Friday Newsletter

Of threats, Trumps and toilets, plus: The Kinks, the Stones and Norah Jones.

Greetings at the close of our first week to all of the new subscribers and a note to guests that you can subscribe for free right now, button down below. Yes, you will receive newsletters this weekend when “longer form” pieces will appear. Now, to kick off today, as we face a few scary days ahead (and then a new era and maybe some relief) here is one of my favorite performances from the old Letterman show, from Joe Arthur, during the heyday of Occupy Wall Street, when we met down at Zuccotti Park. “Travel as equals…or not at all.” Plus: The Stones, and Norah Jones meets “Strangers.”

Politics and Media Notes

New this morning: Federal prosecutors offered the most chilling description yet of rioters who seized the Capitol, writing in a new court filing that the intention was “to capture and assassinate elected officials.” And fresh info on how they got dangerously close to Pence. Plus a great New Yorker long form piece just posted from someone who was inside the insurrection.

If you somehow missed what has to be the Correction of the Year (so far): CNN had to admit in reporting on how members of Congress acted during the assault on the Capitol, “A previous version of this story misstated that Rep. Ted Lieu grabbed a crowbar before leaving his office. He grabbed a ProBar energy bar.”

And Headline of the Day from Vice: “The Guy Who Flew a Confederate Flag in the Capitol Has Predictably Surrendered.” And I love the people who try to cancel an election result now crying about “cancel culture." Pathetic, moronic, and I'd say laughable--but hard to laugh about. Also no laughing matter: With Covid-19 deaths now averaging close to 4000 per day, Gov. Northam of Virginia offers another horrific cost of the “Insurgency of the Dunces” last week on Capitol Hill: the state’s National Guard troops so urgently needed to set up massive vaccination efforts are instead defending the D.C.—from fellow Americans.

Meanwhile, Joan Walsh, friend, comments: “I'm sad that Cornel West is trying to equate ‘neoliberals’ with the people who murdered folks in the Capitol this last week. FFS. I remember when he was prophetic. This is terrifying.” Why the surprise? He was a leading Jill Stein surrogate and therefore helped elect Trump, without a word of even semi-apology since.

A tweeted warning from AOC: “FYI, there is (yet another) viral misinformation campaign going on, this time a false tweet that’s been photoshopped to look like I sent out a call for a ‘purge.’ Unsurprisingly it’s circulating like wildfire on FB & Twitter. This is one way death threats & targeting ramp up.”

And so the Ivanka-Jared reign ends with the couple being accused of not letting Secret Service agents near their toilets, and today trying to deny it: A true Friday news dump. Watch Stephen Colbert’s mockery here. CNN, meanwhile, reports that Ken ‘n Barbie are “in a bit of a panic” about their future. Now they know how we’ve felt, every day, for the past four years. Colbert: “I do understand the Kushners’ toilets might be very busy right now with Jared and Ivanka flushing their social lives and political futures down them.”

After former football coach and new Alabama Sen. Tommy Turbeville suggested that Biden’s inaugural be delayed until we get a better handle on Covid, Jeff Greenfield tweeted: “A prominent newspaper called Tuberville ‘dumb as a bag of hammers.’ A Bag of Hammers is suing for defamation.” How stupid is he? If the impeachment vote in the Senate comes down to a 50-50 vote he will probably rub his hands and exclaim, “Oh, boy, overtime, who gets the ball?” Another writer, Chase Mitchell, observed, “You know that loophole where your high school's football coach also had to teach a class? Tommy Tuberville is what happens when you make that guy a fucking Senator.”

Well, let’s pause for a moment to celebrate “It’s all over now” for the “out of time” Trumps.

