Month: September 2016

I first heard the music of Gasper Nali last year while surfing YouTube for new music to listen to. I fell in love with this video immediately:

Since then, he has had the chance to make a more professional recording of this song (and more):

His instruments are made from recycled objects that he has collected. One person’s trash is another’s treasure.

If these were ever the last words I were to write I would say simply that there is so much beauty in the world, if we are only willing to look and listen for it. Don’t let the ugliness bring you down. Whatever might be said about globalism, the ability for us to connect and experience so much from around the planet is truly awe inspiring, and would not be possible if we were holed up behind our walls and fences. Let us celebrate all our fellow humans have to offer. Let us experience and learn from one another. We’ll be better for doing so.

Gary Johnson should go get his shine box.

○ Senate overwhelmingly rejects Obama veto of Saudi September 11 bill | Reuters |

It’s right here, HRC highlights her failures in the Obama administration and the promises for more of the same. Working with the sponsors of terror, the Wahhabist Islamic regime of Saudi Arabia. With other Gulf States like Qatar and the Emirates as major funder of Bill and Chelsea’s Clinton Foundation.

The first Trump-Clinton presidential debate transcript, annotated

HOLT: Secretary Clinton?

CLINTON: Well, I think there are a number of issues that we should be addressing. I have put forth a plan to defeat ISIS. It does involve going after them online. I think we need to do much more with our tech companies to prevent ISIS and their operatives from being able to use the Internet to radicalize, even direct people in our country and Europe and elsewhere.

But we also have to intensify our air strikes against ISIS and eventually support our Arab and Kurdish partners to be able to actually take out ISIS in Raqqa, end their claim of being a Caliphate.

We’re making progress. Our military is assisting in Iraq. And we’re hoping that within the year we’ll be able to push ISIS out of Iraq and then, you know, really squeeze them in Syria.

But we have to be cognizant of the fact that they’ve had foreign fighters coming to volunteer for them, foreign money, foreign weapons, so we have to make this the top priority.

…
CLINTON: But let’s talk about the question you asked, Lester. The question you asked is, what do we do here in the United States? That’s the most important part of this. How do we prevent attacks? How do we protect our people?

And I think we’ve got to have an intelligence surge, where we are looking for every scrap of information. I was so proud of law enforcement in New York, in Minnesota, in New Jersey. You know, they responded so quickly, so professionally to the attacks that occurred by Rahami. And they brought him down. And we may find out more information because he is still alive, which may prove to be an intelligence benefit.

So we’ve got to do everything we can to vacuum up intelligence from Europe, from the Middle East. That means we’ve got to work more closely with our allies, and that’s something that Donald has been very dismissive of.

We’re working with NATO, the longest military alliance in the history of the world, to really turn our attention to terrorism. We’re working with our friends in the Middle East, many of which, as you know, are Muslim majority nations. Donald has consistently insulted Muslims abroad, Muslims at home, when we need to be cooperating with Muslim nations and with the American Muslim community.

○ Joe Biden Promised to Bring Stability Across Syraq
○ ISIS to Bush-era Iraq invasion – Unintended Consequences

In Joe Biden’s Own Words of Truth; Our Arab Allies Funded ISIS!

Vice President Joe Biden stated that US key allies in the Middle East were behind nurturing ISIS …

Read my recent diary …

○ Keeping America Secure, Clinton Is More Hawkish

By now it is well known (although not as well known as it should be) that Donald Trump is a dishonest businessman who takes advantage of contractors as part of his standard operating procedure. Of course, each and every one of those contractors has a unique story, even if they mostly wind up sounding the same. Here’s one from J. Michael Diehl, the retired owner of Freehold Music Center in Freehold, N.J., a store that is still open and operated by his sons.

My relationship with Trump began in 1989, when he asked me to supply several grand and upright pianos to his then-new Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City. I’d been running a music store for more than 30 years at that point, selling instruments to local schools and residents. My business was very much a family affair (my grandsons still run the store). And I had a great relationship with my customers — no one had ever failed to pay.

I was thrilled to get a $100,000 contract from Trump. It was one of the biggest sales I’d ever made. I was supposed to deliver and tune the pianos; the Trump corporation would pay me within 90 days. I asked my lawyer if I should ask for payment upfront, and he laughed. “It’s Donald Trump!” he told me. “He’s got lots of money.”

[Black voters won’t ever like Trump. The debate showed why.]

But when I requested payment, the Trump corporation hemmed and hawed. Its executives avoided my calls and crafted excuses. After a couple of months, I got a letter telling me that the casino was short on funds. They would pay 70 percent of what they owed me. There was no negotiating. I didn’t know what to do — I couldn’t afford to sue the Trump corporation, and I needed money to pay my piano suppliers. So I took the $70,000.

