The Lies Vance and Trump are Selling

 

The most striking thing that JD Vance has admitted out loud and in public is that even if Haitians are supposed to be here legally, he's still going to call them "illegal aliens". He knows and knew that the "people eating pets" thing was a lie when he spread it. He could easily bother to check whether crime really was up or whether communicable diseases were up, But the point isn't whether he's being honest--he's not. 

It's whether he can induce people to follow up on his story and keep it alive as if it were a big deal. Just like big public lies could induce people to follow up on a land deal in Arkansas, or a lie about a man's honorable service in Viet Nam, or a lie about a fully American man's birth certificate, or an attack on an embassy in Libya by Islamic terrorists, or an email server, or a man's son's laptop, and try to make that into a big deal, whether it really is or not. 

But there is something else in Vance's particular set of lies that is revealing--the idea that if a person can wave a wand over someone and declare them citizens, having a particular office means you can "uncitizen" them.  Or unperson them.

Now, Let's Play "Do You Hear What I Hear?"

 

Having a hard time coming to any conclusion besides the obvious one about what Rich Lowry catches himself blurting out here pic.twitter.com/PFHQMCS8UP

— Madeline Peltz (@peltzmadeline) September 16, 2024

Now it's time to play the inciting new game show, "Do You Hear What I Hear?" where the contestants try to make out whether it's the word we are not supposed to say, or just a terrible, terrible slip of the soft palate. In our clip today, we have Rich Lowry, editor of National Review, on Megyn Kelly's show, which I guess is a thing, extremely butchering the word "migrants" or "immigrants" until it sounds like....

Well, you be the judge. 

OK, time's up, audience. So, as is the catch phrase of our show: "Did you hear what I hear?"

No. You actually don't need more time for this. I don't know what part of NR or Megyn Kelly or Rich Lowry confused you about whatever is "in their heart". The actual answer is--the reason people are hearing it isn't about whether it has been said out loud, it's about this dumb dance we are doing around immigration trying not to make it about---that, when we know damn good and well it is. 

You can actually not use that one word and still be saying that word more than you know. That's the  whole answer. We don't need a whole lot more episodes. 

So those of you who got the right answer here, you win a lifetime supply of the baggage of knowing about it, and for those you who didn't know, you get the parting gift of probably figuring it out but most likely not from this blogpost. 

Thanks for playing everybody! And let's meet again probably sooner than we think we should right here in the 21st century but apparently not!

UPDATE: Here's a bonus round, Christian supremacist edition:

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"? 

As Goes Ohio? Kansas? Arizona?

 

If Nikki Haley, who dropped out weeks ago, is pulling 20% in the GOP primary against Trump in Ohio--this is a worrisome thing for him. Here's what I'm thinking--it's well-educated and female voters who realize that Trump is an appalling person. Some of these people will end up voting for Biden. Some will stay home. But this is an issue that Trump actually CAN'T address. 

What do I mean by that? Take the E. Jean Carroll defamation suit. He counter-sued and lost, because what in the hell is the difference between assaulting someone digitally vs. with a penis? He's going back in against ABC and George Stephanopoulos because Nancy Mace kind of made him do it.  So we are now going to be talking about Trump's being a rapist and Trump INVITED it. 

We are going to go back to the Ukraine issue in the first impeachment because Trump invited that, too. We are going to se him condition Jewishness as it relates to Zionism, for a degree of Zionism that truly is anti-Palestinian. We are going to question what he REALLY wants done at the border because he stopped the border deal. We are going to question whether he understands foreign policy because after all--Russia is being expansionist, dare I say, imperialistic? And there's stupid tyrant fanboy Trump, wanting to be recognized by the Big Kids Dictator Club. 

Texas Placing Bets on Whether a Woman Will Die

 

The Texas Supreme Court put a lower court's decision on hold regarding whether Karen Cox could receive what might be a life-saving abortion of an almost-certainly doomed fetus, following on AG Ken Paxton's claim that any doctor or hospital that performed that procedure would be prosecuted. This woman is the stake in a fucking card game. It seems to me that the elected zealots involved, like Justice John Devine:

John Devine, an anti-abortion activist and self-styled “Ten Commandments Judge,” will become one of Texas’s nine Supreme Court justices early next year, as the Democrats are not fielding a candidate for the seat in the November election.

....

