All Tactics, No Strategy (The Walking Dead Season Six, so far)

This post refers to events that transpire through the first five episodes of season six. If you don't want those episodes to be spoiled, stop reading.

I have written pretty long preview posts before each half-season of the previous two seasons. This year I didn't think there was enough to talk about so I skipped it.  Six seasons in, I still find myself looking forward to and enjoying every episode. But the show remains very frustrating because of its predictability and refusal to focus on the big picture of this new world the show has created for us.  The characters seems to be doomed to an endless cycle of moving form one false oasis to the next for the foreseeable future.   Five episodes in the ratings have slipped for the first time in the show's history but they remain sky high for the world of basic cable. And there is no reason to think that AMC will not continue to milk this Golden Goose for as long as its audience are big enough to justify the special effects budget.

This season is about part for the course.  Each episode is entertaining and suspenseful in the moment, and frustrating and stupid upon further reflection.  Here are my thoughts on each episode in the season so far:

1. First Time Again.  The season premiere was entertaining and I liked the way they told a bifurcated story that covered a lot of exposition without sacrificing much action. But it was also disappointing when you step back and think about how stupid Rick's plan was.  The Walkers were trapped in a quarry.  The thing to do was seal off the gap between the two 18 wheelers and then light all the Walkers on fire.  There are a variety of ways to do that, but enough flame tipped arrows from Darryl would have eventually done the trick.  Instead they decided to march 30,000 zombies down the road for a day's shamble and hope for the best.  Dumb, dumb, dumb. Grade: B+

2. JSS.  Easily the best episode so far.  They had just lulled me into thinking this was going to be a filler episode about the women folk of Alexandria when the Wolves attacked.  The action was great and the combat was very suspensefull.  I also liked the Enid story line.  Her back story was written sparsely, which is something the show should do more often. And her interactions with Carl felt genuine. My theory on her is that she has some kind of affiliation with a group outside the walls but I do not think it is the Wolves.  She doesn't have a W carved on her forehead for one thing and I think we've learned that the Wolves are some kind of whacky death cult.  Enid is not that.  But she apparently started to tell Carl some kind of secret about how "we" got to Alexandria during the Wolf attack.  I think she will turn out to be a good guy and her return will probably be dramatic and heroic. I sure hope Carl gets to kiss her this season.  Grade: A.

3. Thank You.  A fun episode to watch but frustrating in respect because I'm pretty sure they are going to come up with some kind of cop out reason that Glenn survived that impossible situation in the dumpster.  It's one thing to make the audience learn they should not jump to conclusions and another thing to just cheat.  I suspect a really big cheat is coming and nothing in the following episode dissuades me from that opinion.  I'm writing this while watching the Talking Dead after episode 5 and the actress who plays Jess is desperately trying to convince us that Glenn is dead. And I think we all know that means he is alive.  Grade: A-,

4.  Here's Not Here.  I have to acknowledge that this is the kind of episode that I have been wanting since the end of season three.  But the timing seemed gimmicky, as if they were just trying to drag out the "Is Glenn story line for an extra week. And the execution was uneven.  The acting by Morgan and Eastman were first rate.  I expect one or both of them to receive the first Emmy nomination(s) in this history of this show. (Eastman will be eligible in the guest star category.)  But the plot was very predictable.  We know from the moment we meet him that Eastman is going to be Morgan's Yoda and we know that he is doomed to die before the episode is over.  Eastman's backstory was about as cliche as television gets in this golden age.  But the performances redeem the episode.  I just hope that Morgan survives beyond this season. It seems like either he will have to give up his Akido philosophy or pay the price for it.  I'm hope he kills that last Wolf before the Wolf kills him, but I doubt they writer kept him alive unless he is going to do damage to someone in our group.  Maybe he will kill Gabriel or Abraham.  Someone important.  Grade: B+.

5.  Now.   This story was a shambling mess of plot holes. Rick shouts that everyone should keep noise to a minimum.  Later on he teaches Jesse's kid how to shoot by firing his revolver into the herd.  In between there is no attempt to kill any of the Walkers who are threatening Alexandria. I know there are a lot of them, but the armory appears to be well stocked, so why not put Rosita in the lookout tower with a rifle and a silencer, to take down as many as she can? For the love of God, THIN THE HERD!  (A few ideas for that: big knifes mounted on a long piece of pipe, throwing rocks, sling shots, etc.  There are a lot of options.)  Grade: C.

But that is just a small demonstration of my biggest frustration with the show. It's all tactics, never strategy.  I just want someone on this show to do some math and teach the others that the only way to get civilization back is to kill all of the approximately one billion Walkers that are shambling around the Americas. Every Walker put down is a step towards that goal. It's daunting, but you have to assume others are out and about doing their share of the work as well.  Kill your quota every day and eventually the world will be tamed. Then you can get to work on figuring out how to cure the survivors or at least come up with a protocol for preventing the dead from doing any damage after they pass.

But this is not the show for that.  Maybe Fear the Walking Dead will become that, but it doesn't seem likely.

Stray Observations and Predictions:

-  Milking the Glenn story line is a cheap trick.  Next week seems to focus on Darryl, Sasha and Abraham so we might go three straight weeks without learning what happened to Glenn.  I'm beginning to suspect we won't find out his fate until episode 7 or even the midseason finale. But I'm more convinced than ever that he is alive and he will be reunited with his pregnant wife.

- They seem to be saving on actor's salaries by holding key characters out of some episodes. Where was Carol tonight? Where was Eugene?

-  There should have been some mention of Morgan's Wolf prisoner.  Even if he was committed to not killing him, I can't believe that he would not let Rick or Deanna that there was a Wolf left.  Maybe he wouldn't have wanted to put the Wolf's life in danger, but she certainly knows that his prisoner intends to kill the others.  Keeping him out of sight seems to be part of a strategy of making his return more dramatic.

