Violent Semester Ahead at Colleges?, Dems' "Camo Cap" Voter Outreach Goes Awry, RFK JR as Trump's CIA Director?, Video Game Review Shows Why Corporate DEI is Dying (The Five for 08/23/24)
Plus, the Y2K bug becomes a retro horror/comedy. Lord of the Rings and and Tomb Raider offer up animated stories...for adults who don't like animated stuff.
Hey, welcome to The Five, a publication about the stories that matter.
[one]
As a variety of social and political issues continue to divide the nation, colleges are taking a quite hypocritical approach to student discipline. Fraternities and Greek life are being punished for even the most minor infractions, while students engaging in felonies—including kidnapping—in the name of far-left causes are getting off scott free.
The piece is quite lengthy, so to read more about the persecution of fraternities…click the link below to read the full story.
As Maryland was cracking down on its fraternities last spring, pro-Palestine protests were sweeping through campuses across the country. Students built sprawling encampments that openly violated university rules, and some assaulted and verbally attacked Jewish students. A student at Yale was stabbed in the eye with a flagpole, and another at Columbia was told to “go back to Poland.” At UCLA, violence and hate erupted on both sides, as Jewish students were blocked from walking to class, and a group of pro-Israel protesters attacked the pro-Palestine encampment with fireworks.
In many cases, students got off scot-free despite committing criminal acts. At Princeton, the faculty voted to grant students “legal and disciplinary amnesty” after they were arrested for breaking into and occupying a campus building. At Columbia, protesters who held three janitors hostage after breaking into a campus building saw charges against them dismissed by the Manhattan district attorney, who cited a lack of sufficient evidence—even though multiple photos and videos documented their crimes. (The pro-Palestinian protests at Maryland were mostly confined to sit-ins that dispersed peacefully.)
Now, as students nationwide are preparing to return to campus this fall, all signs point toward another chaotic, and potentially violent, semester. One coalition at NYU has already said it’s ready to embrace “armed struggle” in its fight for the pro-Palestinian cause. And it’s not clear whether or not colleges will stop them.
[two]
And all of a sudden, everyone is after the rural white vote…with efforts that have taken strange turns this week. Up first, Kentucky governor Andy Beshear made a comment on MSNBC about Vance’s pro-life stance…which certainly sounds like a call for Vance’s family members to be raped:
Think about what some people have had to go through because of these laws. JD Vance calls pregnancy resulting from rape ‘inconvenient.’ Inconvenience is traffic. Make him go through this.
The election may come down to Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, which have a lot of blue collar workers, which Vance appeals to. This is why there’s so much heat on Vance, who may be playing an outsized role in this Presidential race compared to the typical election cycle (for example, Cheney, Biden and Pence were likely almost non-factors in the elections of Dubya, Obama and Trump, respectively).
Vance, raised by a drug addicted mother and then his widowed grandmother, escaped poverty by joining the Marines, before enrolling in a pretty typical state university and then earning the grades to go on to Yale Law School.
But according to a Congresswoman from Vance’s own state of Ohio…that’s all a very bad thing.
I was born in the Buckeye state, and I’ve never left. JD Vance likes to talk about how he’s from Ohio, but as soon as he could, he ran away to Yale and Silicone Valley, cozying up to billionaires while trashing our communities.
Technically, Vance “ran away” to the United States Marine Corp, leaving a town with a 19.6% poverty rate (the national rate is 11%) that offered little opportunity to join the middle class, paid for undergrad with his military service via the GI bill, and then earned his way into a prestigious university heavy on legacy admissions through merit. I’d love to see any evidence that JD has ever “trashed the communities” where he’s from, as Vance’s book and interviews focus on his distinct pride in his upbringing and the obstacles his family has overcome (including his mom finally beating drug addiction).
This story is highly personal to me, as I’ve endured cutting remarks and snide attitudes about my rural upbringing my entire life (a producer at one of the top news networks once told me she was “surprised I was so well spoken” when she discovered I grew up on a farm—if she had said that about any other gender, orientation, religion etc—her career would have ended that day).
So, in the eyes of those in power—if people from Appalachia and the Midwest leave and accomplish something, they’re sellouts…and if we and work jobs with less opportunities—we’re rubes worthy of being mocked.