Devine has long been a staunch anti-abortion activist. At a June rally in Fort Worth, Devine told the crowd he had been arrested 37 times while protesting abortion clinics in the 1980s, Smith reported. Though, in a more recent interview, “he said he had been arrested during peaceful protests several times in the 1980s but did not remember how many,” Smith reported. Despite this history of activism, Devine insisted he “is still able to interpret the law impartially.”

In 2008, Devine and his wife, Nubia, showed everyone just how committed they were to the pro-life position when her seventh pregnancy endangered her life and that of the baby. The Texas Observer‘s Emily DePrang wrote about a video his campaign put out called “Elizabeth’s story.”

Like that bet. 

So-called pro-life people love to say that a woman's life isn't really jeopardized by a pregnancy. They love to act like they did something special by allowing a fetus to be born if it survives even briefly. And they will claim victory of anything short of this young mother of two just dying right now. Trisomy-18 isn't always fatal: kids with Edwards syndrome can live--see former Senator Rick Santorum's youngest child, Bella, for a story of a child with a way better than expected outcome. But keep in mind this is a former senator with a shit-ton more access to the best care for his kid, and whose wife did not have Cox's unique set of pregnancy complications.

A Good Election Night for Our Rights

 

This was a Democratic ad calling out Daniel Cameron, the Trump-endorsed GOP nominee for Kentucky Governor.

He just lost. pic.twitter.com/5svhTxuKai

— No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen (@NoLieWithBTC) November 8, 2023

The big news out of Ohio was that voters came out to support a bill enshrining the right to abortion in the state constitution, but the evening's results showed more than that: the above ad shows that voters understood their rights were on the line in Kentucky, and in Virginia, the Democrats held the state senate and flipped the house, denying bland but super-conservative Gov. Youngkin the opportunity to ban abortion there. 

It was a good night for reproductive rights. 

It was also a good night for Yusef Salaam who won a New York City council seat--he was one of the Exonerated Five. He got sort of an "endorsement" from Donald Trump once--he endorsed that innocent man be executed. 

Anyway, there were good signs for Democrats. Democrat Dan McCaffrey won a Supreme Court seat in Pennsylvania against an anti-abortion candidate, but this win is also big for what is sure to be a meaningful year ahead regarding voting rights and election law. 

I guess Republicans can point to their success in keeping very corrupt Tate Reeves in as governor in Mississippi...but well. It's Mississippi.

A Win for Democracy in Ohio!

 

The people of Ohio decided, in an August election devised by Republicans, that no, maybe they do want a simple majority to determine referendums to the constitution, and maybe they do want more direct representation about what does make it onto the ballot. This vote was also about abortion--a referendum to enshrine abortion rights in the Ohio constitution is on the ballot this year. 

I'm basically going to reiterate what I said around this time last year regarding the vote in Kansas--bodily autonomy, one's right to privacy and self-determination are popular. People do not want their private life dictated to and understand the personal stakes of having a choice. They know that it is not right for the state to deny a 11-year old rape victim the medical intervention for a pregnancy no reasonable person would make her carry. They understand that making a pregnant patient wait until the heartbeat of their doomed fetus stops, at the risk to their own health, is simply wrong. They don't want doctors criminalized for giving needed medical care. 

Abortion rights are popular and receiving that care should remain safe and legal. It is up to anti-abortion people to try, finally, to actually concentrate on legislation that might make that procedure more rare--by concentrating on access to health care. trying to resolve what is broken in the health care system regarding high infant and maternal mortality, strengthening the rights of pregnant workers, ensuring affordable and safe child care, and other measures that make it easier and safer to carry, bear and raise a child. 

But they should relent on the idea that they should make choices about other people's bodies. And Democrats should not be timid about supporting reproductive rights.

The Big What-if?

 

Trump: I'm going to be making a very big announcement on Tuesday November 15 pic.twitter.com/EmpMcqYVt0

— Acyn (@Acyn) November 8, 2022

Ooooohhhhhh! A big announcement, is it? At Mar-a-Lago (the site where, two times, now, multiple boxes containing assorted government paper Trump had no business still having, were carted out--and this is important). The Winter White House. Much Florida Guy energy!

Not to overshadow the important message of the midterms, mind you-but whatever, whatever, whatever could it be? Did he strike oil while rustling up some food in the backyard at Bedminster? Does he have one weird trick for eliminating stubborn grout stains? Has he had a vision of the Blessed Virgin with several important prophecies for our future? Does he want you to know that you can donate your unwanted old vehicle to 1-877-kars 4kids? 

