I saw a couple talking heads shows yesterday while I was baking a chocolate cake from scratch. The cake was more fun.
Whenever there was a conservative on, the apparently blessed GOP opinion goes something like this tweet by Geraldo Rivera:
Here’s what I think the GOP is saying. It is simply UNTHINKABLE that anyone would question the motives of the president. The possibility that he is a Russian asset is so improbable that the only reason anyone would investigate him is because the investigators are viciously anti-Trump. There is simply no other explanation.
This reminds me of the lawsuit that Trump was dealing with during the 2016 campaign season where he accused the judge of being biased because he was of Mexican descent.
There are many other examples that are too numerous to tell. But the bottom line is that poor Trump is getting picked on by others because they are envious, deranged or biased. His actions are irrelevant to the treatment he’s receiving. It’s an endless litany of whining about no one liking him.
As a president of the United States and most powerful person in the world (I know. Terrifying) you would think he would just get a dog. You have reached the apex of human achievement without curing multiple sclerosis. The fact that some people are mean should just roll off the back.
But that’s not what this is about. Trump behaves in a manner that is inconsistent with his constitutional oath. And just because he hasn’t been indicted or impeached yet doesn’t mean he hasn’t done anything illegal. So this strategy of portraying himself as persecuted is a strategy that he either has found to work for him in the past or he’s getting advice on how to decimate his opponents by discrediting the very institutions his party will champion when there’s a Democrat in office.
It’s a wonder that so many people still fall for it when they are so unlikely to cut the out groups so little slack for having the disability of being born poor.
Does a supreme fuckup like Trump, having had all the advantages in life, deserve so much sympathy now that the federales know what he’s been up to?
I think not.
YMMV.
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And now a musical update from Randy Rainbow (South Pacific, IIRC):
Filed under: General |
The Confluence 
Here are the Republican motherfuckers up for reelection in 2020. If you live in those states give them a call today!
Republican Senators up for re-election in 2020
Shelley Moore Capito (R-West Virginia)
Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana)
Susan Collins (R-Maine)
John Cornyn (R-Texas)
Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas)
Steve Daines (R-Montana)
Mike Enzi (R-Wyoming)
Joni Ernst (R-Iowa)
Cory Gardner (R-Colorado)
Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina)
Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Mississippi)
James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma)
Martha McSally (R-Arizona)* special election 2020
Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky)
David Perdue (R-GA)
Jim Risch (R-Idaho)
Pat Roberts (R-Kansas)
Mike Rounds (R-South Dakota)
Ben Sasse (R-Nebraska)
Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska)
Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina)
Fortunately, the only Republican I’ve ever voted for was Phil Graham and Kay Bailey Hutchinson. Graham was still a democrat and Hutchinson was a mistake because she was never the independent voice who stood up for Texans that I thought she’d be. She wasn’t a dreadful Senator like Rubio, Cruz, etc. but she wasn’t as good as she could have been. I’d say a disappointment.
Nothing inherently wrong with what you did. But the state of affairs is very different now, right? We can’t give even the reasonable ones a chance because they are not acting on their conscience. Desperate situation requires desperate measures, vote them all out.
Well, that was decades ago but you are correct. Do not vote for a Republican, period. They all go in lock step unison with their compromised leadership regardless of the issue or circumstances. It is beyond ridiculous that Mitch McConnell is still Senate majority leader. You’d think the Republicans would vote his duff out and then kick him out of the Senate or force him to resign. As far as I am concerned they are all complicit.
Here in CO, Gardner is working hard to keep from appearing as the Trump syncophant we all know he is. And thanks to RD for posting Randy Rainbow’s video!
For some reason, this scene in Notorious epitomizes to me what is happening in America today… Ingrid Bergman is America, the mother and son team poisoning Ingrid are trump and his enablers…
In some sense, it is the most unsettling aspect of all. That America, which was never perfect, but was indeed begun as a great effort in liberal and enlightened democracy, founded by people who believed in the values of the Age of Reason, should have devolved to this. This is the world which Orwell fictionally imagined; one which turns logic on its head, so that lies are truth, and what Big Brother tells you trumps anything that you would see or think otherwise.. And it has something of the medieval church in it, where dogma insisted that the Pope was infallible, so that everything the Church said has to be right, and thus any objective evidence to the contrary must be the work of the Antichrist, and anyone who expressed it must be burned.
