Otherwise you lose.

This is an axiom in sports, where defense scores no points, but it’s also a truism in music. Want to date yourself, want to stop having hit records? Keep on doing the same damn thing. It’s only when you change that you have longevity, but this is so risky most people just can’t do it.

Innovation, new, it’s anathema. That’s what’s wrong with America, no one can sacrifice, no one can lose their job. A bigwig told me file-trading had to end, not because of equity, not because of the artists, but because of what would happen to him! He needed his job running a label. That’s how myopic this person was.

Change is inevitable, and either you change or you die, you become irrelevant.

The number one example here is the Beatles. Believe me, “Sgt. Pepper” was a surprise. And people are too young today to remember that the Beatles’ so-called White Album came with a blank cover as a comment on over-produced record packages, gatefold covers, hype, everything but the music. The Beatles wanted to say it was about the music. And they ended up achieving their goal. Either you keep on pushing the envelope or you die, it’s over. You may even keep your job, but you become increasingly irrelevant. Irving Azoff is a prime example. Once a record label titan, he got back into management, but then created GMR, a competitive performing rights agency that lobbies for better returns for artists, and the Oak View Group, which builds and manages venues. Record labels are at the tail end of the music game today, even their paradigm is suspect, sans their catalogs they’d be dead in the water, they don’t even know how to break an act, they’re the opposite of nimble. And that’s what the internet, the digital tools afford. Used to be creation involved heavy lifting, now you can acquire many of the building blocks for free, nearly anybody can compete, and they do, disruption has been the mantra for the last two plus decades. It’s especially prevalent in social media, we went from Friendster to MySpace to Facebook to Instagram to TikTok with a stop at Snapchat along the way. The only way Facebook can compete is by purchasing its rivals. Isn’t that the story of Threads, that Facebook can’t win if it starts from scratch? Threads started without bedrock Twitter features and therefore it missed its window, never mind being tied to Instagram. Putting out half-baked software might work if you’re a startup, if you own the field, but if you’re me-too not only must you have everything everybody else has, but more.

Kind of like electric cars. Castigate Elon Musk all you want, but Tesla is so far ahead of the traditional auto manufacturers it’s laughable. You’ve got to read Dan Neil’s take on the new Mercedes…

“Mercedes-Benz Introduces Hands-Free Driving. How Does It Compare to Tesla? – Drive Pilot, the first Level 3 autonomous system to be state-certified for use on public roads, underscores the difference between Mercedes-Benz’s and Tesla’s approach to driver-assist technology.”: https://tinyurl.com/mxp2zm6t

That’s a free link and you should read the article, Dan Neil is the #1 auto writer in America, he’s at the “Wall Street Journal.” Neil is raving about this Benz, about its auto-driving. But if you read what Tesla is doing…you might not even understand it:

“To cross this uncanny valley of autonomy, Tesla has moved to a deeper kind of processing based on generative artificial intelligence. FSD V12 (using the fourth-generation hardware, HW4) effectively abandons the bulk code front-loaded into previous versions, even a map, relying instead on a series of neural nets daisy-chained together, tasked to learn and mimic human driving behavior by watching video clips. FSD V12 was never told to stop at stop signs; it just knows how humans respond to them, and does that.

“Initially trained on video clips and telemetry curated from millions of Teslas already on the road, FSD V12 will continue to observe and learn. More data is always better. To that end Tesla has built Dojo, a supercomputing neural-network trainer. Dojo is designed to turn millions of terabytes of video data, gathered from hundreds of millions of driven miles, into something like instinct, reflex, wisdom and experience, to be imparted to succeeding generations of self-driving cars.”

Tesla is leapfrogging its own technology. Tesla understands cars are not about iron, but software. And its competitors still don’t understand that. VW can’t even retool for it. They don’t get it. Because they’re not willing to invest and risk. Software is an adventure based on vision. That was Steve Jobs’s expertise, vision, not coding. You have to know the landscape in order to solve the problem. The questions of yesterday are not those of today.

