Spotify playlist: https://spoti.fi/3En9fUa

1

This was not your father’s stadium show.

Wait a minute, I am that father! At least the age of said fathers, I have no kids.

Stadium shows were a new thing. They were a creation of demand. Just that many people wanted to go to the show, to see an act that not only touched their souls, but impacted the culture. The music was everything, not only for you, but everybody. Everybody knew the show was happening, it was all over the radio, in the news. It was not a victory lap, it was the zeitgeist.

Fifty years later it’s not even the same stadiums. The circles of yore have been torn down, replaced by unique ballparks. Food is very near gourmet. Just going to the park is an experience, irrelevant of the game. And the stadium show you go to might appeal to you, but not necessarily everybody else. There may have been mania over Taylor Swift tickets, but most people have no interest in going. Whereas when the Stones were playing… They were young, they were still dangerous, they were the other, and we considered ourselves the other too. The acts represented more than the music, a viewpoint, a philosophy…

And conventional wisdom was there would be no more stadium shows after the classic acts faded away. This has proven to be untrue. There are now more stadium shows than ever. Amalgamations of old rockers. What is the experience?

Well, one thing is for sure, you’ll have no problem getting a ticket. This is the dirty little secret of the Taylor Swift on-sale. I mean how many people really want to sit in the last row of the upper deck? And even if they’re willing to pay, it’s not much. So the truth is many people who purchased Taylor Swift tickets went for the entire allotment, caught up in the mania, believing they’ll be able to flip them for more than face value. I doubt it. The example here is Miley Cyrus. She went on the road while she was still on “Hannah Montana” and parents went insane, they just could not get tickets, they were up in arms, there had to be an investigation… Which never happened, but to solve the problem, the next time around Miley went paperless. And the gigs didn’t immediately sell out. Yes, everybody had been caught up in the mania. And although the scalpers don’t want paperless, it’s really the audience that is against it, because then they can’t scalp their own tickets. The truth hurts.

As for the truth, M. Shadows of Avenged Sevenfold; weighed in on the kerfuffle:

“Avenged Sevenfold’s M. Shadows Offers Insight On Ticketmaster Pricing Controversy”: https://bit.ly/3GznkR0

It’s refreshing to see an artist speak the truth, as opposed to obfuscating, as opposed to staying silent. And would Taylor Swift have put all these tickets on sale on the same day if she didn’t want to set a record she could publicize? Springsteen taught us you do the on-sales market by market, but then there could be no hype.

But they did hype the fact that “Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy” was the first album to enter the chart at number one and go gold in its very first week. That’s only 500,000 albums, almost all vinyl, some cassette, and there were no shenanigans. That’s when big acts sold tonnage, they didn’t need to pump up the numbers, the truth itself was just overwhelming.

But as big as “Captain Fantastic” was, it was not head and shoulders above the competition. The summer of ’75 featured the Eagles’ true breakthrough, “One of These Nights,” and the first Fleetwood Mac album with Stevie and Lindsey, and Jefferson Starship’s “Red Octopus,” Marty Balin may be forgotten today, but that summer “Miracles” was ubiquitous in a way no track is today. And there was James Taylor’s comeback “Gorilla.”  And Wings’ “Venus and Mars.” And breakthroughs like Gary Wright’s “Dream Weaver.”

It was a different era.

And last night at Dodger Stadium that era was celebrated.

2

Elton John never left the hit parade. He was one of those artists with AM hits who didn’t sacrifice his credibility. He never released a stiff. And he released more music than just about anybody else. And when he played Dodger Stadium in that baseball uniform back in 1975… It wasn’t so much that he could sell out the building, but a celebration of his place in the culture.

And now he’s part of the firmament.

And soon he will be gone. Not only him, but his contemporaries. Those still able to ply the boards.

And make no mistake, last night was a celebration. It was a completely different show from those in the arenas before Covid. Elton was playing to everybody, including those in the rafters. And the way this was done was via video and first class sound reinforcement, which were absent back in the day, as they say. It was a party.

But that’s not what reached me.

“Bennie and the Jets” was the opener.

Actually, it was that naked piano figure that was the opener. Usually acts hit you in the face right off, to make you stand up and pay attention. But “Bennie” is all about the groove. It doesn’t get your feet moving, it gets your head knocking, your body goes Gumby, “Bennie” goes straight to the heart. You can’t resist. And “Bennie” couldn’t be resisted last night.

