Earlier and Earlier Every Year

I remember that years ago there was a Freeview channel called Great Classics which was basically the owners of the 'Great' channels equivalent to Talking Pictures TV, designed to exploit the Sony film library.  Except that it was only Great Classics for something like eight months of the year - the rest of the time it transmogrified into something called Great Christmas, which showed wall-to-wall crappy made-for-TV Christmas themed movies.  Now, I know what you are thinking - four months of Christmas movies, when the festival itself lasts only twelve days?  Yup, four months, kicking off in October and carrying on, right through Christmas into January.  I mean, who the fuck wants to have to endure four bloody months of those horrible movies and their cloying, utterly fake, sentiment?  Well, apparently there must be a few, as Great Christmas is still a thing - Great Classics long ago died a death and was replaced by Great Romance, (wall-to-wall horrible made-for-TV romance movies), but when October rolls around, it's back to Great Christmas for another four months.  In fact, this year, I think that it started even earlier.  Really, I just don't see the point - surely no sane person wants Christmas to be anywhen other than December, during the depths of Winter, from which it offers a brief respite.

But it isn't just Great Christmas.  Over the Summer, Pluto TV had a channel titled Christmas in July.  What the fuck?  What don't these people understand about the fact that Christmas is inextricably linked with Winter, in particular the Winter solstice?  Unless you live in Australia, where their seasons are arse about face, so that December is the height of Summer.  Arguably, for them it would make perfect sense to have Christmas in July, as that would place it back in mid-winter.  The fact is that the  version of Christmas that is peddled to us these days is essentially an invention of Northern Europe - hence its association with cold, snow and long dark nights.  It just isn't right to try and celebrate it any time else - especially not in Summer or Autumn.  Unless, of course, you are a TV company desperate to cash in on the 'season of goodwill' - to the extent that you are prepared to uproot it from its proper time and place.  Commercialism has no boundaries and certainly no shame.  But, to get back to one of my favourite refrains, the fact is that these constant attempts to start Christmas season early and artificially extend it, (for purely commercial purposes) simply serves to erode the sense of 'specialness' that the season is meant to have - if it happens every bloody day then it quickly becomes a bore.  Moreover, I find it particularly galling that these bastards want to extend the season in the name of profits and sales, yet, at the same time, when it finally arrives, they are then reluctant to allow us the traditional twelve day festival, trying to hustle back to work by 2 January at the latest, usually after Boxing Day.  Bastards. 

A Man's Messiah?

Sometimes I read some news item and think 'I could have written that for The Sleaze, in fact  I should have written it for The Sleaze'.  So it is with that story doing the rounds about that American dude who claims to have spent eighteen days with Jesus while he was in a coma for, well, eighteen days.  Which, in itself, isn't unusual - the media loves these sorts of near death experience tales of 'afterlife' experiences.  But what makes this one stand out is the guy's description of a 'macho Jesus', who stood nearly six feet tall and certainly wasn't woke.  This Jesus was a 'man's Messiah', apparently, bristling with anger toward sinners and injustice.  The physical descriptions of Jesus seem to place a lot of emphasis upon his manly physique and general masculinity.  Which leads me to suspect - on the basis of no supporting evidence, whatsoever, but that's never stopped me before - that the guy claiming to have had this experience is either now, or has been in the recent past, a hardcore MAGA supporter, probably a gun owner with strong views on race, women, homosexuals and transsexuals.  That said, he did describe his Jesus as being of a dark, Middle Eastern, complexion, so perhaps not quite as reactionary as one might assume.  Whatever the truth, his is a pretty conservative version of Jesus - certainly not the liberal, tolerant, do-gooder preaching love and understanding who tends to dominate modern interpretations.