If followed to its end, the “logic” of these people, who are not well educated, not rationalists, but simply blindly devoted followers of Trump and the cult of know-nothingism which he represents, is that anyone or any institution which unearths facts about his treason and his anti-Americanism, is actually evil, since Trump cannot be, and thus they should be ignored or destroyed. The FBI, the good and investigative part of the media, DOJ, Democrats, are all pernicious versions of the Antichrist. Tear down every single institution which has kept America safe from those who would destroy it, and destroy them instead. Everything in the Mueller report is false. Mueller is evil. The whole FBI should be dismantled. The CIA should be destroyed. The free media must be gotten rid of. This, of course, turns us into Russia, or Nazi Germany, which did all of those things.
That people who call themselves “Conservatives,” but who are really worshippers of totalitarianism, who are so desperate to save Trump, that they will choose the path of denying and destroying anyone or anything which questions him, would show themselves to be akin to the leaders of the Inquisition and, the Nazis who burned books and art and intellectuals, is cause for as much concern as anything Trump has ever done, as awful as all of it is. If there is no more reliance on objective truth; if facts are completely malleable, depending what side one is on, then how can we function as a society, other than having a dictatorship in perpetual power, which creates its own reality, and then terrorizes or brainwashes everyone else to be subservient to it? Hopefully, there are still enough rational people out there, but the damage already done to the concept of a shared, observable reality, is incalculable. We know exactly what their immediate plan is: First, try to squelch the Mueller report. Second, deny every bit of it, say that it is all lies by the Antichrist Mueller, who made it up to attempt to hurt the True Leader, Donald Trump. But there are not two sides to every story, even though the media would have it so. And finding people to put on panels to argue that up is really down, and that collusion is not a crime, but if it is, what does it matter, anyway; and that treason cannot exist, because it is all in the mind, does not elevate the practice of journalism, it makes a mockery of it.
Hits keep coming and when will the Republicans find their voice?
Right now we’re left wondering if Trump was just a useful idiot or was actually in on it all. Personally I think he knew Putin was helping him though Manafort and was perfectly fine with it.
Yes, is there any doubt?
All of us, Hillary supporters were robbed twice and both times were unjust. We will not forget.
So he is not blackmailing Republicans to support him, right? Right? Republicans with conscience and loyalty to country should voluntarily resign if he is blackmailing them.
Host: “Today we have two guests to discuss the latest news on the Mueller investigation. A liberal and a conservative. Let’s get into our discussion. How important do you think the Mueller report will be, in our understanding of whether or how Trump is being influenced by Russia?
Liberal: Oh, it will be very important. Let me go through what it is central to the upcoming report. Is Trump an agent of Russia? Is he just a dupe? So many things we need to know.
Conservative: I know what I already need to know. The report will be a fraud and a hoax. It will be as worthwhile as a torn up dishrag.
Host: How do you know this before having seen the report?
Con: Because I know that Trump did nothing wrong. And Mueller is a crook and a phony and a liar.
Lib: He is a decorated and heroic veteran, he was a lauded director of the FBI..
Con: It’s all fake news. He was a disgrace as FBI director. His subordinates hated him. They called him, “Mueller the Cruller,” because he spent all his time eating pastries.
Lib:: That is ridiculous, you are attempting to slander Mueller to protect Trump.
Con: The FBI should be disbanded, and Trump should be able to start a new group called, “Trumpets,” which will look out for his welfare.
Host: Isn’t that totalitarian sounding?
Con: George Washington did it, and so did FDR.
Lib: No, they didn’t.
Con: They did, and just because you are an idiot lib who does not know history, that is not my problem.
Host: Can we at least agree that we are sitting at a table here, having a discussion about many topics?
Con: Depends on your perception of what a table is. This might actually be a 400-pound man posing as a table. Some of them can do that.
Lib: Well, if we cannot agree on the most basic aspects of reality:; if it is all just what you or I say it is, then what is there to discuss? Why even have a society? Just a bunch of psychopathic people making assertions. The earth is flat; no it isn’t.
Con: You libs have been saying that the earth is round for decades. But you are wrong. Medieval maps clearly show that the earth is flat, and that if you fall off at the end, you are eaten by a dragon.
Lib. All of those maps were disproven by the explorers who traveled the globe, and did not fall off.
Con: Many fell off, but the liberal press lied about it to protect Hillary Clinton, who was being paid by the dragon to encourage people to travel to the edge and be eaten when they fell off. This was well covered by the real journalists, as you probably know, but then you are being paid by Clinton, too
Host: Well, this is a fascinating discussion, and there are so many more topics to cover. Thanks to both of you for this lively debate. We’ll have you back tomorrow.”
This exchange would look much different on a Sinclair owned network, since it would be a discussion between a conservative, and a conservative nutjob.
This is the danger we face when we let the GOP control the show, soon we will have a choice between Sinclair and Fox if we are not careful
“As a president of the United States and most powerful person in the world (I know. Terrifying) you would think he would just get a dog. ”
Nothing justifies cruelty to animals, RD.
