Everyone in media is having a ton of fun trashing the Melania documentary. It’s reported that the film cost Jeff Bezos $75 million to make and $35 million to promote. It has also been widely reported that nobody is buying tickets. A TPM writer watched the film “so you don’t have to,” and wrote,
At the concession stand, I noticed they were selling large commemorative popcorn buckets emblazoned with Melania’s face. It’s part of a massive marketing campaign that brought a distinctly fascistic flavor to city streets, with billboards featuring the first lady’s portrait looming over street corners. Yet, at my screening, this effort to cultivate a cult of personality wasn’t quite taking. When I asked the two women selling snacks if anyone had bought the buckets, I received an emphatic response.
“No — and I hope not,” one of them said,
Meanwhile Bezos is laying people off at Amazon. I understand Amazon Prime deliveries are getting a bit slower. Lots of Prime items no longer offer free two-day delivery. Four to five days is the norm. Note also that the film has a single digit rating on Rotten Tomatoes. But the accompanying reviews are hilarious.
Regarding yesterday’s Epstein document dump — what was redacted, and what wasn’t? The names of alleged co-conspirators were redacted, which is kind of infuriating considering that exposing these people was the whole point. I’m reading the FBI has identified ten co-conspirators, but we still don’t know who they are. Likewise, the names of some federal prosecutors and law enforcement officers were redacted. According to this very helpful Time magazine article, some of these records date to the late 2000s, “when then-U.S. Attorney Alex Acosta approved a controversial deal that shielded Epstein from federal charges related to allegations of sexual abuse and sex trafficking of minors in Florida in exchange for a guilty plea to state charges.” But Acosta’s name was not redacted.
On the other hand, names of several of the survivors were not redacted. “One survivor, who had identified herself anonymously as “Jane Doe”, told CNN that she has received numerous unsolicited phone calls since her identity was revealed Friday,” per the Time article linked above.
A whole lot of people closely associated with the Trump Administration are named in the files, including Elon Musk. Another is Kevin Warsh, who just got named to be the new fed chair, and Brett Ratner, who directed the Melania movie. I don’t believe the files implicate anything about these people.
Election interference. Nothing worries me more than what Trump might do to interfere with the midterm elections. The New York Times has a good overview of the threat and how to address it.
Documentary is too kind. Informercial is closer but no one seems to be buying whatever the product is. The market is really flooded with hate products of late. Have we reached market saturation on hate-ware? Is that the problem? I was thinking ICE goon bobbleheads could be a hot product, but this Melania fail makes me wary without even the tariff problem. I guess we just don't have the killer product everyone wanted.
How about picking up those unused popcorn buckets cheap and turning them into dart board accessories? That could work.
Documentary is too kind. Informercial is closer but no one seems to be buying whatever the product is. The market is really flooded with hate products of late. Have we reached market saturation on hate-ware? Is that the problem? I was thinking ICE goon bobbleheads could be a hot product, but this Melania fail makes me wary without even the tariff problem. I guess we just don't have the killer product everyone wanted.
How about picking up those unused popcorn buckets cheap and turning them into dart board accessories? That could work.
Melania has her own vanity issues. She won't handle this well. Hopefully, she'll go to NY or wherever she goes to spend money and avoid Donald.
Trump has a problem with Congress, especially the House, and the DHS bill will go back to the House next week. The GOP majority is razor-thin. The deal is a two-week funding extension to give both sides the chance to haggle over standards for ICE, like no face coverings and no arrests of citizens. ICE has no jurisdiction over elections – that's where the election will surface in the form of voter intimidation.
Some Democrats in Congress know that confining ICE to what they are empowered to do according to their charter, or whatever you call the rules they were created under, will end ICE as the Gestapo Miller envisions. DHS would be down for a long time if the GOP balks at constraints. Voter sympathy for ICE is pretty thin.
"It’s reported that the film cost Jeff Bezos $75 million to make and $35 million to promote"
Yeah they had to pay Mel 40 million for the rights so nothing untoward there just the first lady taking 40 million from the owner owner of the largest retail operation in the world and the owner of the Washington Post. It's all on the up and up!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v661fPA15Vg&list=RDv661fPA15Vg&start_radio=1
Melania is just another grifter. It's all they know. The movie shows what a putz Bezos is.
If you remember Scott McKenzie's "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Some Flowers in Your Hair)", or even if you don't, you might like the Marsh family's adaptation, Minnesota.
It moves me more than Springsteen's anthem, but then my home is in the 1960s, not particularly the decade that followed.
Floods usually don't backfire because people do not usually cause floods to happen. Only a fool would blow up a dam from the wrong side of the spillway. Ezra Kline today writes this is exactly what the current administration has done with their flood the zone tactic. They are overwhelmed by the flood they created. The cons have conned themselves.
Ezra sees it but does the administration know the cause of its current foot pain are self-inflicted? Are they going to stop shooting themselves in the foot? Do they even know they overwhelmed themselves with their own strategy?
Opinion | Trump Has Overwhelmed Himself – The New York Times
It does not help that Ezra ends with this foreboding paragraph.
Kind of reminds one of an old Ronald Regan quote.
The dynamic is a paradox. ICE is predicated on the idea that 20,000+ secret police in masks with military gear and unlimited license to kill and/or maim can drive into submission a freedom-loving population of 350 million. A significant portion of the population is appalled at the brutality essential to maintain a control ratio of one ICE Nazi to every 17,500 citizens. See the problem? They do.
The more people they kill, the more energized the opposition. If you actually turn ICE into a kinder, gentler force that leaves law-abiding immigrants alone, you no longer have a government-run domestic terrorist organization. Trump is trying to change the perception outtside Minniapolis that ICE isn't stalking kids at Elementary Schools. (They still are.) That they are not sparying mace in the faces of protesters. (They still are.)
Trump wants ICE to operate without acountablity – that's the promise behind the masks. The federal government will give you immunity and a pardon. The states will not know who you are. That will get tested in the next two weeks, I don't think Trump will conceed the need for ICE to be accountable to the states they operate in, But how will the issue fly with voters in November?
On Tuesday I was watching a Democrat Senate+House subgroup "Forum" (not technically a congressional "hearing"). Several people shared their direct experiences of what is occurring in Minneapolis. I found it riveting. I found the video record on CSPAN and clipped out the oral witness statement of a Ms. Rahman, who is autistic and a sufferer of traumatic brain injury. I find her story a strong and deeply personal expression of how epically wrong these so called "law enforcement" practices are. I extracted a clip of her portion of the proceedings. Please take a look. Every American should hear this story. (I hope the clip lasts at least a day or two).
https://www.c-span.org/clip/public-affairs-event/user-clip-rahman-detention-story/5191939