I suppose that we should be thankful that this description of a 'masculine Messiah' didn't go further, with claims that he regularly shagged ten women a night with, miraculously, no sign of fatigue, for example.  Or even a description of a 'two-fisted Jesus', engaging the enemies of God with fisticuffs - a very Trumpian vision of Christ, standing up for the 'righteous' (who, of course, would all be Trump voters).  Obviously, we could be unkind and point to the homoerotic undertones of this version of Jesus, which rather undermine the non-woke overtones of the story, which clearly seeks to position this manly Jesus as a riposte to 'liberal' speculations about a non-gendered or, even worse, a female God.  Ideas which make the right and Christian traditionalists very uneasy.  But there's no doubt that a macho, muscle-bound Jesus does sound like some sort of homoerotic fantasy, (and let's not forget that, according to scripture, Jesus spent his time hanging out with twelve other guys and never married).  Ultimately, the story disappoints me - I was hoping for a tale of ascension to a heaven that looks like the saloon bar of a pub, where there is no closing time and the pumps never go dry.  I was also hoping for tales of this ripped Jesus engaging in barroom brawls with Satan, every time he tried to sneak in, despite having been barred an eternity ago.  But I guess that some people's imaginations have a limit...

Doctor on the Slide

We're on the final leg of Rewind TV's repeat run of London Weekend's 'Doctor' series, derived from the Richard Gordon novels with Doctor on the Go.  (Unless they are going to show the Australian spin-off series, Doctor Down Under or the brief BBC revival Doctor at the Top, as well).  Doctor on the Go, which ran from 1975-77, was the fifth incarnation of the series, which had debuted in 1969 with Doctor in the House.  By this time, only three of the original cast of characters were left - Robin Nedwell as Dr Waring, Geoffrey Davies as Dr Stuart-Clarke and Ernest Clarke as Professor Loftus - with original star Barry Evans having left to do sex comedies after Doctor at Large, while George Layton had departed at the end of Doctor in Charge (although he continued to write for subsequent series) as had Richard O'Sullivan, who went onto TV sitcom superstardom with Man About the House.  Consequently, Doctor on the Go feels a pale shadow of previous incarnations, despite its attempt to return the series to its origins with a hospital setting and medically based gags after the eccentric digression of Doctor at Sea.  The trouble was that, by this time, they'd already used up the best medical gags in earlier series (not to mention the preceding series of films derived from the novels), so it all feels more than a little bit repetitive.  Moreover, by this time, the main characters look and feel far too old to be engaging in the kind of shenanigans which had seemed amusing when they were medical students, but now, with them as qualified and experienced doctors, just seem utterly irresponsible.  You can't help but sympathise with  Professor Loftus as he bawls them out and threatens to sack them on a weekly basis.

As a result, it is far more difficult to sympathise with either of the leads.  Indeed, by Doctor on the Go, you find yourself praying that Stuart-Clarke is going to get struck off, so incompetent and dangerous to patients he has become.  He was bad enough in Doctor at Sea - lazy, crooked and disloyal - but by Doctor on the Go he is insufferable.  Watching seventies sitcoms is, more often than not, a disconcerting experience, so different were the attitudes and humour displayed in them, compared to today, a sobering reminder of how radically things can change over a relatively short period of time.  Sexism, racism and bigotry of all kinds are treated as the norm, with all manner of misogynistic and racist terms happily bandied about without consequence.  But even as the seventies progressed, things began to change and Doctor on the Go, even in 1975 seemed somewhat old-fashioned in its humour - by 1977 it seemed positively prehistoric.   Which is something that reverberates down the decades when you see it again now - whereas the earlier series, despite their problematic, by modern standards, aspects, are actually still amusing and entertaining to watch - Doctor on the Go just seems tired, a cynical attempt to wring some more mileage out of the format.  Doctor in Charge, which showed from 1972-73, probably represented the series at its peak, reflected in its ratings at the time, despite its relatively crude (by modern standards) production values, still retains a degree of freshness and manic energy, both of which Doctor on the Go lacks.  Even Stuart-Clark isn't quite insufferable, despite his incompetence.  Maybe I'm biased because Doctor in Charge is the first of the 'Doctor' series I have a clear memory of watching, but I can't help but feel that it was all downhill for the format after that.

