People are sick of having to think about this dude every single day of their lives
You'll have to be a paid subscriber to read today's newsletter in full. I am sorry I know that is very annoying. I don't like it any more than you do. It's mainly about how Donald Trump is a racist piece of shit (and how I think he might lose again this time.) It's a topic I have covered many times before but probably most directly – certainly headline-wise – in this one I just remembered from 2019.
After that the 17 most remarkable sentences I've read recently plus three gut punching poems I love and the three best new songs of the month.
Thank you to Michelle Catalano for the nice shout out for ACWF in her lovely newsletter Going it Alone.
A book I’ve been reading for a while, in bits and pieces, is Luke O'Neil’s A Creature Wanting Form. It’s a collection of stories from one of the most brilliant writers of this generation. The stories can be heavy and profound, distressing and emotional. I savor this collection. I take it in small bites, because too much may leave me aching.
I have another collection of stories almost finished so if you would like to publish that please let me know!
Oh one more thing before we get going: The next Hell World Top 5 Songs thing will be on Chris Cornell. I have a great batch of writers lined up already but could use a few more non-white dudes so if that applies to you let me know.
Perhaps feeling the floor falling out from under him after it became apparent these past few weeks that he will no longer be able to sleep walk to victory over Joe Biden – not to mention after no one cared he almost got assassinated – Donald Trump took a long look in the mirror and decided it was time to go back to the old him. To pull out the most reliable trick in his bag: being insanely racist. Not just regular racist but archaic racist. Old-timey racist.
In a strange – even for him – and irritable interview in front of the National Association of Black Journalists yesterday Trump accused Kamala Harris of only just recently turning Black. As you might imagine his army of amateur race scientists and cranium peepers were delighted by this move and are now busy polishing their calipers and looking at slides of blood under the microscope to un-invent the concept of being biracial. It's a bold strategy sure to whip up his base and turn off almost everyone else in the country. Certainly they're can't be that many biracial people in the U.S. right?
Let's check the census real quick.
"In 2020, the percentage of people who reported multiple races changed more than all of the race alone groups, increasing from 2.9% of the population (9 million people) in 2010 to 10.2% of the population (33.8 million people) in 2020. ...The Black or African American and Some Other Race population increased by 722,383 people, a 230% change."
Hm.
That's before you throw in the percentage of people in the country who are "normal" and "tired of this kind of shit." Not sure they have data on how many people that applies to. Not sure I'd want to know anyway.
There's a fitting symmetry to it all I suppose. Trump's entrée into national electoral politics came with him questioning the race and national origins of one biracial presidential candidate. Let's hope that he ties it all off with a big bow by making his exit about the same nonsense.