How A Recent 'History Lesson' By A Progressive Shows How Little They Truly Think of Democracy

 

 

I have come to realize over the last year of the intolerance of the left in almost every front.  Their contempt and hatred for anyone who does not completely and totally believe in their ideology has become increasingly obvious over the last year in many fronts. Over the last year they have done everything in their power to ‘defend democracy’ by arguing the only way to do so is to completely suppress every single person who has an opposing viewpoint.

 Not only must Fox News and Newsmax be banned but Republicans and conservatives can not express their points of view on legitimate news networks or the press. The ‘legitimate media’ job is to call every single Republican a fascist and threat to democracy, though by doing so they are only confirming what the left already knows.  Not only must the electoral college be removed and new states created, but the Republican congressmen and elected officials must be given less and less power so they don’t have too much influence – which is to say, any at all. The Republicans have never done anything right and if they do, they don’t mean it.  Democrats are always right and the media is not doing its job if it does not give them credit for it all the time. Democrats must not only defeat Republicans at the polls but they must not compromise with them to pass legislation.  Moderation in any form is worse than bipartisanship.  The voters for Republicans are at best empty vessels that have been filled with sewage by listening to Fox News all the time. And it is our jobs as loyal citizens to suppress them and ignore them. Some call for their being completely isolated from the rest of the county. Some actually say that you should disown them even if they are members of your family.  All of them are racists, sexist, homophones without the slightest redeeming virtue, barely being deserving of the label human.  They don’t say our country would be better off without them, but it's implied.

Yet I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything more appalling then the most recent post in Daily Kos this past Wednesday with the headline: “Why has America tolerated six illegitimate GOP Presidents?” The headline alone is bad enough, but the entire article reads like the author has decided to take on the job of the kind of historians that conservatives have spent decades writing arguing about the failure of the New Deal and the Great Society as policies.

Yet this article is infinitely worse and far more troubling. The right loathes FDR and LBJ with every fiber of its being but I have yet to read any history that argues that neither man was legitimately elected president. The right will argue that everything about the New Deal was a failure, they still feel FDR was little more than a dictator (a feeling that has been held by the right for more than eighty years and was felt by some Democrats at the time) but as far I know none of them have ever question FDR was guilty of rigging any of his four elections.  They make a different argument against LBJ about how his campaigning was among the most negative ads against Barry Goldwater (an accurate description) but they will allow that Goldwater had little real chance of winning and that while he lost the battle, long term the GOP won the war. They will still question the fact that JFK stole the Presidency from Richard Nixon in 1960, but in this case they are on firmer ground and I’m still inclined to agree with them.

The argument made by the author in this article is far more troubling and in many ways based on a read of history that completely ignores reality.  In this article the left shows that it is just as capable of cherry picking history to reflect a message that makes its points clear.

Here are some of the ‘high’ points:

Nixon bribed South Vietnam to not take a peace deal on the eve of the 1968  election to make sure that he became President.

Gerald Ford is illegitimate because he would never have been President because of Richard Nixon.

Reagan never believed in democracy and arranged a back channel with the leader of Iran to steal the 1980 election from Carter.

Bush was only President because he served under Ronald Reagan, and the criminal investigation of Iran Contra avoided him.

All four of these Presidents appointed Supreme Court justices who, in their eyes,  didn’t value democracy. They argue that Sandra O’Connor, one of the greatest justices in history is under the same brush as Scalia and Renquist, because she voted for Bush V. Gore. They argue the same for Anthony Kennedy even though he was the swing vote in the Oberfell decision. They mention David Souter but they ignore him altogether. Stevens was appointed to the court by Ford and he dissented in the Bush V. Gore opinion as did Souter. They ignore that as well.

Finally Trump. When it comes to the left, you don’t need to say anything else. (I will.)

All of this basically involves ignoring every single part of history involved and because I’ve written quite a lot about many of these events, let’s deal with what the author has conveniently chosen to omit.

And it starts in 1960:

In it, the author chooses to reverse how history worked. It argues that Nixon was responsible for every CIA and Mafia plot to assassinate Castro, not Kennedy. The fact that only the Bay of Pigs took place in the aftermath is ignored as well as the fact that later events proved that the Kennedys were responsible for okaying multiple assassination attempts on Castro during JFK’s administration, all of which failed. They also choose to ignore all of the dirty tricks Kennedy played in the election – including of course the voter fraud that took place in Texas and Illinois. They also ignore that Nixon was running a 50 state campaign and by far the cleanest campaign of his career. They also ignore that unlike the Nixon of eight years later,  he courted the black vote and was the last Republican candidate to receive more than twenty-five percent of it. They also argue that Nixon took bribes during the 1952 campaign which was pure and simple not true. As is always the case with the left Nixon is always the villain.

Next comes 1968. The author ignores that the Democratic Party was divided about LBJ’s handling of the Vietnam War. They leave out basically every aspect of the Democratic campaign – which is basically everything. McCarthy’s protest vote, RFK entering the race, LBJ withdraw, Humphrey’s entering and locking up the nomination without entering a primary, Robert Kennedy’s assassination, everything that happened in the convention and the halls of Chicago – all of which made it look like Humphrey was going to be trounced in the general against Nixon. The Democratic Party did far more to defeat Humphrey than Nixon’s actions near the end of the campaign.

They also choose to ignore that four years later the leftist wing of the party united behind George McGovern and the Democratic party walked away from him. The fact that Nixon managed to win a landslide in 49 of 50 states does not count in their thinking because in their minds if Nixon hadn’t cheated in 1968, he would never been President in the first place. That said, they have no problem claiming Gerald Ford, who was basically a good man in a horrible situation, was similarly illegitimate even though he believed in democracy more than Nixon did.

Then they choose to argue that Reagan didn’t believe in democracy which is laughable.  Reagan had tried to get the Republican nomination for President twice before in 1968 and 1976, both times as an outsider.  He believed in the process. Similarly he went through 1980 on a long path to the nomination.

This also absolves Carter from any fault in his campaign, which is just as ridiculous. Carter’s approval ratings were so low by the middle of 1979 that the Party was terrified by what would happen when he stood for reelection and Ted Kennedy launched a primary campaign to unseat him. The hostage crisis more than anything else saved Carter from losing the nomination. The party thought he was a lame duck going in and up until the convention people were trying to get him to step aside in favor of Edmund Muskie and Jerry Brown.

Carter than campaigned horribly throughout the fall, using a poisonous tone that led to him being considered nasty. He also made multiple mistakes that could have helped him, such as refusing to debate third party candidate John Anderson, who had said he’d withdraw if Carter did so.  And most importantly Carter could not come up with a reason to vote for him, rather than against Reagan. Despite what happened behind the scenes, Reagan almost certainly would have won anyway. It also ignores the fact that it wasn’t a close election: Reagan carried 45 states and 492 electoral votes.