When Executions Go Wrong

My money is still on it being some kind of criminal fuel scam, possibly involving siphoning red diesel from farm vehicles then selling it back at sky high prices.  Certainly the petrol in those vans seems to indicate something to do with under the counter fuel sales, but the authorities - probably to cover up their own incompetence - still seem determined to try and pin the whole Fairford debacle on Iran and somehow 'prove' that it was terror-related.  So, now they've arrested some Anglo-Iranian guy in London on terror-related charges and are trying to link him to the guys they've already had to bail because of a lack of evidence of them being terrorists. Still, the British police have always been good at fitting people up for crimes - whether they actually committed them or not, so I've no doubt that they'll eventually come up with some kind of dodgy 'evidence' that they foiled a major terror attack.  But enough of the nonsense going on here in the UK, what about the latest outrage in the US?  Two attempts at lethal injections and still they can't manage to kill a death row prisoner.  This debacle just goes to underline the barbarity of capital punishment - the fact that someone has been found guilty of a heinous killing doesn't justify killing, (or trying to kill), them in cruel and agonising ways, in front of an invited audience.  But what else do we expect from our blood-thirsty, violence-obsessed transatlantic cousins?  Frankly, I'm only surprised that their cable TV networks haven't invoked some kind of constitutional amendment in order to get their cameras in there and broadcast executions live - this one could have been featured in 'When Executions Go Wrong'.

Now, I know that we shouldn't, in any way, make light of something as inhuman and unpleasant as a botched execution, particularly when, instead of killing the condemned, it leaves them in a critical condition in hospital, but, I couldn't help but think that they were bloody lucky this wasn't a B-movie.  Because usually in such films, when someone survives an execution, they are usually revived as a blood-thirsty zombie.  At least the woman they were trying to execute didn't suddenly revive, tear off her restraints, leap up from the trolley she had been strapped to and start tearing out the throats of guards and officials with her teeth, before attacking the ghouls in the audience.  These zombies are always impervious to bullets, so there would just have been no stopping her - she could have gone on an orgy of revenge killings.  But at least it was only a lethal injection she survived - if they'd been trying to fry her in the electric chair and she survived, then she would have been electrically supercharged and been able to zap people with bolts of electricity from her hands - like an ICE agent wearing those gloves - as she burst out of the chair, glowing and crackling.  As for the gas chamber, well, she would probably just have sucked up all the gas, giving herself super powers in the process, then blown it out into the faces of everyone nearby as she broke out of the chamber, fatally gassing them.  So, I'd say that they all had a lucky escape - the prison authorities are probably only facing a multi-million dollar lawsuit, rather than a rampaging zombie hell-bent on revenge.  But, as I said, we really shouldn't be making light of any of this dreadful business.  You should be ashamed of yourselves...

After Hours: Drugs, Sex and Violence on the Buses

We take another journey After Hours to discover a lost PG Wodehouse classic: ‘Steady On, Jeeves’. Can Jeeves’ secret photography studio in the pantry save the day for Bertie? Will the proceeds from the Drones Club nude calendar raise the funds to pay off Aunt Dahlia’s gambling debts? ‘Consumer Eye’ looks into a dodgy sexual deviant dating app, while The-Man-in-the-Pub tries to sell his re-imagining of classic British sitcom ‘On The Buses’. Is the world ready for his vision of drug dealing bus crews and drive by shootings by double-decker bus? Plus, just why was a kebab shop burned to the ground by soldiers in hazmat suits? One man recalls how one bad takeaway terrorised an entire town. Across the pond – is ICE sourcing its equipment from providers of ‘adult’ toys? Hear top reporter’s hard-hitting in-depth investigation. Finally, join Harry and Stan as they dig up some more graveyard relics and try to restore them in ‘Dead and Buried’.

