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Outtakes—Anger Politics
By Rick Outzen, January 27, 2016
Back in 2010 when the Tea Party was fighting help the Republican Party seize control of Congress during President Barack Obama’s first mid-term election, University of Illinois at Chicago professor Lennard Davis wrote a piece for the Huffington Post titled “The Politics of Anger.”
Davis wrote, “The Tea Party is angry. America is angry. Anger is the watchword of the election season.”
He was puzzled by the reverence some political pundits had for anger. The professor asked, “Since when did anger ever amount to a political position? Since when did we start thinking of anger as a plank in a political platform?”
Davis pointed out that habitual anger wasn’t respected and often called for anger management counseling. In most families, when one lost his temper, an apology was expected to follow. He argued that anger should not be a permanent state of being in relationships or politics.
“Isn’t politics the art of the practical and the possible?” asked Davis. “Government involves compromise and alliance. In the old days, politicians used to make strange bedfellows — nowadays, as in a marriage gone bad, they don’t even get into bed together anymore.”
Unfortunately, anger politics won the mid-term elections. The Democratic Party suffered massive defeats. Republicans took control of 29 state governorships and 26 state legislatures. They gained 63 seats in the House, the largest turnover for any midterm election since 1938. They failed to take control of the Senate but gained six seats.
The Tea Party became a political force. Their anger over Obamacare and “out-of-control” spending won the election. So what changed? Did Congress pass a balanced budget? Was Obamacare repealed? Were other programs and entitlements cut?
No.
The anger was good for winning elections, but apparently not for governing. Congress’s approval rating has plummeted. It was 20 percent in November 2010. Today, the Republican-controlled legislative branch has an approval rating hovering around 14 percent.
Did the Republican Party and Tea Party apologize and change their strategies? No, they doubled down and blamed the White House for their ineffectiveness.
This year, anger is back on the political scene. Billionaire Donald Trump is anger about what he characterizes as losing. He will make America a winner again, and the Republican voters love his message. The polls have him outdistancing his opposition by double digits.
Sen. Bernie Sanders has also tapped into the anger and frustrations of those tired of the same tired rhetoric in the Democratic Party. His ideas aren’t politically correct but are far-reaching, and he is closing on the front-runner, Hillary Clinton.
Sorry, Professor Davis. The politics of anger are back with a vengeance.
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Friday, January 29, 2016
Horsey, this should have been drawn with the "poor" and the "middle class" at a separate, "children's" table.
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Thursday, January 28, 2016
"[Pride] is also, in the traditional Christian view, a vice, and a particularly pernicious one." Trump is full of pride and is narcissistic-- why do we want that as our President?
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COMMENTS:
* The Trump solution to every problem in five steps: 1. Promise the world to investors and voters. 2. Act vigorously without understanding the problem. 3. Fail miserably. 4. Go bankrupt. 5. Repeat as needed.
* Gerson neglects to mention that pride is the chief sin of many of his precious evangelicals. Their behavior reflects contempt for others far more than it does Christ's teaching. But that's old news. Gerson's personal savior, George "Man of Faith" Bush, believed in recklessly invading countries and implementing torture. And said he was "having a great time".
* How empty and shallow is this man? Another entire campaign rally address to tout how popular and well liked he is; how favorable his polls are; and how evil and bad and stupid everyone else is. Every reason in the world to elect him President of the US, Leader Of The Free World, Commander In CHief, etc. If he were running for Student Council President, I may consider, but......
* like any decent con man, butthead is ruthlessly exploiting fear, ignorance and greed, none of which are in short supply among the repug faithful. it's macrabe theater.
* Trump has blown himself up bigger than the Stay Puff marshmallow man and the Republican establishment waited to fight him until all that Gerson and his kind can do is punch him in the ankles. Trump voters don't seem to care about this talk any more. He's their guy and he's gonna make them all apprentices and fix all their lives with huge deals.
* These are the peoples who kept the snake oil business going for years; so no surprise.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Donald Trump’s dangerous politics of pride
By Michael Gerson, January 25, 2016
Of all Donald Trump’s political skills, perhaps the most impressive is his ability to persuade people to support him by suspending their deepest, lifelong beliefs.
Some prominent conservatives have embraced Trump, in spite of his recent support for dramatically higher taxes on the wealthy and a single-payer health-care system. They are saying, in essence: Because he is an immigration restrictionist and speaks in a non-PC vernacular, it doesn’t matter that he has endorsed the two main policy priorities of modern liberalism.
The same can be said of some pro-lifers, who must look past Trump’s previous support for partial-birth abortion and his inability to provide a serious rationale for his pro-life conversion (other than the obvious political imperative). Ann Coulter put it bluntly, admitting she doesn’t “care if [Trump] wants to perform abortions in the White House,” so long as he builds a wall and expels 11 million undocumented immigrants.
But this support comes at a price. Most obviously, it represents the final triumph of Clintonism — Bill Clintonism — which is the belief that personal character, particularly on sexual and family matters, has no serious public implications. Evangelicals have been cultural holdouts on this matter. “You brag abt many affairs w/ married women,” Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) recently challenged Trump in a series of tweets. “Have you repented? To harmed children & spouses? Do you think it matters?” For evangelical supporters of Trump, it doesn’t matter.
The greater problem for evangelicals is found not in the field of biology but of theology. Trump’s defining personal and public characteristic is pride. In making America great again, he offers not a set of political ideals or policies but he himself. He, he says, is better, smarter and tougher than our corrupt and stupid leaders. Pride is his platform.
It is also, in the traditional Christian view, a vice, and a particularly pernicious one. “The essential vice, the utmost evil is Pride,” wrote C.S. Lewis. “Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere flea bites in comparison; it was through Pride that the devil became the devil. Pride leads to every other vice; it is the complete anti-God state of mind.”
Why is pride so dangerous? Because it is never sated, and always breeds conflict. “Pride is essentially competitive,” said Lewis, “while the other vices are competitive only, so to speak, by accident. Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man. . . . Other vices may sometimes bring people together: You may find good fellowship and jokes and friendliness among drunken people or unchaste people. But Pride always means enmity — it is enmity. And not only enmity between man and man, but enmity to God.”
In our personal experience, we know that pride is often at the root of resentment, rivalry, jealousy, antagonism, greed and a desire for revenge. It is the unifying conviction of evangelicals that people eventually come to the end of their ego and need to look upward; upward from the foot of the cross. For some, this humility comes naturally. For others, it involves humiliation, failure or loss — what some might call being a loser. But it is precisely at this point of surrender and trust that the prodigal is welcomed home: “You are my beloved son, on you my favor rests.” So, blessed are the poor, the hungry and the weeping. They are often the closest to God.
What does this mean for politics? A leader with an overweening, compulsive pride finds it difficult to learn or change: What of worth can others possibly teach? A narcissistic leader is always at enmity with other people and groups, and cannot be a unifying figure. As Abraham Lincoln displayed, the capacity to heal requires humility and empathy. A narcissistic leader is vindictive, keeps lists of his grievances and enemies and is vulnerable to the abuse of power. A narcissistic leader finds it difficult to feel sympathy for those regarded as failures and losers, for the wounded and disabled, for strangers, refugees and the vulnerable.
This is what evangelicals are sacrificing in their search for a savior. There is but one. And it is not Donald Trump.
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COMMENTS:
* The Trump solution to every problem in five steps: 1. Promise the world to investors and voters. 2. Act vigorously without understanding the problem. 3. Fail miserably. 4. Go bankrupt. 5. Repeat as needed.
* Gerson neglects to mention that pride is the chief sin of many of his precious evangelicals. Their behavior reflects contempt for others far more than it does Christ's teaching. But that's old news. Gerson's personal savior, George "Man of Faith" Bush, believed in recklessly invading countries and implementing torture. And said he was "having a great time".
* How empty and shallow is this man? Another entire campaign rally address to tout how popular and well liked he is; how favorable his polls are; and how evil and bad and stupid everyone else is. Every reason in the world to elect him President of the US, Leader Of The Free World, Commander In CHief, etc. If he were running for Student Council President, I may consider, but......
* like any decent con man, butthead is ruthlessly exploiting fear, ignorance and greed, none of which are in short supply among the repug faithful. it's macrabe theater.
* Trump has blown himself up bigger than the Stay Puff marshmallow man and the Republican establishment waited to fight him until all that Gerson and his kind can do is punch him in the ankles. Trump voters don't seem to care about this talk any more. He's their guy and he's gonna make them all apprentices and fix all their lives with huge deals.
* These are the peoples who kept the snake oil business going for years; so no surprise.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Donald Trump’s dangerous politics of pride
By Michael Gerson, January 25, 2016
Of all Donald Trump’s political skills, perhaps the most impressive is his ability to persuade people to support him by suspending their deepest, lifelong beliefs.
Some prominent conservatives have embraced Trump, in spite of his recent support for dramatically higher taxes on the wealthy and a single-payer health-care system. They are saying, in essence: Because he is an immigration restrictionist and speaks in a non-PC vernacular, it doesn’t matter that he has endorsed the two main policy priorities of modern liberalism.
The same can be said of some pro-lifers, who must look past Trump’s previous support for partial-birth abortion and his inability to provide a serious rationale for his pro-life conversion (other than the obvious political imperative). Ann Coulter put it bluntly, admitting she doesn’t “care if [Trump] wants to perform abortions in the White House,” so long as he builds a wall and expels 11 million undocumented immigrants.
Real estate mogul Donald Trump said during his presidential announcement that Mexican migrants to the U.S. are drug traffickers and rapists, as well as "some ... good people." ( / AP)Many evangelical Christians are now in a similar position. In considerable numbers (Trump was the presidential choice of 42 percent of them in a recent poll), they are attracted to Trump’s unvarnished populism and his identification with middle-class anxiety and anger.
But this support comes at a price. Most obviously, it represents the final triumph of Clintonism — Bill Clintonism — which is the belief that personal character, particularly on sexual and family matters, has no serious public implications. Evangelicals have been cultural holdouts on this matter. “You brag abt many affairs w/ married women,” Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) recently challenged Trump in a series of tweets. “Have you repented? To harmed children & spouses? Do you think it matters?” For evangelical supporters of Trump, it doesn’t matter.
The greater problem for evangelicals is found not in the field of biology but of theology. Trump’s defining personal and public characteristic is pride. In making America great again, he offers not a set of political ideals or policies but he himself. He, he says, is better, smarter and tougher than our corrupt and stupid leaders. Pride is his platform.
It is also, in the traditional Christian view, a vice, and a particularly pernicious one. “The essential vice, the utmost evil is Pride,” wrote C.S. Lewis. “Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere flea bites in comparison; it was through Pride that the devil became the devil. Pride leads to every other vice; it is the complete anti-God state of mind.”
Why is pride so dangerous? Because it is never sated, and always breeds conflict. “Pride is essentially competitive,” said Lewis, “while the other vices are competitive only, so to speak, by accident. Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man. . . . Other vices may sometimes bring people together: You may find good fellowship and jokes and friendliness among drunken people or unchaste people. But Pride always means enmity — it is enmity. And not only enmity between man and man, but enmity to God.”
In our personal experience, we know that pride is often at the root of resentment, rivalry, jealousy, antagonism, greed and a desire for revenge. It is the unifying conviction of evangelicals that people eventually come to the end of their ego and need to look upward; upward from the foot of the cross. For some, this humility comes naturally. For others, it involves humiliation, failure or loss — what some might call being a loser. But it is precisely at this point of surrender and trust that the prodigal is welcomed home: “You are my beloved son, on you my favor rests.” So, blessed are the poor, the hungry and the weeping. They are often the closest to God.
What does this mean for politics? A leader with an overweening, compulsive pride finds it difficult to learn or change: What of worth can others possibly teach? A narcissistic leader is always at enmity with other people and groups, and cannot be a unifying figure. As Abraham Lincoln displayed, the capacity to heal requires humility and empathy. A narcissistic leader is vindictive, keeps lists of his grievances and enemies and is vulnerable to the abuse of power. A narcissistic leader finds it difficult to feel sympathy for those regarded as failures and losers, for the wounded and disabled, for strangers, refugees and the vulnerable.
This is what evangelicals are sacrificing in their search for a savior. There is but one. And it is not Donald Trump.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Dare we say "it takes one to know one"?
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COMMENTS:
* To all posters here dismayed with the state of media reporting today: most of these pundits, including Coulter, are not journalists by training, experience, or inclination. They are little more than media personalities, don't you agree?
* Coulter is another republican nut case. Please dismiss this ignoramus.
* The arrogant, calling the arrogant, arrogant. Hello pot. The kettle is calling.
* Sorry, but the odious opinions of this anorexic harridan long ceased to be of any interest. The media is doing the public a major disservice to devote any coverage to her at all.
* Is she the epitome of stupid or what. She has absolutely no room to say someone is arrogant. Cant bear to watch her anymore as she is just a groveling, sniveling, whining, know nothing. Last time I saw anything of her, I thought something was wrong with my TV, so I changed the channel and walla, TV was ok.
* The political climate is really toxic when Coulter, an avowed conservative, says Faux Noise has gone overboard in it's rhetoric and tone.
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Ann Coulter Calls Out ‘Arrogant’ Fox News
By Brian Flood, January 28, 2016
If the current political media landscape wasn’t crazy enough for you, you’re in luck.
Conservative commentator Ann Coulter showed up on MSNBC to bash Fox News last night. Seriously. Coulter went on MSNBC. To Bash Fox News.
While appearing on “Hardball with Chris Matthews,” the oft-controversial Coulter said Donald Trump has “established himself as the real alpha dog” among GOP candidates and she “hopes he doesn’t” show up to tonight’s debate.
“I think Trump is shaking up the way people look at Fox News as maybe not always our (conservatives) network,” Coulter said.
