Wow, Vance is really quick on his feet, he's got the rap, that's for sure. I love how he pointed out that Harris hasn't sat down for any interviews at all-- she's like the Wizard of Oz, maintaining an aura in front of rallies, but is nothing when the curtain is pulled aside.
But I couldn't be a pol: like when the lib interviewer asked Vance about a Texas woman who supposedly can't legally get an abortion, Vance had to pretend that his heart breaks for her--- I'd have said something like, "I'm running for Veep, you want me to get involved with everyone's household problems? She's got a brain, she'll work it out somehow. We're not living in an ep of The Handmaid's Tale, there's gotta be a lot of abortion support personnel in her community. What, do I need to go meet her to help her open a Facebook account? She's living in Texas, not the mountains of Afghansitan. Kee-ryess...."
"I love how he pointed out that Harris hasn't sat down for any interviews at all-- she's like the Wizard of Oz, maintaining an aura in front of rallies, but is nothing when the curtain is pulled aside."
This is a bad point to raise, because Trump is the exact same way. If you put him on stage at a rally, he performs really well. In an interview, he tends to come across as a mess. I wouldn't have gone there.
I don't like Vance: I think Vance is a huge liability for the Republicans. He has a high school student's understanding of the world, not a man's. And he does come across as a weirdo. He has almost an incel vibe, I don't know how else to explain it. He's creepy.
Take his obsession with natalism/babies and his 'thought experiment' that parents should have more votes. One, it's alienating to anyone who doesn't have kids and Trump needs those votes. Two, having a child doesn't guarantee someone actually does 'care about the future.' A lot of crackheads have kids. Should their vote count for more than say, Dave's? Ann Coulter's? Like I said, he has a high school student's understanding of the world, not a man's.
I would take any legal aid/public defender type lawyer over Vance as a VP candidate, because they at least understand human nature. They at least understand how wily and unexpected people are. Vance comes across as oddly naive and I don't think he's a winner for this ticket.
Trump needs working-class whites; people who don't have college degrees. That's how he won in 2016. He wrote a book exposing his family problems, when the #1 rule of a white trash family is be loyal/don't air the family's dirty laundry.
His wife keeps having to make excuses about his 'jokes' that offend people. It's sad. Vance is like the kid you went to high school with who did bird calls to try and impress girls and couldn't get laid. That kid eventually ends up married to some sad Asian woman who's always making excuses for him. "No, he's kidding. Hahaha. No, he really is a good person. No, don't worry about me he's really not mean to me. Hahaha." That's who Vance reminds me of.
This guy's a liability, he's a liability, he's a liability...he's a liability. I know Ann Coulter is mostly high on him but even she's clocked the weirdness of the natalism thing. It is off-putting to voters.
And I'll be honest with you, Vance is wrong about the natalism thing. If he was smart he would drop it. If Trump was smart, he'd order him to shut up about it. I was raised Catholic. I have an aunt with 10 kids. She was constantly overwhelmed.
My aunt and her husband were kind of able to afford their family, they owned their home. But they couldn't afford help, which they badly needed. They relied on people like me and my sister to help them for free. But they never thanked us. They aren't smart about how they treat people; they don't have self-awareness. They were prolific parents but not good ones. They didn't raise their kids very well; their kids mostly problems not assets to society.
My aunt & uncle are spending their golden years, saying they can't afford to keep sending their kids money, asking them to stop having babies - trying basically to undo all the trad bullshit they instilled in them for years. I know at least 2 of their grandkids have tried to get legally emancipated so they can get away from their irresponsible parents without landing in the CPS/group home system. (It hasn't occurred to their grandparents to take them in, because these are not nice or considerate people. Just very fertile ones. They don't really care if their grandkids end up in the system.)
One of my cousins became a Catholic priest; no kids. He's the one who has set up some kind of college fund for these like, neglected feral nieces and nephews of his. This is the *exact opposite* of what Vance is suggesting. In my family, the celibate guy who's never been married is the only one thinking about the future of any of these kids. The parents? I don't know what their deal is, but they don't seem to be thinking about anything.
Vance is a PROBLEM.
I don't "get" him. I graduated from what's regarded as one of the best universities in the world. I'm technically still Catholic. I have a trashy white family and it was difficult for me to establish myself. I should be the natural voter for this guy but all I see is red flags.
I don't think the voters Vance is meant to appeal to like him; I think Trump should find a way to ditch him while he still can.
As the husband of a sad Asian woman (happy before I married her) with no kids, I approve this message. Still, I'd vote for Vance if he was on the top of the ticket.
He's a terrible candidate. He can't think. He is classroom smart not real world smart. He would be as bad as Jimmy Carter because he's just as idealistic. He has no sense.
ETA: probably worse than Carter; Carter is a nuclear engineer. Like Carter, Vance is not that smart in real-world terms. Cutesy philosophies do not equal real life. In politics, I would take anyone who'd been a law guardian for kids in foster care over any Yale lawyer. Guys like Vance actually are not equipped to be good presidents; he doesn't understand human nature. He's equipped to have a narrow specialty at a fancy law firm, but not to do anything with actually important consequences.
"You ‘would take any legal aid/public defender type lawyer over Vance’—really?" yes, because they operate in the real world. They know their clients are scumbags, but the law is adversarial - it's their job to give them zealous representation. They also usually press their clients to take a plea. You're someone who's never met one of them, that's why you don't understand what I'm saying.
The natalism thing is stupid. A lot of idiots who aren't good with kids, or who don't care about their kids, have WAY too many kids. Do you want a legal aid story about this, because I know someone who worked there on the civil side, in Brooklyn. If someone's indigent and has a good reason, Legal Aid will get them a divorce. "Good reason" = someone is pregnant. There are people who are 29, 30, on their 4th marriage with kids strewn across the 5 boroughs. THAT'S who Vance is going to end up bribing with his natalism fuckery.
Not having kids does not mean someone doesn't care about the future; if you don't understand that, you're not very bright. A lot of people - nuns & monks, Buddhists or Christian - specifically DON'T have children. You think, what, St Francis of Assisi and Thich Nhat Hanh didn't do anything for future generations? It's BAD THINKING.
You're linking these stories about Hungary or whatever - yeah, Eastern Europe is kind of a pit and they have a massive brain drain. Smart people in Hungary keep trying to move here, or to Canada.
I used to live in Canada. Do you know about their "baby bonuses"? Widely criticized at the time as a 'bribe for Catholics in Quebec' most of the money went to Saskatchewan.
