There's too much news. There's just too much news. Please…less news.

Carroll Pratt was one of those guys who adds laugh tracks to TV shows. Here, he's asked about the longest real laugh he ever "saw"…

Just got off the phone with a friend who called to ask, "What does this mean?" My reply: "Who the hell knows?" That's how this whole year has been. That's how this whole administration has been. One of the nine thousand things some of us dislike about Trump is how volatile everything is with him around. Things keep happening that make you say, "This has never happened before!" No precedents. No historical guidelines. And not much logic. Who'd have thought that a presidential candidate who bragged about planting unwelcome kisses on women and wanting to grab them by their privates would cause a lot of self-described Christians to say, "That's our guy!"?

It's been that way so long that a lot of us wake up and turn to the news to answer the constant question, "What's he done now?" There's too much Karma in this newest twist to even begin to unpack it. The man who mocked Joe Biden for wearing masks has tested positive for COVID-19 and so has his wife.

Or have they? I'm reticent to believe anything this man says.

My friend on the phone said, "I don't how to react." I told him, "You don't have to have a reaction now. You can wait a few days and see what kind of additional twists 'n' turns this story takes." It goes one way if tomorrow they test again and say "False positives!" It goes another if Trump and the First Lady make miraculous recoveries and yet another if they get sicker or if one of them gets sicker. And yet another depending on who else who's been around them gets it. And yet another if they infected others…

Do they cancel the debates? Who knows? This has never happened before.

Does this affect the ballots? Who knows? This has never happened before.

Whatever your reaction is, wait. It may be different tomorrow. Something will be. And it will never have happened before.

Speaking of the 1980 movie Fame (as I was the other day), here's the title song sung by Irene Cara and illustrated with clips from the film. Thanks to Gary Greenfield for pointing it out to me.

There were a lot of these "young people trying to become stars" movies and TV shows and this was the only one that felt kinda/sorta authentic to me…

Ever since I watched The Debate, I've had trouble getting my mind off it and into things I should be writing. Oh — and before I forget, I linked the other day here to the Washington Post fact-checker's fact-check on The Debate but there were so many false statements, he had to do a Part Two. Remember when Trump said "Many car companies came in from Germany, went to Michigan and went to Ohio"? Well, it turns out no car companies came in from Germany, went to Michigan and went to Ohio. There's a lot more of that and even some things Biden got wrong.

I am more and more buying into the theory, advanced elsewhere, that someone reminded Trump that Biden was once a stutterer and still occasionally has problems with it, and that Trump's main goal heading into The Debate was to harass and badger Biden into stuttering, thereby seemingly proving the smear that guys like Rudy Giuliani were spreading that Biden has serious dementia. Even Brit Hume of the Fox News Division — that's the news division, not the opinion division — was saying, pre-debate, that Biden was senile.

Okay, enough about that topic. I need to get my mind off it…though I am curious as to what the Commission on Presidential Debates will come up with when they say they'll be tinkering with the format of the remaining contests. Let's see…Trump will have to agree to any change and he'll say, "Why should I let them change the rules since I won so handily? They just want to help that loser, Sleepy Joe." He'll threaten to not appear if they change any rules but he's behind in the polls (and getting behinder) so he can't afford to lose those last two debates…very intriguing…

Were you wondering what Donald Trump and Joe Biden said to each other after the debate? No, I know you weren't but just play along so I can introduce this video for you. Here they are in the elevator after all that mud-wrestling, courtesy of Master Impressionist Jim Meskimen…

I think we could all use this song this morning. Here's my favorite one-man singing group Julien Neel with some changed lyrics but the message is the same as it ever was…

Countless online comments and articles today are suggesting that in subsequent debates, the Moderator should have a mute button of some sort to cut off the microphone of a debater who goes over his time limit and/or keeps interrupting. That might be nice but, first of all, the rules of these debates are drawn up in advance and all parties must agree to abide by them. Trump would never agree to that if only because his ideal world is one in which the office holders can silence the reporters, not the other way around.

Secondly: If Chris Wallace had had such a button last night and had used it, Trump would have gone right on ranting and his voice would have been picked-up by Biden's microphone and Biden would have heard him and been just as distracted. They weren't that far apart. And of course, Trump would have also gone off on how the proceedings were rigged against him. He's incapable of not complaining he's being mistreated.

Okay, I get it. You want to see them in little glass booths like on a quiz show and the Moderator can turn their microphones on and off. Good luck getting Trump to agree to that.

I agree it was a shitshow but that's the point. Trump turns everything into a shitshow. He's like the blind guy who always wants to plunge the room into darkness because he's used to functioning in that situation and others aren't. If you're good at screaming and bullying, you always want to create that environment. It gives you home court advantage. I don't think it's a bad thing that the world saw that last night.

This Friday evening, our pal Frank Ferrante is hosting a two-hour event to note the 130th birthday of Julius H. Marx, better known as Groucho. It's a good excuse to get together a buncha folks — including Dick Cavett, Leonard Maltin and Harpo's son Bill Marx — to talk about the man AKA Otis B. Driftwood, Rufus T. Firefly, Wolf J. Flywheel, J. Cheever Loophole, Dr. Hugo Z. Hackenbush and Captain Jeffrey Spaulding.

Why does this manner matter? Because he was funny and because he was irreverent and because he was influential and because he continues to matter. That's right: He matters because he continues to matter. Some of us will never let go of him. I'm sure Frank and his guests will have plenty to say about why. I'm just not sure he can keep it down to two hours.

Tune in to the Evening with Groucho Facebook Page this Friday at 4 PM PDT. And tell 'em Groucho I sent you.

