Politics – Page 13 – Life on the Wicked Stage: Act 3

Andor, Or We Are The Heroes We Need

Echoing Tina Turner

The ever expanding universe of the Star Wars franchise is one that often leaves me colder than I imagine I’d feel if I were floating alone in space. That’s the same with most of these run the IP into the ground franchises. When something comes out of those factories that’s actually decent, it’s a surprise. One of the surprising beacons of warmth has been the Andor series, which is currently streaming in its second season. I’m also a fan of the movie Rogue One for which Andor is a prequel.

Yes, the story is about the rebel rebellion against the Empire, but there’s something different about Andor. Recently I read a piece from Derek Pharr on Nerdist, Hope Without The Force: How Andor Rewrites Rebellion. It helped me put my finger on why the show feels different and surprisingly current beyond the scope of small screen entertainment.

Here’s a quote:

Andor makes the quiet argument that the Jedi weren’t just irrelevant to the uprising against the Empire. They were liabilities and detached from everyday suffering. The Jedi were fixated with balance and prophecy, and wildly ineffective at stopping fascism when it counted. The Jedi Order had their shot. They blew it. Meanwhile, on Ferrix and Narkina 5, regular people are building the rebellion through sweat, sacrifice, and solidarity. Not the Force.

Whether you are a fan of the series or not, I encourage you to read the entire piece. Pharr’s thesis is indeed a good one about the series. But for me it spins off into many of the challenging moments we face today in the wake of our own evolving evil empire. One that’s certainly not intelligently designed, much less preordained.

Bottom line, it’s going to come down to those of us on the ground.

I think we need to eternalize and begin acting on that instead of waiting around and looking for heroes among congress critters, political parties, media mouthpieces, TV lawyers and those at the bar, or even judges to come to the rescue. We know what’s ahead is going to continue to get uglier. We’re probably going to have to meet ugly with a little ugly ourselves. Cue Tina Turner’s We Don’t Need Another Hero.

As Pharr puts it,

The Jedi were legends. The rebellion was real.

No elegant solutions from a more civilized age. Just people. Flawed, desperate, courageous people, who decide enough is enough.

He also argues that noble as they were, the Jedi were spectacularly bad at saving things in their attempts to reclaim balance. I don’t know about you, but that sounds frighteningly familiar.

Read Pharr’s piece if and when you watch Andor. If you don’t watch the show, read the piece anyway.

Pie in the sky? Perhaps. But I’ll take a serving and ask for seconds.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Arrogance Is Not A Good Look

Especially when you’re falling to Earth

Arrogance is never a good look. We all wear it to a degree. Too many think they wear it well. Until they don’t. When whatever flavor of arrogance they’ve draped themselves in trips them up, the fall makes Icarus look he’s still soaring.

The lessons of history, literature, religion, heck — even cartoons — tell us that all inflated egos, like balloons, either pop or fizzle. As long as the balloon can be kept aloft, life’s a party. Funny how we’re able to brush that all aside. Arrogantly so.

Seeing Apple get a real courtroom comeuppance yesterday, tech titans in general thinking they can out reason human reasoning, and the continual display of cock and bull topsy-turvying in the political world, one would think that most sensible people, especially those with armies of lawyers on retainer, would begin to sense a few chinks in their armor long before they become dangerous vulnerabilities. They’d probably be served better employing fools or court jesters.

Oh, wait…. Trump cabinet meeting.

Given how we’ve turned gambling into the national sport, it makes one wonder how long before we gamify the entire human experience and begin betting on the timing of career stumbles and failures beyond what already happens in the stock market. Predictable as they are though, the odds wouldn’t offer much change of a big payout.

Then again, keep in mind what Terry Pratchett says:

Modesty is only arrogance by stealth.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Hostile and Political Amazon

The dangerous farce continues (and sometimes it’s quite funny.)

I guess someone at Amazon read my post from a few weeks ago about how it is possible to bring a bully to heal. I doubt it. But it is fun to watch Jeff Bezos make the Trump administration sweat a bit under similar circumstances. At least for the moment.

