Post-election 2020 reactions and resolutions in the Post-Trump era

I have been hoping to get back to writing about films and I am working on something but I wrote this on the night of the election and want to post some of my political thoughts

I've been tuning out the news because it's so stressful. I'm praying that this country did the right thing and put in a president who respects the law and his fellow human beings.

I believe there generally can be a silver lining to every tragedy, but the universe simply has to even out this way if it makes sense.  There's really no silver lining to more years of Trump: It doesn't mobilize good people more than they've been mobilized and it doesn't serve more people in a good way. I've been begging to see how exactly this makes sense.

 

Additionally, I'm not much of a futurist and sadly so little of what people do every four years matters that our voice really only matters every two or four years in this system. 

 

I accept that some people might be better served by a Trump administration, but there are a lot of people who aren't and campaign strategists consciously misled those people into thinking that Biden represented socialism which was the root of all evils and used every smear in the book. I welcome Arizona and Wisconsin and hopefully Michigan and Pennsylvania to the side of reason, while several  other states have let us down as a nation.

 

However, this is also a wake-up call for us that democratic messaging isn't well-received by many in this country for some legitimate reasons. and that sense we had in the immediate aftermath of 2016 of outreach was lost by some of the more extreme fringes of the left in the years after 2020.

We've spent a lot of the last four years not just fighting for the rights of the "disenfranchised" but turning into bullies ourselves. It's one thing to advocate for transgender or gay rights, but it's another to want to destroy anyone who attends a church or has advocated for people on both sides to speak up about these issues. It's one thing to want to uplift black people, but it's another thing to actively rail against anyone who doesn't share your platform on affirmative action. I've been banned from forums on movies simply for having the views of a white male or for having a view on the merits of Thomas Jefferson that differed from the people in my board.

People talk about the disenfranchised in historical terms as if they're permanently affixed labels that work 100% of the time on a macroscopic level when every interaction and inequality needs to be taken in context. The terms "People of Color" and the "Patriarchy" are inherently alienating terms to disenfranchised white people and for a few years, the language of liberal people in certain self-segregated spaces has posited the world through an over-simplistic "white straight men verses everyone else" as if the source of Hispanic, South Asian, diaspora African and African-American struggles in this county are all traceable to the same root causes and consciously created by white people who wanted to maintain supremacy. 

A lot of these people think my problem is with the "disenfranchised" but it's really against jerks. Being a caped crusader for your narrow definition of the "disenfranchised" does not give one liberty or recuse from being a jerk. It was my treatment in this spaces that caused me to contribute roughly eight or nine articles to right-wing publications (alongside people I don't agree with politically) on the topics of intellectual exclusivity and misunderstandings of racism: https://thefederalist.com/2019/02/20/wont-solve-racism-blacklisting-liam-neeson/

This does not mean in any way it is acceptable to vote for someone who ignores facts, demonizes immigrants, never accepts personal responsibility, promotes incivility, and acts like he's above the law.

But it does mean that the responsibility still falls on us as the disenfranchised or as Democrats to explain our views to others if we want them to be convinced, even if that constitutes a micro-aggression or two. It also means that civility and allowing a climate of free speech still applies.

I wrote this a couple days later on how much I'm willing to forgive and forget

 

For the last four years, if you voted for Trump in 2016, I didn't hold it against you as long as you weren't still riding the Trump train. If you weren't calling out a dishonest lawbreaker who was scapegoating Americans for being dishonest, breaking rules, and scapegoating Americans, than that was a problem with me. 

 

Now, whatever you feel about Trump doesn't matter. You don't have power, so I don't have a grudge anymore. You just held some batty ideas during an incredibly unnecessarily dark period of our national history. 

 

Unless you are going to be excessive in not respecting power now (in an extreme version: hatch plots to kidnap Democratic governors or whine about how you feel scared under an administration that I'm guessing won't deport you, defy UN laws to not accept your rightful refugee status, or institute a religion-based ban, I'm not going to care about you until maybe 2024.

 

Yeah, you can tea party all over the place, and I won't like your views, but I don't think the government is in a place of existential crisis. 

 

However, if you were a politician who directly enabled this reign of terror, I will hold it against you. 

 

Every senator, representative, cabinet member, governor, campaign advisor (looking at you Chris Christie, Newt Gingrich and Rudy Giuliani) and especially white house spokesperson who enabled Trump or didn't oppose him loudly enough is responsible for turning us into a third world country.

Mitt Romney, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Jeff Flake, Bob Corker, Rod Rosenstein, the McCain family, Jerome Mattis, Sally Yates, James Comey, Michael Cohen, Rex Tillerson, and Justin Amash get passes. There might be a couple others I'm forgetting but the rest don't deserve to hold public office.

My Journey to Save the Democrats in North Carolina: Part I

I am normally not a travel writer, but I thought I would share some of my work. I was able to raise $590 by crowd-funding to North Carolina this past week to work for the state's democratic party and wrote about my travels.

Post One:

The “organizer”* of our mission, Josh, has mentioned that this is a really unique grassroots movement because a lot of its members weren’t active in politics before Hurricane Trump. In fact, I’m not sure if I can remember much about my political leanings before November of 2016 and, to be entirely honest, I found people who posted about politics on their facebook walls to be irritating. But if the government is extreme enough and tangibly damaging lives, you have to react if you have empathy.

