Trump Wants to Choose Iran's Next Leader

President Trump proclaimed that his desire to choose Iran's next leader.

He told Reuters:

We're going to have to choose that person along with Iran. We're going to have to choose that person.

We want to be involved in the process of ​choosing the person who is going to lead Iran into the future, so we don't have to go back every five years and do this again and again. We want somebody that's going to be great for the people, great for the country.

So much for Trump telling the Iranian people to take over your government. 

To drive the point home, Trump also told Axios, "I have to be involved in the appointment, like with Delcy [Rodriguez] in Venezuela."

This is exactly what I was afraid of a week ago today only 48 hours before military action in Iran commenced:

Yet let us suppose there is military action in Iran. Who can say it would be any different than what occurred in Venezuela earlier this year where they extracted Nicolas Maduro only to install his vice-president as his replacement? Meet the new Ayatollah. Same as the old Ayatollah. 

If Trump was capable of bestowing legitimacy upon the Taliban during his first term, then it certainly isn't conceivable the Iranian regime will remain in place during his second term.

Whoever becomes Iran's new leader, even if they are up to the task and move the country from theocracy to democracy, will be perceived as Trump's puppet in view of his overt desire to choose a leader of his pleasing rather than giving the space necessary for the Iranian people to choose.

Trump Makes Noem Roam Somewhere in the Western Hemisphere

I wouldn't say President Trump fired Kristi Noem as Department of Homeland Security Chief so much as he demoted her. 

I mean Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas - Western Hemisphere sounds like a groovy gig, but she will soon answer to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defense, er, War Pete Hegseth. Imagine being a member of Trump's Cabinet one day and becoming a lackey for Hegseth the next. 

To be sure, Noem will still live high off the hog and have horizontal jogging sessions with Corey Lewandowski at taxpayer expense as Lewandowski is leaving DHS with her. But Trump wants Noem out of the spotlight and is banishing her to Central America as punishment. Noem and Lewandowski became an albatross around Trump's neck. 

It didn't help matters that Noem had a disastrous set of hearings on Capitol Hill. At the Senate hearing on Tuesday, Republicans were every bit as vigorous in their questions as Democrats with Louisiana's John Kennedy and Thom Tillis of North Carolina both taking her to the woodshed. Trump was unhappy with Noem claiming under oath that he had authorized an ad campaign worth nearly a quarter of a billion dollars which prominently featured her, but she further infuriated him when she would deny her affair with Lewandowski at a House hearing yesterday. 

Of course, Trump knew full well about the affair and was surely aware of the ad campaign which was ubiquitous on radio and TV. So, he softened the blow with a cushy new job.

Naturally, Trump has appointed someone who might be every bit as bad if not worse than Noem as her successor - Oklahoma GOP Senator Markwayne Mullin. While Noem accused Alex Pretti of "domestic terrorism" claiming he was there to "perpetuate violence", Mullin was little better and characterized Pretti as "a deranged individual who came in to cause massive damage with a loaded pistol was shot and killed.” 

Mullin has as much contempt for immigrants and those who disagree with Trump's immigration policies as Noem. The question is if he will be smart enough not to spend so lavishly on himself and furnish a government jet with a luxury bedroom for briefing sessions with female subordinates.

While Noem deserves her comeuppance, we must remember that it is Trump who set everything into motion concerning ICE's actions on kidnapping people off the streets, deportations and the murder of American citizens.

Marjorie Taylor Greene Doesn't Want to Have a Serious Conversation About Iran or Anything Else

While I certainly have plenty of misgivings about the Trump Administration's aims and objectives about taking military action in Iran, there is a danger of those who have similar reservations in elevating conspiracy theorists and their conspiracies because their views appear to align with their own. 

To be specific, I refer to an editorial in The Bulwark co-written by Andrew Egger and Benjamin Parker titled "Who's in Charge Around Here?" focusing on Secretary of State Marco Rubio's gaffe that the U.S entered the war because Israel decided to attack Iran first. Egger and Parker straddle into Pat Buchanan territory:

One of the only true consistencies of Trump’s foreign policy—besides tariffs—has been his Putin-like insistence on being treated with what he considers the appropriate deference and respect internationally. He’s made it very clear to our allies, like Canada and Denmark, as well as smaller countries like Venezuela, that America is a major country that can do whatever it wants to minor countries. (He treats China and Russia as members of the same great-powers club.) The one exception appears to be Israel, which, despite not being a treaty ally of the United States and being one of the smallest countries on the planet, can nonetheless—at least in the telling of the administration—drag our globe-striding superpower into war.