This article also mentions the nomination of Kennedy as a consequence of the Reagan administration. Again it ignores that Reagan was up for reelection in 1984 and won in an even bigger landslide over Walter Mondale.

Bush 41 is attacked because of his negative campaigning and the fact that he was involved in Iran Contra. This goes out of its way to ignore the utter shitshow that the Democrats were going through in the primaries, including Gary Hart withdrawing because of the Monkey Business scandal, Joe Biden withdrawing early because of an excuse of plagiarism which took out a member of the Dukakis staff and the fact that Dukakis himself campaigned poorly throughout.  Again, this was not a close election.

Now when it comes to W the author says he won only because of the Supreme Court. I find this a remarkable interpretation of events as neither side saw much of a difference between Al Gore and George W. Bush. It also conveniently ignores the presence of Ralph Nader, who I’m pretty sure every good leftist was campaigning for.

And of course, there’s Trump. No one can put a single argument that the left did anything wrong. Except…for one small detail the left has been hoping you’ll forget. In a poll that took place in the aftermath of the 2016 election, it was revealed that of those who voted for Bernie Sanders in the 2016 primary, eleven percent voted for Trump. Kind of remarkable they never let that fact come out of any complaint in the last decade.

So as history this is truly terrible as it cherry picks facts to make you believe that every Republican only became President because of cheating and that there were no other outside factors that had anything to do with their Presidency. But the implications are far worse.

The left has spent a lot of time over the last decade trying to find a way to explain how, if they are right on every basic principle and value, how the Republicans managed to win the White House seven times between 1968 and 2004.  You can’t blame Fox News for what happened prior to 1996 nor the fact that these elections were stolen: as I have mentioned in  the four out of five Elections the Republicans won between 1972 and 1988, in each of them they won more than four hundred electoral votes and in two the Republican candidate took 49 of 50 states.  How on earth could that have happened if the Democrats were right on everything and the Republicans were wrong?

This article makes a simple argument. None of them were legitimate Presidents, results of the elections be damned.  The fact that in four of these cases, millions of more people voted for the Republican over the Democratic candidate, is irrelevant.  The fact that in Nixon and Reagan’s landslides, many Democrats voted for the Republican is irrelevant.   The message couldn’t be clearer: if you don’t like what the candidate stands for, then they are illegitimate.

The fact that all four of these Presidents did do some good and that all of them were willing to work across the aisle is completely irrelevant too. If anything all of the Democrats who were in Congress should have brought the government to a standstill the moment they were elected. The Democrats should have started impeaching Nixon the day after he took office in 1969 – after all, they had the numbers which were far larger in both Houses of Congress than they are today.  No legislation should have been passed at all during Nixon’s first term – after all, it made him look good.  Similarly the Democrats should have held hearings the moment Ford became President and demanded a trial for Nixon, pardon be damned.  And they should have started impeaching Reagan on day one of his administration and never worked with him.

And the implications for the democratic process are terrifying particularly as we enter an election year.  On one hand, the left is arguing that the Republican party is doing everything in its power to destroy democracy as we know it by saying no Democratic victory is legitimate – something quite a few elected officials still say. On the other hand, in an article like this – and this is only the most detailed one I’ve seen – they are arguing that no Republican victory can every truly be legitimate. If you’ve decided that no past Republican victories were real ones, then it’s an easy step to say that no future ones are.

I’ve rarely seen an argument more deliberately inflammatory than this one.  For the past decade Democratic candidates are increasingly becoming the ones that accept defeat more easily than Republicans do. An article like this basically says that this is a sucker’s move.  It argues that conceding any loss at all, gracious or not, is something that has no place in our democracy if you don’t like the results. It argues that George McGovern and Walter Mondale’s biggest mistakes and candidates was not filing endless lawsuits in every state arguing that the elections were stolen. It argues that neither Al Gore should have ignored the Court’s ruling and that Hilary Clinton should not have conceded on election night. And it argues that in not only next year but all the ones to come, that no Republican President is legitimate even if they get more votes than the Democrat does.

It's an argument that essentially says that democracy only works if your guy wins. And if it doesn’t you’re free to ignore the results.  This ‘history lesson’ by far lays bare that there are those on the left who believe that democracy only works if it is totalitarian for your side, and if it doesn’t anarchy is acceptable. If ever there were an argument about extremists on both sides having the same governing principle, this article is exhibit A.

 

A Tribute to 2012 Movies: Skyfall

 

I will confess that I have wanted to write this article for a long time but was able to come up with a proper format. Those of you who have followed my columns know that I actually started a separate series on James Bond movies in which I claimed a) that I found them all fundamentally flawed growing up and b) that the Daniel Craig version resolved every problem I had with them. Now I am finally ready to write about it.

When Skyfall came out, I thought it would be fitting for the Academy to nominate it for Best Picture. There were many reasons to do so, the most obvious being that it was the 50^th anniversary of Dr. No and the Oscars was already planning to celebrate it. What better reason to do so then to nominate a Bond film for Best Picture?

And it would have been a decision that not only fans of Bond would have celebrated. In dealing with the Oscar nominations for 2012, Entertainment Weekly putting a word out for Skyfall in its For Your Consideration box. Roger Ebert and Leonard Maltin had each given it four stars (for Maltin that’s a harder bar to reach).  And few who have seen the film before or since can argue that it is not one of the premiere action movies – if not among the best films period – of the 21^st century.  To call it the best James Bond film of all time is a high bar for some to make, but in my opinion it’s not a close question.

While some will quibble about the idea that Daniel Craig is the best James Bond, I don’t think I’ll get much debate that he is by far the most realistic one.  Craig has nailed every aspect of Bond since the opening moments of Casino Royale  in which we literally saw him become 007.  He doesn’t make jokes about the killings he commits; he is cold and angry in a way none of the other Bonds have been and he is capable of loving the most deeply. The fact that from Quantum of Solace on Craig had to be dragged kicking and screaming into every Bond film actually helps his performance;  you can sense his reluctance every time he is called back into action, and he has no patience for any of his superiors and few of the agents he works with.  This is true in all of his film but never more so than Skyfall.

Any discussion of the film justifiably begins with the opening, considered one of the greatest opening sequences of any film in history.  It plays like an action film itself as Bond goes through the streets of a marketplace chasing a man who has names of key MI6 operatives. He’s accompanied for the first time by a fellow agent who we only know as Eve most of the movie. Naomie Harris tears into this role as the first woman you’re actually rooting for Bond to hit it off with. (The Craig films did a much better job with female roles overall than the previous forty years had.)  The sustained chase of the agent leads to what very well may be the quintessential Daniel Craig moment as James Bond: in the midst of a train car that is decoupling, he leaps from one, and as the back of it disappears behind him, he briefly pauses to roll up the sleeve of his coat that got mussed when he was jumping.