The follow-up was “Philadelphia Freedom,” one of my personal favorites. It’s got the chunka-chunka guitar that Elton says is a nod to the Philly sound, but I always heard it as Tom Johnston’s riffs in the Doobie Brothers, but in any event it’s a one listen hit. About a team competing in World Team Tennis. There was a tennis boom, everybody played, now you can walk right on a court, if it hasn’t been converted to pickle ball. Billie Jean King. Jimmy Connors. They were international icons. Quick, name the #1 tennis players today. Of course, tennis aficionados can, but everybody else can’t and doesn’t care. But they cared back in ’75.

And unlike the country acts, everybody playing rock today, there was only one guitarist, Davey Johnstone, laying down riffs with an edge, because Elton was definitely considered a rock act, pop was anathema. You had to be more than a pretty face, who you were was part of the music. And Elton got bit by the tennis bug like the rest of us. Back in the days when participation was more important than watching.

“Philadelphia Freedom” has been appended to the digital version of “Captain Fantastic,” but back in ’75 it was a single, and a single only. Like the Beatles, Elton had so many hits he could afford to leave them off his albums, which people would buy anyway.

But “Border Song” was on the very first Elton album, even though we ultimately learned that “Empty Sky” preceded it. And Elton told a long story about an ailing Aretha Franklin showing up to sing it, a commitment is a commitment, and I liked hearing it, but I would have preferred “Sixty Years On” or “The King Must Die,” but Elton ultimately did play the third track on that initial LP, the one that reached me first, “Take Me to the Pilot,” people don’t even make records with that energy these days.

Then earlier than we expected it (although I did have the set list) came the number that Cameron Crowe made iconic in “Almost Famous,” I’m speaking of none other than “Tiny Dancer.”

“Blue jean lady

L.A. lady

Seamstress for the band”

She was a real person, Maxine Feibelman, Bernie Taupin’s first wife. He was infatuated, he wrote the lyrics from his heart, back when just being part of the touring entourage was enough, you’d sell your soul to be a part of the rock and roll circus, the people on the bus, on the plane, were gods. Nobody was cooking up an app, trying to become a techie, the goal was just to get closer to the music, and this is what Maxine managed to do.

And I think it was during “Tiny Dancer” that our faux Apple Watches came alive. That’s what they looked like, that was their shape. They handed them out at the door and they were triggered by some unknown power and they lit up all by themselves, it was very cool, reminded me of back in the day when you had to trump your contemporaries with your production.

“Tiny Dancer” is an optimistic song, from back when California was still a dream, when the coast was where people were free, the goal was to get there, and everybody in the stadium knew what Elton was singing about.

Next came “Have Mercy on the Criminal,” from “Don’t Shoot Me I’m Only the Piano Player,” which Elton labeled a “throwaway” back in the aforementioned day.

“Don’t Shoot Me” is one of my favorite Elton LPs. The hits are the opening cut “Daniel,” which I liked but never loved, and “Crocodile Rock,” which hearkened back to what had come before, which I first heard on the radio, which I positively adored. But neither of these cuts is why I love “Don’t Shoot Me.” The two tracks I play most, that I play all the time, are “Teacher I Need You” and “Elderberry Wine,” neither of which were hit singles, nor was “Have Mercy on the Criminal,” and I loved that Elton played it. But back when albums were albums you knew every track on an LP and the song about having a crush on a teacher, it just made me smile, and the crushing piano of “Elderberry Wine” would infect anybody, never mind that emphatic Elton vocal.

And then came “Rocket Man.”

3

Elton was cold, at least that was the perception. You see as iconic as “Tiny Dancer” is today, it was not a hit. “Levon” got a bit more airplay, made it all the way to #24, whereas “Tiny Dancer” peaked at #41, and in truth unless you’re in the top ten, maybe fifteen, it’s almost like your record doesn’t exist. And sure, it was only six months later, but people didn’t expect Elton to come back with a barnbuster, a track that battled Alice Cooper’s “School’s Out” for most airplay honors.

I’m speaking, of course, of “Rocket Man.”

Now my favorite track on “Honky Chateau” was and still is “Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters.” And one can argue that “Honky Chateau” was not as consistent as what preceded and followed it, but it had that pocket closure of the gatefold cover and…Elton was at the peak once again.

Now the world has completely changed, it’s no longer about the record, but the live performance, whereas it used to be exactly the opposite. There was only one version, maybe there was an authorized live take later, usually on a double-live album that served as a greatest hits package, a compendium of what once was as opposed to a pushing of the envelope, and we know every lick on those records.

