In the word’s of Neil Young- “It’s better to burn out, than it is to rust.”
I am now an entirely apolitical person. I excused myself from the annals of the internet in mid 2019 after what you may call internet induced political fatigue. Thats quite a feat considering I come from a family with political roots in both federal and local government, went to a polling university that garners an A+ from FiveThirtyEight where I pursued political science and later went to law school where Mr. Biden himself was a constitutional law professor. The cacophony of purity tests and conspiracy theories from the left and right were so deafening that I now abstain from all news and voting and vowed to fulfill my civic duty by creating jobs in my local economy and being an active participant in my kid’s school district, the ultimate goal being to help impact my local community and hope that there is a butterfly effect that ripples further.
In a country so divided, surfing and reading about surfing were my safe haven. In the water, especially during COVID, my friends and I would put any politically induced stress in a neat box and compartmentalize it for an hour session, focusing on the things that unify us, rather than separate us. Environmentalism was always a topic of discussion, parenting, jobs, etc. But never politics. The sport we love has unified so many disparate characters that it only seemed logical that the sport could get us to drop our arms and embrace our brethren from 6 feet away and enjoy one of the last bastions of human contact many of us have since we are all working from home and trying to also, somehow, teach our kids science via a fucking Zoom connection while also taking conference calls.
Surfer magazine was, for years, the sports bible. With a long history of writing some of the most interesting and compelling articles in surf, Surfer magazine represented, to me, a unifying publication aimed at every surfer. As I exited the internet and stopped reading news, I vowed that the only things I would read would be BeachGrit, PE Newswire, and Surfer. The articles on surfer, especially the ones by Zander Morton, scratched my itch and reminded me of when I would thumb the physical pages as a kid.
As I read daily, I was pleased and loved what I was reading. But as 2020 went on one voice, Todd Prodanovich, stood out as just fucking tone deaf. Dude straight up doesn’t get it. He is the exact type of person that pushed me off social media (and out of Democratic Party affiliation). Purity tests, finger wagging, and hyper politicization of everything are Todd’s name of the game. As things got weird in 2020, TP dropped the facade of any sort of journalistic integrity and wrote articles (more like Vox than Surfer) finger wagging at those who surfed under COVID regulations, selling COVID pseudoscience, finding injustice everywhere, and just being the worst kind of elitist opinionated limousine liberal most liberals hate. Earlier in the year he had a call to action claiming surfers should embrace our anti-establishment roots and then went on this week to endorse a ticket filled with two of the most establishment centric politicians who have ever filled a ticket, how radical.
Fast forward to this weekend, Todd announced that Surfer, is indeed dead. I for one, am happy. He announced that the cover will feature a paddle out for George Floyd and include a longford piece on the LGBTQ community. Those thought pieces are great for those who want that intermingled with ads for the SharkBans, but most of us don’t. I have no problems with the cover or the article, but putting those things front and center, Todd proved that as Editor-in-Chief, he didn’t care about all surfers, just the ones he agreed with politically. It was disheartening to know that TP’s vision for Surfer was not for surfers, but to turn the magazine into yet another virtue signaling outrage machine more focused on having its finger on the pulse of woke than on being the source of truth for all things surf.
We as surfers, are a group of individuals tied by a common bond- mainly a love for the ocean and getting fat tubes. Needless division in our tight knit group should not be tolerated. In almost every surf documentary, people of all races and socioeconomic statuses describe surfing as an escape from their day-to-day. Shoehorning politics and egalitarian elitism into a sport that so many of us rely on for an escape should not be something we accept carte-blanche. Who the hell is Todd Prodanovich to tell us what to think and who is he to needlessly divide us over what he perceives as important. We are anti-establishment, and that’s why Surfer Magazine was replete of political grandstanding, because surfing isn’t supposed to represent that. Also, judging by the fact that the majority of the comments and thumbs ration TP’s opinions into absolute oblivion, its pretty obvious the masses feel the same, at least the ones on Surfer.com.
