I’m not going to post any more of these here, but I have to post this one, since it seems so apropos of the day.
Please god let our useless Democratic Party successfully tie the Trump anchor to the neck of the broken, discredited ideology that is modern “conservatism”.
I’ll be over here, not holding my breath.
I’m pretty sure the words Eric Gellar meant to use instead of “faith” were actually “pathological paranoia.”
TheHill: Trump hits Colin Kaepernick at Kentucky rally
Trump veered off script during a campaign rally in Louisville, Ky., and appeared to claim credit for the player’s free-agent status.
“There was an article today that was reported that NFL owners don’t want to pick him up because they don’t want to get a nasty tweet from Donald Trump. Do you believe that?” the president said, prompting an ovation from the crowd at Freedom Hall.
“I said, ‘If I remember that one, I’m going to report it to the people of Kentucky because they like it when people stand for the American flag,’ right?” he added.
Trump was apparently referencing an article published Friday by the website Bleacher Report, in which one league executive explained why Kaepernick does not have job.
The anonymous executive said the 29-year-old “can still play at a high level” but that “some teams fear the backlash from fans after getting him.”
“They think there might be protests or Trump will tweet about the team,” the executive said. “I’d say that number is around 10 percent.”
Kaepernick was a frequent Trump punching bag during last year’s presidential campaign. The then-Republican nominee said the quarterback should leave the country if he continued to protest the “Star Spangled Banner.”
While Trump found time to go after an old foe, he did not mention FBI Director James Comey’s explosive testimony earlier Monday to the House Intelligence Committee.
Honest conservative test: Imagine if Clinton had won, given Chelsea a West Wing office and a clearance. Would you have raised hell? https://t.co/hpERzr5VV9
— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) March 20, 2017
The party reply will be that Clinton should’ve been locked up, so the question is moot.
Honest conservative test #2 : Imagine if Obama had spent 8 years using the POTUS Twitter account to tweet out disparaging remarks about prominent conservative actors, news media personalities, sports stars and musicians. How many tweets like that would it have taken before you were howling about how unprofessional it was and how much it tainted the office of the POTUS?
Honest conservative test #3 : Name one thing conservatives have accused Obama or Clinton of doing that Trump or a Conservative member of Congress has not now been proven to have done themselves.
We could do this all day…American Conservatism has painted itself into a corner. There is simply no way the ideology stands up to the light of day now that it’s been coopted and subverted into a continuous stream of twisted facts and outright lies blatantly fabricated to put a particular set of people in power, especially since those same people are not doing what they promised and are actively working against the voters who put them there.
We keep saying that, but when does it finally hit the point where it can no longer sustain itself under the weight of its collective bullshit. Everybody thought this line of conservatism was finally going to come crashing down when Trump became the Republican nominee and political discourse became so toxic that the whole party distanced themselves from him, expecting terrible losses. But he won the election and the Republicans now control all of Congress. Then we thought maybe President Trump would be a bit more reasonable and less inflammatory than Candidate Trump, but it has been even worse. And the madness just keeps chugging along with no end in sight.
That’s the thing though. It’s no long about believes and ideologies. It’s about teams. Trump put himself on Team Conservative, thus everything he does will be seem in a positive light by people on his team…even if it’s not a conservative action.
Take all these attitudes being shown by the Conservatives and apply them to any sports team. So as to avoid inflaming passions by using something like “Deflategate”, let’s instead talk about Laurence Phillips on Nebraska Cornhuskers during his senior year. He had been doing some very bad things (multiple assault charges), to the point that he was suspended from the team. He was supposed to be suspended for the post season as well, but Osborn made a bunch of noise about talking to Phillips, how he everything was a misunderstanding, etc… The suspension was lifted and Phillips played in the bowl game.
If you asked some die-hard Nebraska fans, it was the right move. Phillips was a reformed man, what he had done wasn’t really that bad (I mean, she was a woman and she was probably cheating on him; she was asking for it). To other Nebraska fans, it was a huge mistake that to this day taints Osborn’s legacy.
In this analogy, the GOP is Obsorn and Trump is Phillips. For some of the GOP fans, it won’t matter what Trump does, he was always been in the right and a favorite. Those are the ones that would still vote for him if he shot someone in Times Square. But as his approval rating has shown, the die-hards aren’t the majority. The longer he goes on like this, the lower that rating will go. To the point where people who are in this tribal mindset will either need to get more flexible in their thinking (unlikely) or switch teams (much more likely). The Dems need to start figuring out how to make those team-switches happen.
On a side note: Lawrence Phillips killed a man while in prison and later committed suicide in his cell.
It is coming to that point under Trump, it’s just going to take more time. We literally have a sitting POTUS who, less than 90 days into his administration, is under investigation by the FBI for ties to a foreign power that may have influenced the election. I mean, it’s unprecedented. Even dedicated Conservatives are, as @JFrazer’s example illustrates, going to need to choose to rearrange their deck chairs or head for the lifeboats.
Dems don’t necessarily need to get Conservatives to switch teams, they just need to keep Team Conservative at home next election. The more Trump and his pals screw up, the worse light they paint team Conservative in, the easier it becomes (as a Conservative Republican) to say “fuck this, give me a real option or I am sitting this one out”. Meanwhile Dems and moderates will be out in force for the next two elections to try and counter the Trump effect. Basically we are heading for a swing in the other direction that mirrors the 2016 election. This time it will be Republicans instead of Democrats who site the election out, and more Democrats than ever will be mobilized to show up at the polls to try and make a difference.
The investigation has been going since LAST JULY! Seems like it would have been important for congress and the public to know that at some point before the election, not just now :/
I’m not sure if it’s true that the Republicans are going to sit the next election out even if things continue on the current path. They can be whipped up into a frenzy if the conservative media overlords wish them to be.
And I’m not sure if it matters that the Trump campaign is under investigation by the FBI if they are unable to pin anything on Trump himself or at least find damning evidence that there was collusion with Russians to influence the election. I’m not convinced that any of this happened, and if nothing comes out of it, Trump can easily use this to fire up his supporters.
Theoretically, it should have been important for them not to know that, but, then Comey threw that policy out the window.
President Trump called Epstein a “terrific guy” back in 2002, saying that “he’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”
Now, Trump is on the witness list in a Florida court battle over how federal prosecutors handled allegations that Epstein, 64, sexually abused more than 40 minor girls, most of them between the ages of 13 and 17. The lawsuit questions why Trump’s nominee for labor secretary, former Miami U.S. attorney Alexander Acosta, whose confirmation hearing is scheduled to begin Wednesday, cut a non-prosecution deal with Epstein a decade ago rather than pursuing a federal indictment that Acosta’s staff had advocated.
I saw a lot of third-party anti-Hillary commentary calling Bill Clinton a pervert during the campaign, for flying Epstein’s plane on some trips with young women or girls many years ago. Don’t remember if DT or his staff ever spoke about him directly.
what the fuck? ew! ew ew ew!
I need a shower.
Cause the GOP doesn’t ever talk about it and no one passed the 6th grade.
Hey I remember those guys. What happened to them? Barely heard a peep since Trump was elected.