Why is bribing Saskatchewan and not Quebec a problem, you ask? Well, at that point in time Ontario and Quebec were the engines of Canada's economy. Bribing Quebec and Ontario would be bribing a bunch of people who made cigarettes, school buses, worked in steel mills, all kinds of things. Saskatchewan was mostly full of subsistence farmer types, First Nations/Metis people with a lot of problems like alcoholism and paint huffing, and religious weirdos like the Dukobhors. Exactly the wrong people to bribe into having a bunch of babies they can't really afford.
None of these programs ever work the way the people who create them think they will. Countries that have them are always brain drain countries (all the good Canadian doctors and engineers come here; the money's better). They are never American type countries. It's bad thinking. It's grade school student thinking, not adult thinking. Grow up.
By the way- I've been telling people that chimp story for years... most people have no idea of how bad a chimp can fuck a dude up, but they will literally rip-off, everything that can be ripped off! That guy, after the attack, was practically a vegetable!
So True Mike!! I started looking into this stuff w/ the chimp attack in CT- back in... whenever! It was so horrifying! We humans have a real problem w/ projecting ourselves on to other creatures and not recognizing that they have their own MO, and don't really need to be having their 5 o'clock somewhere martinis w/ the fam! The story about the dude w/ the birthday cake was horrific. I have been off chimps ever since!
In that documentary about Al Adamson, they cover his last movie which was supposed to be a children's film about a talking chimp; Al being Al, he hired a really old chimp for cheap, not knowing that the oldest chimps are the most violent. The chimp going batshit on this crappy Z-level set must've looked like the last days of the Biden Administration.
Speaking of talking chimps, your post reminds me of the Lancelot Link:Secret Chimp show (which sucked!) that became part of America's Saturday morning cartoon lineup in 1970-71. Even as a dumb 10-year-old kid I couldn't stand it; thankfully this chimpanzee show was short lived.
Now, thinking back, I wonder how much trouble the production team had using all those chimps as "actors." I guess nobody got their face ripped off during filming otherwise I'd have heard about it.
The trick is to only use very young chimps. When they're "kids," they're playful and easy to work with. They begin to get aggressive as teens (the males especially), and once they get big enough to rip a man's arm off, you need to steer clear.
I guess it would be considered unethical for Hollywood animal handlers to keep the pre-teen chimps playful, easy to work with, and profitable by giving them puberty blockers before their hormones start raging.
Dave, why not a piece on films for The New Criterion? Roger Kimball would love to throw you some paid work because of how you've been suppressed. I searched the mag's website for "cinema", and found articles on Bergman, Lanzmann, Hitchcock et al. TNC is too highbrow to go for a piece on zombie films, but you must have a passion or two for some of the classic filmmakers.
Or maybe a piece on L.A. as portrayed in films over the decades, with either a focus on or outside of the movie business.
Or a piece on L.A. (or California) politics and how they've transformed over the decades. Maybe use the rise of Kamala as the opening gambit to your exploration.
Send Kimball an email, he loves to buck the cultural tide (e.g., by recently hiring Woody Allen to write a short story for TNC)-- or ask Ann to tawk to him, I know she knows how to reach him!
Reading TWTP just hasn't been the same for me ever since Trump was almost assassinated by Elephant Man. I know it's been almost a month, but it still feels fresh. All the fake blood and plastic Halloween bones in a Pennsylvania field -- it reminds me of that tragedy.
FWIW, those of you who appreciate Ol Dave's columns on Takimag can give Takimag likes on X, Mr. Musk's platform - but only after you buy a brotha a few beers!
Hi Dave, hope you're doing well in this heat. I was reading through "The Sexy Issue" Feb 1982 of the Lampoon when I saw the "Children's Letters to Penthouse Forum" and couldn't help thinking that you would find that funny, as I'm sure you have already being a fan. The best is the one that opens "I've been a Forum reader ever since my dad put his Penthouses in a drawer I could reach." Fucking hysterical! I sometimes think that some of the funniest issues were from the early 80's rather than the 70's but actually that entire decade and change was great.
I agree with you. I think '79 through '83 were golden years for the magazine. With the counterculture/hippie era over, the writers tended to get more creative and expansive in what they lampooned.
I'm trying to find online a list of the mag's editors throughout the years, can't find one. It looks as if Tony Hendra edited from 1971-75, then he co-edited with Sean Kelly until 1978, then P.J. O'Rourke edited from 1978-81--- although it appears that perhaps lines of authority weren't clearly drawn, which makes sense given that the mag embodied chaos....
My friend Shary Flenniken, mainly NatLamp's cartoonist (Trots & Bonnie), edited briefly in '79/81. I've interviewed her several times for my column over the years. In one form or another, Shary was with the mag from '72 to '90.
I was so fucking pissed because she rarely gets to L.A. (she lives up in Washington State), but she was coming to L.A. for a book tour in 2020 for her Trots & Bonnie retrospective. I was gonna get a whole week with her. Then fucking Covid, and the publisher canceled the tour.
Some guy at YouTube was complaining that her strips celebrate the killing and castration of males--- maybe he should stick to reading Bil Keane's The Family Circus.
Speaking of which, the most reactionary part of any newspaper is the comics page--- the same strips are running now that ran in the 1970s, many of them now drawn by the spawn of the original cartoonists.
Iconoclastic take! I'd swallowed the liberal line that the Hendra years were the summit. Highly recommend Jessica Hendra's book 'How to Cook Your Daughter':
I found this 2015 Hollywood Reporter piece after reading your comment:
P.J. O’Rourke: How I Killed ‘National Lampoon’ (Guest Column)
"It was my fault," only half-jokes the best-selling satirist and former editor of the iconic publication. Now, on the eve of a Lampoon-less 'Vacation' reboot he deems unworthy (a "dump-fill featuring the 'Hangover' wimp"), he explains what went right and very wrong for the once-legendary comedy brand.
By P.J. O’Rourke
A new Vacation movie is scheduled to be released — or allowed to escape — on July 29. To judge by the obvious, pitiful, frenetic, stupid raunchiness of its trailer, it belongs to the genre known as “post-humoristic.”
The movie declares itself to be a remake of National Lampoon’s Vacation, the 1983 classic of obvious, pitiful, frenetic, stupid innocence. But the words “National Lampoon” are never mentioned in the trailer. This is doubtless a relief to those two good souls in Funny Heaven: John Hughes, who wrote the script for the original, and Harold Ramis, who directed it. Yet the absence of the magazine’s name causes pangs of ancient regret to old duffers who held NatLamp dear in the 1970s and early 1980s.
We remember how the publication was a font of youthful nihilism’s dark, ironic genius (albeit with the obvious, pitiful, frenetic and stupid qualities that entails).
