I'm not at all sure they don't believe it themselves. Not that it matters all that much since they are in it for the whole deal the money and power (and hate, I guess). Come for the hate stay for the money, or visa versa.
I'm sure some, many, most, nearly all believe the crap because it conforms with their (ignorant) beliefs. Based on thankfully limited experience among people who actually listen to the crap, they believe they're being informed. But then again, I guess it's the norm. One believes whatever and then goes to sources that reinforce it instead of flinging facts and truths around.
I've gone back and forth on the vexed question of "do they believe", and, personally, I've decided that, based on their apparent idea that we on the Left doesn't believe what we say, they don't need to believe either. It's all lies and virtue signaling and is entirely based on the needs of the moment. (Now, there might be low-level MAGAts who believe, but for the influencers it's all smoke & mirrors.)
Not worth the effort to consider whether or not the grifters and other bullshit artistes believe their own grifting. I have no doubt the marks and suckers do believe. (People who follow the crap ironically and Roy excepted, obviously.)
Oh, absolutely. They think EVERYTHING we do is nothing more than virtue-signaling. Why do I drive a hybrid car? No, it can't possibly be that I'm just trying to do one pitifully small thing to respond to the threat of climate change, I must be drivin' around all day long, shouting, "Hey, look at me! Savin' the planet!" Maybe I think it'll get me hot chicks.
Same deal when I was marchin' in those BLM protests, I couldn't possibly care about what happened to George Floyd, a man I am not related to and who even has a different skin color than mine, such a thing humans do not do. No, again, I'm in it for all the hot chicks.
Uh, Mr B? About those chicks...? First of all – that car, it's gotta go. Then the protests thing? Maybe, but whatever you're doin' these days, if it ain't on tiktok...just sayin'...
This gets into that whole pesky thing about "belief" where it doesn't really mean what we assume it means. There's the whole reality-based-community version of adherence to an idea rooted and in concordance with objective reality, then there's the I-have-a-dream version of fealty to an ideal that should be brought into being for the betterment of all mankind. Some people believe in the speed of light, some believe Trump is God made flesh. You see the problem. Talking about what a person "believes" only tells you what matters to them, it's as subjective as all get out. Belief and Reality only have a nodding acquaintance. As Yogi Berra liked to say, when a batter tells you who he is, believe him.
whis is typically pretty good, riffing on the Paul Harvey joint Trump's staff or whatever lunatics ripped it off from. I have no doubt it is "real", whatever that means these days.
I checked, the idiots who made it have made other videos shared by Trump, so it looks like they're on the team and not mocking him, at least not intentionally.
No, not meant for the majority of Americans because the path to YouTube Influencer success is narrowcasting. Unfortunately for the Republican party, there's been some leak-over into the minds of their candidates who now talk like the goal is to get the most subscribers on Patreon instead of the most votes in an election.
If we all survive this, we'll need to give YouTube a medal for destroying the Republican party.
I doubt that I understand you — I’m a dotard now with a sympathetic TBI (very long, boring story) so the brain’s not working…
The mass media first fills the griftees brain with bullshit such as to make them susceptible to conservative BS artistes. The grifting is then pushed via non-mass media and social networks and stuff.
Meanwhile, far too many pay far too little attention to the way things work, making them marks for grifters and BS artists.
And here we are with crazies, the nihilists and the pigs in charge…
"The mass media first fills the griftees brain with bullshit"
Not disagreeing with that, but what makes our time unique is the right's move away from mass indoctrination with general-purpose bullshit to specially-curated bullshit intended only for a narrow audience. Most people won't even see it, and if they did, they wouldn't understand it, but today's right-wingers don't care what the normies know or believe, they're focused so closely up their own assholes.
Look at any right-wing propaganda campaign, they repeatedly abjure any argument that might go over with the non-insane in favor of the craziest amped-up nonsense that drives their core followers wild. Works great if you're trying to build a following on Nazi Substack, but I'm increasingly optimistic it's not gonna work for a major political party.