The sequence unfolds with more than just Bond, of course, throughout Eve is chasing him and in the midst of all the action there is a moment of tension when Eve has a shot to take out the enemy but could hit Bond. M listening in London keeps ordering her before she finally loses patience and says: “Take the bloody shot!”  We hear the bang and see Bond fall. We cut back to London and her a disconsolate Eve say: “Agent down.” M walks to the window and folds her arms. It’s one of the few times in her tenure with Craig as Bond that she actually shows emotion.

And of course then we get the single greatest Bond song and opening number in the history of the franchise, at least in my opinion. Countless James Bond films have won Best Song over the years and I don’t question the ability of many of the quality of the artists.  Ever since Shirley Bassey electrified us with ‘Goldfinger’ (she did the same thing at the 2013 Oscars) they’ve been some of the most memorable moments in film history. But few have had the power of Adele’s voice in the context of what we are seeing in the opening and the nature of the film that is to come.

Craig’s performance is a masterwork because we are seeing a James Bond we never have. Bond has survived countless near death experiences over the decades, but this is the first one that genuinely seems to have counted. From the moment the film begins in earnest Bond is clearly going through PTSD and time and again throughout much of the film, he doesn’t seem like the Bond we know.  We know he’s failed his physical and psychological screening before he does and in so many of the sequences (I’ll get to a couple) he is shakier than we have seen him. Even the banter when people die in front of him seems like a man who is just not up to the challenge of being back.  You get the feeling very early on that M has sent him after the target not because she thinks he’s capable of it but because she thinks he isn’t. She wants to catch Silva and if they both die, so much the better.

Silve is in my opinion the best villain that we’ve ever seen in the history of Bond and this is an opinion that was shared at the time and beyond.  In the same article that suggested Skyfall be nominated for Best Picture, Entertainment Weekly suggest Javier Bardem be nominated for Best Supporting Actor.  The SAG Awards actually did just that.  It would have been a difficult argument to make that the five nominated actors did not deserve their nominations but Bardem’s work was at the level of all five.  Roger Ebert remarked on Silva’s blond hair and that his first major attack is to expose the names of MI-6 operatives who are working undercover and compared him with Julian Assange. I don’t know if the three screenwriters of the film did so deliberately but there is a style to Silva’s behavior as well as the fact that we first see him in exile in a foreign country that makes us think this is a deliberate choice.

It is a matter of how James Bond movies work that the plans of the villains are always ridiculously convoluted and complicated; indeed Q and Bond actually discuss this very fact at a certain point in the film. The reason we don’t think this way is because, at it’s core, Silva’s plan is brutally, painfully simple.  He was a former MI-6 agent who was taken prisoner and who M exchanged with a foreign government. All of his actions are directly as an attack as her: he intends destroy her home (the attack on the base of operations) cripple her professionally and finally kill her.  It’s worth noting that unlike almost every Bond villain in history, he actually succeeds at all of his basic goals, and the fact that he does not destroy the institution she believes in may be due to pure luck than nothing else.

If Casino Royale rebooted James Bond, for all intents and purpose Skyfall reboots the Bond movie.  This is clear in the fact that this is Judi Dench’s final appearance as M.  On a side note, I thought that Dench deserved to be nominated for Best Supporting Actress that year (I chose her over Jacki Weaver who was  nominated for Silver Linings Playbook.) One would be hard pressed to say that Dench has not received a fair amount a love from the Oscars in my lifetime: by 2012, she had received six Oscar nominations (the first when she was 62!) and has gotten two more since. Yet I still believe she deserved recognition for her work as M here.

In her first appearance as the character in Golden Eye she referred to Pierce Brosnan’s Bond as ‘a Cold War relic’. In Skyfall, this term could far more easily apply to her. Dench’s M has always seemed more cold and ruthless in Craig’s film but she reaches a whole new level from the start of the film when she orders Bond not to attend to a mortally wounded man’s injury. She seems more concerned throughout both the attack and the personal messages that Silva sends her over the film as to job security than anything else.  She is rigid to everyone she deals with, not just when it comes to Bond, but everyone who might help her.  When Malory comes to her and tells her she has to go before a public inquiry, she barely seems to have use for the democratic process (most intelligence people feel that way) and she shows no remorse for Bond in the aftermath of his attack or repentance for what she did to Silva to force him that way. Part of me almost wonders when she learns about the fact that Silva has escaped and she gives her speech to Parliament that she knows her life is in danger but she wants to make very clear her point about how necessary her agency is. What better way than to have them shot at?  Even when Bond saves her in the final act, she seems more annoyed that she has to risk her life than this might end the threat.

It's pretty clear given how prominent Ralph Fiennes is as Malory that the movie is setting him up to be the next M and its also clear how much more suited he is to the world of today’s intelligence that Judi Dench. He has a background in intelligence in a way that makes everybody initially suspicious and its clear he’s also a more adaptable both to the politics of today’s surroundings and the methods of intelligence.  In subsequent films he will become just as ruthless as Dench when it comes to destroying the enemies but there’s always a sense of guilt to his actions that we don’t see in Dench in her appearances until the very end.

Skyfall finally finds a way to reboot Q. When Desmond Llewelyn died, replacing Q did not seem an option.  Having seen Ben Whishaw, I now can’t imagine a better choice. Llewelyn seemed like an elegant aide; Whishaw leans in to a young nerd that we all really thought Q is these days.  The first meeting between Craig and Whishaw is hysterical and has just the right amount of flirtation to it. (Was anyone surprised when we later learned this Q is gay?) Q is wry and has such enough self-knowledge to know how to behave. (The joke about the exploding pen is priceless as is his reference not to damage the equipment.) Whishaw has enough of a career that he will always be busy on other projects; but I will love seeing him play Q for as long Llewelyn did.

Because a Bond movie is known for extraordinary action sequences we get a lot of them, but in Skyfall they show a Bond for more shattered. In an exception ten minute set-piece we see Bond in Hong Kong tracking down a target from the airport to a balcony that unfolds with no dialogue until the very end.  Throughout Craig is shown as one step off, missing stunts the old Bond would make easily, bumbling shots he used to make and at the end, losing the grip of the target by accident rather than on purpose. In his initial scene with Silva (which like with Q has a flirtatious vibe) Bond seems more at a disadvantage than he does when he’s usually taken prisoner by the bad guy.  He seems more shaken at the death of the woman he seduced who Silva chooses to kill and he doesn’t manage to win by any physical feat rather than an action that he’s learned on his own. When Silva is captured, he’s far less patient with Q than he usually is even as he follows Silva into the underground. (There’s a fair amount of deadpan humor here too.)

And in the final half-hour Bond returns to his origins what amounts to the home where he was raised as an orphan. (This would be the final screen appearance of Albert Finney who truly relished the role.) Bond clearly seems to have come back here not just because it is a territory he knows he will have an advantage on but because his loathing of it as a child means that he can lay it to ruin with no remorse. His last line before he blows it up is: “I’ve always hated this place” and we know given his actions he means it with every fiber of his being.