That’s why record companies were godhead, unlike today. You needed one to make and distribute a record, at least if you wanted a chance of breaking through commercially. And there was plenty of money to get it right, because nothing scales like music. Yes, cut a hit record and you can stay at home and get paid, you can be dead and your relatives can still get paid. And artists had wrested all the power from the labels, which frequently had no say at all. The act got a budget, contractually, which they frequently exceeded, and oftentimes the first time the label heard the album was when it was done. And then those albums were advertised with singles on the radio while fans rushed out to buy them the first week unheard and there was a mania unlike anything today.

If you had told me “Rocket Man” was going to be the highlight of last night’s show, I never would have believed you. The lyrics are dated. And it’s great, but still, there are more iconic numbers. Yet, when Elton started to play and sing he lifted us up like a Saturn V rocket.

The show changed, this is when it became cerebral.

Shows are not what they used to be. Today you leave your brain behind as you shoot selfies, hang with your buddies. But it used to be different. You were in your own personal bubble, taken away by the music emanating from the stage, it was a positively personal experience.

I bought the first Elton John album without hearing it first. The rock press hooked me, I had to check it out. I did hear “Your Song” over the radio of my friend’s mother’s Chevy during Thanksgiving weekend, but when I dropped the needle on the album when it finally arrived at school from the Record Club of America…

It was cold. It got dark early. The weather was miserable. November in Vermont, before the snow starts to fall.

And Middlebury College is a grind. And I’d been told all through high school…WAIT UNTIL YOU GET TO COLLEGE! So I took it seriously. Which meant I studied all the time, we all did, and my respite came in the afternoon after classes ended, and then just before dinner, and when the day was done, I cranked up my music. This was before it was portable, a decade before the Walkman, and if you were an aficionado you wore headphones to hear the nuances, and you laid in bed and listened in the dark, not only did the music demand respect, you wanted to go down the rabbit hole, you wanted to be taken away.

“She packed my bags last night pre-flight”

There’s not a boomer alive who does not know this line. We were on the same page, because of the radio, because of the culture, you could not escape “Rocket Man.”

So last night I’m surveying the assembled multitude, trying to get a handle on it, what it all meant. Why did everybody come, what were they expecting, what was going through Elton’s head?

One thing’s for sure, he’s never retiring, he just enjoys it too much. Improvising on the piano, working the audience, you’d think after all these shows he’d be going through the motions, but nothing could be further from the truth.

But Elton is 75. He broke through over 50 years ago. He’s lived a charmed life, but he earned it. And Elton is one of our few stars who is a fan himself. He still buys the records, he befriends the newbies, he tries to save those who’ve gone down the wrong path… Nobody else does this. Elton is not reclusive, he’s our most accessible superstar, even if most never meet him, but he’s part of the scuttlebutt, he’s busy living life, and watching the video screens last night it was hard not to be envious, I mean WHAT A LIFE!

But once Elton was young and hungry. Actually, he was hungry for quite a while. And now… He’s an elder statesman?

No, this is not Sinatra, Elton is not our parents’ star. We didn’t go to the show for nostalgia, Elton meant more to us than that. We lived through all those hits. Which were supplemented by stage flamboyance. This guy who made serious music knew no limits live, with not only his glasses but his boots, his feathers, his outfits…he could do all this and still the music sustained, because it was just that powerful.

And he’s not that guy anymore. None of us are. We’re on a downhill slide, wondering if we should whip out our ice axe to self-arrest or go with the flow. Elton kept hiking up his pants. We’re no longer skinny, we can no longer wear pants sans a belt.

“I miss the Earth so much I miss my wife”

Loneliness. The records were an antidote to that. We listened and felt connected, and most of the time we listened alone. They rode shotgun, they kept us company, they got us through our deepest, darkest moments.

Now on wax, “Rocket Man” has an extended outro, but it’s not that long a number, longer than the usual single, but ultimately only 4:41.

Last night it was much longer.

The previous songs had hewed closely to the records, in length anyway, Elton was keeping himself entertained throwing in a few flourishes. But “Rocket Man”…it went on so long that you let go.

Suddenly I was the only person there. I was jetted back to that dorm room at Middlebury College. I was reminded of how much this music meant to me, how it was everything, how I built my life around it.

And I was surrounded by others who’d chosen the same path, but I still felt unique, we’re all individuals, fully understandable only to ourselves. And when the music sets your mind free, you’re reminded of this, your life flows through your brain, you remember what once was and you make connections, you gain understanding

That’s one of the reasons you go to the show, to be surprised.

And “Rocket Man” surprised me last night, it made the whole concert worth it, I got that zing, which is what it’s all about. In truth it’s all we’re looking for, the rest is disposable, it’s just that it’s hard to find. And when you do…

4

I could talk about how good the band was. I could deliver more details, but they’d never convey the feeling, really only the music can convey the feeling.

