FRIDAY 'ROUND-THE-HORN.

Dan Hicks died this year, too, in case you needed  another reason to hate 2016.
•  WWC whisperer Salena Zito has done very well for herself by going amongst The Common People, and reporting back to readers why they think Trump Rulez. Now at the New York Post Zito reports her conversations with jes' plain Trumpkins on an Amtrak train (a proletarian non-Acela one, for only elites take Acela), specifically "Audrey and Robert, a Virginia couple... heading to Montana to visit their daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren," and "Edward of Lancaster, Pa... traveling to see his mother and brothers and sisters in Fort Wayne, Ind." She doesn't say what they do for a living, but from the way they talk I'd say they're in public relations, possibly for the Republican Party:

“On Nov. 8 I went from a responsible, hard-working, upstanding citizen to an uninformed bigot who gleefully supports Russian interference in our elections and the destruction of our republic,” Robert said. “At least that’s what I have read in the newspaper or seen on television, so it must be true, right?” 

Edward smiled, paused, and then said, “It is refreshing to hear your candor, it’s gotten to the point where you are afraid to not only express your opinion, but to stand by your opinion. Yes, I supported him and yes, I would do it again.”

It is refreshing to hear your candor, too, citizen! Zito also talks to a Clinton supporter and guess what, she eloquently regrets her vote and that her party is/are blaming things:

“It astounds me that the press still doesn’t get it, that my party (Democrats) are blaming everyone but themselves for a poor message, poor messenger and the responsibility she bears for placing her email security in jeopardy . . . it’s not Comey’s fault. It’s hers,” said Elizabeth who was sitting in the booth across the aisle.

Elizabeth voted for Clinton, but wasn’t sure she’d do so again. “The way everyone is acting now post-election shows that no one, no one, has learned anything. She is just proving she deserved to lose"...

Zito concludes that "people, even those who supported Clinton, are tired of Trump’s win being blamed on fake news, the Comey letter and the Russians," so stop talking about the so-called popular vote and Trump's insane post-election behavior because the Voice of America (all four of them) has/have spoken. Give Zito credit -- at least none of these Real People were cab drivers.

•  At National Review, Christian Toto finds a new category of Your Article is Very Bias journalism:

If you think liberal media bias is strictly an issue for the New York Times and the Washington Post, you haven’t looked at your average entertainment site lately. 

Nearly every major Hollywood news site leans left. It has been that way for some time, but in recent years it has gotten worse. The improbable rise of Donald Trump is hastening that shift. And, in an age when pop culture plays an increasing role in our body politic, that matters.

People in the arts don't like Trump -- why, that's as big a shock as Guns & Ammo not liking Obama. What examples ya got, Chris?

[The Hollywood Reporter’s Daniel Fienberg] also referred to former Daily Show host Jon Stewart as “the most trusted man in comedy news.” Trusted? Sure, liberals trust he’ll echo their worldview. What about the other half of the country? Doesn’t Fienberg have a duty to consider them?

And then there’s the recent news that Adam McKay signed up to shoot a movie based on former vice president Dick Cheney. Deadline.com broke the story but failed to mention McKay’s political leanings.

Well, stop my presses! Toto never gets around to explaining why this "matters," except for the already-classic You-Elites-Must-Now-Be-Nice-To-Tumpkins routine ("try to learn something from the election results"). But I suspect Toto's article isn't really meant as an exposé anyway so much as a long-copy Position Wanted ad.  I've written several times about Toto's shit, and discovered him a true child of Zhdanov, specializing in attacks on movies that don't flatter his political prejudices. He bylines himself here as a "conservative movie critic," so despite his whinging about bias in arts journalism you know "balance" is not his shtick -- but he's probably praying it's what some stupid publisher thinks is needed in the back of the book, and that will get Toto on a major pub as Counterpoint for your Very Bias. Till then he traipses the same sad circuit as Mark Gauvreau Judge and other culture warriors. That Rupert Murdoch can't loosen his pursestrings and buy these guys some columns in his publications is a pity -- or maybe the tricksiest Bias of all!