Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, current leader Neon Vincent, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Doctor RJ, Magnifico, annetteboardman and Man Oh Man. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) wader, planter, JML9999, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse, ek hornbeck, ScottyUrb, Interceptor7, BentLiberal, Oke and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
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From the A.V. Club: It’s Rumor Time: Dancing With The Stars might be trying to lure in Sean Spicer
What do you do when you’ve failed out of the biggest job of your career, in what might be the most high-profile way humanly possible? If rumors currently swirling around soon-to-be former White House press secretary Sean Spicer are to be believed, you might just slap on your dancing shoes and get ready to cut a rug on national TV.
Spicer is reportedly in talks with a number of TV networks looking to cash in on his weirdly hypnotic brand of blustery anti-charisma (and connection to Donald Trump), with the presumed hope that he’d end up on the usual roster of TV news talking heads after he leaves his job in August. The weirdest offer, though, apparently came from the reality show masterminds at ABC, who are rumored to be attempting to lure ol’ Spicey in to appear on Dancing With The Stars. Presumably, the producers have watched Spicer’s various evasions, dodges, and bizarre leaps of logic from the press room podium and decided, “He’s a natural.”
Now, this is all per The New York Post’s Page Six column, which tends to fall into the “Interesting if true” category of credibility. So we probably shouldn’t let the irresistible image of Spicer, red-faced and choking on a fist-sized wad of cinnamon gum as he attempts to execute a pirouette, seduce us into believing this beautiful nightmare might come to pass. For the record, the man himself—and the show’s masters at ABC—have both issued a “no comment” on his potential casting.
From The Hill: Dems don’t want to help GOP improve repeal bill
Leadership and liberal senators have voiced concerns about supporting GOP amendments that would move the bill toward the middle and potentially help Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) pick up key moderates he will ultimately need if he wants to get a healthcare bill through the Senate.
Pressed about the potential tightrope, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) predicted that Democrats would “take it one amendment at a time,” but wouldn’t want to inadvertently help a bill that nixes large swaths of the Affordable Care Act clear the upper chamber.
“I’m not interested in doing anything to help this bill pass. We always have the opportunity to offer side-by-sides. We’ll have a lot of amendments. I’m sure they’ll have a lot of amendments,” he said.
From the Washington Post: Sanders tries to turn page, but press sparring continues
Sarah Huckabee Sanders made her solo debut as the new White House press secretary on Wednesday, starting a new chapter at the podium with her signature combination of motherly scolding and practiced folksy charm.
Seeking a reset following months of contentious relations between reporters and President Donald Trump’s press office, Sanders began on a personal note, noting her status as the first mother to hold the position and talking about how she hoped to be a role model for her daughter and kids across the country.
“We’re looking to mix things up a little bit. From time to time, I’d like to give us all a little reminder of why we’re here every day, which I imagine, for most of us, is because we love our country and want to make it better,” she said, asking the press to “to indulge me, and let me tell you a little bit about what that means for me.”
From Rolling Stone: Is he the free world's best hope?
Let's begin by synchronizing our watches. We are in the Eastern time zone.
The legislative session is over, and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is about to give his wrap-up press conference. The reporters trudge into the gallery, grumbling, as reporters like to do, about traffic and editors. Someone gives the "10 seconds" signal, and Trudeau strides to the podium. He gives a nod and starts ticking off his accomplishments. The first is self-praise for cutting taxes on the middle class and raising them on the one percent. "We've given nine out of 10 families more money each month to help with the costs of raising their kids," Trudeau says.
It's strange to witness: He speaks in a modulated, indoor voice. His dark hair is a color found in nature. At home, there is a glamorous wife and three photogenic children, still not old enough to warm his seat at next week's G-20 summit or be involved in an espionage scandal.
From Collider: The Final ‘Game of Thrones’ Scripts Have Already Been Written; Season 8 Premiere Date TBD
While we’re all wrapped up in the seventh and penultimate season of Game of Thrones, HBO is hard at work prepping the final season. In fact, the final six scripts have already been written. But when will we see them? That’s a little less certain.
Earlier this year, we learned that Benioff and Weiss are penning the scripts for the final four episodes with Dave Hill writing the season premiere and Bryan Cogmanwriting Episode 2. During HBO’s panel at the Television Critics Association press tour, network programming president Casey Bloys revealed that the final season of Game of Thrones has already been written and showrunner D.B. Weiss and David Benioff are in the process of storyboarding the episodes to determine how long the Season 8 shoot will need to be. “It’s a big season,” saidBloys. “They’re trying to get a sense of how long it’s going to take them to shoot this.”
That means Bloys doesn’t yet know if Game of Thrones will conclude in 2018 or if the final season will have to be pushed back to 2019. Season 7 was pushed back from the series traditional spring debut to a mid-summer premiere in order to accommodate filming. This season’s episodes are already running longer than usual and sound designer Paula Fairfield recently told fans at Con of Thrones that the final six could end up with feature-length runtimes, so if that proves to be true, that could also factor into the equation. Bloys said the episode length is also still TBD.
From the A.V. Club: South Park raised a generation of trolls
South Park is, and always will be, funnier than any of the maladjusted creeps who have spent decades internalizing the show’s many false equivalencies and ironic racism, then lazily regurgitating them in an attempt to mimic its edginess—or worse, by treating them as some sort of scripture for living. And to be certain, there are millions of Poe’s law-defying viewers for whom South Park really is just a comedy, one that satisfies the most basic requirement of saying the things you shouldn’t say, in a far more clever way than you could say them. But regardless of their satirical intent, or the humanity that grounds even their nastiest attacks, it’s clear that even Parker and Stone sometimes question the influence they’ve had on the world, and who is and isn’t in on the joke.
Which brings us (as all 2017 articles must) to Donald Trump, the ultimate troll, and one that Parker sees as a natural outgrowth of South Park’s appeal to a nation bored with politeness. As he recently told the Los Angeles Times:
He’s not intentionally funny but he is intentionally using comedic art to propel himself. The things that we do—being outrageous and taking things to the extreme to get a reaction out of people—he’s using those tools. At his rallies he gets people laughing and whooping. I don’t think he’s good at it. But it obviously sells—it made him president.
Trump’s blithe offensiveness, rampant narcissism, and faith that everyone but him is stupid makes him a natural analog to Eric Cartman. But instead, South Park made him into Mr. Garrison—a decision that makes some logical sense (Mr. Garrison is of constitutional age, hates Mexicans and women, and doesn’t give a shit about anyone but himself), though it also felt a bit like dissembling. Nevertheless, as the election wore on, South Park again seemed to acknowledge its role in helping to create a world where someone like Trump could seem like an exciting, entertaining alternative to conventional blandness. And it made a real, concerted effort to stymie any suggestion of support by having Garrison declare repeatedly that he was “a sick, angry little man” who “will fuck this country up beyond repair,” all while openly mocking those who still loved him anyway as nostalgia-drunk idiots.