News Burst: June 02, 2017 (Patreon)

Greetings from Santa Monica. I hope this News Burst finds you very well! This has been an interesting week; much to do, much still to do this weekend. I’m already marinating on both of next week’s videos, and may even record them both tonight (we shall see). One thing I know for sure is I have to get back to House of Cards tonight. Got through the first three-ish episodes of Season 5 last night. It’s so wacky at this point, but I love it. The cinematography, the acting, the writing. It’s sublime, and I'm happy it's back.

Back on track: The month has turned over into June, as you all likely realized by now (unless you’re just waking up), so allow me to take this moment to not only thank you all for your continued support of this show, but to let you know what’s going on with perks this month.

$55+/month subscribers will get their signed “infamous” Tweets this month, on good enough paper that you can frame it, if you’d like. Those will begin going out in the next week or two, so expect to see them coming through your inboxes beginning mid-month. $50+/month subs will get their postcards throughout the month, as always, so keep an eye out for that.

If you’re at the $100 level, and have been for all three CLS Patreon cycles so far, your personalized thank you videos will begin recording next week, and you’ll get an individual message with a link (hopefully long) before month's end. Remember that if you’re at that level, you’d also typically get a postcard, but you have the option to opt for the Tweet instead. If you want to do that, go find the thread from May here on Patreon and place your name in the comments (you’ll have another week or so to do that). If you’ve already done it, you have nothing else to do. If you still want a postcard instead, that’s totally fine with me, too.

As always, $10+/month Patrons can look forward to our monthly Q&A. I will post the thread this weekend to solicit questions, and get the video posted midweek.

I'm marinating on some new perks, probably more on the upper end. Does anyone have any input or ideas?

I think that’s it, as far as notes go. Let’s get into the godforsaken news!

Kathy Griffin vs. The World: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4566964/Kathy-Griffin-claims-Trump-family-ruined-life.html

My Take: This story has kind of taken on a life of its own, in a way. The big news was a day or two ago, when comedian (or are we still using the word comedienne?) Kathy Griffin published a photo of her holding a faux severed head of Donald Trump, dripping in fake blood. Her intent, apparently, was to attack the “she’s bleeding out of her wherever” line from the campaign; accompanying video footage makes it somewhat obvious that she expected that the provocative image was going to get blowback. She obviously just didn’t expect this level of blowback.

I’m going to save my full thoughts on this for Monday, since I think I’m going to do Monday’s video on this crap revolving around not so much Griffin, but all of us. So stay tuned for that. But in short, I think what Griffin did was crass, inappropriate, mean, and completely out of the ordinary for someone like her. I’m actually a fan of her’s, not so much today as 10 or 15 years ago, and I always really loved her comedy and sense of humor. I’m not entirely sure I understand where this even fits in. It plays as I think it was intended: As a desperate plea for attention.

I also don’t think she made it any better at this press conference. She showed what appeared to me real contrition on the matter just a day or so ago, and I don’t really get the idea of coming out with lawyers and blaming everyone else for your personal and professional downfall. Thing is, I think she’s right in a sense -- this is a witch hunt with an over-magnified sense of justice, and the response does stand in contrast to the act -- but sometimes, you have to know when to fold ‘em.

The Fallout of Paris: http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/336124-winners-and-losers-in-paris-accord-withdrawal

My Take: Trump’s move to withdraw from the Paris global warming agreement surprised me, not because I think he would have any problem doing it, but because I thought he would be aware of how politically fraught the move would be, both domestically and internationally. His daughter, Ivanka, was also apparently a vocal proponent of staying in, as was her husband, so other forces behind the scenes obviously took precedent here.

Now, I’m not going to say I support the move, or even understand it, but I will say that there are arguments to be made in favor of exiting. I don’t think they’re very strong arguments, and I don’t think they outweigh the spectrum of risks that are out there, but they do exist. And I found Trump’s call to re-enter under different terms to be the best possible option, if he was intent on leaving (as he clearly was). I dunno. The accords had no teeth, no enforcement mechanism, nothing that can be done to really punish the US if it didn’t follow through or meet its goals. I only see downside here.