Trump. Just Trump. His base truly believes (most of – they are as transactional as the rest of us) what he says about himself, his unmatched powers, his world-ruling acumen, his wealth...
They do not give anyone else that level of adoration, and they never will (maybe their spawn will latch onto another Griftero Supremo sometime).
All the rest of the rightists/wrongists are along for the ride, but when LOTUS is gone they'll discover their shit stinks just like everyone else's.
True, but about the level of adoration he receives, a recent poll found that 30% of Republican voters say they'd either stay home, vote for Biden or vote third party if Trump is the nominee. And yes, 70% is a substantial majority, but not so substantial when it's your own party and they all voted for you to be President twice already.
The best example I can think of is their attack on Biden. I think you could craft a pretty effective attack with "Sure, nice enough fella, means well, but he's just not up to the job." Effective because it doesn't require you to hate Biden to vote against him. Doesn't actually require you to know anything about Biden except that he's old.
But no, let's go with "Head of international crime family" instead. Can't buy that unless you hate Biden, but doesn't everybody? Everybody I know does, that's for sure! Yeah, let's use that one, it's a sure winner!
Poor Pauline Kael let slip once that she didn't know anyone who voted for Nixon, and we liberals were all expected to hang our heads in shame for the next 50 years for not getting outside our liberal bubble to know more conservatives. Funny it doesn't work in the other direction.
Yeah, praise of MLK from the Right was always a bad, awkward fit. They pretended to like the One Quote because it was the only thing out of Dr. King’s mouth that could conceivably have its meaning twisted enough to appear to support their anti-affirmative action, and now anti-CRT/DEI agenda.
So given where conservatives have been heading with Trump leading the charge -- which is right off a cliff into full-on fascism -- it’s predictable the Right feels like it’s a good time to redefine MLK from National Icon of Heroism to The Father Of (DEI) Lies. They want to make sure ALL the ground has been softened up.
Not just stealin', they're actually readin' what this Jesus feller actually said and tellin' others! Not like God intended, just take the hate straight from your suburban mega-church pastor.
Charlie Kirk's one of those guys I see him and I think" I hope that asshole gets a spot on his dick that won't go away and maybe one day, he's walking through busy downtown and is so worried about the spot on his dick that he doesn't pay attention to traffic and ends up getting hit by a car. "
I used to feel bad thinking that way but not so much anymore. I guess I hate them all but I hate some more than others. CK is pretty high on the list.
You probably don't know this about MLK, and the reason you don't know it is because I just made it up this morning. See how the liberal media deceives you? They didn't write about this thing I just made up this morning! Why? Because if you knew about this, you would know that there's no need for civil rights, or even to treat Black people civilly.
"You see the way the elites look down on us? They won't even take the trouble to read our minds! Their contempt is so apparent. Time to have another chat with the NYT and WaPo reporters who are permanently assigned to our local diner."
I think the program those papers of record have established to reinvigorate local economies is brilliant. Sure, them small towns are toast, but the diners carry on...
"Why, I got outraged about something I saw on Facebook this morning and I had to wait til lunch to unload on that New York Times reporter! I demand better service!"
Grrr: by 4am, local wingers were posting "what about MLK's womanizing?".
Aaron McGruder's "The Bookdocks" provides the perpetually useful MLK Day gif:
A bowtied white guy says "I think if Martin Luther King were alive he'd -": and a folding chair bowls him over and Huey, McGruder's activist child hero leaps up to start punching him.
Let's be fair, they simply can't imagine or understand how people could be motivated by ideas or principles, our admiration of King must be simple-minded hero-worship and nothing else. Tell us he cheated on his wife and we'll have to give him up, plus everything he ever stood for. How else could it work?
“...in which the Civil Rights Act and everything like it is an error to be eradicated.” And they have the Supreme Court to do it. Alito’s pseudo-originalism will say equality for nonwhite, non male, non land owners isn’t in the Founders’ Constitution and the amendments after the Civil War aren’t valid because women and Blacks didn’t vote for them and what self-contradiction? You’re the contradiction!
