Further Stray Thoughts on the Current Political Climate

1. Holy break-dancing fuck, what a bunch of cowards we have running the government these days.  They’re afraid of immigrants.  They’re afraid of Muslims.  They’re afraid of their own constituents.  They’re afraid of the law.  They’re afraid of the press.  They’re afraid of education.  They’re afraid of beer commercials and Broadway plays.  They’re afraid of anyone who doesn’t look exactly like them, think exactly like them, worship exactly like them, or vote exactly like them.  They’re afraid of their own shadows.  And they want me to be afraid too.  To hell with that.  Man up, grow a pair, and learn how to be goddamned Americans, you morons.  These colors do not run.

2. So apparently “not actively drooling” is the new standard for “presidential” these days?  That was a thoroughly embarrassing performance by der Sturmtrumper standing before his captive Congress this week, and listening to his punch-drunk minions proclaiming how presidential he is these days has been an exercise in lowered expectations worthy of a junior high prom.  Seriously – 320 million Americans and this is the only president we’ve got?  The problem with democracy is that everyone is stuck with the government that the winners deserve.

3. The Russian noose continues to tighten, as it now seems the Confederate Attorney General lied under oath about meeting with their agents during the campaign.  This is the same guy who proclaimed that lying under oath was such a serious offense that any public official caught doing so should be removed from office.  One wonders if he’s changed his mind on that.

4. Apparently der Sturmtrumper’s PR Barbie will not be punished for her violations of law and ethics for plugging the family business on government time, because reasons.  I’m not at all surprised to hear this.  It’s pretty much the standard GOP position, as I’ve learned from years under Governor Teabagger (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Koch Industries) here in Wisconsin – rules are for other people, not Republicans.

5. Although in her defense, the fact that she had her feet up on the Oval Office couch hardly strikes me as anything to get the vapors over.  Eyes on the prize, people – remember Bowling Green!

6. We seem to be rapidly descending into a “papers, please” kind of society.  How this squares with the rabid calls of “freedom” from der Sturmtrumper’s supporters I don’t know.  I suppose it’s just ironic that all of the things they accuse the left of doing in their paranoid fantasies are now being enacted by their heroes without word one of complaint.

7. They’ve already introduced a bill to abolish public education as we know it.  Because education just makes the peasants uppity, after all.  Nate Silver published some interesting data back in November which outlined the clear relationship between education levels and voting patterns – the more educated you are, the less likely you are to vote Republican.  I suppose getting rid of education seems easier than adjusting their policies to reality.

8. None of this is normal.  None of this is acceptable.  And anyone who pretends otherwise is kidding themselves and bullshitting you.

9. After seven years and more than five dozen attempts to repeal the ACA under the previous Administration and over a month after der Sturmtrumper declared that repealing the ACA would happen on day one of his regime, nothing has yet happened.  They don’t actually have anything to replace it with, have never had anything to replace it with, and someone may have finally gotten it across to them that the vast majority of Americans (70% last time I checked, which means a whole bunch of Republicans are on that side too) don’t want it repealed.  They may do it anyway, because if there is anything that sums up the modern GOP it is the willingness to blindly follow extremist ideology at the expense of actual human beings.  Remember folks, “access to healthcare” is not the same thing as “having healthcare.”  In theory I have access to a lot of things I will never be able to afford or use.

10. Is there anyone surprised that under a president whose campaign was publicly endorsed by every major neo-Nazi organization in the US and the KKK, whose main puppet-master and first major hire after being elected is the guy behind the white supremacists of the alt-right, and who lives in a fantasy land where false-flag operations occur whenever they are politically convenient for him, we are now seeing a phenomenal rise in hate crimes in this country?  If there are any such surprised people, should they be allowed to walk the streets unmedicated?  Discuss.