In the word’s of Neil Young- “It’s better to burn out, than it is to rust.” Thank god Surfer did the former rather than the latter. Todd, Vox and The Atlantic might love your reductive and pedantic race to politicize everything and find your way to the lowest common denominator, but for the time being- don’t let the door hit you in the ass on your way out. You won’t be missed.
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Bunghole shit is fairly common.
Okay.
He walked out the front door.
I remember the first time I saw that…..pretty cool. Like….is that my local spot?? Always trying to find that buzz in the water…haha…or was when it was empty..
apolitical IS political. sheesh.
I cannot disagree. Sounds about right.
I think trumpers think Marx and derivatives of are some type of automatic disqualifier. They also are unfamiliar with all the critiques of capitalism out there, beginning with Herman Daly’s. Must be nice to just assume the world works the way white dudes in power tell you it should work and everyone who disagrees is a commie or traitor or going to hell.
But why is Trump a fascist? Cause he appeals to the middle class? How can Barr be using strongarm tactics when he’s a Constitutional originalist?
Both parties are keenly aware that these days, lasting policy advancements will only take place through the courts.
I’d say it’s safe to say you’re in academia. Question is, when you economic theories, do you only focus on the critiques of capitalism, or do you offer students a balanced approached that affords them an opportunity to emerge into the real world with choices they can make on their own?
Otto–nice to see you not copying and pasting talking points! Hippy will be happy. GOAT will be confused. I’m thankful as this may actually turn into a discussion, although I’m under no illusions either of us will budge away from how our neurons are already hardwired. It is hard to change brains (literally, to change the neural pathways) once they’ve been built around thought patterns, esp for older kooks like us.
First off, I come from a blue collar background. I am middle class. My dad was carpenter’s union, and mom a low pay secretary. My first jobs were cleaning the toilets at the local county park, and I’ve framed houses and done demolition work and washed dishes and stocked grocery shelves. I still have 2 jobs to this day, where one is, yes, in academia, but not teaching or researching any of this, actually, and the other doing cut prep work in a walk in cooler at a grocery store. I also help my friend trim trees when money is extra tight. So to say Trump appeals to the middle class is a blanket statement that doesn’t hold water. And based on polls dropping today, Trump actually trails Biden in every age demographic. Yes, his key demographic is uneducated white men age 40 to 60. Notice the emphasis there is on “uneducated.” Trump’s populist message plays on fear and anger of white dudes losing out–it’s been analyzed countless times. This is the hallmark of a fascist regime. Trump used to have a book of Hitler’s speeches on his bedside–one of the few things he’s ever read. He glorifies other despots the world over. It’s clear he’s a narcissistic sociopath who cares not about the Constitution, the first amendment, the environment, and actually the middle class–notice how much wealth has accrued to the 1% under him, vs. how many jobs have been lost in the middle class. He calls those in the middle class losers (check the Howard Stern interview), just like those who serve in the armed forces. He’s a conman who will break every law (and has), and will do whatever to stay in power. Barr–“constitutional originalist.” Nice euphemism that is empty. Some links below
Economic theories–you realize we don’t have capitalism as articulated by its basic premises, right? We don’t have a free market. We have subsidies, corporate tax breaks, massive governmental intervention (from both parties), etc. So I’ve never seen capitalism in action. But your assumption is that is the best way to organize market transactions. Yet the data is clear that democratic socialist policies as seen in Scandinavian countries are better than what we have–every quality of life poll shows this, and they have a higher quality of life and standard of living than we do. But no, I didn’t get brainwashed by the Red Scare of the 1950s that demonized Marx’s economic theories b/c of “communism.” You may want to look at Herman Daly’s work–he was an economist with the World Bank. Basically started the field of ecological economics. Look into his “fallacies of misplaced concreteness” esp in his book For the Common Good. There are so many holes in the assumptions of capitalism (esp. of neoliberal varieties) that it’s laughable. But I get why you think it makes sense–as a white dude in his late 50s/early 60s, groomed to see America as the land of freedom and opportunity your whole life, who probably drives a US made pick up truck, it would be surprising if you actually had critical thoughts of your own about this whole b.s. system. Maybe I’m wrong, but given all the comments I’ve seen from you in the last few years, I don’t think so. You’re being fucked over by the Republican party. Here’s some data points–and yes, Obama could have done a lot more to even the playing field–Trump’s only tilted it further towards oligarchy:
https://opportunityinsights…
I am pro-capitalist if social and environmental externalities are captured. They’re not, and under Republicans, never will be, which means someone else is footing the bill. Dems aren’t much better. But this type of capitalism I find exciting and needed:
https://thegiin.org/impact-…
This is fascism in action: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news...