*Full disclosure, I don’t know who is organizing this mission. Josh just sent me the initial email and when I spoke with him, he denied being the organizer of anything almost as if it were a criminal liability. He attempted to explain me the hierarchy of how all this works but it was a snoozefest, so I tuned out, sorry.

At the same time, it’s another thing to get into. For about a dozen years I followed the NBA closely but as the players with whom I was most familiar retired and they kept having so many drafts where people who were younger than me kept entering the league whereas my ability to jump, dunk, and run got worse. Kind of depressing. Apparently, the people you’re voting for being younger than you will pretty much never be a problem in this sport.

In that same sense, I’ve devoted much of my energy in the past four years to learning the names of the 100 senators and familiarizing myself with where they stand, because: 1) Let’s be honest, 435 Represenatives is way too many so screw them and 2) We unfortunately couldn’t do anything about the executive branch for four years, but congress had the power to keep him in check. I also called, visited the offices of, and wrote emails to the offices of senators who sucked at their jobs (and wouldn’t you know it, they were all Republicans).

Fun fact: I was sort of kind of named for one of those 100 senators, Orrin G Hatch, and I had the pleasure of delivering a hand written letter to his staffers somewhere in 2017 about how I was ashamed to be named after him when he absolved filibuster rules to confirm a corrupt Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price, who (wouldn’t you know it) resigned in disgrace.

In all honesty, following the NBA and following the Senate isn’t actually that different. Instead of box scores, you can check voting records or polls or scores. It’s also interesting to note that there are several Senators like Elizabeth Warren, Corey Booker, and Ted Cruz who the average person knows of because they make the news often, while there are several of them who get by under the spotlight. Have you heard of a guy named Ron Wyden or Deb Harris? Or maybe her surname is Fisher? She’s a Republican from Nebraska and I actually met her through Capitol Hill but I can’t remember.

In 2018, I was a member of the press club and surrounded by a more politically active group of people and one introduced me to a site called Real Clear Politics where you can follow the polls day-by-day and I started realizing that about eight states were in play in the Senate race (we ended up winning Nevada and Arizona while losing Florida, Texas, Indiana, North Dakota, Missouri, and Tennessee) and wanted to make a difference there. I originally decided to phone bank, but looking for creative ways to take vacations, I considered possibly getting employment in Tennessee or Florida and moving there temporarily. The getting-paid-to-go plans fell apart and I contemplated travelling to Florida anyway and staying in a hostel.

Not doing that was a big regret I’ve had over the past two years. And to think Floridian Senator Bill Nelson lost by 10,000 votes to a guy who distanced himself from Trump at the time and claimed bipartisan credentials but voted to deny even hearing evidence at the impeachment trial and has blamed the failure of things to get done in Washington on a leftist obstructionist agenda. Think of how the  Supreme Court battle or the impeachment trial or several other issues  would have changed in the last two years if we’d had one more Democratic seat in the house.

So I’m going to North Carolina this week. Everything is in play here. A close senate race, the governorship and more. I don’t have clear instructions of what I’m doing (I blame the orientation for being so boring) or how much of a difference I’m making, but it’s an adventure.

Darren Keeps His Distance From Us

Post Two:
If I’m going to attract people to my writings here, it behooves me to paint myself as a heroic crusader to protect the integrity of the vote, but so far I've felt pretty unheroic in the first two days.

A party organizer named Gary explained that a lot of the rural districts where things lean very red is where voter suppression is most likely to happen which is where I am not.

The main things to look for in voter suppression are lines being too long, rejecting ballots that shouldn’t be rejected, an unnecessary police presence, misinformation being given to voters, and intimidation. The “intimidation” call is a fine line that I’m not sure if I’m trained to make.

 

I’m not sure if it’s Southern hospitality or a small sample size but I didn’t seen too much of anything but civility.

On the first day, I encountered an African-American democrat named George and his white Republican counterpart Darren.

AJ told me that the Republicans lie and something like we’d be screwed if the Republicans win but he also said that Darren is fine people. I was too tired of wishing the Republicans dead at this point so I tried to make a peace offering to Darren by saying that I hope we’d have a more bipartisan country when the election is over, but he responded that he didn’t trust the other side. At the same time, he softened over time.

Because I was sitting farther away from the stream of people on the first day, I was left to hear the conversations of AJ and a security guard who had an hour break and went to go hang out with us. They talked about how the KKK was nearby and when I asked if there was a lot of fear of growing up black in this area, they said well, there is racism, but there’s just a lot of crime around here. Also, this is 2020 and the blacks have guns now. Touche!

 

More than anything else, this is an economically depressed town. Racism is alleviated a fair bit through the military presence I’m told, but the military can’t fill all the empty storefronts.

Fayetteville doesn’t have a lot of local investment in industry like the nearby research triangle (Durham-Chapel Hill-Raleigh) so it’s struggling. It does have the largest military base in the country up the road and everyone loves the second amendment no matter who you are. This metropolitan area ranks among the highest in gun ownership. The security guard is on duty (which I’m presuming grants him a gun already?) and still his own gun in his car while Mike had eight guns.

