Month: March 2018

As some other pros have already said, something is going on with Stan Lee. His personal assistant, Max Anderson, has been fired and is being kept away from having any contact with Stan, who recently was in poor health fighting a bout with pneumonia.

All of the reportage seems to be coming from Stan’s “camp,” although the identity of those in the camp is a bit debatable.

But I can speak about Max, that’s for dámņëd sure. Because I’ve been a friend of Stan’s for decades, and have had plenty of opportunities to watch Max with Stan at various conventions. And I can tell you right now that whatever bad things you may hear people saying about Max concerning Stan: Don’t believe it.

I’ve watched Max manage Stan at conventions for the last fourteen years. In addition to being a tireless supporter of Stan, including organizing and selling all manner of Stan Lee merchandise that has pumped tons of money into Stan’s pocket, I have watched Max treat Stan the way a good son treats his beloved father. Max doesn’t hesitate to put himself between Stan and overeager fans, creating a bubble of space so Stan doesn’t get crushed by well wishers. I’ve seen Max arrange at conventions for a comfortable couch/rest area to be set up so that Stan has somewhere to go in order to take a nap between panels and autograph fests.

Some years ago, at Dragon*Con, I presented the Julie award (name for Julie Schwartz) to Stan. Now there’s no stairway directly from the ground to the stage; you have to come around and use a side entrance. Disdaining that, Stan–who was in his eighties–vaulted from the floor up onto the stage. I saw a hilarious photograph of Stan leaping onto the stage while the people from his table ran up behind him to spot him in case he pitched backwards. Max was the first one out of his chair.

Max has cared for Stan, watched over his business and health concerns for over a decade. He does not deserve to be kept away from Stan, and he certainly doesn’t deserve to be savaged by fans for any reason. Max is a great guy.

PAD

All blessings to Glenn on today, his birthday, and my thanks for keeping this place up and running.

PAD

So Trump managed to get himself some positive points this week by theoretically standing up to the NRA. But we must emphasize the “theoretical” part because it wasn’t all that long ago that Trump was endeavoring to make nice to the Democrats and making positive noises about immigration…until he threw all of that under the bus, screwed over DACA, and started talking about šhìŧhølë countries. His talk is fine, but all the NRA has to do is apply pressure and Trump will back down. Meanwhile he’s been busy in other ways.

1) Steel Crazy After All These Years.. Trump announced that he was going to implement a tariff of 25 percent on imported steel and ten percent on aluminum. Naturally this caused the stock market to plummet once again as investors feared retaliation from China which is almost certainly guaranteed. Republicans, including Paul Ryan, are asking Trump to reconsider because of the likely consequences of his actions, but at this point it seems unlikely that he will. Which means we can wind up in a trade war (his words) with other countries, but without the resources to win it. Everyone from farmers to our own manufacturers could be crippled as a result of subsequent fall out, but Trump is perfectly happy to allow a massive tariff war because he thinks it’s good for business.

2). Shouldn’t they be on the same side? . Trump once again launched an attack on his attorney general, Jeff Sessions, declaring that Sessions had no business asking the Inspector General to investigate potential FISA violations over surveillance. It of course makes sense that Trump would try to change the subject: Robert Mueller’s investigation is drawing closer, his beloved Hope Hicks has joined the endless number of people who have resigned, and son in law Jared Kushner had his level of security clearance dropped to the same level as people who work in the kitchen and below that of the White House calligrapher. So it’s natural that Trump wants to draw attention from a monumentally chaotic week by bìŧçhìņg about Sessions, to whom he referred as Mr. Magoo. This was of course an idiotic comparison. Most people below the age of forty haven’t the slightest idea who Mr. Magoo was. And anyone over the age of forty knows that Magoo, with his tendency to blindly (literally) walk into the middle of dangerous situations, make things far worse with his participation, and then pat himself on the back and declare, “Oh Magoo, you’ve done it again!” far more closely resembles Trump than Sessions. If Jim Backus, the brilliant actor who provided Magoo’s voice (not to mention Thurston Howell on “Gilligan’s Island”) were still alive, I’m sure he’d be fast tracked into providing some manner of animated response.

3). Dead from D.C., it’s Saturday Night!. Trump once again was stupid enough to try waging a Twitter war with Alec Baldwin, the man who is so convincing as Trump that newspapers have inadvertently run pictures of Baldwin’s impersonation of Trump rather than Trump himself. It was actually pretty hilarious because he cited Baldwin’s stating that the impersonation was painful, to which Baldwin responded that he was willing to endure the pain so that he could keep doing it during Trump’s inevitable impeachment and departure from the office. If SNL were smart, they would have Baldwin on SNL complaining about Alec Baldwin’s impersonation of him. And he could be voicing his frustration to an assortment of actual former Trump staffers who were fired or quit. Cap it with Hillary Clinton walking in and sharing her sympathy. It just couldn’t get more meta than that.

4). Shooting off his mouth again. . Trump shocked the GOP with a meeting on Wednesday, broadcast live, in which he basically transformed into what the GOP and Trump just a year ago claimed was Hillary Clinton’s attitude. Trump advocated passing stricter gun laws, upping the age at which you could buy them, and even taking them away from people who are suspected of being nuts and then subsequently going after them in court. Dianne Feinstein, who was seated next to him and has been advocating just those things for quite some time, was grinning like a loon. But forty eight hours later: NRA representatives came out of a meeting with him assuring their patrons that they shouldn’t worry about it; Trump has suddenly been silent about gun control; and Mitch McConnell declared that there would be NO debate about guns in the Senate because they were too busy gutting banking laws so that consumers will be roundly screwed over.

Did he do anything right?. He tried, with guns. The problem is this: Trump hates conflict. He hates having people yelling at him or being angry with him. This is why he will always reflect the opinion of whoever he just met with. Indeed, it’s why he seemed much happier running for president than actually BEING president. He’s already planning his 2020 run even though it’s only 2018. I’ve never heard of anyone planning that far ahead. But he’s doing it because that’s the only time he is really pleased. He’s surrounded by thousands of people cheering him and accepting blindly everything he says.

PAD