I don't know that we'll get to consensus on this, Burt, but some of what you say rings true in my memory. It also seems like a convenient manipulation to say Fox (or any network), and those the wield power behind the scenes, weren't behind him. Let's not forget that all of the power players knew what a Clinton presidency would look like and likely didn't want to play ball with them again (event hough the Ds had hitched their monetary wagon to Hillary years prior). After Trump won, the Ds played their part just as well as Rs in the 90s & '08-'16 (as in anti-president, let's find something to be outraged about him while supporting his wasteful military budgets and protecting pharma).

But for a stacked deck at the state level, the Ds might have had even bigger mid-term gains. Something that will be discussed as "interesting" and "insightful" next year, but is a foregone conclusion in my mind. That being that the GOP will gain back seats and limit Biden's remaining two years not because of anything he or Rs have done, or will do, just because of voting districts & new restrictive laws.

- If I recall correctly, FOX had people saying things like "That wacky Trump guy sure is right about a lot of things, right? Maybe he'll move the real candidates to the right a little." Then when he started destroying the entire field, people like Bill O'Reilly started (very) subtly criticizing him and you had Megyn Kelly trying to ambush him, etc. It still amazes me that they had absolutely no effect. I totally missed what was going on with republican voters at the time.

- Today I think Carlson is the only guy there who actually understands Trump and why he won, and more importantly, how he can use him. The rest are mindless zombies parroting RNC talking points.

- I think the Regime (I like this term so I'm going to keep using it) also acts against leftwing interests. A lot of people on the right claim that the GOP is just there to act as a speed limit on leftist "progress" and are just controlled opposition. The truth probably is that this role shifts back and forth between the parties.

- I don't think the number of D's and R's in government at any given time really matters long term. But that's not right...of course it matters to us peons. But mostly it represents internal conflicts within the establishment. They'll fight each other all day, but neither side will do anything to topple the whole thing.

- I probably sound like a conspiracy theorist, but I don't want to give the impression that I think this is all the work of a few old men in a smoky room planning all this out with precision. It's more due to inertia and material interests than conscious planning at the top level. Things become more planned as they trickle down. It's hard to articulate.

Clown world:

https://nypost.com/2021/07/10/rep-madison-cawthorn-warns-biden-will-seize-guns-and-bibles/

It's not a conspiracy to see truth in the Ferrell/Galifianakis flick The Campaign.

I should watch that again. I thought it was funny at the time. Wonder if it holds up.

I feel like Galifianakis holds up better than Ferrell (in most cases).

Easily. Where did Galifianakis go? He vanished.

You search your ferns, I'll check mine!

past present and future

Imagine cutting checks to a Catholic school and then trying to keep out something you deem too conservative.

Factory farmed chicken is fucking gross regardless of which team controls the factory

Say that at Popeye's and I'll slap you in the face!

Fuck Chick Fil-A

Not sure any other current events reveal the actual state of the Republican party as well as these hearings.







The party that adopted Back the Blue as both rallying cry and badge of honor will do everything within its power to sabotage an investigation into an act of violence against police officers, if the circumstances mean that supporting them is no longer politically convenient.

The party that decries purity tests and accuses opponents of being held hostage by extremists will reject and despise its own members, if they don't support an effort to memory hole and minimize violent acts taken by its own extremists.

The party that fetishizes the physical imagery of American democracy and spent half of last year arguing that when the left is done pulling down statues of Nathan Bedford Forrest, George Washington is probably next...couldn't really give a shit that a crowd trashed the Capitol building while an election was being certified.

On each of the above topics....police support, opposition to political purity tests, enshrinement of American iconography....the party and its media supporters have produced rational, reasonable arguments. And yet in each instance, the response to January 6 seems to demonstrate that those arguments were cynically appropriated in order to provide a talking point against perceived political opponents, rather than coming from an intrinsic and lasting belief. They were each, in their way, disposable. Without cost or care.

This comes back to Ruddo's question yesterday, too, I'm sad to say:

At the heart of this question is a quiet recognition that broad swaths of the worldview are currently determined by whether or not believing a thing is true means believing the libs are wrong and/or evil. We're all left to wonder: would millions of thinking adults take a life-saving vaccine only if they felt the vaccine had come from "their" political side? Or is there literally no issue whose fate isn't capable of being re-positioned daily on that lone, guiding fulcrum of hatred for libs?

I've been watching How To Become A Tyrant and it's remarkably true of the GOP's recent history and their continued efforts for the upcoming elections. Peter Dinklage as narrator is a nice touch, too.

DeSantis is really trying to ride the Trump train for 2024, eh?

Potentially the most sane thing this dude has said in years.

Fuck Dick Cheney. He should die.