I think Darling Nikki was headed there when she said the Civil War was about "the government tellin' people how to live." If she's still around in a month we'll see how far she goes with this shit.
You have to be impressed by the level of cognitive dissonance in a daughter of immigrants, an Indian-American woman, thinking she can win over the Republican base. Honey, no matter how much you y’all it up while spewing vicious fascist garbage, the Repubs still see you as one of “them” and will be howling for your blood in due course.
True, sadly. But she’s got all the bases covered except for “Muslim,” yet she doesn’t see herself as a walking slab of red meat for a vicious right-wing mob.
There was a woman on MSNBC, she'd been doing focus groups with Republican voters for the past coupla years, poor woman, and she said she had one just recently where 5 out of 7 said they would never vote for a woman - any woman - for President. Assuming you'd never put together a focus group with 5 men and only 2 women, there must have been at least one woman who would never vote for a woman.
And am I wrong in thinking they're more open about this now? Maybe in the past the men in the group would have kept this to themselves? Well, the misogynist cat is out of the bag now.
This is a hobby-horse I will die on. The characterization of racism as a black-and-white division in the Republican mind is a oversimplification. A person of color who code-talks and behaves correctly is Of the Body. It would be only when they are isolated from that culture in a hostile environment (say, a rural community where they are not known as "one of the good ones") where they would be at risk, and they could likely calm the locals with the correct language. The stereotypical 19th century century small-town sheriff and white supremacist militiamen with a blanket hatred do exist and are accepted as Of the Body, but they are tolerated.
So, what "racism" is these days is about white privilege. Anyone who accepts white privilege can be Of the Body regardless of color, just as Italians and Irish are now White as freshly-fallen snow. The hatred is directed at the Other, the expression of non-white culture. Rap, saggy pants, Ebonics, demands for equality and justice, that kind of thing. If people of color give up their language, culture, demands, and accept white privilege they too can be White. They can celebrate their history ironically, like the Irish with st. Patrick's Day and the Italians with The Sopranos, something they have transcended.
I am compelled, every time his name is mentioned, to note that Steven Crowder once voiced the Brain on the PBS series Arthur. Which is funny enough, but, because the Brain's family was black, he ended up singing a Kwanzaa song on their Christmas special. The world is so weird.
Yet another right winger who could’ve turned out differently if they’d only been successful in entertainment or art? Like Breitbart? Ben Shapiro? Herr Schickelgrüber?
So I'm forced to choose between two alternate universes, one where Stephen Crowder is a successful comedian, the other where Stephen Crowder is... well, Stephen Crowder? I'm sorry, is there a "none of the above" option?
First these fascists appropriate MLK Jr.’s speeches for their own political agenda. Then they denigrate the guy by reiterating debunked nonsense and using his affairs as ad hominem attacks.
Now apparently, MLK Jr., was the racist and white nationalist’s are the victims.
Last week we talked about Haley’s comment that slavery wasn’t responsible for the Civil War. If anyone had any doubt before, they shouldn’t. Below is part of a speech from the “Cornerstone“ speech by Alexander Stephens, Vice President of the Confederacy:
“Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth. This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all other truths in the various departments of science. It has been so even amongst us. Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well, that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. The errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago. Those at the North, who still cling to these errors, with a zeal above knowledge, we justly denominate fanatics.”--Alexander Stephen’s
Meaning? What was he a CINO (Confederate in Name Only) at the time? He was the VP of the Confederacy. These are his words and the sentiment of the entire South and Confederate States of America.
Every Confederate State had slavery embedded in their respective state constitutions. So whether or not the Civil War was fought over slavery is absurd.
When republicans talk of state rights it’s the equivalence of admitting that the Civil War was fought over slavery since it’s only a matter of semantics.
