George Clooney is staying out of the primaries but plans to back whoever the candidate is against Trumpanzee. He feels confident Trump will be a one-termer, although he worries that the Starbucks guy could screw up everything. "The narrow edge he took to get there in 2016 has all gone so yes, I do [think he can be beaten]. We just have to not have third party candidates like [former Starbucks CEO] Howard Schultz... I’m not a fan at all. If [Schultz] wants to run as a Democrat as he says he is then you should run as a Democrat, not try and lead the process before you even got started."My guess is that Schultz would like a graceful way too get out of this whole mess he created. The problem is that he's hired all these high-priced hookers consultants who are not letting their meal ticket vanish so quickly. Take Bill Burton for example. He worked at the DCCC and parleyed that, eventually, into a big gig as under Deputy White House Press Secretary Obama and an even bigger gig with the Priorities USA SuperPAC. More recently he ran the California operation of a sleazoid Democratic consulting firm, SKDKnickerbocker (owned Mark Penn). Burtion was getting a mega-paycheck at SKDKnickerbocker when Schultz wooed him away with promises of God-knows-how-much loot.And Burton is just one example of consultants who have attached themselves to Schultz's billions. One of them, not Burton, told me that none of them think Schultz is going anywhere but that the money is great and that there's not much they have to do. And especially now, while Schultz is laying low and "waiting for Biden to self-combust," as that same top Schultz consultant told me.Yesterday, the Daily Beast reported that Schultz's campaign is basically dormant, if not dead. Burton claims that Schultz is still considering running and that he'll announce his decision "in the late spring or early summer." (My contact in the campaign operation told me they figure Biden will screw up by then, leaving Schultz with a path to victory. I asked him if they were all drunk over there and he laughed, well aware that Schultz issuing strung along by people dependent on him for a paycheck.)Erin McPike says he's recovering from back surgery and that that's why there's no campaign. Oh."But Schultz has also dialed down the elements of his campaign prep that don’t actually require public appearances," wrote Sam Stein. "He has not posted to Facebook or Instagram since April 30. His last missive was on how leaders make decisions 'through the lens of personal beliefs' which included a photo of a chess board, a French press, a cup of coffee and a diary with the phrase 'success is best when it's shared' written in black sharpie marker."
According to Facebook's ad archives, Schultz has not run an ad on the platform since April 23, when his account posted a spot that declared "It's Time To Un-Partisan.” Since Easter, Schultz has tweeted just twice. The first was to promote an op-ed he wrote on his trip to Arizona. That was on April 29. The second, and last, tweet came on Monday, when he tweeted a winky emoji at someone wondering if he was a character in Game of Thrones, after a cup of Starbucks was mistakenly included in a scene of the popular HBO show.And it’s not just Schultz. Neither Steve Schmidt, his top adviser, nor Burton have tweeted since late January.“The next president is not going to be decided on Twitter,” Burton said. “I would think if you looked at what he is doing publicly it stacks up with a lot of people engaged in the national conversation.”That was once true. In the beginning of April, the Schultz media team was sending out statements on various relevant issues and informing reporters about upcoming events like his Fox News town hall in Kansas City, Missouri. After that, Schultz initiated a “Heart of America” tour that took him to Kansas. That same week, his team sent out a statement about Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) Medicare for All proposal and sent a dispatch about his travels including information about Kansas farmers’ lives being impacted by Trump trade policies. The tour then headed to Arizona where it appears stopped—at least for now—because of his surgery.There has been one major development that happened in the 2020 election since Schultz’s trip to Arizona: the formal entrance of former Vice President Joe Biden into the Democratic primary. Biden is an establishment figure with a lengthy record that places him a fair distance away from his party’s ideological left. In short, he’s the very type of candidate that Schultz has said would convince him to ultimately not enter the presidential race. But Burton stressed that the former VP’s presence was not a factor-- at least yet-- in Schultz’s thinking.
It isn't likely that anyone has written Schultz into the final episodes of Game of Thrones but he may have been offered a role in the prequel (set 5,000-10,000 years before the one we're watching now), possibly titled The Long Night. Jane Goldman, Carly Wray, Max Borenstein, and Brian Helgeland are writing it now and one of them could have offered Schultz a role, along with Dixie Egerickx, Denise Gough, George Henley, John Simm, Naomi Ackie, Jamie Campbell Bower, Ivanno Jeremiah, Alex Sharp, Toby Regbo and Richard McCabe. Coffee-drinker and A Song of Ice and Fire author George R.R. Martin said, "Speaking of television, don’t believe everything you read. Internet reports are notoriously unreliable... We have had five different Game of Thrones successor shows in development (I mislike the term 'spinoffs') at HBO, and three of them are still moving forward nicely... The one I am not supposed to call The Long Night will be shooting later this year." The hope, of course, is that Schultz will accept a role as some minor Targaryen, who can be cut out of the film later, after he doesn't run and doesn't help Trump win a second term.Howard Schultz Targaryen (of the Night's Watch)