“Who’ll walk me down to church when I’m sixty years of age

When the ragged dog they gave me has been ten years in the grave”

You took to one side first. Yes, albums had two sides, and you got stuck on one and when you knew it by heart, you flipped the vinyl for the other.

The first side of “Elton John” was not only the one with “Take Me to the Pilot,” but “Your Song” too. The second side was more inscrutable. But it’s the second side I play today.

“You’ve hung up your great coat and you’ve laid down your gun

You know the war you fought in wasn’t too much fun”

“Sixty Years On” opened side two. You had to slow down to get it. Which I first did lying on my bed, stoned, listening on headphones as to not disturb my roommate. The combination of Gus Dudgeon’s production and Paul Buckmaster’s strings…”Elton John” sounds like it was cut in a cathedral.

“I’ve no wish to be living sixty years on”

Right now it’s 52, Elton’s got eight years to go. He’ll do it until he can’t. He could die tomorrow, or live to 100. But at some point he’ll be gone, and all that will remain is the records, which will affect others the same way they affected me.

“And Magdalena plays the organ

Plays it just for you

Your choral lamp that burns so low

When you are passing through”

We’re tired. We’re worn out. We’re reflective. We may think seventy is the new fifty, forty, but inside we know we’re old, that we’re never going to win this war of attrition, that we’ll ultimately pass and we’ll fade away and not radiate. It’s hard to believe, hard to accept, but at some point in your sixties you do. You let go of the handlebars, you fly, it’s all personal, where you went to school, what you own, what others think no longer matters, it’s just you, alone, with the music.

5

“No man’s a jester playing Shakespeare”

Never underestimate’s Elton’s voice. We’re not looking for excellence, we’re not looking for a standard, we’re looking for character, uniqueness, and Elton’s voice was high, yet powerful, he had the music in him, and a great example of this is when you drop the needle on “The King Must Die,” the closing track on the first American album, “Elton John.”

“And sooner or later

Everybody’s kingdom must end”

Nothing is forever, fight it all you want, you’ll lose.

“And I’m so afraid your courtiers

Cannot be called best friends”

If you have one true friend, who you can truly trust, you’re lucky. You can have all the money in the world, be famous, and be unable to trust anybody, everybody wants something from you, your cash, access, and there are so many looking to topple you and take your place, staying atop the throne is hard, very hard.

“Caesar’s had your troubles

Widows had to cry”

It’s inevitable, no one is left unscathed, no one here gets out alive.

“Some men are better staying sailors

Take my word and go”

You can keep your head down, refuse to risk, be safe, but you’ll be shut out of the rewards.

Or you can be like Elton John, push all your chips in, stay the course with no safety net, never taking your eye off the prize.

But the reign ends.

That was what I was reminded of last night. You can’t fight the hands of time. Not only does your body change, so does the audience. We’re all just here for a short while. Not only Elton, but me. Didn’t matter who I knew, I was alone last night. That’s the way it is when the music is really great.

“When the juggler’s act is danced upon

The crown that you once wore”

You’re gonna fall, no one wins forever. We’re seeing this with Elon Musk right now. His minions, his blind followers, don’t want to accept this, because they’re afraid of a new king, where that will leave them, they refuse to have hope in themselves, they want to place the burden on someone else, but underneath the image we’re all human, and fallible.

Michael Jackson called himself “The King of Pop,” he needed the anointment, a phony title which most of us derided, just the word “pop” made us wince, our music was so much more than that, anything but disposable, we were convinced it was forever.

But Elton John had more hits over a longer period of time than Michael Jackson. Not that it’s a competition, but this is just to point out that Elton is a titan. And nothing he did last night impacted that assessment. To tell you the truth, it was just another show, he’d already made his bones, proved his worth. It’s just that we don’t want to believe it’s over. Because if it is…so are we.

So it won’t be long before the king is dead, and no matter how much publicity they get, you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone. I mean Aretha’s dead? How can that BE! She’s not going to blow our minds, unexpectedly, take us way beyond the limits like she did that night at the Kennedy Center Honors?

The music won’t pay your bills, put a roof over your head, get you a significant other. The music is more akin to a coach, teaching us lessons, encouraging us to perform better, as our best selves.

Ultimately, the music detaches from the performer. Journey is a good example. The audience owns those songs, it doesn’t matter who is on stage.

Elton’s seen it. Done it. And so have I, and so have you. If for no other reason than we’re running out of rope, we can see the end of the runway.  We are who we are. Take a good look around, you may not be here ever again.

