SICKOFITRADLZ: Another Harrison Ford film struggles to turn a profit

No offense to Variety, but how is this news:

Not even time-tested adventurers like Indiana Jones and Ethan Hunt are immune to the shifting sands of the movie business. Those action heroes, played by Harrison Ford and Tom Cruise, returned to theaters in Disney’s “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” and Paramount’s “Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One,” with the hope that the potent combination of escapism and nostalgia would invigorate the box office. Instead, both films are among the summer’s most baffling disappointments, and much of that has to do with their outsized budgets.

“Indy 5,” which opened in late June, has grossed $375 million globally after six weeks of release, while “M:I 7,” which debuted in July, has generated $523 million after five weeks of release. Those ticket sales are respectable in the current moviegoing landscape, especially because the films are part of decades-old properties aimed at older audiences.

At the end of the summer of 1994, I'm at CiCi's pizza, enjoying the buffet with friends and I point out that Speed is a bigger money maker than Harrison Ford's Clear and Present Danger when we're talking movies.

My very good friend Melissa looks at me and says, "No, Marica, Harrison Ford is a big star." Speed is the film that made Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock stars. And I had my Entertainment Weekly with me in my purse. I pulled it out. Melissa was surprised that Speed made $121 million but insisted that $122 million was more. Kind of.

Until you factored in that Harrison Ford was paid millions for his film while Keanu wasn't the big star when he filmed Speed nor was Sandra.

I was right. Go to Box Office Mojo and look up their budgets. Speed? $30 million. Clear and Present Danger? $62 million.

Which had a bigger profit? Speed. And that's even more obvious worldwide where Harrison's film pulled in $215 million while Speed pulled in $350 million.

Again, how is this news?

Harrison Ford hasn't carried a hit film in many, many years. I don't even give him What Lies Beneath because I saw it -- and everyone I know who saw it saw it for -- Michelle Pfeiffer.

For me, that was the last great film he was in.

Here's C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"

Thursday, August 17, 2023. More notice the prime minister of Iraq's lies, Naomi Klein shares what it's like for people to confuse you with a total nut job, Ronald DeSanits -- governor of Florida and an attorney -- does not actually know Florida law (unless, like me, you just believe everything he says is a lie), and much more.

Let's drop back to the August 15th snapshot:

Starting with Iraq, ASHARQ AL-ASWAT reports:

Iraq no longer required the presence of "foreign combat forces" on its territories to combat ISIS, announced Prime Minister and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces Mohammed Shia al-Sudani on Monday.

Sudani was speaking during a meeting with commanders of the Armed Forces and Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), members of the Ministries of Interior and Defense, and the military forces that took part in the war against the ISIS terrorist organization.

PRESS TV quotes him saying:

"Today, Iraq does not need foreign combat forces, and we are conducting advanced dialogues in order to determine the form of future relationship and cooperation with the international coalition," he said.

“The Iraqis have become, after the liberation battles, more united than ever before… All Iraqis fought in one trench from all nationalities, religions, sects and components."

What a load of garbage. His remarks, the prime minister himself.

Do they need foreign troops? No, they don't. But he's not calling for them to leave. And it was just last week that Iraq's Minister of Defense Thabit Muhammad al-Abassi was in DC meeting with US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin to discuss the new agreement as the DoD press release noted:

This meeting looks beyond the defeat of the Islamic State and is an outgrowth of a visit Austin made to Baghdad in March. "We are interested in an enduring defense relationship within a strategic partnership," said Dana Stroul, deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East, during an interview last week.

Many officials are calling this an agreement on establishing a "360-degree relationship" -- meaning it would be a whole-of-government strategic partnership for years.

For years.

Years.

Foreign troops not needed but US troops to continue "for years."

Iraq's prime minister was lying to the Iraqi people.

Yesterday, THE CRADLE noted the problems with the prime minister's claim versus that agreement and added:

His statement came on the heels of reports from Anbar province in western Iraq that said planes carrying an unknown number of US soldiers, advisors, and civilians arrived at Ain al-Asad air base.

“Ain al-Asad base witnessed an unusual movement of military transport aircraft that landed inside the air base with the US warplanes overflying the base to secure the arrival of these planes,” the source explained.

Meanwhile, THE NEW ARAB reports that Iran's Quds Force General Esmail Qaani flew into Baghdad on Tuesday for his fourth visit since Mohamed Shia al-Sudani became prime minister of Iraq and:

Qaani's visit aims to discuss the recent strategic agreement between the Iraqi government and the US, disagreements between the Iraqi militias and the Iraqi government and the need for de-escalating the conflicts.

"Qaani has urged leaders within the coordination board of the Islamic resistance to stop all military operations against the US and the global coalition forces at this time," the source outlined.

