Category: Viral

The 2019-20 NBA season did not end the way Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Milwaukee Bucks wanted, but on an individual level, this campaign will end the same as the last for the reigning league MVP. According to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, Antetokounmpo has been named the NBA’s Most Valuable Player for the second year in a row, adding to his personal trophy case for the second time this year — the Greek Freak was also named the league’s Defensive Player of the Year.

Per Marc Stein of the New York Times, the official announcement is coming a little later this afternoon, but even before news of Antetokounmpo’s second consecutive coronation became official, it was hard to see anyone beating him for this award. For how good LeBron James was during the 2019-20 season, Antetokounmpo was flat-out dominant, averaging career-best marks in scoring (29.5 a game) and rebounding (13.6 a night) while pitching in 5.6 assists, a steal, and a block per game. The cut-off for MVP voting was before the NBA’s COVID-19 hiatus in March, and in that time, Antetokounmpo led the Bucks to a league-best 53-12 record.

With the win, Antetokounmpo becomes the 12th player to win consecutive MVP awards, and the first since Steph Curry went back-to-back in the 2014-15 and 2015-16 seasons. It is unclear whether Antetokounmpo won this award unanimously, something that only Curry has accomplished.

Jon Hamm has adopted a new rescue dog, and sadly, he didn’t name his new pooch “Dog Draper,” but it’s still a heartwarming tale.

According to the non-profit animal welfare group I Stand With My Pack, at only four months old, Splash was abandoned twice at a shelter by would-be adopters over the summer because he had “too much puppy energy.” The welfare group stepped in to find a good home for the boisterous pup, and man, did they knock it out of the park. After being contacted by the group, Hamm scooped up Splash who now “lives a fairy tale life,” according to an Instagram post from I Stand With My Pack:

Considering Hamm’s history of advocating for rescue dog adoption, and his emotional heartbreak when his beloved dog Cora died, Splash is in good hands. You can also see videos of the good boy’s puppy energy that made him too much of a handful for lesser mortals than the handsome Mad Men star below:

Splash isn’t the only thing that Hamm has rescued lately. The actor recently signed on to to be the latest leading man to revive the classic Fletch series made popular by Chevy Chase in the ’80s. Hamm and Superbad director Greg Mottola have a reboot ready to go at Miramax, and this time, Fletch might actually happen. Here’s the official synopsis:

In a mysterious chain of wild events, Fletch finds himself in the middle of multiple murders — one of which pins him as a prime suspect. While on a quest to prove his innocence, Fletch is tasked with finding his fiancée’s stolen art collection, the only inheritance she’s acquired after her father goes missing and is presumed dead. Zev Borow, consulting producer of the Lethal Weapon TV series, will be penning the feature adaptation.

Here’s hoping they’ll film near a nice park for Splash.

(Via I Stand With My Pack on Instagram)

Donald Trump has been threatening to ban TikTok in the US for some time now, and it looks like that is getting closer to actually happening. Today (September 18), the Trump administration said it will ban downloads of the app (and WeChat) starting Sunday, September 20 due to national security and data privacy concerns regarding the Chinese-owned companies behind the apps.

During an appearance on Fox Business Network, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said his office will order a full ban of the app, not just on new downloads from app stores, by November 12. He noted, however, that discussions for a deal that would include data safeguards could give American TikTok users continued access to the platform.

A press release from the US Department Of Commerce notes that after the weekend, “Any provision of service to distribute or maintain the WeChat or TikTok mobile applications, constituent code, or application updates through an online mobile application store in the US” will be prohibited.

TikTok general manager Vanessa Pappas has addressed the news in a response to Instagram head Adam Mosseri. In response to a potentially misleading headline, Mosseri tweeted, “Careful with this headline, the ban is only of *new downloads* of TikTok, an outright ban will happen on 11/12 unless a deal is made. I’ve said this before, but a US TikTok ban would be quite bad for Instagram, Facebook, and the internet more broadly.” Pappas them chimed in, “We agree that this type of ban would be bad for the industry. We invite Facebook and Instagram to publicly join our challenge and support our litigation. This is a moment to put aside our competition and focus on core principles like freedom of expression and due process of law.”