So it’s not only the Beatles, it’s Madonna. She kept changing her sound and she survived. Had a long run of hits when everybody else became an oldies act. There might be money in being an oldies act, but there’s very little glory, musicians want to create and have their new work accepted. It’s one thing to triumph in an era, it’s quite another to triumph in another. And I’m not talking about using disco beats, or employing rappers, that’s me-too. What you’ve got to do is continue to innovate. But very few people can do this, and that’s why they’re icons.

And this is what the public responds to. Always. It wants the new and fresh. You age quite quickly in today’s world, you have to shake up yourself before you’re replaced. That was the essence of Clayton Christensen’s “Innovator’s Dilemma,” a legendary book most people still haven’t read. Yes, you must disrupt yourself.

The label wants more like the old. But that’s not what the audience wants. As a matter of fact, the audience can’t even tell you what it wants, that’s your job.

So Scott Galloway, the business guru of the bros, the hottest analyst working today, talked about a soccer game he went to, in the U.K., the Premier League. His team was the underdog, but the score was tied 1-1 deep into the contest. But then his team focused on defense and the other team won. Defense is a whole state of mind. It’s about fear, it’s the opposite of aggression.

It’s worst in golf, it’s well-known if you play it safe to win you lose. You have to continue to go for it.

I can give example after example. But in politics, the Democrats say to play it safe, to go with Joe Biden. Hell, you should see my inbox, people are excoriating me. Look at the good job Joe has done! They’re drinking the kool-aid. They forgot how Trump won. Which was by speaking to the hearts and minds of the dispossessed. Biden isn’t connecting with almost anybody. Intellectually you might be a fan, but emotionally… Hell, the guy’s barely in public, for fear he’ll commit a faux pas.

Time after time a celebrity wins political office. Not always do they succeed, but plenty of time they do. Why? Because the public wants something, someone new! That’s the story of Jesse Ventura in Minnesota and Arnold Schwarzenegger in California. Ventura was a bust, and forget that Gray Davis would have been better than Arnold, Jerry Brown came back and made people forget that Schwarzenegger ever held the office. Because Brown is a pro. Furthermore, Brown changed his perspective, he was no longer Governor Moonbeam, he was a pragmatist, oftentimes going against his own party. Hell, Brown is like FDR, people would still be voting for Jerry if it weren’t for term limits, Californians overwhelmingly adore what he did.

Don’t tell me you don’t. You might hate the Beatles, or Madonna. No one wins with everybody. And in the heyday of streaming, we’ve got vinyl. We’re talking about winning, that’s all. It’s rarely universal.

So by putting their faith in Biden, the Democrats are playing it safe to win. As you can see from everything I said above this is a bad strategy, because the landscape changes, never mind the fact that Biden has a record, that can be picked apart. You don’t see Biden reinventing himself.

Don’t make this about Trump. That’s playing defense. I’m talking about playing to win.

Let’s make it plain. Can you see Biden debating Trump? Donald will eat Joe alive. And Joe can’t get away without debating, it’s a bad look, it will cost him votes.

Everybody is an expert until they’re not. Just because you spent decades in a field that does not mean your opinion is right today. Usually you’re out of touch with the public, the consumer, the voter. You’re into your fat cat lifestyle, and you’re unaware, you can’t see the threats. Today the threats always come online, that’s where stories start, both Joe and Donald are jokes when it comes to tech, but I must admit Donald works social media, to his vast advantage.

The parties think it’s all about television advertising. This is identical to the majors thinking it’s about terrestrial radio. That’s an old paradigm, which still carries some weight, but the ball has moved, most records today are broken on TikTok. And it’s the same in politics, it’s all about online.

And stop asking me for money, empower me. That’s a classic story, to the Democrats’ detriment. You gave money to beat Trump in 2020, now you can’t pick up your phone, can’t check your e-mail without an ask for money. Makes you want to give nothing at all. Not to mention these companies reaching out have forgotten the story of CD Now, whose e-mails generated revenue, so they increased the frequency to the point that it put the company out of business. The audience said no mas!

How do I know all this? I’m online all the time. On that smartphone that my aged contemporaries decry. Enough with the digital detox, the denigration of the internet, online is where it’s all happening today, from calling up an Uber to ordering food to connecting with friends. And today kids have more friends than ever, and you never lose touch with anybody you ever knew, they’re right at your fingertips. Meanwhile, the “pros” in politics and fundraising are doing the same damn thing as always.

