{"id":176317,"date":"2020-07-14T19:16:00","date_gmt":"2020-07-15T00:16:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2020\/07\/14\/kanye-has-left-the-building\/"},"modified":"2020-07-14T19:16:00","modified_gmt":"2020-07-15T00:16:00","slug":"kanye-has-left-the-building","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2020\/07\/14\/kanye-has-left-the-building\/","title":{"rendered":"Kanye Has Left the Building"},"content":{"rendered":"
Rapper, and celebrity nut job, Kanye West has ended his presidential run<\/a>:<\/div>\n

On July 4, Kanye West tweeted<\/a> that he was running for president. It was treated as one of his typical grandiloquent pronouncements. The tweet sparked a lot of opinion pieces, cable news segments, and even a question<\/a> in an Oval Office interview with Donald Trump. But most people brushed it off. In a follow-up interview<\/a> with Forbes, West pledged, if elected, to run the White House like the nation of Wakanda from Black Panther. That remark seemed to reinforce the notion that this was just a lark. After all, West had previously compared himself to figures varying from God to Willy Wonka without attempting to establish the Kingdom of Heaven or manufacture an Everlasting Gobstopper.<\/p>\n

\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n

On the morning of July 9, TMZ reported<\/a> that West\u2019s family was concerned that the billionaire rapper was suffering a bipolar episode based on his presidential aspirations. The well-sourced tabloid website added \u201cour sources say his family and those close to him are worried, but they believe things will stabilize as they have in the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n

Later that day, I talked to Steve Kramer. He is a get-out-the-vote specialist who runs a firm that also helps candidates get on the ballot. Kramer, who has worked mostly for Democratic candidates but has also had some Republican clients, told me that he had been hired to help West get on the ballot in Florida and South Carolina. He added that his understanding was that West\u2019s team was \u201cworking over weekend there, formalizing the FEC and other things that they\u2019ve got to do when you have a lot of corporate lawyers involved.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n

This all seemed real enough, and I reached out to West\u2019s publicist for a response. The initial response was to loop in another spokesperson on the email. West\u2019s team then went dark. As I waited for a response, I followed up with Kramer who told me, \u201cHe\u2019s out.\u201d <\/p>\n

I asked what happened. \u201cI\u2019ll let you know what I know once I get all our stuff canceled. We had over 180 people out there today,\u201d Kramer said.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Is Vermin Supreme running this year? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rapper, and celebrity nut job, Kanye West has ended his presidential run: On July 4, Kanye West tweeted that he was running for president. It was treated as one of his typical grandiloquent pronouncements. The tweet sparked a lot of opinion pieces, cable news segments, and even a question in an Oval Office interview with …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[674,415,405,414],"class_list":["post-176317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-celebrity","tag-entertainment","tag-presidential-campaign","tag-psychology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176317"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176317\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}