Whether Trump Wins or Loses, We're All Lost

Raise your hand if you'd like to read another opinion piece about the 2020 presidential election. Anybody? Thought so. At this point, surely just about everything's been said and written that can be, and just about everybody, from both sides or neither side, seems prepared for a win, loss or, yes, even a draw. (One thing we all have in common: We'll all be glad when it's flipping done.)

I don't cover politics, therefore I feel under no pressure to strain and persuade you that I am that nonexistent thing: free of bias. Nor do I even feel obligated to come off as fair or balanced. Such a quaint journalistic notion as trying to report without smirking, shaking one's head in disbelief or schadenfreude most definitely went the way of the blue dress, the housing bubble, the ascent of Pravda II: Fox News (which famously, laughingly appropriated the once-noble and meaningful standard of the newsman and newswoman, "Fair and Balanced," as its brand slogan, making it forever unusable again among actual journalists) and, finally, the entire presidency of one Donald J. Trump: noted real estate con man, philanderer, TV star, proud member of the heretofore little-known Orange race, marathon tweeter of late-night grievances.

So what in the heavens have I got to say? Just this. Whether Trump wins or loses next Tuesday, I've a feeling we will all continue to be lost — not as individuals, perhaps, but as a country. If he wins, well, that outcome certainly speaks for itself. But if he loses, it means that anywhere from one-third to forty-something percent of Americans still love him, still approve of him, still want him, after all he's done, to be in charge of Brand USA. Others have made that point, and still more will continue to make it. Because it's the true takeaway, and as such, it bears repeating, and repeating. 

Even in the case of a Biden win, a considerable chunk of the electorate, regardless of the election's results, will still think that entertainment and outrageous statements and coddling dictators and flipping off the military and pissing on rather than holding up the least among us (you know, like that dude Jesus who so many of Trump's followers claim to also worship taught mankind back in the day) are more acceptable and qualifying in a leader than brains, sober judgment, a steady hand and what used to be known as common human decency. 

We are a country populated by a frightening number of people who prefer a reality show clown posing as president versus an actual, capable, reliable leader. Again, many have made the point; again, it's impossible to repeat it too much. It is, frankly, still shocking to imagine, even after four years in which you'd think we'd all have become inured.

I have been a New Yorker for three decades, but lately I've been reading about the South, where I grew up, and my home state of Tennessee's shameful role in that dark blip in U.S. history known as the Civil War. (That Tennessee happened to be the last state to join the Confederacy, something many of its residents are fond of pointing out, does make it one whit less culpable, any less on the wrong side of history, or any less damned.) It may seem like ancient times, but the truth is, it really wasn't all that long ago, and what I have come to realize, as so many of you have, is that "we the people" haven't really changed that much over the last 150 years. During Civil War times, there were proud racists (there still are — just check out Fox News's prime-time lineup) and rabid secessionists (ditto — have you visited one of those gated communities full of tacky McMansions on a golf course lately? United Colors of Benetton they're not), but for the most part there were just sleepy little sheep: uninformed, uneducated, unmotivated, simply going along, drifting toward the gaping maw of oblivion (sound familiar?). 

Next week, the citizenry has a shot at turning away from ugliness and restoring our status as that fabled "shining beacon" of the world. 

And if it doesn't? 

Well, I reckon we had a good run, and we will thus retain our status, for four more years, as the world's most infuriating, tiresome and totally implausible reality show. I just hate to think what the finale will be.

David Letterman and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey Both Decide to Go as the Unabomber This Halloween

Time Replaces Cover Logo for First Time, Says VOTE, While New York Mag Cover Sports "I Voted" Stickers

It's refreshing to know there's still a first time for things, especially things created by journalists. 

In an unprecedented move, Time magazine has replaced its cover logo, instead urging readers in that familiar space and typeface to VOTE. The accompanying cover art, of a woman wearing a scarf to cover her nose and mouth, is by the estimable Shepard Fairey.

Time's editor in chief and CEO Edward Felsenthal explains the decision to change up the cover this week:

Few events will shape the world to come more than the result of the upcoming U.S. presidential election. ... To mark this historic moment, arguably as consequential a decision as any of us has ever made at the ballot box, we have for the first time in our nearly 100-year history replaced our logo on the cover of our U.S. edition with the imperative for all of us to exercise the right to vote. ... We stand at a rare moment, one that will separate history into before and after for generations. It is the kind of moment in which readers across the country and around the world have always turned to TIME. We thank you for doing so now.