Naomi Klein has a new book due out next month, September 12, DOPPELGANGER: A TRIP INTO THE MIRROR WORLD. I've read it, I enjoyed it. VANITY FAIR has an excerpt where Naomi writes of being in the ladies' room and hearing two women discuss her at the sinks while she's in the stall, talking about a position Naomi does not hold when she realizes that they're saying "Naomi Klein" but they mean "Naomi Wolf" who was attempting to speak for and order around the Occupy Wall Street activists:

That was not the only point of disagreement between Wolf and the organizers. For better or worse, the Occupiers had been very clear that the movement did not have a policy agenda—two or three political demands lawmakers could meet that would send them all home satisfied. Wolf insisted this was not true: She claimed the movement actually had specific demands and that she, improbably, had figured them out. Wolf then took it upon herself to deliver a haphazard list of supposed demands to New York governor Andrew Cuomo at a black-tie event organized by Huffington Post, where she and Cuomo were both guests. Wolf failed to connect with Cuomo inside but managed to get herself arrested in a burgundy evening gown, a melee documented by a bank of cameras. This is what the women in the bathroom were referring to when they talked about how “Naomi Klein” did not understand their demands.

I had paid only peripheral attention to Wolf’s antics as they unfolded—they were just one of many bizarre things swirling around Occupy during that eventful fall. One day the camp buzzed with rumors that Radiohead was about to perform a free concert—only to discover that it was an elaborate prank. Next, Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, and Russell Simmons actually did drop by, entourages in tow. Then it was Alec Baldwin’s turn. In this circus atmosphere, a midcareer writer getting handcuffed while unsuccessfully ordering around protesters half her age was barely a blip.

After the bathroom incident, though, I started paying closer attention to what Wolf was doing, newly aware that some of it was blowing back on me. How often does this identity merger happen? Enough that there is a viral poem, first posted in October 2019, that has been shared many thousands of times:

If the Naomi be Klein
you’re doing just fine
If the Naomi be Wolf
Oh, buddy. Ooooof.

Over the years, there have been plenty of oofs. In the decade since Occupy, Wolf has connected the dots between an almost unfathomably large number of disparate bits of fact and fantasy. She has floated unsubstantiated speculations about the National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden (“not who he purports to be,” hinting that he is an active spy). About US troops sent to build field hospitals in West Africa during the 2014 Ebola outbreak (not an attempt to stop the disease’s spread, but a plot to bring it to the United States to justify “mass lockdowns” at home). About ISIS beheadings of US and British captives (possibly not real murders, but staged covert ops by the US government starring crisis actors). About the results of the 2014 Scottish referendum on independence, which the “no” vote won by a margin of more than 10 percentage points (potentially fraudulent, she claimed, based on an assortment of testimonies she collected). About the Green New Deal (not the demands of grassroots climate-justice movements, she said, but yet another elite-orchestrated cover for “fascism”). She has even spotted plots and conspiracies in oddly shaped clouds.

And just like in that overheard Manhattan bathroom, every time she floated one of these theories, I would hear about it—only now on that infinitely scrolling bathroom wall known as social media. “I can’t believe what Naomi Klein said.” “Has she lost it?” “The real victim here is Naomi Klein.”

I came to think of her as Other Naomi. This person with whom I have been chronically confused for over a decade. My doppelganger.

Crazy Naomi Wolf is lusting over Donald Trump (seeing him gives her "pangs" and the realization that, gasp, "he had been our bully") and dreaming of a Donald Trump ticket with Robert F. Kennedy Junior.

Kids, if a Naomi Wolf approaches, find an adult immeditely.

Let's note this letter to the editors of THE PENSACOLA NEWS JOURNAL:

Our public education institution is under attack. DeSantis’ crusade on the “woke” and “porn” in the schools is nothing more than a Trojan Horse. He is heavily funded by donors from the Heritage Foundation, as is Moms For Liberty. Their goal is to cause so much chaos and frustration in the public schools so they can dismantle public schools and turn them into charter schools for profit.

The truth of the matter is transgender people want to be included in society. There are a number of people who are against this. In their attempts to shut down this topic, they have created fear and panic. Transgender people make up less than two percent of the population. They are not a threat to your children. Children are not getting their genitals cut off. This is against the law and there isn’t one case of this happening in this country.

Change is scary and that is what is happening. I encourage you to educate yourself about this topic. Seek out medical professionals that treat transgender people. Get the facts, not the hype.

Vanessa Reynolds, Pensacola

All he has is hate to offer.