While not strictly a music app, TikTok has had an undeniable impact on the music industry, helping hits like Doja Cat’s “Say So” and Drake’s “Toosie Slide” to immense popularity.

NBA fans will probably look back at this middle part of Giannis Antetokounmpo’s career with intrigue when he finally wins a championship. Let’s be honest: Even after two straight early exits, the odds favor Giannis one day raising the Larry O’Brien trophy, meaning the way we look at Giannis has to be through the lens of how that happens as opposed to whether he breaks through. Things around Giannis will certainly change between now and then, but the past two years have shown that ultimately, Giannis Antetokounmpo, for all his brilliance, needs to keep improving for the Bucks to become champions.

There’s more fun in imagining the system a new coach might run or what type of Eric Bledsoe trade could put the Bucks over the top, but Giannis is arcing up the same learning curve many NBA stars have traversed over time. LeBron James had to round out his offensive game as a shooter and post play-maker before becoming a champion. Michael Jordan had to bulk up, outwit the Bad Boys, and learn to trust his teammates. Greatness has a way of tricking us into blaming those who don’t have it, but greatness is also a spectrum. Giannis is great, but he needs to be better.

That means that until Giannis puts together a signature postseason performance, his shortcomings will always be a major reason why — right alongside any other player’s performance or the decisions made by the team’s various coaches and executives — the Bucks do not win.

Milwaukee built its team around what Giannis is great at. They averaged the shortest offensive possessions in the league in large part because they had basketball’s best fast-break finisher and one of its best turnover creators. Those turnovers were most often created because the Bucks deployed Brook Lopez as a deterrent at the rim and let their wings fly around the court, because that’s what Giannis is best at. Nearly three-quarters of their shots came from the most valuable spots on the court — the rim and the three-point line — which ranked seventh in the NBA. They got to their spots by incorporating Giannis as a drive-and-kick giant, a screener, and a post player. Without a great point guard, Giannis has had to become a chameleon on offense, even if it’s obvious he’s best around the basket.

The soon-to-be two-time MVP’s stat line in nine Bubble playoff games — 27 points, 14 rebounds, and six assists a night — hide the disappointment of his performance. Giannis clearly learned a few lessons from the Raptors’ suffocating six-game dismantling of Milwaukee last year, as he was more comfortable launching from three and more aggressive creating his own shot against Miami, but one thing was unchanged. When the Bucks couldn’t get an easy shot in transition, Giannis could not consistently create good shots for himself and his teammates to match the Heat’s scoring. The Bucks’ game plan was stifled pretty easily. Because of their roster makeup and dedication to to their scheme, Milwaukee needed Giannis to be otherworldly to reach its ceiling and he just wasn’t.

To be fair, the Heat in particular were a difficult matchup for Giannis and the Bucks because of Bam Adebayo, one of the only players in the NBA capable of matching Giannis’ length and athleticism. But the Heat front office also deserves credit for quietly building a stable of forwards who are functionally strong, a long-underrated quality among NBA defenders and one that is vital to contain Giannis. From Adebayo to Andre Iguodala to Jae Crowder to Jimmy Butler, the Heat were able to throw a variety of defenders at Giannis who were all able to match his physicality.

Giannis’ go-to move in the half court is simply to lower his shoulder, create space by ramming into his defender, and then hit them with a spin move or euro-step for an easy layup or a kick-out to beat a rotating defense. Because he is still not an elite ball-handler and doesn’t throw teammates open like the NBA’s best passers, defenses can home in on his drives. Miami was ready to do so, and they were happy giving him space for the first step, knowing they’d corral him and force either a turnover or a contested shot.