Matthews then asked Coulter about the snarky Fox News statement that compelled Trump to bail on the debate: “Why would Roger Ailes start a fight that could cost him, god, 15 to 20 million people?”
“Monopolies can get arrogant and there does seem to be a little bit of arrogance here,” Coulter said. “It’s really insulting to voters.”
For the record, Coulter went on to say that she has no problem with Megyn Kelly.
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COMMENTS:
* To all posters here dismayed with the state of media reporting today: most of these pundits, including Coulter, are not journalists by training, experience, or inclination. They are little more than media personalities, don't you agree?
* Coulter is another republican nut case. Please dismiss this ignoramus.
* The arrogant, calling the arrogant, arrogant. Hello pot. The kettle is calling.
* Sorry, but the odious opinions of this anorexic harridan long ceased to be of any interest. The media is doing the public a major disservice to devote any coverage to her at all.
* Is she the epitome of stupid or what. She has absolutely no room to say someone is arrogant. Cant bear to watch her anymore as she is just a groveling, sniveling, whining, know nothing. Last time I saw anything of her, I thought something was wrong with my TV, so I changed the channel and walla, TV was ok.
* The political climate is really toxic when Coulter, an avowed conservative, says Faux Noise has gone overboard in it's rhetoric and tone.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Ann Coulter Calls Out ‘Arrogant’ Fox News
By Brian Flood, January 28, 2016
If the current political media landscape wasn’t crazy enough for you, you’re in luck.
Conservative commentator Ann Coulter showed up on MSNBC to bash Fox News last night. Seriously. Coulter went on MSNBC. To Bash Fox News.
While appearing on “Hardball with Chris Matthews,” the oft-controversial Coulter said Donald Trump has “established himself as the real alpha dog” among GOP candidates and she “hopes he doesn’t” show up to tonight’s debate.
“I think Trump is shaking up the way people look at Fox News as maybe not always our (conservatives) network,” Coulter said.
Matthews then asked Coulter about the snarky Fox News statement that compelled Trump to bail on the debate: “Why would Roger Ailes start a fight that could cost him, god, 15 to 20 million people?”
“Monopolies can get arrogant and there does seem to be a little bit of arrogance here,” Coulter said. “It’s really insulting to voters.”
For the record, Coulter went on to say that she has no problem with Megyn Kelly.
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Trump represents "... the perils of Obama Derangement Syndrome."
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COMMENTS:
* So the GOP wants the owner of Fox news to use his company to take down Trump because they can't find a way to do it> As for Palin she was either drunk or on drugs. I feel sorry for Trump. But then the GOP might have paid her to support him knowing people would turn away from Trump if she is backing him.
* In other words, republicans have no one but themselves to blame.
* The roots of this disaster grew out of RIchard Nixon. The downward spiral continued to escalate as the GOP policies became more unsound and more religiously based. So now that the GOP]s mantra of "Dare to be Stupid!" has reached a crescendo the people in the shadows who used the flawed means to gain power are seeing their monster morph into a complete berserker. The right wing media darling of the GOP -- Fox news took the early shots as it would not bow to Donald Trump's narcissistic ego. Once the shots were fired and no one attempted to heal the wounds early enough, the thing took on a life of its own. Fox became another media source hence liars. Well, if you are familiar with Fox's reporting that's an easy step to take. And Fox continues to handle the feud with Trump badly. Their "suck up to conservatives" philosophy has tricked them into letting Trump badger and insult them with impunity. What started as a truly twisted clown show of a GOP election cycle has turned into a total freak circus. Donald Trump reality sow of a campaign has gotten him all the ego stroking that he wanted. And a lust for power only grows with food. I don't know how serious Trump's followers are in this age of the "Troll". If they are mostly serious; the GOP will not emerge as the same party that we have seen for decades. Will the racist democrats who left the Dems to become republicans again have to find a new rock to crawl under and cultivate (hardly the right word) their perverse hatred. That seems a fine solution to me. I don't see a way to make the hatred disappear or even morph into something real. It is deep rooted bigotry. It is linked to religion like ISIS. It has abandoned all reason and humanity. Its death could only bring me joy. *note: yes "Dare to be Stupid" was stolen from Weird Al Yankovic.
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GOP burns to the ground: Donald Trump, Sarah Palin and the self-immolation of the Republican establishment
For the record, it wasn’t Sarah Palin’s rambling endorsement of Donald Trump last week that finally drove editors at National Review to launch the magazine’s “Against Trump” push. The conservative media revolt had been in the works weeks prior to Palin’s now-classic oratory display.
Still, there was something fitting about the Right Wing Noise Machine’s simmering civil war over Trump breaking out into open warfare in the wake of Palin’s embarrassing speech; a comeback that had lots of Republican supporters publicly cringing.
What’s inescapable about the mounting GOP hand wringing is that Trump is a right-wing media creation. He’s flourishing on the fertile playing field of bigotry and resentment that National Review, Fox News, Rush Limbaugh and a litany of others, have helped seed for many years. There’s little doubt that during President Obama’s two terms they cultivated an anti-intellectual movement that now appears poised to seize control of the Republican Party.
Today, scores of conservative commentators remain utterly baffled as to what’s driving the popularity of the man who, in a matter of weeks, may control the Republican Party nomination. How astonishing is that?
Not only that, but Trump’s critics on the right are waging an all-out civil war with his fiercest media defenders, forcing media players to take sides in the slug fest.
For a movement that has often displayed amazing discipline in terms of targeting its cannon fire on Democrats and liberals, the Right Wing Noise Machine now finds itself stuck in circular firing mode.
On one side, Trump’s denounced as a “vicious demagogue,” a “con man,” a “glib egomaniac,” and “the very epitome of vulgarity.” On the other side, Trump’s army has derided National Review as out of touch, and accused the magazine of cozying up to “open border zealots,” a cardinal sin on the right.
None of that disguises the fact that Trump is the monster the Noise Machine created by encouraging bigoted and dishonest forces within the conservative movement; by giving credence to the three year Benghazi cover-up charade, the two year IRS witch hunt, by fueling ugly passions about Obama wanting to take away everyone’s guns, and by arguing he’s uninterested in defending America’s national security.
For years, lots of conservative pundits and talkers cashed large, and in some cases very large, paychecks feeding this ugly beast. Now the beast is beyond their control and they’re going to whine all the way to New Hampshire?
Call it the perils of Obama Derangement Syndrome.
Conservative John Ziegler saw this media-enable crack-up coming months ago (emphasis in original):
The conservative shock and awe of a possible Trump nomination, and the long-term political implications it could unleash, is now real.
But the revolt likely arrives comically late to the game, since a September or October pushback would’ve made more sense. Indeed, the magazine is “telling the Republican Party to pull its ripcord long after we’ve hit the ground,” noted GOP consultant Alex Castellanos.
That delay certainly raises questions about the competency behind the “Against Trump” endeavor. Denouncing Trump, National Review editors insist he “is a philosophically unmoored political opportunist who would trash the broad conservative ideological consensus within the GOP in favor of a free-floating populism with strong-man overtones.”
But all of those things were telegraphed nearly half-a-year ago when Trump first sprinted to the head of the GOP pack. Why did it take National Review editors and nearly two-dozen writers six months to belatedly acknowledge the obvious and, most importantly, join forces to stop him? (National Review editor Rich Lowry wrote that the project was first launched in late December, but then had to be set aside because of the busy holiday season.)
And who has the conservative nation turned its lonely eyes to in its hour of common sense need? Glenn Beck (Obama’s a “racist“), Dana Loesch, Katie Pavlich, Erick Erickson, and Brent Bozell, who once likened Obama to a “skinny, ghetto crackhead.”
Talk about a rogues gallery of Obama Derangement Syndrome sufferers who have now banded together to preach political clarity. But when the intellectual cupboard is bare, you make due with what’s still left on the shelves and hope the expiration date hasn’t already passed.
The Right Wing Noise Machine was revved up to 11 during the Obama years in an effort to destroy his presidency. In the end, the Noise Machine’s lasting contribution, in the form of a Trump nominee, may be assuring that Obama hands the White House over to another Democrat.
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COMMENTS:
* So the GOP wants the owner of Fox news to use his company to take down Trump because they can't find a way to do it> As for Palin she was either drunk or on drugs. I feel sorry for Trump. But then the GOP might have paid her to support him knowing people would turn away from Trump if she is backing him.
* In other words, republicans have no one but themselves to blame.
* The roots of this disaster grew out of RIchard Nixon. The downward spiral continued to escalate as the GOP policies became more unsound and more religiously based. So now that the GOP]s mantra of "Dare to be Stupid!" has reached a crescendo the people in the shadows who used the flawed means to gain power are seeing their monster morph into a complete berserker. The right wing media darling of the GOP -- Fox news took the early shots as it would not bow to Donald Trump's narcissistic ego. Once the shots were fired and no one attempted to heal the wounds early enough, the thing took on a life of its own. Fox became another media source hence liars. Well, if you are familiar with Fox's reporting that's an easy step to take. And Fox continues to handle the feud with Trump badly. Their "suck up to conservatives" philosophy has tricked them into letting Trump badger and insult them with impunity. What started as a truly twisted clown show of a GOP election cycle has turned into a total freak circus. Donald Trump reality sow of a campaign has gotten him all the ego stroking that he wanted. And a lust for power only grows with food. I don't know how serious Trump's followers are in this age of the "Troll". If they are mostly serious; the GOP will not emerge as the same party that we have seen for decades. Will the racist democrats who left the Dems to become republicans again have to find a new rock to crawl under and cultivate (hardly the right word) their perverse hatred. That seems a fine solution to me. I don't see a way to make the hatred disappear or even morph into something real. It is deep rooted bigotry. It is linked to religion like ISIS. It has abandoned all reason and humanity. Its death could only bring me joy. *note: yes "Dare to be Stupid" was stolen from Weird Al Yankovic.
...................................................................................................................................................................
GOP burns to the ground: Donald Trump, Sarah Palin and the self-immolation of the Republican establishment
They're against Trump now, but conservative elites have been kindling this wildfire for the better part of a decade
By Eric Boehlert, January 27, 2016For the record, it wasn’t Sarah Palin’s rambling endorsement of Donald Trump last week that finally drove editors at National Review to launch the magazine’s “Against Trump” push. The conservative media revolt had been in the works weeks prior to Palin’s now-classic oratory display.
Still, there was something fitting about the Right Wing Noise Machine’s simmering civil war over Trump breaking out into open warfare in the wake of Palin’s embarrassing speech; a comeback that had lots of Republican supporters publicly cringing.
What’s inescapable about the mounting GOP hand wringing is that Trump is a right-wing media creation. He’s flourishing on the fertile playing field of bigotry and resentment that National Review, Fox News, Rush Limbaugh and a litany of others, have helped seed for many years. There’s little doubt that during President Obama’s two terms they cultivated an anti-intellectual movement that now appears poised to seize control of the Republican Party.
Today, scores of conservative commentators remain utterly baffled as to what’s driving the popularity of the man who, in a matter of weeks, may control the Republican Party nomination. How astonishing is that?
Not only that, but Trump’s critics on the right are waging an all-out civil war with his fiercest media defenders, forcing media players to take sides in the slug fest.
For a movement that has often displayed amazing discipline in terms of targeting its cannon fire on Democrats and liberals, the Right Wing Noise Machine now finds itself stuck in circular firing mode.
On one side, Trump’s denounced as a “vicious demagogue,” a “con man,” a “glib egomaniac,” and “the very epitome of vulgarity.” On the other side, Trump’s army has derided National Review as out of touch, and accused the magazine of cozying up to “open border zealots,” a cardinal sin on the right.
None of that disguises the fact that Trump is the monster the Noise Machine created by encouraging bigoted and dishonest forces within the conservative movement; by giving credence to the three year Benghazi cover-up charade, the two year IRS witch hunt, by fueling ugly passions about Obama wanting to take away everyone’s guns, and by arguing he’s uninterested in defending America’s national security.
For years, lots of conservative pundits and talkers cashed large, and in some cases very large, paychecks feeding this ugly beast. Now the beast is beyond their control and they’re going to whine all the way to New Hampshire?
Call it the perils of Obama Derangement Syndrome.
Conservative John Ziegler saw this media-enable crack-up coming months ago (emphasis in original):
Thanks to Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Matt Drudge, Sarah Palin, a website named “Breitbart,” and certain elements of Fox News (all of whom have both pushed and ridden the Trump bandwagon for selfish commercial purposes), the conservative base is living under several important delusions which has allowed for “Trumpsanity” to foster and grow.Fact: The only entity that could likely stop Trump at this point would be a concerted effort by Fox News. But Roger Ailes and company are reportedly struggling with how to handle the Republican frontrunner, and have shown no interest in trying to take him down.
The conservative shock and awe of a possible Trump nomination, and the long-term political implications it could unleash, is now real.
But the revolt likely arrives comically late to the game, since a September or October pushback would’ve made more sense. Indeed, the magazine is “telling the Republican Party to pull its ripcord long after we’ve hit the ground,” noted GOP consultant Alex Castellanos.
That delay certainly raises questions about the competency behind the “Against Trump” endeavor. Denouncing Trump, National Review editors insist he “is a philosophically unmoored political opportunist who would trash the broad conservative ideological consensus within the GOP in favor of a free-floating populism with strong-man overtones.”
But all of those things were telegraphed nearly half-a-year ago when Trump first sprinted to the head of the GOP pack. Why did it take National Review editors and nearly two-dozen writers six months to belatedly acknowledge the obvious and, most importantly, join forces to stop him? (National Review editor Rich Lowry wrote that the project was first launched in late December, but then had to be set aside because of the busy holiday season.)
And who has the conservative nation turned its lonely eyes to in its hour of common sense need? Glenn Beck (Obama’s a “racist“), Dana Loesch, Katie Pavlich, Erick Erickson, and Brent Bozell, who once likened Obama to a “skinny, ghetto crackhead.”