A number of people at the polls who were first-time voters were very celebratory and were taking selfies. A group of four (three adults and one kid, I’m guessing two of the adults were a couple) came out of the polls asking a poll worker to take their picture because it was their first time voting. Wanting to commemorate the occasion is more than I’ve ever done but I can get that. What I don’t understand is if you have that much excitement about voting, why didn’t you do it before? Strangely enough, many of these people were older than 22. I’m not surprised that people aren’t passionate about politics; I’m more surprised they didn’t step up to the plate when  voting itself doesn’t require a lot of effort.

I asked these people a couple questions and the general consensus is that they didn’t vote before because they didn’t feel as strongly. The missing piece of information I had is which candidate roused you to action? I didn’t feel comfortable asking that piece of information (and it might have not been legal, anyway).

 

One young woman I spoke with was pretty defiant of her mother who said “I’ll take the Democratic literature, thank you” while her mom said “don’t worry her mama’s a Trump supporter.” For some reason, being at the polls made me number than I would have been in cyberspace to see an enthusiastic Trump supporter. Maybe knowing the polls favor Biden helps? The daughter said health care was the biggest factor in her vote.

George’s niece and her family came by and they were talkative (Southern charm?) with me which was pretty surprising not just because it seemed like an inappropriate place but because, well, I read as white. To the degree that I’m scared of white Republicans, I’m also a little weary of engaging in serious talks with black people with such a climate of micro-aggression policing.

 

What everyone could agree on was that I was “way out in the country” but I was within five miles of city limits. Apparently, if it’s a small North Carolina town, there really isn’t much in the way of suburbs. I could have run a 10K race to get back to Fayetteville and they treated me like I was on the movie Cast Away when I told them I had Ubered. At the end of the night, Darren, my enemy, kept worrying about me and telling me to get an Uber back.

First-time voters taking a selfie

Post Three:
Today I stopped by the makeshift headquarters and met Ronnie. She is a young, overworked desk jockey who will give you a free t-shirt and stickers if you’re nice.  

As Trump is saying more and more ridiculous things, I keep getting the motivation to want to work and beat him, but I had a thought: What happens when that motivation is gone? If he loses, where do we put our political energy? One certainty is that as I talk to people here who have a “what has government done for me lately” attitude, I realize that the solution is to have a public who knows exactly what government does and doesn’t do, and what it is currently doing. Then they won’t be willing to toss aside a very real functioning institution for an abstract vision sold to them by a madman who yells louder than anyone else.

Today, in my quest to know “what is voter intimidation”, I had to contend with a Vietnam veteran for Trump named Mike who I didn’t know how to classify. One of the first things he said was how he wanted to rip up those  Biden-Trump signs and had torn down 250 of them this past week. Exactly what you’re supposed to not be doing! It turns out that he and his democratic counterpart at this station, AJ, had been here for almost two weeks together and developed enough of a camaraderie that they could make jokes like that. I still cautiously sent a note through the reporting system.

If you’re not sure what constitutes voter intimidation, Mike is your worst nightmare. He also is a bit rough around the edges. He engaged in some “locker room” talk about the female voters passing by and made an off-color joke about San Francisco and gay people that was probably 15 years away from being considered acceptable.

But had an interesting history. Mike was a Vietnam War veteran who illegally voted four times against Ronald Reagan and is still a registered Democrat. He enthusiastically voted for Obama because he grew up with mostly black friends, but he was disappointed with Benghazi. When I pointed out that most prominent military leaders have broken with Trump, he said that he knew Mattis and John Kelly (the DHS Chief and Chief of Staff) and they were both not well-respected (which brings the follow-up: Why did Trump hire them?). At the very least, Mike could list me some prominent generals he liked.

When I said that maybe it was best to not discuss politics, he asked if it bothered him that he was smarter than me. I wasn’t really in the mood for argument and felt the need to try to talk about how I’m for bipartisanism and talk about stuff I might politically have in common with him.  

Eventually, I saw the good in Mike. As a sign of the camaraderie between AJ and Mike, the latter offered to give the former a lift when the banks closed and asked me to distribute pamphlets of both parties. In fact, Mike and AJ agreed to distribute each other’s pamphlets when the other took a break.

I had the feeling that Mike was just an elderly extrovert who really needed to talk to people for his own health. When I started ignoring him and putting on headphones, Mike talked harder to me in desperation to have someone to talk to and asked about bars in DC or if it’s easy to see the monuments in DC. Besides he knew the rules: He never explicitly campaigned for Trump and engaged both democrats and Republicans.

On the second night, Gary gave me a ride home and said Mike was harmless. There had really been one report of a legitimate threat in the 12 polling stations that day so I missed out.

Post Two:

If I’m going to attract people to my writings here, it behooves me to paint myself as a heroic crusader to protect the integrity of the vote, but so far I've felt pretty unheroic through two days of poll observing.

A party organizer named Gary explained, while shuttling me between polling stations, that a lot of the rural districts where things lean very red is where voter suppression is most likely to happen. The other poll observers didn’t really have much to report either except for a Trump.

The main culprits are lines being too long, rejecting ballots that shouldn’t be rejected, an unnecessary police presence, misinformation being given to voters, and intimidation. The “intimidation” call is a fine line that I’m not sure if I’m trained to make.