Not to bigfoot J.D. Puffenstuff's (who he does not own, he says) rally, or whatever, but Trump wants you to know you would be safer with him in charge of the nuclear codes because he'd know when to use'em! And also, Nancy Pelosi impeached him twice, which makes her just as much an animal as MS-13. That's serving some serious presidential vibes and doesn't at all sound like a sad self-important has-been about to be indicted for lots of things. He sounds like a sad, self-important has-been about to be indicted for lots of things who got told announcing he was running for the 2024 GOP presidential race would 1) possibly turn out the vote--against the GOP, 2) sever his legal fees being paid by the RNC and 3) end his Save America fundraising grift. 

He doesn't want to announce right now, but maybe--after he knows whether Lee Zeldin will be able to pardon him for anything he's maybe in trouble for in NY--then he might announce. When he's guaranteed that the 1/6 Committee goes away and we see Jim Jordan or (holy jumping jiggery-fuckery) Margarine Tater Grease having the gavel in the Oversight Committee, why, then, wow! His glidepath back to the "dump" feels so much more stable. Very legal and very cool. 

I have all the obvious questions and reservations you might think I have, especially in light of "Putin's chef" admitting screwing about in US elections has been on the menu for a long while and still is. And also, I think about the threat GOP wins might have on the future of support to Ukraine. And what it means to have election denialism become the default, not election security. Not one person, one vote, but one election, hordes of lawyers. 

He has basically already announced that he wants to announce. Our Democracy better batten down its ever-loving hatches. 

What Does Desperate Bitch-hood Sound Like?

 

According to JD Vance, Tim Ryan is planning on "flooding America with illegal aliens and then using American tax dollars to fund gender reassignment surgeries for those aliens" pic.twitter.com/iMOPiEMuxT

— Kat Abu (@abughazalehkat) November 4, 2022

The Democrats are doing a replacement theory because they want to make a transgender army happen, is a thing a stupid venture capitalist ignorant signifying idiot individual wants to say out loud where people can hear.

Of course this is stupid. 

I don't have any more to say about that.  The whole thing is the most stupid ever.  Vance is just not credible. 

This Rhetoric is Harmful and Misogynistic

 

JD Vance thinks parents should stay in violent marriages "for the sake of their kids." That's not just wrong, it's unbelievably dangerous. pic.twitter.com/aQnTGRCuNi

— Tim Ryan (@TimRyan) July 25, 2022

I'm not going to get into the argument of "Well, women can be abusers, too", because I really feel like what Vance is getting at here is women don't like their helpings of marital chastisement, so the little round heels use lawyers to slink away from their otherwise perfectly good homes. Homes, where, presumably, they would be raising their children in a much better environment with two parents than by trying to go it alone.

It's appalling that a supposedly educated man knows no better than this. I heard something some time ago that really stuck with me--it's better to be from a broken home than to live in a broken family. If a spouse is being abused, what are the odds the kids aren't absorbing the trauma of that, and being abused themselves? 

On the other side of Roe, we're already looking at homicide being the number one cause of maternal mortality, and the likelihood of it being due to intimate partner violence being really high. Staying together "for the kids" in a world where parents might not have planned for or wanted these kids feels like so much resentment and interpersonal aggression ready to happen in a world where resources aren't there for them.  But once the kids are here, should they have a loving, not-violent environment to grow up in? 

His answer that getting a divorce is too easy is a disgrace--what if getting your ass beat and your psyche trampled on the daily is something no human should have to suffer? What if no one deserves the threat of violence or even death as a part of their interactions in their own home, which should be a refuge and place of safety and comfort? What if raising a child with healthy boundaries and physical and emotional safety was more important than some arbitrary feelings about two parents in the home? 

We have child marriage and rapists being fathers in this country. We have families ripe for abusive relationships. And this fool wants to pontificate on whether maybe spouses should just put up with beatings? Fatherlessness is better than a monster for a father. 

I don't know if this is his true belief or something he's signifying for the hard-right evangelicals who believe the rod shouldn't be spared and the husband is the head of the house in some iron-clad spiritual way, but this view is unhealthy and misguided, and saying it out loud displays an unfitness for making decisions pertaining to other people's lives. 

He needs to lose. Tim Ryan should be the next US Senator from Ohio. 