In response to the Trump tariffs, which are already driving up prices and driving down consumer confidence, Amazon has announced that they will be displaying the amount of price increases that are due to tariffs on its product pages.

Of course this generated an immediate response from the White House with the press secretary, standing at the podium beside the Treasury secretary, labeling Amazon’s move as a “hostile and political act.”

Oh my.

Three things to quickly comment on:

First, when you need to trot out Treasury Secretary Bessent to try and clam waters you’re losing. As I’ve said before, he reminds me of the LaLa guy. Remember him?

Whatever Bessent says seems to make as much sense.

Second, we just reached the 100 day mark of this dangerous farce of an administration and the meaningless polls are telling us folks are unhappy. You don’t need polls to know that, see that, or feel that. The unease in the air is thicker than this Spring’s pollen count.

You can only create a fake reality in the movies. And even then, those fake realities fall apart in the end.

Third, most early bets are Bezos will fold and pull back on this. But one can only bend a knee so far before it breaks. Or they don’t let you launch any new satellites.

And the bending begins.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Sunday Morning Reading

We’re always chasing bubbles.

Back from a brief hiatus, there’s plenty to read and share. It feels like it’s becoming increasingly important, and perhaps more urgent to do both. I promise there’s some happiness amidst all of the Strum and Drang down the page.

First up, Canadian Stephen Marche is singing the Red, White and Blues. It’s easy to look from the outside in, or even from within and be dismayed at what’s going on in this country. Because it’s so damn easy to see. Unless of course you’re still in shock, or choosing to ignore it. Marche’s tune doesn’t hit a false note as he says America was a “country of bubbles.”

David Todd McCarty is back Poking The Bear. It’s good seeing him write about politics again.

Drik de Klein of History of Sorts wrote Evil, I Think, Is The Absence of Empathy back in 2019, using Captain G.M. Gilbert’s quote from the Nuremberg trials as the headline. I remember reading it a while ago and it resurfaced this week, proving, as always, just how short our attention spans are. Or perhaps our comprehension and retention capabilities.

NatashaMH says, “I can’t stand people being ignorant bastards” in her excellent piece Our Modern Discontents. Again, a viewpoint from outside the red, white, and blue bubble that feels like it’s ready to pop.

Jacob Silverman’s Welcome To The Slop World: How The Hostile Internet Is Driving Us Crazy is an invitation to a party that turned into something nobody was expecting.

Speaking of bubbles, big tech is in hot water of its own boiling these days. Google is facing anti-trust charges and a possible breakup that probably won’t happen. Wendy Grossman takes a look at Three Times A Monopolist.

Who’d a thunk it? Bot Farms Invade Social Media To Hijack Popular Sentiment. Eric Schwartzman does some digging in those all too fertile fields.

This past week we celebrated William Shakespeare’s birthday. As usual lots of words were written about the writer who used them better than anyone else to describe the human condition. One of the accepted parts of the Bard’s legacy is that he was an absent husband that left his family behind to pursue his calling. But a discovery of a letter might just change that. Check out what Ephrat Livini has to say about the possibility in an Overlooked Letter Rewrites History of Shakespeare’s Bad Marriage.

And for that happiness I promised, I’ll stick with Shakespeare and Cora Fox with ‘I Were Happy But Little Happy, If I Could Say How Much’; Shakespeare’s Insights On Happiness Have Held Up For More Than 400 Years. We often focus on his tragedies, but he reveled in the joys of life as well. Keep those happy bubbles afloat as long as you can. Pop the bad ones.

(Image from Rey Seven on Unsplash)

If you’re interested in just what the heck Sunday Morning Reading is all about you can read more about the origins of Sunday Morning Reading here. You can also find more of my writings on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.

Carole Cadwalladr’s Final Column for The Observer

But she hasn’t stopped observing.