A few days ago, I posted a link to an indiegogo campaign for a book some friends of mine are doing and I stand by that recommendation. However, it prompted a flurry of messages from good friends, casual friends and some total strangers asking — and in one or two cases, almost demanding — that I promote their book, event, video, project, whatever. I have had such flurries in the past and with each flurry, I get more and more annoyed.

When such requests some, they come in such volume that if I acquiesced to them all, this blog would have so much advertising that you wouldn't want to read it. Hell, I wouldn't want to read it.

It's annoying when strangers (or folks who barely know me) ask because I like to think I do this blog to entertain whoever happens by, not to sell them stuff. I've turned down a number of offers to "monetize" this blog by accepting paid advertising and/or putting it under the umbrella of some big, commercial website. I like the fact that it's no more commercial than the occasional cut I receive if you order something via one of my Amazon links.

And it's annoying when friends ask for that reason and because…well, sometimes my friends do things that I don't feel like recommending. That's awkward.

So please don't ask and don't send me photos and graphics that you want me to post to support your endeavor. I don't even plug my endeavors that much on this site. (I also have a general distrust of crowdfunding efforts, having been ripped-off by a number of them that sounded like they'd deliver what my credit card was charged for…and didn't.) You can tell me what you're doing and I might (might!) be moved to write about it. But if you ask for a plug and especially if you send me advertising you want me to post, the answer is no. If you saw the flurry that's presently in my e-mailbox, you'd understand why.

Here's the Washington Post fact-checker.

I agree with Jonathan Chait's review of The Debate. And with Eric Levitz on why Biden (probably) won the debate.

And while I would have liked to see Chris Wallace be more forceful in getting Trump to play by the rules, I don't think there was much he could do. And a case could be made that he did his job by letting Trump be Trump. That's who the guy is and the world got to see it. Why is that a bad thing?

Trump apparently thought he scored some points against Biden by repeatedly bringing up Hunter Biden. Now, the fact-checkers are saying Trump was wrong about Hunter B. being "dishonorably discharged" from the military and the claim of a multi-million dollar payoff is, at best, arguable. But even if Trump was right, is that going to move votes? Hunter Biden isn't on the ballot and he isn't on any list of issues that voters care about.

I have the feeling there'll be a lot of uncomfortable questions put to Republican Senators and Congressfolks tomorrow and a lot of evasive non-answers.

And now, I'm going to try to go back to not paying attention to the guy in the White House who, I hope, won't be there much longer.

The busiest humans on the planet this evening were professional fact-checkers. If you're interested, here are links to Politifact and The New York Times. It is perhaps worth noting that they got these online quickly because so many of Trump's fibs are ones he's made over and over and over…

Okay, I watched the thing. Did you get the idea that about a third of the way into it, Chris Wallace looked like he wanted to get out of the news business and go make BBQ Bacon Crispy Chicken Sandwiches at Burger King?

I suppose many/most Trump fans liked his I-Don't-Play-By-The-Rules bluster. He succeeded in rattling Biden a few times but I think it was obvious to any watcher that that was the game and that being loud is not the same thing as being right. The fact-checkers are playing Catch-Up right now but it looks like Trump got ten things wrong for every one of Biden's.

Seems to me Trump is going to lose support for his unwillingness to genuinely condemn white supremacists and militia groups — he basically told them to "stand by" in case violence is needed — and for all his rambling about a fake count in the election. But he's behind, he needed to get some Biden supporters to swing his way and I don't think he managed that. He just proved that Donald Trump is exactly what his opponents say he is. And Biden did a lot to dispel the charges that he's slow, has no endurance, etc. Whenever I've stumbled onto Trump-supporting chat boards lately, they all seemed dead certain that he would never show up for the debate at all.

It was also effective that Biden kept talking directly to voters and reminding them that this election is about them and in their hands. Trump kept talking to Chris Wallace. My take is that what most people who watched will take away from the debate is that it was a mess and a "shitshow" and a disgrace on many levels…and that wasn't because of Joe Biden.

Promoters of the L.A. Comic Con have announced a public event for December 11-13 at the Los Angeles Convention Center. In this item here, I mentioned that they had yet to announce any guests. Well, they have now…Frank Miller on Saturday and the cast of My Hero Academia on Saturday and Sunday. Over on this page, they list all the things they're doing to try and make the event safe for attendees.

One line there says, "With input from the City, County & State, we will continue to adapt L.A. Comic Con to be both super FUN and diligently SAFE." I don't know if they've spoken to anyone at the city or county levels but we now have California Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly saying that to his knowledge, no one associated with the event has consulted with him.

The state's counties are classified via a four-tier system which decides the threat of COVID-1 is widespread (purple), substantial (red), moderate (orange) or minimal (yellow). According to this report, "…guidance for convention centers should also be out soon and that could possibly provide a road map for reopening, but they will not be in the purple tier and most likely not in the red tier where indoor and outdoor concert venues remain closed." So maybe the convention will have to move wholly online or postpone or maybe Frank Miller, properly masked and sanitized, will come to your homes to sign stuff.

A few folks wrote to ask what the odds were of me attending. They're about the same as the odds of Donald Trump getting the black vote because they agree no one since Abraham Lincoln has done as much for their people. My non-attendance is partly because of the COVID thing, partly because they won't invite me, partly because I have no interest in attending and partly because as I've been stating on this blog for years, "I've always thought the L.A. Convention Center is a real terrible place with a confusing and fragmented floor plan, horrible parking and ghastly traffic for some distance in any direction." That's a cut-and-paste from this blog post from 2015 but I said things like that many times before.

I would love to think that by the middle of December, the threat of the coronavirus will be so minimal, one could attend a public event like that without fear. I don't think it will be.