We remember how, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the magazine went to hell. National Lampoon now seems damned to the point that its name isn’t even worthy of being attached to a summer cineplex dump-fill featuring the Hangover wimp dentist as leading man and a Chevy Chase cameo.
Sick transit gloria. What a shocking fall for Lampoon‘s shock humor. And it was my fault.
I was editor-in-chief of National Lampoon from 1978 through 1980, when the magazine began sinking. It limped on as a monthly until 1985, but I was one of the last original creators still on board.
The failure was caused by success. From the inaugural issue of National Lampoon in 1970 until he left in 1974, Michael O’Donoghue was the most important influence on its style, tone and content. He went on to become the first head writer for Saturday Night Live. Before becoming the first stars of SNL, John Belushi and Chase starred, alongside Christopher Guest, in the 1972 off-Broadway play National Lampoon Lemmings. Belushi recruited Bill Murray for the 1973-1974 National Lampoon Radio Hour cast, which included Richard Belzer. Murray and fellow Radio Hour performer Gilda Radner starred in the 1975 off-Broadway National Lampoon Show. Hughes started a spectacular career writing for the Lampoon. Ramis started another scripting National Lampoon’s Animal House with NatLamp co-founder Doug Kenney and Chris Miller, author of Lampoon‘s popular Animal House short stories that inspired the 1978 movie.
If you see a pattern, it’s called money. What do you think the proper comparison would be between how much Hughes was paid for writing National Lampoon’s Vacation and how much I paid him for the short story “Vacation ’58,” upon which the movie was based? If you’re thinking chalk and cheese, you like to eat chalk better than John did.
Even in the salad days of magazine publishing, there wasn’t a lot of lettuce on the plate. Playboy used to pay — cue Dr. Evil moment — a dollar a word.
By 1980, talented young writers with youthful nihilism’s dark, ironic genius had as many opportunities as there were Porky’s sequels.
Besides, National Lampoon was never a pleasant place to work. The office was rife with the clubby snits and snubs of its clubby, snitty progenitor, Harvard Lampoon, founded in 1876. Some of the snits were a century old. Plus having a bunch of humorists in one place is like having a bunch of cats in a sack.
As the boss, I had the people skills of Luca Brasi in The Godfather and the business acumen of the fellows who were managing New York’s finances in the 1970s (remember the Post‘s headline “FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD”).
The National Lampoon staff was busy sticking it to the man and being alienated, sarcastic, cynical and hip. I had the Squaresville job of making the magazine show a profit. To which task I guess I seemed well-suited. I owned a suit. And I was the only staffer who admitted voting for Gerald Ford.
Therefore, when Squaresville things happened, I got to deal with them. For example, National Lampoon published an illustration of Mick Jagger performing fellatio on a microphone. This depiction — drawn with perhaps too much vigor — appeared opposite a full-page ad by one of the few companies willing to advertise in the National Lampoon. It was a Japanese manufacturer of turntables, amplifiers, speakers and microphones.
I got to visit the American headquarters of the Japanese corporation and talk to three senior Japanese executives.
Me: “What makes the illustration funny is the Freudian nature of a performing artist who casts himself in a phallic role, subconsciously overcompensating by utilizing an actually phallic object in his performance.”
Japanese executives: Silence.
Me: “You see, Mick Jagger’s persona is that of a subject for sex objectification by women. Yet the intense narcissism of his presented behavior is such as to cast doubts upon his own heterosexual orientation.”
Japanese executives: Silence.
Me: “So, in order to make a humorous point concerning this psychological paradox, we exhibited the musician in a symbolic situation in which his libido is manifested mechanically rather than biologically. Mechanical representations of biological functions being one of the root sources of mirth according to Laughter, an Essay on the Meaning of the Comic by 19th century French philosopher Henri Bergson.”
Japanese executives: Total silence.
There are those who say that National Lampoon “changed the face of American humor.” It certainly put some wrinkles on mine. We published our last issue in November 1998.
What was so much fun about the original National Lampoon’s Vacation was its maniacal expression of the love-and-hate relationship between weird hip sensibilities (Hughes) and even weirder normal middle-class values (Clark Griswold).
That kind of fun can’t be had in the 21st century, where there are no normal middle-class values, all the Clark Griswolds are alienated, sarcastic and cynical, and every suburban schlub is a font of nihilism’s dark, ironic genius.
Once, there was “If You Don’t Buy This Magazine We’ll Kill This Dog” — the January 1973 cover line by actor, comedian and erstwhile National Lampoon contributing editor Ed Bluestone. This was in the days before Photoshop, and the cover shoot wasn’t going well. The dog was a professional model. Like Kate Moss, it sat perfectly still with a blank expression. Finally Lampoon‘s art director Michael Gross had the idea of standing off-camera behind the dog’s trainer (who was holding the gun) and shouting the dog’s name. Hence the perfect pathos of the dog’s sidelong glance.
Now, it’s a totally different world. It’s “If You Don’t Buy a Ticket to This Crappy Movie, We’ll Go Watch Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation in the Theater Next Door.”
Yeah, it's great for me too, I can check out the issues you mentioned without shelling out $20 to ebay sellers! Joe Queenan wrote a great essay about thrifty people in the book 'The Seven Deadly Virtues', I tried to find it online but couldn't.....
Once more Dave brought tears to my eyes. Not that kind of tears . . . the kind you get from laughin' so damn hard you almost passed out !!! Dave, seriously dude, how in hell did you cause the 5.1 earthquake a couple of weeks ago near Hermleigh, Texas? July 26 at 09:30 I was peacefully lying in my bed staring at the ceiling, and the whole fucking word started rattling, WTF !?! I don't get no oil royalty check, but Dave does, now I have seismic activity 120 miles away rattling my house. Oh, and one more thang Dave, you said, quote: "But as Asians lack dimorphism, trying to figure out the men from the women is like trying to guess the orchard from the applesauce." I don't believe you should be sayin' that, at least in the case of the Mongols there's some serious sexual dimorphism, I ain't lyin', see fer yerselves y'all : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgjF4go1-3Y
The other me should not have accused you of the earthquake transfer. That dastardly act was surely the work of the arch villan Elon, who else could have done it?
Next time I fly Frontier I hope that pilot is in the jump seat (I don't want him actually flying the plane) so when someone lays they seat back in my face, Tyronius can slap a mofo upside the head.
Has anyone looked at the 2016 book Easy Meat: Inside Britain's Grooming Gang Scandal, by Peter McLoughlin? I can't find it for sale at Amazon or abebooks, though there are some copies at ebay for around $30 each. Derb mentioned it on the Aug. 9th ep of Radio Derb:
Liked your Takimag piece on relatability vs whatever's happening in the Republican Party right now. And your mom's observation on Limbaugh. I think he was great entertainment, in the same way some Fox anchors can be funny at times, but people have no critical thinking around that stuff.
