Since November 9, 2016, a mighty firehose of BS and bad news has been blasting full force at us. It often seems improbable that Reason and the Age of Enlightenment's core moral values, so long the bedrock of our nation, have been abandoned by our Administration and Congress. It can be difficult to remain a cheerful optimist in these times.
But as dark as these days can be - and they are going to get worse - the center will eventually begin to hold again, as the poet W.B. Yeats might have said. His 'slouching rough beast' has been among us for a year. But he will not always hold sway. In the meantime, we can all appreciate the glimmers of light that will occasionally pierce through the blanket of gloom that has covered the country.
Like what happened in Alabama! What a glorious upset!! Among the reddest of red states, Alabama seemed poised to elect Judge Roy Moore as their next senator. Moore has not been shy about his loathing of post-Civil War society. He had declared his belief that homosexuality should be criminalized. Women should not hold elective office. Heck, they shouldn't even vote - he wanted to negate the 19th Amendment. Oh, also the 14th Amendment... you know, the one that outlawed this:
Yes, a well-regarded Man of God, a budding Theocrat in fact, who called for an end to the Separation of Church and State. His refusal to remove a large monument honoring the Ten Commandments outside his courtroom got him into trouble, built his base, and presented the GOP with their Senate candidate. The GOP endorsed him, and so did an enthusiastic Trump... all despite the revealed scandal of his early days, in his 30's, when he would prowl retail malls for young teenage girls.
It didn't seem like his opponent, Doug Jones, had much of a chance. He had a checklist of Democratic Party positions, including abortion rights - a huge issue in religious Alabama. Plus, he had done what many said could never be done: successfully prosecuted the KKK perpetrators of the 1963 Birmingham church bombing that killed four young black girls at their Sunday School.
In the end, it was close. But Jones carried the night, by a razor-thin 21,000 votes. And this graph really says it all:
So let's consider... Black voters, who comprised nearly 30% of the vote (and who had to jump through multiple hoops to get registered and then to vote) delivered a 96% pro-Jones bloc. Wowzers. They showed up in numbers that exceeded totals in the 2008/2012 Obama elections! They must really hate Roy Moore.
And it worked. It put Jones up. What remains disheartening is that the White People vote polled so low for Jones. 65% of White Women voted for Roy Moore. 65%!! To give us a little insight into the hive mind of the Moore World, let's follow the Tweet thread of an ACLU lawyer who attended the final campaign rally, the night before the election. It is quite a spectacle as he follows along:
https://twitter.com/briantashman/status/940382978701701120
Whew. That is quite a concentration of Oddballs. But the real prize belongs to Moore Spokesman Ted Crockett. After a repugnant conversation on why Moore would outlaw homosexuals, Crockett claims that Muslims shouldn't serve in public office because they can't be sworn in on a Bible. Watch how Crockett is crushed into speechless astonishment when Jake Tapper tells him that this is simply not true. Hilarious:
That interview is simply Comedy Gold! This sets us up for the usual terrific Onion satire piece, and it doesn't disappoint:
https://politics.theonion.com/roy-moore-retires-from-politics-to-spend-more-quality-t-1821235915
God Bless The Onion. For another look into the mindset of how White Evangelical voters can side with one such as Moore, follow this short Tweet thread from Elaina Plott, an actual White Evangelical who is not conservative. She reacts to Roy Moore's refusal to concede the election:
https://twitter.com/elainaplott/status/940936284213841920
It is kinda strange that days after the election, Moore is still calling for a recount (which the State of Alabama won't do automatically because the vote margin isn't close enough). He is currently soliciting/grifting his base for money so he can pay for one himself. And he won't concede; instead, he is waiting for God to speak to him, because "God is always in control". To which noted bullroar-caller, J.K. Rowling, tweeted:
Narrator's voice: Roy was right. God was in control. What he didn't realise was, She's black.
Oh, ho ho. That's why Rowling is Empress of all she surveys...
Then there was the immense brouhaha when three of Trump's sexual impropriety accusers appeared again on television this week, prompting Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-New York) to call for his resignation. In typical fashion, Trump doubled-down, going for the crotch punch against Gillibrand. She was told of the tweet during her bipartisan Bible study group session:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/12/12/trump-sends-sexually-suggestive-and-demeaning-tweet-about-gillibrand/?utm_term=.dc850149f856
She'd do anything! Well, Press Secretary Sarah H. Sanders suggested that anyone who thought that Trump imbued that text with sexual meaning "must have their minds in the gutter." Yes, everyone must necessarily have their minds in the gutter when reading texts from our Sleazebag-in-Chief President. What was quite unusual about all this umbrage was how USA Today, the national newspaper, reacted. Customarily, their editorial board does not weigh in on sensitive matters. They prefer to react to things like floods, or norovirus, or not enough sunshine.