The final minutes seem to be both an end and coming full circle. We learn, with little true surprise, that Eve’s last name is Moneypenny and she’s no longer going to be in the field. Malory has taken over as M and his last words were if he wants Bond to get back to work: “With pleasure, M,” Bond says, even though we’re not truly sure if Bond means it.

Spectre and No Time to Die both clearly had the methods of wrapping up the Bond franchise for good, even though as we watched the final minutes of the latter we knew it just wasn’t going to happen. Replacements for Craig had been discussed as far back as 2010, with luminaries such as Idris Elba being mentioned. (Jeopardy actually did an entire category devoted to it in 2013.) But it will be nearly impossible in my opinion for anyone to come close to the majesty of Daniel Craig’s work in these films and Skyfall particular. In a review of Layer Cake a 2004 action film Craig appeared in, Roger Ebert reacted to the idea of Craig as the next Bond as saying: “Who would wish James Bond on anyone?” He changed his mind after Casino Royale.  Going forward any future Bond will have to answer to the role the way that Thomas Jefferson was told he was replacing Ben Franklin as ambassador to Paris: they will succeed Craig; no one will replace him.

 

 

 

 

FDR's Attempt to Pack the Court, Conclusion: The Failed 'Purge' Of 1938 and A Final Look At What The Court Can and Can't Do

 

 

The defeat in the battle of the Supreme Court was only the start of the bad news for FDR’s second term. In the middle of 1937 a recession began that would continue into the first half of 1938, which would weaken public confidence in the Administration’s policies on the new deal.

More importantly, the strain in Roosevelt’s coalition in the Democratic Party between the liberal New Deal supporters and the conservative wings in the South had become more evident. FDR’s reaction was to do something nearly as unprecedented as his attempt to shape the judiciary the previous year. In what would be become known to history as Roosevelt’s Purge FDR did something that had never happened before in the age of the primary and still hasn’t happened since. He inserted himself into campaigns against Southern Democratic Senators in an effort to get more liberal supporters of the New Deal on his side.

From the start, members of the National Democratic party were appalled by this, though many of the more loyalist members of the administration were infuriated by the Southern leaders of legislation even before the battle in the Court.  In the 1938 election he targeted 10 conservative Democratic Senators. Democratic leaders quickly convinced him that four of them – Alva Adams of Colorado, Champ Clark of Missouri, Augustus Lonergan of Connecticut and Pat McCarran of Nevada – could not be removed.

He focused his energy on six others: Guy Gilette of Iowa,  Frederick Van Nuys of Indiana, Cotton Ed Smith of South Carolina, Millard Tydings of Maryland,  Walter George of Georgia and George Berry of Tennessee.

FDR also endorsed several New Deal Democrats who did triumph in primaries.  Lister Hill managed to defeat Thomas Heflin of Alabama; Claude Pepper of Florida withstood a primary challenge as did Alben Barkley. Hattie Caraway of Arkansas, Robert Bulkley of Ohio and Elmer Thomas of Oklahoma also won  their primaries.

Because Hill’s victory was the earliest and Pepper’s not long after, Roosevelt was given to overconfidence and was cheered on by advisers such as Harry Hopkins, Thomas Corcoran and Harold Ickes.

But his efforts to realign the party almost everywhere else was a disaster.  In Indiana, the party could not even come up with a New Dealer to challenge Van Nuys. In Iowa, the party campaigned for liberal Congressman Otha Wearin but the state party was behind Gilette and he easily withstood the challenge. But by far the worst defeats came in the South where Roosevelt decided to put up the most effort. While George Berry  lost his primary, FDR had nothing to do with it: he had crossed Tennessee Boss Crump and that hurt him

In Georgia, FDR backed youthful attorney Lawrence Camp against Walter George. George had not endorsed FDR for President in 1932 and had never supported the New Deal as enthusiastically in FDR’s second term. Because of all the time Roosevelt spent in Georgia, he considered it his second home. In a speech delivered in Barnesville on August 11^th, Roosevelt praised George’s service and intelligence and honor but urged voters to endorse Camp. George accepted the challenge. George defeated Camp in a nearly two to one rout in the primary.

In South Carolina FDR endorsed Governor Olin Johnston against Smith. Smith was far more unpopular in South Carolina at the time, not for his racial policies but because of his position on labor. Smith waged the fight against Roosevelt as a Yankee carpetbagger.  He formed a coalition with Jim Byrnes, but Byrnes loathed Smith and only endorsed him because he did not agree with Johnston’s support of FDR’s push for labor reform. Johnston could not please either textile mill owners or the white supremacists and Smith won the primary.

It's worth noting that in the aftermath of Smith’s triumph and reelection that most voters had chosen Smith as a contrast to Roosevelt’s interference in the primary. When he faced reelection six years later Johnston would rout him.

Maryland went little better. Roosevelt campaigned heavily for Congressman David J. Lewis but Tydings easily won.  In this case, it was more due to Tydings own liberal record which in the midst of the rise of fascism abroad was far more liberal than Roosevelt’s.  In January of 1934, he had introduced a resolution condemning the Nazis in Germany and asked Roosevelt to express America’s alarm at the antisemitic measures.  He was also stronger than FDR on foreign policy at the time, having introduced a bill that would lead to the independence of the Philippines as well as one that had done so for Puerto Rico. (The leadership of the liberal party at the time opposed it.)

Roosevelt also targeted three critical members of the House: John O’Connor Chairman of House Rules in New York, Eugene Cox of Georgia and Howard Smith of Virginia. O’Connor was particularly targeted because FDR had put forth a government reorganization bill in March of 1938 that had wanted to, among other things, integrate all independent agencies into cabinet departments. The Senate had narrowly approved the bill, but the House had submitted it to the rules committee where O’Connor had vehemently opposed it. The bill had been killed.

The purge went just as badly there. All three Congressman survived their primaries. Cox would serve in the House until his death in 1952. Smith was in Congress until 1966. O’Connor did lose reelection, however.

With everything that happened in the purge and the outrage still heavy over the Court Packing bill, the 1938 elections were a disaster for FDR and the Democrats. In the House the Republicans won 72 seats. The win was not as big in the Senate – the Democrats ‘only’ lost eight seats but there were after effects. James Pope of Idaho and William McAdoo of California (FDR’s friend from their days in the Wilso administration) both lost their primaries. And Lonergan won his primary but lost his Senate Seat narrowly to Republican John Danaher, while Democrats lost seats in states that they had taken in 1932 in Republican states such as Kansas, South Dakota, Vermont and New Hampshire. Bulkley lost his election in Ohio to Robert Taft and Wisconsin went to Alexander Wiley.

FDR had strengthened the conservative alliance between conservative Democrats and the Republican party.  He had weakened himself by appearing power hungry, turned Democratic skeptics into opponents and it made him look weak.