I know you've worked in casting - Obama has a lot of warmth and comes across as intelligent. When you compare him to Romney - like if you were casting a commercial, you'd always take Obama over Romney. Romney isn't bad, he just isn't as likable as Obama. It's pretty easy to see why Obama won. (I think it's also possible the Mormon thing hurt Romney).
Trump is a mess and I think Vance was a terrible, TERRIBLE VP pick. I was raised Catholic, 12 years in Catholic school, I only know like one person from HS who still goes to mass. Picking this weird guy who converted into the most pedo-friendly organization in the world was a bizarre choice. He's also got the natalism obsession, and crypto obsession. Criticizing working women, but his wife was the earner - she's the one who had to ditch a high-powered law job for his VP run. And when he tries to be funny it comes across as creepy instead. I don't think this ticket can win.
Kamala's record is a mess but she'll definitely win unless someone stable - a Romney type - enters the race really last minute. Because at least she's not taking advice from Don Jr and Eric Trump. At least her advisers are pros, even if they're kind of nuts. Walz may be creepily obsessed with China but he's got warmth/relatability, people like him a lot more than anyone else in the race. Again, Walz is the only one in this field you could cast in a commercial and expect to see ROI. Not Don, Kammie, or Vance. There's no way Trump can win this time: that weird interview with Musk has probably sealed his fate.
It sucks, but it's a sucking reality. No one wakes up and say: "Nah, ...I'll vote for Trump this time"
Don, the Jr., Musk, and the rest of MAGA loonies (with the addition of Drag Vance) are as boring as the raising Sun in the morning - paraphrasing some Jew I know.
I'm definitely not voting for the Harris Waltz (I'd rather vote for the Macarena), but whether I vote for Trump-Vance will depend on my mood that day---if I'm in a snarling, Jim Goadish mood I'll vote for them, otherwise I'll vote for the dead bear cub and the bicycle. I do wish that Vance was on the top of the ticket, he does have the rap and the youth (born in 1985!). We need to get the young generations in there so they can fark things up even worse than the boomers they so love to blame for all their troubles.
No Dems for me, ever! My comment was aimed at Team Trump's likeability among swing voters. The Trump ticket offers nothing to make someone change their minds.
Edit: Trump is an egomaniacal tumor, so he picks his friends among his peers.
Speaking of chicks with dicks, I see rumors circulating that Fuentes is into them or maybe they’re into Fuentes. I don’t know all the details. It’d be so funny if it’s true.
If that comical, light-hearted, "trolling" comment is actually from Nick, so what? It's not as if he was pulling his pud to, as you wrote, "chicks with dicks."
In the same vein, I used to view the "Five Pillars of Islam" internet site in England just to trash their pro-Muslim/Islam articles with my comments. Someone could have come along and questioned my affinity to the West, or said I was a budding terrorist, solely based on the number of comments I contributed and the amount of time I spent on that crappy Islamic site.
Slightly off topic: I received a few death threats from outraged "British" Pakistani Muslims over my 5 Pillars of Islam posts about their pedo "prophet," Muslim inbreeding, low IQ, welfare dependance, over-the-top violence, and the Israeli-Arab issue; I provided charts and graphs and links from/to reliable sources proving all my points.
After one of my posts a pissed-off Muzzie replied that he can't wait to put a bullet in my head. I wrote back, laughing at him, and, as an experiment, reported him to Facebook to see what they would do.
Back then, at the height of ISIS, Facebook had been banning me for weeks and months at a time for my non-violent, yet anti-Muslim/Islam, posts and I wanted to see how they'd handle a direct, unambiguous, personal death threat from a Muslim to me.
Facebook's reply was that his writing "I can't wait to put a bullet in your head" did not go against the terms and conditions of Facebook. LOL! I screened grabbed that one and threatened to used it against Facebook later.
As I said, it’s a rumor. Nothing is confirmed. Then again I wouldn’t be surprised if it were. Fuentes is clearly not right in the head when he talks about sex like someone with OCD talks about hygiene. There’s something clearly off about his sexual views.
I don't think there's anything wrong with being kinky, but one should keep one's predilictions to oneself, or air them only in a forum designed for such (like the excellent website FetLife). Otherwise one is like the pathetic Sam Brinton, wearing stolen dresses to diplomatic parties. I read he went in drag to such a party in Paris, all the men in tuxes and he a bald pathetic mess. The French can get their freak on as well as any group, maybe better, but they know about time and place.
Just watched a CNN interview with Vance:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7GiUYYJh7w
Wow, Vance is really quick on his feet, he's got the rap, that's for sure. I love how he pointed out that Harris hasn't sat down for any interviews at all-- she's like the Wizard of Oz, maintaining an aura in front of rallies, but is nothing when the curtain is pulled aside.
But I couldn't be a pol: like when the lib interviewer asked Vance about a Texas woman who supposedly can't legally get an abortion, Vance had to pretend that his heart breaks for her--- I'd have said something like, "I'm running for Veep, you want me to get involved with everyone's household problems? She's got a brain, she'll work it out somehow. We're not living in an ep of The Handmaid's Tale, there's gotta be a lot of abortion support personnel in her community. What, do I need to go meet her to help her open a Facebook account? She's living in Texas, not the mountains of Afghansitan. Kee-ryess...."
"I love how he pointed out that Harris hasn't sat down for any interviews at all-- she's like the Wizard of Oz, maintaining an aura in front of rallies, but is nothing when the curtain is pulled aside."
This is a bad point to raise, because Trump is the exact same way. If you put him on stage at a rally, he performs really well. In an interview, he tends to come across as a mess. I wouldn't have gone there.
I don't like Vance: I think Vance is a huge liability for the Republicans. He has a high school student's understanding of the world, not a man's. And he does come across as a weirdo. He has almost an incel vibe, I don't know how else to explain it. He's creepy.
Take his obsession with natalism/babies and his 'thought experiment' that parents should have more votes. One, it's alienating to anyone who doesn't have kids and Trump needs those votes. Two, having a child doesn't guarantee someone actually does 'care about the future.' A lot of crackheads have kids. Should their vote count for more than say, Dave's? Ann Coulter's? Like I said, he has a high school student's understanding of the world, not a man's.
I would take any legal aid/public defender type lawyer over Vance as a VP candidate, because they at least understand human nature. They at least understand how wily and unexpected people are. Vance comes across as oddly naive and I don't think he's a winner for this ticket.