Their Buchananite tone continued:

Of course, the administration’s telling is wrong. The United States isn’t bound by Israel’s foreign policy any more than it is by France’s or Australia’s. And while suggesting it was all Israel’s idea may make it a bit easier to argue that America was facing an imminent threat under any circumstances, the White House may be opening themselves up by saying so to a barrage of attacks from the anti-Israel parts of its own base.

“We need to have a serious conversation about what the fuck is happening to this country,” former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said yesterday, “and who in the hell are these decisions being made for, and who is making these decisions.”

Since when has Marjorie Taylor Greene ever wanted to have a serious conversation?

Greene simply wishes to vilify Israel and Jews at large. After all, Greene claimed the U.S. and Israel had bombed a school killing over 100 girls. The problem with Greene's claims is that it was made by Iranian state media which she evidently accepts as the gospel truth. 

It isn't to say that school children weren't killed but it cannot be independently verified by whom and there remains a question of how far the school may have been situated from an Iranian military base. But if Greene is telling us to accept Tehran talking points at face value, then she has zero interest in a serious conversation.

Let us remember that Greene has palled around with white supremacists like Nick Fuentes, employed his colleagues, suggested Israel was responsible for JFK's assassination and Charlie Kirk's as well, voted present on resolutions condemning anti-Semitic violence against Jews in D.C. and in Boulder, Colorado later complaining that condemning anti-Semitism is something "forced on Congress."

If Egger, Parker and other Bulwark staff honestly believe Marjorie Taylor Greene wants to have a serious conversation then that tells me that they too are embracing conspiracy theorists and their theories. Alas, anti-Semitism is the world's oldest conspiracy theory. 

In their sincere effort to discredit President Trump and Trumpism, The Bulwark is prepared to amplify anyone who now sees fit to criticize him even if the aims and objectives they espouse are every bit as irrational and nonsensical as those offered by Trump and MAGA.

Simply put, it is impossible to have a serious conversation if you simply exchange one set of stupid and foolish ideas for another set of stupid and foolish ideas.

Why I Now See Bruce Froemming in a Different Light

Last Wednesday, former MLB umpire Bruce Froemming passed away following injuries sustained in a fall. He was 86.

Froemming was a big-league umpire from 1971 through 2007 predominantly in the National League. He would first gain notoriety for a confrontation he would have with Chicago Cubs Milt Pappas when he called ball four on San Diego Padres pinch hitter Larry Stahl denying him a perfect game. While Pappas would get his no-hitter it would begin a public feud between the two men which lasted decades.

Perfect game or not, Froemming would be involved in a MLB record 11 no-hitters including four behind home plate. He would finish his career with 5,163 games umpired - the third most in MLB history behind only Bill Klem (5,373) and Joe West (5,460).

While brushing up on Froemming's achievements following his passing, I came across something of which I was not previously aware.

At the beginning of the 2003 season, Froemming was suspended for 10 games without pay for calling an MLB employee "a stupid Jew bitch." Froemming had argued with the official over travel expenses to Japan where he was to umpire the inaugural series of the 2003 season between the Seattle Mariners and the Oakland A's.

As someone who was following baseball observantly at the time, I am astonished that I was not previously aware of the event.

It would appear that most people who were aware of the incident quickly forgot about it. Consider the words of Phil Mushnick of the New York Post in July 2007 following that year's MLB All-Star Game in San Francisco:

The day before the All-Star Game, Froemming was saluted as both a noble fellow and for a job well done by Fay Vincent, the former commissioner of baseball, in a guest column that appeared in the New York Times. During the game, FOX’s Joe Buck and Tim McCarver lauded Froemming as, “good for baseball.”

But neither the former commissioner, in his Times piece, nor FOX’s broadcasters, while addressing a national audience, saw fit to note – perhaps they were too polite or they just plain forgot – a certain episode. In 2003, Froemming didn’t disengage his cell phone until after he could be heard, at the end of a voice mail, calling MLB administrator Cathy Davis a “stupid Jew bitch.”