I remember this. So trump and pootie talked about “adoptions” and the moron trump also reminds that Don Jr. talked about “adoptions”, wink wink. They checked each other’s alibi in their talk and why do we wonder that thereis no paper trail.
Anybody wonder why the Republicans are going after Steve King (IA) so aggressively when they are complicit in all manners of enabling and tolerating such sin with trump?
Because they’re terrified about what’s on the horizon, pm. Shit’s about to get real.
Yeah, I am looking for cracks and this appears to be one. There were also two R senators with strong reaction to the Russian Asset doing the Pocahontas thing in his tweet (not enough).
Can we forge birth papers for Vicente Fox so he can become nuestro Presidente? 😛
But is it so remarkable?
Oh myyyyy… 😀
I heard a report that people are not sympathetic toward federal workers under shutdown. What a shame! They don’t know what their government does, they don’t know what might happen if it all comes crumbling down. It is perhaps a credit to the predecessors that they ran the government such that people didn’t have to worry about it. Now, people are blissfully ignorant. Can you imagine air traffic controllers working without pay? But these schmucks who are supporting the Russian Asset and the Republicans, they don’t care, is that it? And, why isn’t there an uproar against Mitch McConnell? He can solve this in a matter of minutes.
WTF, man!
And wonder why he is doing this in light of all the recent revelations, people!
https://twitter.com/Jamie_Weinstein/status/1085183359729500160
This is the Republican strategy as I have mentioned before. Tolerate and minimize damage from trump to the party (not the country), use him wherever possible – they are lying in wait for RBG’s seat, and execute other such R agenda. They are not going to go against him at all before 2020 and nothing will happen before 2020, just like McConnell operated during the last years of Obama. Ex Bushies (like this guy Barr) are helping with this agenda (they put Kavanaugh in SCOTUS). But the moronic Russian Asset in the WH may still shoot himself and his ‘party’ in the foot and burn it all to the ground. Watch out for the Bushies. They are complicit with the rest of the Republican congress.
I watched just a little of the Barr hearing this morning. They had a panel of good people. One of them said that Barr will of course be confirmed, and that this falls under the “elections have consequences” rubric; that any Republican, Jeb, Rubio, could have picked Barr, he is not an outlier. But of course this ignores the fact that the election was utterly corrupt and crooked, the extent of which we do not even know, but it was at least as bad as what we do know. Republican polling date given to Cambridge Analytic, given to Russia, to microtarget susceptible voters in key states with fake news and fake Facebook and Twitter users, all designed to convince them that Trump was good, and Hillary was evil. Illegal campaign payments made to squelch damaging stories. Russia putting its assets in every part of the Trump campaign. In essence, Russia running its key asset, Trump, and doing everything to get him elected. including running another asset, Stein, and maybe even another asset, Sanders, to take votes away from Hillary. We don’t even know about possible vote machine hacking; and then there were undoubtedly illegal disenfranchisements of Democratic voters in key states.
So apparently the lesson is, that you can and should cheat in every way possible, conspire with other countries, because if you “win,” you get to appoint Supreme Court Justices, and pack the lower courts as well; you get to pass a massive tax cut for billionaires; you do not enforce sanctions on Russia; you undermine the FBI, CIA, DOJ; you essentially try to fix it so that you can never lose another election, and that Russia is running U.S. policy. There is no constitutional remedy for this, other than impeachment, but then that is far too late to undo any of it; plus the Republicans were aware of all of the cheating, and took Russian money, so they will not impeach and convict, unless they have already gotten what they want. So cheat, win, and reap the rewards. In many countries, such an election would be invalidated. In England, there would be a vote of no confidence i the government, and new elections would be held. Here, nothing can be done. And that is why they did it, because crooked elections have no consequences, at least none that offset all the rewards they bring to the traitors and the crooks. As simply put as that, this was the ultimate result of one party existing only to win and control, and the other trying to win on issues. Republicans have not one bit of compunction or guilt about any of it. Even if it costs them the next three elections, something that is unlikely, anyway, they still have the courts, they still own the media, they have all of the money. The rigged machine paid out, and they got all the money out of it, so what do they care now?
We needed to take the senate in 2018. I knew there were not enough to win but can’t believe people still elected people Hyde-Smith and others like her on the R side.
So thousands of federal employees are summoned back by #theAsset and made to work without pay. Are you kidding me? Where the hell is the outrage from the public? Really, people marched for other things but where is the outrage for these federal employees and the employees themselves can’t organize and protest and they are not even allowed to talk to the press in most cases. But the fact he is bringing them back makes them “essential” as opposed to “non-essential”, right?