Talk about a rogues gallery of Obama Derangement Syndrome sufferers who have now banded together to preach political clarity. But when the intellectual cupboard is bare, you make due with what’s still left on the shelves and hope the expiration date hasn’t already passed.
The Right Wing Noise Machine was revved up to 11 during the Obama years in an effort to destroy his presidency. In the end, the Noise Machine’s lasting contribution, in the form of a Trump nominee, may be assuring that Obama hands the White House over to another Democrat.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Yeah..... just go away.
...................................................................................
Wednesday, January 27, 2016
Chomsky believes that "'the Republican Party has drifted off the rails' and must be stopped ..."
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COMMENTS:
* Those wacko politicians represent a wacko portion of America. These people are, to put it mildly, frustrated and self-destructive. They see life moving away from "their way" and they are digging in their heels to stop change, at all costs. Are these people willfully stupid? At times.
* Well said! They want to rule the world and woe to anyone who stand in their way. Cruz said this in high school! The rest are demonstrating by their actions they also believe. Despite their wailing about how Christian they are, they demonstrate by their actions they are much closer to the AntiChrist. They worship at the money trough and try to step on the necks of anyone questioning their actions.
* Again, Chomsky is absolutely right, the GOP only creates, perpetuates, or denies problems. They have been the average citizen's, and the world's, biggest nemesis for at least the last two generations.
* You really can't expect much from the Republican party. The majority of them are so stupid they don't know they're stupid. They've been destroying this country since St. Ronnie Raygun was in office in the early 80's. Hell, even before then, There are two kinds of Republicans. Millionaires and god damned fools.
* Socialism: The radical idea of sharing. “Have you ever wondered why Republicans are so interested in encouraging people to volunteer in their communities? It’s because volunteers work for no pay. Republicans have been trying to get people to work for no pay for a long time. ” -George Carlin
* Republicans are no different than gangsters. It's very easy for them to get the many Americans that are of the macho, judgemental, unforgiving mentality on their side. It's easy for anyone to think they themselves are Christian. Self justification is always present in those that are little able to observe themselves critically with humbleness even though they sometimes can to some degree.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Noam Chomsky: The GOP is a threat to human survival
Renowned scholar and activist Noam Chomsky declared this week that the GOP and its far-right front-runners are “literally a serious danger to decent human survival.”
Speaking with The Huffington Post on Monday, Chomsky cited the Republican Party’s refusal to tackle—or even acknowledge—the “looming environmental catastrophe” of climate change, thereby “dooming our grandchildren.”
He went to rebuke the Republican party for its “abject service to private wealth and power” and dispossession of the poor.
But Chomsky made it clear that his conviction that “the Republican Party has drifted off the rails” and must be stopped by no means amounts to an endorsement of Democratic hopeful Hillary Clinton—who he has previously criticized as hawkish and opportunistic.
In fact, he told The Huffington Post that the United States has what amounts to a one-party system—with both Democrats and Republicans united by business interests. Yet, within those parameters, he argued, small differences do matter, given the immense power of the American political system.
And Senator Bernie Sanders, Chomsky recently told Mehdi Hasan of Al Jazeera’s UpFront show, “would–of the current candidates–be the one who would have, from my point of view, the best policies.”
“I agree with him in a lot of things, not in other things,” Chomsky said, calling him “basically a new dealer.”
“I frankly think that in our system of mainly bought elections, he doesn’t have much of a chance,” he continued. However, recent polling in early primary states bodes well for Sanders, and one survey found him more electable than Clinton when matched against Trump, Cruz, or Rubio.
Whatever happens, Chomsky told Hasan, he plans to strategically vote against the GOP, which he says wants to “destroy the world.”
...................................................................................................................................................................
COMMENTS:
* Those wacko politicians represent a wacko portion of America. These people are, to put it mildly, frustrated and self-destructive. They see life moving away from "their way" and they are digging in their heels to stop change, at all costs. Are these people willfully stupid? At times.
* Well said! They want to rule the world and woe to anyone who stand in their way. Cruz said this in high school! The rest are demonstrating by their actions they also believe. Despite their wailing about how Christian they are, they demonstrate by their actions they are much closer to the AntiChrist. They worship at the money trough and try to step on the necks of anyone questioning their actions.
* Again, Chomsky is absolutely right, the GOP only creates, perpetuates, or denies problems. They have been the average citizen's, and the world's, biggest nemesis for at least the last two generations.
* You really can't expect much from the Republican party. The majority of them are so stupid they don't know they're stupid. They've been destroying this country since St. Ronnie Raygun was in office in the early 80's. Hell, even before then, There are two kinds of Republicans. Millionaires and god damned fools.
* Socialism: The radical idea of sharing. “Have you ever wondered why Republicans are so interested in encouraging people to volunteer in their communities? It’s because volunteers work for no pay. Republicans have been trying to get people to work for no pay for a long time. ” -George Carlin
* Republicans are no different than gangsters. It's very easy for them to get the many Americans that are of the macho, judgemental, unforgiving mentality on their side. It's easy for anyone to think they themselves are Christian. Self justification is always present in those that are little able to observe themselves critically with humbleness even though they sometimes can to some degree.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Noam Chomsky: The GOP is a threat to human survival
Bernie or Hillary, these Republicans must be stopped at all cost, America's most celebrated leftist warns HuffPo
By Sarah Lazare, January 27, 2016Renowned scholar and activist Noam Chomsky declared this week that the GOP and its far-right front-runners are “literally a serious danger to decent human survival.”
Speaking with The Huffington Post on Monday, Chomsky cited the Republican Party’s refusal to tackle—or even acknowledge—the “looming environmental catastrophe” of climate change, thereby “dooming our grandchildren.”
He went to rebuke the Republican party for its “abject service to private wealth and power” and dispossession of the poor.
But Chomsky made it clear that his conviction that “the Republican Party has drifted off the rails” and must be stopped by no means amounts to an endorsement of Democratic hopeful Hillary Clinton—who he has previously criticized as hawkish and opportunistic.
In fact, he told The Huffington Post that the United States has what amounts to a one-party system—with both Democrats and Republicans united by business interests. Yet, within those parameters, he argued, small differences do matter, given the immense power of the American political system.
And Senator Bernie Sanders, Chomsky recently told Mehdi Hasan of Al Jazeera’s UpFront show, “would–of the current candidates–be the one who would have, from my point of view, the best policies.”
“I agree with him in a lot of things, not in other things,” Chomsky said, calling him “basically a new dealer.”
“I frankly think that in our system of mainly bought elections, he doesn’t have much of a chance,” he continued. However, recent polling in early primary states bodes well for Sanders, and one survey found him more electable than Clinton when matched against Trump, Cruz, or Rubio.
Whatever happens, Chomsky told Hasan, he plans to strategically vote against the GOP, which he says wants to “destroy the world.”
...................................................................................................................................................................
When TX governor Abbott looks in the mirror, does he see a dinosaur?
...................................................................................................................................................................
Texas Governor Unveils Plan To Repeal The 20th Century
By Ian Millhiser, January 11, 2016
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) proposed a series of constitutional amendments on Friday that would so fundamentally alter our founding document that it would be akin to throwing out the system of government established by the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and replacing it with something entirely different. The amendments are a hodgepodge of efforts to restore constitutional interpretations that briefly gained traction beginning in the Gilded Age, proposals to implement longtime Republican fantasies, and ideas drawn from the fringes of talk radio and the legal academy. Though Abbott’s new constitution would maintain the federal government’s current division between executive, legislative and judicial branches, the powers of all three branches would be diminished so significantly that the new system of government would be barely recognizable to students of our current system.
Indeed, Abbott would place restrictions on the federal government that are so severe, both national child labor laws and anti-lynching laws would be unconstitutional under his proposals.
Repealing The Twentieth Century
Abbott’s amendments are a hodgepodge of irrelevancies, curiosities and apparent efforts to return America to the golden years of the Hoover administration. One proposal is to “restore the balance of power between the federal and state governments by limiting the former to the powers expressly delegated to it in the Constitution,” a proposed amendment that’s already in the Constitution as the Tenth Amendment (although Abbott clearly disagrees with how many of Congress’s powers have been interpreted). Another amendment would “require a seven-justice super-majority vote for U.S. Supreme Court decisions that invalidate a democratically enacted law,” which is a somewhat surprising choice for the governor of a state that is so eager to sue the federal government to halt policies it disagrees with.
Abbott’s first proposed amendment, however, indicates just how drastically he would like to shrink the role of the federal government. That one seeks to “prohibit congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one state.”
For much of American history, judges, scholars, lawmakers and even presidents battled over the proper meaning of Congress’s constitutionally granted power to “regulate Commerce . . . among the several States.” The first Supreme Court opinion to interpret this language read it expansively. There is “no sort of trade” that does not constitute “commerce” according to Chief Justice John Marshall’s opinion in Gibbons v. Ogden.
The word “commerce,” moreover, reaches beyond trade to encompass what Marshall called “intercourse.” As Yale law Professor Jack Balkin explains, “intercourse” includes a broad range of activities:
Then came what is probably the single most transformative event in America’s economic history: the building of the railroads. As I explain in my book, Injustices: The Supreme Court’s History of Comforting the Comfortable and Afflicting the Afflicted, prior to the transcontinential railroad, it took about 118 days to travel from America’s east coast to its west coast. After just one rail line connecting the coasts was completed, it took only six days.
This interconnectedness is what allowed the growth of multi-state businesses and forced even many of the most localized producers into competition with people from another state. To give just one example, in the 1870s nearly all grain grown in the Midwest traveled to Chicago, where it would be stored in warehouses owned by a handful of firms. There, it would wait until it could be shipped even further to purchasers in many different states or even in Europe. The local farmer was now part of a complex chain of commerce that “concerns more States than one.”
Yet, even as the railroads enabled new nationwide corporations that presented regulatory challenges that had not existed in a younger America, the Supreme Court of this age grew increasingly dominated by conservatives who imposed new doctrines preventing federal law from addressing the newly nationalized economy. One of the most significant distinctions drawn by the justices of this era was between the transit and sale of goods, which the Court deemed to be part of its definition of “commerce,” and activities such as “manufacture, agriculture, mining [and] production in all its forms,” which it deemed to be beyond the reach of Congress. This distinction formed the basis for various decisions thwarting federal business regulation, including a particularly notorious case invalidating federal child labor laws.
Abbott’s proposal for an amendment prohibiting “congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one state” is an attempt to recreate the doctrines that led the Supreme Court to strike down child labor laws. In a white paper explaining his proposals, he endorses the view — which was discarded by the Supreme Court nearly 80 years ago — that “commerce” means only “the ‘trade’ or ‘exchange’ of goods—as distinguished from manufacturing, agriculture, or other means of producing the goods that would eventually be traded or exchanged.”
Yet his actual proposal is significantly more radical than any previous Supreme Court decision. Past decisions, after all, merely limited the federal government’s power to regulate “commerce.” Congress’s other powers, such as its power to spend money to “provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States” or its power to enforce civil rights protections written into the Constitution after the Civil War, were untouched by Gilded Age decisions narrowing the definition of “commerce.”
Abbott, by contrast, would forbid the federal government from “regulating activity that occurs wholly within one state.” If a local sheriff’s department, for example, actively led lynch mobs against African Americans, Abbott’s proposed amendment would forbid the federal government from stepping in unless these lynch mobs somehow crossed state lines.
Indeed, it’s difficult to count the laws that would cease to exist if Abbott’s prohibition on federal laws regulating any activity that occurs entirely within one state were written into the Constitution. Most workers, for example, do not cross state lines during the course of their workday, so the web of laws regulating the workplace would likely have to go. To give just one other particularly salient example, few restaurants are built straddling a state line, so the federal ban on whites-only lunch counters also would likely be unconstitutional since the actual act of serving food at such a restaurant occurs entirely within one state. A short list of laws that would either be drastically shrunk or invalidated entirely if Abbott got his way includes “the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the sick leave portions of the Family and Medical Leave, the Freedom of Access to Clinics Act, as well as minimum wage and maximum hour laws and labor and environmental laws.”
A Stew of Radicalism
It’s worth noting that Abbott’s plan to effectively undo much of the twentieth century is only one part of his agenda. His other proposals include a balanced budget amendment, two amendments that appear designed to shut down regulation from agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Labor in its entirety, an expansion of state officials’ ability to sue the federal government, and proposals allowing a two-thirds supermajority of the states to “override a U.S. Supreme Court decision” or “override a federal law or regulation.”
The proposal to allow two-thirds of states to repeal a federal law mirrors a similar proposal by Randy Barnett, a libertarian law professor who has also suggested that Social Security violates “the original meaning of the Constitution.” Such a proposal also appears in The Liberty Amendments, a book by the popular right-wing radio host Mark Levin.
Were this proposal to become part of our founding document, it would build upon one of the greatest anomalies in the original Constitution. Because our Constitution gives each state two senators, regardless of whether anyone actually lives there, a voter in Wyoming effectively enjoys 66 times as much representation in the Senate as a voter in California. Wyoming’s two senators represent just 0.18 percent of the nation, but they still receive two percent of the Senate’s votes. Allowing a supermajority of states, as opposed to a supermajority of voters, to repeal a law would expand upon this favoritism towards small states.
In any event, however, such a repeal amendment could be irrelevant if Abbott’s full package actually became part of the Constitution. His other proposals would hobble the federal government so severely that it’s not clear that it could pass many laws at all.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Texas Governor Unveils Plan To Repeal The 20th Century
By Ian Millhiser, January 11, 2016
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) proposed a series of constitutional amendments on Friday that would so fundamentally alter our founding document that it would be akin to throwing out the system of government established by the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and replacing it with something entirely different. The amendments are a hodgepodge of efforts to restore constitutional interpretations that briefly gained traction beginning in the Gilded Age, proposals to implement longtime Republican fantasies, and ideas drawn from the fringes of talk radio and the legal academy. Though Abbott’s new constitution would maintain the federal government’s current division between executive, legislative and judicial branches, the powers of all three branches would be diminished so significantly that the new system of government would be barely recognizable to students of our current system.