A couple of weeks ago I linked to Carol Cadwalladr’s recent return to the TED conference to deliver a speech entitled This Is What A Digital Coup Looks Like. It’s worth a watch if you care about such things. Heck, it should be required reading if you care at all about what’s happening in our digital and non-digital lives.

This post is linking to her farewell column in The Observer, the Sunday sister paper to The Guardian and The Guardian Weekly papers in Britain. Like all media outlets it’s been through some things in recent years. The Observer was purchased late in 2024 and like all such transactions that prompted staff layoffs and terminations, including Carole Cadwalladr and a number of her colleagues. You can read all about that on in her post Fuckty bye in How To Survive The Broligarchy. I suggest you do that as well as read her final Observer column It’s Not Too Late To Stop Trump and The Tech Broligarchy From Controlling Our Lives, But We Must Act Now.

I happen to believe she’s fighting the good fight. That last column provides some excellent behind the scenes during her preparation and anxiety leading up to that recent TED speech, as well as some reactions she received while at the conference, including an interchange between her and OpenAI’s Sam Altman, in addition to making the important case she continues to make.

She’s paying attention and raising alarm bells. We should too. She’s standing in the way. We should too.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Distrust-By-Default

Donning a new armor for protection

In a typically thorough article on Ars Technica about Microsoft preparing to reintroduce the Recall feature to Windows 11, Andrew Cunningham sums up his, and I think many of our, queasy feelings about these kind of feature and marketing failures we’ve recently seen from the likes of Microsoft, Apple and others, using the phrase distrust-by-default.

Here’s the quote in context:

This was a problem that Microsoft made exponentially worse by screwing up the Recall rollout so badly in the first place. Recall made the kind of ugly first impression that it’s hard to dig out from under, no matter how thoroughly you fix the underlying problems. It’s Windows Vista. It’s Apple Maps. It’s the Android tablet.

And in doing that kind of damage to Recall (and possibly also to the broader Copilot+ branding project), Microsoft has practically guaranteed that many users will refuse to turn it on or uninstall it entirely, no matter how it actually works or how well the initial problems have been addressed.

Unfortunately, those people probably have it right. I can see no signs that Recall data is as easily accessed or compromised as before or that Microsoft is sending any Recall data from my PC to anywhere else. But today’s Microsoft has earned itself distrust-by-default from many users, thanks not just to the sloppy Recall rollout but also to the endless ads and aggressive cross-promotion of its own products that dominate modern Windows versions. That’s the kind of problem you can’t patch your way out of.

Briefly, Recall is the Windows 11 feature that was built to capture and recall almost all of what you do on your PC via snapshots, making it available for recall later. After substantial promotion, Microsoft pulled and delayed the rollout last year after security concerns were raised. Skepticism was high even before the security issues were raised that caused the delay. Cunningham’s article provides an excellent rundown on that and I encourage you to read the full thing.

I think Andrew is spot on calling the uneasy feeling many of us have distrust-by-default. Certainly when it comes to this specific Microsoft moment and other tech companies. Zooming out, I think it also describes well the armor we’re all adopting on any number of issues in these moments of mistrust we seem to be facing on so many fronts in our lives.

(Image from Atmospher1 on Shutterstock)

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Maybe “We’re All Afraid.” We Need To Stop Saying So.

Candid cowardice breed bullies

It’s often a risky thing to be candid. Even more so about your fears. I get that. Been there myself in some moments that I felt the stakes were high. Thankfully those stakes didn’t involve the fate of the United States and perhaps the free world.

Lisa Murkowski's statment on being afraid of Trump

Senator Lisa Murkowski’s statement as quoted in the screenshot above is indeed admirable for its candor. Yet I would call it cowardly, given her office. If you’re one of 100 people elected to the senate of the United States, you’re chosen to overcome your fears in the face of danger.

I don’t doubt that there are threats of retaliation. Yes, that’s scary and as she says “that’s not right.” But admitting you are susceptible to succumbing to fear only feeds the fever that breeds more of what you fear. And we’re already tossing too much chum into these turbulent waters.