-   Remember when Darryl was on this show? It's a good thing that next week's episode apparently focuses on him.  The dip in the ratings is not just because the narrative is trapped in a cycle of going from one false oasis to another. It's because Darryl isn't getting enough screen time.

-  We are overdue for a familiar death and I think we'll get one next week. Abraham seems like a good candidate.

Meanwhile Back in Crazy Town (Updated GOP forecast)

I have taken up a new way of reading Republican primary polls.  Normally as Iowa and New Hampshire draw near, the candidates sort themselves into two broad categories; contenders and pretenders.  Two to four people are fighting for the lead and the rest are hoping to get lucky and outlast some of the more mainstream candidates.  That model does not compute for 2016.  The polls have been dominated by two candidates with absolutely zero political experience.  All of the candidates with credible resumes are huddles in a pack fighting to get to the upper single digits and more than a handful of  hopeless candidates soldier on without a blip of support or a plausible path to the nomination.  Here's the taxonomy I have created:

Outsiders	RCP	Serious	RCP	Niche	RCP	Charity	RCP
Trump	27.2	Rubio	9	Huckabee	3.7	Graham	0.5
Carson	21.3	Cruz	8	Paul	3.3	Jindal	0.3
Fiorina	5.5	Bush	7	Christie	2.5	Pataki	0.3
		Kasich	2	Santorum	0.5	Gilmore	0
TOTAL:	54.3%		26.0%		10.0%		1.1%

The Outsiders have dominated the polls.  Yesterday I was looking at the Real Clear Politics Polling and those three candidates had gotten between 52 and 54 percent of the voters in every single poll for the last month.  And they always appear in the same order: Trump first, Carson 2nd, Fiorina 3rd. This morning a new ABC/Washington Post poll has come out and it shows this group's support swelling to 59 percent!  (That's Trump 32, Carson 22 and Fiorina 5.)

Two weeks ago Trump's numbers slipped noticeably and the establishment began to breath easier. It looked like the Trump bubble had burst and he was going to be remembered as this year's Herman Cain. Cain led the RCP average for about three weeks in the summer of 2011. Donald Trump has now led the polls for more than three months.

Note that this Taxonomy is not a typical "Tiers" system.  The point of this taxonomy is to sort the candidates into categories based on the nature of their support rather than the volume of their supporters.  Marco Rubio is in the 2nd category but I still think he's the most likely nominee.  Mike Huckabee might do very well in Iowa and last longer than several Ousider and Serious candidates.

I still believe the nominee will be a candidate with a credible resume and broad appeal to the various demographics that make up the present Republican party. All of those candidates are in the Serious category. The Niche candidates are semi big names but who only appeal to one type of voter. Huckabee and Santorum to social conservatives. Chris Christie appeals to the pro-business and tough on crime crowds that used to form the bulk of the party. Rand Paul is hoping to catch some interest among the mostly younger conservatarian types who hate the government and know the party has to appeal to new segments if it's going to remain a major party. Together they are getting 10 percent of the vote. Four completely hopeless candidates are continuing to run because they have nothing better to do. They combine for just over one percent support and their primary purpose at this point is to warm up the crowds on GOP debate nights.  They are political opening acts.

The Road Ahead.

If the Serious candidates want to get down to winning this thing, they have to appeal to the people currently supporting the Outsiders. To paraphrase Willie Sutton, that's where the votes are.  And that's why I despair of the coming months. Rubio, Bush and Kasich are ill suited to Trump's game.  Cruz has cleverly stuck to a non-aggression strategy with the Outsiders. If any of them were to drop out, Cruz would likely benefit enormously.

But they are unlikely to drop out unless something personal rocks their campaign. Trump lives for this attention. Carson is making boat loads of money selling his books. Fiorina is ambitious enough to tell any lie and stick to it in the face of overwhelming evidence. So far Jeb Bush has been most willing to confront Donald Trump. He has lost every single round of that match up and he will keep losing them if he thinks he can be a bigger bully than Trump. Jeb is way too much of the establishment to make headway with that crowd now.  I don't think Kasich has the fight in him. Rubio and Cruz are best positioned to gobble up those points when this race is mercifully over.  And that leaves me with this revised forecast for the 2016 Republican nomination:

Candidate	Pre 1st debate	Post 1st Debate	Pre 2nd Debate	Pre 3rd Debate	Change
Trump	2	1	8	12	4
Bush	34	31	24	17	-7
Walker	32	29	22	--	-22
Rubio	23	28	26	46	20
Huckabee	3	3	1	1	0
Santorum	1	1	1	1	0
Paul	2	1	1	0	-1
Cruz	1	1	2	10	8
Kasich	1	2	6	3	-3
Carson	0	0	3	5	2
Christie	0	0	0	0	0
Jindal	0	0	0	0	0
Fiorina	0	2	3	2	-1
Graham	0	0	0	0	0
Perry	0	0		--	--
Pataki	0	0	0	0	0
Gilmore	0	0	0	0	0
The Field	1	1	3	3	0

So the headline is that I'm giving almost all of Walker's chance to win the nomination to Rubio. Ted Cruz's chances have also increased greatly, mostly at the expense of Jeb Bush. Trump and Carson have both grown a bit while Kasic and Fiorina have slipped.

After the debate I will update the field again and I will begin to try to analyze what the race for delegates might look like next year. The most tantalizing thing about a fractured field is that it feeds the ultimate dream of every political nerd; the prospect of a brokered convention. I have been hoping for one all of my political life so I remain skeptical that it can happen this time. But Trump is well positioned to gobble up delegates in the early states. And he's not known for hi ability to play well with others.