Speaking of transphobes, on his little watched video program (certainly not worth leaving your dying husband at the hospital for), Glenneth Greenwald asks questions:

Question for anyone celebrating these indictments: What *exactly* did Trump do that was illegal? If we’re going to start prosecuting presidents for crimes—Great—but that's clearly not what this is: It's a one-time exception to bury the establishment's foremost political enemy.

Well, let's start with you. That eye sore that you're wearing with the mismatched tie, your incessent hand gesturing and that home-dye job are all illegal and you should be arrested. However, unlike you, I managed to say all that without jazz hands. I don't think I've seen so much hand movement since Ava and I reviewed a Kenny Chesney TV special:

Take Faith Hill, the star of NBC's Fireflies. We've seen more than enough of "Cover Girl" Faith (and "Cover Girl" Queen). We've never been too impressed with her soundtrack work which is always overproduced. Fireflies will be the embarrassment, we told ourselves. We assumed that Kenny Chesney's Somewhere in the Sun would be the high point.

Well we can be wrong. And boy, were we.

Somewhere in the Sun no doubt pleased arm pit fetishists throughout the land. If Chesney flashing his pits does it for you, ABC provided you with enough multiple orgasms to last a lifetime.

Other than on the arm of Renee Zellweger, this was our first time seeing Chesney. And we quickly realized that something more was going on than Chesney's desire to demonstrate, repeatedly, that, yes, he had hit puberty and sprouted body hair.

What if, we wondered, Liza Minnelli woke up one morning with two left feet? She would still have the song in her. She would still need to express herself through movement.

If that day should ever come, Minnelli will owe a huge debt to Kenny Chesney who is bravely pioneering The Dance of the Arms while others without dancing feet simply accept their lot in life. "Jazz hands"? That's so last millenium. This is arm choreography at it's most energetic. Chezney with a Z!

Little Miss Show Biz strode around the stage. Sometimes he did the wave all by himself. Sometimes he pointed at the audience in a sudden burst of arm movement! Sometimes he did an extended pointing session, sweeping the arm back and forth. Sometimes he threw both arms suddenly into the air in an All . . . That . . . Jazz kind of maneuver. The arms need to be bare. They are his legs.

Kenny sleeveless is like a dancer in short-shorts.

Watching him blowing kisses and move around gesturing wildly, our question wasn't, "Why did Renee leave him?"; our question was, "Did she ever see him onstage before she married him?"

Second? Fake electors. Do you not grasp this, Glenneth?

What am I doing?

I've noted for years and years and decades now that Glenneth doesn't understand the law. He never does. I don't think he's lying, I just don't think he ever understands the law. Glenneth, if you can take a moment away from shopping for the latest fashions on QVC, you might try actually reading the indictments -- it's all outlined in there. Should we order you a thesaurus on AMAZON to help you with the reading? No, Glenneth that's not a sex toy.

In her awful column that we noted yesterday, Air Head Naomi Wolf tried to argue (lie) that what Donald did was the same as what Al Gore did. No. He didn't try to toss out votes and substitute them. That's not what took place on Team Gore-Lieberman and it's a sign of just how pathetic Naomi's become that she'd make that claim. Apparently, there's no one she won't sell out, not even her former friend Al Gore. Al Gore did not try to get anyone to create a slate of fake electors, he did not try to get the vote count changed through private pressure -- recounts (which were stopped before completed) were done in the full view of the press and were shown on the network news.

Some people may not understand -- though, if like Glenneth, you don't understand and you have a law degree, you're an idiot -- so let's go to WSWS. Patrick Martin explains:

The indictment of ex-President Donald Trump in Georgia, the fourth in five months, is the most serious so far. It outlines, in nearly 100 pages of detail, how Trump and dozens of co-conspirators, some indicted, some not yet, engaged in a conspiracy to overturn his defeat in the 2020 presidential election.

Though limited to a single state, the indictment gives a much fuller picture than the federal indictment brought two weeks ago of the efforts by Trump and his aides to steal Georgia’s electoral votes, won by Democrat Joe Biden by a margin of 11,799 votes. It charges, among others, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, Trump’s top campaign lawyers Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, Jenna Ellis and Kenneth Chesebro, outside consultants like John Eastman and high-ranking officials of the Georgia Republican Party.

Dahlia Lithwick (SLATE) explains:

The two most recent indictments filed against Donald J. Trump are mirror images in many ways. Jack Smith’s federal document filed in Washington was spare almost to the point of being an inky line drawing, whereas Fani Willis’ Georgia filing is rich and detailed and pointillist. Smith targeted one defendant only, whereas Willis went after 19 defendants on 41 counts. Smith mentions a handful of co-conspirators; Willis notes 30 unindicted co-conspirators. As Norm Eisen and Amy Lee Copeland point out, Smith’s case will likely be blacked out for television and audio audiences, whereas Willis’ suit will most likely become must-see TV for weeks on end. Jennifer Rubin argues that the D.C. trial will happen quickly, while the Georgia case may face months of wrangling, flipping, bargaining with conspirators, and lengthy pretrial shenanigans. Claire Potter points out that Willis can seize Trump’s assets under Georgia’s RICO law. And Rick Hasen observes that Fani Willis has centered race and racialized vote suppression in a fashion that is far more explicit than the federal analogue.