I’m reasonably sure when the signatories of the Declaration of Independence put their names to that document there was fear in their minds and hearts. History is replete with leaders who have taken courageous stands and I’m also reasonably sure most did so while facing fears. We need to see and hear more that. Strongly worded letters and sound bites just aren’t strong enough this time around the history cycle.

I’ll give the Senator credit for saying she’s going to continue to use her voice which she says might appear confrontational at times. She used it well in an early decision point in this administration by voting against the nomination of Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense. Others weren’t so brave. My issue with her candid language here is once you admit you’re on the defensive, the other side knows it has the advantage and feels free to press harder. The only thing that’s going to turn the tide and pop the buffoon’s balloon are those who don’t cower and candidly concede he’s made you afraid, no matter how fearful you are.

You can watch more of the Senator’s remarks in the video below for a fuller context.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

There’s a Corner and Trump Has Backed Us Into It. Again.

The farce continues

The headline of this post came to me first. Sometimes that happens. Then I had a memory flashback suggesting that I had used that headline before. I have. That was in early August of 2023. That’s why I added the “Again.”

The first time was right after the orange menace was indicted for the third time. As excited as some were for the legal victory in that moment, I felt then that we were still in great peril. That feeling proved accurate. It chills me to read what I wrote then:

There’s no back to find our way to, regardless of the legal outcomes. Frankly there’s no back to find our way to even if somehow this monster suddenly disappeared from the planet. The damage has been done. And I don’t think we collectively have what it takes to bridge the gaping wounds, much less comprehend them. Our political systems are incapable of stopping the slaughter of children with guns. Our spiritual institutions keep remaking foundational tenets into something unreconcilable with their founding. And we’re going to fix this?

The wounds are fresh. The pain is real. There’s a monster in our midst and it’s going to take extraordinary measures to defeat it. Nothing will be the same if we do. Nothing should be the same as we try. And if there’s any healing to come it’s not going to happen without amputations that alter the way we navigate the world.

We keep repeating this cycle. We’re still in that same corner as we sit watching, hoping, perhaps praying for some legal or moral victory to change any of the actions the Trump administration is tossing about. I know there are many, like me in that previous post, who wish he would somehow disappear from the planet. But neither legal victories nor acts of God are going to change the course of destruction we’re on and have been. The damage has been done and more keeps happening daily. Some bizarre force is keeping us in trapped in a corner. It’s also keeping Trump there too. He seems to enjoy it. Most, not all, of the rest of us do not.

Let’s take this Abrego Garcia deportation case. The Trumpsters have already tossed aside (for the moment) a Supreme Court ruling against them, redefining it as one in their favor, turning no into yes, day into night, and reality into fantasy. By doing so these fluffed up maniacs have dug a hole so deep that they can’t climb out without damaging their own machismo, dragging all of us deep into it as well.

It’s a serious moment that requires serious people to actually act seriously. A rare combination that’s tough to find these days. Whether it’s this issue, an unexplainable tariff/trade war, threatening law firms and universities, or whatever this administration is tossing into the bottomless blender of bluster, behind the scenes they are still ardently working towards success in an issue that might just render moot all of the moments of new horrors they unveil daily.

The subtext beneath all of this is a plot line that threatens to make any and all of these horrid actions seem like distractions. I’ve said all along that this administration is acting as if they don’t care about the outcome of future elections. They would not be acting this way if they were. Yet that’s the frame we seem incapable of breaking when discussing each of new eruption.

If we’ve learned anything (there’s no proof we have) it is that this dictator and his henchmen mean what they say and it’s no mistake that they keep hinting of a third term, or president for life scenario. Yes, there will most likely be elections. There are elections in Russia, Hungary, and pick your favorite autocracy. This will be the battle that decides all, and we need to face each new challenge within that context.

There’s a straight line that can be drawn between the moment this Abrego Garcia case finally winds its way back to the Supreme Court for a decision and the fate of future elections. The chess moves are simple to see.