In a surprising Game 1 defeat, Giannis tallied six turnovers because of Miami’s aggressive stunting and his reliance on his inside scoring game against a Heat team that stonewalled him in the paint.

By Game 3, Giannis did adjust, and was able to get the ball on the move in more advantageous situations, but the Heat were ready for that, too. Not only did he go 0-7 from deep, he was inefficient all over the court and was flummoxed by Miami’s ability to show multiple defenders as he drove to the rim.

It looked as if Giannis was seeing ghosts. Miami pulled him all the way out of his comfort zone, forcing him into errant threes and even more puzzling fallaway jumpers and pull-ups inside the arc. The Greek Freak looked troublingly mortal through no fault of anyone but himself.

Obviously, there are issues that go beyond Antetokounmpo — the overall construction of the team, Mike Budenholzer’s startling rotations that every single person tabbed as an issue after Game 1, and the fact that the players just did not rise to the occasion as a collective. Milwaukee generated the third-best expected effective field goal percentage in the playoffs yet had just the seventh-best actual efficiency. In other words, they missed shots they should have made, and it was felt even harder after a regular season in which the inverse was true, and the Bucks out-performed their expected efficiency and had the highest effective field-goal percentage in the NBA. A coach’s job with the offense is to create advantages for his players, and there are hundreds of ways to do that. But a star’s job is to take that in and adjust to what he sees on the floor, and where Budenholzer missed, Giannis couldn’t make up for it like he could in the regular season.

The challenge is not unique to Giannis. It’s not as if Frank Vogel is reinventing basketball in Los Angeles, but LeBron James always has a secondary plan. Kawhi Leonard can get to his spot and make shots in isolation whenever he wants (albeit, Denver did a great job of making his life difficult late in their series to bounce the Clippers). Even the shooting-averse Jimmy Butler was able to take and make more jumpers against Milwaukee’s conservative defense in the second round.

To get to the next level, Giannis probably needs to focus less on the outside, where he made just 32.5 percent of his threes, and more about how to be excellent inside. Miami’s defensive pressure exposed that he has still not made the leap as a passer that we’re seeing from Jayson Tatum this postseason. At the same time, Giannis made just 7-19 shots from the restricted circle to the free-throw line in the playoffs. For all his improvements as a finisher, defender, post player and transition killer, Giannis now is largely an elite version of the long-limbed Greek Freak who entered the league in 2013, but there isn’t much new polish to his game. In two straight postseasons, Giannis has not had the capacity to adjust. Adding some effective counters to his head down, attacking the rim style — such as a floater or short midrange pull-up as defenders back up to set up the wall at the restricted area — would make it much more difficult to scheme him out of effectiveness.

Superstars define the playoffs, and so far Giannis has not proven himself up to the task. It is why he has not competed for a championship yet and also why it will be so fascinating to watch as he improves and eventually gets there. Milwaukee’s roster options, Giannis’ contract situation, and Budenholzer’s job status will dominate the offseason dialogue around Milwaukee, but in the end, it will all come back to whether Giannis can adjust to the teams that have outwitted him the past two years and excise his postseason woes.

The 2020 Emmys are nearly upon us and the most cutthroat category this year might just be the Best Supporting Actor in a Drama race.

That’s because three members of the Roy family are vying for that statue and, like their Succession alter-egos, they’ll do anything to come out on top – or to top from the bottom, really, who knows with this show. Of course, the actual actors – Kieran Culkin, Matthew Macfayden, and Nicholas Braun – seem like lovely gentlemen who would never debase themselves by giving in to the heady temptation of competition but their counterparts certainly would so we’re going to predict the winner of this dick-swinging contest the only way a Roy would respect: by indulging the fragile ego of our inner frat bro.

That’s right, we’re getting in the mud and deciding this thing Boar on the Floor-style. The only rule? There are no rules (though we do recommend chanting “Boar on the Floor” while reading the rest of this nonsense to really tap into the Stalin-esque spirit of it all).

