Vee

Dems getting 218 remains unlikely, but worth reporting on the gains and losses nonetheless:

Get ready: Not surprising, but whatever:

Wonderful to see her looking so well. I hope the long-lived rumors of a more serious illness are just that and she can return again.

Show of the year for me. HBO-caliber work from the legendary Tony Gilroy (longtime scribe of the original Bourne films and writer-director of the excellent Michael Clayton, among others) and probably the best Star Wars product period since 1983, let alone in the recent overexposed Disney doldrums choked by fan service and Easter eggs. Gilroy was responsible for reshooting and rewriting a great deal of the deeply troubled Rogue One after filming was mostly complete, and made a silk purse from a sow's ear. R1 is far from perfect, but the excellent things in it are all him. Now he's taken a supporting player from that film who I thought had little to say and made him into a linchpin in this prequel, set five years before the original Star Wars. You would not know this show is SW unless someone told you. Its arcs are strictly played out in 2-3 episode blocks of semi-contained stories contributing to a larger plotline. Its ground-level immersion in the working class lives of its little people on backwater worlds, in the grinding bureaucracy of the Empire, in the Kafka-esque prison system and in the high-toned world of Coruscant and the Senate is second to none. It's of a piece with both UK kitchen sink dramas of the '70s and '80s and the original Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. And Stellan Skarsgård (among many others, like Diego Luna, Denise Gough, Kyle Soller, Andy Serkis, Faye Marsay from Doctor Who and Fiona Shaw) is giving the performance of a career, again. I should also single out the incredible Genevieve O'Reilly, signed to a bit role as the young Mon Mothma in Revenge of the Sith in the 2000s (Mon Mothma is Senator to Chandrila and future leader of the Rebel Alliance, glimpsed as an older woman in Return of the Jedi) who has now risen to become a major star in this show years later, as Mothma struggles to navigate the constant surveillance on Coruscant, her helpless position in the Senate, and working to fund the nascent Rebel cells.

Yeah, no. It's racist, and it's happening because they don't want to show Nicholas Chavez and either Trina intimate. There hasn't been a single onscreen kiss and as far as I can tell, there won't be until they have absolutely no other choice. If they decided to turn the show into the Spencer/Trina Lovefest 2023 I'd happily eat crow. I'm not seeing it. I think they will do the bare minimum and try to wait the fans out. That doesn't make anyone "Chicken Little" to state the obvious about this piece of shít soap.

Long, important thread:

The real tragedy about Dave Chappelle is when he tries, he can still be very funny and very insightful, including about political issues (policing, etc). I saw some of his monologue and a fair amount made me laugh. The problem is that like many top comics before him, he's gotten so caught up in lashing out at the changing times and being a contrarian that he lost sight of his own place in the larger matrix. The contrarian pushback too many comics fall into has become his major identity. I don't believe the Dave of 20 years ago would be cheering becoming a (somewhat volatile) hero to the alt right or bigots. That's my only commentary on tonight!

Warnock's going to take it. But yes, we need to stay juiced.

Like I said on the last page, she is the only one skilled enough to work these margins with or without the House and still pass legislation, and I absolutely think she can pass legislation in either scenario. I am all for new blood when it is ready and when the numbers are less razor-thin, which is not this cycle.

And we're thrilled at having at least a 20-40% chance of keeping the House! Even if we don't though, with these slim numbers the GOP is not going to be able to function in a majority. They will be infighting til 2024.