What a year for The Intercept. First co-founder Glenn Greenwald pulled a snit over editing of his pieces and fled to Substack. Now another founder, award-winning film director Laura Poitras, has been fired. She says it was in retaliation for speaking to the media about the organization’s failure to protect a source, Reality Winner, who is now serving five years in prison for leaking confidential intelligence documents to the Intercept. Later Thursday, First Look, the parent company, issued a statement that Poitras had “not been active in any capacity with our company for more than two years.” Poitras denied this, saying she had been working on several films, and stated:

Journalists make mistakes, sometimes with serious consequences. What is alarming about this case is the multitude of mistakes, the egregious disregard for source protection, and the mishandling of an internal review that ended with a cover-up. It goes without saying that no one should participate in an investigation into themselves, yet this is what happened at The Intercept

This is “only” sports, but let’s note here that my “team,” the long-wayward Jets, just hired the first Arab-American (Lebanese) and Muslim head coach in NFL history, Robert Saleh, the defensive coordinator of the 49ers. To him we say: Ahlan!

There have been so many once-rare federal executions under Trump—and the Trump Court—in the past month they are now slipping by with few even noticing, so let’s notice last night’s here. One more set to die today, making it 13 in the past six months after a long ban on state murder at the federal level. Biden has indicated he will put a stop to this, revealing again the unequal treatment under the law—in these cases, a killing.

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In a lengthy interview with the NY Times today, my man, Sen. Sherrod Brown, claims progressives are going to be “pretty happy” with Joe Biden. Brown is taking over as chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, and before you yawn check out his plans. And Bernie running Budget!

Those reading this page as subscribers (hint, hint) may have noticed a new photo strip across the top with a mysterious photo of five gents hiding their faces with balloons labeled with the sentiment “Peace.” First person to identify them wins a free subscription….oh, wait, all of the subscriptions are free already. Well, I will at least name and honor you here, so offers your guess in the Comments section. Here’s what it looks like:

Film

Have loved many a French movie and series, so we tried the much-hailed Lupin this week, and gave up after one episode. Lead character’s back story is unusual and interesting, but the theft plot was even more farfetched than Oceans Eleven. Pass.

On the other hand, we caught One Night in Miami last night as it dropped early at Amazon, and thought it was great (despite qualms about portrayal of Sam Cooke’s music until the very end). And speaking of the Stones: There’s even a discussion in the film about Sam handing Bobby Womack’s “It’s All Over Now” to Mick and Keith. Full take coming here this weekend. In any event, that film belatedly joins my Ten Best list for the past year, where I had conveniently left three spots open for late bloomers. So here is the current list, which still awaits, say, Nomadland, Minari, and News of the World—or the new doc (dropping at Apple today) on the FBI vs. MLK and controversy over release of the bureau’s tapes on his alleged affairs.  

Beanpole, Mangrove, The Assistant, Collective (doc), One Night in Miami, Never Rarely Sometimes Always, Beyond the Visible: Hilma af Klint (doc), The Outpost

Very Interesting if flawed:  The Sound of Metal, Let Him Go, First Cow, Red White and Blue, Time, Totally Under Control, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Mr. Jones, The Forty-Year-Old Version, Athlete A,  Mank,  David Copperfield,  Once Were Brothers, Billie, Zappa.

Song of the Day

On this day in 1972, “American Pie” hit #1 on the Billboard chart. Note: Music did not die.

There’s a new re-issue package for the blessed 50th anniversary of The Kinks’ career comeback single “Lola” and Lola vs. Powerman album. I was a charter member of the so-called Kinks Kult in the ‘60s as their sales sank, culminating in their greatest if least popular album Arthur in 1969. Banned for a time from the U.S. for reasons I can’t recall, Ray Davies came up with possibly transgender “Lola” to bring them back. I finally saw them live at the Fillmore in 1970 and the following year got to interview Ray at length for Crawdaddy, and then again about four years later. You’ve heard “Lola” a hundred times, so here is the lesser known, if still terrific, tune for the same album by sibling Dave Davies, which has been oft-covered but here by Queen Norah at Bonnaroo, no less.

Greg Mitchell is the author of a dozen books, including the bestseller The Tunnels, the current The Beginning or the End, and The Campaign of the Century, which was recently picked by the Wall St. Journal as one of five greatest books ever about an election. He won more than a dozen awards as editor of Editor & Publisher magazine and for all of the 1970s he was the #2 editor at the legendary Crawdaddy. This year he wrote and directed his first film feature, Atomic Cover-up.