Elton John will never be in Dodger Stadium again. That’s done.

If you’re waiting for him to come through your town, don’t, he won’t.

And you won’t see the likes of him again. We never did get a new Beatles. These iconic acts are sui generis. They don’t write by committee, and they’re not afraid of failing, because only when you hang it way out there, push the limits, do you have a chance of creating lasting art that embeds itself in the culture, in the universe.

The artists are not your friend.

But the music is.

Doesn’t matter how the performer acts, those records will never change. They’re my king.

Long live the king.

“Elon Musk Reinstates Trump’s Twitter Account – Mr. Musk, who had run a poll on Twitter about whether to bring back the former president to the service, said, ‘The people have spoken.'”: https://nyti.ms/3Gu1A9e

That was then and this is now. Donald Trump was a disrupter. He said the unsayable. He broke norms. He rallied people who were sick of stuffed-shirts who believed they were above them, who had forgotten about them, especially when it came to globalization.

Now let’s not get hung up in reality, in truth. Turned out once in office Trump was the corporate shill the Republicans truly are, lowering taxes on the rich and…

But this is not about truth, it was never about truth. It’s about emotion, having something to live for, ATTENTION!

I mean what is there to live for anymore? You’ll never be rich, unless you win the lottery. Everybody in entertainment and sports is a whore, sold out to the highest bidder, just like the naming rights of the arenas and stadiums they play in. In order to move forward in life, you need hope. And let’s be clear, this is not what Hillary Clinton was delivering, in essence she was promising more of the same. Furthermore, she was anything but believable, we still don’t know who the real Hillary is.

But we damn sure know who Donald Trump is. A not-so-bright guy born with a silver spoon in his mouth who will do anything for attention, who never admits he’s wrong, who believes that Roy Cohn wrote the moral handbook.

“I can see by your eyes you must be lying

When you think I don’t have a clue

Baby, you’re crazy

If you think that you can fool me

Because I’ve seen that movie too”

Or should I have quoted Ian Hunter’s “Once Bitten, Twice Shy”?

Yes, Elton John’s “I’ve Seen That Movie Too” was on “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road,” not “Caribou,” but it applies here just as much as “The Bitch Is Back.”

“I’m a bitch, I’m a bitch, oh, the bitch is back

Stone cold sober as a matter of fact

I can bitch, I can bitch, ’cause I’m better than you

It’s the way that I move, the things that I do”

That’s right, Trump doesn’t drink. And from day one he’s thought he’s better than the rest of us. That was what “The Apprentice” was all about: I’m rich, I’m omniscient and I have the power to hire and fire, you report to ME!

Yes, Donald Trump felt justified when he was five. And he skated until he became president, because with the office comes attention, and it turned out that Trump was a lying, cheating, scumbag. How dare I talk about the Donald this way! But that’s just the point, this is exactly how Trump talks!

And the media couldn’t get enough of it.

Back in 2016, we believed that facts still mattered, that significant swaths of the public were not completely looney-tunes. This was before QAnon not only gained huge traction, but back when Democrats laughed when told people believed Hillary was running a child-sex ring out of a pizza parlor.

No one is laughing anymore, neither Democrats nor Republicans. It’s a fight for the soul of our country, it’s a fight for democracy, it’s a fight for an ABORTION, and Trump is on the losing side of all these issues, which is why the Republicans got creamed in this year’s elections. Turns out most American citizens are frightened, turns out they’d rather live in a land of enforced laws that apply to everyone, they’re scared of creeping autocracy, and they know if elections are not sacred, you’ve got no democracy.

And now Trump pulls out the same playbook.

Homies might be buying it, but not Rupert Murdoch. Rupert has put out the word to his papers and his TV news channels, Trump is toast, bury him. The “New York Times” did not put this lift of the ban at the top of its homepage. Everybody’s seen this movie and they’re not going to fall for the deception again, they don’t want to relive the plot.

So you’ve got Elon Musk. Part of a triumvirate, along with Kanye West and Trump, who are attention whores, who need to be in the headlines every damn day. Usually while they destroy their careers. People tire of the story and it goes on long enough for reporters to uncover the truth and the old saw remains, if you’re rich, SHUT UP! Because as Balzac said, “behind every great fortune there is a crime.” And this is true. You don’t want the spotlight upon you.

So Trump comes back to Twitter, he will, no matter what he’s said in the past. And I don’t care about the follower count, boosted by bots, who is going to see what he posts?