and I’ll gladly defer to an expert on this:
/http://www.npr.org/2020/09/06/9103...
And when GoldmanSachs knows Dems are better for the economy, well, Otto, you’re in deep trouble:
https://www.yahoo.com/finan…
yah…enviornmental externalities…..aka natural capitol, is really our species big issue. I’m a negative population growth economist. Carrying capacity has been exceeded etc. I agree with your platform. Vote!!
You’d be hard pressed to find economists in Scandinavian countries attributing their economic “higher quality of life” data points resulting from socialism. They more operate a generous welfare program within the framework of capitalism. Most companies are privately owned. No minimum wage laws. Wages are negotiated by unions with 80-90% of the workforce being under union negotiated wage contracts. Nearly 50% of their GDP is from taxation. Workers in average taking home 40% of wages. While healthcare is free and unuversity education is too, unlike the US there is no incentive in the job market to necessarily gain a university degree. Wages don’t create their incentive to work, the welfare state does. Government owns on average only 24% of industry in Scandinavian countries.
The things Bernie Sanders advocates for on his platform here in the US should not be justified under “look how well Democratic Socialism works in Scandinavia” talking points because without the free market, those Scandinavian countries wouldn’t have the quality of life data points everyone so quickly grabs ahold of.
So you’re saying we can design economic and social systems that work for everyone ? Let’s do it. But no policies from Republicans going back to Reagan support this.
It could only work by bringing manufacturing back in a major way. That would require more and continued de-regulation as platformed by Trump. Scandinavia countries like Sweden have economies based in steel, iron ore, machine engineering, technology, automotive, wood and pulp. Heavy exporters. We export very little, which has caused huge trade deficits.
The Democratic socialism platform of Biden isn’t going to work in an economy that is very service oriented.
Manufacturing will not come back under Biden. As such, the only way to get universal healthcare and free education and minimum wage laws and more welfare is increased taxation on income and point of sale. In Sweden, value added taxes are assessed at production level, not point of sale. But look how Progressives here in CA act. VAT is at point of sale. And income tax increases. And now they want to dictate how companies run their BoD. The tax base is shrinking. Soon, CA will have nothing left but Hollywood, Silicon Valley and welfare recipients. The middle class will be gone. And so will the tax revenues.
I am a conservative fiscally–we should put US $ into green, sustainable infrastructure and manufacturing. We should also pay a living wage and have trades be a viable alternative than college debt. I was and am against NAFTA, the WTO, and other global trade agreements. De-regulation does not support these efforts, though–it leads to pollution and low wage jobs and exorbitant corporate CEO wages. Trump has no economic plan. Literally–he has no plans, at all. Meanwhile, and I recognize Dems oversaw NAFTA under Clinton, and Obama did not do enough to protect US workers (b/c at the end of the day, regardless of party, US citizens don’t want to pay more for products and want cheap shit from China), Biden actually has plans for all of this. Maybe check them out:
https://joebiden.com/build-…
https://joebiden.com/clean-…
https://joebiden.com/made-i…
Again, Trump literally has no plan on any of this. No platform. Nothing published on a website.