Indeed, Abbott would place restrictions on the federal government that are so severe, both national child labor laws and anti-lynching laws would be unconstitutional under his proposals.
Repealing The Twentieth Century
Abbott’s amendments are a hodgepodge of irrelevancies, curiosities and apparent efforts to return America to the golden years of the Hoover administration. One proposal is to “restore the balance of power between the federal and state governments by limiting the former to the powers expressly delegated to it in the Constitution,” a proposed amendment that’s already in the Constitution as the Tenth Amendment (although Abbott clearly disagrees with how many of Congress’s powers have been interpreted). Another amendment would “require a seven-justice super-majority vote for U.S. Supreme Court decisions that invalidate a democratically enacted law,” which is a somewhat surprising choice for the governor of a state that is so eager to sue the federal government to halt policies it disagrees with.
Abbott’s first proposed amendment, however, indicates just how drastically he would like to shrink the role of the federal government. That one seeks to “prohibit congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one state.”
For much of American history, judges, scholars, lawmakers and even presidents battled over the proper meaning of Congress’s constitutionally granted power to “regulate Commerce . . . among the several States.” The first Supreme Court opinion to interpret this language read it expansively. There is “no sort of trade” that does not constitute “commerce” according to Chief Justice John Marshall’s opinion in Gibbons v. Ogden.
The word “commerce,” moreover, reaches beyond trade to encompass what Marshall called “intercourse.” As Yale law Professor Jack Balkin explains, “intercourse” includes a broad range of activities:
“Commerce” meant “intercourse” and it had a strongly social connotations. “Commerce” was interaction and exchange between persons or peoples. To have commerce with someone meant to converse with them, meet with them, or interact with them. Thus, commerce naturally included all trade and economic activity because economic activity was social activity.The primary limit on Congress’s power to regulate commerce stemmed from the words “among the several states.” These words, Marshall wrote, limited Congress’s authority to “commerce which concerns more States than one.” In a pre-industrial economy, this was a very meaningful limit because many local communities had fairly self-contained economies. A farmer might grow his own crops, prepare them for sale entirely within a single state’s borders, and sell them at a market just up the road. At no point would any part of the production or sale of these goods cross state lines, and no farmers from distant communities other states competed with local farmers at the marketplace. So the local farmer’s activities were beyond the reach of Congress.
Then came what is probably the single most transformative event in America’s economic history: the building of the railroads. As I explain in my book, Injustices: The Supreme Court’s History of Comforting the Comfortable and Afflicting the Afflicted, prior to the transcontinential railroad, it took about 118 days to travel from America’s east coast to its west coast. After just one rail line connecting the coasts was completed, it took only six days.
This interconnectedness is what allowed the growth of multi-state businesses and forced even many of the most localized producers into competition with people from another state. To give just one example, in the 1870s nearly all grain grown in the Midwest traveled to Chicago, where it would be stored in warehouses owned by a handful of firms. There, it would wait until it could be shipped even further to purchasers in many different states or even in Europe. The local farmer was now part of a complex chain of commerce that “concerns more States than one.”
Yet, even as the railroads enabled new nationwide corporations that presented regulatory challenges that had not existed in a younger America, the Supreme Court of this age grew increasingly dominated by conservatives who imposed new doctrines preventing federal law from addressing the newly nationalized economy. One of the most significant distinctions drawn by the justices of this era was between the transit and sale of goods, which the Court deemed to be part of its definition of “commerce,” and activities such as “manufacture, agriculture, mining [and] production in all its forms,” which it deemed to be beyond the reach of Congress. This distinction formed the basis for various decisions thwarting federal business regulation, including a particularly notorious case invalidating federal child labor laws.
Abbott’s proposal for an amendment prohibiting “congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one state” is an attempt to recreate the doctrines that led the Supreme Court to strike down child labor laws. In a white paper explaining his proposals, he endorses the view — which was discarded by the Supreme Court nearly 80 years ago — that “commerce” means only “the ‘trade’ or ‘exchange’ of goods—as distinguished from manufacturing, agriculture, or other means of producing the goods that would eventually be traded or exchanged.”
Yet his actual proposal is significantly more radical than any previous Supreme Court decision. Past decisions, after all, merely limited the federal government’s power to regulate “commerce.” Congress’s other powers, such as its power to spend money to “provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States” or its power to enforce civil rights protections written into the Constitution after the Civil War, were untouched by Gilded Age decisions narrowing the definition of “commerce.”
Abbott, by contrast, would forbid the federal government from “regulating activity that occurs wholly within one state.” If a local sheriff’s department, for example, actively led lynch mobs against African Americans, Abbott’s proposed amendment would forbid the federal government from stepping in unless these lynch mobs somehow crossed state lines.
Indeed, it’s difficult to count the laws that would cease to exist if Abbott’s prohibition on federal laws regulating any activity that occurs entirely within one state were written into the Constitution. Most workers, for example, do not cross state lines during the course of their workday, so the web of laws regulating the workplace would likely have to go. To give just one other particularly salient example, few restaurants are built straddling a state line, so the federal ban on whites-only lunch counters also would likely be unconstitutional since the actual act of serving food at such a restaurant occurs entirely within one state. A short list of laws that would either be drastically shrunk or invalidated entirely if Abbott got his way includes “the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the sick leave portions of the Family and Medical Leave, the Freedom of Access to Clinics Act, as well as minimum wage and maximum hour laws and labor and environmental laws.”
A Stew of Radicalism
It’s worth noting that Abbott’s plan to effectively undo much of the twentieth century is only one part of his agenda. His other proposals include a balanced budget amendment, two amendments that appear designed to shut down regulation from agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Labor in its entirety, an expansion of state officials’ ability to sue the federal government, and proposals allowing a two-thirds supermajority of the states to “override a U.S. Supreme Court decision” or “override a federal law or regulation.”
The proposal to allow two-thirds of states to repeal a federal law mirrors a similar proposal by Randy Barnett, a libertarian law professor who has also suggested that Social Security violates “the original meaning of the Constitution.” Such a proposal also appears in The Liberty Amendments, a book by the popular right-wing radio host Mark Levin.
Were this proposal to become part of our founding document, it would build upon one of the greatest anomalies in the original Constitution. Because our Constitution gives each state two senators, regardless of whether anyone actually lives there, a voter in Wyoming effectively enjoys 66 times as much representation in the Senate as a voter in California. Wyoming’s two senators represent just 0.18 percent of the nation, but they still receive two percent of the Senate’s votes. Allowing a supermajority of states, as opposed to a supermajority of voters, to repeal a law would expand upon this favoritism towards small states.
In any event, however, such a repeal amendment could be irrelevant if Abbott’s full package actually became part of the Constitution. His other proposals would hobble the federal government so severely that it’s not clear that it could pass many laws at all.
...................................................................................................................................................................
"... his endlessly convenient opinion shifts, on the very core issues his supporters care most about, ought also to signal that Donald Trump doesn’t care about you, either. ... Trump voters seem eager to ignore the fact that their candidate is only theirs until he doesn't need them."
...................................................................................................................................................................
COMMENTS:
* From the article... "What I don’t get is why you think Trump is going to give you what you want." What if Trump voters simply want to give a middle finger to the establishment?
* Then, in the unique case that trump is elected, he'll take that finger and shove it right up the voters behinds by working with the establishment
* Perhaps...but Trump voters aren't exactly known for long-term planning skills. Angering the GOP establishment is the goal at the moment and, given the hysterical reaction by virtually all conservative media outlets, I'll quote George W. Bush by saying "Mission, accomplished".
* Trump can force the media to cover an issue. He can plant memes very well. I agree it will be fund. Cruz will be creamed because he's simply smarmy and has other issues. Rubio is probably the most electable.
* So Megan, what you are saying is.... Trump is NOT a sincere man.
* I'd feel so much better if Trump's demogagery was attached to a core set of principles. He seems to free-associate and merely stumbles onto topics or words that give progs the vapours. When he discovers on of those little nuggets, it becomes a stock speech line. ...
...................................................................................................................................................................
Hey, Trump Voters: He'll Offend You Next
By Megan McArdle, January 26, 2016
Trump fans, let's talk.
I have heard you. You don’t like America’s immigration policy. You don’t like what the modern economy offers to folks who don't have a college degree. And you are sick to death of well-paid folks in Washington and New York and California calling you bigots because of your stance on immigration, trade or foreign policy.
I don’t happen to agree with you on immigration policy, but I think “we should have fewer immigrants, and should not grant visas to people who came here in violation of the law” is a perfectly legitimate policy preference that deserves debate, not contempt. I can see why you’d want a candidate who was strong on an issue you care a lot about, someone who ignores the accusations of bigotry that so often shut down any serious debate on immigration.
What I don’t get is why you think Trump is going to give you what you want.
After all, four years ago, the guy was an immigration liberal, criticizing Romney for taking an excessively hard line. His positions on other major conservative issues, like abortion, are shamelessly opportunistic. His enthusiasm for bashing China is somewhat undercut by his enthusiasm for outsourcing the manufacturing of his own products to same. It is impossible to say with certainty which way he actually leans on any issue -- or perhaps the answer is “Whichever way the wind blows.”
Of course, all politicians are strategic in their policy positions, and all politics is, to some extent, an exercise in signaling. We have no idea what problems politicians will face, what they’ll be able to get Congress to go along with, what problems might crop up with their plans when all the niggling details have to be worked out. In the end, we’re mostly looking for a sort of fit: “Does this person agree with me on the issues I think are most important?” The hope being that if they agree with you now, they’ll be more likely to do what you would do when it comes time to actually make deals and respond to crises.
A lot of Republican voters are angry that their elected officials have not produced anything like the policies voters wanted, and their interpretation seems to be that the folks they send to Washington are simply turning around and selling them out.
I understand that what Trump signals with the angry rhetoric, the gleeful indifference to the opinions of the chatterati, is that he’s not “one of them” -- that dread “Washington establishment” that every politician in the country is now trying to run against. Donald Trump, it is supposed to say, doesn’t care what They think, which leaves him free to fight for Us.
But his endlessly convenient opinion shifts, on the very core issues his supporters care most about, ought also to signal that Donald Trump doesn’t care about you, either. He’s against outsourcing and immigration as long as that’s getting him votes. But if he can find a different coalition, he’ll happily abandon the current one in a flash. As he’ll need to, if he gets the nomination, and starts looking at the electoral math to take the general. Trump may set the land-speed record for a full 180, and his supporters will have little right to complain, given that his newfound attachment to conservative issues -- including the ones he hammers most -- is obviously weak and opportunistic.
The mass of voters who show up at his rallies may not know his long history of … let us say, strategic reconsideration of previously stated positions on core value issues. Low-information voters may share Trump's disdain for "the media," in which case they will remain low-information voters and never learn much about the names on the ballot.
But that doesn’t explain why he has followers among high-information conservatives. And for them, the best I can come up with is that they think the Washington establishment is so disconnected from the base that even a frank opportunist like Trump couldn’t possibly be worse.
“It couldn’t possibly be worse than what we have now” is what people say right before they are proven wrong.
Adam Smith famously noted that “there is a lot of ruin in a nation”. The corollary is, however, that things could indeed be much worse than they are now. And the people you elect out of desperation are often, in fact, much worse for you than the frustrating, half-witted, pork-laden compromises that the candidate you spurned would have made.
If you don’t believe me, just ask the folks who voted for Ralph Nader … and got George W. Bush. But at least those folks had some reason to believe that Nader would actually govern in ways that those folks liked. Trump voters seem eager to ignore the fact that their candidate is only theirs until he doesn't need them.
...................................................................................................................................................................
COMMENTS:
* From the article... "What I don’t get is why you think Trump is going to give you what you want." What if Trump voters simply want to give a middle finger to the establishment?
* Then, in the unique case that trump is elected, he'll take that finger and shove it right up the voters behinds by working with the establishment
* Perhaps...but Trump voters aren't exactly known for long-term planning skills. Angering the GOP establishment is the goal at the moment and, given the hysterical reaction by virtually all conservative media outlets, I'll quote George W. Bush by saying "Mission, accomplished".
* Trump can force the media to cover an issue. He can plant memes very well. I agree it will be fund. Cruz will be creamed because he's simply smarmy and has other issues. Rubio is probably the most electable.
* So Megan, what you are saying is.... Trump is NOT a sincere man.
* I'd feel so much better if Trump's demogagery was attached to a core set of principles. He seems to free-associate and merely stumbles onto topics or words that give progs the vapours. When he discovers on of those little nuggets, it becomes a stock speech line. ...
...................................................................................................................................................................
Hey, Trump Voters: He'll Offend You Next
By Megan McArdle, January 26, 2016
Trump fans, let's talk.
I have heard you. You don’t like America’s immigration policy. You don’t like what the modern economy offers to folks who don't have a college degree. And you are sick to death of well-paid folks in Washington and New York and California calling you bigots because of your stance on immigration, trade or foreign policy.
I don’t happen to agree with you on immigration policy, but I think “we should have fewer immigrants, and should not grant visas to people who came here in violation of the law” is a perfectly legitimate policy preference that deserves debate, not contempt. I can see why you’d want a candidate who was strong on an issue you care a lot about, someone who ignores the accusations of bigotry that so often shut down any serious debate on immigration.
What I don’t get is why you think Trump is going to give you what you want.
After all, four years ago, the guy was an immigration liberal, criticizing Romney for taking an excessively hard line. His positions on other major conservative issues, like abortion, are shamelessly opportunistic. His enthusiasm for bashing China is somewhat undercut by his enthusiasm for outsourcing the manufacturing of his own products to same. It is impossible to say with certainty which way he actually leans on any issue -- or perhaps the answer is “Whichever way the wind blows.”