The editor's note is followed by a discreet button for ordering a print issue of your very own — meaning they intend to take full advantage of monetizing this historic moment in presidential politics, and journalism. And you know what? Good for them. Journalism today, notably print journalism, depends on fresh ideas and financial health. Here's to more of both, no matter what comes to pass on November 3rd.

... And in another burst of creativity from the newsstand ...

The cover of New York magazine's October 26 issue will feature a series of peel-off "I Voted" stickers, in partnership with the organization I Am A Voter and created by an assemblage of 48 artists including Shepard Fairey, Barbara Kruger and Laurie Simmons. The magazine explained that millions of Americans are voting by mail, therefore missing out on those little adhesive testaments to doing their public duty typically handed out at the polls. There will be four different covers, each with 12 stickers — enough for readers to wear a different one daily through Election Day. Here's a sneak peek:

Sue the Messenger: Trump's DOJ Goes After Big Tech

The Trump administration has followed through on a promised war against big tech, suing Google over alleged antitrust activities because its ad platform and search tool happen to be more popular by far than anybody else's. Eleven states joined the feds in the suit.

"If the government does not enforce the antitrust laws to enable competition," the deputy attorney general said in a lofty statement this morning, "we could lose the next wave of innovation ... and Americans may never get to see the next Google." I am about as sure that this is about advancing innovation as I am that it's just coincidence the 11 states also suing happen to be red states, and that the lawsuit was filed exactly 2 weeks before Election Day. 

As CNET reports, the DOJ's action was controversial even within the department: "Some of the attorneys were concerned the aggressive timeline ... was to ensure the Trump administration gets credit for taking on a big tech company." 

But there's more. Yesterday, Trump's chief of staff Mark Meadows went on morning television to warn that there will be still more lawsuits against the tech giants, namely social media companies, which the president and his cronies have repeatedly accused of bias against Republicans — their latest fury being that the Twitter accounts of those aiming to spread the New York Post's widely debunked report on Joe Biden's son were either censored or frozen. (More than 50 former intelligence officials have signed a letter casting doubt on the veracity of that story, maintaining it has all the hallmarks of a Russian disinformation campaign.)

By the way, the best part of Meadows' appearance on "Fox & Friends" was when he played free press advocate:

"They're now starting to censor, actually, reporters. That's a dangerous place for them to go when they're the arbiter of what they deem to be the truth."

And what the media is deeming to be the truth at the moment is the work of thousands of pollsters and oddsmakers predicting an overwhelming Biden victory on Nov. 3. If that comes to pass, expect all the noise about the evils of big tech, and the rest of Trump's personal vendettas masked as righteous crusades on behalf of the "people," to get drowned out by the sound of all those leather wingtips and low-heel pumps bolting for the exits. 

What If the Polls Are Wrong (Again) and Trump Wins?

MSNBC's Steve Kornacki makes us want to believe. But should we?

Why do we (meaning we in the media) continue to put so much stock in polls? As journalist Linda Ellerbee wrote in her excellent and inexplicably out-of-print memoir "And So It Goes: Adventures in Television" back in the 80s, "Ask yourself: If polling is so accurate, then why are there so many companies doing it?" 

Two weeks ahead of Election Day, virtually every poll shows Biden beating Trump in terms of the popular vote. Meanwhile, the dreaded swing states (that is, the only places in this "democracy" where your vote seems to actually make a difference) continue to swing wildly. In other words, remember 2016? Let's not break out the bubbly quite yet. 

Check out what Munr Kazmir writes in Medium's Dialogue & Discourse:

Polling is not reality. The polls showing Biden polling higher than Donald Trump, which are giving Democrats a dangerous dose of overconfidence, are often based on tiny sample sizes of 500 people. ... Things have changed since polling was a gold standard of accuracy, if indeed it ever really was one, which it wasn't. Polling is a representation of people willing to be polled."

Florida, as always, makes for a good study of the inherent flaws of divining the tastes of the American public, presidential or otherwise. As of this morning, FiveThirtyEight, an aggregation of hundreds of polls generating tens of thousands of potential outcomes, put Biden nearly 4 points ahead of Trump. Meanwhile, USA Today reports today that the numbers in the state are now favoring Trump. It's enough to make your head hurt. 