Also, I reach a whole lot of people from all over the world. And this direct feedback informs me. I know more than most politicians and writers because I’m on the front lines where the people are. I’m not going to dinner, I’m not a member of the club, I’m sacrificing a lot, but getting rewards in return. But I keep being told they know better. How? They don’t talk to the people involved!

And then there’s the reverse. Everybody complains about ticketing but there’s been no change, even after the Taylor Swift brouhaha. The government still might act, but I can tell you from firsthand experience, the government still doesn’t understand ticketing, never mind the public. And it’s one thing to identify a problem, quite another to propose a solution. And how you gonna fix the problem if you’ve got people making 20k selling Taylor Swift tickets?

“Yes, I Just Made $20,000 off Taylor Swift Tickets”: https://tinyurl.com/33e9c7wy

Yes, make it equitable and the public doesn’t like it! They want to scalp!

I don’t need to toot my own horn. You know a whole hell of a lot that I don’t know, I guarantee it. But what I’m talking about here is my area of expertise, where I live, all day long.

Go from the gut. Voting is emotional. Check the landscape for emotions. Believe me, I hear from the dyed-in-the-wool Trumpers. As for Biden? I always hear from old people telling me to shut up, not to upset the apple cart. But where would America be if it didn’t upset the apple cart on a regular basis? Biden is the apple cart. As was Hillary before him. Or as Bob Dylan put it so eloquently half a century ago…

He not busy being born is busy dying.

Tune in Saturday October 7th to Faction Talk, channel 103, at 4 PM East, 1 PM West.

Phone #: 844-686-5863

Twitter: @lefsetz

If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app. Search: Lefsetz

Marc Brickman testifies:

It’s just a matter of when. And it’s all because of the press.

Press means almost nothing today, unless it’s politics. Those inside the Beltway, the decision makers, the string-pullers, they read and watch with a vengeance, it’s the only way for them to take the temperature of the country, to know what is going on, otherwise they’re too deep into their hole. And the press has not only turned against Biden, it’s actively attacking him, demolishing him, it’s amazing Biden hasn’t dropped out already.

We know the public doesn’t want Biden. Every poll tells us that. The only people who want Biden are aged, imploring us all to shut up and get with the program, to vote for him instead of the evil Trump. The only thing they don’t realize is we’re already voting for Biden, we’re committed, just not to the man. In other words, we know how heinous Trump is, but jeez, can’t you give us a choice, can’t you give us attention, if not even lip service? No. Because the Democratic party brass thinks it knows better, just like the record company brass thought they could conquer Napster, and look at how that turned out, badly.

But ultimately well. With streaming. And other avenues of internet revenue, all the rights holders had to do was admit yesterday was history and accept that we live in a future where the old rules do not apply.

At first it was the iTunes Store. But anybody who still buys a file is a Luddite, just like those telling us to put our faith in Biden. Time has moved on. Files felt good in 2005, but not in the teens, when Spotify took over. Sure, there are still people buying files, but they’re akin to the people telling us to stay with Biden, that he’s our man. Hell, Apple stopped making iPods, but there are still people buying files. Who are they? All I know is not to listen to them. Even worse, the “Billboard” charts give more weight to sales than streams, rendering them insider only affairs, a scorecard for those who do not count, looking for bragging rights in a world where most are not paying attention. Quick, what’s number one this week? You don’t know and you don’t care.

In other words, Biden was good for 2020, but bad for 2024. Because times change. And people get older each and every day, in other words younger people are now eligible to vote and getting them to be excited about Biden is like getting them to go spend time babysitting their grandparents, i.e. anathema.

But, it’s the mainstream media that is dooming Biden. One opinion piece after another. And the worst thing for Biden is they all ring true. Like in Monday’s “New York Times,” Bret Stephens says:

“His problem is that he looks and sounds feeble.”

Bingo.

