Taboo

Back in the film saddle today -- hit 580 with "Tabu," perhaps the last big silent film made and the last of Murnau's career... yes, it is hard to watch the film, or any of his films, without the rumor of his death, but...  I liked it.  It has high marks for filmography (being shot on location in Tahiti would do that, I would think) but the story itself was fairly well told, with the only text coming from letters (mail) rather than the dialogue screen shots, which to me was pretty cool.  I ordered a block of films from the library, and with some artful rearranging of Netflix...well, progress awaits.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/interrogation/2017/10/charlie_sykes_was_a_conservative_radio_star_then_trump_won.html

I actually think he downplays the effect of the racism card; for one thing, many Americans do not like being called racists, especially when they are not, and the press-guided smear campaign to turn everyone opposed to Obama into some sort of racist -- overt, secret, unintentional -- led, in my opinion, to some voters saying (in their own way) that they will show you what racism is...it is very American, you know.  Now, politics doesn't quite work that way, but I wonder how much of the Obama to Trump voters aren't motivated by economic concerns so much as this internal rebellion about typecasting..

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/two-counties-defining-battle-lines-gop-s-civil-war-n812516

This caught my attention, given the importance of Delaware/OWU in my life and the fact that Jai Chabria was a year ahead of me (we were acquaintances back in the day through College Republicans)... anyways, my own opinion is that this is unpleasant politically, but we also deserve it, in that, much like Ewell on Day One of Gettysburg, we've won a battle but not the war, and are now squandering away the opportunity.  Obamacare has yet to be repealed; tax reform is a mystery, and the infrastructure bill... in some ways, it should have been first, as it would have been good PR.  Some of this, of course, is Trump's fault, but Congress saw the election results and if they couldn't put something together by 1/21... well, that is a problem.