Then, there's Robert Cahaly, chief polster of the Trafalgar Group, the only major polling organization that correctly predicted Trump's victories in Michigan and Pennsylvania in 2016. As Kyle Smith writes in National Review, Cahaly predicts this time around that Trump will also take Michigan, in addition to Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and Texas. (This, despite the fact that a number of news orgs have already put Michigan, North Carolina and Arizona in the "safe" column for Biden.) Cahaly projects another ultimate win for Trump, with 280 electoral votes.

Pollsters reassure us that they properly identified the trouble with their crystal ball gazing last time around and have now "fixed" those problems. But what if they haven't? What if they're spectacularly wrong again? And the bigger question, again: Why do the media continue to worship at the altar of pollsters, people who are devoted to the patently absurd enterprise of predicting human behavior? 

If the polls fail us yet again, you can bet one thing: It won't mean that one fewer player will be doing polling four years from now.

Stop Trying to Apply Deeper, Intellectual Meaning to Dolly — She's Already Much Smarter Than You Are

This week's issue of The New Yorker features, by way of a review of the book "She Come by It Natural: Dolly Parton and the Women Who Lived Her Songs" by Sarah Smarsh, yet another highbrow attempt to divine deeper meaning from the simple pleasure that is Ms. Parton (although there is nothing simple about her). As Susan Sontag once said regarding art criticism, some things should be allowed to simply exist. Dolly — a national treasure and kick-ass woman who speaks for herself, through her charity, her humanity and, of course, her own words and music — is one of those things that need not be analyzed to death by a bunch of overeducated, pseudo-intellectual city folk. Kindly leave her out of your cerebral circle jerk.

Future Vice President Harris Covers November's Elle

Senator Kamala Harris: brains, beauty and, most importantly, decency. Not trying to take away your health insurance, or invalidate your marriage, or kill your parents from COVID, or destroy your faith in our leaders and institutions. In other words: Vote right, dumbasses. (read the full story at Elle Magazine)

56-Year-Old Lenny Kravitz Covers Men's Health Mag, Makes Everybody Feel Worse About That Quarantine 15

(via Men's Health)

The Hottest Products of the Pandemic Are Zoom, Purell and Netflix (And Booze, Cannabis and ... Spiral Hams?)

In "news more predictable than the plot of a Dane Cook movie" news, branding agency MBLM (pronounced "Emblem") is out with its "Brand Intimacy Study 2020," revealing that the hottest brands of the pandemic in terms of consumers' usage of and emotional attachment to them are, in descending order (drumroll): Zoom, Purell and Netflix. 

The study was based on a survey of 3,000 consumers in the U.S. in late summer who shared their opinions of and experiences with 100 brands across 10 sectors. The full study will be released Oct. 7. 

The popularity of Zoom, Purell and Netflix may be a no-brainer, as are greater sales of stuff like home workout equipment, jigsaw puzzles and, last but certainly not least, booze. Then there are all those products (paper goods, disinfectant spray) that flew off the shelves because of the mass hoarding of all you selfish bastards. But our being largely shut in the last six months has also led to a curious run on a number of other products, as AARP reported — among them, inflatable swimming pools and bidets. And Business Insider noted the surprising rise in demand for things like nail polish remover, Kombucha and spiral hams.

Of surprise to absolutely no one is the massive spike the cannabis industry has enjoyed since Covid hit, as TechCrunch reported. "Some company CEOs see the pandemic driving consumer acceptance and pushing legalization at the national level," the site noted. "With legalization, new consumers enter the market, and companies such as Canopy Growth, PAX and Grenco Science look to benefit as makers of some of the best vaporizers on the market — that is if consumers can find them in stock." Meanwhile, new players are joining the gold rush all the time — including, most recently, Martha Stewart, who launched her own line of CBD gummies. (They are simply delicious. I hear.) 

You know another thing that's been on the upswing during Covid? Debilitating depression. Which might have a tad something to do with the popularity of booze and marijuana. (And I'm pretty sure the sudden demand for spiral hams is related to the latter.)

You Can Watch the Next Octagon-of-Horror Cage Match "Debate" ... or You Can Just Go Ahead and Kill Yourself

According to legend and lore, journalists are the type to rush to the scene of a car crash with the hope of interviewing the man splattered on the road before he draws his next breath (or before his or her competition at the newspaper or TV station arrives on the scene), or to knock on the door of some lady who just lost her baby in a fire, demanding to know how she FEELS. Cliches like "hard-bitten" and "world-weary" are tossed around; personally, I find "ruthless" and "heartless" more accurate. 

