That Presidential Debate

How Bad Was That?

If you lean to the left like me and you're with the progressive, there's no way in hell Donald Trump is acceptable. It goes without saying, but I'm saying because let's face it: Joe Biden looked much worse than Trump - who was largely being himself - and revealed to the world how far gone he was. 

That wasn't just some sleepy forgetful guy there. That is the POTUS looking for a second term and maybe even some of his lost marbles. I kind of brushed aside some of the rumours about how bad his senility was, but there was just no denying it in that performance. Get this: Trump was awful, but we're not talking about that because we're so used to pointing out how awful Donald Trump is, every time he opens his mouth. No, we're taking about just how far gone Joe Biden is towards the happy place. Man, I was squirming listening to him mangle not just his answers but his legacy with it. It was so bad he's going to be remembered for it. 

Look, if you were applying the criterion that maybe Donald Trump isn't compos mentis, you have to apply the same scrutiny to Joe Biden and frankly, he looked further along the road to an unravelled mind than even the Donald. The early crit is that there would be panic in the senior democratic ranks. Jeez, you reckon? 

How Did We Get Here?

I've probably said this here some time ago but American politics has uniquely been unable to move on from the Baby Boomers. Australia quietly made the transition in the last decade. Anthony Albanese is probably the lat ALP leader who is a BabyBoomer, and he's a young one at that, being born in 1963. Malcolm Turnbull was the last Liberal Party leader and he was born in 1954. Scomo, is the first Gen-X PM of Australia and while he was terrifyingly terrible, he wasn't an old fart - just a stinky one. 

 If you look around the world, the leaders of the first world apart from Japan have moved on from Baby Boomer leadership. Boo was the last Boomer UK PM. Liz Truss was also a terrifyingly terrible Gen-Xer born in 1975; Rishi Sunak was born in 1980, so he's practically a Millennial. Macron was born in 1977. Olaf Scholz of Germany is a Boomer, but Giorgia Meloni, Justin Trudeau, Pedro Sanchez, and even our favourite Gen-Xer Volodymyr Zelenskyy, were all born in the 70s. 

Somehow, America has resisted moving on at every juncture in the last 25 years. They have gone from Bill Clinton being the first Boomer to be POTUS, followed by 2 terms each of Dubya and Obama, 1 term of Trump, and 1 term of Biden; all of them baby Boomers. Flanked by the likes of Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, the Dems look pretty ossified. The Republican leadership in Congress and the Senate on the other hand have added some Gen-X voices voice, but they seem to be the voices of the deranged, like Marjorie Taylor-Greene and Matt Gaetz. Gaetz is in fact a millennial.   

I understand, age is just a number. Paul McCartney is 82 and still touring. When asked about retiring he     quipped "first you retire and then you expire. What am I going to do? sit on the couch and watch Netflix all day?" And he seems mostly fine, but he doesn't run the top job in the Free World. The point is, it's one thing to defy age and keep going - and the Boomer generation of US leadership has gone on for a very long time, but it also can't last forever. These guys are simply getting too old, but America's been in denial about it until this debate. Both sides need to play back the debate to the respective candidates and ask them if they think they really did alright. Maybe they will see the blindingly obvious and step down.   

Wanna Feel Old? 

A couple of days ago, Derek Jeter turned 50. Fifty!

View From The Couch - 27/Jun/2024

Welcome Home Julian Assange

After 5 years of incarceration at HMP Bellmarsh, Julian Assange has struck a plea bargain deal with the Americans, this week. And just like that the long siege was over. The seemingly quiet denouement belied the all-of-government effort Australia put together to work towards the release of Assange. 

In the commentary and articles that have come out in the wake of the Saipan court appearance, this one caught my attention. a six MP delegation consisting of a wide spectrum of Australian politics went to lobby the US Department of Justice. One of them was none other than the Fossil Fool himself Barnaby Joyce.

The delegation raised several issues including freedom of speech, shifting public sentiment in Australia, the US-Australia alliance, and jurisdictional rights.

