What Do MAGA have Against Sign Language?

 

Charlie Kirk called out by US National Association of the Deaf as sign language controversy escalates https://t.co/L5dW9CSvqV #deaf #interpreters #ASL #signlanguage

— Deaf News Today (@DeafNewsToday) January 12, 2025

I see Chris Rufo has also decided he needs to be mad about sign language interpreters, too.  Deaf people deserve to have access to information in a way that is immediate and relatable to them. It actually doesn't distract anyone--mostly. If you are distracted, maybe this is a cognitive problem about YOURSELF you need to get addressed. 

But as a person who finds aural processing a little more difficult in my older years who uses CC for tv--it sucks and is not reliable. I can hear, but I am aware it is not always adequate for people who can't. Also, CC is absolutely not great at all for someone who might be deaf or hard of hearing and also has an issue with reading facility, like dyslexia. 

Feels Soft and Squishy

 

This is just a quick observation, but there's some overlap between the people who insist on men being manly men and mewling babies who are a-scareded of WWIII with Russia. Charlie Kirk isn't talking to Russian people in the above screencap (do they care who he is?) or even to Putin--he's telling his followers that what Russia is doing (invading Ukraine, threatening to go further, sabotage against European energy/communication infrastructure) is not their problem. People who want to do anything about that are the problem.

The question isn't "Do American people want war with Russia?" Of course not. The question is "Did the Cold War actually end?' and maybe not. The next question is, "What is Russia actually doing to us?"

Well, a campaign of disinformation, election interference, paying western-based influencers to spread RU propaganda, weakening our long-established ties with our allies...and the actual heroes in Europe--the people physically defending their own homeland with bravery and ingenuity, are somehow being treated as if they are "prolonging a war" by not rolling over for a genocide.

We had a great generation in this country that despised the idea of a genocide in Europe, who appreciated the fight for freedom and democracy. On the right, I see genocide-deniers and people who want to see we are not even a democracy.  I don't care for propagandists who have no moral convictions to even bother having the courage of, except possibly for culture war (a distraction, and a dangerous one that divides our country and weakens it). 

This sort of thing feels very weak and squishy to me 

Tucker Carlson's Daddy Issues

 

Just so we're up to date on this, not that long ago, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (my imaginary boyfriend from Canada) testified that Tucker Carlson was a paid propagandist for Russia. Which I really don't need more "proof" about because we are looking right at him. Like Tucker is that guy you absolutely know is a sell-out. 

Now, you could ask yourself how this white supremacist-identified misogynist stays around after his break with Fox News, but wow. I dunno. Some people probably do feel like his break with the mainstream (I know, I get the joke--it's the joke I'm actually making) gave him freedom and power to be more truthy, or whatever.  But I think he really just has to bite down harder on his schtick, and that is entirely what he did just now bigging up Trump at Turning Point, by referring to the US rejecting Trump as a willful little girl and Trump, vengeful, as a disciplining Daddy figure. 

Can one's mind's eye vomit? Because I think my forebrain just virtually puked a little. 

Guess Who Lauded a Hitler Enthusiast?

 

NEW:

Donald Trump’s Bedminster golf club hosted a convicted Jan. 6 rioter and alleged Nazi sympathizer twice this summer, where he was celebrated and gave speeches.

At one event, Trump sent a video praising the attendees as “amazing patriots.”

At the other, he won an award. pic.twitter.com/g7EMJiIvfg

— Tom Dreisbach (@TomDreisbach) September 12, 2024

If I know my readers, you probably guessed "Trump" with a quickness and only wondered "Which Hitler enthusiast, though?"  But this is where Trump's "MAGA movement" is right now, with Trump clearly saying "we" when referring to the 1/6 insurrectionists during the very revealing debate (because he did want to be there--and also did not turn up and he did tell them to be there and they understood the assignment).  

But the answer is the guy who was most obviously Hitler cosplaying as if that was natural.  Which Hitler enthusiast even being a question, just like sitting down with obvious antisemitic clowns Kanye and Nick Fuentes, or cozying up to Laura Loomer today, or spreading a blood libel about legal Haitian immigrants in Ohio, is a hell of a sign that Trump has gone mask-off. Or maybe that needs to be: "hood-off"? 