There was a military veteran for Trump who seemed kind of mouthy and obnoxious at first and I didn’t know how to classify him. One of the first things he said was how he wanted to rip up those  Biden-Trump signs and had torn down 250 of them this past week. Exactly what you’re supposed to not be doing! It turns out that him and his democratic counterpart at this station, AJ had been here for almost two weeks together and developed enough of a camaraderie that they could make jokes like that. I still cautiously sent a note through the system alerting them to him.

His name was Mike and he was a Vietnam War veteran who illegally voted four times against Ronald Reagan and described himself as a registered Democrat who voted for Obama but was disappointed with Benghazi. When I pointed out that most prominent military leaders have broken with Trump, he said that he knew Mattis and John Kelly (the DHS Chief and Chief of Staff) and they were both not well-respected (which brings the follow-up: Why did Trump hire them?). At the very least, Mike could list me some prominent generals he liked. When A.J. spoke about how he and Mike have a good system of respecting each others views, I’m not sure what he was talking about at first.

When I said that maybe the best way to do that was not discuss politics, he asked if it bothered him that he was smarter than me. I wasn’t really in the mood for much argument and felt the need to try to talk about how I’m for bipartisanism and talk about stuff I might politically have in common with him.  He voted for some Democrats but he had a lot of loud opinions including the congresswoman incumbent that was paying AJ. He also engaged in some “locker room” talk about the female voters passing by, but he knew the laws and was pretty careful to not break them. It turned out he was joking about tearing down the Biden signs because he knew that was against the law and how long he’d go to prison here.

For the most part, he and AJ had truly gotten along. When AJ lamented that he had to go to the bank before it closed, Mike offered to give him a lift and asked me to distribute pamphlets of both parties, and the two agreed to distribute each other’s pamphlets. I had the feeling that Mike was just an elderly extrovert who really needed to talk to people for his own health. He never explicitly campaigned for Trump and engaged both democrats and Republicans about anything and everything worth talking about, including military health plans, medics, what to do about when you get old and your bones fail you, tattoos, etc.

When I started ignoring him and putting on headphones, Mike talked harder to me in desperation to have someone to talk to and asked about bars in DC or if it’s easy to see the monuments in DC.


At least things were better here than on day one where I had almost no idea what I was doing. I am not a resident of Cumberland County, NC, so I can’t be put on the official poll watchers list received by the county board of elections. I can coordinate with inside poll watchers but I’m sort of a rogue free agent.


I was told before going down that this was a seamless operation but a lot of people (most of whom are volunteering) are simply playing catch-up to a logistical reality they were never that educated on. I’m not suggesting this means that Biden and the Democrats won’t perform awesomely on election day. Nothing that’s been messed up with my logistics has really impacted any voters because I’m not seeing much disenfranchisement at all. It’s just little details. Today I’ve been outside of the democratic headquarters for an hour typing this up because my two-step verification and password won’t go into the app that is supposed to contain the script and everything for me to go GOTV canvassing (knocking on the doors of the half million registered democrats who haven’t voted yet and trying to pump them into action).

 

The 25 People That Most Impacted the Year of 2018

For a short period of time in the late 90s to about 2003, I would read People Magazine's 25 people that defined our year list. Today I am going to play Fantasy People Magazine editor (which probably I'm the only person in the world to play because I'm weird into lists like that). Feel free to add, subtract, or debate with this in any way you see fit. I'm going to go with the Harry Potter route and leave the person who has the most impact on our lives and is using it to do evil (the president) the "he who shall not be named" treatment. Also Robert Mueller strikes me as a 2019 person so he's off too:

