Joe Biden Constantly Tries To Be Ronald Reagan

In his years as president, Joe Biden has been trying to be like Ronald Reagan. He thinks he can maintain a centrist approach and not make any one side too upset or too happy. He’s trying to appeal to everyone and be likable. But you can’t be appealing if you don’t engage with the public.

Also, Ronald Reagan was not a centrist.

And you certainly can’t be appealing to your base if you making a public effort to court Nikki Haley voters.

I get strange looks from mainstream MSNBC Democrats when I point out that if Joe Biden was just a little more engaged with the 80 million who voted for him in 2020, he wouldn't be so thirsty for the weird, evil, anti-trump Republican vote. That vote is still vehemently anti-woman, anti-trans, anti-queer, and anti-worker.

Chris Murphy, arguably one of the nicest US Senators in the chamber, has tried to spin Joe’s centrist style as disappointing everyone by design. So while Reagan made most people feel good, Joe Biden makes most people feel down, and that was the plan.

You didn't have to make the strategic choice to be Ronald Reagan in the 2020s, Joe. You could have, um, listened to what voters under 40 want. They are the ones inheriting this environmental catastrophe. They are the ones who can't buy a house or apartment. They are the ones who are reporting that they are the saddest US generation since the Great Depression, while Americans over 60 are reporting they are richer and happier than ever before. Oh, but the men in that group are all voting for Trump! Great strategy, Joe.

Joe could have at least done a weekly video on YouTube. A little fireside chat for the kids who care. But Joe didn't even do that!

Look, we were all stressed out, doing drugs and committing suicide when Trump was dropping a dozen tweets a day (we're still committing suicide, see how young people are unhappy above). Joe could have found a happy medium between engaging with us and tweeting us to death. He chose to be the silent type. That doesn't help when you need to retain 80 million votes for the re-election.

Joe Biden might somehow win this election because Trump is so unhinged. But if I had to examine this as an objective outsider for the first time, I’d think Joe Biden is trying to lose. Intentionally.

Rehab, American Style

Michael Douglas got a well deserved Emmy for his performance as Liberace in Steven Soderbergh's swan song, Behind the Candleabra. At the end of his acceptance speech, he made a reference to his 34 year-old son, Cameron, who is serving a drug use sentance, with two full years in 23-hour solitary confinent.

He elaborated backstage:

If you happen to have a slip, this for a prisoner who is not violent … they punish you....In my son's case, he has spent almost two years in solitary confinement, and right now I'm being told I cannot see him for two years. It's been over a year now, and I'm questioning the system. Obviously, at first I was disappointed with my son, but I've reached a point now where I'm very disappointed with the system.

The next day, Sabhbh Walshe of The Guardian, agreed with him, and drove the point home in her analysis:

People may have little sympathy for Cameron Douglas, the poor little rich kid who had it all and couldn't handle any of it. He did break the law numerous times by dealing drugs to feed his habit and deserved to be sanctioned for that. It's reasonable to assume also that if he had come from a poor minority background, he may have received an even harsher initial sentence and no one would have been writing newspaper articles about him or calling out to him during high profile award ceremonies. Still his case deserves attention as it typifies the stupidity of the war on drugs that has caused America's prison population to explode while doing almost nothing to eradicate drug use in our society.

I can add my two cents and say that Mr. Douglss and Ms. Walshe are absolutely correct.

The last time I was called for jury duty, I spent seven of the most depressing hours of my life watching white lawyers, judges, court officers and jurors, busily administering the drug laws of the commonwealth of Massachusetts. All the defendants and their families were sad, poor persons of color, who were going to rot in prison and have their futures wrecked because poor, sad, addicted poor people use illegal drugs. When I was finally called to explain my unwillingness to serve on a jury, I told the judge I considered the drug laws of this nation to be close to the classic definition of insanity. We are doing the same things, over and over again, and expecting a different result.

Drug addiction is a medical problem, and drug dealing is a function of the poverty and lack of opportunities that's endemic in this country. Our answer to this social pathology? Lock up one third of the young men of color in this country, incarcerate more people than any other nation on earth, create a vast, corrupt and wasteful prison industrial complex, and continue this madness year after year, as the problem gets worse! Yes, Mr. Douglas was right to address this at the Emmys.

Andy Dick: Crash, Burn, Repeat

The Hollywood press has seen his downward spiral, which has increased speed over the last few months. From crashing his car into a telephone pole while coked-up in 1999, to getting beaten-up by Jon Lovitz in 2007, to getting tossed out of a house party last month, to this latest episode at a Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant. We know how this story will probably end. Everyone in Hollywood thinks he either a disgusting asshole, a 'walking rehab patient', or both. This will not end well.