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James J. O'Meara's avatar

"They all really like those 90s and 80s action stars over in the Kremlin."

Khrushchev was banned from visiting Disneyland (back then Disney was still based, I guess), however Brezhnev was later able to meet his idol, Chuck Connors, star of The Rifleman.

" But does anyone really care about Van Damme in the West now?"

Sir, do not besmirch the name of JCVD (whose name is too sacred to pronounce). One need only view the YT videos of Space Ice, extolling the genius of his films, and excoriating the demonic pretender, Stephen Segal (who, judging by his films, must have very interesting connections with various Eastern European clans, despite having the initials "SS")

"You look at the tastes or our elite and you can’t help but gape at how garish and tasteless it is... Many peasants are convinced that their political elites are geniuses and masterminds and the proof for this is the fact that they occupy such vaunted positions of wealth and power."

I'm told that the match that set off the Romanian revolution was a TV broadcast showing CeauΘ™escu and wife at home. I think they wanted to cool everyone down by showing their simple peasant lifestyle (plastic covers on sofas, tea doilies, that sort of thing) but the people were enraged to find that after stealing all their money, they lived in such a banal way. A Bond villain set would have been better. "We need a better class of tyrant!"

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Leo's avatar

Nice article. Short, fun, and easy to digest when I'm sitting on my non-golden crapper.

I'm guessing that sportsmen, musicians, martial artists etc. are easy to control because most of them make nothing at all, while a select few make an absurd salary. Therefore, whoever controls where the camera points has the power to make them dance.

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