I have been a working journalist, I am proud to say, for more than 30 years, but have never been one to enjoy visiting a nursing home that just exploded to count the dead old people scattered on the lawn. (Covering blazing nursing homes was just one of the luxuries of my first job out of j-school, at a local TV station. I left there after a couple of years, realizing it probably wasn't normal or healthy to require an entire bottle of bourbon to get to sleep after a day's work.) It's why I now write about relatively harmless stuff like the businesses of media and marketing — there are plenty of horrible monsters there, and god knows plenty of bad news, but very rarely is actual blood drawn, and living inside that world doesn't promote alcoholism or keep me up nights. 

As a newsperson and a news junkie, I have always immersed myself in the events of the day, but find that as I grow older I prefer to keep a somewhat safe distance from life's blood and gore, while still making the effort to keep up with what's happening in a world in which I can't escape being a part. The way I see it, I have two options: obsessively follow the details of every sickening, deplorable event (not to mention the endless, largely pointless analysis of said events) in some mission to stay thoroughly informed, or jump off the Chrysler Building. That said, sometimes, try as I might, I simply cannot look away from the car fire. 

That was me two nights ago, during the first presidential, um, debate. I knew what I was getting into ahead of time, but I went ahead, steeled myself, popped a big bowl of popcorn — and thought I could take it. 

I was wrong. 

Boy was I wrong. 

Just as I do not enjoy watching nursing home explosions or chatting up the mothers of dead babies, I cannot abide watching an unapologetic bully in action, in large part because I myself have been bullied, as an adolescent and in the work world. (Again, the media business is full of monsters, especially in New York. I hope to write about those, someday.) What a depressing spectacle and a true low point for our politics and discourse, that event — so much so that I couldn't bear to write about it till today, two days on, because it put me in such a hopeless, exhausting funk the entire day after. (I went to bed at 9 o'clock last night.) 

I will not be writing about collapsing bridges, roller coasters full of school children leaving the rails or police shootings anytime soon, nor will I be watching any more of these televised, octagon-of-horror cage matches where millions of bored Americans gather around the warmth of their big-screen TVs to see a gargantuan toad pummel a sad puppy into bloody submission. I will read the "highlights" the following day, thank you. 

What a shame, that this incontestably low point is what we've all come to. The Chrysler Building's not looking like such a bad option.

Now It's the 12 Weeks of Christmas: Holiday Shopping And Advertising to Commence Even Earlier This Year

Walmart plans to hire 20,000 employees to fulfill online orders this holiday season

In a previous life, I visited "CBS This Morning" to chat with Norah O'Donnell and Gayle King about how Christmas commercials are airing earlier and earlier. The reason was simple, I explained: because research showed at the time that 40 percent of Americans do at least some of their holiday shopping before Halloween — which is why, even though everybody always claims to hate it when stores put out their Christmas decorations and marketers run ads featuring Santa during October, they will continue to do so, forever and ever, amen. The beast that is retail must be fed when it is hungry, after all — and never has that been truer than in this awful year, with Covid wreaking havoc on the sector and major retailers from Neiman Marcus to Century21 going bankrupt.

As Ad Age recently reported, the Christmas-before-Halloween trend has only accelerated in 2020, with holiday promotions from retailers such as Crate & Barrel and West Elm rolling out in mid-September. Carter's, the maker of baby clothing, even pushed out an email blast with the subject line: "Last chance to get ready for the holidays." As Joel Bines, managing director and global co-leader of AlixPartners' retail practice, told the publication: "The traditional November-December holiday season definition is meaningless this year. His company projects total retail business from October to December this year to grow from 1 to 2.6 percent versus last year, when sales hit $1.1 trillion. 

And if you're the kind of person who finds it depressing when stores start decorating for Christmas when the pool's still warm? Then don't stop into Walmart, where aisles and aisles of fake Christmas trees, lawn ornaments and gift-wrapping are already fully stocked. But don't be too depressed — an early Christmas might just be what we all need this year. It's certainly happy news to those struggling with unemployment and underemployment right now. As CNBC reported, Walmart aims to hire 20,000 seasonal employees to help pack and ship online purchases, the first time in five years that the big-box retailer has hired a significant number of holiday helpers.

Leave it to good old American consumerism to turn ho, ho, hum into ho, ho, hooray.