Elon’s Twitter saga has revealed the truth to everybody, that most people are not on Twitter, it’s really just the media intelligentsia who are addicted to it. And this same media reported everything Trump said before his ban. They justified this by saying he was president. They used false equivalencies when Trump was lying outright, they’d get a quote from the other side saying that Trump was speaking the truth. And there was infrastructure, like Fox News, defending  Trump, spewing disinformation 24/7. But Fox has gotten in trouble for this, the voting machine lawsuits are nothing to laugh at. Turns out supporting Trump is bad for business, they want to downplay the Donald if they say anything about him at all.

And one thing about America’s corporations, they guard their image, their business, very closely. They’re fearful their companies will turn into Tesla, a great product that more and more people won’t buy based on the image of the man who runs it, Elon Musk. Meaning, when Trump comes back, even if he never comes back, advertisers will continue to stay away from Twitter. Who wants to be attached to this stink? It’s too big a risk. Furthermore, the guy running the operation is off his rocker.

Taking a vote? On a site that he wanted to weasel out of buying because of the plethora of bots? A Twitter vote is about as accurate as a political poll, as in NOT VERY! It’s a self-selecting group that replies, it is not an accurate sampling of the public, and to make decisions based on this information is a route to hell. Yes, the right wing media and the polls said there was going to be a red wave, but Michael Moore knew there would not be one because he actually went out and touched America, which is anathema to those in D.C. and the news. Oh, they pay lip service, but they’d rather hang with their insider buddies, and they all pay fealty to the rich.

But it turns out Trump is not that rich!

So what are you getting with Trump?

Well, there are diehard fans of perennially last place sports teams. But their dedication and vocal cries don’t mean the team wins. I get it, those on the right hate the left. But do they need Trump to lead the charge? What’s so special about Trump? A know-nothing who shoots from the hip, doesn’t think the law applies to him, and wants to stay in power forever, just like Xi, never mind Putin.

So what is Musk gaining by allowing Trump back on? He gets the kudos of the bros, the right wing fanatics, those who think he can do no wrong, who believe you have a right to say whatever you want whenever you want wherever you want.

But that’s not what free speech is.

But rather than get into a discussion of free speech, as a practical matter Musk is throwing in with a gang, many of whom are uninformed and uneducated, he’s making Twitter positively toxic, who wants to be involved? Once again, not advertisers! At least not those with deep pockets who make these sites run.

By allowing Trump back on Elon is inherently marginalizing Twitter.

And we love to watch the movie, just like with Charlie Sheen. But the movie ultimately ends. It’s a train-wreck. Truth outs, the actor/politician/business person crashes, and the public moves on. So Elon takes Twitter to bankruptcy, and even if he doesn’t, it ends up a second class platform. There ends up being nothing to report. The show is over. People have seen it, they move on.

Come on, the most interesting thing about Twitter is not the content, but Musk’s shenanigans. As for those who think his moves are genius, Charlie Sheen even went on the road where people paid to see him, how many people would pay now? Never mind Charlie losing his big paying TV gig and fading into obscurity.

And people are rooting for Musk to lose. They’re loving his decimation of Twitter. Finally, this guy is gonna get his comeuppance!

Allowing Trump back on is not going to solve his problems, it’s only going to create new ones!

So Trump can tweet away, but we know almost all of what he says is worthless. Hell, if even Fox News wouldn’t broadcast all of his announcement speech, what are the odds all these reporters are going to give air to what he claims on Twitter? VERY LOW!

This is a sideshow. You may tell me 1/6 had no effect on people’s thinking, but you’re completely wrong. And they’re not coming out of the woodwork to claim fraud in elections. Turns out 1/6 was a blip on the radar screen, in terms of its effect on the trustworthiness of elections. That ship has sailed. Yes, as a result of 1/6, heinous voter repression laws were passed, but it turns out the public wants to believe in elections, which is why Trump supported Big Lie secretary of state candidates lost.

Elon Musk is so self-centered, so deep in his bubble, that he doesn’t even know he’s losing, he keeps thinking he’s winning when the truth is just the opposite. So Musk says Trump can come back. It’s news today, but not tomorrow, just like Trump’s ultimate bloviations on the short message site. People love the crash, not the content. It’s hubris on parade, both Elon and the Donald, and that’s one procession most people don’t care to see. Twitter is becoming more of a backwater each and every day. And who pays attention to that? Very few! Allowing Trump back on Twitter is akin to Arista saying it will put out a new Milli Vanilli record. The announcement will be everywhere, but the music will be nowhere.

I rest my case.

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Am I the only one thrilled that she got eleven and a quarter years (135 months)?