Again, this topic is highly personal to me, as I’ve experienced shaming from members of my own extended family as a backwoods hillbilly…doesn’t matter that I hold two advanced degrees, have interviewed a U.S. President (Obama), been on-camera talent for an Emmy winning TV show or published in a half dozen national magazines. Because apparently none of that can outrun my DNA…and that treatment is coming from people who share part of my DNA.
But if you grew up rural like me…Rolling Stone wants you to ignore all that because the Harris/Walz campaign has a CAMO BASEBALL CAP GUYS.
That’s the genius work of this one small bit of Harris-Walz merch. The hat reclaims the rural and Southern identity that mainstream Democrats have long ignored, all in with the power of one nifty little cap. Ella Emhoff proudly wore hers last night, while Walz displayed his own — also camouflage — Jason Isbell hat backstage.
The cap in question is sported by Ella Emhoff, stepdaughter of Kamala Harris. But Ms. Emhoff has a peculiar hobby that doesn’t square up with most camo hat wearing folks…raising money for Hamas front groups.
My friend Haley Shane on Twitter also reacted to this “camo washing” the way I did.
The DNC should be credited with booking a couple of great country artists, which does count as outreach to rural folks, in a genuine sense.
Up first is Jason Isbell, who may just be the finest country songwriter alive, playing his incredible song “Something More Than Free,” written from the perspective of a weary manual laborer.
I don't think on why I'm here, where it hurts
I'm just lucky to have the work
Sunday morning, I'm too tired to go to church
But I thank God for the work
I thank God for the work
It was a cool move, a genuine musical moment that can be appreciated, regardless of your political bent.
The only problem is that Jason Isbell is a rage filled former drunk, kicked out of his first band, Drive By Truckers, for possibly beating his first wife, Shonna Tucker (DBT’s bass player), split with his second wife, Amanda Shires (a member of his solo band), at least in part due to Jason’s rage issues, captured in an HBO documentary released in 2023.
In the trailer, Amanda says “I know how he gets when he makes records, whether he sees it or not.”
When Jason isn’t running through divorces, his other vice is cutting black women out of music videos. Specifically, Mickey Guyton, the other country singer at the DNC (watch her performance here).
It’s not a bad bet to assume Isbell and Guyton were kept separate backstage, as Isbell once cut her out of a music video for The Highwomen, of which he was a member.
I left my ailing husband, who almost died from sepsis, in California just four days after his life-saving surgery because I had been invited to be a part of a female empowerment music video full of these same women. I arrived at the airport exhausted but excited. I checked my itinerary only to find that the entry had been deleted; I had been disinvited. The song was about supporting women in country, yet they disinvited the only charting African American woman in country music. Do they know? Don’t they see that I support them? Do they care? Do they want to see me? The answer is no. Let that sink in.
Isbell, nor the rest of the band, ever apologized to Guyton. And Jason has carried that “forgiveness for thee, not for me” attitude throughout his career, condemning country artists including Dierks Bentley, George Jones and Morgan Wallen of being “unforgiveable” over a variety of issues.
Which is precisely what gives Isbell insider status in elite politics…he shows outright contempt for the people who grew up in similar places and similar circumstances to his own.
The Democrats probably made their best attempt to reach out to rural voters…but the condition to being allowed into their exclusive club is to hate everyone and everything you came from. And if you do that, you can get away with genuinely causing harm to people and displaying open racism, like Isbell.
But you’re not supposed to see any of that…you’re just supposed to be dazzled by the camo baseball cap.
[three]
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is out, and backing Trump:
Robert F. Kennedy said Friday he is suspending his independent presidential bid and is backing Donald Trump.
Kennedy said his internal polls had showed that his presence in the race would hurt Trump and help Democratic nominee Kamala Harris. He cited free speech, the war in Ukraine and “a war on our children” as among the reasons to try to remove his name from the ballot in battleground states.
“These are the principal causes that persuaded me to leave the Democratic Party and run as an independent and now to throw my support to President Trump,” Kennedy said.
However, he made clear that he wasn’t formally ending his bid and said his supporters could continue to back him in the majority of states where they are unlikely to sway the outcome. Kennedy took steps to withdraw his candidacy in at least two states late this week, Arizona and Pennsylvania.