Trump needs working-class whites; people who don't have college degrees. That's how he won in 2016. He wrote a book exposing his family problems, when the #1 rule of a white trash family is be loyal/don't air the family's dirty laundry.
His wife keeps having to make excuses about his 'jokes' that offend people. It's sad. Vance is like the kid you went to high school with who did bird calls to try and impress girls and couldn't get laid. That kid eventually ends up married to some sad Asian woman who's always making excuses for him. "No, he's kidding. Hahaha. No, he really is a good person. No, don't worry about me he's really not mean to me. Hahaha." That's who Vance reminds me of.
This guy's a liability, he's a liability, he's a liability...he's a liability. I know Ann Coulter is mostly high on him but even she's clocked the weirdness of the natalism thing. It is off-putting to voters.
And I'll be honest with you, Vance is wrong about the natalism thing. If he was smart he would drop it. If Trump was smart, he'd order him to shut up about it. I was raised Catholic. I have an aunt with 10 kids. She was constantly overwhelmed.
My aunt and her husband were kind of able to afford their family, they owned their home. But they couldn't afford help, which they badly needed. They relied on people like me and my sister to help them for free. But they never thanked us. They aren't smart about how they treat people; they don't have self-awareness. They were prolific parents but not good ones. They didn't raise their kids very well; their kids mostly problems not assets to society.
My aunt & uncle are spending their golden years, saying they can't afford to keep sending their kids money, asking them to stop having babies - trying basically to undo all the trad bullshit they instilled in them for years. I know at least 2 of their grandkids have tried to get legally emancipated so they can get away from their irresponsible parents without landing in the CPS/group home system. (It hasn't occurred to their grandparents to take them in, because these are not nice or considerate people. Just very fertile ones. They don't really care if their grandkids end up in the system.)
One of my cousins became a Catholic priest; no kids. He's the one who has set up some kind of college fund for these like, neglected feral nieces and nephews of his. This is the *exact opposite* of what Vance is suggesting. In my family, the celibate guy who's never been married is the only one thinking about the future of any of these kids. The parents? I don't know what their deal is, but they don't seem to be thinking about anything.
Vance is a PROBLEM.
I don't "get" him. I graduated from what's regarded as one of the best universities in the world. I'm technically still Catholic. I have a trashy white family and it was difficult for me to establish myself. I should be the natural voter for this guy but all I see is red flags.
I don't think the voters Vance is meant to appeal to like him; I think Trump should find a way to ditch him while he still can.
"Vance is like the kid you went to high school with who did bird calls to try and impress girls and couldn't get laid" wait, so that DOESN'T work?
As the husband of a sad Asian woman (happy before I married her) with no kids, I approve this message. Still, I'd vote for Vance if he was on the top of the ticket.
He's a terrible candidate. He can't think. He is classroom smart not real world smart. He would be as bad as Jimmy Carter because he's just as idealistic. He has no sense.
ETA: probably worse than Carter; Carter is a nuclear engineer. Like Carter, Vance is not that smart in real-world terms. Cutesy philosophies do not equal real life. In politics, I would take anyone who'd been a law guardian for kids in foster care over any Yale lawyer. Guys like Vance actually are not equipped to be good presidents; he doesn't understand human nature. He's equipped to have a narrow specialty at a fancy law firm, but not to do anything with actually important consequences.
What did you think of Pence? I liked Pence, he kept his mouth shut, but he never caught on with the public.
"You ‘would take any legal aid/public defender type lawyer over Vance’—really?" yes, because they operate in the real world. They know their clients are scumbags, but the law is adversarial - it's their job to give them zealous representation. They also usually press their clients to take a plea. You're someone who's never met one of them, that's why you don't understand what I'm saying.
The natalism thing is stupid. A lot of idiots who aren't good with kids, or who don't care about their kids, have WAY too many kids. Do you want a legal aid story about this, because I know someone who worked there on the civil side, in Brooklyn. If someone's indigent and has a good reason, Legal Aid will get them a divorce. "Good reason" = someone is pregnant. There are people who are 29, 30, on their 4th marriage with kids strewn across the 5 boroughs. THAT'S who Vance is going to end up bribing with his natalism fuckery.
Not having kids does not mean someone doesn't care about the future; if you don't understand that, you're not very bright. A lot of people - nuns & monks, Buddhists or Christian - specifically DON'T have children. You think, what, St Francis of Assisi and Thich Nhat Hanh didn't do anything for future generations? It's BAD THINKING.
You're linking these stories about Hungary or whatever - yeah, Eastern Europe is kind of a pit and they have a massive brain drain. Smart people in Hungary keep trying to move here, or to Canada.
I used to live in Canada. Do you know about their "baby bonuses"? Widely criticized at the time as a 'bribe for Catholics in Quebec' most of the money went to Saskatchewan.
Why is bribing Saskatchewan and not Quebec a problem, you ask? Well, at that point in time Ontario and Quebec were the engines of Canada's economy. Bribing Quebec and Ontario would be bribing a bunch of people who made cigarettes, school buses, worked in steel mills, all kinds of things. Saskatchewan was mostly full of subsistence farmer types, First Nations/Metis people with a lot of problems like alcoholism and paint huffing, and religious weirdos like the Dukobhors. Exactly the wrong people to bribe into having a bunch of babies they can't really afford.
None of these programs ever work the way the people who create them think they will. Countries that have them are always brain drain countries (all the good Canadian doctors and engineers come here; the money's better). They are never American type countries. It's bad thinking. It's grade school student thinking, not adult thinking. Grow up.
Holy Moly Dave!
This one is an instant classic!
Cheers!
Thank you, Mike!
By the way- I've been telling people that chimp story for years... most people have no idea of how bad a chimp can fuck a dude up, but they will literally rip-off, everything that can be ripped off! That guy, after the attack, was practically a vegetable!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._James_Davis_chimpanzee_attack
Maybe it's payback for what happened to Clyde (real name "C.J., as if that matters with a monkey?) the Orangutan in "Any Which Way But Loose"?
For a famous ape, his IMDB page is a little scant-
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3718205/?ref_=ttfc_fc_cl_t58
Since you're a legit Hollywood Insider, you got any more info for various "Animals in Cinema"?
I know you have at least ONE interesting story!
I’d like to see a chimp try to rip off Imane Khelif’s testicles, or even Amit Elor’s
So True Mike!! I started looking into this stuff w/ the chimp attack in CT- back in... whenever! It was so horrifying! We humans have a real problem w/ projecting ourselves on to other creatures and not recognizing that they have their own MO, and don't really need to be having their 5 o'clock somewhere martinis w/ the fam! The story about the dude w/ the birthday cake was horrific. I have been off chimps ever since!
