Tag archive: Victoria

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The California Recall Election

For the second time in twenty years, California is holding a recall election for its governor.  Like Gray Davis in 2003, the at-risk chief executive is a Democrat, Gavin Newsom, less than two years into his first term, former mayor of San Francisco.  Unlike the successful challenge mounted by Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2003, there is no high-profile Republican candidate running to unseat Newsom in 2021.  Rather, upwards of 40 little-known candidates have ponied-up to the electoral bar, from across the political spectrum, but Newsom is not among them, as the current governor is not allowed to run to replace himself.

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Georgia On My Mind

“Door-knock for Warnock, and vote your Ossoff!”  – Democratic slogan for the runoff campaign

Lost in the mishigas and melee at the Capitol on Wednesday was a political revolution of another sort, this one successful.  Even as Trump supporters vainly stormed Congress to prevent certification of Biden’s victory, the last race of the 2020 election cycle was being called in Georgia.  Against all odds, both Democratic candidates in two runoff races won, bringing the Dems to parity with the GOP in the US Senate.  For the first time since 2009, Democrats control both houses of Congress and the presidency.

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Trump & Sisyphus: Futility in Motion

Asteroid Sisyphus is named for that worthy denizen of Hades, doomed to forever roll a rock uphill, only to have it roll down again, thus necessitating endless repetition of the action.  As such, astrologically, Sisyphus represents futile action without purpose or accomplishment – repetitive, pointless effort which achieves nothing lasting. 

In light of President Trump’s repeated, one might say endless, refusal to accept the clear results of the 2020 election, where Americans handed him his hat and showed him the Oval Office door, it occurred to me to take a closer look at asteroid Sisyphus, to see what role it might be playing in the election and its aftermath.  It’s not just Trump who’s beating this dead horse:  90% of elected Republicans in Washington refuse to publicly acknowledge his loss, and his “legal team” has been rejected in all but one of the nearly 50 court cases filed to overturn the results in key battleground states such as Pennsylvania, Arizona, Georgia, Michigan and Wisconsin.   

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TRIUMF or Tragedy?

There’s a new point (to me) which has come across my radar recently – asteroid TRIUMF, which may have bearing on the 2020 election outcome.  An anagram for the Canadian national particle accelerator (originally called the TRI University Meson Facility), TRIUMF seems to operate well as its phonetic clone, “triumph”, an indicator of ultimate victory or success.

 

TRIUMF would of course have many applications not solely related to the political or career sphere, in theory pertaining to any successful endeavor.   But this teeny orbiting rock chunk does appear to portray a pattern of influence on US presidential nominees and elections, at least in recent times.

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A Tale of Two Nominations

Now that the Democratic and Republican conventions are safely behind us, and their nominees are official, we can take a look at the acceptance charts for those nominations, as a preview of what to expect for the campaign and the upcoming election in November.

 

Joe Biden confirmed his Party’s nomination by uttering “with great honor and humility, I accept this nomination,” at 10:49 PM EDT on August 20th, 2020, from a largely empty school gymnasium in Wilmington, Delaware, with himself, his running mate, the spectators and crew observing current CDC guidelines on mask-wearing and social distancing.

 

Donald Trump’s statement that “with a heart full of gratitude and boundless optimism, I profoundly [?  did he mean “proudly”?] accept this nomination” occurred on August 27th at 10:28 PM EDT, in front of a crowd of 1500 people, largely without masks, packed check-by-jowl on the White House lawn. 

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AAA Profile: Peter O’Toole

Recently I had the opportunity to view “Lawrence of Arabia” again, the 1962 screen classic which reaped seven Academy Awards, detailing the military career of British officer T.E. Lawrence, who led the Arab Revolt that successfully ousted centuries of Ottoman Turkish rule over the Arabian peninsula in the waning days of World War I.  As always, I was taken in by the sweeping majesty of the movie, filmed over a two-year period in the Arabian desert, overwhelming in its epic scope but liberally peppered with human, humane, even humorous moments.  But I was struck by the fact that despite wins for Best Picture, Best Director, Cinematography and Original Music Score, among others, none of the actors won an Oscar, not even Peter O’Toole, outstanding in the title role.

 

Lawrence of Arabia” was O’Toole’s breakout performance, but it wasn’t his only Oscar snub.  Nominated seven more times, four of them in the ensuing decade, the Anglo-Irish actor never took home a little gold statuette for a specific film role, despite a body of work that puts many Oscar winners to shame, including “Becket”, “The Lion in Winter” and “Goodbye Mr. Chips”.  O’Toole once quipped that he was “the biggest loser in Hollywood”, but did reluctantly accept a Lifetime Achievement Academy Award in 2003, after initially refusing the honor on the grounds that he was still acting and would prefer to earn one for himself.

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