This had led to…interesting at least…speculation that RFK Jr. will be given control of the CIA, and allowed to release the details that have been held back on the deaths of his father and uncle.
Will it happen? Who knows. Is it a really cool internet rumor? Absolutely.
[four]
This week, Screenrant ripped a new video game for not being “diverse enough:
The problem here…is that the game is about a Chinese myth about a monkey who fights monsters and rides a dragon. The character comes from a 16th century novel:
In the novel, Sun Wukong is a monkey born from a stone who acquires supernatural powers through Taoist practices. After rebelling against heaven, he is imprisoned under a mountain by the Buddha. Five hundred years later, he accompanies the monk Tang Sanzang riding on the White Dragon Horse and two other disciples, Zhu Bajie and Sha Wujing, on a journey to obtain Buddhist sutras from India, known as the West or Western Paradise, where Buddha and his followers dwell.[2]
Sun Wukong possesses many abilities. He has amazing strength and is able to support the weight of two heaven mountains on his shoulders while running "with the speed of a meteor".[3] He is extremely fast, able to travel 108,000 li (54,000 km, 34,000 mi) in one somersault. He has vast memorization skills and can remember every monkey ever born. As king of the monkeys, it is his duty to keep track of and protect every monkey. Sun Wukong also acquires the 72 Earthly Transformations, which allow him to access 72 unique powers, including the ability to transform into animals and objects. He is a skilled fighter, capable of defeating the best warriors of heaven. His hair has magical properties, capable of making copies of himself or transforming into various weapons, animals and other things. He also shows partial weather manipulation skills, can freeze people in place, and can become invisible.[4]
DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) is dying in the corporate space, with John Deere, Tractor Supply Company and Harley Davidson pulling back from DEI initiatives within the last 30 days alone.
The main lesson of politics and culture in the modern era is…whoever is less crazy, wins. These major corporations did not quit DEI because of a video game…but the fact that a major website would knock down a game for “lack of diversity” about a game that involves a monkey fighting monsters…shows that the DEI train has jumped so far off the tracks that normal people who would either be mildly accepting of DEI, or find it to be annoying…are fighting back against the practice.
Just don’t be crazy. That’s all it takes to win. And the lesson of 2024 is…nobody can not be crazy.
[five]
As always, let’s head into the weekend with a pop culture roundup:
Rachel Zegler (West Side Story, The Hunger Games: Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes) leads a horror/comedy about the Y2K bug, the much-hyped disaster that caused mass panic in the late 90’s over a theory that a programming bug would destroy all computers and plunge the world into chaos at the stroke of midnight on 01/01/00.
It never happened, but this reimagination of Y2K in which newly sentient killer robots build themselves out of household items…looks amazing.
Fellow Gen-Xers and Millennials…bask in the glory of baja hoodies and And 1 t-shirts and Billy Blanks Tai Bo workouts.
MONSTERS: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story will either be murder porn for wine moms who love true crime podcasts…or a complex look at a case that might deserve more attention.
In 1996, the Menendez brothers killed their parents, allegedly in self defense after years of sexual, physical and emotional abuse. The brothers were found innocent in separate trials (justified killings), before being re-tried together, and being sentenced to life in prison without parole.
However, evidence released in May could point to the brothers’ story about horrific abuse being true. If this movie is just a cheap thrill about murder…gross. If it goes deeper into a complex crime case…count me in.
It’s pretty rare for me to slap down a full-on endorsement for an animated project, but Lara Croft is pretty much British Indiana Jones, and while the source material has produce three so-so Tomb Raider movies, maybe Netflix can nail the tone and tenor of the narrative of this excellent story.
UPDATE: Tomb Raider was also supposed to be a live action series on Prime Video, produced by Pheobe Waller-Bridge (Fleabag, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny), but the future of that series is now in doubt.
Scratch that last statement…it’s EXTREMELY odd for me to recommend two animated projects in one issue, but The Lord of the Rings: War of the Rohirrim MIGHT be good. It’s worth checking out the trailer, if you’re a fan of the IP.
This hits theaters in December, so Warner Brothers is likely betting that animated LOTR can be a big hit, to get such a high profile release window.
Until the next one,
-sth