Losing $30,000 was a big hit to me and my family. The profit from Trump was meant to be a big part of my salary for the year. So I made much less. There was no money to help grow my business. I had less pianos in the showroom and a smaller advertising budget. Because of Trump, my store stagnated for a couple of years. It made me feel really bad, like I’d been taken advantage of. I was embarrassed.

Freehold is just down the road on the way to the shore from where I grew up. One of my wife’s closest friends lives there. It’s where New Jersey’s patron saint Bruce Springsteen grew up, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he was a frequent customer at the Freehold Music Center. Maybe that’s where his mom rented him his first guitar.

It’s hard not to take Trump’s behavior a little personally.

Stomping on little people is what he does, and then he tells you how smart he is to treat people this way.

Here’s a message for Trump from the Boss.

Or the October Surprise made by Democrats USA …

John Kerry threatens to end Syria talks with Russia over Aleppo | CBS News |

WASHINGTON – Secretary of State John Kerry is threatening to cut off all contacts with Moscow over the 5-year-old Syrian civil war, unless Russian and Syrian government attacks on Aleppo end.

The State Department says Kerry issued the ultimatum in a Wednesday telephone call to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

Kerry’s spokesman, John Kirby, says Kerry expressed grave concern over Russian and Syrian government attacks on hospitals, water supplies and other civilian infrastructure in Aleppo.

He says Kerry told Lavrov that the U.S. holds Russia responsible for the use of incendiary and bunker-buster bombs in an urban area.

Kerry told Lavrov the U.S. was preparing to “suspend U.S.-Russia bilateral engagement on Syria,” including on a proposed counterterrorism partnership, “unless Russia takes immediate steps to end the assault on Aleppo” and restore a cease-fire.

It’s not clear whether this is a new position for the U.S. or not. On Tuesday, White House spokesperson Josh Earnest said it’s difficult to envision any military cooperation with Russia in Syria because Moscow has repeatedly failed to fulfill its commitments to the cease-fire deal.

Top U.S. general: Unwise to share intelligence with Russia on Syria | Reuters |

○ Syria – Conflicting Reports, Dubious Witnesses Challenge Convoy Attack Case | MoA |
○ Syria – Ceasefire deal breakdown shows US under military rule | Sputnik News |

○ Syria ceasefire under threat after US-led strikes kill regime troops in Deir Ezzor | CNN Report |

Moscow says US failed to separate rebels from terrorists in response to US threats | Russia Today |

The US holds Russia responsible for the violence in Aleppo and is threatening to break off all cooperation with Moscow in Syria, the State Department said. Russia is asking the US live up to its obligation to separate US-backed opposition from terrorists.

In a phone conversation with the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Wednesday morning, the US Secretary of State John Kerry “expressed grave concern” over the “attacks on hospitals, the water supply network, and other civilian infrastructure in Aleppo” by the Russian and Syrian forces, State Department spokesman John Kirby said.

 « click for more info
Militants of Nusra Front, Syria's Qaeda branch. (File photo)

Meanwhile Lavrov said that

“a number of anti-government groups, which Washington considers moderate ones, refused to follow Russia-US ceasefire agreement from September 9, but instead are joining Jabhat al-Nusra, continuing to fight the Syrian army along with this al-Qaeda branch.”

Despite breaking ties with al-Qaeda, Syria’s Nusra remains a target for US and Russia

○ Fight Al-Nusra, no strikes on rebels, Aleppo relief: Kerry and Lavrov agree new Syria ceasefire plan
○ Vladimir Putin questions US commitment to Syria ceasefire deal | The Gusrdian |

Shimon Peres obituary: Peacemaker or war criminal? | Al Jazeera |

The death of Shimon Peres at the age of 93 marks the departure of the last major figure in Israel’s founding generation.

He died on Wednesday in a hospital after suffering a major stroke, the Israeli news website Ynet reported, after his condition worsened following a stroke two weeks ago.

Peres – one of the disciples of David Ben-Gurion , Israel’s first prime minister – spent his long political career in the public spotlight, but his greatest successes were engineered in the shadows, noted Yaron Ezrahi, a politics professor at Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Peres’ most important task, to which he was entrusted by Ben-Gurion, was developing in secret – and over United States opposition – Israel’s nuclear weapons programme through the 1950s and 60s. To that end, he recruited the assistance of France, Britain and Norway.

Peres, like his mentor, believed an Israeli bomb was the key to guaranteeing Israel’s status – both in Washington DC and among the Arab states – as an unassailable Middle East power.

The testing of the first warhead in the late 1960s was probably at least as responsible for ensuring rock-solid US patronage in subsequent decades as Israel’s rapid victory against neighbouring Arab states in the Six-Day War.

…
At home, among both Israelis and Palestinians, he was viewed far less favourably.