I feel defeated. I was brought up in a world where you were told to jump through the hoops, work hard and you’ll end up with a modicum of accoutrements, more than satisfied. As for the rich, they were people who did something extraordinary, like entertainers. And rich was relative. It’s one thing to be a millionaire, quite another to be a BILLIONAIRE! How is the average person supposed to earn a billion dollars? Rob a bank?

Well, that’s one way, you can work on Wall Street, employing financial shenanigans that the average person cannot comprehend, that paid-off elected officials keep trying to remove the guardrails from. Yes, we’ve been told to let the market be free, that it will police itself. HUH? It colludes with itself!

Kind of like CEO salaries. I mean if you started the company, if you own the company, you’re entitled to untold riches. But Michael Eisner didn’t even start at Disney, and by time he retired he was the company’s largest shareholder. How does that happen?

In a way that that the average person going to Disneyland has no understanding of.

So right now we’re seeing Elon Musk self-immolate, light a match to $44 billion. I’m loving it. As for the loss of Twitter… It won’t happen, and even if it did, if people really need to communicate in short bursts of words another platform will arise. Then again, never underestimate the power of the individual. Donald Trump single-handedly put a dent in democracy. Everybody believed in the sanctity of elections, now nearly half of the population does not. And yes, Musk did a good job at Tesla, then…

For a top-notch automobile he could never improve the interior, the appointments, Teslas are upscale vehicles, and upscale customers expect more. And Musk kept telling us his self-driving technology worked, when it turns out he put the kibosh on lidar and went solely with cameras. All evidence says Tesla’s system doesn’t work, that it’s not roadworthy. So, Musk is leaving the door open for the usual suspect car manufacturers to catch up and supersede him.

And yes, SpaceX appears to be a phenomenon.

But why are we all convinced that if you succeed in one vertical, you’re an expert in another?

You want to work for yourself, you want to put in 120 hours burning the midnight oil… Fine, but just don’t expect others to. They don’t care that much, there’s not enough of an upside. And one thing about the market crash of the past year… All these techies, a bunch who are now getting laid off, have stock options that are underwater, i.e. WORTHLESS! Yes, that’s the dream. You get paid in stock and you too become rich. Well, they’ll adjust the strike point for the CEO, but not the rank and file.

Once again, there are two different worlds.

There’s a club, and you ain’t in it.

Not only do you have to be rich, you have to know people.

Cory Booker and the Stanfordites filing letters of recommendation to the court? God, these same people would write letters in support of Jeffrey Epstein! You defend your friends, irrelevant of what they do. And most people just don’t have friends like that. They’ve got nothing to trade, so they’re left out. Get arrested and you’re going to JAIL!

Then again, there’s a good chance there’s footage. If you watch streaming TV crime shows you know there’s a camera almost everywhere these days, your crime has been recorded. But if a CEO tells his CFO to do something, or if the CFO acts based on prior instructions, there’s plausible deniability. Yes, it’s damn hard to convict people. Even if you’ve got a ton of evidence.

And these criminals hire David Boies, who was doing Harvey Weinstein’s dirty work, to intimidate truth-tellers. That’s the key element in John Carreyrou’s Theranos book. Boies and team, yes there’s intimidation in numbers, came into the “Wall Street Journal” offices to try and get the story told their way, if at all, which was totally false. I’m going to let you in on something, most people can’t handle the pressure. That old axiom “You’ll never work in this town again.”? That’s much more true than untrue. Sure, we hear about the people who bucked the system, but most people were silenced and squeezed out, or now owe fealty to bad actors.

Yes, I spent four years in college. I’ve got a diploma. When did it become a badge of honor to drop out? And when did the arts and humanities get such a bad rap? When I went to college it was never about getting a job, never ever, it was about LEARNING! But now college is seen as a glorified trade school. As for the cost… Word is finally getting out, it’s NEGOTIABLE! Almost nobody pays list price. Yes, college is run like a business, whereas it used to be seen as separate, with its ivy-covered walls.

Everything is a business, everybody wants to get rich. Check out how much a firefighter makes. It’s the overtime that bumps their salary. And I’m not saying we don’t need firefighters, but I will say teachers don’t get overtime. And as a matter of fact, the private schools that keep being promoted as part of school choice usually pay their teachers even LESS!

I could go on and on, but I won’t. I’m just saying it’s every person for themselves in America today. You feel like nobody is on your side, everybody’s expendable. And if you play by the rules, you’re a chump. It’s one thing to break through archaic rules as you disrupt an industry into the future, but that’s not what I’m talking about here. What I’m talking about is people who take shortcuts, who think the rules don’t apply to them.