Who the Hell is Charlie Kirk?

 

Imagine someone in their teenage years won a whole fucking Star Search category for Mediocre White Male and thought that actually made them sufficient in their own right to judge someone who spearheaded a movement for civil rights, and said, aloud, "Nah, who's that?"  because maybe, just maybe, he knew exactly how to speak to people not of his milieux about whom they should and should not admire--and he wanted them to vote Republican. 

You know, to the extent his party wants Black people to vote at all or have their votes counted. 

Anyway, when I think of this big-headed manchild with a bad gum-to-chiclet ratio, I recently think about how his quotes about the estimable Ketanji Brown-Jackson sums up everything in this worldview: He doesn't realize that successful Black people were saying they got the foot in the door they needed to demonstrate they could do the work. 

The Price of Lying

 

Rudy Giuliani has been court-ordered to pay $148 million to Ruby Freeman and Wandreya Moss in their defamation case against him. He was the only witness on his behalf and there are two important points to make:

He lied about them and admitted it. 

He provided no proof of any kind that backed up the stories he spread about them, and actually withheld requested discovery documentation. 

These women were threatened and their lives were severely disrupted by the lies Giuliani told. A quick perusal of rightwing social media features a lot of "whataboutism": "But what about what these women did?" Because they don't get the point:

The women didn't do anything. They were counting ballots--of course you move them. They want to believe Giuliani's lies and so, the lie persists for them. THAT's what's worth $148 million. Once their reputations were destroyed by a lie, there is no getting things back to how they were before. 

Because Giuliani is reprehensible, he wants to claim he was shafted by the court: 

Giuliani was unrepentant after the ruling, telling reporters outside the courthouse, “The absurdity of the number underscores the absurdity of the entire proceeding,” and adding falsely that “I have not been allowed to offer one single piece of evidence in defense, of which I have a lot.”

Of course, that's untrue: he was sanctioned for NOT TURNING OVER anything. He always had shit. And if he felt like the court was not letting him be "heard" he could turn his troves of information over to the media. Which he has had plenty of time to do.  And can't. Nothing's stopping him but the lack of information that supports him in any way.

Ken Paxton Got Himself Impeached (UPDATED)

 

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) impeached by Texas House of Representatives 121-23 pic.twitter.com/wlNtCgGlB2

— Acyn (@Acyn) May 27, 2023

I believe that is the Speaker of the Texas House Dade Phelan who was censured for being drunk on the floor but frankly, when I watched this without audio, I thought the man would have more slurring because I'm not saying I know drunk when I see it, but I have known drunk when I've been it. Drunk or sober, the count is what it is, and Ken Paxton got hugely impeached by the supermajority Texas House. This wasn't about liberals trying to get him, and this wasn't about RINOS trying to get him. This was about the creep of Ken Paxton's various problems becoming not just his problem, but the State Leg. problem, and they did not want that for themselves.

You Can't Wring the Truth out of Alex Jones

 

Today, a jury decided that Alex Jones' did about a $1 billion worth of damage to grieving families by maliciously lying about them repeatedly over the airwaves, costing them their piece of mind, safety, health, financial security--he just basically made money by opening his lying trash mouth over and over again to call these people liars over, of all things, the brutal tragic deaths of their children. 

For his part, Alex Jones says that he hasn't got the money--he's bankrupt. He swears they will never see a cent as he fundraises. He fundraises so he can continue to do the work of--lying his face off. 

Watching the Sandy Hook verdict live from his studio, Alex Jones makes an urgent plea to his audience for cash, and tells them that none of the money they send him will go the the families because he has filed for bankruptcy. pic.twitter.com/H658p5Sjiw

— Ron Filipkowski 🇺🇦 (@RonFilipkowski) October 12, 2022

Now, I am a firm believer that if you are such a demented fuckmuppet that you can completely understand that this man perpetrated a politically biased and wholly made-up campaign of lies that ruined the lives of innocent, grieving people and still support Jones that you basically should by all means be hosed of your money. I also believe that if you somehow still and all believe in Alex Jones' lies, there are worse things you could be doing with your money, because by GOD! you are a sick one, aren't you! And I am a believer that somehow, someway, the law will attach the properties of one Alex Jones and alleviate him of his ill-grifted valuta, bankruptcy proceedings or no.  I think one court might take a dim view of being used to circumvent the purposeful findings of another. 