But Oh Boy did they react to Trump's tweet about Gillibrand! "President Trump has shown he is not fit for office," it says:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2017/12/12/trump-lows-ever-hit-rock-bottom-editorials-debates/945947001/
"A president who all but calls a senator a whore is unfit to clean toilets at Obama's Presidential Library or to shine George W. Bush's shoes." What do they really think?
If Trump is unfit, does that make "only the best people" that he'd hire unfit as well? The awkward question and answer session this week during a Federal Judgeship Nomination Hearing in the Senate makes one wonder. One of Trump's early selections, Brian Talley - he of the Paranormal Investigator background - had been yanked for being stupid. But Stupid is not a rare element in Trump World. Check out Matthew Peterson's responses to a Republican senator's questions. It boggles the mind:
Maybe he will learn how to be a Federal Judge on the job. Another example of "the best people" is found with Kathleen Hartnett White, nominee to be Chair of the Environmental Quality Council:
Obtuse mind-thought must be the primary qualification for Trump Administration folk, which makes sense when considering the following: the four Trump family absentee ballots for the recent New York City elections were messed up. Here is how:
https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2017/12/trump-family-reportedly-botched-ballots-for-mayoral-election
It is amazing that President Trump forgot his birthdate. And Ivanka didn't send the ballot in on time. And Melania forgot to sign her ballot. And Jared decided, Fuck It - I'm not going to vote. The best and the brightest, on full display.
Speaking of best and brightest, Virginia Thomas, the political activist wife of accused sexual harrasser Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, presented a conservative group's award to James O'Keefe. "Defending Liberty" is an interesting take on O'Keefe's actions, which include being criminally convicted. And he was recently caught Red-Handed by the Washington Post for trying to plant a false "scoop", fraudulently presenting a "witness" to the Post with a juicy-but-untrue storyline.
But that doesn't matter when one is defending Liberty. Yay!
http://www.businessinsider.com/virginia-thomas-gives-james-okeefe-award-defending-liberty-2017-12
This week also marked the fifth anniversary of the horrible Sandy Hook elementary school massacre. Of all the mass shootings, this one was the worst. 20 first-graders blown to bits, and six teachers. President Obama honored the date each year by hosting grieving parents and gun control groups. This year, of course, was different. Trump ignored the Sandy Hook anniversary entirely, no tweets, no notices. But he did host the NRA:
https://shareblue.com/trump-hosted-the-nra-at-the-white-house-on-the-anniversary-of-sandy-hook-massacre/
Well, according to one of his favorite news sources, InfoWars, Sandy Hook was a false-flag hoax designed by the government to bamboozle the nation into supporting gun controls. Simply amazing that there are people who believe this shite.
Before we leave, take a peek at the latest on the Center for Disease Control. Their employees have been told to NOT USE certain words in preparing presentations for their upcoming budget:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/cdc-gets-list-of-forbidden-words-fetus-transgender-diversity/2017/12/15/f503837a-e1cf-11e7-89e8-edec16379010_story.html?utm_term=.c243adb09472
Words like "science-based", "evidence-based", "diversity" and "gender". It all reminds of the classic George Orwell work, 1984. Recall this bit from the book when Winston was listening to a colleague speak on Oldspeak versus Newspeak:
"In your heart you’d prefer to stick to Oldspeak, with all its vagueness and its useless shades of meaning. You don’t grasp the beauty of the destruction of words. Do you know that Newspeak is the only language in the world whose vocabulary gets smaller every year?
"Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. Every concept that can ever be needed, will be expressed by exactly one word, with its meaning rigidly defined and all its subsidiary meanings rubbed out and forgotten... Every year fewer and fewer words, and the range of consciousness always a little smaller."
OK. Finally, for a good laugh, check out the customer reviews for the pricey "Make America Great Again" Christmas ornament.
https://www.elitedaily.com/p/comments-about-this-donald-trump-christmas-tree-ornament-are-straight-roasting-it-7509461
And to send you off with appropriate Christmahanzakkwaah Spirit, here is the Wynton Marsalis-directed Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra performing the Overture to Duke Ellington's "Nutcracker Suite". What a swinging way to rock through the holidays!!
Happy Holidays!
1 comment:
Thank you for another piece of fine commentary. You need to figure out how to expand your audience!
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