If the Supreme Court defers in any way that subjugates the due process clause of the 5th amendment to the U.S. Constitution, then all bets are off. Game over. If the Supreme Court, or rather the conservative members of that court, put the administration in check by ruling against it, the next move is either surrender or tossing the pieces from the board, scrambling it all and declaring the game invalid.

I’m frankly not sure which outcome is worse. The Supreme Court abdicating ends all but the waiting game for the next shoe to drop, continuing the charade of hoping for some moment of truth that will set us all free. Upsetting the game board acknowledges where we actually are, but are afraid to admit. Both sides are cowering in that corner, afraid to face that moment of truth.

Dark times.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Resurrecting Trust Is A Tall Order

You can fool some of the people all of the time…or maybe not.

It might be easier to resurrect the dead than it is to restore trust. One way or the other, we move on from death, but moving on from any relationship once trust is busted is a tough slog for those still among the living. I’m not just talking about politics. I’m referring to the relationships we have in most of the spheres of life we interact with each and every day.

Certainly that’s true in politics and governing. Those currently in charge of sinking the ship of state want you to think the water inching over your shoe tops isn’t a problem. And if we go under, well that’s the last guy’s fault. So is the fact that we don’t have enough lifeboats. Sorry. Hope you can swim.

The same is true in technology, entertainment, business, religion, and the list goes on and on. Superhero comic book creators would call this world of competing realities a multi-verse, but even that concept doesn’t really hold enough water to drink, fantasy that it may be.

If you feel like you’re wading through swamps of bullshit trying to find morsels of truth it is because you are. The powers that be have realized (again) they can get away with calling day night if they say it often and loud enough with enough assists from a cowering media that loves its microphones more than its freedom to exist. And when some bit of truth pokes its head above the surface it’s quickly washed over and submerged by another pounding wave of new stories or new product updates. Think waterboarding with quicksand.

This distortion swamp is full of mirages reflected back into our eyeballs like a thousand suns reflecting off an endless body of water. There’s nothing to anchor to.

Set the politics aside and focus for the moment on the ongoing saga about Apple’s delaying of Apple Intelligence features it unveiled almost a year ago at WWDC. A recent NY Times column by Tripp Mickle dropped two new grains of salt into the still open wounds of that debate. First up, Mickle seems to want to lay the blame on former Apple CFO Luca Maestri for changing up a plan to increase Apple’s budget for purchasing the chips apparently needed to ramp up for the Apple Intelligence push.

Here’s the quote:

Mr. Cook approved a plan to double the team’s chip budget, but Apple’s finance chief, Luca Maestri, reduced the increase to less than half that, the people said. Mr. Maestri encouraged the team to make the chips they had more efficient.

The lack of GPUs meant the team developing A.I. systems had to negotiate for data center computing power from its providers like Google and Amazon, two of the people said. The leading chips made by Nvidia were in such demand that Apple used alternative chips made by Google for some of its A.I. development.

The next grain of sand has launched a thousand blog posts (including this one) by saying that the previously delayed Apple Intelligence features will now launch this fall. Mickel says that’s according to three sources. Regardless of the quantity of sources, that report has generated more use of the words “may” and “possibly” in following headlines than I’ve seen in some time.

The tech press has either caught on and is choosing to not grant Apple the usual slack after feeling more than a bit betrayed. Or it’s pretending to hide beyond an endless streak of optimism. Either way Apple is currently mired in a trust swamp of its own making. Tangentially, and for what’s it’s worth, the same could be said of The NY Times.

My point here, isn’t to debate the sourcing, the reporting, or even the timing of when Apple may or may not launch new features. The long preamble to get to this Apple “news” should have been your first clue to that. My point is that once any authority fractures trust whether it be a company, a government, an official, a teacher, a parent, or a news organization, all sides lose. You can work to regain trust over time, but the stain will always remain and there’s very little anyone can do to remove it. You can learn to live with it, but you can’t erase it.