1. Jeff Flake-Senator-I personally like the guy, but I am trying to make this a subjective list of who's had impact and he has been a humongous swing vote and to some degree a true voice of independence
2. Beto O'Rourke-Congressman-Currently has the most thunder on the democratic side
3. Kendrick LaMarr-rapper-The People's list included a musician or two and this guy is the first rapper to win a Pullitzer Prize. He's also, I believe the first musician outside of jazz to win a Pullitzer
4. Stan Lee-comic book artist-Almost our entire movie calendar and I suspect the next generation's literary hallmarks based around this guy.
5. Christine Blasey Ford/Brett Kavanaugh-Stanford Professor/Supreme Court Judge-Depending on who you believe, I guess you can take your pick. The country couldn't agree on which one was the significant personhere
6. The Parkland Survivors-Activists-No one has been more history-changing or kicked more ass then these people. I would have made them Time's Person of the Year but Times is always a whimp about that
7. Nancy Pelosi-Congressman-She's probably also Ms. 2019 but she's held steady in what must be the most difficult job in Washington
8. Michael Cohen-Former fixer-No one has pierced Trump's armor more than this guy. He taped everything, he has Giuliani and Trump on tape saying great things about him, he turned on a dime.
9. Sarah Huckabee Saunders-WH Press Seceretary-The face of the Trump administration, the origin of much of our spin, and the heart of much debate about civility
10. Jon Krasinski-Director/Actor-Breakthrough actor with Jack Ryan and breakthrough director with Quiet Place
11. Ryan Coogler-Director-Black Panther. He's #6 on Time's Man of the Year list.
12. Nick Foles-Athlete-Broke the Patriots stronghold
13. Bradley Cooper-Director/Actor-Like Krasinski and Coogler, big big breakout with Star is Born
14. Ronan Farrow-Journalist-Big pioneer in the metoo movement and continues that quest with integrity (vetting false accusations in his reporting) also wrote another book about Seceretaries of State in which he got inside access to Rex Tillerson saying some dirty stuff about Trump, it's mad juicy
15. French Soccer Team-Because someone's gotta win the WC and they were all very multi-cultural and wonderful
16. Emmanuel Macron-French President-The president we wish we had
17. Cardi B-Rapper or musician or something. Love her re-invented words
18. Pete Davidson-Comedian/SNL Cast Member-Has made more headlines than anyone else which has been odd for a 3rd year SNL cast member and has made me really want to watch the show to see how he'll comment on his own life.
19. John Mulaney-Comedian-I've been thinking a lot about comedic voice of the year and I think John Oliver has a place here too but Mulaney has been able to create a really strong brand for himself this year without a talk show or anything, and that his escapism is a hit says a lot. I heard about his comedy special (also his show about puberty) A LOT this year.
20. Tiffany Haddish-Actress/Comedian-Officially the next big thing
21. Chloe Kim-Snowboarder-Why not include someone from the 2018 Olympics. Korean-American was a hero to both sides and a millenial icon
22. Theresa May-British prime minister-Really significant things are happening in England. We should be paying attention, guys!
23. Jose Andreas-CelebrityChef-Been a major voice in activism and charitable efforts
24. Rachel Brosnahan-Actress-I think it's fair to say that no one has ever gone from such an unknown to Emmy winner (although possibly America Ferrara of Ugly Betty) in the span of one year
25. Megan Markle-Princess of whatever-Throwing a bone to the kind of celebrities People Magazine likes to cover

A few others I was considering: Sandrah Oh, Claire Foy, Alyssa Milano, Lindsey Graham, Scott Pruitt, Kamala Harris, LeBron James, Rihanna, Angela Merkel

Top 25 People of the Year

People Magazine made a list of the 25 most intriguing people of 2015. If it didn’t have People’s sensibilities (where people’s ability to sell the front page of a tabloid magazine factored into it), it would have the potential to be an interesting artifact of our times. As far as I can gather, Sandra Bullock, Jennifer Garner, and David Beckham made the list because they’re celebrity favorites of the soccer mom audience although they didn’t really do much this year other than look after their kids. I imagine there are at least 110 million people in the US doing just that. 

Still, the magazine got away with a few familiar names (Barack Obama and Taylor Swift) and made the case that these two really were emblematic of 2015 and not 2009-2014. The magazine also made some good choices with people I overlooked like Chris Pratt (who did become a blockbuster star in 2015 if you consider Guardians of the Galaxy a fluke), Tracy Morgan (you have to admit, he had quite the comeback), and the three Americans who prevented a terror attack in Paris. 

In the end, this is all subjunctive.

When I asked some people on a message board to chime in their own opinions, one commenter chimed in with a Boston media sensation called Baby Doe I’ve never heard of but must have been a big deal for someone in the Boston area.  

Another person countered with what might be considered an anti-People list with a lot of intellectual entries. Here are a few examples of some of them:

Juhari Idusuyi - This 23-year-old African-American woman read Citizen: An American Lyric throughout a televised Donald Trump rally. On camera. She was seated so that she was visible just over Trump's left shoulder for the entire event. Simple nonviolent protest at Trump's lack of ideas about governance.

Rotana Tarabzouni - A 26-year-old Saudi Arabian woman, terribly scandalous in her homeland for singing about taboo subjects, like driving and crises of faith, and performing unveiled and immodestly (meaning she dresses mildly sexy by 1980s American standards). She's getting buzz around LA - she might be one to watch out for on the national airwaves in a year or two.

Robert Epstein - A psychologist whose research suggests and explains how Google could rig the 2016 elections. By modifying which results come first for a given result, a search engine can determine which candidate one votes for, all other things being equal.

Another person posted a list which the board moderator called the best list he’d seen:

Serena Williams, Megan Phelps-Roper, Ava DuVernay, Ijeoma Oluo, Rowan Blanchard, Amandla Stenberg, Ahmed Mohammed, Edward Snowden, Johnetta Elzie, DeRay McKesson,
Alicia Garza, Opal Tometi, Patrisse Cullors, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Roxane Gay, Bree Newsome,
Saladin Ahmed, Michael Ian Black, Natasha Vargas-Cooper, Sean O'Neal, Don Lemon, Aziz Ansari, Rabia Chaudry, David Simon, Oscar Isaac

I asked him about Sean O’Neal (a senior editor at the AV Club) and he replied that he was just surprised that O’Neal just had a kid (reproducing really does get you points it seems). He also conceded that Michael Ian Black’s comedy was starting to strike a chord with him so subjectivity creeps in pretty much everywhere.