Born Szymon Perski, Peres emigrated to Palestine from Poland with his family in 1934, aged 11. Raised on a kibbutz and inculcated in the values of Labour Zionism espoused by Israel’s East European elite, he was quickly identified as a rising star by Ben-Gurion, a fellow Pole.

During the 1948 war, Ben-Gurion kept Peres in a backroom job, far from the fighting, where he was responsible for acquiring weapons, often illicitly, for the new Israeli army.

His diplomatic skills were relied on throughout the state’s tricky early years in the defence ministry. Despite his lack of an army background, he was instrumental in developing Israel’s large state-run military industries.

In the same role, he also developed alliances with key western states, especially France and Britain, that would eventually help Israel establish the Dimona nuclear reactor and build a bomb.

 « click for more info
Prime Minister David Ben Gurion with his chief aide, Shimon Peres. In background:
defense minister Moshe Dayan and Ben Gurion aide, Teddy Kollek (Credit: Tikun Olam)

In return, Peres plotted with these two fading colonial powers an attack on Egypt in 1956 that triggered the Suez Crisis. Israel invaded Sinai to create the pretext for an Anglo-French “intervention” and seizure of the Suez Canal. All three soon had to withdraw under pressure from the United States [president Dwight Eisenhower] and Soviet Union.  

○ How Shimon Peres Stole the Bomb with a Bluff, and Why Military Censor Doesn’t Want Israelis to Know About It

Israeli Nuke-Washing on the World Stage | Tikun Olam |

Now, there’s another to add to the treasury of hasbara promoted by Israel to the world: nuke-washing.  I wrote about a similar domestic effort at cleansing Israel’s nuclear warheads of the stench of potential mass murder.

The IAEA celebrated its 60th anniversary in Vienna, its headquarters, recently. And Israel was there with its very own exhibit featuring the innovations and contributions which Israel’s nuclear program has bestowed on humanity. No mention, of course, of Israel’s 200 nuclear weapons and the legacy that they’ve given the world. No mention, of course, that Israel has refused to join the only international agreement limiting the proliferation of nuclear weapons, the NPT. No mention of the fact that Israel has torpedoed a U.S. and Arab effort to hold a regional conference leading to declaring the Mideast a nuclear-free zone.

Instead, we have Rays of Hope (get it? radiation=rays), Israel’s latest marketing effort to persuade the world to ignore its worst deeds and focus instead on deeds that are marginal at best in their overall impact on Israel or the world. A press release from the prime minister’s office hails this as Israel’s first international exhibit of its accomplishments in the field.

Netanyahu thanks US for blocking UN drive for Mideast nuclear-free zone | JPost |

○ Israel Is Not Our Partner for Middle East Peace
○ Ariel Sharon Dies: The Bulldozer at the Gates of Hell

Since everything has to be ridiculously politicized, it’s natural that it’s going to be impossible to get a hearing, let alone a confirmation, for President Obama’s nominee to be Ambassador to Cuba. Jeffrey DeLaurentis is already doing the job, albeit with the lower rank of “Chargé d’affaires ad interim.” He’s been our top State Department official in Havana since the president normalized relations with Cuba last year. It makes sense to give him the more appropriate rank and title of ambassador.

Commercial flights to Cuba began in August. The policy is not going to be reversed, and certainly not by a casino magnate like Donald Trump. Mobbed-up gaming industrialists have been looking to get back to Havana since Meyer Lansky was in his fifties. Hell, the Kennedys even enlisted Sam Giancana, John Roselli and Santo Trafficante Jr. to assassinate Castro. They wanted their casino hotels back, and they wanted access to the Cuban market.

Even if you disagree with the decision to end a policy of isolating Cuba that had benefited no one for more than half a century, refusing to vote on an ambassador is just petulance.

Republicans, such as Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.) and Lindsey Graham (S.C.), have vowed to block anyone Obama nominates as ambassador.

It’s an effort to rebuke Obama’s decision to reopen ties with Cuba, a move they believe rewards the communist island nation, which still commits human-rights abuses against its citizens.

“A U.S. ambassador is not going to influence the Cuban government, which is a dictatorial, closed regime,” Rubio, a Cuban-American, said in a July interview.

I have to wonder why we have ambassadors in any countries that have dictatorships or monarchial ruling families or that fail in some way to live up to our ideal of openness. Do these countries listen to our ambassadors? Do our ambassadors have any influence over the House of Saud or Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo in Equatorial Guinea?

Equatorial Guinea’s relations with the United States entered a cooling phase in 1993, when Ambassador John E. Bennett was accused of practicing witchcraft at the graves of 10 British airmen who were killed when their plane crashed there during World War II. Bennett left after receiving a death threat at the U.S. Embassy in Malabo in 1994. In his farewell address, he publicly named the government’s most notorious torturers, including Equatorial Guinea’s then-current Minister of National Security, Manuel Nguema Mba. No new envoy was appointed, and the embassy was closed in 1996, leaving its affairs to be handled by the embassy in neighboring Cameroon.