.

Waiting for Godot (D-DE)

The second GOP debate was the one thing I thought it would never be: boring. The consensus is that Carly Fiorina won and it certainly seems like this format plays to her strength. She is likely to gain some steam and stay near the first tier going forward. The other semi-important development was that Scott Walker did nothing to help himself. He is beginning to look like he is in over his head.

The one truly disturbing moment came when Donald Trump was asked about his anti-vaccination stances. He clearly rehearsed for this moment and managed to answer the question in a way that would sound less than bat shit crazy to anyone who is completely unaware of the science. And then it got worse. Dr. Ben Carson and Dr. Rand Paul, two men with decades of experience as doctors responded to him by suggesting there was something wrong with the vaccination schedule. This is not just stupid, it's very dangerous. A lot of people had their anti-vax views validated by no fewer than three presidential candidates.  That was disgusting.

Speaking of boring, the Democrats.

There have been only two stories on the Democratic side: Hillary Clinton's emails and occasional speculation about who else might join the field. 

A. Hillary' Emails.

I haven't watched the McLaughlin group with any regularity since Hillary was First Lady but I will frame the subject as the moderator of that show might: On a scale of 0 to ten, zero being no scandal at all, 10 being a metaphysical certain death of her campaign, how you would rate the e-mail scandal? At this time Mort and Freddie the Beetle Barnes would say 8 or 9, Jack Germond would say 2 and Eleanor Clift would say zero.

I'll go with four.  It's still not clear to me if any real damage was done by her decision to not use a .gov e-mail address but it is clear that her judgment was poor. If nothing else, she saddle her candidacy with a monstrous distraction. The degree of this distraction seems worse because all of the energy this cycle has been on the Republican side. The impact on her polling numbers has also been lasting because people are simply sick of both Clintons and Bushes.

B. Whither Biden?.

Forecasting the Democratic race is boring because Hillary is and remains a prohibitive favorite to be the nominee. I don't think even Bernie Sanders would bet on himself to give an acceptance speech in Philadelphia next July. Handicapping the race has been made even more difficult by the continued practice of every major pollster to include Vice-President Biden in the field. Biden has been averaging about 15 percent in the polls that include him. In Iowa and New Hampshire that amount is greater than the gap between Secretary Clinton and Senator Sanders. It's also roughly equal to the combined polling numbers on the Republican Side of Scott Walker, Jeb! Bush and Marco Rubio. That's more than enough to distort the state of the race for a candidate unlikely to enter the field.

It's true that he has begun kicking the tires on a run but he's not in any great hurry to actually enter the fray. More problematic for him as a candidate is that there are simply very few policy differences between he and the front-runner. The only one that comes to mind is that he was against authorizing the raid that led to the death of Osama bin-Laden, a point that will be made endlessly during any primary against Clinton and in the general election against any Republican who can fog a mirror.

Yes, he has some great intangibles.  He's well-liked and very experienced. He has both an ironic hipster appeal and foreign-relations bona fides that go all the way back to the Cold War.  But he's also past his prime and better suited for his current role than for being the leader of the free world, although we'd trust him to assume that role in a pinch. His status reminds me of a sports cliche: the most popular guy in town is the backup quarterback.

But Hillary's weakness as a candidate is real.  If she wasn't a weak candidate, than Vice-President Obama would be rehearsing for his first debate against Senator Booker and a field of also-rans. So we have to acknowledge the possibility that she will not sweep Iowa and New Hampshire. If she splits them, she'll probably still look strong headed to South Carolina. But if she loses both, the party bigwigs and the Silicon Valley donor class will look elsewhere.  The only person that could raise the right amount of money and be treated seriously by both the establishment and the lefties is Elizabeth Warren. So yes, I'm including her in the forecast.

Where they stand:

Hillary still has the institutional support of all the right people. She has a ton of money and there is zero chance that she will go gracefully.  In June I said her odds of being the nominee were "comfortably over 95%" and I didn't attach a specific number to any other candidate.  That has changed, but only slightly.

Note: I used 95+ for more than 95% and -1 for less than 1% because < and > screwed up the HTML.

Candidate.                November 2014      June 2015     September 2015

Hillary Clinton                 70                             95+                  83

Bernie Sanders                  n/a                           -1                      5

Jim Webb                          10                            -1                      1

Lincoln Chafee                  n/a                           -1                      1

Martin O'Malley                  1                            -1                      1

Unannounced  

Elizabeth Warren              12                             n/a                    5

Joe Biden                            5                              n/a                   3

The Field                           -1                               -1                    2

And yes, my preferred candidate is still Lincoln Chafee. And yes, he's the only one listed with a less than 1 percent chance to win. He is moderate, centrist, even-tempered and reasonable. Just does not feel like the the year for any candidate with those attributes.  Webb and O'Malley each get one percent because they are in the field and I can imagine things going to shit in a way that it falls into their lap. Webb's scenario would have to involve some kind of horrific war breaking out. O'Malley's would be something health-related forces Hillary to drop out and then he manages to eke out a  plurality primary win in a multi-candidate field. You know, just like Carcetti did in Season 3 of the Wire.

So the race is still Hillary's to lose. But unlike three months ago, I can now imagine a plausible scenario for that to happen. I will get on that general election preview soon.

No, Really, what was conquered? (Immediate reaction to The Walking Dead Season 5 Finale)

I enjoyed the finale, very much. I thought Morgan's return was fantastic and his anti-climatic reunion with Rick was handled perfectly. Immediate impressions:

1. What was conquered?  Well, Glenn conquered some fear in letting Nicholas live.  That was actually pretty impressive and it's consistent with his character.  I guess Rick's way of doing business conquered the Alexandrian's denial.  And of course Morgan conquered two huge scum bags with W's carved into their foreheads.