A Very Meaningful Endorsement for this Mandel Guy

 

Trump: We’ve endorsed Dr.Oz. We’ve endorsed JP right? JD Mandell. He’s doing great pic.twitter.com/wkP3KetanL

— Acyn (@Acyn) May 1, 2022

To be charitable, maybe he misspoke, but since Trump can't seem to stop talking about the "X" test that proved he was actually smart, like all the other stable geniuses in is family, I think I want to humbly suggest that if he can't remember who he endorsed in the GOP primary coming up this Tuesday, maybe he should take another test.

To be less charitable, still, I understand why Trump might be confused, because neither Vance nor Mandel necessarily are stand-out candidates (although Mandel has definitely stood out in the field for ads, on occasion, when he's not in his bunker) but J.D. Vance has written a book. Which almost makes him Dr. Oz-level famous.  

Sure, Trump doesn't read books, but the book did get made into a movie (with Meryl Streep, so I'm pretty sure he didn't watch it, either).  They can't all be Herschel Walkers. And some of them are even Eric Greitens, recently seen on a gun-filled playdate with Don. Jr. You all remember Greitens, right? The accused domestic abuser with the rape dungeon in his basement. (Look, this happens.) 

I guess what I'm saying is, the problem isn't that Trump finds the candidate he endorsed in OH so forgettable, it's that he was sharing the evening with a candidate he endorsed who is currently defending himself from charges of sexual assault. It seems like Trump is endorsing people to show he still has political heft, but he doesn't give a goddamn who those people are. It just gives Trump an opportunity to get out there and campaign and appear politically relevant. These endorsees take second billing, and if they win, Trump will take credit, and if they lose, it will be forgotten. 

Maybe Trump isn't a stable genius, but take a look at what he's doing--these campaigns think they have glommed onto Trump's star. They've competed for the honor of his endorsement. But look who he chooses. The twice-impeached one-term wonder is just here for the clicks and likes. His endorsements are part of the con.

View From an Ohio Bunker

 

I've been following the Ohio Republican Senate primary with interest because it really feels like a dance-off between two jerks with no rhythm. J.D. Vance is an appalling try-hard, no question, what with tut-tutting the child-free and musing over the ridonk boss Tweets Trump would make in the wake of an actually human person being tragically killed in an accident with liberal Alec Baldwin involved. Because of course, Trump is known for making comments that aren't at all disrespectful, unkind, or outright hurtful. (I mean wait--he is: why do we need that right now, exactly? While people are actually shocked and grieving? To own libs? Or because the faithful need callouses to build up over their human-feeling parts so they can sink still further into deplorability?) 

But Josh Mandel is a special little culture warrior, and from his bunker (under, I presume, freedom's anti-vax cornfield) is suggesting libs (they!) hate "normal Americans" for eating meat (my husband is a meat cutter--I learned that vegetarianism interfered with my drinking so I had to give it up), having babies, guns (I just recommend keeping the babies and the guns in separate spaces is all, we have guns) and for some weird reason, hashtag bitcoin. 

Oh man, I really hate hashtag bitcoin. It's the woooooorst. Hyping assorted forms of funny money that real people invest actual money in feels like a really grifty economics LARP to me. But I see Mandel is committing to his bit, and his bytes. 

It's The Public Health, Stupid

 

President Biden made some important steps just now to try and end the COVID-19 pandemic which is, thanks to anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers, becoming more of an "endemic" problem here in the good ol' US of A. He has mandated COVID-19 shots for federal employees and contractors and large employers (100+ employees) and expanded testing regimes. This is actually a great start--we had a chance for people to voluntarily choose to take shots that would protect them from severe disease (given that breakthrough cases might still exist because--variants, but that spread of the disease only increases the risk of--variants--like the Delta variant that is ripping through the latest wave, and now we're hearing about Lambda and Mu, both believed to be more immune-dodging buggers). 

Some didn't take that chance, and even patted themselves on the back for not doing it. Now, anti-vax grace period is over, and if you special little people want to be employed and to travel and whatnot, get your whole special asses with the program and get the shots. That's right. Because the majority of us are vaccinated now, and because of you, we can barely have nice things. And we've fucking had it.

Needless to say, the Republican sociopath slow genocide squad started bleating about their freedumbs at once. Ohio Senate Candidate Josh Mandel stood in a cornfield in front of a Trump sign and had a very natural one, which for some reason I find endlessly hilarious.  Yes, don't comply with tyranny. Shoot the vaxstapo if they come to your door! This is normal stuff to say! I am not a crank! 

