Jeff Blehar is *BOX OFFICE POISON* Profile picture
Polls, politics, postpunk. Co-host of @Political_Beats and Friendly Writer at @NRO. Dedicated to you, but you weren't listening.
Sep 8, 2018 8 tweets 3 min read
REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS: Name a guitar solo from a song that genuinely moved you -- maybe to tears, maybe to jump around the room, let's leave it open because people react to music differently.

I'll start with an obvious one: Neil Young's two majestic turns through "Powderfinger." There are so, so many great answers in the responses but this is one I had to highlight. This is one of the greatest, most sprightly yet emotionally intense guitar solos in all of art-rock:
Aug 15, 2018 9 tweets 3 min read
One thing I think we may discover about November is that Latino turnout isn't surging the way a lot of people expect it to. Similar trends in Valadao's and Hurd's districts.

It's educated whites that are going to wipe out the GOP in 2018, not minorities. I'm getting a lot of "LOL what GOP wipeout?" comments in the responses here. Normally I ignore that, but let's assume it's not blind partisanship; it's worth explaining something fairly clear to election analysts but perhaps not so much to folks who don't obsess over this stuff.
Aug 1, 2018 4 tweets 1 min read
A thousand different possible answers, but if you want an easy way in, start with Miles Davis' KIND OF BLUE and IN A SILENT WAY, then Coltrane's CRESCENT (A LOVE SUPREME is not a starter LP), and for something different try Eric Dolphy's OUT TO LUNCH. I will say that, though it is extremely uncharacteristic (both as jazz and as a Miles LP), IN A SILENT WAY has been my 'gateway drug' of choice for tons of people. Nothing else sounds quite like it, and it's basically impossible not to like.
May 25, 2018 7 tweets 2 min read
I think 98% of "REVERSE RACISM!!" yawping is BS, including a lot of affirmative action complaints, but this will never be true no matter how shamelessly people try to redefine the common and obvious meaning of 'racism,' and it's disgraceful to argue otherwise. Bigotry is bigotry. The minute someone starts making a "well *my* bigotry is acceptable and not really racism because teh power structure" argument, then you have entered the world of what is known as "special pleading," and special pleading always merits hard scrutiny (and, usually, contempt).
Jan 10, 2018 15 tweets 5 min read
More to the point of this, it's remarkable to see just how cynically gerrymandered Maryland is (far worse than NC, though Dems are curiously unwilling to grant this). Let's look at some maps, because maps are fun. From 1992 to 2002, this was Maryland's congressional map. It's not a bad map. Sure, MD-3 (Ben Cardin at the time) is a bit awkward looking, but for a state as oddly shaped as MD, it's a sane map w/sensible communities of interest.
Sep 3, 2017 11 tweets 2 min read
Excellent thread. Cop sought to illegally draw blood b/c hoped they'd find patient (who cops injured in car-crash) has something in system. Scenario was high-speed chase, Suspect killed, but cops recklessly plow head-on into innocent driver. He goes to hospital w/grave injuries.
Jul 26, 2017 39 tweets 7 min read
[*rumbling in the distance*]

[*sound of pebbles being shaken loose from mountainside*]

"Hey pa! You hear that? Storm's a-comin'!" "Son, that ain't just any storm. That there's a TWEETstorm. Go get yer mama out from the fields & tell her it's time for some Game Theory."