2. What was gained and what was lost? They lost an architect and a doctor but they gained a Jedi in Morgan and a huge dose of reality in the Ricktatorship's way of doing business.  Perhaps most importantly Dianna lost a husband but gained a very competent general.  I love that she gave the order for Rick to kill Pete.

3. Carol is the Paulie Walnuts of this Zombie Apocalypse.  I keep thinking that she will die, but she hangs around. And she's also being asked to deliver some of the comedic relief, albeit a more ironic tone than Paulie's was on the Sopranos.

4. There probably will be a time skip but I don't think it will be as long as I had hoped.  The Wolves are 50 miles out from Alexandria and I don't think those photos will have any revealing signs because Aaron knew they could fall into the wrong hands.  The ones Rick saw had no such signs at least and the ones they added just showed people. (Probably in response to Rick and Michonne's freak out that there were no people in the pictures.)  So they can play with the timeline as much as they want. I expect it will be like the jump between season 2 and 3: a few months but not more than year. Probably the first way to tell will be when we see Judith for the first time.

5. Morgan and Rick are going to have some great conversations next year.  Lenny James has already revealed on The Talking Dead that Morgan had some kind of life-changing experience between when we saw him in Season 3 and his meeting up with Rick and gang in Alexandria.  Rick of course has descended nearly into the kind of madness that Morgan was grappling with back when he had a booby-trapped town to himself.

6. The Wolves have great potential.  I hope they don't screw up the casting.  When Michonne first appeared in the Season 2 finale, they never showed her face.  We did see a couple of the Wolves tonight but they don't have to be the, well Alpha males of the pack. So they will probably cast someone with at least a bit of name or face recognition for that part. The show has an uneven track record of casting.  Hopefully they will cast someone more like Andrew J. West (who played Gareth) than David Morrisey (the Governor).

One interesting thing is that they do not seem to be well supplied. After all those 2 dudes that confronted Morgan had to do so with an empty 9MM.  Makes you wonder how efficient that food trap is.

7. Negan is another year away.  I don't think we will see Negan in Season six but he's probably on track for a Season 7 story arc.  The Wolves should be able to up the cruelty ante and only Negan will be able to top that.

8. Lennie James is the best actor in this company and I love his British accent.

A Final Thought, Much Repeated.

Please for the love of God can this group think a little more Strategically next season?  Now that they have a congressman, a UNICEF veteran and a Jedi to go along with the sheriff, the archer, the samurai  and the soldier, there is no reason they can't start to think more than 2 moves in advance.  A few suggestions:

1. Dig Zombie Pits.  Why on Earth was the Governor the only person to figure out that gravity is our friend?
2. Send a search team to destroy that food truck trap.  It's obviously a tool of very bad people.  You don't want them to survive and you don't want them to kill any more good people, like poor Mr. Red Pancho.  Send a team back and bring enough explosives to destroy that whole yard.
3. Eugene needs to contribute more.  Maybe he can design the perfect way to destroy the Wolves food trap or figure out a way to make bullets. (Something he apparently does eventually in the comics.)

Law & Order was  really successful show that eventually launched two spin off.  Law & Order SUV was more salacious and less challenging than the original. Law & Order Criminal Intent was slightly brainier and attempted to be clever from time to time.  Of course of the 3, SUV became the most successful and is still on the air.  I'm sure Fear the Walking Dead will follow in that vein. But I'm a dreamer and I choose to hope that the smarter version of TWD will come along, eventually.

Aaron and Deanna are the People We Have Been Waiting For (The Walking Dead Season 5 Second Half)

It's been a while since I have posted about the Walking Dead.  The first two episodes of the second half of season five were basically filler.  First they gave up on one of the best characters in the company by building an entire episode around Tyrsese dying during a digression that barely advance the narrative at all. The episode after that was even less relevant to the main plot.  We spent an hour learning that Ricks group were hungry and tired. I'm pretty sure we knew that since about the 3rd episode of season one, but they spent an hour hammering it home.

And then we met Aaron. The great challenge before the writers of this show is to take a show that has been about survival and zombie kills and elevate into a show about rebuilding civilization. The prison season had moments of this, and those remain the best episodes we've seen.  But mostly the show has been content to put our friends in danger and expect us to be satisfied with the fact that it sometimes lets them die.  But this approach is losing its power as the remaining characters seem to be easily identifiable as Untouchable (Rick, Darryl and Michonne) or Biding Their Time (Everyone else.)

Aaron is the first character with the skill set to make the show about something more than the endless cycle of being chased by zombies and killing incompetent bad guys.  He worked in the Niger delta for an NGO.  He knows how to negotiate with hostile clans and he knows what really matters in building bridges.  The writing on his first full episode was of course uneven.  (The bit about not wanting to eat apple sauce because his mean mommy made him eat apples to make him more manly? Is that a thing? And  I can't for a minute believe they couldn't find a less insulting way to let us know that the new good guy was also our first gay guy on the show.) But there was good stuff too.  He showed that he knows how to negotiate and how to empathize with desperate people.  There is great potential in him.

Last week we met Deanna the putative boss of the Alexandria Safe Zone.  The best characters on this how bring something to the Zombie Apocalypse that was also meaningful in their old life. Deanna was a Congresswoman. For all our national ambivalence about the current congress, the fact is that the House of Representatives is still the best collection of former High School Class Presidents in the world.  You don't get there by accident and you don't stay there without some people skills.  I think Deanna has great promise, although I suspect her run on the show might be short in order to make Rick the unquestioned leader again.  This story is still a hero's quest and Rick is our hero.