Written and Produced by Doc Sleaze

After Hours was created using FreeTTS, ChatGPT Reader and Google AI Studio. Sound effects by Freesound Community via Pixababy.com. Music: ‘Midnight Charleston’ versions 1 & 2 by Cosmiczebra via Suno.ai. Opening theme ‘Twilight Static’ and closing theme ‘Twilight Sunder’ by Doc Sleaze via Freemusic.ai.

As promised, Episode Eight incorporates some of the material bumped from the previous episode - the two parts of 'Steady On, Jeeves', to be precise.  The 'Man-in-the-Pub' segment I pulled from Episode Seven still doesn't get a look in as, once more, I felt that it just didn't fit with the rest of the material, so I came up with an alternative.  I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do with that loose segment, but I'll fit it in somewhere, some when.   This episode continues the trend of sourcing some of its material from outside of the pages of The Sleaze, with 'Dead and Buried' being entirely original and 'Steady On, Jeeves' and the 'Takeaway of Terror' being derived from posts here on Sleaze Diary.  I'm still not sure whether or not I actually like the completed episode - while, individually, the segments are quite strong, I'm still not convinced that they hold together as a whole.  Plus, the title was a compromise and I'm still lukewarm about the artwork.  But both were the best that I could come up with.  Still, I am happy to say that, for the first time since the very first episode, it runs under my target of thirty minutes!

Premature Publication

Once more, the media trumpet a dastardly foreign terror plot on British soil, only for the whole story to rapidly start unravelling.  This time around, the press were all slavering over the idea that the guys arrested near RAF Fairford might be Iranians Hell-bent on attacking vital defence assets.  After all, Fairford had been used by the USAF to launch bombing missions against Iran, so that aspect of the story seemed to be a shoe-in.  Except, except, it turns out that the suspects are all British nationals from London.  Just to add insult to injury, they've now all been released on bail.  Which tends to indicate that they most probably aren't dangerous terrorists.  Indeed, bearing in mind that the three vehicles they were using have been subject to 'extensive examination with the support of military assets and forensic experts', yet there has been no announcement of huge caches of explosives being found in them, it seems, right now, that the only thing that they are guilty of is driving white vans at night in the back of beyond.   It's probably going to turn out that they were driving around looking for a venue for an illegal rave.  Even the reasons behind their arrest seem confused.  On the one hand, we have some local biddy saying that she encountered these vans blocking the road and her driveway as she drove home and the five guys ran off when they saw her headlights, so she dialled '999', (having tried the MoD police first - they couldn't be bothered to answer, which is pretty much par for the course for them).  So, we have her crowing to anyone who will listen that it was her call that foiled a major terror attack, yet, on the other hand, we have the Defence Secretary, Wes Streeting, saying that it wasn't that simple and that there were other, unspecified, factors involved.  Then we have police sources telling us that the arrests weren't 'intelligence lead'.

Not to forget the 'Trump Factor', as we had the fat fuck deciding to 'comment' on the arrests, rambling on about how 'they' had been 'watching these guys' for time and 'now we've got them'.  Except, fat boy, you didn't gey them, we did.  Not that we know what exactly it is that we've 'got' them for.  While, taken at face value, Trump's burblings would seem to bolster the idea that the arrests were part of some large scale international counter-terror operation, foiling a major attack, I think that we can safely dismiss anything that he says.  He's clearly senile and spends much of his time fantasising - just look at his claims about being pulled from the rubble by firemen at 'Ground Zero' on 9/11.  Utter bollocks - he was in New York at the time, but nowhere near the Twin Towers.  We know this because he was actually phoning in to a local radio station bragging about how, with the World Trade Centre destroyed, he now owned the third tallest building in the city.  In fact, I'm surprised that he hasn't claimed that it was actually him, personally, who took down the five guys at Fairford - launching himself at them and bringing all five down with a flying football tackle.  But, getting back to the original point, this whole business just underlines (yet again) the perils of the media going off half-cocked with stories which quickly fall apart once some actual facts start to emerge.  They got so over-excited at the prospect of being able to indulge in a bit of xenophobic, Islamophobic panic-mongering, that they suffered the journalistic equivalent of 'premature ejaculation'.  Equally disappointed are the likes of Nigel Farage, desperate to distract from all that stuff about his finances, (which just won't go away), who thought that they could use this 'foreign terror plot' to whip up some more anti-immigrant hatred.  As ever, the moral here is that you really need to keep your powder dry until you are in possession of some actual facts.