If the war was fought over state rights, then it’s the state’s right to allow its citizens to own slaves; end of story!....:)
Doncha know "racism" these days is anything that makes white folks feel bad. It's okay to discuss the validity of existence of minorities, but don't make whitey feel guilty.
This reminds me of the murder of MLK Jr.'s mother, Alberta, in 1974 as she played the organ during a church service. The assassin was a Black Hebrew Israelite preacher who felt the Kings were serving a false god and misleading black people. I don't think either incidents were right-wing stochastic terrorism; rather, I think of them as the result of living with racism while mentally ill.
Does she still have control of the website? Ha ha, the Republican party officials who thought they could vote her out and that she would respect the results of an election.
They got years of mileage from claiming The One Quote in order to drown out everything else MLK ever said. Can't have the public knowing about the other stuff and taking it to heart. Misdirection always works on the crowd Jonathan Metzl writes about https://www.dyingofwhiteness.com/
The most fitting MLK quote they’ll never know: "We may all have come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now."
Mississippi just announced it's joining 15 other Republican-led states in refusing federal money to provide a food benefit to families whose kids qualify for the school lunch program. Just in the summer, when the kids are out of school, the family gets an extra FORTY DOLLARS added to their EBT card each month, because 40 bucks is more than enough to pay for lunch for one kid for a month ('You get one PBJ sandwich, kid, but sorry, milk puts us over-budget, so choke it down.")
Of course, lots of poor white families will also miss out on the benefit, probably the majority of poor families who miss out will be white. The vast majority won't even know this was available and that it's Republicans keeping it from them.
Iowa’s governor also said no money for childhood nutrition because something something childhood obesity. Republican motto: “Every child is precious. But no fatties.”
Also, could obesity ever be caused by poor nutrition—e.g., eating the cheapest, most calorie-dense and nutrition-empty foods available because the family is on a limited budget? If only we had some way of knowing.
So, like, offering a nutritious meal on a reliable timeline could actually be a healthy alternative to whatever crap food can be scrounged up at the corner store? Well, not if it's gonna cost the taxpayer 67 cents (or whatever) a day!
Both weight gain AND diabetes from the processed high fructose corn syrup hell of low-end American cuisine. But, hey, the agribusiness CEOs gotta eat too, so whatcha gonna do.
"Iowa’s governor also said no money for childhood nutrition because something something childhood obesity."
You mean the Governor of the Great State of High-Fructose Corn Syrup?
And I really can't be bothered, but if one were to look back at her political and legislative record, would one find ANYTHING that indicates a concern about childhood obesity other than this ONE thing? You know, like the people who became SUDDENLY and INTENSELY interested in the question of fairness in competitive women's swimming?
The "content of their character" thing always amuses me. So, for just one example, Trump declines to be admired for his lovely orange-Creamsicle-like skin tone, and would rather be judged for his serial lawbreaking and hatemongering?
Where's he from, California? He's obviously no Midwesterner, or he'd know that complaining about the weather is our second-favorite indoor sport.
Justice Alito would like to have a word, seems you've been Struck Down.
And may all your shirts be brown...
Sorry, wrong post. This was for the Warning. Not sure how it got here...:). Will be deleted...:)
Now my response is first past the post and it's...weird.
Suits Me!
We'll pretend they're PARSON Brown
"...they're PARSON Brown"
Panotone #VZ1109E8. Mix some up at your local Sherwin Williams outlet!
Find it under "Shades that will get you murdered by the cops."
"But I don’t think Kirk’s slurs are meant for the majority of Americans."
Roy, as you've also noted over the years, people like Kirk, are primarily grifters working the marks by pandering to them.
Anyone taking their spiels seriously have what you call issues with truths and facts and reality and stuff.
It's pathological and enabled by mass media who fail or choose not to call them out.
I'm not at all sure they don't believe it themselves. Not that it matters all that much since they are in it for the whole deal the money and power (and hate, I guess). Come for the hate stay for the money, or visa versa.
We have a choice?! Put me down for cash, thanks.