I think back to the sage advice Greg Gutfeild once offered: Don't ever get a pet whose ass you couldn't take in a fight.
That's good advice.
In that documentary about Al Adamson, they cover his last movie which was supposed to be a children's film about a talking chimp; Al being Al, he hired a really old chimp for cheap, not knowing that the oldest chimps are the most violent. The chimp going batshit on this crappy Z-level set must've looked like the last days of the Biden Administration.
Speaking of talking chimps, your post reminds me of the Lancelot Link:Secret Chimp show (which sucked!) that became part of America's Saturday morning cartoon lineup in 1970-71. Even as a dumb 10-year-old kid I couldn't stand it; thankfully this chimpanzee show was short lived.
Now, thinking back, I wonder how much trouble the production team had using all those chimps as "actors." I guess nobody got their face ripped off during filming otherwise I'd have heard about it.
Lancelot Link: Secret Chimp advertisement:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7khIsyP36k
The trick is to only use very young chimps. When they're "kids," they're playful and easy to work with. They begin to get aggressive as teens (the males especially), and once they get big enough to rip a man's arm off, you need to steer clear.
I guess it would be considered unethical for Hollywood animal handlers to keep the pre-teen chimps playful, easy to work with, and profitable by giving them puberty blockers before their hormones start raging.
Chimps wearing clothes and smoking cigars always makes me laugh.
Do mongoloids dream of gelded chimps?
LOL!!!!
That chimp was the Lugosi to Al's Ed Wood
LOL!!!!
Martin Landau was so great as Lugosi in Burton's Ed Wood. Maybe that's Burton's best movie?
Now that's a chimp out!
Long distance information, give me Memphis Tennessee,
Help her find a Churches with fried chicken that is free,
She did not leave a witness but the video told all,
That, and all the bullets that were lodged inside the wall.
LOL! Love it!!!
I guess you guys aren't ready for that yet, but your kids are gonna love it.
Sonny Lopez been Berry Berry good to me!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrbPlr4Wskc&t=25s
"Marie is only six years old"? No wonder YouTube blocked the comments on the vid!
Hi Dave! Your sarcasm is the literary equivalent of jagged rusty barn tin. My advice to your foes is get those tetanus shots up to date. Great stuff!
Thank you, Terry! Love that comment.
Dave, why not a piece on films for The New Criterion? Roger Kimball would love to throw you some paid work because of how you've been suppressed. I searched the mag's website for "cinema", and found articles on Bergman, Lanzmann, Hitchcock et al. TNC is too highbrow to go for a piece on zombie films, but you must have a passion or two for some of the classic filmmakers.
Or maybe a piece on L.A. as portrayed in films over the decades, with either a focus on or outside of the movie business.
Or a piece on L.A. (or California) politics and how they've transformed over the decades. Maybe use the rise of Kamala as the opening gambit to your exploration.
Send Kimball an email, he loves to buck the cultural tide (e.g., by recently hiring Woody Allen to write a short story for TNC)-- or ask Ann to tawk to him, I know she knows how to reach him!
https://newcriterion.com/contact-us/
Reading TWTP just hasn't been the same for me ever since Trump was almost assassinated by Elephant Man. I know it's been almost a month, but it still feels fresh. All the fake blood and plastic Halloween bones in a Pennsylvania field -- it reminds me of that tragedy.
LOL!!!!!
FWIW, those of you who appreciate Ol Dave's columns on Takimag can give Takimag likes on X, Mr. Musk's platform - but only after you buy a brotha a few beers!
Amen!
Thanks JW! I want to sing Dave's praise to those folks who shut him out! (X)!
Hi Dave, hope you're doing well in this heat. I was reading through "The Sexy Issue" Feb 1982 of the Lampoon when I saw the "Children's Letters to Penthouse Forum" and couldn't help thinking that you would find that funny, as I'm sure you have already being a fan. The best is the one that opens "I've been a Forum reader ever since my dad put his Penthouses in a drawer I could reach." Fucking hysterical! I sometimes think that some of the funniest issues were from the early 80's rather than the 70's but actually that entire decade and change was great.
I agree with you. I think '79 through '83 were golden years for the magazine. With the counterculture/hippie era over, the writers tended to get more creative and expansive in what they lampooned.
I'm trying to find online a list of the mag's editors throughout the years, can't find one. It looks as if Tony Hendra edited from 1971-75, then he co-edited with Sean Kelly until 1978, then P.J. O'Rourke edited from 1978-81--- although it appears that perhaps lines of authority weren't clearly drawn, which makes sense given that the mag embodied chaos....
My friend Shary Flenniken, mainly NatLamp's cartoonist (Trots & Bonnie), edited briefly in '79/81. I've interviewed her several times for my column over the years. In one form or another, Shary was with the mag from '72 to '90.
Trots and Bonnie! Wow, she was present at the creation, so to speak--- I'm gonna try to get some of her books.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shary_Flenniken
I was so fucking pissed because she rarely gets to L.A. (she lives up in Washington State), but she was coming to L.A. for a book tour in 2020 for her Trots & Bonnie retrospective. I was gonna get a whole week with her. Then fucking Covid, and the publisher canceled the tour.
Some guy at YouTube was complaining that her strips celebrate the killing and castration of males--- maybe he should stick to reading Bil Keane's The Family Circus.
Speaking of which, the most reactionary part of any newspaper is the comics page--- the same strips are running now that ran in the 1970s, many of them now drawn by the spawn of the original cartoonists.
Iconoclastic take! I'd swallowed the liberal line that the Hendra years were the summit. Highly recommend Jessica Hendra's book 'How to Cook Your Daughter':
https://www.amazon.com/How-Cook-Your-Daughter-Memoir/dp/0060820993/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0
I found this 2015 Hollywood Reporter piece after reading your comment:
P.J. O’Rourke: How I Killed ‘National Lampoon’ (Guest Column)
"It was my fault," only half-jokes the best-selling satirist and former editor of the iconic publication. Now, on the eve of a Lampoon-less 'Vacation' reboot he deems unworthy (a "dump-fill featuring the 'Hangover' wimp"), he explains what went right and very wrong for the once-legendary comedy brand.
By P.J. O’Rourke
A new Vacation movie is scheduled to be released — or allowed to escape — on July 29. To judge by the obvious, pitiful, frenetic, stupid raunchiness of its trailer, it belongs to the genre known as “post-humoristic.”
