No Dog in the Fight

Entertainment for political junkies

Last night, Aug. 23rd, 2023, would have been disappointing for me if I was a political junkie. But I had no positive expectations.

Two things occurred. There was a “debate” among Republican Party presidential nomination wannabes and a supposedly epic interview of a past US President (a non-participant in the farcical debate) who currently seems to be a shoo in for that slot.

The only thing epic about either event was, that for folks like me, they were both an epic failure.

Let’s look at the “debate” first.

I freely disclose that I only watched about ten minutes of that nonsense. That was enough to find out the only thing I cared about since no one on that stage will ever see the inside of the White House unless they have a guest pass.

Namely, would it be as inane and utterly useless for gaining important information as it has been in the past? My certainty that it would be useless was confirmed long before those precious ten minutes of my life were squandered.

The circus was run by clowns and the scripted actors on the stage seemed to be interviewing for clown parts in a different ring of the same circus. The current situation is pathetic. The political events of last evening are proof of that.

The "two party" system as it has evolved is a total failure at providing good candidates for elected office.

The so called "debates" are childish in how they are conducted and are nothing more than Kabuki theater. In fact even describing them that way is an insult to actual Kabuki theater. With any luck this nonsense will fade away even faster than these current candidates will. It’s a richly deserved fate for a TV show that should have been cancelled after the first episode.

If this country survives the next decade (or even the next few weeks, for that matter) but doesn't change the way we select candidates and vote for them, it will make the fall of Rome look well organized.

The uni-party and the people who run what passes for the "news media" have a stranglehold on the politics of this country and they do so with the tacit approval of a gullible and intellectually lazy electorate.

(If you are reading this newsletter you can safely remove yourself from any membership in that particular sector of the electorate. It takes real curiosity, an excess of personal time, and an ability to be un-gullible to read my ramblings for more than a few minutes.)

My observation about part one is;

To date, not one candidate for the presidential nomination of either party has mentioned the most important problems, much less made them a center-piece of their campaign. To bastardize an old political quip, It’s the system, stupid!

Next let’s look at the Tucker Carlson/Donald Trump show which competed directly with the circus on Fox News. I admit to watching the whole thing since I couldn’t sleep.

Whatever you think about the often annoying Tucker Carlson you must admit that he gets the most interesting interviews and covers many topics that others either aren’t smart enough to cover or purposely avoid in order to propagandize to their rapidly diminishing audiences instead.

Tucker did a yeoman’s job considering the obligatory (and nauseating) suck-up-ery required of a interviewer to avoid losing the highly profitable future interviews with a guy who will cut you off faster than a gelding’s testicles if you cross him in any way. For Tucker a guy like Trump is money.

Tucker tried to ask some questions that he thought his viewers were curious about. Predictably, Trump never really answered most of them. No shock to anyone who watches when politicians are interviewed.

But in one way at least, I learned something from this interview that was interesting to me. Namely, Trump isn’t as far away from being as demented as Joe Biden as I previously imagined. I found myself making more mental comparisons about their mental health than contrasts. He rambled on and repeated himself incessantly while making fun of the hapless presidential puppet Old Joe. (aka “the big guy”).

His general demeanor remained as off-putting as always but he looked feeble to me compared to just a few years ago. Many people who watched might have had a passing thought about the fading geriatrics who currently run the country and whether those people are up to the task or not.

Pelosi, Shumer, Biden, McConnell, Feinstein, Hillary, etal. come to mind. So yes, Trump kinda fits in to that group based on his performance last night.

The final wrap-up for my observations are:

1. The system as it exists is purposely moronic and designed to keep you under the thumb of the self anointed gatekeepers of the uni-party. The system insults the voters without the slightest compunction. So far it has worked reasonably well but it is moribund, in my opinion.

2. No one is running on possible solutions to the actual fundamental problems the country faces. I guess I’ll have to pontificate about what those problems are in a future offering of this Substack newsletter but this is boring enough for one post.

Meanwhile the distractions from the media will continue as longs as we allow them to.

As always, comments are welcome and a dialog is encouraged.