Our ambassador returned to Malabo in 2006 and we completed a new embassy complex there in 2013. Was that a “reward,” too? Perhaps it was a reward to U.S. oil firms or some kind of quid pro quo for providing assistance in Bush’s “Global War on Terror.” It’s amazing what lobbyists can do to humanize even the most brutal of regimes.

When it’s convenient or in some strategic or economic interest, we ally ourselves with despots with far more terrifying human rights records than the one compiled by the Castro brothers. And, except in the most extreme cases, we maintain diplomatic relations even with our enemies.

Here’s what the White House says:

Deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes disagreed in an interview with Yahoo News, which first reported the nomination.

“To us, the concept that it’s a reward for a country to have an ambassador makes no sense,” Rhodes said. “On the contrary, having an ambassador gives you a higher profile, a higher-ranked advocate for what America cares about.”

That’s inarguable, but this isn’t even a debate about whether or not to have an ambassador. It’s a debate about whether to call our top diplomat in Havana an ambassador and provide him with the rank, title, prestige and (perhaps) pay that he deserves.

Once again, however, common sense will be held hostage to political pandering and posturing.

The opponents of this nomination are, with a small handful of exceptions, all Republicans. They know this isn’t a reward to Cuba. They just don’t want to cooperate with our president or in any way ratify his decision to open up our relationship to Cuba. And they want to keep their cred with the dead-ender anti-Castro lobby. So, just as with Merrick Garland, the nomination of Jeffrey DeLaurentis will be ignored.

I’m sorry but I know a thing or two about opposing wars.
Expressing reservations about the war in private, off-the record with Sean Hannity don’t mean shit.

I am disappointed and not a little chastened not to have seen the truth of the matter. It’s the only rational explanation.

Read on for more.
Newsweek:

IS DONALD TRUMP REALLY JUST ANDY KAUFMAN IN DISGUISE? AN INVESTIGATION.-Zach Schoenfeld

This is a weird theory, but bear with me: Donald J. Trump is Andy Kaufman wearing a disguise.

Forget the logistical obstacles. Ignore the temporal and practical impossibilities: that Andy Kaufman died of lung cancer in 1984, that Trump has a life story far predating Kaufman’s career, that the two men bear little physical resemblance, that Trump’s wives and children haven’t let slip a word about the ruse. Just consider that the GOP presidential nominee is a character invented and, with characteristically unflinching dedication, performed by the performance artist Andy Kaufman. It’s simple. Einhorn is Finkle. Finkle is Einhorn. Trump is Kaufman.

The theory is nuts. So is the fact that it has exploded into a de facto refrain during the 15 months the orange-haired mogul has spent as a presidential candidate. It is a conspiracy theory. It is a rationalization. It is a defense mechanism. Trump says something appalling? “Ha-ha! Andy Kaufman sure is getting us good,” you reassure yourself. Trump’s about to appear onstage at the Republican National Convention? “Andy will finally take the Trump mask off now,” you mumble to your cat. Trump wins the election and moves into the White House? You squirm. “How far is this gag gonna go?”

Though the idea predates the present election–comedian John Mulaney tweeted that Trump is Kaufman in 2012 but doesn’t remember what sparked it–it has achieved remarkable prominence in 2016. There are memes and Photoshopped images depicting the late Kaufman grinning as he holds up a mask of Trump’s face. (He seems to be saying, “Gotcha!”) There is a satirical news story, published on the website Stubhill News, imagining Trump announcing that he was “actually Andy Kaufman the whole time.” And during the summer, as the Republican National Convention unleashed a new season of Trump Theorization Syndrome, Don Cheadle changed his Twitter avatar to an illustration of Kaufman stepping out of a full Trump bodysuit.

The Kaufman theory hinges on the notion that Trump’s bid for the presidency is so outlandish–the gaffes, the boasts about penis size, the policy reversals and white nationalist overtures–that it must surely be performance art. More specifically, the work of Andy Kaufman, an idiosyncratic figure who yanked performance art in bizarre, unprecedented directions, whether he was impersonating an incompetent comedian known as Foreign Man or pretending to revive an elderly lady who feigned a heart attack on his stage.

—snip—

Adherents of the Trump-Kaufman Hypothesis vary in their seriousness (and looniness). Erik Vance, a 40-year-old science writer based in Mexico City, was among the first to champion the Kaufman connection. He articulated the theory in detail months before Trump declared his candidacy. It was September 2014. Vance was disturbed by Trump’s “ignorant babble” about the dangers of vaccines. “I remember thinking, `This guy has got to be pulling our legs,'” Vance says. “I’d seen Man on the Moon a while before. I just started thinking about other people who mess with us.” His brain landed on Andy Kaufman; Trump’s demeanor suddenly reminded him of Kaufman’s more abrasive characters. So he took a Trumpian leap of logic. “What evidence is there that they’re not the same person?

