It's Chinatown, Jake

Los Angeles, California

My head keeps getting whipped around. What is happening in American politics reminds me of Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass where the Red Queen says: It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place.

On June 15th, Joel and I attended the fundraiser for Biden hosted by George Clooney and Julia Roberts. The big draw was Obama. It was held at the Peacock Theater in downtown Los Angeles (or as the cool kids say: DTLA). I grew up in Los Angeles and am a 3rd generation Californian and 2nd generation Angeleno and I'd never heard of the Peacock Theater! Turns out that Peacock is its newest name, having been named Microsoft and something else at another time. I wish they wouldn't do this. I still call the Giants' stadium in San Francisco, the AT&T. It's no longer that. But I digress.

The fundraiser was an interesting event with intense street security, but not so much getting into the event. Yes, they looked in our purses, but fairly perfunctory. You get a better screening at Dodgers' Stadium, but perhaps that is because of the Naked Gun comedy where there is an attempted assassination of Queen Elizabeth in the stadium foiled by Detective Frank Drebin (Leslie Nielsen). Funny movie, by the way. And I kinda adored Leslie Nielsen. But again, I digress.

At the event, Biden walked haltingly and started speaking slowly. But once he got onto a topic, he was knowledgeable and articulate. He can do this, we thought. But then came the debate two weeks later, hosted on CNN by Dana Bash and Jake Tapper. I watched it alone, but was texting with Nikki, a politico college student who is the daughter of my friend, Cathy. Not to put too fine a point on it, Biden's performance at the debate was profoundly abysmal. As was Trump's, but in a completely different, albeit Trumpian, way. Biden seemed tired, ill, overwrought and unable to rise to the occasion on so many different levels. Trump was Trump. All the adjectives would take up too much space here, so reprehensible should suffice. He represents this new normal of dishonesty. Outright, unconscionable, boldfaced lying. And because Americans are too stupid to do any research on their own, fact-checking is pretty much nonexistent to the right. Duh, well he said it. It must be true. It's on Fox.

Nikki has a crush on Jake Tapper. After we commented on how nice he looked (he looked ok), we both got absorbed by his expressions of incredulity. But really, why would he be surprised at anything Trump would do at this point in time? The envelope to be pushed has ceased to exist. Still, Jake often looked surprised. I texted Nikki, It's Chinatown, Jake. She didn't text back. A few days later I asked Cathy if Nikki would know that reference. She rolled her eyes and said no. Still, I'm sticking to it. It's Chinatown, Jake. If you don't know the people and the territory, or in this case the cult, you just won't get it. On the other hand, a better reference might be Faust. Look it up.

Joel and I were disagreeing on whether Biden should leave the race. After the fundraiser, we started off on the same page. But he didn't watch the debate. Something was clearly not right. Bill Maher had been saying all along that Biden can do the job, but he just can't run for the job. Campaigning has never been his strong suit. But after the debate created the furor that it did, I questioned whether he could do the job of beating Trump.

We had celebrated (as much as we could during the pandemic) when Biden beat Trump. Yes, kids, Biden beat Trump. It was a different celebration than when Obama had won his first election, because Obama represented hope and change. Biden represented sanity. But now something was brewing and as time went on, it made sense to me. When Biden wrote his statement that he was not seeking reelection, I texted the news to Joel. He was not happy. The fear that I have is that we Democrats won't have learned the lesson from the experience with Bernie. To be angry about this, and to withhold your vote makes no sense at all. It made no sense in 2016. Didn't we learn the lesson?

Kamala has not yet chosen her VP. I was hoping for Mark Kelly. We saw him at the Giffords event we attended earlier this year and I was heartily impressed by him. But yesterday I read that Pete Buttigieg is topping the oddsmakers' lists. What a splendid choice that would be on so many levels. The world could move on from the insanity of Trump and the radical right and left! Trump can go to prison or fulfill the bargain he has made with the devil (again, Faust), and Biden can retire knowing that he will be remembered as an effective president and selfless statesman. By Christmas, all could seem right with the world, maybe even in Chinatown.