FDR’s desire was his conviction that the nation needed two responsible political parties: one liberal, one conservative. He would make a similar effort to try a coalition with Wendell Wilkie in the spring of 1944, but both men were dead before it could go forward.

What makes it clear is that FDR had a weapon he could have used in his attempt for the Purge that would have given his liberal opponents a difference particularly in the South: race.  Considering that when Smith was in Congress during the battle of the Civil Rights Act and was still adamantly opposed to it, it’s a weapon he could have used especially as African-Americans were finally starting to abandon the Republican Party. But it is unlikely it would have been a successful tactic in the South in the 1930s and just as unlikely that the idea would have occurred to FDR. As I mentioned at the start of this series FDR was more or less in total agreement with his Southern opponents on the idea of integration and civil rights. One of the biggest conflicts that would play out even throughout World War II was his refusal to believe in integration in the military or agree to even fight for anti-lynching laws domestically.  For all of his progressiveness, he never showed any signs of enlightenment and the idea of fighting racism abroad while ignoring it at home was something that he and his administration never seemed to truly see a contradiction in. Considering that the major breakdown between our two parties is born in our collective opinions on race, it is telling that FDR seemed to see that a liberal and conservative party could somehow be different on every issue but that one.

Ironically many of the Senators that had been FDR’s biggest gadflies in the court battle and some that he had considered purging would end up being his strongest allies in Congress in the battle to win World War II. The sole exception was Smith who twenty years ago had been one of the major speakers in favor of the immigration act that had barred Europe’s Jews in fascism. Much of the reason FDR was able to lead legislation during this period was in part due to the alliance of Southern Democrats and his decision to appoint several prominent Republicans to his cabinet in 1940, including Henry Stimson, who had been in Republican politics since the time of Theodore Roosevelt’s Presidency and became his Secretary of War.

Still it is worth noting that by the end of 1938, Roosevelt’s prestige had been seriously damaged by both his efforts to impact both the judicial and legislative branches.  After the midterms of 1938 he contemplated the end of his Presidency seriously even as the situation in Europe worsened. Only the declaration of war in September of 1939 made him realize he had to run for a third term for what he considered the greater good.

 

Epilogue

What The Supreme Court Is And What It Isn’t

 

Dred Scott Vs. Sanford,  the 1857 decision that said that African-Americans and slaves were not people in the sense that white people were, is considered one of the three worst Supreme Court decisions ever made. (I’ll deal with the other two in a minute.) But because our sensibilities are offending by the obvious racism, it causes us to forget many things.

First, there is the fact that this decision inflamed just as many people in the South as it did in the North. Jefferson Davis was, in many ways, as angry about the decision as Abraham Lincoln would be albeit for different reasons. Lincoln was upset because it confirms slavery was evil in the eyes of America. Davis was enraged because it did nothing to offer it legal protection. “This has always been the South’s position,” he said in speeches he made in the aftermath. It was not a complementary statement.

In a sense one of the bigger weaknesses of James Buchanan’s horrible presidency was that he truly believed this decision would resolve the issue of slavery once and for all.  Buchanan was horribly mistaken because he had underestimated what the Supreme Court can do. As explained in the Constitution the job of judiciary is to interpret the law, not to make law or enforce it.  The Supreme Court did not then, as it does not now, have the power to invoke societal changes. All it does, as a writer once point out, is essentially wave a wand and hope something will happen.  Dred Scott may truly be bad law but it didn’t change anyone’s opinion of slavery one way or another and it didn’t make it ‘the law of the land’. All it did was maintain the status quo.  The bigger flaw of Buchanan was that he thought the status quo could be maintained when his own narrow victory had argued change was coming.

Similarly Plessy V. Ferguson, which enshrined ‘separate but equal’ is horribly racist but only affirmed what was going on for African Americans since the end of Reconstruction. Society had been separate and unequal since the end of Reconstruction in the South and the North was not much better.  It might well have been better for society had the court said that this was wrong, but without legislation from Congress it would not have made a difference to African-Americans anywhere and no one in either party had any real reason to make laws to improve lives for African-Americans in the country.  All the court did was basically say out loud what everyone in America – certainly African-Americans – knew already.

And for those who argue as if a judicial precedent is something that should be carved in stone how do they consider the Brown decision, which effectively overruled Plessy which had been considered ‘the law of the land’ for nearly a decade longer than Roe V. Wade had been? This decision, it is worth remembered, caused just as much outrage in many circles as the Dobbs decision did and led to similar amounts of violent rhetoric and explosion in hatred against judicial officials.  It was decisions like this that caused Eisenhower to consider the appointment of Earl Warren, heroes to millions of liberals, the biggest mistake he ever made.

And this decision didn’t have any real power beyond the symbolic. It took a series of decisions by the Warren Court to have influence but its worth noting none would have been possible without a similar cause of actions by Congress over the next decade when several increasingly sweeping Civil Rights bills that needed to pass both houses of Congresses with bipartisan support. When Hilary Clinton said that John Lewis marched for the Voting Rights act but it took a President to sign it, she was castigated by the left and African-Americans – but she was absolutely right.  What all activists never get is that their protests and actions will make no difference if there is not legislation in response. The same is true for those who consider people who sit on the Supreme Court, either in Warren’s era or today, ‘judicial activists.” The Court can wave a wand as much as it wants but unless there are laws to back it up there is no magic.

It is easy – understandable, even – to blame so much of our recent problems in America on the Supreme Court and to have little confidence in its integrity.  But to simply say that appointing four justices to correct this imbalance is foolish for many reason besides the obvious. It is a violation of the separation of powers that FDR seemed so willing to flaunt in 1937. There are reasons to argue about the courts legitimacy because of its current makeup but the argument the left seems to make is essentially two wrongs making a right. It also argues that all the decisions that the Roberts Court has made are the sole reason for so much that has happened in the last decade when in effect it is doing is still waving a wand. The difference may be that certain people are willing to make it happen but just as with the previous horrible decisions that didn’t change anything that the people in the states didn’t already know. It may have given them cover to do some of the things they did but our nation’s past has given us countless examples to give into the worst impulses of our nature.  No matter how much the left wants to think, the Court can’t make a decision regulating how people will behave.

And if one truly thinks that changing the courts makeup can always lead to positive societal change, I need merely remind you of the decision that the decision that most historians consider the third worst in the courts history. In 1944 the Supreme Court made its third most infamous decision Korematsu vs. US, the decision that upheld the internment of Japanese Americans from the West Coast. Some of the most liberal justices of all time – Harlan Stone, Felix Frankfurter and William O. Douglas were in the majority of this opinion along with Hugo Black, all of whom had been appointed to the Court by FDR. (Stone was named Chief Justice after Hughes retirement). One of the three dissenters was Owen Roberts, who had caused FDR so much trouble in his first term.