It was great to see Rick back in uniform last week.  Andrew Lincoln is a pretty good actor but the show has demonstrated the limits of his range at times.  Rick isn't very convincing when he's overly anxious or bordering with insanity.  Rick is still a cop and a great one.  I think these next few episodes will give us a chance to see him revert to his basic humanity. That doesn't sound especially exciting but this gets me back to the challenge of the show in the first place.  Can they make this horror show a compelling story about how to rebuild a civilization?  It's a tall task but the Aleandria Safe Zone seems like as good a stand in for the Garden of Eden as anything we're going to get.

Predictions.

There are two kinds of Walking Dead fans.  Those who enjoy the zombie kills and can take the story as it comes and those who really want to see where the story goes.  I'm in the latter group and that makes the somewhat pointless art of predictions necessary.

1. Episode 5 will be relatively calm.  I think we get one more hour of the Group getting acquainted with Alexandrians.  There will be an obligatory action scene, most likely involving Aaron and Darryl teaming up to kill some Walkers outside the walls.

2. The next bad guys will be the people that Deanna exiled.  (But not Negan).  I think the last 3 episodes will involve a now familiar pattern of meet a threat, suffer a setback, beat the threat.

3. Morgan will return in Epsiode 7 and bail out Rick's group in the finale.

4. Deanna will die during this confrontation with the bad guys.

5. Of course someone major will die in the finale.  My hunch is Carol because I don't think Deanna buys her Suzy homemaker act for a second.  If there was any doubt about this, her line to Rick about being a great poker player is a less than subtle tip off.  (Tell, if you prefer.) This either leads to her proving invaluable in an unlikely way (for the 10th time) or she will be mistrusted by Deanna and somehow that will go to shit.  The other contenders for a serious death are Glenn and Maggie but they have not built that up at all.

6. We could get a bonus death of a group member, but it won't be anyone we care about. It strikes me that Abraham might not be very useful in Alexandria but I think he will be very useful once Negan shows up and the group truly finds itself fighting wars.  (Season six could be great!) So I don't think it will be him but between Tara, Rosita, Gabriel and Noah, there are some spare people taking up oxygen in the group.

7. The season will end with relative calm and we'll have a time jump before season six.  I expect that Season 6 will find the group having lived a couple years of relative peace. At some point they have to explain Carl going from nine years old to a teenager in such a short time.  And it would be helpful if Judith were out of infancy.

8. I saved this for last because it's the most specific.  Rick will start a relationship with Michonne by season's end.  Of course I have been wrong before.  But I think this is the love story we have been waiting for.  If you think about the group as currently constituted, you essentially have  four adult couples: Glenn & Maggie, Abraham and Rosita, Darryl and Carol, Rick and Michonne.  Only two of these couples are actually having sex but I think that will change soon.  Alexandria should give them the chance to enjoy life a little.  Come to think of it, I think Darry will finally bone Carol...and then she will die.  His many fans of the distaff gender will finally see him have sex with a woman and then he will be the sexiest thing of all: a widower.

The rest of the group are probably not going to pair up anytime soon. In the comic books Eugene ends up with Rosita after Abraham gets killed but that doesn't feel believable on screen.  Father Gabriel is an Episcopal priest but I don't think he's still wrecked with grief about what he did.  Sasha is still mourning Bob and Carl has made the mistake of falling for a feral Emo girl. (We've all been there kid.)  I don't see that working out well which leads me to my last prediction.

9. Enid is a spy.  No one that young survives on the outside for very long.  I think she is a spy for the next group of baddies.  She's probably the person we saw watching the group as they headed towards Alexandria a few weeks back. And she seemed a little too nonchalant about hopping that wall.  I think she was going with a purpose.  I think she was reporting to her old friends, probably the people that Deanna exiled.  She will deliver the trouble to Alexandria and break Carl's little heart in the process.

The Death Throes of Civil Unions

The states in the left column were carried by Barack Obama. The states in the right column were carried by Mitt Romney. Dark Blue indicates marriage equality. Nevada is green because as of this moment, it only has civil unions.  The light blue and red states have no legal recognition of gay relationships.

Another exciting day for marriage equality, with two major developments.  To keep up with these changes I have added a new wrinkle to the above table.  The states with yellow font are states where gay marriage is still not permitted but that are in circuits which have ruled to strike down state bans on gay marriage.  (Colorado became the first to do so earlier today.) Most likely these states will begin to flip in the coming days and two weeks from now, the chart will be mostly blue.

The most western states might take a little longer.  Today that the Ninth Circuit upheld two trial court rulings against state bans of gay marriage.  But that means these rulings are not directly affected by the Supreme Court's surprising decision to  not hear appeals from other circuits.  Alaska, Montana and Arizona can probably hold off the inevitable for a little while, although I'm sure there will be an expedited movement to change that fact in all of those states.

Idaho and Nevada also had an option to delay the inevitable.  Today's ruling came from a three judge panel of the Ninth Circuit.  Those states could have requested a hearing in front of the entire Ninth Circuit but it is a virtual certainty that the result would be the same.  The early indications are that they will not waste their taxpayers money on that. So as soon as tomorrow, I hope to update my chart again.

But today is truly historic.  We now have 25 states with marriage equality and 25 without.  Throw in DC and we can say that a majority of jurisdictions in this country have full marriage equality, barely ten years after Massachusetts became the first.


Another point of history is that today might be the very last day that this country has "civil unions" as the closest facsimile of marriage available to gay people.  Colorado went past that point today and Nevada is expect to do the same tomorrow.  Soon, my map will be just blue or red.  And it's trending blue, in a hurry.