Ginger Whinger

I'm genuinely distressed by the hate and bad vibes being directed at Ed Sheeran, just because he allowed his support act to be kicked off of his tour for expressing pro-Palestinian views.  The poor guy feels that everyone, including friends and family, have abandoned him - he's lost all of his support acts now and ticket sales for his concerts are falling.  Look, it is outrageous that people have turned on him over this issue - the fact is that you should already have hated him because he is patently shit.  I mean, everything about him is crap, his 'look', his attitudes, his music: it all epitomises the utter blandness and mediocrity that nowadays represents artistic endeavour.    Really, he and his music are completely and utterly bland - meaningless and instantly forgettable.  The fact that he has turned out to be a complete cipher with no apparent convictions, let alone loyalty, should come as no surprise.  Yet, the ginger whinger still expects us to feel sympathy for him and seems to think that a few tearful words about the situation in Gaza - which still manage to avoid establishing any actual moral position - are all that are needed for forgiveness.  But that seems to be par for the course these days where what pass for 'celebrities' are concerned: don't take a moral stance on anything, for fear that it might be the 'wrong' one.

Now, I know that there are plenty of big name celebrities who do take public positions on all manner of  issues, but these are generally those who are so big that they are going to get contracts and keep working regardless, (Hell, even Mel Gibson, whose drunken rantings revealed him as some kind of racist, anti-Semitic, misogynist religious extremist, still gets work in Hollywood).  I can also respect those who, like the late Dolly Parton, preferred to avoid overt political statements in order not to alienate sections of her audience who might disagree - but, like her, they often express a clear moral position through their charitable work and personally financed platforms.  What concerns me is that lower level of 'celebrity'.  Not just pub singers like Ed Sheeran who have inexplicably escaped onto the world stage, but those non-celebrity 'celebrities' who have sprung up, like fungi, thanks to the existence of the web - influencers.  You'd think that, as 'influencers', they might actually be interested in trying to influence opinion toward decent causes and values, in reality, of course, they are only really interested in influencing their followers to enrich them by clicking on their sponsored videos of them making cocks of themselves.  It scares me that these soulless non-entities are what pass for mass entertainment these days.  Sure, I'm well aware that ninety per cent, or so, of entertainment and entertainers in the pre-internet age were also shit - but generally, there was at least some quality bar they had to reach in order to get exposure on radio and TV networks.  Ed Sheeran is living proof that such standards no longer exist.

Trader Horn (1973)

As I've noted many times before, sometimes it turns out to be a mistake to revisit some film or TV show that you have fond childhood memories of - more often than not, you find that from an adult perspective, they are actually pretty ropey.  But sometimes, you remember something as actually being pretty crappy and when you finally catch up with it again, decades later, as an adult, it turns out that your first impressions were actually right.  It's a surprisingly rewarding sensation to find that your childhood critical faculties weren't always lacking.  So it turned out to be with Trader Horn (1973), a film I have vague memories of having seen on TV as a kid and not being terribly impressed.  It was one of those films which subsequently seemed to have vanished, with no video or DVD releases, no further showings on UK terrestrial TV that I can recall and which has proven impossible to find on any streaming service.  Until now, that is, when it turned up on a Roku app which specialises in such material.  The version they have is a fairly poor quality off air recording from a US cable channel screening, but, right now, it's all that's available.  Trader Horn is a fascinating film for all the wrong reasons.  It was originally conceived by MGM as a big budget adventure film, a counter point to the more cynical and realist movies that were dominating the box office in the seventies.  Star Rod Taylor was very enthusiastic about the concept, hoping that with the end of the Vietnam war, a new cinematic era could be ushered in with such productions.  Ostensibly a remake of the 1931 film of the same title, itself based upon the eponymous book which purported to chronicle the supposedly true real life adventures of African explorer and guide 'Trader' Horn, the 1973 takes a detour into H. Rider Haggard and African Queen territory, with lost platinum mines and a World War One background.  It was clearly intended to evoke memories of classic African adventures like King Solomon's Mines and even Edgar rice Burroughs' Tarzan.