And the funny old thing is, I don't think Mandel is an actual crank. I think he's a political opportunist and has boosters with his morning coffee and just doesn't give a fuck who dies. He definitely triggers an obvious bovine fecal aroma alert every time I check in on him. 

But this is the Trumpublican party line, right? The hardcore Trump guys are all in for antivax. Like the ratbastard Flynn clan, who are pimping sheep drench. Even the Chinese fuck whose yacht Steve Bannon got arrested on is all up in the antivax shit. 

And you all could ask why, and the dry eye reason why is Republicans can afford to send masses of red state bodies to wingnut Valhalla for the culture war. And they'd still win elections there. And that's pretty Leninist of them. Let's give them a tankie golf clap. 

Anyways, so even if definitely not an authoritarian asshat Greg Abbot wants to now invoke the "right to choose" for Texans (uh no, sonny, that's what Merrick Garland is trying to ensure, not you):

and other Republican nihilist death-eating sonsabitches want to tussle with the mandates, actually still and all, it's about the public health and there's precedent.  Vaccine mandates are as American as cherry pie.  And I cannot tell a lie about that. 

Regardless of the lies others spread, the kind that get people killed. The kind that have already resulted in so many unnecessary American deaths, as Republicans have told for purely political reasons. Because that kind of evil is just beyond me. And well beyond Joe Biden, who just wants you not to die, God love ya. Not because the unvaxxed should be punished, but because he doesn't want Americans to die. How much more simple does it need to be? 

How Not to Lose

 

A lot of digital ink has been spilled this week over Nina Turner's loss to Shontel Brown and what it means regarding progressive and "establishment" Democrats, but I'm going to just say that this primary had a lot to do with some critical errors on the part of the candidate with all the name recognition and quite a lot of money and doesn't really say anything about the direction of the party. It says something about how to campaign and be part of a team. 

Nina Turner is unquestionably part of a team. The Squad and many "name" progressives supported her. But politics is local and parties are national. And somehow, Turner failed to sort out how to manage either the local politics or the national politics. She got told to stop running a negative campaign against her rival by local clergy. She left tv money on the table despite her fundraising from small-dollar donors. And she had already pissed off Hillary Clinton voters by supporting Jill Stein in 2016 and Joe Biden supporters by scatologically deriding his candidacy in 2020. She also ran afoul of the CBC by calling Rep. James Clyburn "stupid".  

Which made her opponent look pleasant and trustable in comparison. It isn't deep. People saw her grievances, and lost sight of what she could do for them, and her campaign didn't turn that impression around. 

But keeping in mind that tomorrow....exists, how Turner has chosen to lose is also very puzzling, because the faults that lost her the race are how she's going to stick her impression. Like, just what were her comments about "evil money" supposed to mean when she also had some really good fundraising? And if she wants to talk about corporate money, well, okay then, let's do that. And why is she saying that her loss is about how the establishment does progressive candidates specifically dirty when she earned her retaliation by specifically pissing on the establishment in the first place? It feels to me like she could have gotten backing with her name recognition if she didn't start off on the entirely wrong foot. 

Also, now that we are are well past the 2020 Democratic primary, I'm just going to say it--Bernie Sanders has questionable taste.  Regardless of whether any fundraising has fossil fuel money behind it, Brown's priorities per her website generally support the Green New Deal, and she says she would be a vote for Medicare for All if it ever came to the floor.  That's not a candidate who is not progressive, that's a candidate who is, but just doesn't have Turner's progressive connections. Which reminds me that Sanders  also had David Sirota, who was a great communicator that blocked a shit-ton of liberals on Twitter and also seems to hate the MSM, as one of his press folks and had Shaun King as a surrogate. It isn't necessary or helpful to defend Turner's primary loss as having a damn thing to do with corporate money when there is a general election to be won, no matter how much of a guaranteed D district it is. 

Sometimes a personality just isn't a fit for a job. And taking a loss without any grace, and by deriding the process as being at fault instead of showing any introspection, basically pulling a Trump, isn't a great look or demonstrating that any lessons were learned. This is how not to lose. It isn't winning, because it precludes the possibility of figuring out how to win. It doesn't help anybody, 

I'm not saying Turner is a very bad candidate, just that she wasn't the best candidate for right there and then, and needs to see a direction away from that loss that is positive and meaningful. Her initial response was anything but.