Or as Lady Gaga says, “Trust is like a mirror, you can fix it if it’s broken, but you can still see the crack in that mother fucker’s reflection.”

There’s an entire industry full of PR professionals and crisis managers lurking, just waiting to make bank on these kind of mistakes, anxious to be called in to try and resurrect a brand or a reputation. But they are really just good makeup artists capable of masking scars. If the art of “spin” was ever a currency, it is has more than lost any value it may have once had.

In an attempt to steer this full circle, if there’s a silver lining in all of this, the raging egos we’ve put in charge of things bigger than consumer electronics can’t keep their mouths shut to their own detriment and perhaps the benefit of those of us on the ground. Their continual yapping and yipping is exposing not just their own ineptitude in governing, but the entire rigged game that everyone in these industries of make believe rely on, whether it be politics, iPhones or punditry.

I’m beginning to hope the immediate damage from these flapping maws will have more impact than any tariff upheaval, leading us all to a healthier and more skeptical view of the world we live in. The world they are tearing to shreds is beginning to feel like one that might not deserve to be saved any longer.

(Image from ChiccoDodiFC on Shutterstock)

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Sunday Morning Reading

More than the bare minimum

It’s another Sunday. At a bare minimum it’s time for a little Sunday Morning Reading. There’s more politics than I’d like to shake any sticks at dominating my reading these days, so apologies if that turns you off. I just don’t think we can turn off or tune out to what’s happening. Like it or not (I don’t) we’re living through an epochal moment in world history demonstrating how little we regard human history. I emphasize “living through” because while we’re bearing witness, it is happening to us and whatever it evolves or devolves into will affect all who come after.

I happen to be one who believes that Trump is the ugly face of the chaos descending around us, propped up by bigger, deeper and darker forces using him as the fool too many fools easily fall for. Jonathan Mahler has an excellent piece that delves a bit into this called How The G.O.P. Fell In Love With Putin’s Russia. Excellent context that should not be ignored.

We’re living in a world daily facing formalist delusions. Benjamin Wittes uses the Abrego Garcia case as one example of that in The Situation: Formalist Delusions Confront Lawless Realities.

Speaking of formalist delusions, who knew some tech bros could declare you dead and wipe you off the books, or at least the books that matter when it comes to navigating life in today’s world. Hannah Natanson, Lisa Rein, and Meryl Kornfield take a look at how the Trump Administration Overrode Social Security Staff To List Immigrants As Dead.

Joan Westenberg calls us America, The Isolated. I can’t argue with her points. Though I will refer you back to Jonathan Mahler’s piece above for wider aperture. The deeper context is that the lens we’ve viewed the world, contained and restrained by borders, has never been the view for the forces now moving so rapidly.

In the growing category of erasing history, John Ismay takes a look at Who’s In and Who’s Out At The Naval Academy’s Library?

Mathew Ingram has penned two terrific posts that address what will certainly become a part of our digital lives as we move forward. Be Careful What You Post On Social Media. They Are Listening is the first post. He’s expanded that with Part 2 as the pace of social media monitoring is sure to be picking up.

Perhaps all of this feels too big or too overwhelming to contemplate in the helter-skelter of our daily lives. But it is beginning to have impacts, big and small. Take a look at Scott McNulty’s very funny run-in with a construction worker at his CVS. While CVS – Construction Versus Scott is about his adventures at his local pharmacy under renovation, there’s a comedy nugget in there that demonstrates how those paying attention are actually paying attention.

My initial reaction to any illness in our children is immediate quarantine and a call to the WHO (I deleted the CDC’s number from my address book because suddenly they just kept telling me to get more vitamin A).

To close out this week, take a look at My Open Letter to Gen Z from NatashaMH. At “a bare minimum,” it’s worth a read to remind us that what we remember and hang on to from “back in the day” is now in a daily collision with what comes tomorrow. Easier to avoid the damage from those collisions perhaps if you acknowledge the maps are constantly changing.

Image from Mega Stolberg on Unsplash.