Of course, all politicians are strategic in their policy positions, and all politics is, to some extent, an exercise in signaling. We have no idea what problems politicians will face, what they’ll be able to get Congress to go along with, what problems might crop up with their plans when all the niggling details have to be worked out. In the end, we’re mostly looking for a sort of fit: “Does this person agree with me on the issues I think are most important?” The hope being that if they agree with you now, they’ll be more likely to do what you would do when it comes time to actually make deals and respond to crises.
A lot of Republican voters are angry that their elected officials have not produced anything like the policies voters wanted, and their interpretation seems to be that the folks they send to Washington are simply turning around and selling them out.
I understand that what Trump signals with the angry rhetoric, the gleeful indifference to the opinions of the chatterati, is that he’s not “one of them” -- that dread “Washington establishment” that every politician in the country is now trying to run against. Donald Trump, it is supposed to say, doesn’t care what They think, which leaves him free to fight for Us.
But his endlessly convenient opinion shifts, on the very core issues his supporters care most about, ought also to signal that Donald Trump doesn’t care about you, either. He’s against outsourcing and immigration as long as that’s getting him votes. But if he can find a different coalition, he’ll happily abandon the current one in a flash. As he’ll need to, if he gets the nomination, and starts looking at the electoral math to take the general. Trump may set the land-speed record for a full 180, and his supporters will have little right to complain, given that his newfound attachment to conservative issues -- including the ones he hammers most -- is obviously weak and opportunistic.
The mass of voters who show up at his rallies may not know his long history of … let us say, strategic reconsideration of previously stated positions on core value issues. Low-information voters may share Trump's disdain for "the media," in which case they will remain low-information voters and never learn much about the names on the ballot.
But that doesn’t explain why he has followers among high-information conservatives. And for them, the best I can come up with is that they think the Washington establishment is so disconnected from the base that even a frank opportunist like Trump couldn’t possibly be worse.
“It couldn’t possibly be worse than what we have now” is what people say right before they are proven wrong.
Adam Smith famously noted that “there is a lot of ruin in a nation”. The corollary is, however, that things could indeed be much worse than they are now. And the people you elect out of desperation are often, in fact, much worse for you than the frustrating, half-witted, pork-laden compromises that the candidate you spurned would have made.
If you don’t believe me, just ask the folks who voted for Ralph Nader … and got George W. Bush. But at least those folks had some reason to believe that Nader would actually govern in ways that those folks liked. Trump voters seem eager to ignore the fact that their candidate is only theirs until he doesn't need them.
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No name-calling? Sure.......
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Tuesday, January 26, 2016
"'... when I hear this man say 'nothing can stop me from winning, not even shooting people,' I don't hear an appeal to voters — I hear a cry for help.'"
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COMMENTS:
* Trump may be super rich, but he still is a complete #$%$. He better not get Pres. or we will be in a war ASAP.
* When Trump said he could shoot someone and not lose any supporters he was making fun of the idiots who support him and they were too stupid to even realize it.
* "I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody. And I wouldn't lose any voters." Is this the man you want to be your president? Is this the man you would trust him to represent you on the international arena?
* His followers are not going to vote FOR HIM,,, they are going to vote AGAINST those in the Republican Party who destroyed it! The Retardicans are mad that their party leaders have totally trashed the party to the point they can;'t get back to the White House. Trump is campaigning more against them than he is the Democrats because he too is disgusted with the status quo in the Republican Party.
* " Stephen Colbert has an interesting theory about Donald Trump's desire to run for president. He thinks the politician's outlandish comments are cries for help." Stephen is correct.. They are a cry for help from the American voters who are ignored,lied to, and who's politicians have failed them.
* I've thought that for awhile now. Trumps wants to be ELECTED president but he doesn't want to BE president and have to deal with the issues of being president.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Stephen Colbert explains why he thinks Donald Trump doesn't really want to be president at all
By Jethro Nededog, January 26, 2016
Stephen Colbert has an interesting theory about Donald Trump's desire to run for president. He thinks the politician's outlandish comments are cries for help.
He laid out the theory on Monday's "Late Show" after Trump told an audience in Iowa over the weekend that his voters are so loyal, "I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody. And I wouldn't lose any voters, OK?"
Colbert's thinking comes days before the first primary vote, as many in the Republican party contemplate what's in store for them in the election. The National Review published an entire "Against Trump" issue with essays by prominent Republicans. And yet, Trump still holds the No. 1 position in the polls.
"That's right. Trump's voters will not leave," Colbert said. "I think that represents a huge problem for one person: Donald Trump. Because when I hear this man say 'nothing can stop me from winning, not even shooting people,' I don't hear an appeal to voters — I hear a cry for help."
Republican dismay isn't just over Trump's staying power. Texas senator Ted Cruz is Trump's closest rival in the polls, but he's so disliked in his own party, the Associated Press reported that Senator Richard Burr of North Carolina told supporters at a campaign fundraiser that he would vote for Bernie Sanders before Cruz.
.
"Ted, you just got thrown under the bus, and it's a VW biodiesel," Colbert, who introduced Cruz as a "half-melted GI Joe," joked.
So, what does this all mean for Trump? He may actually become president, which Colbert doesn't believe he really wants.
"Let's remember, here's a guy who ran for president probably to promote his reality show, or his mattress brand, or his line of premium ex-wives," the host said. "And now he looks like he might actually win. And no matter what he says or does — criticizing women, attacking Mexicans, banning Muslims, saying John McCain is a loser for being a prisoner of war — none of it affects his popularity. So he may not be saying, 'I can shoot someone and still be elected president.' He may be saying, 'I can shoot someone and still be elected president? [silently mouths] Help me.'
"Because Donald Trump can't really want to be president," he finished.
...................................................................................................................................................................
COMMENTS:
* Trump may be super rich, but he still is a complete #$%$. He better not get Pres. or we will be in a war ASAP.
* When Trump said he could shoot someone and not lose any supporters he was making fun of the idiots who support him and they were too stupid to even realize it.
* "I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody. And I wouldn't lose any voters." Is this the man you want to be your president? Is this the man you would trust him to represent you on the international arena?
* His followers are not going to vote FOR HIM,,, they are going to vote AGAINST those in the Republican Party who destroyed it! The Retardicans are mad that their party leaders have totally trashed the party to the point they can;'t get back to the White House. Trump is campaigning more against them than he is the Democrats because he too is disgusted with the status quo in the Republican Party.
* " Stephen Colbert has an interesting theory about Donald Trump's desire to run for president. He thinks the politician's outlandish comments are cries for help." Stephen is correct.. They are a cry for help from the American voters who are ignored,lied to, and who's politicians have failed them.
* I've thought that for awhile now. Trumps wants to be ELECTED president but he doesn't want to BE president and have to deal with the issues of being president.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Stephen Colbert explains why he thinks Donald Trump doesn't really want to be president at all
By Jethro Nededog, January 26, 2016
Stephen Colbert has an interesting theory about Donald Trump's desire to run for president. He thinks the politician's outlandish comments are cries for help.
He laid out the theory on Monday's "Late Show" after Trump told an audience in Iowa over the weekend that his voters are so loyal, "I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody. And I wouldn't lose any voters, OK?"
Colbert's thinking comes days before the first primary vote, as many in the Republican party contemplate what's in store for them in the election. The National Review published an entire "Against Trump" issue with essays by prominent Republicans. And yet, Trump still holds the No. 1 position in the polls.
"That's right. Trump's voters will not leave," Colbert said. "I think that represents a huge problem for one person: Donald Trump. Because when I hear this man say 'nothing can stop me from winning, not even shooting people,' I don't hear an appeal to voters — I hear a cry for help."
Republican dismay isn't just over Trump's staying power. Texas senator Ted Cruz is Trump's closest rival in the polls, but he's so disliked in his own party, the Associated Press reported that Senator Richard Burr of North Carolina told supporters at a campaign fundraiser that he would vote for Bernie Sanders before Cruz.
.
"Ted, you just got thrown under the bus, and it's a VW biodiesel," Colbert, who introduced Cruz as a "half-melted GI Joe," joked.
So, what does this all mean for Trump? He may actually become president, which Colbert doesn't believe he really wants.
"Let's remember, here's a guy who ran for president probably to promote his reality show, or his mattress brand, or his line of premium ex-wives," the host said. "And now he looks like he might actually win. And no matter what he says or does — criticizing women, attacking Mexicans, banning Muslims, saying John McCain is a loser for being a prisoner of war — none of it affects his popularity. So he may not be saying, 'I can shoot someone and still be elected president.' He may be saying, 'I can shoot someone and still be elected president? [silently mouths] Help me.'
"Because Donald Trump can't really want to be president," he finished.
...................................................................................................................................................................
"Trump’s platform ends at 'Make America Great Again.' The rest is noise and half-uttered grievances."
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COMMENTS:
* Great line here about Trump: "The rest is noise and half-uttered grievances." Their emperor is naked, but they all pretend he has a plan to better America beyond having Mexico build a wall, which isn't ever going to happen.
* Conservatives give a lot of empty lip service to the importance of education in our advanced society, yet they do everything in their power to stifle it. Right-wing governors immediately begin cutting education funding, teachers salaries, school infrastructure rebuilding and all things related, as soon as they are elected. A well educated, well read and inquisitive public is a direct threat to conservatives. Their ideology relies heavily on stagnation and blind obedience, re-enforced with a religious dogma that pounds guilt and self-loathing into their constituents brains. Conservatism requires a willful ignorance, a concerted effort to remain closed to new ideas and possibilities. It's a sad fact that as they vote to destroy the education system, their followers are even more prideful of their deep hatred for anyone smarter than themselves.
* It doesn't matter whether conservatives read or not; whether you are a candidate or a pundit, you will have popularity in exact proportion to how nasty you are. Trump, Palin, Cruz, Coulter, Malkin, Limbaugh -- they all figured out the deepest political aspirations of the conservative base: telling liberals to go f•ck themselves. As long as you do that in a book, they will read all day long.
* People who say Palin is stupid don't get what she's doing. She is certainly ignorant, superstitious, and willfully uninformed, but she knows how to to what she does very well, and that is to be a cheerleader. No matter how garbled her syntax, I can usually understand what she means "We're good, they're bad, we're gonna win, we're the salt of the earth, rah rah for us, can I get a hallelujah?" She's gotten a lot of ribbing for that "disco porcupine" jacket, but look how it functioned, jiggling and flashing in the light, like a -- well, like a cheerleader's pompoms. It's not about encouraging thought but stirring up anger.
* Plus no one can top her when it comes to sneering. The intonations and timber of her voice alone communicate the hateful resentment and the self-righteousness they want and need. "Compassionate conservatism" was always a ploy but it doesn't fly even as a marketing tool anymore.
* In my opinion, it's really quite simple to understand. It is far easier to manipulate an illiterate mob than to control an educated group. Look at Russian history as an example. Why is it after each new regime range, the first to be dispensed with are the intellectuals?
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The GOP and the dumbing down of the U.S.: Conservatives need to accept that Trump, Palin and anti-intellectualism are their fault
The conservative braintrust published a symposium in National Review last week outlining why Donald Trump isn’t a real conservative, and, more important, why he’s bad for the Republican Party. This is the kind of thing you expect the National Review to do: Trump isn’t conservative in any coherent way and he is destroying the GOP from within. And so there are plenty of reasons for conservative intellectuals to attack him.
Quite a bit of commentary followed National Review’s symposium, some of which pointed out the irony of conservative media personalities attacking a celebrity candidate whose existence they helped make possible. I did so briefly in a post last Friday. And I imagine this conversation will continue well into 2016, as the Trump circus rolls unimpeded through the Republican primaries.
There was, however, another anti-Trump piece published in the National Review over the weekend, this one by Kevin Williamson. Titled “Our Post-Literate Politics,” the article is a lamentation on America’s growing illiteracy. Williamson’s thesis is that Donald Trump’s presidential candidacy is only possible in a society that doesn’t read or think much. He writes:
A few decades ago, Williamson argues, people were at least grounded in a book, even if it was a terrible one like “Atlas Shrugged.” The point is that citizens had something like an internally coherent worldview, which was shaped by literature and informed by a tradition of thought, be it conservatism or liberalism or some other “ism.” This is preferable to our current situation because it makes something like reasoned argument possible, people having actual positions to defend.
But even that seems impossible now, Williamson writes:
It’s worth asking why that is? Why, in other words, do Trump and — gaseous celebrity candidates like Sarah Palin — seem only to gain traction in the Republican Party? Williamson is right to note the successful sloganeering of candidates like Bill Clinton and President Obama, but both of them articulated actual ideas and policies, whether you agreed with them or not. Trump’s platform ends at “Make America Great Again.” The rest is noise and half-uttered grievances.
The answer, I suspect, is buried in Williamson’s article, which is really quite interesting. It’s not that conservatives don’t read; it’s that they only read or listen to people like Mark Levin or Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh, who are conservative entrepreneurs profiting from the blinkered rage feeding Trump’s campaign. They don’t propound a serious or coherent worldview because they don’t have one; they’re entertainers chasing ratings. These are the forces behind the Tea Party movement; they define the Republican Party now, and there’s no functional equivalent on the left.
I’m deeply sympathetic to Williamson’s argument, but you can’t lament the death of intelligent discourse in this country without conceding that one party — and the media-industrial complex supporting it — is more responsible than the other. The GOP is the party of Fox News and talk radio now, not the National Review, and that’s a huge part of this story.
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COMMENTS:
* Great line here about Trump: "The rest is noise and half-uttered grievances." Their emperor is naked, but they all pretend he has a plan to better America beyond having Mexico build a wall, which isn't ever going to happen.