This decision took place in large part because of the advocacy of the Governor of California, who claimed that Japanese Americans had ‘willfully infiltrated every strategic spot in California coastal and valley countries. He argued the lack of disloyal acts among Japanese Americans only meant that they would do so in the future. When internees were released, he protested their return to California. It was not until near the end of his life that he expressed regret for his action during the process.

The governor during that period was Earl Warren.

 

The Latest Leg of the Jeopardy Wild Card Tournament ALMOST Has Me Confessed it's a Good Idea

 

At this point we are close to a quarter of a way through Season 40 of Jeopardy. We have also just completed the quarter-finals of the most  recent leg of the Wild Card Tournament. I promised in my last article on Jeopardy I’d get back to covering it but a lot of things – including the end of the strike in Hollywood – have gotten in the way.

But now that there is going to be a pause in television as the networks begin to pick up the rubble of the season and more importantly, the writers will begin going back to work for Jeopardy overall, I think we should take a look at the Wild Card Tournament.

I’ll be honest: the quarterfinal matches of the previous round were incredibly disappointing. They might have been called the Diamond leg but they were anything but precious. Two of them were among the most disappointing matches of Jeopardy all year and there were more than a few games where Final Jeopardy stumped all three contestants. (To be fair, two of them also stumped me.) The second semi-final ‘won’ by Aaron Craig, was not much better as entertainment. All that side the two game final was thrilling, with Jilana Cotter, who was a distant third at the end of Game 1, nearly coming from behind to defeat Emily Sands before being defeated by a very difficult Final Jeopardy.

Emily Sands was also, of the three semi-finalists, had by far won the most money in her three games and probably deserved to come back the most. Again I still heavily question the fact of not just letting three game players into the Tournament of Champions rather than go through all this rigamarole, but I can’t say I’m unhappy she’s here.

We have now just completed the quarterfinals of the Clubs leg of the Wild Card round and I’ll be honest this round has almost made the whole tournament worth it. We started the tournament in grand style with a fight between Matt Takimoto, Jen Jazwinski and Charlie Fonville in which Double Jeopardy ended with Charlie and Jen tied with $15,400 while Matt who fell victim to a very tough Daily Double in third with $8100. It came down to Final Jeopardy and Jen ended up getting Final Jeopardy right and Matt got it wrong.  Both wagered everything and Jen came out on top.

You don’t top that kind of game but Game 2 came very close with a back and forth fight between Alan Johnson and Dennis Chase for the lead that ended with Alan in front on the last clue of Double Jeopardy, $13,200 to Dennis’ $12,500. Again it came down to Final Jeopardy and Dennis emerged the winner.

Game 3 was a classic by any measure in what was a fight to the death between Emily Flasco, Stuart Crane and Fred Nelson. Fred went into a big lead near the end of Double Jeopardy but when Stuart chose to bet everything in a Daily Double in SAY CHEESE!, he would bring down the house and nearly manage a huge upset. Fred held on to win in an extraordinary fight.

Game 4 was slightly toned down but it featured a remarkable performance by Nick Cascone to come from third to first in Double Jeopardy which led to his victory.

Game 5 was another nailbiter. Leah Caglio and Kit Sekelsky fought very hard in Jeopardy and Double Jeopardy. But by getting both Daily Doubles very late – the latter on the very last clue of the round, Henry Rozycki stirred the crowd by going into first. Unfortunately Final Jeopardy proved to be problematic. I will give you the clue in the category WASHINGTON D.C.

“It was proposed in Congress in 1926 in honor of a big 150^th anniversary, it opened 17 years later.” None of the three contestants – and for the record, not I – knew it was the Jefferson Memorial. Kit won because she was the only contestant who didn’t bet everything.

Almost as a sign the next match was not nearly as exciting and was part of three out of four matches which were runaways albeit close ones. That said, Friday’s match was another thriller in which Carrie Cadwallader went up to a big lead in the Jeopardy round that Danielle Maurer spent all of Double Jeopardy picking away. At the end of Double Jeopardy, Danielle was in second with $16,000 to Carrie’s $21,200.

Final Jeopardy told the tale. The category was LITERARY CHARACTERS: “In his first appearance in 1902, he was described as ‘betwixt-and-between’ a boy and a bird.” Danielle was the only contestant who knew this referred to Peter Pan. (The first Peter Pan novel was called The Little White Bird for the record.) Danielle’s did only win two games, but in one she defeated Mattea Roach.

Eight of the nine games have had more than their share of entertainment value and we’ve had some pretty tough clues. Here’s who we’ll be playing in the semis as well as their previous record:

Jen Jazwinski: 2 games in July of 2021, $59,201.

Dennis Chase: 3 Games in March 2021, $48,400

Stuart Crane: 1 game, $21,800

Nick Cascone, 1 game, $26,801

Kit Sekelsky, 3 games June 2021, $35,899

Amy Bekkerman, 2 wins March 2022, $54,100

Danielle Maurer, 2 wins $27,999 (defeated Mattea Roach)

Deanna Bolio, Second Chance Tournament winner

Ed Hashima, runner up in the Professors Tournament

In the case of Ed Hashima, it is worth noting he very nearly defeated Sam Buttrey in the final: he was in the lead in the second game of Game 2 and got Final Jeopardy wrong. Still Sam’s correct response had already locked up the tournament. Ed knows he’s following in Sam’s footsteps and in both rounds when he had the last clue called out ‘bring it’ to the delight of the throng. He ran away with the game helped by a Daily Double in the appropriate category TEACHING.

I feel compelled to mention to those pedants who were upset about the possibility of the using of old clues that in fact they have been doing just that.  However unless you’re a long time viewer I seriously doubt you’d notice. The only reason I have noticed is because of my love of the super tournament and have rewatched several of them so many times that I am capable of picking up on it.

To date they have repeated several of the clues in the category THOSE DARN ESTRUCANS from the Million Dollar Masters (itself a favorite from the early years of the shows) at least three separate categories almost verbatim from the Ultimate Tournament of Champions that I know of (TRIANGLES, FABRICS, and THE MAMAS AND THE PAPAS) and A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME from the Battle of the Decades.  I have little doubt that many of the contestants who participated in these tournaments would in fact remember them (Ken Jennings was in the latter two, of course, but he was not in any of the games where they were used) but I think all but the most devout Jeopardy fan would have picked up on even the last one, which was used in May of 2014.

I’d also argue that there has to be an expiration date on how long ago you can use a clue or group of clues again and considering that the earliest one was nearly nine years ago, I think they’re entitled to recycle it.  The contestants, it’s worth noting, didn’t necessarily study the games that closely; many of them stumped when they were used.  I keep score at home but I am fair; because I remembered these clues I did not respond to them even though I knew what the correct answers were to all of them.

