We start today with a Juxtaposition in which Bill Bramhall explains the issue and Matt Wuerker provides an example.
It’s hard to believe there was once a time when, at each party’s national convention, the platform committee would craft the platform and then — then — the party would nominate someone to carry that platform forward.
Not to say that they didn’t often have a very good idea of who that candidate would be, but often there were three or four likely nominees and things would go into the night or longer before the final choice was made.
The primary system has pretty much eliminated that, but, still, having the Trump delegates remove a plank in the 2016 GOP platform holding Russia responsible for the invasion of Ukraine was something that should have been outrageous.
It wasn’t, and it took things from “Here’s the one who best exemplifies our party” to “Here’s the one who our party must now come to imitate.”
Hence Matt Wuerker’s observation that, while Trump’s speeches and his Twitter feed are an endless stream of juvenile insults and name-calling, unchallenged by his loyal party members, Republicans fell to pieces when Nancy Pelosi made a jab which, by the by, was probably not only protected opinion but medically accurate.
However, if you did decide to take it to court, simply telling the court what you claim to weigh would not — heh — swing the scales. It’s too easy to ask him to take off his shoes and prove his defense.
Just as it would be easy for him to release his tax records and prove he’s a successful businessman or release his school records and prove his boast of having graduated with honors.
Which he doesn’t have to, because he can say he had the biggest inaugural crowd in history and, even though it is clearly, obviously, provably untrue, his loyal GOP minions will agree that he’s right.
Though the Onanism Network found it kind of expensive to be too loyal the other day, when they sued Rachel Maddow for accurately reporting that they employed a correspondent who also writes for a Russian propaganda outlet, and giving her opinion that OAN “really, literally is paid Russian propaganda.”
Not only did the judge throw their suit out, but they are now forced to play the attorney’s fees for Maddow and MSNBC.
Meanwhile, Lisa Benson cites a many-times-disproven paranoid theory about DNC/FBI spies under Trump’s bed, which is, I suppose, part of the Obamagate myth promoted by Q-anon and Trump.
“Spygate” being such a fringe delusion that, in order to find out WTF these nuts are talking about, you have to first sort through a lot of information about the New England Patriots peeking at their opponents.
Which has the advantage of having actually happened.
Loyalty to Dear Leader, however, demands believing in such things, which prompted the Onanism Network’s White House correspondent to ask Kayleigh McEnany whether Trump planned to pardon Obama.
And it would all be hilarious if there weren’t a substantial number of people out there eating it all up and planning to vote accordingly in November.
Mike Luckovich is funny, but it’s gallows humor. It’s not simply that the GOP won’t step up to refute Dear Leader’s nonsensical, hateful rhetoric, but they dutifully support any delusional beliefs that appear to offer political advantage.
That includes going back to Ukraine to poke around some more in how Joe Biden’s son got a job because of his connections rather than his qualifications.
They should get Jared and Ivanka on that scandal right away!
While, as Christopher Weyant notes, Trump is busily extorting loyalty from Michigan through a combination of withholding funds and insulting its leadership. And, yes, it does sound familiar.
The latest delusion, illustrated here by Jeff Danziger, combines Trump’s hatred of the USPS and his absurd theory that vote-by-mail is yet another source of fraud, similar to the busloads of illegal aliens who gave Hillary Clinton millions of phony votes.
And then disappeared like a mist, which is a neat trick considering it would take about 30,000 buses to hold that many illegal voters.
But rationality and logic have no place in this debate, and Trump fired his first salvo by accusing Michigan of sending out absentee ballots, which never happened: They sent out applications for absentee/vote-by-mail ballots.
Just as the Republican National Committee did in several states, including Michigan.
And, as Pat Bagley notes, Utah has a substantial history of vote-by-mail and a substantial GOP representation as a result.
But we can’t contradict Dear Leader. Heavens forfend!
It’s all part of his cunning plan, as Nick Anderson points out, for winning the 2020 elections by whatever means necessary.
If that means discouraging people from voting, well, that could be part of it. Shutting down polling stations, banning vote-by-mail, demanding people who used to vote by matching their signatures in the book at each election now come up with legal IDs they may not have any other need for, these are all tools in the voter-discouraging, election-fixing toolbox.
And, as Ann Telnaes charges, it’s hard to dismiss Trump’s repeated charges of voter fraud as anything less than part of a plan to prepare his Deplorables for the outcome he has in mind, regardless of what the numbers show at the end of the day November 3.
I used to say it in jest, but I’m beginning to wonder if this election will end with tanks surrounding the White House, the important question at that point being which way the turrets are facing.
The anti-patriotic loyalty of elephants placing us in a grim …
Juxtaposition of the End
I think Bennett speaks more metaphorically than literally, in that I don’t think Putin actually wants to take over the United States and rule it through a puppet government.
I think, rather, that his interference is designed, as Rob Rogers puts it, to make Trump and the United States a laughingstock among nations and remove us as a credible opponent on the world stage.
So far, so good.
In re: proving the truth of the “obese” accusation -Are you assuming that the equally – er – hefty Mr Barr would allow the case to go to court ?
I’m assuming that, if they sued Pelosi for slander, they’d want the case to go through. I suppose if she sued them, they might duck out, but she’s not that dumb.