* Conservatives give a lot of empty lip service to the importance of education in our advanced society, yet they do everything in their power to stifle it. Right-wing governors immediately begin cutting education funding, teachers salaries, school infrastructure rebuilding and all things related, as soon as they are elected. A well educated, well read and inquisitive public is a direct threat to conservatives. Their ideology relies heavily on stagnation and blind obedience, re-enforced with a religious dogma that pounds guilt and self-loathing into their constituents brains. Conservatism requires a willful ignorance, a concerted effort to remain closed to new ideas and possibilities. It's a sad fact that as they vote to destroy the education system, their followers are even more prideful of their deep hatred for anyone smarter than themselves.
* It doesn't matter whether conservatives read or not; whether you are a candidate or a pundit, you will have popularity in exact proportion to how nasty you are. Trump, Palin, Cruz, Coulter, Malkin, Limbaugh -- they all figured out the deepest political aspirations of the conservative base: telling liberals to go f•ck themselves. As long as you do that in a book, they will read all day long.
* People who say Palin is stupid don't get what she's doing. She is certainly ignorant, superstitious, and willfully uninformed, but she knows how to to what she does very well, and that is to be a cheerleader. No matter how garbled her syntax, I can usually understand what she means "We're good, they're bad, we're gonna win, we're the salt of the earth, rah rah for us, can I get a hallelujah?" She's gotten a lot of ribbing for that "disco porcupine" jacket, but look how it functioned, jiggling and flashing in the light, like a -- well, like a cheerleader's pompoms. It's not about encouraging thought but stirring up anger.
* Plus no one can top her when it comes to sneering. The intonations and timber of her voice alone communicate the hateful resentment and the self-righteousness they want and need. "Compassionate conservatism" was always a ploy but it doesn't fly even as a marketing tool anymore.
* In my opinion, it's really quite simple to understand. It is far easier to manipulate an illiterate mob than to control an educated group. Look at Russian history as an example. Why is it after each new regime range, the first to be dispensed with are the intellectuals?
...................................................................................................................................................................
The GOP and the dumbing down of the U.S.: Conservatives need to accept that Trump, Palin and anti-intellectualism are their fault
The National Review scoffs at Trump and the nation's growing illiteracy while missing how the right inspired both
By Sean Illing, January 26, 2016The conservative braintrust published a symposium in National Review last week outlining why Donald Trump isn’t a real conservative, and, more important, why he’s bad for the Republican Party. This is the kind of thing you expect the National Review to do: Trump isn’t conservative in any coherent way and he is destroying the GOP from within. And so there are plenty of reasons for conservative intellectuals to attack him.
Quite a bit of commentary followed National Review’s symposium, some of which pointed out the irony of conservative media personalities attacking a celebrity candidate whose existence they helped make possible. I did so briefly in a post last Friday. And I imagine this conversation will continue well into 2016, as the Trump circus rolls unimpeded through the Republican primaries.
There was, however, another anti-Trump piece published in the National Review over the weekend, this one by Kevin Williamson. Titled “Our Post-Literate Politics,” the article is a lamentation on America’s growing illiteracy. Williamson’s thesis is that Donald Trump’s presidential candidacy is only possible in a society that doesn’t read or think much. He writes:
“Trump is something that could not happen in a nation that could read. This is the full-flower of post-literate politics. There are still individual Americans who can read, a fact for which writers should say daily prayers of gratitude. There are even communities of sort, and not only ladies’ pinot parties loosely organized around ’50 Shades of Grey. Conservatives are great readers, which is why the overwhelmingly left-leaning world of New York City publishing constantly is looking forward to the next offering from Mark Levin or Bill O’Reilly, whose works produce literary profit sufficient to subsidize the careers of any number of poets and high-minded novelists. But we are not a nation that reads, or a nation that shares a living tradition of serious contemporary literature, fiction or nonfiction.”Williamson continues, pointing to the devolving literary habits of Americans over time. “The American Founders,” he writes, “could have a conversation among themselves because they had in the main all consumed the same library of Greek and Roman classics, British and Continental literature ranging from fiction to political economy, legal literature, and the like. This did not ensure agreement or like-mindedness…What it ensured was literate and enlightened argument.” Nothing to disagree with there. But that “enlightened” culture died a long time ago, and it was in any case rooted in plunder and oppression.
A few decades ago, Williamson argues, people were at least grounded in a book, even if it was a terrible one like “Atlas Shrugged.” The point is that citizens had something like an internally coherent worldview, which was shaped by literature and informed by a tradition of thought, be it conservatism or liberalism or some other “ism.” This is preferable to our current situation because it makes something like reasoned argument possible, people having actual positions to defend.
But even that seems impossible now, Williamson writes:
“From the man of many books to the man of one book, we devolved very quickly to the man of one sentence, the paragraph being too demanding and unwieldy a form. In the case of the Trumpkins, that sentence is ‘Make America Great Again,’ which has a great deal of emotional meaning but no intellectual content. That sort of sloganeering hardly begins with Trump. But Ronald Reagan’s ‘It’s morning in America’ was retrospective, a celebration of the substantial success of his first term in office; it was not a substitute for a program.”Reading all of this, it’s hard not to be struck by Williamson’s inability to locate the origins of this idiocy. What he’s essentially complaining about is anti-intellectualism, and anti-intellectualism is overwhelmingly a Republican problem. There are dim voters on both sides of the political aisle, of course, and Americans are perhaps dumber than they used to be (about politics at least), but Trump’s half-baked slogan is winning over far more Republicans than Democrats. He’s their problem, and he only exists because a sufficient number of conservatives want him to. Trump — or some leftist equivalent — isn’t possible in the Democratic Party. Bernie Sanders is bucking the establishment in much the same way Trump is, but his political philosophy is as consistent and clear as anyone currently running, whereas Trump offers nothing in the way of content.
It’s worth asking why that is? Why, in other words, do Trump and — gaseous celebrity candidates like Sarah Palin — seem only to gain traction in the Republican Party? Williamson is right to note the successful sloganeering of candidates like Bill Clinton and President Obama, but both of them articulated actual ideas and policies, whether you agreed with them or not. Trump’s platform ends at “Make America Great Again.” The rest is noise and half-uttered grievances.
The answer, I suspect, is buried in Williamson’s article, which is really quite interesting. It’s not that conservatives don’t read; it’s that they only read or listen to people like Mark Levin or Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh, who are conservative entrepreneurs profiting from the blinkered rage feeding Trump’s campaign. They don’t propound a serious or coherent worldview because they don’t have one; they’re entertainers chasing ratings. These are the forces behind the Tea Party movement; they define the Republican Party now, and there’s no functional equivalent on the left.
I’m deeply sympathetic to Williamson’s argument, but you can’t lament the death of intelligent discourse in this country without conceding that one party — and the media-industrial complex supporting it — is more responsible than the other. The GOP is the party of Fox News and talk radio now, not the National Review, and that’s a huge part of this story.
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"Monbiot ... notes not just the dumbing down of the U.S. electorate, but also the celebration of stupidity that has emerged in force in U.S. politics." Please, mostly in the GOP.
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COMMENTS:
* "...we have watched the GOP become dominated by the idea that truth, reason, and critical thinking are a liberal agenda designed to destroy our nation’s core values...." another gop platform contradiction that they bloviate about people on welfare and/or in minimum wage jobs needing to get an education to find a better job that pays more...
* Any Palin speech is guaranteed to produce a yuk-fest. The hilarity that her extreme stupidity invariably provokes, however, is outweighed by the terribly sad and sobering fact that, to a very large chunk of the American electorate, ol' Sarah is perfectly OK.
* GOP is lost because the USA is getting more diverse and with that the opinions and beliefs change over time. The old white (usually male) folks are lost and angry. The generations X and Millennials are more open minded and diverse than ever. If the GOP won't change their extreme views they will just keep shrinking and dying but they won't go away without displaying their true colors. We better the careful because a cornered animal can be dangerous. We are about to elect either a Socialist or a woman and after a Black POTUS, this is what the old establishment hate and fear the most.
* I wouldn't be so confident. The RW has been focussed on the state level, and in Michigan they're agitating to tie electoral votes to congressional districts. Which would mean, due to gerrymandering, that although Obama won the popular vote handily in 2012, the Repubs would have won electorally. I'm sure there are other schemes afoot
* It is puzzling that people can be PROUDLY ignorant, but it is a defining characteristic of the Right. Not only being proud of ignorance but actively denying science has become similarly emblematic. The tribalism on both sides has made the Right proud of their lack of information (while at the same time decrying "low information voters"), and the Left is dismissive (correctly in my opinion) of people who wear their intellectual ineptitude as a badge of honor. Unfortunately for us all many of these people are also armed to the teeth. What a great combo: Stupid and Packing Heat. New campaign rallying cry anyone? Our future is locked into dealing with people who will gladly deny facts and intelligent conversation in favor of approved talking points and purely emotional reactions. Depressing.
* Fey is brilliant, but it's pretty hard to parody a parody.
* Agreed. Today's GOP is redefining parody and satire.
* I know. Palin has Out-Fey'd herself. It's quite an accomplishment.
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Sarah Palin’s American lobotomy: The Republicans keep making us dumber, and not even Stephen Colbert can save us
We know the GOP is angry. The bigger problem is that it's stupid. And like rage, the idiocy flows down from the top
By Sophia A. McClennen, January 25, 2016
This last election cycle has revealed an increasing divide over how segments of the population understand political issues. According to Pew, “Partisan polarization – the vast and growing gap between Republicans and Democrats – is a defining feature of politics today.” The problem is not simply connected to opposing ideologies, though. Today polarization is the defining feature of Tea Party politics. From the Bundy gang to Donald Trump’s rallies, we are witnessing a rise in aggressive and divisive politics.
All of this was on display as Sarah Palin reemerged on the national stage this week to endorse Donald Trump. She is, after all, the poster girl for just this sort of rhetoric. Remember that she had Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in a crosshairs on her website telling supporters to “reload” and defeat. After Giffords was shot, Palin still wouldn’t back down from her violent rhetoric.
But here’s the thing: Palin incites violence, but she is also incredibly dumb. So dumb, in fact, that she doesn’t seem to be able to speak in complete sentences.
It is time to take seriously the role that stupidity is playing in shaping GOP politics. We have followed the rampant lying of candidates, and we have followed the rhetoric of anger and hostility. Maybe it is time to look more closely at the role of stupidity. And there is no better figure to help us think about that problem than Sarah Palin.
Throughout her entire career she has surprised us with her stupidity. Remember when she couldn’t answer Katie Couric’s questions about which magazines she reads or when she wrote on her hand to help her remember her talking points at a Tea Party Nation event? And yet, in comparison to the nonsense that came out of her mouth at her Trump endorsement speech, those moments seem relatively lucid.
Almost everyone covering the story of her Trump endorsement was absolutely astonished by her incoherent blathering. The New York Times covered “the most mystifying lines” of her speech.
Of course it has to be said that seemingly on Fox News, Palin gets treated like a serious statesman rather than an incoherent wingnut. Megyn Kelly might have had a hard time choking back chuckles when she interviewed Brit Hume about the speech, but she still conducted a straight interview where Hume simply talked about how the endorsement would affect the Ted Cruz campaign.
For Fox News the speech was a significant political moment, not a blathering of embarrassing nonsense. But then again Fox News once used a picture of Tina Fey impersonating Palin as a graphic on a story on Palin—when Palin actually worked there. So there is little reason to trust their coverage of her.
Thankfully, the late night comedy crowd was prepared to correct the failures of Fox News reporting once again.
Larry Wilmore asked on “The Nightly Show” if Palin was drunk: “I’m not even joking, you guys. She sounds wasted, right?” Wilmore claimed that Palin’s rambling, nonsensical speech couldn’t even be compared to a “word salad.”
James Corden compared her speech to a Dr. Seuss book—if Dr. Seuss “wanted to deport all of the Woozles.” Corden called her speech “particularly confusing,” and reminded his audience of the role that Palin played in destroying John McCain’s run for the presidency: “You just know that John McCain is on his couch at home watching the TV being like, Donald – dude – this is a bad idea.”
Conan O’Brien referred to her speech as “rambling,” “strange” and “nonsense.”
Even Jimmy Fallon, who typically side steps any serious political comedy went after Palin’s inane blather, saying that he “thinks” that Palin was endorsing Trump, but wasn’t sure. He then showed some of the highlights of her stupidity only to look confused and say “What?” He then poked fun at Trump who stood by Palin and looked like a fool.
Palin’s stupidity led to one of the very best bits yet in Trevor Noah’s career as host of “The Daily Show.” He reminded viewers that there was a perfect synergy between Trump and Palin: “Trump is not the first American candidate to get so far in politics knowing so little. He is the second.” He then went on to describe Palin as the “original” He described the speech as “all over the place.” And then said that it was “as if a bag of Scrabble tiles had grown a body and come to life.”
In one of his best lines yet, he claimed that: “It’s like the only thing Sarah Palin hates more than Obama is punctuation. Nobody talks like that. It’s almost like she’s a malfunctioning robot.” He then went on do to a pretty hilarious impersonation of her talking to the people of Iowa as though they were cavemen who didn’t understand English.
And to the delight of many, Tina Fey reprised her Palin impersonation on “Saturday Night Live”. Her angle? Just basically repeat verbatim what Palin said. That simple comedic tactic worked to effectively destroy the McCain-Palin campaign in 2008—and it is working again now. When the nonsense Palin spews is repeated through Fey’s impersonating parody, it immediately reveals the depths of Palin’s stupidity.
The best Palin comedy came from seasoned Palin-basher Stephen Colbert who referred to Palin as “the original material girl” –since every time she makes a public appearance she offers more easy comedy material. “God, I have missed you! It’s like a magical eagle made a wish on a flag pin, and it came to life,” he exclaimed. He, too, keyed in to the incoherence of her remarks: “Sarah Palin just guaranteed Trump the evangelical vote, because I think she was speaking in tongues.” He then went on to Tase the part of his brain that understands sentence structure so that he could speak in Palin about the other candidates.