Let me quote the whole passage for context:

“Biden’s main problem isn’t that he’s too old. There are plenty of sharp, fit and healthy 80-year-olds. His problem is that he looks and sounds feeble. Trump may be awful and insane and nearly as old as Biden, but one thing he isn’t is low energy.”

https://tinyurl.com/f73x3ct3

Yesterday I heard Biden testifying about Diane Feinstein… He was low energy, his voice was weak, he sounded feeble. I haven’t been able to get that word out of my head since Monday, Biden appears feeble. And never forget, it’s not about the essence, but the perception. And that’s the mainstream perception, that Biden is over the hill. Don’t tell me how his brain still works, don’t tell me about his record, if those were important his approval rankings would be higher, and they’re not, they’re in the dumper.

And then last Friday Bill Maher took a sword to Biden’s candidacy and sliced it to shreds:

“New Rule: Ruth Bader Biden”: https://tinyurl.com/z9f8dse9

And then today, David Brooks went for Biden’s jugular:

“Can We Talk About Joe Biden?”: https://tinyurl.com/4z5ee9n9

“Voters know both men very well at this point, so when I hear Democrats comforting themselves that people will flock to Biden if the alternative on the ballot is Trump, I worry they are kidding themselves. Biden’s approval ratings are stubbornly low. In a recent ABC poll, only 30 percent of voters approve of his handling of the economy and only 23 percent approve of his handling of immigration at the southern border. Roughly three-quarters of American voters say that Biden, at 80, is too old to seek a second term. There have been a string of polls showing that large majorities in his own party don’t want him to run again. In one survey from 2022, an astounding 94 percent of Democrats under 30 said they wanted a different nominee.”

Now experts will say that Stephens and Brooks lean right. But in truth, these are the people who will decide the election, non-Democrats who are not enamored of Biden. As for Bill Maher… He might be on HBO, he might be a curmudgeon, but inside the Beltway he’s a giant.

In other words, the drumbeat is getting louder. The only defense is Biden and the party apparatchiks. Who are employing the same playbook from 2016, but it’s nearly ten years later, never mind that Hillary lost.

So how does this go down?

Well, first there is the issue of whether a Democrat breaks ranks.

This is not Drew Barrymore starting her show during the WGA strike. You see there are very few people on Biden’s team, the first person to cross the line will be perceived to be a hero. And it doesn’t matter who throws their hat in the ring first, just that somebody does, and then the dam breaks.

And it’s got to and will happen soon, because we are reaching the deadline for filing for the primaries. And the aforementioned drumbeat is getting louder and louder and…

If you’re reading the blogs, if you’re listening to talk radio, you don’t count. This is a mainstream fight fought in the mainstream press. The “New York Times” is America’s newspaper, its main news outlet, by far. The right may decry the “Times,” but it pays attention to it. Most of the right wing agenda is in response to the “Times.” As for the Democrats…these are their people!

As much as we live in a bottom up society, we also still live in a top down society in certain verticals, and one of them is politics. We won’t really know what the public thinks until Election Day. One really can’t trust any of the polls, they’ve been consistently wrong, it comes down to what the professionals say. And all the professionals except for the party apparatchiks say Biden must go. And maybe Biden will stand his ground for a while, even if pushed, but unlike Ruth Bader Ginsburg there is an alternative, no one can run for Supreme Court Justice individually and triumph, that’s an impossibility. But in elections…

So Biden is toast. Keep the heat up. He may not feel it, but those around him are feeling it. And few realize when they are toast, they are informed by those around them, they are the last to know.

As for Trump… We have the opposite situation. The Republican party brass has lost control, and is in fear of alienating its constituency, ceding all power to Donald. Donald can be decimated, it just takes a concerted effort, but if you go against conventional wisdom, against Trump, in the right wing press you are excoriated. If Fox is not on board, people will go to OAN or another news outlet that tells them what they want to hear. MSNBC? A meaningless haven of tribalists. Manna for those who already believe. It’s ultimately irrelevant, entertainment. But the “New York Times”? That’s everybody’s paper. The joke is on you if you don’t read it, because that’s where the news is made. The “Times” has reporters and blue chip columnists. You might not agree with their opinions but that does not matter, it’s all about their influence. Reach and gravitas, if you don’t have both you’re a sideshow.

Happy days aren’t here again yet, but the media keeps getting louder and more frequent. It’s over. Biden’s done.