a mug of coffee and a smoke before saying they want to live among the people by which they mean the poor who would be happy to afford a McMansion if they could. The truth is tech could save the rural life from the attack by industrialism. If a band can make millions from a track recorded at different times and all the members on separate continents then so can a company. If skyscrapers were needed to house the mountains of paper and the people that pushed them then what is needed after the mountains have been shredded. If our overlords can function with their money all offshore then why must we clock in to the same building.
I will admit we have a major infrastructure crisis in America. Beyond crappy roads, bridges, and dams there is an aged telecommunications network (that includes broadband even if the FCC disagrees). As I discussed previously, broadband access isn’t universal. It could be. The telephone wires and broadcast waves, we all take for granted wasn’t built by companies seeking profit but by Americans for other Americans through the New Deal. It can be done again.
Cities are inefficient as population centers in a wired world. Look at the response time for safety officials in LA vs rural CA and compare distances traveled and taxes paid. It isn’t pretty. If government is best decentralized then so is the population. Each community can function as it wills rather than war with political machines churning out party bench candidates for higher offices. Plenty of services can be outsourced with Sandy Springs as a strong example. Culturally digital media delivery has removed most barriers. In the past, a print was 10k a pop and an empty theater disastrous but those days are behind. No longer is a physical film print or even theater needed to share smaller and foreign movies . No longer do you need a store to buy an album or a book. You may cry wait there is still the live music experience and that is true but like with film where previously one assumed there was a full audience once population hit a certain number now we can see where the most streams or album buys are from. The band can actually find and perform for all their fans without assumption. You can show there is a fan base. But food you may say. If you can tell the difference between a cronut and a knockoff congrats you are an asshole. Food is trendier than any other entertainment these days. I saw three poke shops in a row on my commute this morning. Most restaurants fail. City or rural, why not have rotating chefs and menus, a touring residency. Of course, local cuisine favorites and landmarks will continue to be permanent and a chef could stay but on a wider level why not recognize the transient nature of taste and support tastebud adventures without anyone losing a shirt.
I don’t claim that de-urbanization will solve everything but I do think it would lead to a future rather than this remake of the 20th century we are currently playing out.
-E.C. Fiori
Day 97: The Circle will be Unbroken
Cultural critique has become irrelevant to modern society as a whole. There are occasional reviews worth the words but the garbage heap has grown thick around them. At some level, the increase of cultural production (mostly garbage) is a cause of worse critique as well as content devaluing, if people pay less for culture, they won’t spend more to hear New Yorkers talk about it. Deep though I believe the decline is from stasis within the field.
Lacan has become a plague. What was once a fresh lens 60 years ago has become the intellectual equivalent of duck tape. Lacan’s sentences support themselves so well, they can support almost any other thesis. Like an Ouroboros, his prose circles back on itself. This isn’t against Lacan but against the abuse of his work. I shouldn’t feel the need to grab a red pen and email “come see me during office hours” with the mark up.
I get the sense that most reviewers hate their job as well. The long rambling tangents on current events, musings on societal opinions, plain old academic discourse has become the focus. The actual piece being reviewed will have a synopsis often feeling like the wikipedia entry being rehashed. While 500 words on casting choices sounds like it is about the film, it is more about the political beliefs of the reviewer. Actual discussion of the piece that exists gets peppered in to appease their editor. The reviewer knows the reader’s opinion has been set before clicking through.
One failure is the continued reliance for reviewers to be living in New York. Before the millions of remote working options, it makes sense to hire writers near the main office. Now that the laptop is the writer’s screening room and a conference room not so much. This creates a bubble best shown by “Girls”, a show on averaged watched by 1.5% of HBO subscribers and with ratings below that of other canceled HBO shows. However it was a must watch for critics who would spend the next Monday pushing out praise and roundtables. It might be possible to find the number of employed reviewers through viewership numbers. Critics loved seeing their neighborhood and friends on screen, their current definition of a cultural moment.
In an age of seemingly infinite content, critique has become inefficient. The major cultural commentary outlets waste their resources screening pieces with major distribution making the article, a free ad for the production. Whether franchise, remake, adaptation, or the elusive original property modern audiences know if they will see it thanks to targeted social media campaigns and mass publicity blitzes. Before Google and the marketing delivery systems of the iPhone and Facebook, these reviews did serve as an informative method of discovering recent major releases. The challenge for critics now is to not be the emperor in the Coliseum but Shackleton in Antarctica. The internet is dark and full of terror to paraphrase Game of Thrones/ A Song of Ice and Fire. If I like Vice, what’s another lesser known but similar quality option? What indie films blocked out of major festivals deserve my attention? What soundcloud/bandcamp pages should I book mark? These are the questions critique should be answering.
-E.C. Fiori
Day 95/96: Late Socialism
France has long been the highlight of the socialist argument. Now with the party’s largest postwar failure, the limits of the socialist ideology has been shown. They have long heralded the notion of late capitalism, only to be survived by it.
Most have yet to grapple with the loss of the left and the right. It isn’t hard to understand when viewed within the context of who I refer to as “Marie Antoinette Socialists”: people from the top 20% who went to college and work as “young professionals” (workers who don’t create products as much as “value”. These roles require a strong capitalism to exist). They support hand outs to feel better about their own status. They favor system reform in any area that doesn’t require major change for them. This democratic socialism needs an open market while largely blaming that same market for any imperfection. On the reverse is blue collar workers on gov support whether farm subsides or disability/unemployment. These sons of Jefferson vote against the programs that support them in the name of freedom. They have skills that have real value outside of the market. Things people would need without the existence of dollars. It is foolish for the Gender studies professor to mock their mechanic for not understanding how the world works. They are the modern wolf being held by the ears.
The left and right as relevant terms only continues thanks to hypocrisy of a sort. As more subjects fall off the spectrum, social issue divides become increasingly played up. As the amount of homophobes decreases to the size of the LGBTQ community, the larger middle plays referee between two minorities. This is at some level a distraction from perhaps the largest shift in work since the dawn of agriculture.
The digital revolution will be the end of work as a source of living. Yes even for lawyers despite their smirk otherwise at reading this. Judge Watson has analyzed your interpretation of past court rulings within the framework of all legal thought ever recorded before you finish the sentence. Defendants will want a lawyer who can do the same. Computers are the professional professionals, the most knowledgable experts who don’t need a tie to hide their souls. I don’t mean that as a slight against lawyers but as an argument against those who believe human creatively to be permanently unique. Time makes John Henrys of us all.
Just as the New Deal bought society into the industrial age, we need a new social contract that accounts for the state of the world as it is.
-E.C. Fiori
The Radical Centrists 