“All you gotta do is watch one Tony Clifton video and you realize, this is Trump!” Vance raves. “He’s saying these audacious horrible things that he’s not serious about, but he doesn’t care! It’s just one big joke for him. And it’s brilliant. You watch Donald Trump and you can’t help but think, `No one can think this stuff!’ I imagine Trump going home at night and putting on a beret and listening to Rachmaninoff and discussing postmodern theory.”

—snip—

A year and a half later–shortly before Trump sealed up the Republican nomination–a retired Brigham Young professor named Eric Samuelsen wrote his own blog post musing that Trump is really Kaufman.

“What makes it plausible is the sort of huge pranks that Kaufman loved,” says Samuelsen, 60, a longtime Kaufman fan. “He loved pulling stuff like that. He made up his entire feud with Jerry Lawler.” Trump’s campaign, Samuelsen observes in his essay, “is precisely similar to Kaufman’s comedy.” The overarching idea is the same as Vance’s, though more overtly tongue in cheek. And Samuelsen speculates that someone had the real Trump killed, while Vance suggests that there was no real Trump–this was a character created by Kaufman all along.

—snip—

TRUMP-KAUFMAN TRUTHERS ARE KIDDING–mostly. But as with other ostensibly crackpot theories–aliens built Stonehenge, or the CIA masterminded the Kennedy assassination–this one persists because it has the capacity to explain so much about so much that cannot be explained. These theories catch on because they contain some trace of an elusive truth. It’s the pseudo-intellectual’s version of “I can’t believe this isn’t The Onion.”

Among the pundit class, Trump’s unhinged campaign has sprouted dozens of unlikely theories: that he is deliberately trying (and failing) to sabotage his own campaign, that he might win the election but refuse to take office, that he is only really after revenge, that he is only really after TV ratings, that he might choose his daughter Ivanka as his vice presidential pick, that his whole campaign is just a wild scheme to launch Trump TV. (Hillary Clinton has been subject to outlandish theories of her own, like the recent right-wing charges that she’s gravely ill or being played by a body double.)

If these notions are within the realm of plausibility, why not Kaufman? The elemental insight here is that Trump’s campaign works as exquisite satire, whether he intends it or not. The man has successfully exposed pundits as pompous charlatans laughably removed from the average voter. He has wreaked havoc on the news media’s obsession with false equivalence. He has stripped bare the bigotry undergirding the immigration debate. And, most of all, he’s spotlighted the moral bankruptcy of the GOP itself–hence the spectacle of Paul Ryan denouncing Trump’s attack on a federal judge as the “textbook definition” of racism while declining to withdraw his endorsement. “It’s a very bizarre election season,” says Vance, “and it feels almost scripted by some sort of comic genius.”

So the Kaufman conspiracy succeeds by patching together two theories that already have widespread traction: (A) that Kaufman faked his own death and (B) that Trump’s campaign is a gag with a punchline. Theory B has been championed by Last Week Tonight host John Oliver, who recently implored Trump to drop out and reveal that his candidacy was a satirical stunt all along. This is the one way for Trump, faced with the prospect of a humiliating defeat by Clinton, to redeem himself: “If you drop out in order to teach America a lesson, you would not be a loser,” Oliver urged. “You would be a legend.”

—snip—“

The comedian Elayne Boosler says she has seen the Trump-Kaufman joke all over. (Boosler dated Kaufman for several years, lived with him in the Village and later credited him with inspiring her own career.) “I think it’s a great tribute to Andy that a character such as Trump is credited to him,” Boosler wrote in an email. “Like Andy’s creations, Trump boggles the mind in such a way that leaves people saying, `This can’t be for real.’ In a performance artist, that is genius. In a presidential candidate, it’s unimaginable.”

Though he took glee in toying with his audience’s emotions, Boosler noted, Kaufman made sure fans were safe and let them in on the joke eventually. There was an intensity and a mischievousness about him, but also a sweetness. “I think people want Trump to be Andy, just to feel that now.” What Boosler is saying, I think, is that Kaufman would not burn the world down for the sake of a gag. Others aren’t sure. “Andy just never gave up,” says Abel. “He always went forward. Just damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead.” As for the Trump theory, “I think it’s a hilarious possibility. And it makes a lot of sense. Every time Donald opens his mouth, it’s Andy Kaufman.”

—snip—

For disciples of Kaufman’s Clifton character, the Republican nominee’s mannerisms are familiar. “When Trump walked onstage at the GOP convention, he looked like Tony Clifton to me,” says Kaufman’s brother, who has also played the Clifton character. “There was something about his walk and his stature, demeanor. Before he ever said a word, just walking to the stand to speak, I said, ‘Wow. Tony Clifton.’… It’s the personality that the wrestler has and Tony Clifton has–Trump reminds people of that, I think.”