Round 1

Tom Wambsgans / Matthew Macfayden

The first piggie to oink for his sausage is the “C*nt of Monte Cristo” himself. Mr. Shiv Roy had a rollercoaster of a season, negotiating an open-marriage with his wife on their honeymoon, learning Shiv had become Logan’s new heir apparent, ascending the ATN ranks only to walk his top news anchor through an awkward “Are You a Neo-Nazi” questionnaire – and that’s before company-wide lockdowns, embarrassing dinner party games, and a D.C. trial sucked his balls clean out of his sack. He’s not the most outwardly aggressive of his competitors, but Tom did eventually stand up for himself near the end of season two, and Macfayden played his gradual transformation quietly enough that the simple act of robbing Logan Roy of his fried chicken drumstick sent shockwaves through the fandom.

It’s a tricky magic act to pull off, especially when you’re trying to keep a sopping wet blanket like Tom afloat amidst a sea of vicious, bloodthirsty sharks like the Roy family. Out of everyone on the show, Tom might’ve shown the most growth in season two, even though he was constantly sh*t on by his wife and her siblings. And Macfayden managed to bring some much-needed awareness to forgotten STD’s with this zinger: “You don’t hear much about syphilis these days. Very much the Myspace of STDs.” And he did it with a straight face.

Current Position: On the floor, full-heartedly oinking. He’s murdered Carl, but no one really cares because he’s just so good at looking pathetic.

Cousin Greg Gregory / Nicholas Braun

The next Roy ready to claw his way out of this bag of live raccoons and to the Emmys (virtual) stage is the sweetest, most beautiful Ichabod Crane f*ck that’s ever graced our TV screens. Cousin Greg, or Gregory as he now wishes to be called, also went through a transformation in season two. He got a haircut and a promotion, he committed his first successful act of blackmail, he was pelted with water bottles during a tense moment of “executive-level business,” he became a cocaine dealer, then addict, and he performed word Jiu-jitsu during a Senate hearing. Greg, like Tom, is a social pariah but he so effectively hides his inner sleaze-ball that we’re normally left with the uncontrollable urge to stuff his beanstalk frame into our average-sized arms and shield him from the sh*t tornado that’s sure to destroy his chosen family.

Greg — and by extension, Braun — had a couple of things going for him this season. He’s beloved by the fans because he’s able to convince us he’s really just an aww-shucks guy who’d be happy with a $5 million inheritance unlike the rest of these greedy maggot-pies and he spends most of the season finding ways to fight back in his toxic relationship with Tom. He did manage to negotiate and then reluctantly blackmail his business boyfriend into an open relationship during the middle of a live-shooter situation, so that has to count for something, right?

Current position: This fungus-ridden piglet is hopped up on cocaine and the stretch of Braun’s limbs rivals Reed Richards. He’s here to play.

Roman Roy / Kieran Culkin

Our third and final contestant has entered the arena and you’re higher than Techno Gatsby pre-bed-shitting if you think this slime puppy isn’t going to risk it all for some recognition. Roman started this season – this show, really – as a bit of a train wreck. Well, a train wreck would imply something happened to make him go off the rails but we’re pretty sure “f*cked up little weasel” is in his actual DNA. No, Romulus is like a tiny dog, one of those constantly yapping kinds, who goes around humping everything in sight. It’s gross and funny at the same time, but eventually, after a few minutes of watching it rail a stuffed teddy bear in the face, the illusion that this cute, fluffy little being is anything more than an animal ruled by its base instincts shatters and you just want a shower.