To be clear I am still far from won over by the execution of the Wild Card Tournament even if the concept is admirable. I also find it very hard to feel it can exist in this format if it is used again in seasons that follow – something I need to make very clear Jeopardy should not do. I’m still not happy about the idea of a one game winner or someone who has won no games at all being able to participate in the Tournament of Champions. The fact that they might have won several games to get there does nothing to make me feel this is a dangerous precedent to set going forward.

But when it comes to the quality of gameplay in the last leg I have to admit there has been a level of excitement and thrill that I have longed for from this show. This may be a backhanded compliment to the producers but it is still a compliment.  That said, the idea of having the postseason at the beginning of the show is still a horrendous idea that does not strike me as the kind of the move the show should make long term.  And if we have to go through another group of these games by the time by the Wild Card Tournament ends in mid-December I fear you will have exhausted quite a bit of patience and goodwill of the Jeopardy fans that have stuck with you through this period.

I’m giving you a bit more rope with the level of play in the last two weeks but my tolerance for this is beginning to wear down. You can make it up to me and the fans by starting to lay the groundwork for the next Jeopardy Masters this May – and now that the writers are back, have them start working on some really good clues. And one more thing when you get to the Tournament of Champions get Ike Barnholtz out. It would be bad enough if a Second Chance player won; God knows…who are we kidding? Ike’ll probably ask Cris Panullo for his autograph.

Why I Hope The Demise of the MCU Is Not Exaggerated

 

 

The reports of this weekend’s box office have revealed dour signs for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The Marvels had a poor opening weekend and a drastic fall-off this weekend; the reports are it will probably not even gross $100 million. The first release this year: Ant-Man: Quantomania had a superb opening weekend but disastrously dropped off in the second weekend. The third installment of Guardians of the Galaxy did slightly better than either film but poorly in comparison to the first two.

This is part of a trend that has been following superhero movies in both DC and Marvel over the past year. Shazam! Fury of the Gods and Blue Beetle both were disastrous financial failures and it remains to be seen if the most recent Aquaman film can turn things around for the series next month. Marvel’s problems are deeper, however: Phase Four featured several risky films that did not meet expectations and it was only through the success of Wakanda Forever that the Phase was not a complete disaster. Given the increasingly shaky receptions of so many of the recent Marvel TV adaptation this past year – not only Ms. Marvel but Secret Invasion  and the amount of chaos behind the scenes of Daredevil: Born Again – it is beginning to sound that superhero fatigue has begun to set in.

My reaction to this is simple: Good.

Now before I receive the utter rage of the internet as to being against comic books, I need to be very clear that I do not feel this way about all comic book based adaptations. Growing up among my favorite animated series were the 1990s version of Batman, X-Men and Spiderman, all of which are still considered classics today and all of which I intend to write about in a different context.  Furthermore I’ve always like the well-made superhero film: Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy is a gold standard that almost no comic book film before or since has surpassed. I’ve already expressed how much of a maligned masterpiece I thought Zack Snyder’s adaptation of Watchmen was and I thought the HBO adaptation a decade later was just as much a masterpiece. I was always fond of many, if not all, of the series in the Arrow-verse in the past decade and if most of them stayed on past their expiration date that’s a flaw of too many comic book series. Those of you who read my blog know I ranked Wandavision among the best shows of 2021.  And I have found places in my heart for certain films in the X-Men franchise and was a huge admirer of Todd Philips’ Joker.

But I’ve always had a problem with the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I’ve never truly thought the whole was better than the sum of its parts and that’s allow that all of the movies in that universe were masterpieces, which to be clear almost none of them were. That’s not a real shock when you make twenty-four films in the course of a decade, the law of averages is against the same quality being able to hold within all or even most of them. I don’t blame the filmmakers for that. And I admire them for the scope of their plans when it came to tell one overarching story and can even admire them for being this ambitious in trying to tell it. There has been a risk with trying to tell a great story from the start of Phase One onward and I don’t blame it for it increasingly unwieldy with each successive phase: the filmmakers were juggling a lot of plates and with each phase they kept having to throw in more hazardous things to juggle. By the time they got to Infinity War, they were essentially juggling a dozen chainsaws that were all on fire: it’s not their fault if things had started to get out of control.

My problem is that, individually, very few of the MCU films even work beyond the narrow standard of a summer blockbuster. To be clear, I’m not taking the Scorsese point of view that Marvel movies aren’t really films; we have to acknowledge he’s prejudiced on the subject of what he considers a film. My problem is I know that a great big budget film by the standards of an action movie or other genre CAN be a masterpiece beyond entertainment.  And by that standard, almost every single film in the MCU cannot pass that test.

The reason I feel this strongly is due to a separate fact. The year after Iron Man the film that started the MCU debuted, the Academy Awards began to expand the number of nominated films it had for Best Picture as a reaction to the fact that the Oscars were increasingly nominating movies that were arthouse films that very few people saw.  I’m not to going to pretend that there has been an immense improvement by the Academy in that regard: they still prefer the small-budget and ‘serious’ movie to any blockbuster, comic book movie or not. What has changed is that more and more summer blockbusters have been nominated for Best Picture in the past decade and more importantly, many of these films are considered in other awards that just wouldn’t have been at the start of the decade.

Now the naysayers will says: “They still aren’t nominating comic book movies for Best Picture” and I won’t debate that. (I’ll get to that in a minute, though, because there are other pertinent.) The thing is the kind of blockbusters they have nominated are definitely the kind of films I prefer as entertainment because they appeal not just to the eye but the mind. I think it is worth comparing year by year, the movies that got made by the MCU and the kind of blockbusters that were getting nominated in their stead.

It's worth remembering that the major reason the Oscars decided to nominate more films was because of the justifiable outrage that The Dark Knight was not nominated for Best Picture of 2008. Even those who loved Iron Man would have been inclined to say that Nolan’s vision was the deeper film that the first movie in Phase One.

2009: Unless you were hiding under a rock you know that one of the films nominated for Best Picture was James Cameron’s Avatar. We’ll let that go because there was no Marvel film that year. (Also I didn’t like Avatar.)

2010: I seriously doubt even the most devoted Marvel fans consider Iron Man 2 a cinematic masterpiece: most consider a weaker entry in the first three phases. Few would even think of comparing it to Inception a film so brilliant and imaginative than more than thirteen years later, we still can’t get out of our heads and no one has tried to make a movie like it.

2011: Yeah, let’s be honest the Oscars don’t make it easy for us here. Thor and Captain America were far from masterpieces but none of the bigger studio films were what could be charitably called blockbusters. Hugo is one of the greatest films I’ve seen but it was a disaster at the box office. But during the summer of 2011 the movie a lot of people were talking about – and seeing – was Bridesmaids, the brilliant comedy vehicle that officially made Melissa McCarthy a movie star and gave Kristin Wiig and Maya Rudolph the vehicle they deserved.  The film was nominated for Best Picture by the Golden Globes and Best Ensemble by the Screen Actors Guild. Bridesmaids was the film that was robbed by the Academy and it was far better than either Marvel Movie.