Fans have spotted other parallels between Clifton and Trump. “Their attitudes towards women are probably along the same lines,” says Vance, the science writer. Plus, there’s the swagger, the aggravated New Yorky accent.

“He’s got the pucker–the lips,” Vance adds. “He puckers up. I can’t believe someone hasn’t gotten rid of that with Donald. He’s got that pucker that’s exactly like Tony Clifton. Tony Clifton’s got terrible hair. But I think Donald’s got him beat on that. Just the brashness and the doubling down. If you ever watch Kaufman being Clifton, he doubles down. He’ll say something and then anger people [and] he’ll just double down. It’s really funny when he’s onstage.” Vance considers the present situation. “I guess it’s less funny now.”

Kaufman’s old friend Parinello is now an impassioned Trump supporter. Though he insists Kaufman had several un-Trumpian qualities (“There wasn’t a moment in Andy’s life when he cared about money–it just was totally irrelevant to him”), he sees lots of commonality. “Andy Kaufman and Donald Trump are two of the boldest human beings to ever exist on this world,” he insists. “That is no Hillary Clinton.” Of course, Clinton’s pitch to voters is rooted in her competence and stability–not exactly Kaufman-like qualities. She could probably run on the slogan “I Am Definitely Not Andy Kaufman” and soundly win.

Others compare Trump to Kaufman’s embattled wrestler character, who would challenge women onstage and offer them $1,000 to beat him. “On the campaign trail, Donald has been playing a very specific role from professional wrestling called the heel,” observes Bob Arctor, a Kaufman fan who never met the man. The heel is basically the villain. “And Andy loved being the heel. He loved feeding off all that violent, hateful energy…. I sincerely believe he would have adored Trump’s performance throughout this election cycle.”

This wording is curious: It’s not politics. It’s performance. Trump ought not win the White House so much as he should win an Emmy. Like Kaufman, he has vastly more experience in the entertainment sphere than in politics. In future decades, theorists will perhaps single out his nomination as the first postmodern bid for the presidency: He is not so much running for president as he is performing and contorting what it means to be a presidential candidate. (For best effect, read this line in a Slavoj Žižek voice.)

But the Kaufman conspiracy is all fantasy. Trump is real. He has the boyhood photos to prove it. His father, Fred Trump, was building supermarkets pre-World War II. “It’s preposterous that people would actually think it’s true,” Michael Kaufman insists. And what’s also real is that Trump–or Kaufman as Trump, or Tony Clifton or whomever–could very well take the oath of office on January 20, and his xenophobic proclamations won’t be conceptual art. They will be state-sanctioned policy.

The sheer joy of an Andy Kaufman performance is that you have no idea what might happen. The sheer horror of a Trump presidency, for the overwhelming swath of the country that loathes him, is that you have no idea what might happen. So saying he’s just Kaufman is a goofy reassurance. It’s a way to ascribe meaning to a world without meaning, a world as chaotic and unpredictable as the grammatical decisions in a Trump tweet.

“If this whole thing were a joke, I think there would be a lot of nervous but relieved laughter across the world,” Vance says. He chuckles. “We should be so lucky.”

I repeat:

“We should be so lucky.”

Or…are we?

AG

I am disappointed and chastened not to have seen the truth of the matter. It’s the only rational explanation.

Read on for more.
Newsweek:

IS DONALD TRUMP REALLY JUST ANDY KAUFMAN IN DISGUISE? AN INVESTIGATION.-Zach Schoenfeld

This is a weird theory, but bear with me: Donald J. Trump is Andy Kaufman wearing a disguise.

Forget the logistical obstacles. Ignore the temporal and practical impossibilities: that Andy Kaufman died of lung cancer in 1984, that Trump has a life story far predating Kaufman’s career, that the two men bear little physical resemblance, that Trump’s wives and children haven’t let slip a word about the ruse. Just consider that the GOP presidential nominee is a character invented and, with characteristically unflinching dedication, performed by the performance artist Andy Kaufman. It’s simple. Einhorn is Finkle. Finkle is Einhorn. Trump is Kaufman.

The theory is nuts. So is the fact that it has exploded into a de facto refrain during the 15 months the orange-haired mogul has spent as a presidential candidate. It is a conspiracy theory. It is a rationalization. It is a defense mechanism. Trump says something appalling? “Ha-ha! Andy Kaufman sure is getting us good,” you reassure yourself. Trump’s about to appear onstage at the Republican National Convention? “Andy will finally take the Trump mask off now,” you mumble to your cat. Trump wins the election and moves into the White House? You squirm. “How far is this gag gonna go?”