My list would go something like:
1. Eddie Redmayne-The first person under 35 to win a Best Actor Oscar since 2002 and THEN followed it up with an equally daring role that will likely net him another nod if not a lot of admiration for his gutsiness.
2. Amy Schumer-The buzziest comedian out there AND runs the buzziest sketch show on today. She certainly has something original to say, a hilarious way to say it, and 12 Angry Men Inside Amy Schumer was one of the landmark TV shows of the year. In previous years, Key and Peele would have definitely had this spot
3. Pope Francis-Here's an idea: Let's not be assholes to gays, divorcees and people with a history of abortion for the first time in our 2000 year history. Yeah, buddy, you got a spot!
4. Ted Sarandos-Netflix CEO is a complete game changer. So many genres of TV shows you didn't even know you wanted (a realism-infused living single show for seniors in Grace and Frankie, a new Daredevil, a parody cartoon with deep psychological leanings in BoJack Horseman, a racially diverse Seinfeld in Masters of None, A global soap opera with superheroes in Sense8 marking the Wachowski Brothers first success in over a decade, etc) are being done here and they might just get the first Oscar nominations for something outside of the theater distribution model ever
5. American Pharoah-With the way horse racing has turned into an Arms Race since the 1970's when the last horse won a triple crown (horses winning the Belmont stakes are generally resting through the other legs), American Pharoah's win was deemed pretty impossible after so many people who won the first two legs sputtered
6. Shia LaBeouf-He continues to have success (yes, I'll call it that) and spark discourse about the nature of fame with his experimental art projects and continues to rebound from failure in an exciting way
7. Serena Williams-Winning late in her career with grace maturity and garnering attention for her brand and social causes along the way.
8. Elon Musk-Well on his way to winning the space race, Space X became the first private company to send a spacecraft to the international space station in 2015. Other projects under his tutelage include building a self-funded solar city, developing artificial intelligence and searching for extraterrestrial life. Very few science fiction films are covering territory that Musk isn’t doing in real life.

9. Taraji P Henson-Empire was certainly among the 2 or 3 most buzziest things on TV and this character actress really found her groove and was a big part of that show. Her personality and quotability are definitely becoming iconic. It also helps that Empire debuted in 2015
10. University of Missouri Football Team-By refusing to play until the U of Missouri president resigned, it was probably the most effective thing anyone's done in the race wars going on this year. Their story touches on a lot of things: the privilege athletes are afforded, the disaster that is higher education, the unique geography of Missouri as a place which shouldn't be (you'd expect it to be the deep south) but is probably the most unresolved state in the country in terms of racial tension, and the aforementioned racial tensions these days
11. Lin Manuel Miranda-Combined history and rap and making it a smash success on Broadway. As Obama said during a post-performance speech, very few things can make Dick Cheney and Obama agree on anything. Hamilton being a great musical is one of those things.
12. Paul Ryan-I would be equally comfortable giving this spot to John Boehner who announced the death of partisanship in the House of Representatives by stepping back. Ryan is going to step in and clean up the mess.
13. Rachel Dolezal-Certainly a fascinating story about racial identity and politics these days
14. Jason Day-A golfer and sports person of the year candidate.
15. Francois Hollande-His leadership either caused further complications in the war on terror or presented a step forward in it
16. Ridley Scott-Interstellar and Gravity both had their strengths but his film was the kind of optimistic and imaginative sci-fi adventure that the movies were made for and that we don't see enough of these days. Apollo 13 inspired my sister to study astronomy in college and this could be it for a new generation. Additionally, Scott has been at the forefront of film making since 1979 and this is his introduction to a new generation
17. Kim Davis-Some will call her an idiot, but I kind of admire her at least on the level of doing effective civil disobedience. At the same time, I'm listing people regardless of whether I like them or not and I think she's the 2016 version of Joe the Plumber in the way her story is already being coopted by everyone in the Republican party as a litmus test for their voters' values
18. The election outsiders-Donald Trump, Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson-There's too much focus on the election so rather than use up a bullet point on each one of these guys, let's just group them all in one. These three are surging in the polls at various levels despite probably being unelectable if the voters eventually care about experience.
19. Trevor Noah- This was a big year of talk show hosts, but James Corden, John Oliver and Seth Meyers really belonged on last year's list. I also love Stephen Colbert but I don't think 2015 is the year in which he's found his niche. Meyers has found his niche this year, but I'm not sure if he's making that much of a splash at 12:35 AM and he can no longer take ownership of the SNL era he presided over since he left last year. Trevor Noah is one change-up that has been working by my subjective opinion and his stand-up is pretty spectacular (also by my subjective opinion).
20. Joe Biden-His political capital is at an all-time high this year as evidenced by Stephen Colbert and everyone else practically begging him to run for president. His heartbreak with another family death resonated throughout the nation
21. Stephen Curry-Most of the time (in my experience), the upstart team in the regular season (Sacramento Kings in the early 2000s, Dallas Mavericks in the mid-2000s, the Chicago Bulls and Indiana Pacers in the early 2010s) loses to the experienced team, but Curry's Warriors surprised everyone by not being busts. Curry dominated over reigning king LeBron James, showed a media friendly personality (partially due to his daughter), and matched his regular season record with clutch during the post-season.
22. JJ Abrams-If sequels and reboots are the currency of Hollywood in 2010, than this guy is the established master having turned both Star Wars and Star Trek into must-see events.
23. Justice John Roberts-Continues to frustrate anyone expecting him to be political by voting his conscience and he deserves recognition in a big year in which the Supreme Court upheld Obama care, ruled on freedom of speech laws (the confederate license plate case, the Gilbert, Arizona case), pollution regulation, gerrymandering and same sex marriage. In  a generation or two, the only notable supreme court cases that will appear in a history textbook will be Obama care and same sex marriage: One of which was upheld this year and one which was ruled upon.
24. Amy Poehler-Leslie Knope started out as one of the most awkward characters on a TV show that seemed doomed to wither out. Seven seasons later, Poehler has turned her into one of the most iconic and rootable characters on TV and that’s not all. She’s also written a biography, produced Billy Eichner’s comedy shows as well as Broad City, and is attacking the big screen again with Sisters. The only thing she didn’t do in 2015 was agree to host the Oscars and that’s our loss.

