After I finished the shockingly short Original Sin, President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson, I felt like I needed to read a real book about real journalism from someone who writes things down for a living, so I downloaded She Said. I’m 2/3rds through the book now. I am pretty sure it’s my second reading of at least the middle part, because when you cry thinking about Ashley Judd’s bravery it sticks with you. The biggest difference other than length and overall quality between the two books is that She Said is exhaustively sourced and FAF (forthcoming as fuck) with the citations, where Original Sin is very much giving “trust me, bro.” Which is not to say I don’t believe Tapper and Thompson’s account of what happened with the disastrous 2024 Biden run for president. It’s credible and like I said, pretty short. But also, a book written by women about other women accusing men of wrongdoing has to have a glossary of verifiable sources as thick as the book itself. If you’re Jake Tapper accusing democrats of things you can kinda just yell in all caps for a while and it slaps.
I am in a hotel room in NY as I write this, to update you about where I have gone to and why this Newsletter is so late again, but I promise they will become more regular soon. I have a writing deadline that has been imposed upon me meanly by my managers (because I asked them to), so I will have very little choice but to write other things and procrastinate on that until the very last second. Anyway, Garret’s tour is going so well and I am so proud of him. He’s been unable to sleep pretty much the entire tour because he can’t sleep in the bunk beds on the bus because it’s like a loud coffin. I’m sorry, that sounds amazing, and I would like to try it at least once. But anyway, everyone on the tour has started or taken up vaping again except Matt who might use the occasional zynn or just jokes about it on stage, who can know. The man is a delightful enigma and we love him. But I have resisted. No vape for me! Be proud of me! You are all my dad!
You might be wondering why I would read a book about the 2024 presidential election instead of the dressing they put on papaya salad into my eyes. I will tell you this: I am still pissed at Jill Biden. I don’t know why, but Jill Biden is who my brain wants to blame for this. Maybe it’s internalized misogyny (it is!!!), maybe it’s because the whole thing reeks of al-anon. I really wanted to know who ELSE I am supposed to be mad at, and I knew this book would point me in the right direction. After the cataclysmically poor decision by almost every member of the Democratic Party to allow Joe Biden to kneecap our democracy, I feel like at the very least we deserve a forensic analysis of what the fuck went down. So let me spill the tea so that when you see this book in the airport book shop you will know what’s in it.
Two word summation: power corrupts. Four word summation: Power Corrupts…Old Testament. Biden, at a very advanced age, became convinced that he could become president again because somebody lied to him several times and told him he is hot, fly etc. and he is nothing of the sort. There is some excuse for this on Biden’s part: his mind was turning into oatmeal and not the steel-cut kind. Like many old people in this position, he really didn’t want or was unable to admit that he was losing acuity. There was a pretty shocking and convincing description of cognitive decline going all the way back to before he took office in 2020. Partially this seems due to Hunter being a fucking nightmare. Before I read the book, I thought Hunter Biden was a troubled addict that was doing his best to rectify the wreckage of his past. Upon further consideration, it seems like he might actually be the Roman character from Succession. Delusional and damaged and sad, but narcissistic enough to think he’s the main character of the entire nation. How have I not dated him?
It all adds up. If you credit the chips act and the other accomplishments of the first term to the advisors and staff that were later shut out of the inner circle, you begin to understand how the catastrophic failures in foreign policy later took place. By the time October 7th rolled around, Biden was more or less withdrawn from foreign policy negotiations. Genocide Joe? I mean, yeah, in the sense that he was worrying-about-his-asshole-son-instead-of-holding-Israel-accountable-Joe. Ugh.
I will say this: The Democratic Party is somewhat responsible, but not as much as I thought if the accounts in this book are to be believed. The major, and still totally unforgivable, lapse was that of no one stepping in to challenge Biden when he first announced he was running. That’s on Obama, Pelosi, Jeffries, basically anyone who texts you eight times a day asking for money. It’s on anyone who could have run and is now thinking of running, but declined back in 2022-2023. Also please everyone apologize to Dean Phillips right now. That man did everything he could to get anyone else to run and they all ignored him and then he literally RAN FOR PRESIDENT to get someone else to challenge him and all we got was crickets (my nickname for Marianne Williamson lol). The fact that people made fun of my special Dean Phillips for going against the democratic establishment is like when people fought me on Elon being bad in 2014. I feel like he and I should have some kind of restitution that involves praise and free clothing.
Before any public calls for Biden to step aside, even before the debate, there was pressure from within the Democratic Party to get Biden out. The problem was that no one could reach him. People were writing letters, calling the White House, and no one was able to get to even speak to Biden without going through one of like four people. I mean the man does not text. This is where I get to Jill Biden. Jill, I KNOW you text, so fuck you all the way off. But even more than Jill, fuck Mike Donilon. What a dumb spelling of Donaughlan. Mike Donilononon was chief campaign strategist and a longtime trusted (overpaid) Biden advisor. Other people who had access were Anthony Bernal, chief of staff to Jill Biden, Steve Richetti, chief of staff after 2023 and Bruce Reed, deputy chief of staff. And that’s it. Besides a few other people such as Ron Klain and Annie Thomasini, this was the handful of people that were with Biden daily and keeping everyone else at bay. And, I am sorry, but Joe Biden is alive during all this, so fuck him too. It’s not Weekend at Bernies. Fine, maybe no one is showing you polls and you’re being fooled into thinking you’re ahead because you’re an out of touch 80 year old person whose trauma has caught up with him. But why, for the love of whatever people love in Delaware, do you not think at any point, “Hey, been a while since I had a conversation with a single member of my caucus that wasn’t one of my four advisers. What’s that about?” It’s a horrifying combination of the ravages of time, hubris, and elder abuse. It also cost us the country. So, we better get a movie out of this and it better be starring Bryan Cranston. We deserve nothing less.
Promethius
***As a bonus here are the notes I took while watching Prometheus on a plane. You can read it as a poem or re-watch Prometheus (only if you can’t sleep though!) and follow along to see when you have the same thoughts.***
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Peter Wayland in a Dr Evil costume and he has a tiny dog with him why would he choose to do the broadcast with the dog what was the calculation there.
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“God does not build in straight lines.” What about crystals you absolute mongoose
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Noomi can doomi no wrong
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37:13
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“I’m a geologist. I like rocks. I LOVE rocks.” And I’m an adult, and I like when dialogue doesn’t sound like it was written by a toddler. In fact I LOVE it.
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Noomi wants a baby because of course.
