TWGB: Contempt!

 

Reporter: Are you going to testify?

Trump: I have a gag order. I’m not allowed to answer that question pic.twitter.com/ss1c9flfDL

— Acyn (@Acyn) May 6, 2024

Oh, he's allowed to answer the question. Donald Von Shitzinpantz can testify and talk about testifying, this has been well-established. What he can't do is denigrate the witnesses or the jurors. Now, maybe listening to this lying ass is a form of denigration to the jury--but it isn't prevented by the gag order. And for the nth time--a gag order isn't some brand-new fresh thing invented just to give Trump a hard time. It is a normal application of restraint for a defendant who is already liable to fuck with the witnesses or jury in a way detrimental to the pursuit of justice.

So if someone has a problem with Trump being under a gag order, go look at how Trump tries to fix or even rig things to his benefit. He loves the obstruction of justice because he is not a big fan of justice from Mueller to Merchan to his obviously delayed for all the fuckery reasons federal cases. 

He isn't even a big fan of the Constitution if it stands in his way. 

Only the Rapes that Matter

 

It was Elise Stefanik who let me know how Republican women were going to wear their shame this year: gossamer, barely there, nearly naked--shame like a second skin, all-surrounding, she announced that E. Jean Carroll was a liar and the media was just fluffing her up. Was the determination of his guilt actually made by a jury? So what? Juries can be misled. Peerless leader may have dozens of women who accuse him, but the reality is, he has had, nonetheless, dozens of women. Because he is who and what he is. And the GOP has made peace with that. He's their sex pest. Their letch. 

It's hard for me to think they haven't granted him droit de seigneur over the new brides honeymooning at Mar-a Lago or Bedminster.  After all, we knew about the TMZ tape and dozens of claims of sexual assault back in 2016. And he somehow won, with the support of the religious right. People like Katie Britt, who gave the SOTU rebuttal, support Trump, even while she decries the horrific sex trafficking that has, supposedly, something to do with lax border control right now, while she speaks of things that happened 20 years ago, and not in the US at all. 

Does she just not know that Trump goes way back with traffickers like Jeffery Epstein? Are we just going to ignore who Trump's associates have been? 

I just don't think the sleaze-puddle that is Trump's modeling business and beauty contest associations have been really explored. There's reason to think the whole Q/Pizzagate sex dungeon mole-children shit is just weirdo projection to distract from ""billionaire"" Trump's constant penising around female people, whether they invited it or not. 

The Forgetting Engine

 

The picture above is the American flag being taken down by Trump's little 1/6 fan club meeting attendees who then raised a Trump flag. That image, even more than a Confederate flag being carried through the Capitol, was what filled me with rage that day. For the sake of Trump, the man, the tradition of peaceful transition of government was being interrupted. For the sake of a cult of personality built around the former host of Celebrity Apprentice, a man who ranted about how many times he needed to flush a toilet and claimed windmills caused cancer. 

It was violent. Over 140 law enforcement professionals were injured in brutal combat. The lives of elected officials were threatened. Some of the insurrectionists had deadly weapons. They weren't feds and they weren't antifa. They were people who heeded the call to come down to the Capitol by the promise "it will be WILD."  The rally started as the third "Stop the Steal" rally. Trump campaign money--$3.5 million of it, went into those rallies. 

Campaign money. Because the election was over, but Trump was still campaigning. (He claimed just recently he wasn't still campaigning--for some reason.) The popular vote was over, but he knew the ones that mattered were those electoral votes. So maybe the decision of the people (who were they, anyway?) could be overturned. And he sat on his ass and watched the violence play out that day unwilling, uninterested, in turning it off because it was what he wanted. 

George Santos is the GOP Poster Child

 

You know there's something wrong with a congressman when they turn down committee assignments. Is that even a thing? George Anthony Devolder Santos has turned down his committee assignments after GOP leadership went to bat justifying him getting them, because he would like to not make waves until he settles all his issues. 

That's amazingly optimistic. He has more issues than National Geographic. Are they going to get settled in a hot minute?

Like, take his treasurer situation. His treasurer just left.  Like, just. Left. His campaign finance statement was filed with a new guy, but at least not the "new guy" whose consent was apparently forged. The new treasurer looks to be Andrew Olson. Hopefully that's a real guy, unlike some of Santos' donors, who may or may not be real people, and may or may not have donated money to his campaign. 

That being said, I would not want to be his treasurer. And what we know of his actual funders, well, they are interesting. Like Andrew Intrader, who has also dumped money into the fight against progressive DA's, which is fun, because the people who are against progressive DAs all claim those people were put up by George Soros because of course they do. And it's true! And there is good reason for it. New approaches regarding fighting crime that are not based in nailing disadvantaged people to the fucking wall for accolades and calling it effective might get better results and be less harmful to the effected communities. 

Obviously, I care more about the possibility that these ghost donors are some kind of influence op to buy old George, who likes money a little bit a lot. They could just be simple graft, but also could be representing foreign money for some purpose. It's clearly worth our time to know and rises to the sort of thing a relatively neutered FEC should look at. 

The guy is endlessly weird, and his pathological lying seems almost funny (except that it extends, very pathologically, into his social life as well, apparently), but it certainly isn't because of what it says about our politics, and especially the politics of a certain political party. To his credit, he seems remarkably taciturn about his various woes and unravelling frauds, unlike a certain former president, who is lashing out in all directions on social media, not knowing from whence his first indictments will come. Santos doesn't know that, either, but at least he isn't being a whiny little turd about it. 

