EXPECTATIONS AND VIEWS

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lows

    Low information and high motivation are grumpy parents. The offspring is a chimera now morphing the DNA of the  body politic and it's occurring before our eyes. It isn't the Revolution you expected, but it is televised and phoned, tableted, app'ed, and alogrithimzed.

     The 2016 Presidential race is a warrant. We see from the campaign trail a disturbing image of America.
     Donald Trump campaigns like pitchmen who sell products on late night tv, tweets like a mouthy punk and does so with the frequency of a hormone riven teen, but an American political party has been unable to stop him. 
     My wise friend with a rich experience in law says, "some of us are dinosaurs." The ethic of election campaigns is a moving storm and what used to make sense seems now frequently out of mode. 

    Still, it is hard to imagine a majority of American voters choosing to cast for someone who campaigns with the rhetorical skills of a carnival barker. What about temperament? Where are the first shadings of a policy standard? Where is a sign of intellect up to the complexity of diplomacy? What in his history would lead a voter to conclude he would/could work in the political culture that is the Federal Government. Yes, hard to imagine, but he hasn't gone away and he fans anger and fear.

     There is no data that shows Trump with the ability to win a national election. His followers are a fraction of a fractured party. But he's had more impact than expected. Expectations are not to be trusted anymore and that was a point my wise friend made. That, and old rules are loosing function.

      Boomers watch as reaction times shrink and depth disappear. This political season has been cheap and brawling. Americans who believe governance needs a higher tone and better participants can only shake their heads. In the end Mr. Trump should be marginalized, but those he has rallied will remain inflamed. And one wonders how the circus will play in 4 more years. In politics imitation is not flattery, it is the norm. Have we crossed a Rubicon? Are short attention spans, selfish anger, missing historical perspectives and form over content new rules?

highs

     High praise to Don Cheadle for Miles Ahead, the non biopic film on Miles Davis.  Cheadle directed and starred in an impressionistic triptych fantasy that presents snatches of the great trumpeters life, moving forward and backward, in and out of reality. It is an artful and arty film and features extraordinary music. It is Davis's music but mostly done by cover players, brilliant in their own right. This is not a purist's tale and there are wild diversions brought from imagination, but they still help shape a "sense" of Davis. 

       Miles Davis influenced jazz in several iterations as well as bop and even rock in immense ways. He was a strange cat with exotic ways and tastes but he left a musical heritage. Cheadle does not define Miles Davis for the history books, but he gives us a playful and excellent entertainment that in the end shines the Davis mystique. Cheadle is brilliant as Davis and bold and imaginative as a director.

     See you down the trail.

INSIDE TRUMP'S CLOSET and CONTENTED DIVERSIONS

CONTENTMENT

close up

Grazing slopes on Turri Road, San Luis Obispo County

    Silly to ask perhaps, but at what point and for what reason does a cow decide to stand or to rest?

FAVA UPDATE

   Frequent readers may recall recent photos of this year's fava bean crop, showing great promise. The days of promise have arrived.

     As Lana noted and as memorialized in this 2013 post Romancing the Fava, the Fine Art of the Shuck, it takes a lot of work to get the fava ready for inclusion in a menu. Picking, cracking the pod to shell it and then freeing the morsel from an inner skin. But the flavor is unlike anything else and thus coveted.
     I told Cambria artist and Italian cuisine maven Bruce Marchese, who seemed overly pleased that we had harvested our first batch, I was putting barbed wire and guard dogs around our fava bed.
     

WITH RESPECT TO THE CATALYST

    My friend Bruce Taylor, who blogs as the Catalyst at Odd Ball Observations, frequently treats and teases his readers with posts of food. Often they are items that he has made or that his beloved SWMBO has created. SWMBO, also known as Judy has delighted Lana and me with delicious dishes for more decades that would be polite to mention.

    Recently Bruce posted about a crispy fried egg. This is not that, but something he may wish to try. It begins skillet life as a fried egg, but at a propitious moment is suddenly scrambled, but only briefly. The white is set and the yolk is only a few moments from still being runny. By the time Mr. Camera arrived to snap the evidence, the yolk had set up a bit more than is desired. If you try it, get to that moment of scramble, then spatula it onto your plate and begin to eat. Leave the camera out of the equation and you'll have yolk that is that special exquisite place between solid and liquid. If you like that sort of thing.

SYMETRY

&

 HOME MADE POT STICKERS & HOT AND SOUR SOUP

RUMMAGING IN TRUMP'S CLOSET

      Though I do not see eye to eye with David Brooks on some policy questions I think he is a thoughtful essayist. I find agreement with much of what he writes about ethics and philosophy. I urge you to read this piece on the sexual politics of 2016.