I read through Biden’s “plans”. Promises are not plans. He sure has plans for bigger government when it comes to infrastructure. Everything is about Unions. No wonder Biden specifically endorses a national version of CA AB-5 that killed the gig economy.
Trump has his 2nd Term Agenda on his campaign website. And his plan is keep doing what he’s been doing, which is promises kept.
https://www.promiseskept.com/
look at recent accomplishments on the right side column as well
2nd Term Agenda
https://www.donaldjtrump.co…
Yawn: https://www.nbcnews.com/pol…
I’m glad we can have a civil discussion. I appreciate it.
200K dead and the biggest recession–not sure if that’s stuff to brag about, Otto. Charged with sexual assault by 30 women. Grifting with your kids. Not having any money because you owe it all via loans. etc. etc.
There is nothing Biden would have done differently that would have saved 200K people. The CDC guidelines for determining Covid death is dubious.
Never charged with any sexual assaults. Rich people get accused of shit in the press all the time. It’s a cottage industry for some. Get that hush money payout, without ever having to file a police report.
There hasn’t been grifting by Trump kids. Trump empire has been moving along long before Presidency. In fact, the recent NYT piece showed no financial ties to Russia, etc.
Biden never worked in the private sector. The whole family has profited from public office. The Hunter Biden deals with China and Burisma are super troubling, but he gets a pass cause of the D next to his name.
Trump is asset wealthy and cash poor, which is often how the wealthy operate. Reinvesting income into your businesses is smart.
And here are the talking points. Let’s touch base in a year, esp if Biden wins. We’ll see some jail time for quite a few people on many of the above points.
Uh oh! Look what Ratcliffe just declassified, Brennan notes from POTUS briefing with Obama. Clinton paid for Russian interference, and Obama knew about it, What a scumbag. I know you hate Red State, but its not like your favorite websites are going to report this.
https://www.redstate.com/sh…
Notice how declassified docs with little context, heavily redacted, always drop when Trump needs a narrative shift back to Hillary? I don’t do websites–haven’t for years. I follow twitter feeds.
Btw, how you like those stocks tanking in the last hour due to Trump’s leadership? Pasting from a tweet:
Several Trump advisers are utterly perplexed by Trump’s decision to stop COVID relief negotiations.
A Trump campaign adviser said: “You have to try to be this politically inept.”
One GOP lawmaker told Axios that this is “a gift” for Pelosi.
Hardly a gift. A gift would have been folding and allowing Pelosi to re-fund failing Dem states. The biggest hang-up on a deal is state and local aid, not aid to small businesses. Mnuchin proposed a $1.6 T deal last week that Pelosi refuses to even acknowledge.
Ending the negotiations is a no brainer. Concentrate on Supreme Court confirmation.
You know 75% of people polled prefer they work out a stimulus deal before the SC pick, right? The fed is worried of long-term recession if there’s not a robust stimulus. (Notice, though, my point on capitalism–this is against what capitalism holds…i.e. huge intervention to prop things up). Also data suggests this will also hurt red states more:
https://www.forbes.com/site…
here’s an interesting take on “failed states”
https://www.startribune.com…
Relief to States must be subject to conditional and subject to audit. The biggest problem is there’s really no control over how the funds are used once the leave fed hands. All monies in the CARE act haven’t been spent yet. You can’t extend the extra fed dollars for unemployment cause people are making more that way. The new metric Newsom Instituted last week is unworkable. An equity metric. It’s now preventing re-opening where prior tier system said prior re-opening could happen. He keeps pushing shit back. I don’t know what science he’s following. I don’t think he does either.
This is all above my head, tbh.
Just coming back to this real fast–don’t shoot the messenger (i.e. DailyKos–the Red State of the left), but rather the tweets shared within. Just last night, from a Republican U.S. Senator: https://www.dailykos.com/st…
Well, we’re a Constitutional Republic. Thomas Jefferson rarely used the word “democracy”, opting to call our framework a Republic. A pure democracy can lead to tyranny where 51% can run roughshod over 49%. It’s why we have an Electoral College, and why determining the President under a popular vote system as espoused by Democrats will lead to tyranny. I don’t have a problem with what Lee said. He’s not promoting fascism. With Federalism, there’s a better chance we have many little dictators in Governor office than one President in office for 4 years, 8 if they earn it.