But as to the GOP response? We have Elise Stefanik, letting us know the voters were to blame for voting for the person who deceived them. But how were they to know? And who helped sell them this bill of shoddy goods, Rep. Stefanik? And are you ready to have a chat about it? 

Santos is a symptom, not the whole problem. Trump was a symptom, not the whole problem, too. The problem is dirty money, complacency, cowardice, and loyalty to party over any sense of duty or rectitude. And that certainly isn't getting settled over one election cycle. 

UPDATE: Which leaves out this guy and the evolution of the current GOP--the increasingly nihilistic alt-right aspect. It's sinister that the NY Young Republicans more openly embrace Proud Boys and truck with white supremacy out in the open. How Santos (clearly a performative clod) serves that agenda remains to be seen. But being a gay Brazilian racist clusterfuck certainly is one spin on identity politics for lulz, isn't it? 

Defining the GOP

 

Is that a pizza menu Rep. Elise Stefanik holds in her hand in the picture above? Why, no, it is the Republican party's plan to define itself ahead of the midterms! Many GOP legislators, we are assured, worked long and hard to boil down what the party plans to do in their Commitment to America, and while I think what's on offer is long on goals and short on policy specifics, I can already envision what the party will do, because they have been telling us.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, I think, has done the best job of defining the party: it's about a federal abortion ban.  He has literally said the words "defines our party" regarding this issue, and I sure as heck don't disbelieve him, because even if they can't manage it federally, you can be sure GOP governors and state houses are ready to exercise their "states' rights" to take away the rights of people who can become pregnant. 

They have goals regarding crime and inflation, and also oversight of the White House. I think we can predict fairly well what House Republicans would do with their opportunity--pretty much nothing useful for the economy (tax cuts for the rich and "cutting waste" really won't accomplish much) and maybe they are only concerned about crime regarding some people, but as long as Biden is president, they have a great incentive to not make things better and to, I dunno. Try impeaching him for something. Anything, really. 

They say they want to protect Social Security and Medicare, and Sens. Rick Scott and Ron Johnson have given us a good window into their thinking about that--they are going to destroy the village to save it. 

From the skimpy pamphlet that GOP House leadership brandished, to the video that contained a lot of stock footage from...Russia (Really? A national party won't foot the bill to contract a videographer to shoot B-roll out in Indiana or wherever?), you can really see the loving, thoughtful work that has gone into their messaging. 

Even the comments of their probably-planted concern-mommy let you really know what they are all about:

"Critical race theory; diversity, equity, and inclusion; gender identity ... anti-bullying programs ... These are all Marxist-style programs targeting our children."

— A mom at the House GOP's "Commitment to America" agenda rollout, as Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy nods along pic.twitter.com/AiLhVvX07f

— The Recount (@therecount) September 23, 2022

So, you understand, they will defeat classroom communism with a commitment to be....pro-bullying, anti-inclusion, and definitely crack down on that diversity and equity stuff. You bet! In sum, f you want a party that stands for culture war, inaction on kitchen table issues, the Big Lie, book-banning and making kids carry their rapists' baby to term, well, the GOP have well and truly demonstrated who they are! 

This is What They Do, Now.

 

Roughly the same time I was hitting "submit" on yesterday morning's blog post, Rep. Stefanik was hitting "submit" on the Tweet depicted above: "democrats desperately want wide open borders and mass amnesty for illegals allowing them to vote.  Like the vast majority of Americans, Republicans want to secure our border and protect election security."

Sure, that's just a re-statement of the great replacement theory, but she also wants you to also know who the real victim in all this is: Elise Stefanik, for being smeared by people calling her out for exactly what she's saying. I expected no less, because there is hardly less a person could expect. The Washington Post's Philip Bump has it right--no one will apologize. They won't even stop and consider what the fallout of their rhetoric will be. Not even after it has lead to mass shootings. 

So, maybe Rep. Matt Gaetz will try to say his promotion of GRT is "race neutral". Oh, ok. We'll just ignore which immigrants are singled out. Others can claim (various RW pundits) that if you blame Democrats instead of George Soros it isn't real great replacement theory (it's just sparkling xenophobia!). And they are out there conflating two separate ideas: that America is demographically "browning" in the sense of eventually becoming minority-majority (a neutral, observable trend) and the idea that the demographic change is deliberate (not so neutral, the boogey-man under the bed). 

I guess the dumbest thing is, just as I've pointed out that the border is, in fact, being protected by the Administration despite fear-mongering and hyperbole to the contrary, why is anyone on the right thinking that new citizens are necessarily going to be Democratic voters? I wouldn't count on it, myself. Voting patterns in naturalized US citizens usually lags that of native citizens (and turnout among them isn't so hot, either) and there's no reason, not one, to expect a group to vote for us in return for citizenship. People vote for candidates who promise to do a good job. This is because people are thinking individuals with agency. They might even vote Republican, Elise--we know! 

That fantasy would be so easy (if you don't like the voters you have, just import ones you will!) if it...had any chance of working. And in the meanwhile, would it make sense electorally to create any kind of "crisis at the border" when Republicans seem to use it so deftly (and fallaciously)  as a cudgel for Democratic administrations?

This is what Republicans do now, they are shameless. No one wants to "silence" them--only ask them to be a bit introspective about the damage they are doing. But all they can think to do is escalate.