With a decent budget and production values, Trader Horn might well have been a success and have kick started the big budget action/adventure genre, something that would have to wait a few years more and the arrival of Star Wars.  But, at some point, MGM got cold feet - the budget was slashed and the scope of the film drastically scaled back.  Instead of location shooting in Africa, most of the footage ended up being shot on the MGM backlot and other nearby Californian locations.  All of the exotic African 'flavour' was provided by stock footage taken from earlier colour MGM African escapades, most notably King Solomon's Mines (1950) and Mogambo (1953).  Which meant that the costumes and hairstyles of the main characters had to be matched to those worn by the leads in those films in order for long shots from them to be incorporated with the new footage.  (There's a scene where female lead Ann Heywood gets her hair tangled in some bramble-like bushes which exists purely as an excuse for her character's hair to be cut shorter, to match long shots of Deborah Kerr in King Solomon's Mines).  The overall result is, unsurprisingly, somewhat underwhelming, with the pace, plot and action sequences of the new footage effectively being dictated by the availability of suitable stock footage.  Consequently, the pace is languid and the style flat and TV movie-like.  It doesn't help that many of the sets and locations are overly familiar from previous MGM films and TV series, (many would continue to be used for years to come - the main house set, for instance, later provided the interior of Mr Roarke's house in Fantasy Island).  MGM's downgrading of the project is even evident in the choice of director: Rexa Badiyi, a prolific TV director who, most importantly, had also created many notable TV opening title montage sequences, (most famously that for Hawaii Five-O), making him the ideal choice to piece together from variously sourced footage this montage of a film.  Not a commercial success, it is hardly surprising that MGM seemingly did its best to bury the film following its initial release.  I actually have a suspicion, bearing in mind my age when I first saw it on TV, that it might not even have had a UK cinematic release, instead going direct to TV.  The cast try valiantly to make something of the movie, but they can never lift it above the level of a TV movie.  The aspect to be appreciated, however, is the skill with which the stock footage is integrated with the new, which is far above average in terms of cut-and-paste filmmaking.

(Trader Horn shouldn't, of course, be confused with Trader Hornee (1970), a porn movie that came out three years earlier and was actually a parody of the original 1931 Trader Horn). 

Passport to Pissington?

As for those idiots in that twee little English village - Pissington, or whatever the fuck it is called -  who have unilaterally declared themselves as an 'independent' state that has left the UK - what a bunch of utter tossers.  All because they don't like the idea of a nearby former military base being used to house asylum seekers.  Not actually in their village, you note, but several miles away. What, do they think that there'll be a nasty smell which might waft their way?  Racist bastards!  But what else should we expect of middle class Middle England, who derive all of their 'opinions' from the Daily Mail, The Express and GB News?  They're terrified of anything that isn't like them - white, well off, insulated and privileged - which might threaten their cosy existence.  Already, though, they've found that aligning yourself with the 'Stop the Boats' brigade will result in an invasion of your village by characters far more undesirable than immigrants - in this case racist boot boys in the shape of that arse who calls himself 'Tommo' and likes to try and intimidate RNLI staff as they try to do their jobs.  Like most of these would be 'hard men' of the extreme right, he has convictions for violence, in his case domestic violence, indicating that he's not just a racist, but a wife beater as well.  It's like they say - lie down with dogs and you get fleas.  Or wife beaters.