2012: This is trickier because seven of the nine nominated films did gross over $100 million that year so its not entirely a fair comparison. And I can see why The Avengers might have an argument for it. But I’ll be honest there were two other franchise movies I’m more upset the Oscars didn’t nominated for Best Picture: The Dark Knight Rises and Skyfall, in my opinion the best James Bond film of all time. (In fairness, I’m not Bond’s biggest patron either but I think many critics would agree with me on my ranking.

Moving to Phase Two:

2013: This is a little too easy considering that no one considers Thor: The Dark World or Iron Man 3 even very good films and one of the biggest winners at the Oscars that year was Gravity a technical masterpiece and one of the most brilliant works of cinema I’ve seen in the past decade. It gave me chills when I saw in the theater; it still does on TV.

2014: This is the rare occasion I might give the MCU some credit. The Winter Soldier is the one movie in the MCU I consider a full-on masterpiece not just for the action scenes within it but because it seemed to be set in the real world in a way most comic books aren’t. The fact that the Oscars decided that their idea for a superhero movie was Birdman doesn’t help; nor does the fact that with the exception of American Sniper and The Grand Budapest Hotel that year they basically walked away from the idea of big budget entertainment. Had they been willing to nominate Interstellar I might consider it, but in this case the mcu gets the edge – for Winter Soldier, though, not Guardians.

2015: This one the Oscars win hands down, not just because Avengers 2: Age of Ultron was clearly inferior to Avengers one but because they nominated for Best Picture two genre films that both artistically and from a perspective of a screenplay had it all over either of the MCU films. No one questions just how extraordinary Mad Max: Fury Road was or how good a measure of effects and intellect The Martian is. I would have been fine if either film had one Best Picture.

Moving to Phase 3 and that’s where I’ll stop, mainly because this is where everyone agrees the quality begins to drop.

2016: This is a little tricker because we start getting more films. Now I’ll admit Civil War had the potential to be an Oscar worthy film but compared to the intellect and majesty on display in Arrival that’s the one I would have chosen. Considering that movies like Hacksaw Ridge and La La Land were part of the discussion, not close.

2017: I might be willing to grant the quality of Homecoming or the amusement of Thor: Ragnarök but I don’t consider it a close question compared to The Post, that rare, undervalued Spielberg movie or the majesty of Dunkirk. That said a Marvel Movie deserved a Best Picture nomination and that film was Logan.

2018: Here is where I will admit that Spiderman: Into the Spider verse was a good choice for Best Animated Film. I personally preferred Isle of Dogs but I honestly think Spiderverse was by far the most ambitious Marvel film I’ve seen. And I’ll even acknowledge the logic of Black Panther getting nominated for Best Picture. That said, I’m still nowhere near convinced  that as an entertainment as well as personal significance, it lacks the quality of a film the way that Get Out did the year before or Black Klansman did that year. And if I’m honest, I would have preferred a Best Picture nod for A Quiet Place instead.

2019: Not a close question. I saw all three films and none of them are close to Oscar material. Not in the way that Once Upon A Time in Hollywood  was certainly not in comparison to Joker.

Now of course I imagined partisans of comic book films and the MCU alike will argue the Oscars bigotry towards comic book movies as being the kind of film they nominate and I can’t pretend that I disagree about their snobbishness. If anything, I believe trying to use the Oscars or really any awards show as a yardstick for appreciating any film quality is not a bar that we should try to set. I know the kind of movie the Oscars nominate and no comic book movie could meet that standard. Comedies are still not being let in at any real rate, horror films don’t apply and it is only now that science fiction is starting to have any presence at all. The fact that an action film such as Fury Road (and a sequel, too!) is such an aberration to the Oscars ridiculous standard I’m kind of amazed it got let in.  They should honestly say it’s an honor ‘not’ to be nominated.

But the fact is this: I would rather watch or rewatch any of those movies that I’ve listed then any of the Marvel films from the first three phases.  All of these movies fall under the definition of ‘Spectacle’ a term used by Kenneth Turan when he was praising the well-made blockbuster. He used that term to refer to such movies as Gladiator, Saving Private Ryan, Lord of The Rings (the first two films) and most revealingly Batman Begins.  I don’t agree with the first choice but the other films are all the kinds of movie I would gladly see not only on a big screen but in a theater.

You will also note that many of my choices for blockbusters I would were helmed by directors you will recognize and respect as the kind of craftsman you appreciate; Christopher Nolan, Denis Villeneuve, Quentin Tarantino and Ridley Scott and Alfonso Cuaron. All of these directors are the kind of craftsmen capable of making the kind of films that can not only make huge amounts of money but are wildly admired by fans and critics alike. I would rather see any film they make than any film in the MCU: there was a reason I wanted to see Oppenheimer the moment it came out and I’m looking forward to seeing Napoleon later this year. We’ve been talking about these directors films decades after their made; no one talks about any single Marvel movie for more than a few weeks after it comes out.  Individual performances may stand out; the films themselves are basically popcorn.

And this, to be clear, can be seen in certain comic book films as well: there are moments in all three movies of Nolan’s trilogy that resonate with me after twenty years and there is power to be found in several of the X-Men films. (I’m going to talk about them later on.) But the MCU has always been about some bigger picture rather than an individual work or even series of works. My problems with them is not they don’t work as comic book movies but because, with rare exceptions, they’re not about anything other than the special effects and stunts and some witty lines.  They’re not character studies, they don’t have dense plots; they’re not even really about what’s going on in the movie – they’re all about rushing ahead to the next film, the next piece in the puzzle.  Most films are about the journey rather than the destination: the major flaw in the MCU has been that it has built its films on the reverse of that concept.

The Internet is divided between partisans who think the MCU has gotten too woke and another faction that thinks the purists don’t want to recognize change. How about the simple fact that they’re not just that good? I saw Captain Marvel in theaters. It wasn’t very good. Not because it was woke; it sucked. It was all about rushing through an origin story to get the Easter egg. That’s all it was. That’s all almost every Marvel movie is. Joker which I saw that fall was a better film because it used the trappings of the DC verse to actually try and tell a different story. I didn’t like one film and hate the other because I’m a white male; I liked one and disliked the other because one was a much better film on every level.  I also saw Little Women and Us and loved them too. You can hate a certain film just because it stinks: it doesn’t have to be a litmus test for anything.

I don’t know if this is the failure of the last few MCU means that Disney and Marvel will finally stop making these films. Far more likely they will  take a long enough pause until they think we’ve forgotten and then reboot them. I confess I’m not personally invested in their success or failure the way millions of Americans seem to be. All I know is that we have to stop looking at the MCU for what it isn’t and see  it for what it is – and that what it is has never been as much as so many filmgoers truly seem to believe it to be.