— from “Inside the GOP Effort to Make Sure Biden Is The Democratic Nominee,” reported on 7.3 by notus.org’s Ben T.N. Mause and Reese Gorman.

“Democrats Don’t Know How To Spot A Weak Hand,” posted on 7.9.24:

Here are a few supplemental remarks about Fly Me To The Moon (Sony, 7.12,) which I favorably reviewed last weekend.

(1) Colin Jost‘s cameo as Senator Cook, a conservative none-too-bright, is a little embarassing. He only has a couple of lines, for one thing, and you can barely see him — he’s mostly covered in shadows. Jost is married to Scarlett Johansson, the film’s star and senior producer, and they couldn’t give him, say, six or seven lines?…a well-lighted scene with a little back-and-forth repartee? It’s humiliating, man — grounds for divorce.

(2) Ray Romano plays an upper-level NASA administrator named Henry Smalls…fine. But why is he wearing a ten-day growth of beard? NASA bigwigs were total straight-arrows, for one thing, and nobody in 1969 walked around with the Miami Vice Don Johnson short-beard look. That shit didn’t begin until the mid to late ’80s.

(3) Early on there’s a magnificent nighttime shot of a couple of Cape Canaveral launch towers a mile or so away, glowing with amber light. Congrats to dp Dariusz Wolski.

(4) Despite the protests of some delusional HE commentariat lunatics, Todd Douglas Miller‘s Apollo 11 showed without a shadow of a doubt that obesity was mostly non-existent in 1969. And yet Fly Me To The Moon includes two insert shots of a beefy. bordering-on-fat TV reporter going on about the atmosphere of excitement at Cape Canaveral, etc. There aren’t any galumphy, sea-lion-sized TV reporters now, and there sure as shit weren’t any 55 years ago.

(5) Woody Harrelson‘s Moe Berkus, a governmental “bad” guy, insists that fake moon landing footage should be captured in case the Apollo 11 mission goes wrong. Fine, but why is it important to shoot this footage live, or concurrent with the actual moon landing and exploration? They could have shot it a few days before and nobody would be the wiser. It makes no practical sense.

(6) Channing Tatum‘s Cole Davis is a total drag to be around. He stops the film in its tracks every time he says a line.

(7) And by the way, Tatum is now 44, and a recent promotional interview he did with Johansson shows he’s clearly going bald. He could fix this shit right away by going to Prague — his middle-aged years have only just begun! — but of course he won’t because he’s too cool for school.

If Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries and Nancy Pelosi don’t stand up and insist to Joe Biden that he needs to fold his tent and release his delegates, their reputations will be soiled beyond repair. A chance to stop The Beast was put before them and they wimped out? History will not forgive them.

“Biden Won’t Win — The Democrats Need a Plan — Here’s One” — James Carville, N.Y. Times, 7.8.24:

“Mark my words: Joe Biden is going to be out of the 2024 presidential race. Whether he is ready to admit it or not. His pleas on Monday to congressional Democrats for support will not unite the party behind him. Mr. Biden says he’s staying in the race, but it’s only a matter of time before Democratic pressure and public and private polling lead him to exit the race. The jig is up, and the sooner Mr. Biden and Democratic leaders accept this, the better. We need to move forward.

“But it can’t be by anointing Vice President Kamala Harris or anyone else as the presumptive Democratic nominee. We’ve got to do it out in the open — the exact opposite of what Donald Trump wants us to do.

“I want to see the Democratic Party hold four historic town halls between now and the Democratic National Convention in August — one each in the South, the Northeast, the Midwest and the West.

“We can recruit the two most obvious and qualified people in the world to facilitate substantive discussions: Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. They may not represent every faction under our party’s big tent. But they care as much about our democracy as our nation’s first president, they understand what it takes to be president, and they know how to win.”

From N.Y Times 7.8 editorial — “The Democratic Party Must Speak the Plain Truth to the President

“For those at the helm of the Democratic Party — including the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer; the House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries; and even the former House speaker Nancy Pelosi — the time has arrived to speak forcefully to the president and the public about the need for a new candidate, before time runs out for other candidates to make their case to the party’s convention delegates.

“These Democratic leaders know that the presidency is not a day job, and Mr. Biden needs to hear from them and others that the security of and stakes for America are too high to continue to move forward with Mr. Biden as the nominee.

“If their reticence up to now was partly a show of respect and partly a calculation that Mr. Biden would be more receptive to private counsel than to public criticism, it is increasingly clear that the president is unwilling to accept the reality of his situation. He is engaging in a staring contest with Democratic leaders, and he appears to be winning. The only way to persuade Mr. Biden to accept the need for new leadership is to demonstrate that the party is no longer following him.

“The 2024 presidential election is not a contest between two men, or even between two political parties. It is a battle for who we are as a nation.

“President Biden clearly understands the stakes. But he seems to have lost track of his own role in this national drama. As the situation has become more dire, he has come to regard himself as indispensable. He does not seem to understand that he is now the problem — and that the best hope for Democrats to retain the White House is for him to step aside.”

…I’d be super-down for this…Denzel throws dust into the eyes of a charging rhino!…some other actor (Chris Walken?) saying to 20-years-younger Denzel “you shall be my instrument.” That I could easily go for. That I would delight in.

But I can’t invest in a gladiator flick film starring Paul “weepy dad + milky complexion + greasy whiskers” Mescal. He’s too vulnerable, too meditative, too watery-eyed. Not my kind of alpha male. 24 years ago Russell Crowe had that X-factor, coiled-tension, charging-bull quality, and Mescal is supposed to be his son? Not buying it. Outside of the deranged HE commentariat trolls, relatively few are.

If Ridley had gone with a real man, fine. But the tearful, melancholy, too-quick-to-smile father from Afterburn? Forget it. He’s not good-looking enough. His jaw is too pointy, too Margaret Hamilton.

There’s no trusting a trailer, of course, but I’m sensing that the overall tone of Gladiator II is on the porno-violent side…overly emphasized…more blood, more severed limbs, more howling rage, etc. But at least there’s no more herky-jerky cinematography.