UPDATE (and it's awesome):  The Opinion from the Ninth circuit in the Idaho case includes the following sentence, which ends with a footnote:

Same-sex marriage, Governor Otter asserts, is part of a shift towards a consent-based, personal relationship model of marriage, which is more adult-centric and less child-centric.(12)

Footnote (#12) Reads:

He also states, in conclusory fashion, that allowing same-sex marriage will lead opposite-sex couples to abuse alcohol and drugs, engage in extramarital affairs, take on demanding work schedules, and participate in time-consuming hobbies. We seriously doubt that allowing committed same-sex couples to settle down in legally recognized marriages will drive opposite-sex couples to sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll.

Latta v. Otter D.C. No 1:13-cv-00482-CWD

History When You Least Expect It.

Blue for Equality, Green for Civil Unions, Red for Neither

This morning the Supreme Court declined to hear seven pending appeals related to gay marriage bans. The immediate consequence is that gay marriages are legal in Virginia, Indiana, Wisconsin, Utah and Oklahoma.  Within weeks, it will also be legal in West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Kansas, Colorado and Wyoming. That latter group of states is not reflected in the above chart because I've been trying to track the gradual progress of this issue in order to show that the law is following the will of the people.  More about that later.

The news caught me by surprise.  It only takes four of nine justices to hear a case and my assumption was that the four conservative justices, who voted against Windsor, would vote to hear it.  But at least one of them chose not to hear all of these cases.  We may never know how the vote went, but there are three plausible scenarios:

1. Chief Justice Roberts didn't want to deal with this case just yet. He might not want the headache and publicity of a high-profile gay marriage case.  I'm pretty sure that deep down, he does not give a shit about this issue, and would much prefer to go back to handing out privileges to corporations and chipping away at the rights of criminal defendants. 

2. The Justices are waiting for a circuit split.  Perhaps he would rather wait until next year or until a circuit split arises.The Sixth Circuit, which covers Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee, might soon rule in favor of the right of states to ban gay marriages. If that happens, then the issue will be more pertinent a year from now and even some of the liberal judges might vote to hear that case.

3.  Antonin Scalia had a moment of integrity. Well, stranger things have happened.  In his Windsor dissent, Justice Scalia predicted that the Court's opinion would inevitably lead to a ruling that states did not have the power to ban gay marriages.  After all, the Windsor majority held that the federal government could not deny the due process rights of American citizens.  It's not much a of a leap to infer that state governments also could not do so.  By that logic, the principled thing to do would be to let the lower court opinions stand.  Tony, if that's what you did....I salute you.  But let's just say I have my doubts.

Where we Stand and Where We Go Next.

Whatever the reason, the headline is that more than 50 million people will live with marriage equality.  For the first time, some permanent damage has been done to my underlying theory about the spread of this freedom tracking with democratic trends.  It's obvious at a glance that blue states are nearly unanimous in allowing gay marriage.  But now a small number of red states have marriage equality too.  Included among them is Utah, the state where the lowest percentage of voters chose the President last time out.  Wyoming, the President's 2nd worst state in 2012, will soon join Team Equality too.

The next big decisions will come from the sixth and ninth circuits.  If Marriage Equality prevails in both, only Deep South and a swath of the Great Plains will not have full marriage equality.  If there is a split, then the state by state fight will resume for another year.  And this time next year, I'll probably be blogging about how the Supremes are going to take a case and give us a final answer. And that opinion will come out at the start of the next next general presidential election.

Good times.

Oscars!

Be sure to watch the video from 3:55 on to see Oprah Winfrey learn about her Oscar Nomination for The Color Purple. 


As of last night, I have seen every movie nominated for this year's Best Picture Oscar.  My general impression is that there were a number of good and very good movies this year, but no clear front runner in terms of deserving this award.  My thoughts on each, in rough order of how much I liked them.

Best Picture Nominees

1.  Nebraska.  I have enjoyed all of Alexander Payne's films.  This is every bit as good as Citizen Ruth and Sideways.  Will Forte and Bruce Dern really carry a movie that manages to be both funny and poignant in the same proportion as most of Payne's films.

2.  Her.  Spike Jonze has a real knack for making movies with stupid premises that turn out really fun and oddly believable.  I think he's a special talent and this movie captivated me throughout.

3.  Gravity.  This movie was an amazing experience in the theater.  I literally ducked out of the way of space debris twice.  (It missed.)  The story is serviceable and Sandra Bullock is fine.  I think the director deserves some specific praise for how he showcased Bullock's body.  She is lithe and athletic.  Beautiful in a way, but not at all objectified.  And while many people have legitimate quibbles with the details of the science faux-pas, I for one am happy that a movie about the space program did so well at the box office.  I think it's inspiring and I won't be upset if it wins this category.

4. Dallas Buyers Club.  Great story with great acting.  (See below.)

5. Philomena.  Wonderful story with two great performances.  I think it avoided some of the obvious traps related to a story of this kind.  

6.  American Hustle.  Fine but predictable and not all of the acting performances keep up with the pace.  My favorite part of this movie was Louis CK, who I thought was way out of place in Blue Jasmine, but who showed some real potential as a comedic character actor here.

7. 12 Years a Slave.  It's impossible to talk about this movie without first talking about what it has to say about our history.  There is no more important topic in American history than slavery and I think Hollywood has done a dreadful job of portraying the real life of slaves. Last year two of the nominees were about slavery, but neither Lincoln nor Django Unchained really told us much about what the real life of slaves was like.  This film attempts to do that, and it's a very difficult job.  This film deserves credit for tackling the barbarity of slavery while trying to show how it lasted for so long in this country.  The movie has some dramatic flaws, but some of the directing choices I liked, like when he lets the camera linger on a characters face for a few seconds at the open of a scene.  

It seems that this movie has become the front runner.  I don't think it's quote on that level, but I do think this is a film that people should see.  And I am very interested in reading the book on which it is based, a memoir by the title character, Solomon Northup.