Obviously, their declaration of 'independence' is utterly meaningless.  You can bet that they will still expect the police to turn up when 'Tommo' and his thugs turn up in force for one of their trademark violent 'protests', or for the local fire brigade to come and put out fires, even though, by 'opting out' of the UK, they'd no longer be paying for these services.  Likewise things like power, water, sewage and so on - they'd have to negotiate new contracts with providers for these services, doubtless being forced to pay a premium.  To be quite frank, I think that if they really want to cede from the UK then Andy Burnham should give them a taste of real independence by setting up a hard border around the village, demanding passports and visas if they want to enter the UK, with the prospect of being treated as illegal immigrants if they leave their village without going through border control with this documentation.  Plus, of course, all services originating outside the village - in the UK - should be suspended.  I doubt very much that the middle class bastards would last more than a few hours under these circumstances.  That's the trouble with such twee fantasies - they simply won't survive their first contact with reality.  As soon as the pillocks find that they can no longer get their groceries delivered, they'll be begging to rejoin the UK.

The Craziness That Keeps on Giving

Donald Trump undoubtedly is the crazy who just keeps on giving - as his latest lunatic ramblings confirm.  This time he's claiming that the triumphal arch he wants to erect in his own honour in Washington DC will actually be some kind of military defence installation, housing drones, sniper positions and lots of sniper ammunition.  The obvious question, obviously, is just who or what this installation is meant to be defending DC against?  Is Trump expecting Canada to invade some time soon?  (Actually, with so much of the US military tied up in his vanity war in Iran, that might not be a bad idea - Mark Carney really needs to give the idea of seizing the US Eastern seaboard serious consideration).  Or maybe he's expecting an attack from further afield - perhaps he's somehow pissed off some aliens who are now poised to land their flying saucers in DC.  But, in truth, we all know what this is really about: let's face it, snipers and drones aren't going to repel any kind of invading army, but they could be deployed against large scale civilian protests.  And that's what Trump is afraid of - a popular uprising against him.  Probably when he refuses to leave office in 2028.  This time, of course, it wouldn't be a case of refusing to accept an election result, as he can't stand again, but of refusing to accept the Constitution.  Which he already has form for.

Sure, we also know that this nonsense about drones and snipers is pure fantasy - at best, another spurious attempt to justify the expense of building that monstrous edifice to his vanity - but it provides a valuable insight into the workings of his fevered mind.  He's running scared - the end of his presidency and the power and protection it gives him is in sight, with the likelihood that Congress will soon be controlled by his opponents even sooner. All of which makes him far more dangerous, more likely to start not just saying, but actually doing, even crazier stuff than he already is.  Let's face it, he's just itching to declare a state of emergency within the US and impose martial law and by all accounts is obsessed with the idea of deploying a nuclear against one of the US' enemies, (with Iran being the most likely target right now).  The recent poll which suggests that the majority of Americans would support his removal from office via either impeachment or the 25th Amendment, (they were slightly less keen on a military coup but pretty ambivalent about him dying in office of natural causes), probably isn't going to help Trump's mindset much, either.  (Interestingly, despite the number of alleged attempts against him, assassination wasn't an option, so we just don't know how Americans feel about the idea of a modern day Lee Harvey Oswald offing the fat bastard).  Heartening though it is to see US citizens finally grasping what the rest of us have known for years - that they have elected a dangerous madman to the highest office in the land - the trouble with all of these scenarios (including assassination), barring, possibly, the military coup - is that they would simply deliver a J D Vance presidency.  Which isn't necessarily an improvement - at least with Trump you know he's simply a demented and dangerous old man, but a snide, two-faced, slippery God-botherer like Vance is a potentially far more difficult prospect to deal with.