Though the idea predates the present election–comedian John Mulaney tweeted that Trump is Kaufman in 2012 but doesn’t remember what sparked it–it has achieved remarkable prominence in 2016. There are memes and Photoshopped images depicting the late Kaufman grinning as he holds up a mask of Trump’s face. (He seems to be saying, “Gotcha!”) There is a satirical news story, published on the website Stubhill News, imagining Trump announcing that he was “actually Andy Kaufman the whole time.” And during the summer, as the Republican National Convention unleashed a new season of Trump Theorization Syndrome, Don Cheadle changed his Twitter avatar to an illustration of Kaufman stepping out of a full Trump bodysuit.

The Kaufman theory hinges on the notion that Trump’s bid for the presidency is so outlandish–the gaffes, the boasts about penis size, the policy reversals and white nationalist overtures–that it must surely be performance art. More specifically, the work of Andy Kaufman, an idiosyncratic figure who yanked performance art in bizarre, unprecedented directions, whether he was impersonating an incompetent comedian known as Foreign Man or pretending to revive an elderly lady who feigned a heart attack on his stage.

—snip—

Adherents of the Trump-Kaufman Hypothesis vary in their seriousness (and looniness). Erik Vance, a 40-year-old science writer based in Mexico City, was among the first to champion the Kaufman connection. He articulated the theory in detail months before Trump declared his candidacy. It was September 2014. Vance was disturbed by Trump’s “ignorant babble” about the dangers of vaccines. “I remember thinking, `This guy has got to be pulling our legs,'” Vance says. “I’d seen Man on the Moon a while before. I just started thinking about other people who mess with us.” His brain landed on Andy Kaufman; Trump’s demeanor suddenly reminded him of Kaufman’s more abrasive characters. So he took a Trumpian leap of logic. “What evidence is there that they’re not the same person?

“All you gotta do is watch one Tony Clifton video and you realize, this is Trump!” Vance raves. “He’s saying these audacious horrible things that he’s not serious about, but he doesn’t care! It’s just one big joke for him. And it’s brilliant. You watch Donald Trump and you can’t help but think, `No one can think this stuff!’ I imagine Trump going home at night and putting on a beret and listening to Rachmaninoff and discussing postmodern theory.”

—snip—

A year and a half later–shortly before Trump sealed up the Republican nomination–a retired Brigham Young professor named Eric Samuelsen wrote his own blog post musing that Trump is really Kaufman.

“What makes it plausible is the sort of huge pranks that Kaufman loved,” says Samuelsen, 60, a longtime Kaufman fan. “He loved pulling stuff like that. He made up his entire feud with Jerry Lawler.” Trump’s campaign, Samuelsen observes in his essay, “is precisely similar to Kaufman’s comedy.” The overarching idea is the same as Vance’s, though more overtly tongue in cheek. And Samuelsen speculates that someone had the real Trump killed, while Vance suggests that there was no real Trump–this was a character created by Kaufman all along.

—snip—

TRUMP-KAUFMAN TRUTHERS ARE KIDDING–mostly. But as with other ostensibly crackpot theories–aliens built Stonehenge, or the CIA masterminded the Kennedy assassination–this one persists because it has the capacity to explain so much about so much that cannot be explained. These theories catch on because they contain some trace of an elusive truth. It’s the pseudo-intellectual’s version of “I can’t believe this isn’t The Onion.”

Among the pundit class, Trump’s unhinged campaign has sprouted dozens of unlikely theories: that he is deliberately trying (and failing) to sabotage his own campaign, that he might win the election but refuse to take office, that he is only really after revenge, that he is only really after TV ratings, that he might choose his daughter Ivanka as his vice presidential pick, that his whole campaign is just a wild scheme to launch Trump TV. (Hillary Clinton has been subject to outlandish theories of her own, like the recent right-wing charges that she’s gravely ill or being played by a body double.)

If these notions are within the realm of plausibility, why not Kaufman? The elemental insight here is that Trump’s campaign works as exquisite satire, whether he intends it or not. The man has successfully exposed pundits as pompous charlatans laughably removed from the average voter. He has wreaked havoc on the news media’s obsession with false equivalence. He has stripped bare the bigotry undergirding the immigration debate. And, most of all, he’s spotlighted the moral bankruptcy of the GOP itself–hence the spectacle of Paul Ryan denouncing Trump’s attack on a federal judge as the “textbook definition” of racism while declining to withdraw his endorsement. “It’s a very bizarre election season,” says Vance, “and it feels almost scripted by some sort of comic genius.”

So the Kaufman conspiracy succeeds by patching together two theories that already have widespread traction: (A) that Kaufman faked his own death and (B) that Trump’s campaign is a gag with a punchline. Theory B has been championed by Last Week Tonight host John Oliver, who recently implored Trump to drop out and reveal that his candidacy was a satirical stunt all along. This is the one way for Trump, faced with the prospect of a humiliating defeat by Clinton, to redeem himself: “If you drop out in order to teach America a lesson, you would not be a loser,” Oliver urged. “You would be a legend.”