8. Captain Phillips.  Good, but a bit longer than it needed to be and I found Tom Hank's New England accent unnecessary.

9.  The Wolf of Wall Street.  One of the most boring, pedantic, obnoxious movies I have ever seen.  It is ambitious and attempts to maintain for three hours the kind of pace that makes the last 40 minutes of Goodfellas so great.  But this movie is without any redeeming quality.  It is best thought of as being stuck in a crappy diner seated next to a table of douche bags who have too much liquor and about 1/100th of the charm they think they have.

Best Director.

About 80% of the time the Best Picture winner also takes home this prize.  But last year Argo won the big prize even though Ben Aflleck wasn't even nominated for best director.  I think this might be another year with a split in the big prizes.  Above I listed Gravity as the 3rd best film, but Alfonso Cuaron should be the favorite in this category for all the technical mastery.  This is a film that will be remembered for advancing the art of cinema special effects.  

Best Actor.

1.  Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyer's Club).  This will be the first half of an Oscars-Emmy year that I never would have predicted even five years ago.

2.  Christian Bale (American Hustle) does a pretty good Bronx accent but he was a little dull.

3.  Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a Slave)  to call this a challenging role would be an under statement.

4.  Bruce Dern (Nebraska)  A fine performance, but I think he belonged in the supporting category.  Will Forte deserved the nomination in this category.

5.  Leonardo DiCaprio (Wolf of Wall Street).  He was fine but the part was one note for 3 hours of 

complete drivel.  It would be a shame if DiCaprio finally won an Oscar for a movie this good.

Best Actress.

1. Judi Dench (Philomena).  I adore her, and she nailed this performance.  

2. Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine).  She acts the hell out of this part but it is a bit broad.  And I don't think it helps when a woman very publicly calls you out by name for working with the man she says molested her as a child.  She also pretty much plays a fictional version of Mia Farrow, directed by the man who hates her.  She could win but I think the Academy will politely pass.

3. Sandra Bullock (Gravity).  She was good but here character's back story was pretty much a pastiche of cliches.  

4. Meryl Streep (Osange County).  I didn't see it, but I guarantee she was better than...

5. Amy Adams (American Hustle.)  She has one hell of an agent.  She's not yet 40 and this is her 5th nomination in less than 10 years.  I only thought she was good in one of those roles (The Master).  But this year her nomination may set a record of sorts. (Spoiler alerts ahead.)  In this film she plays an American who is pretending to be British. This is supposed to be a big reveal in the third act.  But her British accent was so terrible that I didn't buy for a minute that anyone would fall for this con. By the time we learn this about her character, I forgot that we were supposed to actually think she was British. Or had been to Britain.  Or had seen A Hard' Day's Night.  So the record I referred to is this-has anyone ever been nominated for a movie when their performance gave away a major plot point?  I know Jaye Davidson's nomination in the best supporting Actor category for the Crying Game gave away a major point but that wasn't because his acting sucked.

Best Supporting Actor:  Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club).  Absolutely disappeared into the role.  This is close to a cinch.  The other performances are all fine, but clearly not as good as Leto.

Best Supporting Actress:  This is the toughest category to handicap.  Jennifer Lawrence was good in American Hustle but I don't think she's going to win 2 years in a row.  Sally Hawkins was excellent in Blue Jasmine but she's got to be hurt by the Woody Allen controversy.  I didn't see Augst: Osage County but I doubt that Julia Roberts will win.  That leaves June Squibb for Nebraska and Lupita Nyong'o for 12 Years a Slave.  I loved Nebraska but I thought Squibb's part was a little too broadly written.  And Nyong'o played by far the most challenging part in a movie that's likely to win a lot of trophies.  But I don't think it was a truly great performance.  My guess is Hawkins, but none of these names would surprise me.

Best Writing-Original Screenplay.

Woody Allen's nomination for Blue Jasmine is the residue of voters' habits.  To be blunt, his age is showing.  The characters feel like they are from another time.  And it say something when the most believable character is played by Andrew Dice Clay.  Most of the other nominees are pretty good but it would be something of an injustice for anyone other than Spike Jonze (Her) to win.  This is a great story made even better by the plausible execution of an absurd premise.  

Best Writing-Adapted Screenplay.

I didn't see Before Midnight, so I'll resist the temptation to make an Ethan Hawke joke. Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope should win this for Philomena, but I think John Ridley is more likely to win, for 12 Years a Slave.

Official Predictions:  So here is my office pool (of one) predictions. 

Picture: 12 Years a Slave

Director: Steve McQueen (12 years a Slave)

Actor: McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)

Actress: Dench (Philomena)

Supporting Actor: Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers' Club)

Supporting Actress: Sally Hawkins (Blue Jasmine)

Original Screenplay: Spike Jonze (Her)

Adapted Screenplay: John Ridley (12 Years a Slave)

2014 Hall of Fame Ballot

So this is the first (and probably last) year that I was able to actually vote for the baseball Hall of Fame.  Deadspin.com has worked out a deal with an unnamed HOF voter who has agreed to vote for whoever the Deadspin readers want him to vote for.  So I filled out a ballot on their site and learned a thing or two about the process.  Here is who I voted for, and why.

I. Three First Time Candidates:
1.  Gregg Maddux. I had real hope that Maddux would become the first unanimous HOFer, but just heard that one blow hard is voting only for Jack Morris in protest of "the steroid era".  Nevertheless, I'm pretty sure Maddux and Glavine will both get very high percentages and go in with their heads held high.

2.  Tom Glavine.  See above.

3.   Frank Thomas  Being primarily a DH hurts him, but he has the numbers that matter most to traditionalists, a batting average in the 3s (.301) and over 500 home runs (521).