     It is my belief that all are welcome in the American political rumble, even those with views I deplore. However people are responsible and accountable for their behavior. That means of course that voters should be thoughtful and even studied. That is not the case too often. We acknowledge it with the identification of LOW INFORMATION VOTER. Regardless, candidates are still liable for what they say, do, advocate and for the effect they have.

      I suspect some of you are offended by the images above but as I follow Trump and his artful manipulation of the media and his use of propaganda techniques, and read again his racist, sexist, ethnocentric remarks and see a void when it comes to specific policy objectives, other than building a wall, and see his bullying and bellicose manner I am reminded of history. So I've spent time reading about Germany from the end of WWI, the rise of Nazism, Adolph Hitler's oratory, the consolidation of the workers movement, the outrageous beer hall putsch, the writing of Mein Kampf, the growth of the Nazi party and all that followed.  Of course there many differences and circumstances.  But it is the similarities that worry me.

     Here we are when conservatives and liberal are both surprised and even outraged by Donald Trump's ascent. His own party is worried sick. Pundits, commentators and analysts are surprised his quest for the Presidency is real. Donald Trump is not Adolph Hitler nor is he a Nazi. But the similarities should worry us all.

     See you down the trail.

SEAL TEAM STEEL-YOUR NEWS IQ AND IT TAKES A VILLAGE

SEAL COOL

    REEL NOTES CAPTAIN PHILLIPS

    A couple of extraordinary things struck me in an otherwise excellent film, directed by Paul Greengrass and starring Tom Hanks, who seems incapable of anything but masterful. Hank's acting when he portrays Captain Phillips in shock, and the extraordinary low key cool of the real navy personnel who play acted their real life roles, are more than worth the ticket.

     Hanks emotional volume and visceral acting in this act were stunning. 

      As the operation drama reaches a peak, the screen fills with military and medical staff who are the real deal, apparently getting a pass to portray a role. They evince an élan. It is all about mission-efficient and in control.

     You see technology and intel being brought to conduct in the planning and execution of the operation. These touches are an additional layer of film making skill.

      The film is an enthralling adventure.  There are present issues with the real Captain Phillips' navigating and some of the Phillips' behavior was directorial interpretation. Though not unimportant, they do not affect the storytelling or power of engagement in Greengrass' film. For his part, Hanks has such a facile way of digging into a character and making them live he trades on credibility and you believe.   

 LOW DOWN ON LOW INFORMATION 

     How do you define a low information voter?

     If the recent work of Pew Research is indicative "low information" might be giving too much credit. Is stupid more appropriate?   How do you measure up?

     Link here to take a quick News IQ Quiz.  You may have your own editorial comment after you've seen your results and those of fellow voters.

LOCAL COLOR

IT TAKES A VILLAGE

    We treasure village life.  

    The simple pleasures are magnified, as when the grounds of the Cambria Historical Society became the gathering center for a Harvest Market-a kind of tag sale, ice cream social and music venue.  For those who do not know our village nestled in Monterey Pines between the Pacific and the Santa Lucia mountains, here are homespun autumn snapshots. 

a desert that is an appetizer

    See you down the trail.

DECIDING & WOULD YOU VOTE FOR HIM?

WHICH IS IT GOING TO BE?

     The presidential campaigns continue to court the undecideds, especially in those key and decisive counties in the "battle ground" states. I'm not sure how someone can be undecided at this point, but this is also the age of the "low information voter, so..."  
     BTW, does the concept "low information" voter give you pause too?  Or maybe just scare you?
     To those who might be still undecided, we send along 
memories of that MeatLoaf classic Paradise by the Dashboard Lights.  
     "What's it going to be? I need to know right now!" 
     "Let me sleep on it."
     "Tell, what's it going to be?  I need to know right now!"
     "Let me sleep on it."
      Etc., Etc., Etc. until, you may recall, the refrain                       "Now I'm praying for the end of time..."
      You know, for some, it may be better to remain 
undecided eh?
     

DAY FILE

DECIDING

Cloudy & Gray or Blue and Sunny

sort of stuck in the middle

If you wait long enough around here,

that California sun shines through

and the skies go blue.
REEL THOUGHTS

THE INTOUCHABLES

     This French film has been playing The Palm, our favorite art and foreign house, for a few weeks and continues to draw crowds and great reviews.  We know why.

      The story of a wealthy French aristocrat who suffers a paralyzing accident and the Senegalese emigre from a poor extended family who becomes his caregiver is hilarious, touching and true.  Subtitles seem to disappear because the acting  and story line are both superb.  It's a great little film that will give you a lift.

AND HERE IS ONE TO WATCH FOR

It seems this has greatness written all over it.

Actors, producer, director, and the storyline itself.

Do you think he could be elected today?

See you down the trail.