25.Justin Trodeau-I know Canadian politics aren’t worth worrying about to most Americans, but to the degree that they are, Trodeau’s election marks a major shake-up in a system that many feel had gone stagnant. Failing that, he’s dreamy-looking enough to sell a cover.

Interview with "Obama Girl" Producer Ben Relles

When I worked for ReelSEO, I scored this interview with then-Barely Political head Ben Relles in early 2013. Unfortunately, Relles has changed positions so this interview is no longer relevant to what Relles does or what Barely Political currently is. However, Relles was so kind to lend his time to me and what he said was so insightful that it should be published somewhere. So here you all go:

The 2008 election, featuring a ready-made caricature in Sarah Palin, was the first Presidential Election in which YouTube was part of the cultural ethos, and by most standards Barely Political emerged as the biggest buzz generator of that election cycle with Amber Lee Ettinger AKA Obama Girl, who made appearances on SNL and Bill O'Reilly after her hit "I Got a Crush in Obama" (ironically, made in 2007 when he was still a Senator) became one of the internet's most viral videos with 25.8 million views and 100 million overall channel views in 2008.

While Ettinger played the role of Obama Girl, it was Ben Relles who recruited the talent, co-wrote the music, and invested $2,000 of his own money to create the video series that would go on to revolutionize the way YouTube would eventually influence political elections.

Relles, a Pennsylvania native, is a 1997 graduate of the University of Wisconsin with a degree in journalism and a certificate in business administration, and started his first online marketing company his senior year of college. A decade later, Barely Political, would be his second venture as he foresaw that internet video would be the new frontier.

Six years later, Barely Political is currently the 40th most subscribed channel on youtube at 2.35 million subscribers and ranks 23rd in page views with 1.6 billion. The site has expanded to an in-house team of writers, performers, producers and the channel's director/editor in Tom Small. The content has also expanded to music video parodies (known as the "Key of Awesome" series) as well as parodies of comic book characters among other series.

Additionally, Ben Relles served as VP of programming and content development for Next New Networks which helps YouTube artists increase the visibility of their channel. Next New Networks was bought out directly by YouTube and in March of 2012, Relles was named head of creative development for YouTube's Next Lab.

Q. Who are the comedy influences of you and the crew at Barely Political?A: For me personally, my dad.  He just cracks me up and it was fun when we were launching the Barely Political channel that I was able to get his advice on all that early decisions..  Aside from him, I'd say sketch comedy shows I grew up watching -- Saturday Night Live and Mr. Show being the biggest two.

I think the crew at Barely Political (the writers are Mark Douglas, Todd Womack, and Bryan Olsen) all have different influences but that's part of what keeps our videos unique.  We have writers with years of experience with sketch, improv and stand up and that serves us well for a YouTube channel. 

Q:  What inspired you to go in the field of comedy?

A: I always loved comedy and tried my best to find project where I could try and be funny.  I middle school I made short silly movies at home.  In college I wrote a humor column.  After college I tried doing stand up for a few years.  But I really felt like I landed on a something when I found YouTube.  With YouTube you can make a short funny video, and if it hits on something really funny then a few days later millions of people are sharing it with their friends. That never gets old to me so I want to stay connected to that.

Q. How do you think the landscape for politically oriented comedy is different these days (in terms of both making comedy and watching comedy) then it was 15 years ago before the widespread use of the internet and how is it the same?

A: I think it's different in that the internet democratized political comedy -- especially that's the case with what YouTube did.  A lot of that started with Jib Jab in the 2004 election when their videos were being seen as much as Saturday Night Live or The Tonight Show or any other mainstream political comedy channel.  And then recently you see hundreds of funny sketches on YouTube being done by people all over the world that are funny and really original.  Bad Lip Reading, Alphacat, and Sarah Silverman all come to mind.  I also think individuals have a chance to shape people's perception of candidates through YouTube in ways you couldn't before.  Gaffes do become more costly when they are being remixed and spoofed within 12 hours.

On the other hand in some ways the fundamentals of what makes for great political comedy are very similar.  People love seeing politicians get called out on their BS, and I think the best political comedy does that.

Q: Most rewarding part of your job for you and the crew at Barely Political?

A: For me it's getting to work with the Barely Political team.  I started the site but had no idea I'd get to work with such hilarious people who would build the channel to over 2 billion views.  I love that they have built such a huge, loyal fan base.

Q: What would you say to newcomers who aren't familiar to your brand about what Barely Political is today and why should they check it out?