[. . .]

Finally—and again, this is both atmospheric and also very important—Fani Willis has not just formally named Trump as a mobbed-up crime boss, but also placed him squarely behind the wheel of a national criminal clown car. For Trump, stripped away from the sober officials who once lent him intellectual heft and political credibility, his final public act may well be honking sadly on the oversize horn, surrounded by the likes of Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, Jenna Ellis, and Jeff Clark. The only thing more piteous than the mental picture of a diminished Donald Trump in the dock standing trial for lies, forgeries, and bullying is Donald Trump doing so in the presence of a whole host of people—tragically, with law degrees—who are living case studies in moral and intellectual mediocrity. His co-defendants are living proof that the personnel equivalent of spray tan that briefly tried to burnish him into looking like a principled and sober commander in chief after 2016—John Bolton, John Kelly, Bill Barr, among others—had well and truly departed the scene by the time of the 2020 election assault.

For those interested in THE MANY LIES AND COURT CASES OF DONALD TRUMP, Ruth is covering this Shonda Rhimes like story -- all of Donald's indictments and charges -- at her site.

On to Ronald DeSantis who can't stop lying because, really, what else does he have? The campaign's in free fall. Sarah Fortensky (THE HILL) reports on an interview TIME did with Ronald and she emphasizes Ronald's reaction to being asked what he would do if one of his children was gay or transgender -- he doesn't respond really but I guess even he knew it would turn off voters if he said, "Stone them to death."

But the thing I'm having big trouble with is his lying. He insists, regarding surgery for transgender youth, "As a parent right now, I can't take my six-year-old daughter and get her a tattoo, even if I want to do that." Ronald, that daughter's got teen pregnancy written all over, I'm sure she'll have plenty of tattoos. But my objection isn't based on his lying about surgery. Unless the child is inter-sexed (formerly "hermaphrodite") -- meaning born with both genders, they aren't doing surgery on young children. I know Ronald loves to repeat that lie as do Moms For Bigotry and Naomi Wolf and so many others.

But, again, that's not what's bothers me most about this article.

Ronald is the governor of Florida. He is an attorney.

Why the hell is he lying about Florida law?

And why do people let him get away with lying?

You don't even have to read the full text of Florida statute 381.00787, just the first clause: "(1) A person may not tattoo the body of a minor child younger than 16 years unless the tattooing is performed for medical or dental purposes by a person licensed to practice medicine or dentistry under chapter 458, chapter 459, or chapter 466."

So, yes, a medical professional can tattoo a child under 16 in Florida if it's medically necessary.

These are the type of lies that keep hurting him with GOP voters. Julia Manchester (THE HILL) reports:

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s support in the Republican presidential primary slipped to its lowest level this year, according to a new Quinnipiac University national poll released Wednesday.

Eighteen percent of Republican and Republican-leaning voters said they supported the Florida governor, which is his lowest level of support in Quinnipiac’s polling of the GOP primary this year. Former President Trump, on the other hand, clocked in at a whopping 57 percent support among Republican and Republican-leaning voters. Quinnipiac noted that DeSantis was only 6 points behind the former president in February, but now he finds himself trailing Trump by 39 points.

Chris Christie, Mike Pence and Asa Hutchinson continue to assert that they could move ahead and capture more support.

You know what?

They're right. It is possible to win over voters.

The problem? Winning back voters. Ronald's driven people away. It's very unlikely that he can win them back at this point. When you run someone off, you tend to lose them for good. When they turn, they stayed turned. Ronald might believe in 'conversion therapy' for his former voters but that really doesn't take. Let's look at 1992 and, specifically, at H. Ross Perot. He was running as an independent candidate and worried some -- Republicans and Democrats -- because, in June of 1992, he was polling at 39% among likely voters.

39%? It's possible to build on that. In a three way race, 39% of likely voters in targeted states could have put you in the White House.

But his campaign was over long before November.

By July, one month later, he'd dropped to 25%. It was impossible to win the 14% back. And he dropped further. 18.9% is the percentage of voters that turned out to vote for him.

Yes, you can build on your support. But once your support starts to erode seriously -- something beyond the margin of error -- it is very difficult to draw people back to you.

That reality does not bode well for Ronald DeSantis.

The following sites updated: