There Was a Rally in Wilkes-Barre

 

The picture above isn't from the rally Trump held in Wilkes-Barre, PA for Doug Mastriano (insurrectionist) and Dr. Oz (snake oil salesman) but from May of this year, when it was all about the primary. Sure, Trump was already a one-term, twice impeached former president, who incited an insurrection riot and had already had 15 boxes of stuff taken from his Mar-A-Lago country club/domicile at the time. But his support was enough to boost Dr. Oz over the top in the GOP primary. 

Trump has since had a lawful search warrant served back in August to have even more classified and other documents horked out of his increasingly dodgy-seeming resort, once referred to as the "Winter White House". It might look bad, and I suspect the reason why is bad. But why would Mastriano and OZ turn down such valuable assistance? 

Doug Mastriano, the gubernatorial hopeful who also took to the stage this night, can't seem to talk to the 1/6 committee, and wants to let his lawyers do the talking, I guess. He has some interesting fellow travelers amongst his retinue: Prophets and conspiracy theorists. Basically, Mastriano's circle looks like the kinds of people that back in the before Trump times, would not actually be a part of a serious campaign, because they are, to use a term of art: kooks. 

Dr. Oz himself is a person caught on tape saying he would deny life-saving care to smokers. 

Speaking to the National Governors Association in 2013, Dr. Oz admitted to denying life saving medical procedures to smokers.

Oz: “As a heart surgeon… I pledged I would never operate on smokers, and I don’t.” pic.twitter.com/BHHVMWLT89

— PatriotTakes 🇺🇸 (@patriottakes) September 3, 2022

 Which for me really places his spokesperson (who put the campaign in the uncomfortable place of explaining whether their spokesperson really spoke for the campaign) in a different light, having been judgmental about the presumed diet of stroke patient and actually competent politician John Fetterman. No, that is the voice of the campaign. Unempathetic and without any notion of duty to care. 

These aren't the doofuses of yesteryear: they make Tom Corbett, space cadet and Rick Santorum look like fucking solons. And Trump, if we lived in a culture that valued honesty, would seem like turd polish for Richard Nixon's slighted bronze. 

We are living in the stupidest timeline. The offramp is visible, but oh, how much I sincerely hope the voters have a map back to sanity.  And truly know how to read it.