The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

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Doctor Cleveland's picture

Fatherhood at Fifty-One

One year ago last night, as my spouse and I were getting ready for bed, she complained that her waistbands were feeling tight although she hadn't gained any visible weight.

"Could you be pregnant?" I asked, and she told me that was ridiculous. She was probably right. We were too old. We had missed the window for having children and reconciled ourselves to growing old together as a childless couple. So I went to sleep.

One year ago today I woke at 5:30 in the morning and found my wife had already been awake for hours. My question had nagged at her until she dug an old home-pregnancy test out of the bathroom closet. Positive. A baby was coming.

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Doctor Cleveland's picture

Arrivederci, Columbus

All statues, like all politics, are local. They're about the place where they are put up, and they change that place (which is to say, they're political). It's a mistake to think a statue is put up to represent some eternal truth; they're a local statement about the politics of the moment. So it is with Christopher Columbus, who got statues and a national holiday for political, and progressive reasons. Those statues don't seem progressive anymore, for a simple reason: they worked. So they've outlived their purpose.

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Doctor Cleveland's picture

He Knows He's Losing: Trump as Mike Tyson

The most obvious thing to me about last night's toxic sludge fire of a debate is that Trump knows he's losing. Bigly. And he has no idea what to do about it. Many pundits are confused on this point, because they treat Trump as a conventional politician or as a media figure rather than as a psychiatric patient. And if you don't view Trump through the lens of his maladies, you misunderstand him. Trump is not a serious politician. Comparing him to other Republican presidential candidates doesn't help you understand him. This is not Mitt Romney.

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Doctor Cleveland's picture

The Mayor from Jaws Explains those Quotes he Gave Bob Woodward

Everyone knows I want to be a cheerleader for Amity Island, right? You want to project confidence. So while I might have told some reporter from the mainland that we were facing “a  grotesque, Biblical monster of the deep,” “a bloody, churning nightmare of teeth,” or “a lean, mean tourist-eating machine,” there was no reason to tell the general public that. You don’t want to start a panic, fellas. Just think of the kids.

Doctor Cleveland's picture

Fear, Loathing, and Pandemics

An epidemic turns out to be a rotten time to have a germophobe President. Trump's more obvious pathologies -- ignorance, narcissism, magical thinking, pathological lying -- have gotten the obvious attention, because those are all real dangers to public safety. But Trump's germophobia makes him fundamentally unsuited to a public health crisis. His focus on making sure that he, personally, does not get ill, is just the mindset that increases the number of people who will. Selfishness helps an epidemic thrive. The outbreak can only be defeated by cooperation.

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Doctor Cleveland's picture

Halloween Goofiness (Self-Promotion Edition)

I have a new piece on McSweeney's Internet Tendency today, right on time for Halloween: "I Am Just Trying to Have a Civil Online Conversation about Vampires." Here's a taste:
 

Doctor Cleveland's picture

Why Booing Trump Matters

Various elite media types clucked, scolded, and clutched their pearls after Donald Trump got booed at the World Series and some of the crowd spontaneously chanted "Lock him up!" Because when ordinary voters do it, it's "uncivil." When Trump does it, it's the Voice of the People. But the talking heads' discomfort was about something more important: cognitive dissonance. Trump being booed threatens their worldview. The American media cannot accept the fact that President Trump is unpopular.

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Doctor Cleveland's picture

Impeaching the Black Swan

I have no idea how the impeachment proceedings against Donald Trump will play out. Neither does anyone else. The most important thing to remember when reading media coverage of the impeachment process is that the writer has no idea how the impeachment process is likely to go. This goes for everybody.

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Doctor Cleveland's picture

Hoarding, Archiving, and the Public Domain: Universal Vault Edition

The New York Times Magazine just dropped a piece on the complete destruction of every master recording in Universal's West Coast vault. I haven't even finished reading it, because it's so terrible I have to digest it in installments and take breaks. Hundreds of thousands of irreplaceable master tapes were destroyed.
 

Doctor Cleveland's picture

Shakespeare Wasn't Perfect

So The Atlantic has seen fit to publish more "Shakespeare authorship" conspiracy-mongering, this time masquerading as feminism by proposing a female candidate. But the piece doesn't quote even a single line of the real poetry that woman wrote. It can't, of course, because that would give the game away.

Pages

TypeTitleAuthorRepliesLast updated
Blog entryFatherhood at Fifty-One Doctor Cleveland106 months 3 weeks ago
Blog entryHe Knows He's Losing: Trump as Mike Tyson Doctor Cleveland292 years 11 months ago
Blog entrySailing Michael Wolraich243 years 9 months ago
Blog entryThe Mayor from Jaws Explains those Quotes he Gave Bob Woodward Doctor Cleveland53 years 10 months ago
Blog entryArrivederci, Columbus Doctor Cleveland133 years 10 months ago
Blog entryThe Terrible Horrible No Good War on Happy Holidays Ramona1534 years 3 months ago
Blog entryAlas for Gene Wolfe Doctor Cleveland14 years 4 months ago
Blog entryWhy Booing Trump Matters Doctor Cleveland74 years 7 months ago
Blog entryFear, Loathing, and Pandemics Doctor Cleveland144 years 8 months ago
Blog entryThe Stupidity of Talking To Stupid People Michael Maiello554 years 10 months ago
Blog entryCharlottesville, Salem and Historic Monuments Danny Cardwell124 years 10 months ago
Blog entryWho Hijacked Yahoo Mail? Michael Wolraich3135 years 2 weeks ago
Blog entryHalloween Goofiness (Self-Promotion Edition) Doctor Cleveland15 years 2 weeks ago
Blog entryImpeaching the Black Swan Doctor Cleveland245 years 2 months ago
Blog entryHoarding, Archiving, and the Public Domain: Universal Vault Edition Doctor Cleveland125 years 5 months ago
Blog entryShakespeare Wasn't Perfect Doctor Cleveland155 years 6 months ago
Blog entryShould Our Allies Hack Our Elections? Doctor Cleveland35 years 7 months ago
Blog entryNobody Misses the WASPs Michael Maiello375 years 10 months ago
Blog entryYour Public Domain Day Report, 2019: YES!!! Doctor Cleveland225 years 10 months ago
Blog entryWe Never Should Have Had Military Forces in Syria in the First Place Michael Maiello1095 years 11 months ago
Blog entryAdvent in Herod’s Kingdom Doctor Cleveland85 years 11 months ago
Blog entryMy First Short Story in a While Doctor Cleveland95 years 11 months ago
Blog entryHarvard and David Hogg Doctor Cleveland45 years 11 months ago
Blog entryDag Needs Some Culture Michael Maiello45 years 11 months ago
Blog entryWriting Short Fiction, Then and Now Doctor Cleveland75 years 12 months ago

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