The episode made short and quick news. Froemming apologized. Sort of. He explained that his comment about Davis wasn’t meant to be heard by anyone other than his wife. “There was no anti-Semitism on my part, whatsoever,” he further explained. Gee, how could anyone regard “stupid Jew bitch” as anti-Semitic?

Froemming nonetheless served a 10-day suspension. Then, before Froemming could even be forgiven, it was forgotten. Poof! It disappeared. Then his career carried on as if nothing had happened, right up until – and now beyond – this year’s All-Star Game, when he was saluted as a great guy and a credit to the game.

Maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe it isn’t.

But it’s certainly a lucky thing for Froemming that he only slurred a Jewish woman. In a world that has lost its balance, imagine had he slurred a black person. Imagine.

Ya think the FOX broadcasters, Tuesday, would have told a national audience that Froemming has been good for the game? Ya think a former commissioner of baseball would have lauded him in a guest column in the New York Times? Ya think the Times would have run such a column? Ya think Froemming would have worked Tuesday’s All-Star Game?

Froemming would have, in 2003, been fired, condemned to the Land of Al Campanis and to reside in the Jimmy The Greek Go Away Forever Village. Though neither of those men actually spoke a racial slur, their indelicate words were all it took.

I’m not sure what kind of price public figures should pay for their hateful, bigoted words. But whatever it is, and if equality is the prize, it should be the same price.

Double standards aside, there is another consideration. When someone utters a phrase like "stupid Jew bitch", it comes from a deep-seated hatred. One does not utter such words unless one means them in the moment regardless of whatever they might say down the road. 

I strongly suspect that Bruce Froemming harbored anti-Semitic attitudes (as well as negative attitudes towards women) long before he uttered them. His apology isn't so much conveying regret for his attitudes but rather that he was caught in the act of revealing them. How many other times had Froemming uttered anti-Semitic statements in private whether he was alone or with his umpire colleagues? If he did do so, then how many of his fellow umpires agreed with him?

This isn't to say that Bruce Froemming wasn't capable of goodness or kindness. There is, of course, goodness and badness in all of us. 

Yet I now view Froemming in a different light just like I do with Johnny Bench. I acknowledge their achievements and contributions to baseball. But these are the sort of people that I would have no desire to meet much less get to know. R.I.P.

The Last Picture Show Has Long Left a Lasting Impression

This afternoon I went to the Brattle Theatre for a screening of The Last Picture Show. 

Released in 1971 and nominated for 8 Academy Awards, The Last Picture Show features an all-star ensemble cast consisting of Timothy Bottoms, Jeff Bridges, Cloris Leachman, Ellen Burstyn, Eileen Brennan, Ben Johnson. Clu Gulager, Randy Quaid, John Hillerman along with the film debut of Cybill Shepherd. At the time, Shepherd was the muse of the film's director Peter Bogdanovich who adapted the screenplay for the silver screen along with Larry McMurtry who would later become famous for the Lonesome Dove books.

I first remember watching The Last Picture Show on late night TV in the early 1980s. As I recall, it would have been on WDIO/WIRT, the Duluth-Hibbing ABC affiliate which would show late night movies on Saturday night. The Last Picture Show was among several early 1970s films I was first introduced to during this period along with M*A*S*H and Serpico. 

The Last Picture Show left a lasting impression on me. First and foremost, there is the bleakness of smalltown life. Shot in black and white on location in McMurtry's hometown of Archer City, Texas near the Oklahoma border (named Anarene in the film), the landscape was mostly desolate with small pockets of beauty. While Northwestern Ontario is about as far removed from Northern Texas as you could imagine, the desperation of people in isolation is the same everywhere. One wishes to be anywhere other than where one is right now.

Then there are the performances. When I first watched The Last Picture Show more than 40 years ago, I was most struck by Bottoms' performance and have often wondered why he didn't have a bigger Hollywood career along the lines of Bridges. Bottoms would star in The Paper Chase two years later but would later settle for smaller roles in a variety of movies and TV shows and would later develop a niche for playing former President George W. Bush.

Four of the eight Oscar nominations received by The Last Picture Show were in the Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress categories. Bridges and Johnson each earned Best Supporting Actor nominations with Johnson prevailing while Burstyn and Leachman each earned Best Supporting Actress nominations with Leachman prevailing. 