That’s what it’s like watching Roman Roy inch his way closer to his father’s right hand this season. He makes a valiant effort at playing it straight, mingling with the common folk, dressing up in Dirk Turkey costumes, and pretending to give a sh*t about his dad’s company, but it’s all a show. What Roman really wants is love – I mean, more money and power wouldn’t hurt either, but yeah, love. He’s willing to do anything – sacrifice his brother, endure physical abuse from his dad, shrug off a failed space launch with some cringe-worthy rocket scientist jokes – in order to be accepted and respected by his family members. The problem, one that Culkin illustrates beautifully throughout the second season, is that Roman is hardwired to self-destruct. He can’t help but tie his own noose, so even when he’s making strides in terms of his career ambitions – like surviving a tense hostage situation – or his personal relationships – like his budding mommy kink exchange with Gerri – eventually, it’s all going to come crashing down.

Current position: Roman’s already accepted the fact that no amount of anti-bacterial gel will wipe the America off of him, so he’s not afraid to get dirty and because there is no line separating Kieran and his character, the two are now interchangeable.

Round 2

Wambsgans / Macfayden

You can’t make a Tomlette without breaking a few Gregs so Macfayden’s going for the jugular. Is Braun’s character really a supporting player in this game or is he just Matthew Macfayden’s glorified fluffer? Who deserves that gold-plated figurine? The man who says “Latte Me” or the boy who runs to get the latte?

Cousin Greg Gregory / Braun

The claws are out. Braun doesn’t want them to be. He hates to use this leverage, but he’s got principles guys and he’s starting to figure out the meaning of the term “self-respect” so here it goes: Toms Wambsgans swallowed his own load. Is that who you want representing you, Television Academy voters? An actor who can successfully convince you he swishes his own spunk like milky mouthwash?

Roman / Keiran

Kieran’s amped up on adrenaline and the knowledge that no one’s going to give a f*ck about how cute Macaulay was as a kid this holiday season because the pandemic will delay the release of Christmas. Worse, he actually believes he can win this. But not by sitting back and hoping Braun and Macfayden rip each other to shreds (or give in to their white-hot sexual tension). No, he’s a man of action, so here’s a list of all of the ways Roman was a good boy this season: He bought a sports team for his daddy (it wasn’t the team he liked but that really shouldn’t factor into this); he did some backdoor dealing to make the Pierce negotiation go through (turns out he torpedoed it by going off-script but again, no relevance here); he survived a hostage situation by playing a crude game of F*ck, Marry, Kill with his bros; he stood up for Kendall when he was on the chopping block; and he showed just a hint of vulnerability when he proposed to marry Gerri (or kidnap her, or consume her flesh, it’s really all the same). See what a good boy Roman was. A very good, very naughty, dirty boy. And didn’t Kieran play him so well? Don’t you secretly believe he jacked off in that bathroom scene? DON’T YOU?!

Round 3

Wamsbgans / Macfayden

Not only did Tom eat Logan’s fried chicken, he told Shiv he thinks he’s unhappy most of the time like two minutes before. Who else but Macfayden could pull off that kind of emotional whiplash in the same episode? Your move, Greg.

Cousin Greg Gregory / Braun

Gregory said he touched Bill Gates and Braun made us all believe that was actually worthy of a humblebrag. And that’s after we all collectively realized big tech was destroying our society. Braun could brainwash us into thinking Mark Zuckerberg was a chill dude to playing Animal Crossing with and we’d buy it hook, line, and sinker. He’s a talented, clever little minx and his body looks like the human equivalent of the Wacky Wavy Tube Man. It’s truly neck and neck.

Roman / Kieran

Roman emotionally matured enough throughout the season to recognize his own trauma and Kieran laughs like a hyena which is, oddly, adorable. He’s the perverted, vile, misbehaving sex symbol America deserves right now.

Final Round

Wambsgans / Macfayden

But Tom filibustered that Senate hearing with his sheer stupidity by refusing to acknowledge he even knew a Gregory Hirsch, and Macfayden pulled that off even though Braun was sitting right behind him in the scene. The cahones on this dude. And, he didn’t want to have to play this card, but you all know how horny you’ve been for Mr. Darcy during this quarantine, and it’s not the Colin Firth version that’s been tickling your naughty bits.