A pure democracy is not the goal. I agree with that.
Why not a parliamentary model? Why not campaign finance reform? Why stick with an Electoral College that disproportionately benefits rural states (making it less democratic)? Were you going to join the Michigan treason fucks who were plotting on kidnapping and killing the Governor? Those 6 idiots with no brains and no dicks are going to spend a LOOOOONG time locked up, all to “liberate” Michigan, as trump said back in the spring.
Crazies come in a stripes. Whitmer went crazy with EO’s, and even after the state Supreme Court found her EO’s unconstitutional, she just turned around and had the health dept. issue new orders to bypass the legislators once again. That’s using power without limits and that will come back to haunt her come election time.
I think the biggest change that could help our Republic is term limits for Congress. When men early on in our Republic served in Congress, it was never seen as a career path, but rather purely of a civic duty they felt they owed. They made less money serving in Congress, and untied from lobbyists and special interests, just wanted to serve the people of their State and as quickly as possible return to their farms. I agree with campaign finance reform.
I don’t think the Electoral College disproportionately helps rural States. It forces candidates to appeal to the many versus the few. Look how the Dems have been pushing for Puerto Rico and DC to be given statehood. That’s purely for the purpose of once gaining power, to keep that power. More dem representation in Congress and more dem voters, which also explains their open border policies.
100% on board with term limits. 1000000% and campaign finance reform. Mandatory voting law (like in Australia). 3 months of campaigning all with the same budget. Fuck this 4 year cycle of slow build up. All the $ on ads–could be given to small businesses, or investing in solar panels, or retraining coal workers. etc. etc. Just wasted money to “buy” votes. Here’s an article on the Senate and disproportionate rep–is actually some math behind those claims, spelled out much better than I could do:
https://www.nytimes.com/201…
Open borders–doesn’t matter to me, tbh. History of this country. Written right on the statue of liberty. If we had a middle class that was supported by DC, wouldn’t be an issue–would be enough jobs to go around. Or if we just paid living wages for jobs in ag and education and police force, and invested in those things, would be enough jobs to go around.
That 1,600 former DOJ lawyers are a drop in the bucket of how many lawyers work in the DOJ, not including “former DOJ lawyers”. Its damning to their position that they could only find 1,600 willing to sign the letter. The Durham investigation is not AG strongarm tactics. You had FBI agents on Crossfire Hurricane who took out liability insurance policies because they themselves questions the overreaching of Comey’s Obama endorsed investigation into not only Trump’s campaign but also him as a duly elected President. Fucking insurance policies man. The shit Ratcliffe has been declassifying is an absurd bad look for Comey and Obama.
All you could find regarding Trump as a fascist is a philosophy professor that released a book in 2018 and an article that historically compares Trump to Mussolini with help of an article from The Atlantic? Please. You’re obviously smart. You can do better.
GoldmanSachs is going through a shakeup at the moment. My financial advisor left GoldmanSachs and now GS has a fucking team assigned to me. GS is pushing green energy stocks heavy. There’s more to the story there. It’s hard to pin down what, but by the activities as of late, there’s probably SEC regulatory changes that Biden has floated to benefit GS and the like. I’m moving the portfolio elsewhere.
Otto–no need to do better, as you’ll not want to admit to reality. Once you realize there is no precedent like this in the past, as gov workers don’t do that sort of thing, well…But nah, I’m not going to spend 3 minutes finding all the analyses and data points that point to Trump’s fascism. Actually, here’s another: https://www.thenation.com/a…
My expectations are low, and I have other things to do than meet your standards of acceptable data, when you’re a born and bled Trumper. And nice conspiracy theory on GS and Biden. Or maybe they just realize Biden has sane economic platforms and policies that will lead to job growth: https://www.businessinsider…
Well fucken said.