As I get older, Johnson's performance as Sam the Lion resonates more. Sam the Lion owned the diner, the pool hall and the picture show house. While stern, Sam the Lion was also sentimental. In a scene by the water, Sam the Lion tells Sonny Crawford (played by Bottoms) how he would take a younger married woman to that same place and swim naked:

If she were here now, I'd be just about crazy as I was then in about five minutes. Isn't that ridiculous? 

No, it ain't really. Being crazy about a woman like her is always the right thing to do. Bein' a decrepit bag of bones, that's what's ridiculous. Gettin' old. 

I have no doubt this is what earned Johnson, a bonafide rodeo star and stuntman, the golden statue. At the time Johnson won the statue he was 53 years old - the same age I am now. Yet he appeared to have lived several lifetimes longer. I can scarcely imagine what he endured and yet possessed a masculinity which was dignified and generous.

The muse of Sam the Lion's monologue was Lois Farrow (portrayed by Burstyn). She was the unhappily married mother of Jayce Farrow (portrayed by Shepherd). While there was no denying Shepherd's captivating beauty, it is Burstyn to whom I am drawn. She looked really good with longer hair. Towards the end of the movie, after stopping Sonny Crawford from marrying her daughter, she tells Sonny that she loved Sam the Lion like no one else before or since. I found Burstyn's performance far more compelling than the one for which she earned a Best Actress Oscar several years later for Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore.

I must confess that I never saw the film's 1990 sequel Texasville. Perhaps one day I will. Yet I see The Last Picture Show as a film which stands on its own. There is a certain ambience about early 1970s films which could not be recaptured in the 1990s let alone in the 2020s. 

Nevertheless, here in the 2020s, some 55 years after the film's release many of its stars are still with us. Bottoms is now 74, Quaid is 75 (even if he has gone off the deep end), Bridges and Shepherd are both 76 while Burstyn is 93. Aside from taking a stroll down Amnesia Lane, I wanted to appreciate the work of these actors while they are still walking among us before the final credits roll on their last picture show.

Wayne Granger Only Wore a Cincinnati Reds Uniform for 3 Seasons, But Was Inducted into the Team's Hall of Fame

Former MLB relief pitcher Wayne Granger passed away on Wednesday at the age of 81. No cause of death was announced.

Granger grew up in Western Massachusetts in the small town of Huntington which is about 25 miles northwest of Springfield. In his youth, Granger played baseball, basketball and soccer in high school and would play baseball at Springfield College.

Prior to the 1965 season, Granger signed with the St. Louis Cardinals and would make his big-league debut with the club in 1968 when they won the NL pennant. Granger appeared in Game 6 of the World Series against the Detroit Tigers which the Cardinals lost 13-1. While Granger pitched two scoreless innings he did plunk both Al Kaline and Willie Horton.

Only 48 hours after Granger pitched in the World Series, the Cardinals would trade him and speedster Bobby Tolan to the Cincinnati Reds for veteran outfielder Vada Pinson. 

In his inaugural season for the Reds in 1969, Granger set a then big-league record with 90 appearances out of the bullpen resulting in 27 saves. The following year, the Reds would win the NL pennant and Granger contributed with a league leading 35 saves. During the 1970 season, the Reds would move from Crosley Field to Riverfront Stadium. Granger has the distinction of both throwing the last pitch and earning the last win for the Reds at Crosley Field in a game against the San Francisco Giants.

For the second time in three seasons, Granger would find himself in World Series competition this time against the Baltimore Orioles. In Game 3 of the 1970 World Series, Granger gave up a grand slam HR to Orioles pitcher Dave McNally marking the only time a pitcher ever hit a grand slam in World Series competition. Granger would also give up two runs in the deciding Game 5.

In 1971, Granger would lead the NL in appearances by a pitcher with 70. But the Reds struggled that season and the team would trade him to the Minnesota Twins for reliever Tom Hall. After a single season with Minnesota, the Twins would send him back to the Cardinals in the trade which brought Larry Hisle to the Twin Cities. 

Granger's second tenure with the Redbirds was short-lived and by August he was in a New York Yankees uniform. In the next three seasons, Granger would pitch with the Chicago White Sox, Houston Astros and the Montreal Expos ending his big-league career in 1976. Granger tried to hook on with the Atlanta Braves in 1977 but would be released during spring training and would end up pitching in the Mexican League for two seasons.

In 451 appearances (all out of the bullpen) over 9 big-league seasons, Granger went 35-35 with a 3.14 ERA collecting 108 career saves. 