Cousin Greg Gregory / Braun

Gregory’s tired. The moral depths he’s sunk to in order to survive this cabal of baby-feasting jackals has left his oversized frame so fatigued, even “doin the old cocaine” won’t help. And Braun’s got another alt-rock ballad to perform. He reneges with a profound Grexit speech: “If it is to be said so it is.”

Roman / Kieran

Kieran lost interest in this game before it even began. He just stayed in it to facilitate the implosion of Tom and Greg’s bromance because he loves destroying things that are good and he wants to see Macfayden and Braun at each other’s throats. If he loses, he’ll claim the whole show was rigged. If he wins, he’ll brush it off as some circle-jerk door prize that doesn’t really mean anything before changing his Twitter bio to something unbearably pretentious and gifting the statue to the dude who plays Frank, telling him to use it as an anal dildo or something.

Wambsgans / Macfayden

Congratulations Macfayden, you play a blubbering, clay-brained codpiece so well, we’re hoping you win an Emmy for it.

Chicago soul singer Jamila Woods is a year removed from her critically hailed album Legacy! Legacy! and appears ready to begin releasing new music, starting with the sultry, NSFW video for new single “Sula (Hardcover).” Channeling ethereal soul stars of decades past like Erykah Badu and Nina Simone, Jamila’s latest finds her ruminating over the nature of love and life as a young, Black woman. She seems to weigh her options between “freedom” and motherhood, love and sex, and criticizes the world for limiting her options.

The video revolves around some “secret garden” imagery, as Woods begins the clip wandering the neighborhood until she comes to a locked garden gate. Opening it, she reveals a curated wonderland of knick knacks and heirlooms evoking old cultural traditions. Photos of Woods’ musical inspirations adorn bookcases and shelves bearing books like The Souls Of Black Folks and she luxuriates in their presence before stripping down to her birthday suit. Remember Erykah Badu’s “Window Seat” video? It’s a lot like that, but from the front.

“Sula (Hardcover)” is a remix of “Sula (Paperback),” the single Woods released in August inspired by Toni Morrison. Where the song originally had a softer, simpler composition, here, it’s built-up and percussive, illustrating exactly the versatile qualities Woods sings about in the lyrics.

Watch Jamila Woods’ “Sula” video above.

On the new episode of Indiecast, Steven Hyden and Ian Cohen make the argument that Deerhunter might be the last great American indie band. It’s an interesting claim for sure, but one that makes more and more sense as the discussion continues. It all starts when the duo is digging deep into the band’s 2010 album Halcyon Digest in celebration of its tenth anniversary, when Hyden and Cohen reveal that Deerhunter is the last band in the true sense of the word: an entity that exists as a collective, rather than an identity that’s actually driven by one person.

The Atlanta band marks an interesting divide between the indie bands of the aughts and those of the 2010’s. The aughts had full-fledged bands like The Strokes, Interpol, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Grizzly Bear, Animal Collective. The biggest names in 2010s indie, on the other hand, are more of a solo project with a backing band, with projects like Car Seat Headrest, Snail Mail, Soccer Mommy, and Mitski all revolving around one creative personality.

In this week’s Recommendation Corner, we have Lomelda’s impressive new album Hannah and Jeff Tweedy’s forthcoming book How To Write One Song.

New episodes of Indiecast drop every Friday. Listen to Episode 8 below and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts here. Stay up to date and follow us on Instagram and Twitter.

Anybody who knows anything about Drake is fully aware that the rapper is a huge basketball fan. He had the time of his life during the Toronto Raptors’ championship parade in 2019, and he got himself a personalized championship ring worth more than an annual salary at a high-paying job. Drake has been known to play ball himself from time to time (like a run he had with Justin Bieber and Quavo earlier this year), and that includes the Sanctuary Basketball League, his recreational league.