Senator Whish-Wilson says Mr Joyce played an important role.

"He said, 'I was the deputy PM, I've been the acting PM. I have been the deputy head of the National Security Committee for many years, and I don't agree with what Assange has done. But it was not illegal and this extra-territorial overreach [by the US] is a precedent that cannot stand.'"

Dr Ryan said that the US officials pushed back against their arguments, claiming Assange's freedom was purely a legal matter, not a political one.

It was then that Mr Joyce brought Johnny Depp's dogs into it, raising the infamous case in 2015 when the then-minister for agriculture threatened to euthanise the Hollywood star's pooches — Pistol and Boo — due to quarantine breaches.

Dr Ryan said Mr Joyce suggested to the meeting that political considerations inevitably played a role in these sorts of matters.

"Basically, he said there had been pressure placed on him at the time and if it had been left to him, Pistol, Boo, Johnny, and Amber would be behind bars in Australia."

That's pretty funny. I don't much like Barnaby Joyce but if his lousy-loutish-loony-bin argument of bringing up Johnnie Depp, Amber Heard, and their dogs made the point that all of this was a political consideration over a legal one, then I have too say he was a beautiful broken clock that happy day. He's done good, and Lord knows I never thought I'd write that about Barnaby Joyce. 

The other bit that was amusing was this observation:

Senator Whish-Wilson believed two main issues cut through during the meeting — public opinion in Australia and the impact on the US's reputation globally.

"I was watching when they were suddenly taking notes on a couple of occasions. Firstly, when we raised the issue that the political situation had shifted [in Australia]," he said.

"And also that the Chinese government had commented around [Australian journalist] Cheng Lei's imprisonment … that they were criticising the US saying, 'How can you point the finger at us when you are going after Assange?'"

Dr Ryan also made the point that at a time when Russia, China and other authoritarian nations were locking up journalists, it was not a good look for the US to continue its prosecution of Assange.

"I'd taken some Chinese newspapers with me. And I said, 'Look, here's evidence in the Chinese press where this case has been used as an example of the US not respecting freedom of the press,'" she said.

"In the Chinese media's perception, there was a degree of hypocrisy in the US accusing China of that sort of action. They were really surprised by that."

You can just picture the DOJ representatives squirming in their chairs. I guess the important thing was to remind the DOJ that at the end of the day they were running point for a political consideration that had run its course. The politics surrounding Julian Assange had simply changed vastly, as had Australian politics. 

"It would be fair to say within that hyper-partisan environment, they didn't know what to make of this group of assorted Australian politicians who on paper had so much that divided them, that were all pushing for this same outcome, and all prized Julian's freedom."

"Mate, it's just a point of fairness", I can hear somebody say. 

Why Blog About This Today?

Back in the glory days of Julian Assange telling truth to power by telling the world of their misdeeds and  before his situation blew up, he made the remark that blogs are useless. Bloggers, are mostly only talking to their friends. They make no impact on the world. And it always stuck with me because by then this blog here was a few years old. 

First of all, he's right. 

Secondly, he sure made an impact because what he did got the entire US government to come for his head. Yours truly over here's been noting stuff down that amuses him over the decades and here we are - no impact, no substance, no importance - but I don't regret this. 

Thirdly, I just wanted to write how, as useless as my blog has been, I'm still here and I have enjoyed my freedom for the last 12 years so go suck on that pal. But I'm delighted he's been released. That much is true. 

Where Have I Been For The Last 8 Months?

Hard to say. The usual rabbit holes of Youtube and all that it entails, I would say. Work has been exhausting too. New years came and went and all I did was make a 1/24 scale plastic model of a 1970 Pontiac Firebird. Easter was spent doing things I didn't expect to do and then recovering from it. I haven't managed to do a whole lot of recordings, but my band WhatEva did manage to play a bunch of gigs.  

As for the Youtube thing, what have I learned? Putin's Russia is deeply, deeply fucked up. If this war in Ukraine keeps going, Russia may even disintegrate - and then we'll really be in a world of pain.