Metal Monday
YouTube Obsession
I have an uncanny fascination with mega mansions. I’m sure I’m not alone in this fascination. Considering most of us grew up with MTV Cribs or Lifestyles of the Rich and the Famous, those shows feed into our monkey-brain curiosity to look inside dwellings. And better yet, why not super dwellings?
There are plenty of YouTube channels that tour houses but none do it better Enes Yilmazer.
What sets Enes apart from other channels, besides the variety of upscale properties he tours, is his vernacular when talking about these homes. I can’t tell if he is making up jargon on the fly or if it is common for a coffee table to have a “live edge.” My partner and I like to make up our own Enes-isms when describing my futon or 60yo radiator heater.
Also, his videos help fan the flames of the coming class wars in my heart. No one needs this much space. It might be too much to say I hope a landslide washes it away before they can sell it but I’m going to say that.
The segment (In the video above) featuring the taxidermized mountain lion to “Honor P22” is especially dark. It should tell you how these people feel about anything outside capital.
Watching
In a bout of nostalgia I was recently watching old skateboard clips of Rodney Mullins and the algorithm must of caught on because it suggested a recently uploaded 4k remaster of the unique skate movie YEAH RIGHT!
If you are unaware, skateboarding culture really hit a peak around the time the videogame Tony Hawk’s Underground came out in 2003. As a teen in this era, of course was into skateboarding. To say I was “into skateboarding” is really a misnomer however as I was in Indiana backcountry with no paved roads for miles around. Video games and tech decks were my only outlet.
This was the first skateboarding video I ever bought for myself. Much like how Akira was the first anime I saw, YEAH RIGHT! set unfair standards toward the rest of skate movies I would come across. Directed by Ty Evans and Spike Jones, this movie presents skating so creatively and turned me into a lifelong Spike Jones fan.
Reading
Tired of Winning: Donald Trump and the End of the Grand Old Party by Jonathon Karl is an attempt at deconstructing Trump’s years after the 2020 election up to his 2024 campaign. Highlighting his motivations, schemes and ranting outbursts on well-constructed timeline. As a timeline of events, it is an interesting book.
However….
As you might expect from Jonathon Karl (A prominent voice in traditional political media) Tired of Winning is largely liberal copium. To talk about Trump’s success as a creation of the GOP without mentioning the failings of the democratic party that brought about his win in 2016 is a huge oversight¹. Not to mention the neo-lib dog whistles sprinkled throughout. At one point, Jonathon compares FDR’s leadership in WWII to Ronald Regan “bringing down the Berlin wall.”
☼eye-rolling intensifies☼
When describing the Jan 6th riots, Jonathon calls out Trump for being such a poor leader that he could not get the military to help him perform a coup. Not even once does he mention that the military would have no reason to support a coup from any president when even Biden raises their budget every year.
He also relates Trump’s attempts at removing troops from Afghanistan, Syria, Somalia and Germany at the end of his term to that of a bumbling toddler. Despite how bungled his attempts were, it is never addressed at how popular these withdrawals would be with most Americans on the Right or the Left.
And therein lies the problem with the democratic party in the past two elections: It in not about the issues or what Americans want, it is about beating Trump. At the time of this writing (1.29.2024) the Biden campaign website still has no information on Biden’s platform. Essentially admitting that if they acknowledged his actual stances on issues, people would see that Biden is no different than Trump.
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¹ I’ve not read his other books on Trump but -if this book is any relation- I highly doubt any but the lightest criticisms to the democratic party.