The movie declares itself to be a remake of National Lampoon’s Vacation, the 1983 classic of obvious, pitiful, frenetic, stupid innocence. But the words “National Lampoon” are never mentioned in the trailer. This is doubtless a relief to those two good souls in Funny Heaven: John Hughes, who wrote the script for the original, and Harold Ramis, who directed it. Yet the absence of the magazine’s name causes pangs of ancient regret to old duffers who held NatLamp dear in the 1970s and early 1980s.
We remember how the publication was a font of youthful nihilism’s dark, ironic genius (albeit with the obvious, pitiful, frenetic and stupid qualities that entails).
We remember how, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the magazine went to hell. National Lampoon now seems damned to the point that its name isn’t even worthy of being attached to a summer cineplex dump-fill featuring the Hangover wimp dentist as leading man and a Chevy Chase cameo.
Sick transit gloria. What a shocking fall for Lampoon‘s shock humor. And it was my fault.
I was editor-in-chief of National Lampoon from 1978 through 1980, when the magazine began sinking. It limped on as a monthly until 1985, but I was one of the last original creators still on board.
The failure was caused by success. From the inaugural issue of National Lampoon in 1970 until he left in 1974, Michael O’Donoghue was the most important influence on its style, tone and content. He went on to become the first head writer for Saturday Night Live. Before becoming the first stars of SNL, John Belushi and Chase starred, alongside Christopher Guest, in the 1972 off-Broadway play National Lampoon Lemmings. Belushi recruited Bill Murray for the 1973-1974 National Lampoon Radio Hour cast, which included Richard Belzer. Murray and fellow Radio Hour performer Gilda Radner starred in the 1975 off-Broadway National Lampoon Show. Hughes started a spectacular career writing for the Lampoon. Ramis started another scripting National Lampoon’s Animal House with NatLamp co-founder Doug Kenney and Chris Miller, author of Lampoon‘s popular Animal House short stories that inspired the 1978 movie.
If you see a pattern, it’s called money. What do you think the proper comparison would be between how much Hughes was paid for writing National Lampoon’s Vacation and how much I paid him for the short story “Vacation ’58,” upon which the movie was based? If you’re thinking chalk and cheese, you like to eat chalk better than John did.
Even in the salad days of magazine publishing, there wasn’t a lot of lettuce on the plate. Playboy used to pay — cue Dr. Evil moment — a dollar a word.
By 1980, talented young writers with youthful nihilism’s dark, ironic genius had as many opportunities as there were Porky’s sequels.
Besides, National Lampoon was never a pleasant place to work. The office was rife with the clubby snits and snubs of its clubby, snitty progenitor, Harvard Lampoon, founded in 1876. Some of the snits were a century old. Plus having a bunch of humorists in one place is like having a bunch of cats in a sack.
As the boss, I had the people skills of Luca Brasi in The Godfather and the business acumen of the fellows who were managing New York’s finances in the 1970s (remember the Post‘s headline “FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD”).
The National Lampoon staff was busy sticking it to the man and being alienated, sarcastic, cynical and hip. I had the Squaresville job of making the magazine show a profit. To which task I guess I seemed well-suited. I owned a suit. And I was the only staffer who admitted voting for Gerald Ford.
Therefore, when Squaresville things happened, I got to deal with them. For example, National Lampoon published an illustration of Mick Jagger performing fellatio on a microphone. This depiction — drawn with perhaps too much vigor — appeared opposite a full-page ad by one of the few companies willing to advertise in the National Lampoon. It was a Japanese manufacturer of turntables, amplifiers, speakers and microphones.
I got to visit the American headquarters of the Japanese corporation and talk to three senior Japanese executives.
Me: “What makes the illustration funny is the Freudian nature of a performing artist who casts himself in a phallic role, subconsciously overcompensating by utilizing an actually phallic object in his performance.”
Japanese executives: Silence.
Me: “You see, Mick Jagger’s persona is that of a subject for sex objectification by women. Yet the intense narcissism of his presented behavior is such as to cast doubts upon his own heterosexual orientation.”
Japanese executives: Silence.
Me: “So, in order to make a humorous point concerning this psychological paradox, we exhibited the musician in a symbolic situation in which his libido is manifested mechanically rather than biologically. Mechanical representations of biological functions being one of the root sources of mirth according to Laughter, an Essay on the Meaning of the Comic by 19th century French philosopher Henri Bergson.”
Japanese executives: Total silence.
There are those who say that National Lampoon “changed the face of American humor.” It certainly put some wrinkles on mine. We published our last issue in November 1998.
What was so much fun about the original National Lampoon’s Vacation was its maniacal expression of the love-and-hate relationship between weird hip sensibilities (Hughes) and even weirder normal middle-class values (Clark Griswold).
That kind of fun can’t be had in the 21st century, where there are no normal middle-class values, all the Clark Griswolds are alienated, sarcastic and cynical, and every suburban schlub is a font of nihilism’s dark, ironic genius.
Once, there was “If You Don’t Buy This Magazine We’ll Kill This Dog” — the January 1973 cover line by actor, comedian and erstwhile National Lampoon contributing editor Ed Bluestone. This was in the days before Photoshop, and the cover shoot wasn’t going well. The dog was a professional model. Like Kate Moss, it sat perfectly still with a blank expression. Finally Lampoon‘s art director Michael Gross had the idea of standing off-camera behind the dog’s trainer (who was holding the gun) and shouting the dog’s name. Hence the perfect pathos of the dog’s sidelong glance.
Now, it’s a totally different world. It’s “If You Don’t Buy a Ticket to This Crappy Movie, We’ll Go Watch Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation in the Theater Next Door.”
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/pj-o-rourke-how-i-809985/
Thanks for that!
I honestly think nothing tops "Children's Letters To The Gestapo".
Indeed! "Thank you for the cowboy sheriff's badge!"
I found an amazing site with PDFs of all the National Lampoon issues!
http://www.luckyfrogfarms.com/cook/NL/
DUDE! You are good. There used to be a site like that, years ago, but it got pulled. I had NO idea there was another one. This is GREAT! Thanks!
Yeah, it's great for me too, I can check out the issues you mentioned without shelling out $20 to ebay sellers! Joe Queenan wrote a great essay about thrifty people in the book 'The Seven Deadly Virtues', I tried to find it online but couldn't.....
Once more Dave brought tears to my eyes. Not that kind of tears . . . the kind you get from laughin' so damn hard you almost passed out !!! Dave, seriously dude, how in hell did you cause the 5.1 earthquake a couple of weeks ago near Hermleigh, Texas? July 26 at 09:30 I was peacefully lying in my bed staring at the ceiling, and the whole fucking word started rattling, WTF !?! I don't get no oil royalty check, but Dave does, now I have seismic activity 120 miles away rattling my house. Oh, and one more thang Dave, you said, quote: "But as Asians lack dimorphism, trying to figure out the men from the women is like trying to guess the orchard from the applesauce." I don't believe you should be sayin' that, at least in the case of the Mongols there's some serious sexual dimorphism, I ain't lyin', see fer yerselves y'all : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgjF4go1-3Y
LOL! Thank you!