II.  The Previously Snubbed.

4.  Tim Raines.  One of the best lead off hitters and base stealers of all time.  He has been overlooked for too long.

5.  Mike Piazza.  The only reason he wasn't elected as a first-time candidate last year is some very murky suspicion of steroid use.  This makes no sense to me.  I remember Piazza as a prototypical line-drive hitter and I didn't notice any obvious changes in his body during the worst of the steroid years. Much more importantly, he never tested positive and has never been formally charged with anything related to use of steroids.  I really don't think it's the place of sports writers to keep someone out of the Hall based on such vague innuendo.

III.  The Steroid Users.
6.  Barry Bonds &
7.  Roger Clemens

These are the toughest calls for me.  Their statistics make them obviously qualified candidates.  But they did use steroids.  I would not have voted for them the first time up, because there should be some consequences for such blatant violation of the rules of the game.  But here is my personal standard for known Steroid Users: they don't get in on the first ballot, and they don't get in if their qualifications are on the margin.  But if they put up HOF worthy numbers before using steroids, they deserve consideration.  And in the case of these two men, I would vote for them.  Yes, they tarnished the game, but so did every owner and GM who signed any of these guys to a contract.  You can't just erase two decades of the game from the history books.  They both deserve to be in the HOF.

IV.  A Guilty Pleasure.
8.  Don Mattingly.  I have long said that although Donnie Baseball is my favorite athlete of all time, I know he is not deserving of being in the Hall of Fame.  He had a six year period that had him on pace for the hall, but most HOFers put up those kind of numbers for 10 or 12 years, not six.  But a funny thing happened when I was filling out my semi-sort of official ballot.  I voted for him.  Because I could.  I guess it's the only way I could thank him for the many joyful hours of my childhood.  It seemed only fair, even though I know he's not strictly deserving of the honor.  This has taught me much about this process.  Consider that most of the voters  have been up close and personal with these men for the length of their playing careers.  It must be an emotional process for them sometimes too.

Notable non-votes.
1.  Jack Morris.  I have said for several years that I would vote for him but the best defense of such a vote I can come up with is that he was better than Bert Blyleven.  (And he was.)  But one substandard player getting in should not be an invitation for others to get in.  So I'll pass.  But I think Blyleven should have to wash Jack Morris' car once a month or so until one of them dies.

2.  Craig Biggio.  A close call.   And there is a statistical argument in favor of him, but I think he just comes up short of the standard.

3.  Lee Smith.  Also a close call.  Maybe next year if my top four all get in, I'll give him more serious consideration.  This is a big year, with three deserving first-timers and a small backlog of oversights.

The Dreck of the Steroids Era.
1. Sammy Sosa.  I thrilled at watching him at Wrigley my first few years in Chicago.  He was a terrific player, but never really the full package.  And it's pretty obvious that his strength came from synthetic sources, and he might have been a very marginal player without steroids.

2.  Mark McGwire.  If he never did steroids, his career would have petered out in the mid to late 90s and he probably would have retired with 300-odd home runs, a share of the rookie Home Run record, one World Series ring, and ample good will as a human being.  One of my favorite things to look at on baseball-reference.com is the Similarity Scores.  For most of Mark's career, he was most similar to a variety of other power hitters who wound up well short of the HOF: Roger Maris, Cecil Fielder, and Ryan Howard.  Then his last four seasons, he was most similar to a pair of HOFers: Harmon Killebrew and Willie McCovey.  The difference in his career after the age of 34 is that he was using steroids.  Steroids gave him inflated numbers, and he doesn't deserve to be in the Hall of Fame.

3.  Raphael Palmiero.  Another very good player whose numbers and reputation were greatly enhanced by chemicals.  Looking again at baseball-reference similiarity scores, we see a player most similar to such very good, but not great players as Will Clark, Al Oliver and John Olerud in his twenties.  Suddenly in his 30s, he was most similar to Billy Williams, Orlando Cepeda and Eddie Murray, in that order.  Three Hall of Famers, each of increasing quality and stature.  No dice, Raphael.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/p/palmera01.shtml

Pew Survey on Belief in Evolution of Humans

Four years ago, majorities of Republicans, Democrats and Independents all expressed a belief that humans evolved. Today, a large plurality of Republicans (48%) claim that humans have always existed in their present form.  Only 39% of Republicans believe that humans evolved from other forms of life. Did Fox News succeed in making their viewers dumber? Tempting as that is to say, I suspect that not many people stopped believing in evolution in the last four years. But I think that a lot of people who are smart enough to know that evolution happened, no longer identify as Republicans.

But let's focus on the positive.  Sixty percent of Americans overall now believe in evolution.  Just a third, (33%) believe that humans have always existed in their present form.  We have a long way to go, but what has Darwin taught us if not to believe in the power of very slow, extremely gradual change over long periods of time?

http://www.pewforum.org/2013/12/30/publics-views-on-human-evolution/

This is just entertaining.

I wasn't a big fan of the Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. He lost me when the story went to Antarctica. But I really enjoyed the little sub-plot about how all the WW2 era comics had not-so subtly gay characters that were "sidekicks" of the main hero. This is just incredible documentation of that bygone era.

Well, let's start with something beautiful.

This is my 2nd attempt at a blog of my own. The first, Spiderstumbled.com was launched in early 2004 with a stated mission of electing John Kerry President. But for 50,000 idiots in Ohio, we would have made history. Fuck you, Ohio.

Oh wait. I said we'd start with something beautiful. And we will, in a second. But first let me state the primary topics of this blog:

1. Politics

2. Baseball

3. Science and reason; secularism

4. Comedy

5. Literature and Cinema

I find that these are things I most care about, and I will try to put them in the best light possible.

Welcome to the Monkey House and now....the something beautiful.