When Colbert hosted “The Colbert Report,” Palin was a frequent target. Recall when he called her “a f$%king retard” in reference to her support of Rush Limbaugh referring to liberals as retards on his show. That was the segment that also called her out for her use of a “hand-o-prompter” – notes written on her hand to help her in an interview.
One of Colbert’s best Palin takedowns took place back in 2011 when he mocked Mika Brzezinski for daring to wonder how long the media was going to let Palin continue get so much attention. Colbert’s rant—where he lectures Brzezinski on how she needs to buck up and cover Palin anyway– may be the best attack on her stupidity yet:
I know you think this story has no purpose other than keeping Sarah Palin’s name in the headlines for another news cycle. I know you think she has nothing to offer the national dialogue and that her speeches are just coded talking points mixed in with words picked up at random from a Thesaurus.
I know you think Sarah Palin is at best a self-promoting ignoramus and at worst a shameless media troll who will abuse any platform to deliver dog-whistle encouragement to a far right base that may include possible insurrectionists.
I know you think her reality show was pathetically unstatesmanlike and, at the same time, I know you believe it represents the pinnacle of her potential. And that her transparent desperation to be a celebrity completely eclipsed her interest in public service long ago.
I know that when you arrive at the office each day you say a silent prayer that maybe, just maybe, Sarah Palin will at long last just shut up for ten f*cking minutes.
And yet, here we are, five years later, and Palin is even less coherent than before and she’s back in spotlight supporting a candidate who has been shown to speak to his audiences at a fourth grade level.
Exactly how long is the stupid epidemic going to spread within the GOP? It’s like stupidity is the Ebola of GOP politics—a metaphor you know Fox News would use if they weren’t so busy promoting the stupidity themselves.
As Lee Camp explained on last week’s episode of “Redacted Tonight,” Trump’s level of speech is the lowest of any presidential candidate. He cites Trump in what seems like a direct channeling of Palin-speech “We have to build a fence. And it’s got to be a beauty. Who can build better than Trump? I build; it’s what I do. I build, I build nice fences, but I build great buildings. Fences are easy, believe me.” Camp explains that Trump “represents the continued dumbing down of America.”
Trump’s moronic comments are also wrapped in lies. As Camp points out, Trump isn’t just talking like a fourth grader: “He is a dumb, dumb, lying fourth grader.”
Back in 2008, George Monbiot of “The Guardian” asked why morons are allowed to succeed in U.S. politics. “How did politics in the U.S. come to be dominated by people who make a virtue out of ignorance? … How did Sarah Palin, Dan Quayle and other such gibbering numbskulls get to where they are?”
Monbiot notes that Bush and Palin were candidates that flaunted their stupidity. He notes not just the dumbing down of the U.S. electorate, but also the celebration of stupidity that has emerged in force in U.S. politics.
Don’t forget that in the first GOP debate, Trump remarked that “We need brain.” He literally used a totally stupid phrase to argue for intelligence in government. How exactly does such a completely moronic statement go unchecked?
Well it doesn’t, of course. After the debate there was a flurry of memes that emerged to mock Trump’s comment. And Twitter blew up with a host of citizen-satire that mocked Palin’s idiotic comments.
The Daily Currant highlighted Palin’s stupidity by running a satiric piece that compared her to a dumb school kid: “Sarah Palin has reportedly been stuck for several hours after licking a frozen flagpole outside a rally in Des Moines, Iowa this morning.” The piece went on, “I know Sarah Palin isn’t the brightest politician in the world,” says one Iowa Republican attending the rally. “But you would think that being from Alaska she would at least understand the concept of metal being cold.”
And, as mentioned, the professional TV comedians weighed in too.
Every time we get GOP nonsense, someone calls it out. But so far, calling out the stupidity and laughing at it, isn’t hurting Trump or Palin. It doesn’t hurt because over time we have watched the GOP become dominated by the idea that truth, reason, and critical thinking are a liberal agenda designed to destroy our nation’s core values.
Here’s the irony though. Intelligence is actually a core value of U.S. politics, or at least it used to be. Elvin Lim has found that over time our political rhetoric has relentlessly declined. In fact, he notes a nosedive in intelligence in public speech since the founding fathers. President George Washington’s “Farewell Address” in 1796 was written at graduate-degree levels: Grade 17.9 , while President Abraham Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address” in 1863 was at an 11th-grade level. Now we have Trump coming in at fourth grade. I’m guessing Palin doesn’t even rate that high.
It seems that the only way to understand Trump and Palin is to Tase not only the part of the brain that understands sentence structure, but also the part that understands anything at all.
...................................................................................................................................................................
COMMENTS:
* "...we have watched the GOP become dominated by the idea that truth, reason, and critical thinking are a liberal agenda designed to destroy our nation’s core values...." another gop platform contradiction that they bloviate about people on welfare and/or in minimum wage jobs needing to get an education to find a better job that pays more...
* Any Palin speech is guaranteed to produce a yuk-fest. The hilarity that her extreme stupidity invariably provokes, however, is outweighed by the terribly sad and sobering fact that, to a very large chunk of the American electorate, ol' Sarah is perfectly OK.
* GOP is lost because the USA is getting more diverse and with that the opinions and beliefs change over time. The old white (usually male) folks are lost and angry. The generations X and Millennials are more open minded and diverse than ever. If the GOP won't change their extreme views they will just keep shrinking and dying but they won't go away without displaying their true colors. We better the careful because a cornered animal can be dangerous. We are about to elect either a Socialist or a woman and after a Black POTUS, this is what the old establishment hate and fear the most.
* I wouldn't be so confident. The RW has been focussed on the state level, and in Michigan they're agitating to tie electoral votes to congressional districts. Which would mean, due to gerrymandering, that although Obama won the popular vote handily in 2012, the Repubs would have won electorally. I'm sure there are other schemes afoot
* It is puzzling that people can be PROUDLY ignorant, but it is a defining characteristic of the Right. Not only being proud of ignorance but actively denying science has become similarly emblematic. The tribalism on both sides has made the Right proud of their lack of information (while at the same time decrying "low information voters"), and the Left is dismissive (correctly in my opinion) of people who wear their intellectual ineptitude as a badge of honor. Unfortunately for us all many of these people are also armed to the teeth. What a great combo: Stupid and Packing Heat. New campaign rallying cry anyone? Our future is locked into dealing with people who will gladly deny facts and intelligent conversation in favor of approved talking points and purely emotional reactions. Depressing.
* Fey is brilliant, but it's pretty hard to parody a parody.
* Agreed. Today's GOP is redefining parody and satire.
* I know. Palin has Out-Fey'd herself. It's quite an accomplishment.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Sarah Palin’s American lobotomy: The Republicans keep making us dumber, and not even Stephen Colbert can save us
We know the GOP is angry. The bigger problem is that it's stupid. And like rage, the idiocy flows down from the top
By Sophia A. McClennen, January 25, 2016
This last election cycle has revealed an increasing divide over how segments of the population understand political issues. According to Pew, “Partisan polarization – the vast and growing gap between Republicans and Democrats – is a defining feature of politics today.” The problem is not simply connected to opposing ideologies, though. Today polarization is the defining feature of Tea Party politics. From the Bundy gang to Donald Trump’s rallies, we are witnessing a rise in aggressive and divisive politics.
All of this was on display as Sarah Palin reemerged on the national stage this week to endorse Donald Trump. She is, after all, the poster girl for just this sort of rhetoric. Remember that she had Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in a crosshairs on her website telling supporters to “reload” and defeat. After Giffords was shot, Palin still wouldn’t back down from her violent rhetoric.
But here’s the thing: Palin incites violence, but she is also incredibly dumb. So dumb, in fact, that she doesn’t seem to be able to speak in complete sentences.
It is time to take seriously the role that stupidity is playing in shaping GOP politics. We have followed the rampant lying of candidates, and we have followed the rhetoric of anger and hostility. Maybe it is time to look more closely at the role of stupidity. And there is no better figure to help us think about that problem than Sarah Palin.
Throughout her entire career she has surprised us with her stupidity. Remember when she couldn’t answer Katie Couric’s questions about which magazines she reads or when she wrote on her hand to help her remember her talking points at a Tea Party Nation event? And yet, in comparison to the nonsense that came out of her mouth at her Trump endorsement speech, those moments seem relatively lucid.
Almost everyone covering the story of her Trump endorsement was absolutely astonished by her incoherent blathering. The New York Times covered “the most mystifying lines” of her speech.
Of course it has to be said that seemingly on Fox News, Palin gets treated like a serious statesman rather than an incoherent wingnut. Megyn Kelly might have had a hard time choking back chuckles when she interviewed Brit Hume about the speech, but she still conducted a straight interview where Hume simply talked about how the endorsement would affect the Ted Cruz campaign.
For Fox News the speech was a significant political moment, not a blathering of embarrassing nonsense. But then again Fox News once used a picture of Tina Fey impersonating Palin as a graphic on a story on Palin—when Palin actually worked there. So there is little reason to trust their coverage of her.
Thankfully, the late night comedy crowd was prepared to correct the failures of Fox News reporting once again.
Larry Wilmore asked on “The Nightly Show” if Palin was drunk: “I’m not even joking, you guys. She sounds wasted, right?” Wilmore claimed that Palin’s rambling, nonsensical speech couldn’t even be compared to a “word salad.”
James Corden compared her speech to a Dr. Seuss book—if Dr. Seuss “wanted to deport all of the Woozles.” Corden called her speech “particularly confusing,” and reminded his audience of the role that Palin played in destroying John McCain’s run for the presidency: “You just know that John McCain is on his couch at home watching the TV being like, Donald – dude – this is a bad idea.”
Conan O’Brien referred to her speech as “rambling,” “strange” and “nonsense.”
Even Jimmy Fallon, who typically side steps any serious political comedy went after Palin’s inane blather, saying that he “thinks” that Palin was endorsing Trump, but wasn’t sure. He then showed some of the highlights of her stupidity only to look confused and say “What?” He then poked fun at Trump who stood by Palin and looked like a fool.
Palin’s stupidity led to one of the very best bits yet in Trevor Noah’s career as host of “The Daily Show.” He reminded viewers that there was a perfect synergy between Trump and Palin: “Trump is not the first American candidate to get so far in politics knowing so little. He is the second.” He then went on to describe Palin as the “original” He described the speech as “all over the place.” And then said that it was “as if a bag of Scrabble tiles had grown a body and come to life.”
In one of his best lines yet, he claimed that: “It’s like the only thing Sarah Palin hates more than Obama is punctuation. Nobody talks like that. It’s almost like she’s a malfunctioning robot.” He then went on do to a pretty hilarious impersonation of her talking to the people of Iowa as though they were cavemen who didn’t understand English.
And to the delight of many, Tina Fey reprised her Palin impersonation on “Saturday Night Live”. Her angle? Just basically repeat verbatim what Palin said. That simple comedic tactic worked to effectively destroy the McCain-Palin campaign in 2008—and it is working again now. When the nonsense Palin spews is repeated through Fey’s impersonating parody, it immediately reveals the depths of Palin’s stupidity.
The best Palin comedy came from seasoned Palin-basher Stephen Colbert who referred to Palin as “the original material girl” –since every time she makes a public appearance she offers more easy comedy material. “God, I have missed you! It’s like a magical eagle made a wish on a flag pin, and it came to life,” he exclaimed. He, too, keyed in to the incoherence of her remarks: “Sarah Palin just guaranteed Trump the evangelical vote, because I think she was speaking in tongues.” He then went on to Tase the part of his brain that understands sentence structure so that he could speak in Palin about the other candidates.
When Colbert hosted “The Colbert Report,” Palin was a frequent target. Recall when he called her “a f$%king retard” in reference to her support of Rush Limbaugh referring to liberals as retards on his show. That was the segment that also called her out for her use of a “hand-o-prompter” – notes written on her hand to help her in an interview.
One of Colbert’s best Palin takedowns took place back in 2011 when he mocked Mika Brzezinski for daring to wonder how long the media was going to let Palin continue get so much attention. Colbert’s rant—where he lectures Brzezinski on how she needs to buck up and cover Palin anyway– may be the best attack on her stupidity yet:
I know you think this story has no purpose other than keeping Sarah Palin’s name in the headlines for another news cycle. I know you think she has nothing to offer the national dialogue and that her speeches are just coded talking points mixed in with words picked up at random from a Thesaurus.
I know you think Sarah Palin is at best a self-promoting ignoramus and at worst a shameless media troll who will abuse any platform to deliver dog-whistle encouragement to a far right base that may include possible insurrectionists.
I know you think her reality show was pathetically unstatesmanlike and, at the same time, I know you believe it represents the pinnacle of her potential. And that her transparent desperation to be a celebrity completely eclipsed her interest in public service long ago.
I know that when you arrive at the office each day you say a silent prayer that maybe, just maybe, Sarah Palin will at long last just shut up for ten f*cking minutes.
And yet, here we are, five years later, and Palin is even less coherent than before and she’s back in spotlight supporting a candidate who has been shown to speak to his audiences at a fourth grade level.
Exactly how long is the stupid epidemic going to spread within the GOP? It’s like stupidity is the Ebola of GOP politics—a metaphor you know Fox News would use if they weren’t so busy promoting the stupidity themselves.
As Lee Camp explained on last week’s episode of “Redacted Tonight,” Trump’s level of speech is the lowest of any presidential candidate. He cites Trump in what seems like a direct channeling of Palin-speech “We have to build a fence. And it’s got to be a beauty. Who can build better than Trump? I build; it’s what I do. I build, I build nice fences, but I build great buildings. Fences are easy, believe me.” Camp explains that Trump “represents the continued dumbing down of America.”
