Month: November 2017

Tom Steyer – You Idiot

by Coleman Patrick Ranahan

Tom Steyer: billionaire, is an idiot on a galactic level. Like, not just the kind of idiot you point and laugh at on the street. I’m talking, “This guy is about to fall down the escalator, drunk” dumb.

One of what are an incredible amount of notable scenes from Christopher Nolan’s film ‘The Dark Knight’: The Joker, whom took “half” of the Gotham mob’s money; burns it in the center of a giant warehouse. Tom Steyer is definitely not the Joker (thank god), nor the Russians whom the Joker taunts in that very scene, but while not in face paint or wearing a purple jacket, Tom Steyer is gleefully burning his money. He just needs the warehouse.

“All you care about is money…” the Joker exclaims. Now… enter Tom Steyer. *Looks at the bottle of wine I’m drinking… I should probably put this down. Nobody’s gonna give a shit about a Dark Knight comparison… sigh. Whatever. Fuck you. *Oh god, did I already drink half the bottle? Oh yeah, the Dark Knight comparison didn’t really matter. Where was I?

If you watch cable television, or news programs (god help you) from MSNBC, CNN, et al, you’ve probably noticed the Tom Steyer ad. There he sits in his chair, while dramatic music plays, like a drunk Mr. Rogers, and invokes the word “impeachment” while Steyer rambles on and heavily doctored graphics fade in.

This is the kind of dumb shit you see on the street, with dumb fuck idiots plastering Hitler mustaches on Obama or whatever dumb fuck thing you think you could dumb fuck human beings could photoshop on a face.

This is the kind of thing you would see petty Republicans do because they don’t have anything better to do, like baseball fans when they make awful, bad shirts meant to invoke rage on the opposing team when you visit near the stadium on the street (looking at you Chewing Gum field). Tom Steyer is the Democratic version of that, and his airing of his “ads” do nothing but harm the public discourse.

Is our President a meandering child accused of multiple sexual assaults? Yes.  Is our President someone who taunts the disabled and values strength over substance and character? Yes. Is our President a terrible person? Yes. Do I think he’s easily the most corrupt, horrible individual to hold the mantle of the highest office on planet earth and appoint what I call the Nightmare Cabinet? Certainly.

By airing these ads, we’ll be subject to wave after wave of idiots with money now that should they suddenly disagree with the President, and airing for their impeachment. If you’ve ever wanted to argue for why your DVR should skip past commercials, here’s your prime example. (Unless you of course sneak this ad into a god damn Marvel commercial or something).

The counterargument is, maybe idiots with money don’t air ads, but I think we all know the likelihood of that happening isn’t high. Either way, Tom Steyer is making us roll our eyes into the back of our heads like the amount of people that should have died from watching The Book of Henry.

Tom Steyer could be doing much better things with his money (like peddling my god awful millennial sushi for instance), I think we could all agree with that. He’s not funding candidates, he’s not funding real activism causes, but instead burning his senseless ad dollars in areas that aren’t truly making a difference. This doesn’t move Congress closer to a vote, this doesn’t move the Senate closer to a vote. This just stokes the tribalism for a cheap thirty seconds.

I roll my eyes every time I see one of them. I don’t like the sitting President at all, but he could instead help prep for 2018 and 2020.

You want to make a real statement? Fund progressive candidates. Fund activism causes. Fund things that will help lead to the stemming of global catastrophe.

Tom Steyer, you’re armed with billions of dollars. Join me, and stop your senseless waste of money on ads the Republican controlled congress, Senate, and White House will shrug off just like they shrug off gun violence victims, potential victims of the ACA repeal, or accused child molesters.

You can find me on Twitter @colemanranahan.

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Kesha – The Antithesis

By Coleman Patrick Ranahan

(Photo Credit – Vulture)

I’m not a man who attends a great deal of concerts. I can literally count on one hand how many actual concerts I’ve been too. And no, my siblings middle school choir concerts do not count, YOU CAN’T MAKE ME MOM.

It struck me Wednesday night, through the gap of a gay couple kissing in the audience of a concert at the Palladium in Hollywood, as Kesha commanded the stage, this was the most positive event I have been at all year. Not just simply because of the surrounding circumstances, a terrorist attack in New York, six hundred people shot in Las Vegas, an administration that runs around like a drunk toddler into a batch of legos.

All spectacularly bad photos below this sentence are taken by me.

I was surrounded by what had to be close to three thousand people packed in side by side at the Palladium. Some, were dressed in fancy outfits; custom, some painted, a man passed by me in gold spandex and sequin cape with a top hat, and some donned eye paint and glitter-beards. Anything and everything you could think of, we had it. Kesha’s army was here, her “animals” she lovingly called us. I was in a mere green button-up but I kind of wished I had dressed up.

Likely this will sound hyperbolic, but it had the vibe of the emerging flower power/sexual revolution 1970’s, but in the modern day. Or at least that’s what it struck me like as I was watching everything unfold in front of me from the back of the Palladium.

I didn’t wear anything fancy, though I sported a fancy attitude (some may contest otherwise), but I felt surrounded by the most positive energy I hadn’t felt in quite some time. It was astonishing, singular, and only of that moment. And it registered to me immediately upon stepping into the circular disco style floor of the Palladium.

Kesha’s choice in her opening band, Savoy Motel, a band I had never heard of before, showed an upbeat, fun 1970’s vibe with enough electric guitar solos to make AC/DC blush that seemed to coincide with Kesha’s jailbreak into the artist she’s evolved into.

As Kesha took the stage, she had a confidence, a swagger, a smile. She belonged up there. She loved roaring into the audience, even at one point taking a drink from a flask and “baby-birding” it into the audience. And we all ate it up. And with the presence of a super-star, gave the audience a little bit of everything. She could have asked us all to sucker punch each other in the face and we might have done it.

Without mentioning Donald Trump by name or by occupation, Kesha laid out that all were welcome, all were accepted, and to not let anyone be disparaged by their race, gender, sexual preference etc. The whole room didn’t have to hold their breath to know what she was getting at, we all knew.

The more unshackled Kesha became, the more it emanated into the room.

Whatever the days that come ahead, whatever nonsensical tweet storms our President decides to tear into like a proverbial six-pack that an alcoholic desires, I’ll most definitely remember this night. It wasn’t by any means an absolutely wild night, it was just a stark contrast of what we can be versus what our nation has grinded itself into right now.

And in that small room, that meager slice of life in Los Angeles, that room of people chanting ‘motherfucker’ back to Kesha as she strided around the stage, it felt like happiness, and that Donald J. Trump, is something you can’t roll back.

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