That “Wall Street Journal” article about Elizabeth Holmes was printed back in 2015, over seven years ago. And what has happened since then? Holmes has been living the life of Riley. Yes, click on this link, it’s free: https://on.wsj.com/3gnm6xx Scroll down to see the pictures Holmes’s significant other sent to the court to show what a good person she is, that she deserves leniency. You see Holmes in Park City… It looks like nobody in these pictures works, they’re gallivanting all over the country, willy-nilly, as if Holmes was a perfect specimen of society, bedrock. I mean only a rich prick like Billy Evans could be so tone-deaf as to not realize these pictures make Holmes look anything but remorseful.

And Holmes never expressed a speck of remorse until sentencing. She doesn’t care about those she ripped-off, she just wants a lighter sentence, she and her lawyers will say anything to try and achieve this.

But this time it didn’t work.

Oh, she’s going to appeal and the wheels of justice move so slowly that her kids may be out of college before she goes behind bars, laughing all the while. Holmes is making a mockery of the system. If only she were like Jimmy McGill, aka Saul Goodman, who ultimately owned up to his bad behavior and paid the price. Holmes could have pled guilty, she could stop all these high-priced appeals, she could ask to be put in prison right now!

And I don’t care if she only serves a year. As long as she thinks she’s going to serve eleven plus. Holmes has got to pay the price.

As for it being sexist… Come on, look at the top of the same “Wall Street Journal” article posted above, can you say ENRON? Men have gone to jail for fraud for over a decade!

And fraud it was. What kind of person acts like this, FOR YEARS! You wouldn’t, I wouldn’t, but Holmes believed she was above it all, as she famously said, “I’m too pretty to go to jail.”

No one is too pretty to go to jail.

And it’s not only Holmes, Trump has to be convicted too. And spend some time in jail, if even only a day. Because you can’t poke our eyes with your illegal b.s. and get away with it. If Holmes doesn’t go to jail, and if Trump isn’t convicted, why should anybody do the right thing?

I’m here to tell you, they’re not. Let’s start with phishing schemes, it’s not all Russians. Unless people pay consequences behavior is legitimized. Which is why we’re still feeling the aftereffects of Wall Street skating after destroying the economy back in 2008.

And whenever we catch someone, shine the light upon them, they always blow back, tell us we don’t know, when in truth we do, because we were brought up right, we know the difference between right and wrong.

But if you can’t put food on the table, or if you keep being exposed to the lifestyles of the rich and bogus, you too are going to get frustrated, you too are going to want your piece of the pie.

I want to see Elizabeth Holmes wipe that s..t-eating grin off her face. I want to see her scared to the bone. I want to see her begging for mercy. I want her to see that she did a bad bad thing, which she most certainly did. Come on, incorrect medical test results, knowingly? I can barely think of anything worse than that, it’s truly life and death.

And we live and we die and nothing seems to change. Money talks, and the rest of us walk. And just because you have money that does not make you a good person, oftentimes just the opposite. But in our world, money is everything. The goal isn’t to become an artist, but someone with a musical profile who can turn themselves into a brand.

Let’s even talk about the Kardashians… I don’t care how much money they have, if I was washed up on a desert island with them I’d kill myself. Because what would there be to say? That’s why you go to college, to hear other opinions in the dorm, to learn not only facts, but how to analyze. There is very little black and white in this world, almost everything merits discussion, but if you’re uneducated and ignorant this cannot be done. Even worse, those in charge want their constituents ignorant, they’re more easily molded.

No, Elizabeth Holmes, you’re not better than the rest of us, YOU’RE WORSE! In the interim you could have volunteered, given back, but NO! as John Belushi famously said, that’s below you.

I hope to see you cleaning toilets soon.

Even better, I hope to stop reading about you in the press.

But I don’t want you to be forgotten, I want you to be a lesson to both the citizens of today and those of tomorrow, teaching us that there are rules in society, and you break them at your peril. Furthermore, life is not solely about lifestyle, it’s what’s inside that truly counts. And Elizabeth Holmes, you’re rotten to the core. Call me Crabby Appleton, I don’t mind being the voice of reason in this era of groupthink, where no one ever blows the whistle on anybody else. That’s right Holmes, the judge blew the whistle on you, get off the court, go straight to the locker room, jail, YOUR ROOM and don’t come out until you’ve thought long and hard about what you’ve done and how you’re going to repay society. Theoretically you can rehabilitate yourself, even Chuck Colson did. Best to start NOW!