Trump’s moronic comments are also wrapped in lies. As Camp points out, Trump isn’t just talking like a fourth grader: “He is a dumb, dumb, lying fourth grader.”
Back in 2008, George Monbiot of “The Guardian” asked why morons are allowed to succeed in U.S. politics. “How did politics in the U.S. come to be dominated by people who make a virtue out of ignorance? … How did Sarah Palin, Dan Quayle and other such gibbering numbskulls get to where they are?”
Monbiot notes that Bush and Palin were candidates that flaunted their stupidity. He notes not just the dumbing down of the U.S. electorate, but also the celebration of stupidity that has emerged in force in U.S. politics.
Don’t forget that in the first GOP debate, Trump remarked that “We need brain.” He literally used a totally stupid phrase to argue for intelligence in government. How exactly does such a completely moronic statement go unchecked?
Well it doesn’t, of course. After the debate there was a flurry of memes that emerged to mock Trump’s comment. And Twitter blew up with a host of citizen-satire that mocked Palin’s idiotic comments.
The Daily Currant highlighted Palin’s stupidity by running a satiric piece that compared her to a dumb school kid: “Sarah Palin has reportedly been stuck for several hours after licking a frozen flagpole outside a rally in Des Moines, Iowa this morning.” The piece went on, “I know Sarah Palin isn’t the brightest politician in the world,” says one Iowa Republican attending the rally. “But you would think that being from Alaska she would at least understand the concept of metal being cold.”
And, as mentioned, the professional TV comedians weighed in too.
Every time we get GOP nonsense, someone calls it out. But so far, calling out the stupidity and laughing at it, isn’t hurting Trump or Palin. It doesn’t hurt because over time we have watched the GOP become dominated by the idea that truth, reason, and critical thinking are a liberal agenda designed to destroy our nation’s core values.
Here’s the irony though. Intelligence is actually a core value of U.S. politics, or at least it used to be. Elvin Lim has found that over time our political rhetoric has relentlessly declined. In fact, he notes a nosedive in intelligence in public speech since the founding fathers. President George Washington’s “Farewell Address” in 1796 was written at graduate-degree levels: Grade 17.9 , while President Abraham Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address” in 1863 was at an 11th-grade level. Now we have Trump coming in at fourth grade. I’m guessing Palin doesn’t even rate that high.
It seems that the only way to understand Trump and Palin is to Tase not only the part of the brain that understands sentence structure, but also the part that understands anything at all.
...................................................................................................................................................................
"So, many conservatives, really resenting the Constitution, seek its destruction." Why don't the RWNJs just seek their own self-destruction?
...................................................................................................................................................................
COMMENTS:
* Republicans want a "Christian Theocracy" throws the Constitution and every other great document out the window..................kiss Freedom! Democracy goodby..................
* We must now enshrine the hate, intolerance, bigotry and small mindedness of the the Republicon party.
* Step one-change the Constitution. Step two-throw it out and replace it with the bible. Republicans plans
* I love when conservative talk about the constitution, then they want to trash it. Bundy carries his own version of the constitution which every one but me should follow, I have my own version and it is really great. But if you wish to join me I could give you some admendments, lets talk $$
* Neither party can claim to support what the Constitution represents. And neither party can claim they don't pick and choose when they support it.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Conservatives and the Constitution
By Max J. Skidmore, January 25, 2016
The Constitution: We Love it; it's Perfect; Let's Change it!
Singing their praises of the Constitution, House Republicans adopted a "requirement that every bill must cite the provision of the Constitution which permits its introduction." Surprisingly, the actual Constitution frequently makes conservatives uncomfortable.
Rick Perry, former Texas governor and former presidential aspirant, offers an extraordinary example of this apparent ambivalence. In 2010 he published Fed Up! Our Fight to Save America from Washington, with a foreword by Newt Gingrich. Perry urges repeal of some amendments, and adoption of others. He particularly hates the 16th Amendment that authorizes the despised U. S. income tax. He also wants to repeal the 17th Amendment, which gives the vote for a state's U.S. senators to the people of that state, rather than to its legislature. Strangely, many other conservatives also urge that we deny American citizens the right to vote for their senators. Perry wants new amendments to remove lifetime appointments for federal judges, grant Congress the power to overrule Supreme Court decisions, define marriage and require it to be between one man and one woman (probably that means one at a time), outlaw abortion anywhere in the United States or territories, and of course, he repeats the long-desired (and simple-minded) demand for an amendment that would require the US budget to be balanced.
Additionally, he believes many accepted programs and practices to be unconstitutional. These include Social Security, any bank regulation, any consumer financial protection, any federal programs relating to education, and any activity that he believes to be inconsistent with "free enterprise."
Of course this is not a book to be taken seriously. It will have no effect, and will be forgotten. It is useful, though, for a look into American popular conservatism.
The Republican website advocates an amendment to require in Congress "a super-majority for any tax increase," and also a cap on overall spending so that governments could never balance the budget by tax increases, only by spending cuts. Many prominent Republicans besides Perry--Ben Carson, Rand Paul, and Mike Huckabee, for example--would limit the tenure of federal judges. Donald Trump, Rand Paul, Rick Santorum, Lindsay Graham, Chris Christie, Bobby Jindal, and Scott Walker are among those who oppose birthright citizenship.
The modern Republican obsession with low taxes has superseded its traditional devotion to balanced budgets. This means that they, along with Perry, advocate repealing the Sixteenth Amendment.
A "super-majority" for tax increases also would require constitutional change. It would empower a minority to thwart the will of the majority regarding taxes. The website advocates such a constitutional amendment.
Eliminating birthright citizenship would mean repealing the Fourteenth Amendment. That would be the first constitutional change that took away a citizen's right because of the parents' status. Repeal would also remove the mechanism that enabled the Supreme Court to apply the US Bill of Rights to the states to protect citizens from state, as well as from national, governments (Justice Clarence Thomas has opposed extending the Bill of Rights to protect against actions by state governments even with the Fourteenth Amendment).
Changing lifetime tenure for federal judges may be popular. It might even be a good idea if done properly, but, again, term limits would require a change of the Constitution's Article III.
Many conservatives around the country have also advocated a "repeal amendment," that would change the Constitution to permit states to veto any action by the U. S. Congress. The Virginia House of Delegates actually passed such a resolution in 2011. Supporters often call this the "Madison Amendment." This is historically ignorant (or duplicitous), because Madison advocated giving Congress had the power to overturn state laws.
Conservatives frequently call for the states to propose amendments, saying that Article V empowers two-thirds of the states to do so. This is a popular misunderstanding, as better-informed conservatives recognize. Only a national body can formally propose amendments, either Congress, by a two-thirds vote of each House, or a national convention. There cannot be a national convention unless two-thirds of the states request Congress to call one. In either case, three-fourths of the states must ratify proposed amendments to make them effective.
The reason conservatives would like a convention, is their naïve belief that it could be limited to proposing only the amendments they desire. Our national experience in that regard is not reassuring. We have only had one national constitutional convention in our history, and that one was strictly limited. It was not to be a constitutional convention at all, but would merely suggest revisions to the Articles of Confederation.
Instead, it immediately disregarded its charge, and proceeded not to place additional limits on the national government, but instead to produce the Constitution designed to increase national power at the expense of the states. In this instance, the outcome was good, but it would be foolish to assume that a successor convention might be equally adept at improving the existing constitutional structure. It could easily do the reverse: throw out the Constitution, and come up with whatever scheme might be popular among zealots at the moment.
Current Texas Governor, Greg Abbott, has produced 90-plus pages of extreme revisions that he would like to see to the Constitution. States could jointly overrule Washington; a supermajority on the Court would be required to overrule legislation (not too smart from his point of view because of the many times the Court has upheld conservative dogma by narrow decisions).
So, many conservatives, really resenting the Constitution, seek its destruction. They praise "federalism," but implicitly advocate something unworkable: a confederacy. The Articles of Confederation failed. The disastrous attempt by southern states to maintain slavery by dismembering the country and creating a confederacy failed even more spectacularly.
Perhaps the most puzzling movement has been opposition to the Seventeenth Amendment, which gave a state's voters the right to choose their United States Senators, taking that power from legislatures. That issue requires more attention than possible in this brief article, and will be the subject of a separate posting.
...................................................................................................................................................................
COMMENTS:
* Republicans want a "Christian Theocracy" throws the Constitution and every other great document out the window..................kiss Freedom! Democracy goodby..................
* We must now enshrine the hate, intolerance, bigotry and small mindedness of the the Republicon party.
* Step one-change the Constitution. Step two-throw it out and replace it with the bible. Republicans plans
* I love when conservative talk about the constitution, then they want to trash it. Bundy carries his own version of the constitution which every one but me should follow, I have my own version and it is really great. But if you wish to join me I could give you some admendments, lets talk $$
* Neither party can claim to support what the Constitution represents. And neither party can claim they don't pick and choose when they support it.
...................................................................................................................................................................
Conservatives and the Constitution
By Max J. Skidmore, January 25, 2016
The Constitution: We Love it; it's Perfect; Let's Change it!
Singing their praises of the Constitution, House Republicans adopted a "requirement that every bill must cite the provision of the Constitution which permits its introduction." Surprisingly, the actual Constitution frequently makes conservatives uncomfortable.
Rick Perry, former Texas governor and former presidential aspirant, offers an extraordinary example of this apparent ambivalence. In 2010 he published Fed Up! Our Fight to Save America from Washington, with a foreword by Newt Gingrich. Perry urges repeal of some amendments, and adoption of others. He particularly hates the 16th Amendment that authorizes the despised U. S. income tax. He also wants to repeal the 17th Amendment, which gives the vote for a state's U.S. senators to the people of that state, rather than to its legislature. Strangely, many other conservatives also urge that we deny American citizens the right to vote for their senators. Perry wants new amendments to remove lifetime appointments for federal judges, grant Congress the power to overrule Supreme Court decisions, define marriage and require it to be between one man and one woman (probably that means one at a time), outlaw abortion anywhere in the United States or territories, and of course, he repeats the long-desired (and simple-minded) demand for an amendment that would require the US budget to be balanced.
Additionally, he believes many accepted programs and practices to be unconstitutional. These include Social Security, any bank regulation, any consumer financial protection, any federal programs relating to education, and any activity that he believes to be inconsistent with "free enterprise."
Of course this is not a book to be taken seriously. It will have no effect, and will be forgotten. It is useful, though, for a look into American popular conservatism.
The Republican website advocates an amendment to require in Congress "a super-majority for any tax increase," and also a cap on overall spending so that governments could never balance the budget by tax increases, only by spending cuts. Many prominent Republicans besides Perry--Ben Carson, Rand Paul, and Mike Huckabee, for example--would limit the tenure of federal judges. Donald Trump, Rand Paul, Rick Santorum, Lindsay Graham, Chris Christie, Bobby Jindal, and Scott Walker are among those who oppose birthright citizenship.
The modern Republican obsession with low taxes has superseded its traditional devotion to balanced budgets. This means that they, along with Perry, advocate repealing the Sixteenth Amendment.
A "super-majority" for tax increases also would require constitutional change. It would empower a minority to thwart the will of the majority regarding taxes. The website advocates such a constitutional amendment.
Eliminating birthright citizenship would mean repealing the Fourteenth Amendment. That would be the first constitutional change that took away a citizen's right because of the parents' status. Repeal would also remove the mechanism that enabled the Supreme Court to apply the US Bill of Rights to the states to protect citizens from state, as well as from national, governments (Justice Clarence Thomas has opposed extending the Bill of Rights to protect against actions by state governments even with the Fourteenth Amendment).
Changing lifetime tenure for federal judges may be popular. It might even be a good idea if done properly, but, again, term limits would require a change of the Constitution's Article III.
Many conservatives around the country have also advocated a "repeal amendment," that would change the Constitution to permit states to veto any action by the U. S. Congress. The Virginia House of Delegates actually passed such a resolution in 2011. Supporters often call this the "Madison Amendment." This is historically ignorant (or duplicitous), because Madison advocated giving Congress had the power to overturn state laws.
Conservatives frequently call for the states to propose amendments, saying that Article V empowers two-thirds of the states to do so. This is a popular misunderstanding, as better-informed conservatives recognize. Only a national body can formally propose amendments, either Congress, by a two-thirds vote of each House, or a national convention. There cannot be a national convention unless two-thirds of the states request Congress to call one. In either case, three-fourths of the states must ratify proposed amendments to make them effective.
The reason conservatives would like a convention, is their naïve belief that it could be limited to proposing only the amendments they desire. Our national experience in that regard is not reassuring. We have only had one national constitutional convention in our history, and that one was strictly limited. It was not to be a constitutional convention at all, but would merely suggest revisions to the Articles of Confederation.
Instead, it immediately disregarded its charge, and proceeded not to place additional limits on the national government, but instead to produce the Constitution designed to increase national power at the expense of the states. In this instance, the outcome was good, but it would be foolish to assume that a successor convention might be equally adept at improving the existing constitutional structure. It could easily do the reverse: throw out the Constitution, and come up with whatever scheme might be popular among zealots at the moment.
Current Texas Governor, Greg Abbott, has produced 90-plus pages of extreme revisions that he would like to see to the Constitution. States could jointly overrule Washington; a supermajority on the Court would be required to overrule legislation (not too smart from his point of view because of the many times the Court has upheld conservative dogma by narrow decisions).
So, many conservatives, really resenting the Constitution, seek its destruction. They praise "federalism," but implicitly advocate something unworkable: a confederacy. The Articles of Confederation failed. The disastrous attempt by southern states to maintain slavery by dismembering the country and creating a confederacy failed even more spectacularly.
Perhaps the most puzzling movement has been opposition to the Seventeenth Amendment, which gave a state's voters the right to choose their United States Senators, taking that power from legislatures. That issue requires more attention than possible in this brief article, and will be the subject of a separate posting.
...................................................................................................................................................................
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