The league championship recently went down (on Drake’s literal home court at his Toronto mansion), and his team came out ahead. Naturally, Drake did some celebrating, and it went above and beyond the conclusions of most rec. leagues: There was confetti, champagne, championship shirts, championship hats, and a raised platform in front of a media wall.

Drake actually got in a bit of a beef after the league finals. Everyday Struggle co-host Wayno commented on Drake’s celebration, “Of course he won the championship in his gym lol.” Drake fired back, “U love to chat about next man ur a nerd.” Wayne responded, “I’m the nerd? nah Gz you just bothered by anything, imagine being bothered after winning a championship.”

Ultimately, this could be the most notable basketball championship in Toronto this year, as the Raptors are fresh off a loss to the Celtics in a back-and-forth seven-game series.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe expanded on Thursday when it was announced that “Alison Brie-type” Tatiana Maslany will play She-Hulk in an upcoming Disney+ series. The Orphan Black star has yet to respond to the news, and neither Marvel nor Disney have made it official, but Mark Ruffalo, ever the rebel, went ahead and congratulated his “cuz.”

Ruffalo, who’s played Bruce Banner/the Hulk in the MCU since 2012, tweeted, “Welcome to the family, cuz!” Maslany’s Jennifer Walters/She-Hulk is Bruce’s cousin, who becomes the not-so-jolly green giant after Bruce gives her a blood transfusion. Marvel describes the family members as being “close allies. Though they come to blows on a few occasions, for the most part they are fierce allies with strong family ties. Jennifer is one of the few to understand the Hulk and his plight.” Family, am I right?

She-Hulk now has a star (Maslany), a director (Kat Coiro), and a showrunner (Jessica Gao), but can we expect a cameo from Ruffalo? “There’s some talk about it, but it’s all kind of preliminary,” he said earlier this year. “It would be nice to see Banner, Hulk, Professor, somebody show up to help and to guide or be a gentle guiding presence of She-Hulk as a friend.” Hulk should bring along my dude Korg along, too. He and She-Hulk would get along swimmingly. (Can a Hulk swim? Save that for season two.)

In June 2018, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez handily defeated a 10-year incumbent in the Democratic primary for New York’s 14th congressional district. That sparked discussion of a party shift toward embracing Democratic Socialism, which must have struck fear into the heart of Tucker Carlson, given AOC’s immense popularity. Well, Carlson soon found himself on-air admitting that he’s not opposed to basic principles of Democratic Socialism during a discussion with Harvard professor and philosopher Cornel West. Given that Carlson’s been behaving in a particularly virulent manner lately — including how he’s defended the Kenosha vigilante teen murderer because of the “property rights” often championed by the far-right (like people are really trying to take those rights away) — the 2018 clip has now resurfaced.

This clip is part of a larger discussion of DNC Chair Tom Perez’s characterization of AOC as the future of the Democratic party. Carlson seemed concerned the “radical left” is going “mainstream,” and he asked West to appear on air to explain the movement. Carlson, of course, cited the failure of Venezuela, and he wished to explore whether Democratic Socialism was aggressively picking away at the Democratic party. West, who is a leading member of the Democratic Socialists of America, explained that, yes, there are different forms of the branch around the world, some successful and some not.

In this mini-clip that’s now circulating anew, West needed less than a minute to boil down the essence of his argument.

“The fundamental commitment is to the dignity of ordinary people and to make sure they can live lives of decency,” West explained. “It is not an ‘ism,’ brother. It’s about decency, it’s about fairness and it’s about the accountability of the powerful.”

Carlson’s response? “If that is what democratic socialism is, then I am basically on board,” he said. “I do think that ordinary people, middle class people, ought to have dignity. And I think that our current systems make it hard for them to have dignity.”

Since 2020 is such a dumpster fire (and Tucker’s making a spectacle of himself lately by blaming Lindsey Graham for Trump dishing on his COVID lies), it’s not too surprising to see that this clip is circulating afresh. And people dig it.

Happy Friday, everyone.