What can't be adequately done, however, is wring the truth out of this monster, and worse yet, you can't wring it out of the kind of monsters who support his lying. 

Now--this man has said demented things that no person in their right mind should be capable of believing, because just a basic awareness of the workings of the world should militate against it. Things like weather machines and actual public figures being part of a ring of demonic pedophiles is an awful lot to choke down for someone who has their head on straight. He says purposefully horrific things all the time for attention.  For clicks and likes and people following him to hear more crazy shit. The idea that there are people who like what he says and then go ahead and believe it gags me with biggest of all possible spoons. 

Jones apologists can pretend this man apologized and disavowed what he said. If he truly felt remorse in anyway, his shenanigans regarding the two court cases (with one to come) would have been utterly different, but instead, he used his time to whine, rage, complain, bitch that he was being shut up and silenced for his truth--not facing the consequences of actual lies, told by him, that he recognized as such and felt any way about. He can't have that both ways. 

The problem for the right wing is, they legitimized this huckster. But why not? Trump, of Trump University and the Trump Foundation, both found to be frauds, wouldn't see any wrong in Jones. Tucker Carlson seems to aspire to be Glenn Beck and Alex Jones' circle jerk spank rag baby. And Steve Bannon literally still has a following of the kind of tools who donated money to Build a Wall that was supposed to be built by either Mexico or US tax dollars and was never going to be built with their money (that went to yachts and whatnots). They aren't just his supporters--they are his kith, kin and kind!

This Is The GOP

 

This is the Affirmative Action pick for Vice President. If you think this is bad, just wait til their Affirmative Action pick for the Supreme Court is handed a lifetime appointment. pic.twitter.com/XArHeTKwct

— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) March 21, 2022

You might know Charlie Kirk from being a big-headed manchild without a college degree who talks to conservative youth about white supremacist nonsense, or, if you're lucky, you don't know this SOB at all.

What I do know is that the elected Vice-President of the United States has been the DA for San Francisco, the AG for the state of California, and a US Senator. That's not affirmative action, those are qualifications. That's actual work at actual jobs of importance. In the way that being a well-paid dupe peddling lies to dopes is not work. She works to make things suck less. Charlie Kirk exists to make things suck more.

Judge Ketanji Onyika Brown Jackson is a highly educated legal professional who clerked with Justice Breyer and went on to an established judicial career. She has significant experience both as a defense lawyer and a judge, and has been rated by her peers (not Charlie Kirk, who is certainly not one of those) as well-qualified. 

There shouldn't need to be an answer to the mindless burblings of a racist fool, but I'm of the mind that you should call these assholes out loudly and often. And the reason is, he's only foghorning the racism to the folks too dim to hear the subtle dog-whistles blown by the more legitimate GOP spokes-cretins. (Brit Hume also made a slightly snide allusion to whether VP Harris "ticked boxes" today. Did he mean a racial box? Is he putting down her qualifications, as if no presidential ticket in history ever did not have certain voter demographic considerations in mind?)

It's a little defensive and maybe even shrill when Sen. Lindsey Graham has to tell us that the GOP are "used to" being called racists. But why have they never taken the hint and looked at why that keeps happening, especially when they elected a whole birther as president and are now using QAnon tropes against a Black woman? 

When they are supported by people who want to carry Confederate flags and think "Black Lives Matter" is a radical statement, and they cater to that ethos, maybe there's a pretty good reason they are being called that. When GOP allegations regarding "voter fraud" all seem to point to concern about turnout in places where people of color vote, they aren't really hiding anything. 

When Sen, Marsha Blackburn wonders if Judge Jackson is carrying a hidden CRT agenda through a handful of what I will generously call "misunderstandings" about what any of her prior statements mean, it's hard not to believe she is just participating in culture war axe-grinding, rather than a good-faith discussion of what Jackson's record actually shows. 