A: We started as a political comedy channel, but that's not our channel any more.  We have different comedy videos for different people.  Comic book fans should check out our series "Super Therapy."  Pop music fans should check out "The Key of Awesome".  Everyone should check out our recent sketch "Deck Maintenance".  I thought it was pretty hilarious.

Q: Is it fair to say that you didn't do as much in the 2012 Cycle with politics? How much ambition on the part of your site was there to replicate the magic of Obama girl.

I made the observation that you are more focused on comic book geeks than political wonks in your demographic?

A: That is fair to say.  I wouldn't say its comic book geeks as main audience.  Key of Awesome is nearly half our views, and that's more aimed at music fans.  

Obama Girl was a unique thing.  A lot of people think that character genuinely shaped people's opinions of Obama and the video is in textbooks, museums, was on SNL, GMA, etc.  But in terms of audience, our channel still is more geared toward pop culture than politics. Obama Girl is at about 100 million total views across the series. Key of Awesome is closer to 1 billion.

Q: So in the last four years, you've moved away from political humor. Was that a conscious decision at some point to decide to move in a different direction or did you simply watch the traffic and follow it?

A: Right, during the 2008 election we were doing mostly political sketches.  We made a lot of Obama Girl videos, and we were working with the Gregory Brothers on the Autotune the News videos.  Then we wanted to start a new channel for non-political sketches, but we already had so many subscribers on the Barely Political channel we figured we'd just put everything in the same place. 

Q: Was rebranding your site from Barely Political to Key of Awesome a difficult move? 

A: The Key of Awesome took off and became popular so quickly it made the decision easy to have the Key of Awesome series on our Barely Political channel.  But I'd say it was tricky in 2009 trying to balance the Obama Girl videos with the Key of Awesome with some of the remixes Michael Stevens (now the host of Vsauce) was writing which I thought were brilliant, but were tricky to have all on one channel.  I think we have about 2 billion views so far on the channel, and over 1 billion of them are from the Key of Awesome so we've made it work.

Q: You're current position is to promote people's channels and help people promote their channels better. Do you think that the success of one channel on YouTube happens at the expense of another person's channel (in other words, is it a zero sum game?), or that in your position, you can help competing channels each get more views?

A: No I don't think the success of one one channel happens at the expense of another channel, there are always new audiences coming to YouTube and spending more time on the site. 

Q: On an appearance on Anderson Live, you helped a girl follow her passion of making videos for her own YouTube channel. How often do you get the opportunity to directly reach out to someone like that and help them?

A: I love working with people who are brand new to making videos YouTube.  My usual advice to people is to just get started and posting videos and not over think the first one.  Make videos about something you love and see how it goes.  When they make that leap and then become a regular YouTube creator I love it.

Q. According to UW-Madison News You invested $2,000 into the Obama Girl video when you created it. Did you expect to recoup your investment monetarily? YouTube lowers the barrier for entry significantly, but for the people that invest money into making a better product, do you advise them to invest that money with the mindset that they'll be able to make it back if the video is good enough?

A: I did think we'd make the money back.  I thought the video would be popular and we were ready to go with iTunes, T-Shirts and ring tones and all that.  But creators certainly don't need $2000 to make great content on YouTube.  In most cases I think YouTube creators first build an audience, then once they do they start putting more of the adsense towards more ambitious videos.

Q. Could you elaborate on the music making process at Key of Awesome? If I'm not mistaken, you have some people do the singing beforehand and everyone on screen is lip-synching. Why do you do it this way? Also, why do you only have a couple people sing rather than some of the actors singing themselves?

A: The actors definitely do the singing usually.  They just record it in advance to make sure they get a version that sounds great.  Mark Douglas writes the lyrics.  And often he also sings the lyrics and stars in the video.

Q: Is Kristen Brancaccio of The Intern Diaries really still an intern [Ed Note: Kristen Branaccio was just featured on Project Greenlight as a finalist], or is she like the Tonight Show's Ross the intern, where she was originally an intern, and then kept the title after graduating the internship. 

A: Right the latter.  She started as an intern, and now helps with all aspects of the channel.  She's awesome.

Q: Key of Awesome is very interactive with the Comment Videos, is that part of some strategy to pull people in or is that just fun to make?

A: I would say they are fun to make, but end up being a great way to interact with fans.

Q: You've hired more than a couple people at Barely Political to help write. Is that helpful to have different people write one parody song or does it tend to clutter up the process. Does one person write one parody song or is a Key of Awesome song written by committee?

A: I would say with these guys it helps.  Everything is written by Mark Douglas, Todd Womack and Bryan Olsen.  Those guys work really well together and I think most videos at this point the writing is collaborative in one way or another.

Q: You, Ben, are fairly anonymous to Key of Awesome/Barely Political subscribers which is ironic because even the director shows up in the videos here and there. Is that by design?

A: I wouldn't say it's by design.  I started the channel 6 years ago, and I love the whole team and the channel, but day to day I don't get involved in the production process of the videos.  And I can't keep a straight face on camera for some reason.

Q: How much are you a music studio? Is it easy to reproduce the music (do you just use a pre-recorded track like karaoke?) for the Key of Awesome, or do you make the music from scratch?

A: Not a music studio, but do make music from scratch.