The other me should not have accused you of the earthquake transfer. That dastardly act was surely the work of the arch villan Elon, who else could have done it?
Enough with the Jewish lady wrestler stereotypes already.
Enough with the meshugge, already
ALL these meshuggeners with their meshuggas are making me meshugge! OY!
She’s Samson AND Delilah
in 80's there was jewish lady wrestler. She'd defeat opponents w/ guilt
Next time I fly Frontier I hope that pilot is in the jump seat (I don't want him actually flying the plane) so when someone lays they seat back in my face, Tyronius can slap a mofo upside the head.
That column was so funny I'm gonna donate even though the stock market kicked my ass last week...
Is that you who just bought all those beers? (hard to tell with screen names)
As a not yet banned from Amazon writer, my many screen names are intentional obfuscation, as is my lame writing.
Indeed, sir, I just purchased three.
So very much appreciated, my friend.
I remember that Bakersfield chimp story.
Has anyone looked at the 2016 book Easy Meat: Inside Britain's Grooming Gang Scandal, by Peter McLoughlin? I can't find it for sale at Amazon or abebooks, though there are some copies at ebay for around $30 each. Derb mentioned it on the Aug. 9th ep of Radio Derb:
https://www.johnderbyshire.com/Opinions/RadioDerb/2024-08-09.html
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29209313-easy-meat
Liked your Takimag piece on relatability vs whatever's happening in the Republican Party right now. And your mom's observation on Limbaugh. I think he was great entertainment, in the same way some Fox anchors can be funny at times, but people have no critical thinking around that stuff.
I know you've worked in casting - Obama has a lot of warmth and comes across as intelligent. When you compare him to Romney - like if you were casting a commercial, you'd always take Obama over Romney. Romney isn't bad, he just isn't as likable as Obama. It's pretty easy to see why Obama won. (I think it's also possible the Mormon thing hurt Romney).
Trump is a mess and I think Vance was a terrible, TERRIBLE VP pick. I was raised Catholic, 12 years in Catholic school, I only know like one person from HS who still goes to mass. Picking this weird guy who converted into the most pedo-friendly organization in the world was a bizarre choice. He's also got the natalism obsession, and crypto obsession. Criticizing working women, but his wife was the earner - she's the one who had to ditch a high-powered law job for his VP run. And when he tries to be funny it comes across as creepy instead. I don't think this ticket can win.
Kamala's record is a mess but she'll definitely win unless someone stable - a Romney type - enters the race really last minute. Because at least she's not taking advice from Don Jr and Eric Trump. At least her advisers are pros, even if they're kind of nuts. Walz may be creepily obsessed with China but he's got warmth/relatability, people like him a lot more than anyone else in the race. Again, Walz is the only one in this field you could cast in a commercial and expect to see ROI. Not Don, Kammie, or Vance. There's no way Trump can win this time: that weird interview with Musk has probably sealed his fate.
It's with no joy that I must agree with you on your assessment, my friend.
It sucks, but it's a sucking reality. No one wakes up and say: "Nah, ...I'll vote for Trump this time"
Don, the Jr., Musk, and the rest of MAGA loonies (with the addition of Drag Vance) are as boring as the raising Sun in the morning - paraphrasing some Jew I know.
I'm definitely not voting for the Harris Waltz (I'd rather vote for the Macarena), but whether I vote for Trump-Vance will depend on my mood that day---if I'm in a snarling, Jim Goadish mood I'll vote for them, otherwise I'll vote for the dead bear cub and the bicycle. I do wish that Vance was on the top of the ticket, he does have the rap and the youth (born in 1985!). We need to get the young generations in there so they can fark things up even worse than the boomers they so love to blame for all their troubles.
No Dems for me, ever! My comment was aimed at Team Trump's likeability among swing voters. The Trump ticket offers nothing to make someone change their minds.
Edit: Trump is an egomaniacal tumor, so he picks his friends among his peers.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13742781/JD-Vance-posing-female-classmates-urinals-photo.html
He wouldn't make it to the top of a ticket. He's a serious mess, he wouldn't make it through the primaries.
Speaking of chicks with dicks, I see rumors circulating that Fuentes is into them or maybe they’re into Fuentes. I don’t know all the details. It’d be so funny if it’s true.
https://x.com/guntnews/status/1815925686672253242?s=46&t=YWAFZzo3QlF1u17II8JzBg
If that comical, light-hearted, "trolling" comment is actually from Nick, so what? It's not as if he was pulling his pud to, as you wrote, "chicks with dicks."
In the same vein, I used to view the "Five Pillars of Islam" internet site in England just to trash their pro-Muslim/Islam articles with my comments. Someone could have come along and questioned my affinity to the West, or said I was a budding terrorist, solely based on the number of comments I contributed and the amount of time I spent on that crappy Islamic site.
Slightly off topic: I received a few death threats from outraged "British" Pakistani Muslims over my 5 Pillars of Islam posts about their pedo "prophet," Muslim inbreeding, low IQ, welfare dependance, over-the-top violence, and the Israeli-Arab issue; I provided charts and graphs and links from/to reliable sources proving all my points.
After one of my posts a pissed-off Muzzie replied that he can't wait to put a bullet in my head. I wrote back, laughing at him, and, as an experiment, reported him to Facebook to see what they would do.
Back then, at the height of ISIS, Facebook had been banning me for weeks and months at a time for my non-violent, yet anti-Muslim/Islam, posts and I wanted to see how they'd handle a direct, unambiguous, personal death threat from a Muslim to me.
Facebook's reply was that his writing "I can't wait to put a bullet in your head" did not go against the terms and conditions of Facebook. LOL! I screened grabbed that one and threatened to used it against Facebook later.
As I said, it’s a rumor. Nothing is confirmed. Then again I wouldn’t be surprised if it were. Fuentes is clearly not right in the head when he talks about sex like someone with OCD talks about hygiene. There’s something clearly off about his sexual views.
100%. It's VERY clear.
I don't think there's anything wrong with being kinky, but one should keep one's predilictions to oneself, or air them only in a forum designed for such (like the excellent website FetLife). Otherwise one is like the pathetic Sam Brinton, wearing stolen dresses to diplomatic parties. I read he went in drag to such a party in Paris, all the men in tuxes and he a bald pathetic mess. The French can get their freak on as well as any group, maybe better, but they know about time and place.