Workin’ for the Weekend* #55: Vivekapalooza, and Megyn Kelly’s OnlyFans

Also: Pauly the Pigeon & Caribbean Jews FTW!

Aug 29, 2023

(* Apologies for the delay; the technology-dog ate my homework, twice!)

You can tell summer’s on the wane when you go to a Mets-Angels game, as Jaye and I & some teens did Sunday, and by far the most meaningful on-field activity—more exciting even than Shohei Ohtani’s at-bats or the adorable Taiwanese cheerleaders (?)—is a damn pigeon, living his best life:

* If you like baseball, and perhaps even if you don’t, there’s a guy on Substack I’ve appreciated for a long time, who I think is the most underrated baseball writer in America: Sam Miller. His essay last week, “The Last Good Pitch,” is the tragic tale of a guy you never heard of, “The only pitcher to strike out 10+ batters in each of his first two major league games never did it again.” Here’s a selection; please give ol’ Sam a spin:

Karl Spooner grew up in milk-farm country in upstate New York. His dad died when he was a pre-teen, and his mom died when he was 17. He walked pigeon-toed and he had flat feet, wore special shoes, and struggled in mud. But his arm was extraordinary. He was known around town for his awesome snowball throwing, and in his adult townball league he struck out 2.7 batters per inning.
Once, he got a tryout start in front of a bird-dog scout, and he arrived just before gametime having bicycled 16 miles, mostly uphill, to get there. George Hodges, the bird-dog, said “Spooner looked less like a pitcher than anyone he had ever seen. That is, he did right up to the point where he let go of the ball. At that juncture, he started looking like Walter Johnson with a tailwind.” The Brooklyn Dodgers signed him and he left high school a year early. His bonus was supposed to be $500, but it was supplemented by an extra $100 to cover his dental bill. At the time, all but seven of his teeth had been pulled.

* Anyway, about Megyn Kelly’s OnlyFans page. She doesn’t really have one, of course, but, well, just start watching at around the 37-minute mark of last week’s monthly appearance for some of the best Fif’ reaction faces yet. “Looks like I’m kinda rubbing the nipples,” is one direct quote, not from us. Other pre-GOP-debate topics on the episode included Vivek Ramaswamy’s lies (her characterization!), his I-was-bullied-now-I’m-a-billionaire energy, which candidate had the most to gain going in, and our reaction to the breaking news of Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prighozin’s fiery death. Whole thing:

* Speaking of Mr. TRUTH, whose appearance on Episode #411 coincided uncannily with his leap from 2.3 percent to 7.4 percent in national polling (the “Fif bump,” as it is commonly known), here’s my debate-night piece: “Vivek Ramaswamy's Popular Incoherence.” I was certainly nicer than George Will was, let alone Josh Barro….

* Look who’s wishing Moynihan a happy birthday! Why, it’s Politico’s very own Playbook!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Todd Young (R-Ind.) … Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) … Mike Huckabee … David Gregory … CBS’ Major Garrett … Nick Denton … Todd Harris of Something Else Strategies … David Molina of the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics … New Mexico GOP Chair Steve Pearce … Ricki Seidman … Betsy Wright Hawkings … Seyward Darby of The Atavist Magazine … Matt McDonald of Spectator USA … The New Yorker’s Adam Gopnik … Natalie Strom of Edelman … Justin Roth … Geo Saba of Rep. Ro Khanna’s (D-Calif.) office … Brooke Barker … Erik Brydges … Karoline Leavitt … WaPo’s Jacob Bogage … Emily Cherniack of New Politics … Michael Moynihan … Pam Coulter … Abbie McDonough … Meagan Shepherd of Sen. Mitt Romney’s (R-Utah) office … Dabney Hegg … former Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) … Elizabeth Cutler … former Rep. John Culberson (R-Texas) … Errol Louis.

* Last week’s #418 was the second Fif’ rodeo for Mike Pesca, following #343 in January 2022. His Not Even Mad podcast, w/ lefty Virginia Heffernan and our old pal Jamie Kirchick (#55, #347, #394), took a dirt nap in February after just 10 episodes, with the last featuring swap-out panelists David French (#191, #325, #365) and Lara Bazelon (#357, #369, #417). And remember: Stay tuned to The Gist for Pesca’s promised I-wuz-wrong confessional that may or may not be related to a certain Mr. Kmele….

* Speaking both of Caribbean Jews and our pals over at the Ask a Jew podcast, as we just did in M.O. #178, Chaya Leah Sufrin & Yael Bar Tur are out today with an episode featuring not just a Caribbean Jew, but a Caribbean Jew crypto bro (although with a different meaning than you might expect), the delightfully named Yirmiyahu Danzig.

* Speaking of Danzig, listener David emails with “The perfect video for Moynihan”:

Hi Gents,

Long-time subscriber here, still enjoying your show.

Just wanted to let you know I found the perfect video for Moynihan's
interests….
It's supermodel Karen Elson and former Smashing Pumpkins and Hole
bassist, Melissa Auf der Maur, performing a cover of Danzig's 'Devil's
Plaything' in (probably) 2002.

Enjoy. :)

* From the Chat—available, as is the Comments section, to paying subscribers!—comes this absolute hate crime from Bill Allen: “MM and MW, please watch this and then kindly reconsider your dogshit take on 4 Non Blondes’ ‘What’s Going On.’ Respectfully.”

* Comment of the Week is yet another win for L Brown, who just keeps coming correct w/ the follow-up facts:

Floyd Normal is the black animator who defends Song of the South:
https://insidethemagic.net/2020/07/black-animator-defends-song-of-the-south-ne1/
And Maurice Rapf was the blacklisted Hollywood writer who was on the Song of the South production. There are some remarkable quotes in this obit:
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2003/may/09/guardianobituaries1
"I never knew anybody in the party—in all the years I was associated with it, which was a long, long time—who was seeking anything but humanistic goals," he recalled.
Rapf, who was excused from testifying before the House UnAmerican Activities Committee (HUAC) because he had the mumps, explained: "The thing that most impressed me and probably made me a communist was that anti-semitism was illegal in the Soviet Union, and that the Soviets were very anti-fascist, which the US was not."
In 1934, aged 20, Rapf visited the Soviet Union, stopping off in Berlin on the way home, a brave choice for a young Jew. What he saw there convinced him that communism was the only way of defeating Hitler.
In his memoir Back Lot: Growing Up With the Movies (1999), Rapf remarked:
"How, one might ask, did I rationalise the Moscow purge trials of 1937? How did I accept the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact of 1939 which led to the Nazi invasion of Poland and the start of the second world war? To this day, I don't know the correct answer to these questions."