The entire global warming debate bothers me, mostly because it lacks the obvious amounts of pragmatism, moderation, and reasonableness that will be so necessary for people in the west to truly understand the threat. As usual, I have a plan to dedicate a video to this sometime in the near future, but I will say this: Global warming is real, it’s likely partially or entirely caused by humans, scientists have compelling evidence suggesting all of this is true, scientists ALSO are wrong with their predictions constantly, doing no favors to the movement for acceptance, and catastrophize the issue with incredible immediacy when they don’t have a grasp on the when, just the what and how. This is important stuff to work out, because, like in previous decades Peak Oil (which we still haven’t reached), the more you’re wrong, the more no one will give a fuck.

(Related Story - Ivanka’s Climate Loss: http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/01/ivanka-trump-climate-deal-239041)

(Related Story - Trump Supporters Revel in Victory: http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/02/trump-supporters-paris-exit-239088)

More Terror: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_PHILIPPINES_ATTACK_THE_LATEST?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2017-06-02-10-10-18

My Take: The hits just keep on coming. And I’m afraid they’re going to keep on coming for a while, yet. The most recent attack is in the Philippines, a country that has found itself a rather strange recent target of ISIS. But this one’s bizarre for multiple reasons. This ISIS-claimed shooting at a casino cost the lives of 36 people from smoke inhalation, strangely enough. No gunshots struck anyone, apparently. Setting shit on fire and suffocating people is its own kind of violence, of course, but no one was shot. ISIS’ MO is shooting and blowing shit up until they themselves die.

The second interesting thing is that the casino was robbed. $2 million was stolen (in valuable casino chips), another thing ISIS wouldn’t usually do. ISIS terrorists are suicidal by nature. They don’t try to steal things and get away. The reason we think this is ISIS-related is because ISIS is claiming credit for it. Filipino authorities are vociferously denying that ISIS had anything to do with it, though. You have to wonder if they’re starting to claim instances they’re not even responsible for, a double-edged sword that both raises the terror they can inflict around the world, while at the same time further painting a target on their backs.

And just today (linked below), the popular German rock festival Rock am Ring was evacuated due to an apparently actionable terror threat. The world continues to be gripped by these random, terrible occurrences. What I’m most curious about, though, is what the world intends on doing about it. I’m not saying I have the answers here -- because I don’t -- but is this really the new normal? Is what Europe looks like right now going to be the US in a decade? People far smarter than I am really need to get to the bottom of this. It’s a massively complicated issue that requires a solution.

(Related Story | Rock am Ring Evacuated After Terror Threat: https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/3711222/german-music-festival-rock-am-ring-evacuated-cops-terror-threat/)

Hillary Clinton Blames Everyone Else, Again: http://thehill.com/homenews/house/336001-dnc-allies-incensed-by-clinton-criticism

My Take: Hillary Clinton simply cannot take responsibility for her loss to Donald Trump. It’s maddening, especially since I just finished reading the fantastic Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton’s Doomed Campaign, and learned that she was blaming everyone else since two years before she ran against Sanders, and for nearly a decade before that leading up to and into her race against Obama in the 2008 primaries. She was a horrendous candidate who wasn’t only unlikable, but couldn’t even properly articulate why she was running in the first place. Must be someone else’s fault! (Speaking of Shattered, I posted my video review of it today on Twitter and on CLS' Facebook [linked here on Patreon for your convenience].)

This time around, it’s the Democratic National Committee’s fault, an organization that not only works to elect Democrats across the country (just as the RNC does for the Republicans), but that was so deeply, obviously, overtly, and inappropriately in Hillary Clinton’s corner during a primary in which they’re traditionally supposed to stay neutral, that it boggles the mind how she could turn her cannons on them, of all organizations.

Let’s be clear: Hillary Clinton spent more money than any presidential campaign in history, lost to the most unpopular, easily beatable presidential campaign in recent American history (if not literally all of American history), almost got beaten in the primary by a 70-something year old socialist from Vermont, got away scott-free from a classified documents scandal that would have landed you or me in federal prison, and had perhaps one of the greatest “all-star team” of politicos, wonks, and experts ever assembled in her corner, including her politically brilliant husband who no one listened to for some reason. She needs to go away.