And somehow, Cruz, Sasse, and Cotton were all in their own various ways, even worse. 

This confirmation hearing is supposed to be about the nominee, and yet it is ostensibly about the Republican party and how, at a 6-3 conservative advantage on the court, they nonetheless need to grandstand about the courts. It's about the GOP. And yes, ok. We see them.

We really do. 

My Nostalgia Is Acting Up

Eminem defies NFL and kneels in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick during Super Bowl halftime show https://t.co/XDI07ULqDk

— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast) February 14, 2022

They told Slim Shady to please stand up, but Slim Shady said God sent him to piss the world off.

There was a lot of commentary on Twitter about how this half-time show was about my generation, and frankly, we never did say we were going to die before we got old. We said don't you forget about me. And we are getting old, and I wish more of us were getting wise. 

The fucking kids aren't all right. Charlie Kirk thinks the half-time show was full of sexual anarchy. This dumb man-baby must have been peeing in his diapers through the Janet Jackson and Prince half-time shows. He literally comes off like John Lithgow's character in Footloose.  That's two Footloose references I've made this month. I may be getting old. I repeat myself. Matt Walsh, middle aged but younger than me, doesn't know "woke" means aware, and Marshall Mathers is aware he's a white guy who owes a fuckton to Black music and Black people. That he's supposedly making amends for anything else is Walsh's own bullshit. 

I'm glad the convoy asshats didn't come to LA to fuck with the Super Bowl despite what loons like Wendy Rogers and Senator Rand Paul wanted. That would have been a shitshow--all those Confederate flags in LA. I don't think those two remember how things could go, because they forget that urban America is also real America. They think it would scare the shit out of people who live in the cities that right-wing dumbasses think have been burned down by BLM. They forget riots that have happened not even thirty years ago. 

I don't, The truckers don't, either, and they probably know that unlike Ottawa or Windsor, if you go to LA or NY or Philadelphia, you might meet with an entirely different atmosphere that isn't going to wait for police action because nope. Residents will find a way. People have turned out en masse for deceased kids they didn't even know, and some jackasses want to disrupt the shelves at Acme and whether our own kids get fed--are you for real? 

So Charlie Kirk's Doing Prophecy Now?

Charlie Kirk warns "God will not honor the challenge and the outright rebellion to his authority here on earth," adding "There will be justice for what they did to this country and it's coming very soon" pic.twitter.com/IgUx4GN2sP

— Jason Campbell (@JasonSCampbell) October 28, 2021

Seeing TPUSA's Charlie Kirk threatening about what his big, omniscient and all-powerful sky-friend is going to do while standing in front of a backdrop that reads, "Exposing Critical Racism Tour", reminds me that the way of life in the antebellum period that included slavery was considered a part of God's order and that peculiar institution was defended in the pulpit. And the segregation and degradation of Black people in the US was maintained by white Christian churches. 

Slaveholders were very afraid of "rebellion" amongst their human assets. There is reason to believe that the 2nd Amendment was inspired by fears of slave rebellion. Politicians have used theology as a tool to justify codifying unjust and racially discriminatory laws. And one theory regarding the historical study of how racism was codified into our laws is...critical race theory. Which Charlie Kirk, who has no degree in anything but grifting, is currently on tour being mad about, since it is the well-paid astroturf big concern thing of the moment. 

And now, Charlie Kirk wants to tell us that "they" (Commies, George Soros, Democrats, shitlibs, whoever) will get justice because God says so. And maybe that's a a suggestion was to what God thinks should happen next--? That could might happen eventually wink wink nudge nudge?

It always strikes me as funny that people who say they've read the Bible will go ahead and bear false witness and take the Lord's name in vain on the regular. Like they never considered what "false witness" and "taking the Lord's name in vain" really meant. But "lying about what actually happened" is a good way to say "false witness", and "taking the Lord's name in vain" is a not-very opaque way of saying "God is not your imaginary hype man". Deciding to just say something you think out loud and saying Jesus is your +1 on that is kind of blasphemous, right? Same with false prophecy.