Although Granger only pitched with the Reds for three seasons, he would be elected to the team's Hall of Fame in 1982. No other Reds player in the team's Hall of Fame played fewer seasons in Cincinnati than Granger.

Wayne Granger certainly made a lasting impression with Cincinnati Reds' fans. R.I.P.

Khamenei Reportedly Killed After U.S. & Israel Strike Iran

Following a joint U.S.-Israeli military operation in Iran, both Israel and President Trump have reported that the Ayatollah Khamenei has been killed in an airstrike. 

For their part, Iran claims Khamenei is alive, well and "commanding the field." Yet one must consider this to be a "Baghdad Bob" moment.

Trump told the Iranian people, “When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take.”

Presuming that Khamenei and other members of Iran's leadership are dead or incapacitated, who will succeed them?

Consider what I wrote scarcely 48 hours ago:

Yet let us suppose there is military action in Iran. Who can say it would be any different than what occurred in Venezuela earlier this year where they extracted Nicolas Maduro only to install his vice-president as his replacement? Meet the new Ayatollah. Same as the old Ayatollah. 

I also think the words of Adrienne Mahsa Varkiani, an Iranian American, who is the Deputy Editor of The New Republic, should be given weight in a piece she wrote today titled "I Want Iran To Be Free More Than Anything; I Also Don't Trust Trump":

Trump can talk about how he cares about the freedom of Iranians all he wants, but everything he has done until now makes that hard to believe.

Just examine how the Trump administration is viewing its operation inside Iran. This round of strikes on Iran is not called “Operation Aiding Freedom”—or some feel-good cliche. It is called “Operation Epic Fury,” which is being led by the newly-renamed “Department of War.”

But if that is too small a point, perhaps we can look at what Trump has really done to support the Iranian people thus far. In 2017, just one week after becoming president, he banned all Iranians from the United States. It is almost silly to mention that now, given how much worse things have gotten since then, but at the time, it was a nightmare. For a few days, that ban applied to valid visa holders and permanent residents as well. I remember calling my cousins with green cards who were outside the country, trying to explain to them in my broken Farsi the latest on immigration law.

That ban has only gotten worse in his second term—with no new visa applicants allowed to enter the United States. (In his first term, Trump eventually relented and allowed Iranian students the opportunity to continue to come study here.)

Varkiani then goes on to decry Trump's decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018. I would part company from her on that for the simple reason the JCPOA had the effect of giving a lifeline to the Khamenei and company and only prolonged the suffering of the Iranian people. It is also worth noting that President Biden did not see fit to rejoin the JCPOA after rejoining the Paris Climate Agreement, UNESCO and WHO.

Nevertheless, I share Varkiani's mistrust of Trump regarding the aspirations of the Iranian people when he has gone out of his way never to welcome Iranians who opposed the regime in this country. In which case, who can say that Trump won't reach an agreement with a member of the existing regime as he has done in Venezuela? Or perhaps we will see the restoration of the House of Pahlavi. The days of the Shah of Iran don't look so bad after nearly half a century of rule by Shiite Islamic fundamentalists, but there were plenty of human rights abuses under the last Shah of Iran. Is there any reason to believe that Reza Pahlavi would be better than his father? After all, Bashar al-Assad proved to be more ruthless than his father in Syria.

Naturally, I shed no tears for Khamenei and hope the Iranian regime will come to a long overdue end. But I worry that Iranians will simply trade one murderous regime for another. And if Trump and his so-called Board of Peace are to be involved in a post-Khamenei Iran, the opportunities for corruption will be staggering. 

However, even if Iran's new regime is less than stellar, if it no longer has designs on the destruction of Israel then it will be one less thing for the Jewish state to worry about. Not that Israel isn't still surrounded by countries and an international community hostile to it. But not having a nuclear design with designs to use that nuclear power against Israel would be quite significant.

Of course, if it turns out that Khamenei is in fact not dead then both Trump and Israel will have egg on their face. Such an error would put the wind back into the sails of the Iranian regime. That would be most unfortunate. If you are trying to kill the Ayatollah, you better not miss.

UPDATE: Khamenei has been confirmed dead with Iranians taking to the streets to celebrate. I hope their celebration isn't short-lived. I also recall rejoicing in Baghdad after the fall of Saddam in 2003. Only time will tell.