You are falling into the trap of equating the magazine with the editorial. Your conclusion would make more sense if it was Todd that got sacked for the direction he took the magazine. And i’d be kind of inclined to agree with you.
But mocking the magazine’s death on the editorship of one guy is simplistic and just the kind of reduction to the point of absurdity that the internet has driven us to.
I am (was?) a subscriber of Surfer mag, I subscribed because I wanted the mag to stay afloat and even in Australia they gave me a subscription rate of 25 bucks a year including postage. Small change.
I am also a subscriber of TSJ. While TSJ publishes fantastic quality stuff, Surfer went into this weird death spiral and although I am sad to see it go, i’m not surprised. It floundered for the past 2 years or so, changing paper size and quality, and then for some reason started with really lame covers and about 1/3 was advertorial. It was never going to survive with that kind of angle.
All they had to do was copy TSJ, go quarterly and try to stick it out. Surfing World came back from the dead on a similar format.
I didn’t care for Todd Prodranovich much. He was the wrong guy to run it. But I loved Surfer Magazine right up until the last few years.
Uh… what? What are you talking about and what is the relevance to SURFER magazine going under? Not clear on your blaming Trump connection..?? I always thought he blamed everyone else….For everything! I guess i should go watch some Fox News to get an idea of what the duck your talking about.
You’ll love it!!
Opened my eyes
Politics is a shit show and politicians are the scum of the earth. But (DUH!!) some politicians are politics are more despicable than others. And people who actively support politicians are fuckwits.
But just fucken go out for 30 minutes every couple of years and vote for the least despicable candidate/party. Basically vote AGAINST the most despicable.
Pretending you’re above it all is just fucken dumb.
Took a lot to get to: “The rank populism of Trump and use of the political machinery of the law via Barr, with the demonization of the “other” to stoke fear in a mindless cult, should be analyzed within these larger trajectories”.
He hasn’t done any analysis. He grasps ahold of two major assumptions, one with merit while the assumption with Barr lacks supporting evidence.
Just cause you ramble off a bunch of political science shit, then challenge the other to do the analysis has done nothing. What’s important to the American voters? The economy. Covid-19. Violence/unrest. Healthcare. Foreign policy.
The real question is where fascism fits into these issues. Not broad political trajectories beyond the scope of what captures voters who identify as Republican or Democrat.
That is true
Thers an aussie cougar about my age on CNN in your early hours.
Damn I’d love to round out her vowels
Bit harsh but a few good points
So does trump.
Seen CNN since he got the flu?
Some embarrassing shit
Really 5 Yr old stuff
Digging holes they won’t get out of.
Really Nazi style reporting.
For sure. And that vid opp returning to the White House was sick
He gives me hope
The others give me despair
Reckon his ss (pun sorta intended) guys had any choice on getting in the suburban with his corona infested ass?
https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
This would have been a more fitting final cover shot.
Anti-establishment? LMFAO. Surfer have not been AE for at least 20 years now.
Deleted, worng thread
Hahahahar
Good on Todd. Great call to take a stand for racial equality and recommending a vote for the one team that isn’t rolling back environmental laws . And yes, beach access and clean oceans are political. As a former employee of surfer, brought in by the amazing Steve pezman. I’m stoked how they went out. good timing too. Reading comments on Todd’s blm and the election, shows surfing to really be the new nascar. Glad surfer was the Bible when the sport seemed to have alot more soul. So many amazing people were part of surfer and always will be.
For now, back to bg and more articles on sharks and Kelly!!!!
The only racial inequality is in your head
Black govs
Mayors
Senators
Doctors
Lawyers
Congressmen
Presidents
Get real
I don’t think Pezman was still at Surfer when Dave Carson was hired at Surfer and I don’t think you are David Carson.
Let’s see: Oh it was Beach Culture so maybe.
But I think Hawk hired Carson to take over SURFER.