—snip—“

The comedian Elayne Boosler says she has seen the Trump-Kaufman joke all over. (Boosler dated Kaufman for several years, lived with him in the Village and later credited him with inspiring her own career.) “I think it’s a great tribute to Andy that a character such as Trump is credited to him,” Boosler wrote in an email. “Like Andy’s creations, Trump boggles the mind in such a way that leaves people saying, `This can’t be for real.’ In a performance artist, that is genius. In a presidential candidate, it’s unimaginable.”

Though he took glee in toying with his audience’s emotions, Boosler noted, Kaufman made sure fans were safe and let them in on the joke eventually. There was an intensity and a mischievousness about him, but also a sweetness. “I think people want Trump to be Andy, just to feel that now.” What Boosler is saying, I think, is that Kaufman would not burn the world down for the sake of a gag. Others aren’t sure. “Andy just never gave up,” says Abel. “He always went forward. Just damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead.” As for the Trump theory, “I think it’s a hilarious possibility. And it makes a lot of sense. Every time Donald opens his mouth, it’s Andy Kaufman.”

—snip—

For disciples of Kaufman’s Clifton character, the Republican nominee’s mannerisms are familiar. “When Trump walked onstage at the GOP convention, he looked like Tony Clifton to me,” says Kaufman’s brother, who has also played the Clifton character. “There was something about his walk and his stature, demeanor. Before he ever said a word, just walking to the stand to speak, I said, ‘Wow. Tony Clifton.’… It’s the personality that the wrestler has and Tony Clifton has–Trump reminds people of that, I think.”

Fans have spotted other parallels between Clifton and Trump. “Their attitudes towards women are probably along the same lines,” says Vance, the science writer. Plus, there’s the swagger, the aggravated New Yorky accent.

“He’s got the pucker–the lips,” Vance adds. “He puckers up. I can’t believe someone hasn’t gotten rid of that with Donald. He’s got that pucker that’s exactly like Tony Clifton. Tony Clifton’s got terrible hair. But I think Donald’s got him beat on that. Just the brashness and the doubling down. If you ever watch Kaufman being Clifton, he doubles down. He’ll say something and then anger people [and] he’ll just double down. It’s really funny when he’s onstage.” Vance considers the present situation. “I guess it’s less funny now.”

Kaufman’s old friend Parinello is now an impassioned Trump supporter. Though he insists Kaufman had several un-Trumpian qualities (“There wasn’t a moment in Andy’s life when he cared about money–it just was totally irrelevant to him”), he sees lots of commonality. “Andy Kaufman and Donald Trump are two of the boldest human beings to ever exist on this world,” he insists. “That is no Hillary Clinton.” Of course, Clinton’s pitch to voters is rooted in her competence and stability–not exactly Kaufman-like qualities. She could probably run on the slogan “I Am Definitely Not Andy Kaufman” and soundly win.

Others compare Trump to Kaufman’s embattled wrestler character, who would challenge women onstage and offer them $1,000 to beat him. “On the campaign trail, Donald has been playing a very specific role from professional wrestling called the heel,” observes Bob Arctor, a Kaufman fan who never met the man. The heel is basically the villain. “And Andy loved being the heel. He loved feeding off all that violent, hateful energy…. I sincerely believe he would have adored Trump’s performance throughout this election cycle.”

This wording is curious: It’s not politics. It’s performance. Trump ought not win the White House so much as he should win an Emmy. Like Kaufman, he has vastly more experience in the entertainment sphere than in politics. In future decades, theorists will perhaps single out his nomination as the first postmodern bid for the presidency: He is not so much running for president as he is performing and contorting what it means to be a presidential candidate. (For best effect, read this line in a Slavoj Žižek voice.)

But the Kaufman conspiracy is all fantasy. Trump is real. He has the boyhood photos to prove it. His father, Fred Trump, was building supermarkets pre-World War II. “It’s preposterous that people would actually think it’s true,” Michael Kaufman insists. And what’s also real is that Trump–or Kaufman as Trump, or Tony Clifton or whomever–could very well take the oath of office on January 20, and his xenophobic proclamations won’t be conceptual art. They will be state-sanctioned policy.

The sheer joy of an Andy Kaufman performance is that you have no idea what might happen. The sheer horror of a Trump presidency, for the overwhelming swath of the country that loathes him, is that you have no idea what might happen. So saying he’s just Kaufman is a goofy reassurance. It’s a way to ascribe meaning to a world without meaning, a world as chaotic and unpredictable as the grammatical decisions in a Trump tweet.

“If this whole thing were a joke, I think there would be a lot of nervous but relieved laughter across the world,” Vance says. He chuckles. “We should be so lucky.”

I repeat:

“We should be so lucky.”

Or…are we?

AG