I'm sure some, many, most, nearly all believe the crap because it conforms with their (ignorant) beliefs. Based on thankfully limited experience among people who actually listen to the crap, they believe they're being informed. But then again, I guess it's the norm. One believes whatever and then goes to sources that reinforce it instead of flinging facts and truths around.
When ideas don't come to me
Help me know how I'm s'poseta be
Go ye to the sources
Them what reinforces!
And then walk around trouble-free
I've gone back and forth on the vexed question of "do they believe", and, personally, I've decided that, based on their apparent idea that we on the Left doesn't believe what we say, they don't need to believe either. It's all lies and virtue signaling and is entirely based on the needs of the moment. (Now, there might be low-level MAGAts who believe, but for the influencers it's all smoke & mirrors.)
Not worth the effort to consider whether or not the grifters and other bullshit artistes believe their own grifting. I have no doubt the marks and suckers do believe. (People who follow the crap ironically and Roy excepted, obviously.)
Oh, absolutely. They think EVERYTHING we do is nothing more than virtue-signaling. Why do I drive a hybrid car? No, it can't possibly be that I'm just trying to do one pitifully small thing to respond to the threat of climate change, I must be drivin' around all day long, shouting, "Hey, look at me! Savin' the planet!" Maybe I think it'll get me hot chicks.
Same deal when I was marchin' in those BLM protests, I couldn't possibly care about what happened to George Floyd, a man I am not related to and who even has a different skin color than mine, such a thing humans do not do. No, again, I'm in it for all the hot chicks.
Uh, Mr B? About those chicks...? First of all – that car, it's gotta go. Then the protests thing? Maybe, but whatever you're doin' these days, if it ain't on tiktok...just sayin'...
Hot chicks, you say?
*makes notes*
Be careful what you pretend to be, because you are what you pretend to be.
"Be careful what you pretend to be, / because you are what you pretend to be"
This is from George Harrison's original notes to "The End"
Huh, and I thought John was the Deep One.
John was an actual Deep One...
The Shadow Over Liverpool
He had that Innsmouth look
https://youtu.be/FlW8KamiXAU?si=7oEBPCnni4C4LxaV
Not the Buddha or Kurt Vonnegut?
I'm pretty sure I could find it in Facebook in front of a picture of - who else? - Morgan Freeman.
This gets into that whole pesky thing about "belief" where it doesn't really mean what we assume it means. There's the whole reality-based-community version of adherence to an idea rooted and in concordance with objective reality, then there's the I-have-a-dream version of fealty to an ideal that should be brought into being for the betterment of all mankind. Some people believe in the speed of light, some believe Trump is God made flesh. You see the problem. Talking about what a person "believes" only tells you what matters to them, it's as subjective as all get out. Belief and Reality only have a nodding acquaintance. As Yogi Berra liked to say, when a batter tells you who he is, believe him.
Have you seen that "And God Made Trump" video that's going around? I can't decide if it's fake.
Frankly, I'm afraid to watch it. Yasterbylansky has a parody at https://yastreblyansky.blogspot.com/2024/01/literary-corner-god-made-former.html
whis is typically pretty good, riffing on the Paul Harvey joint Trump's staff or whatever lunatics ripped it off from. I have no doubt it is "real", whatever that means these days.
I checked, the idiots who made it have made other videos shared by Trump, so it looks like they're on the team and not mocking him, at least not intentionally.
Oh yeah, the scary thing is they're serious as a heart attack.
No, not meant for the majority of Americans because the path to YouTube Influencer success is narrowcasting. Unfortunately for the Republican party, there's been some leak-over into the minds of their candidates who now talk like the goal is to get the most subscribers on Patreon instead of the most votes in an election.
If we all survive this, we'll need to give YouTube a medal for destroying the Republican party.
I doubt that I understand you — I’m a dotard now with a sympathetic TBI (very long, boring story) so the brain’s not working…
The mass media first fills the griftees brain with bullshit such as to make them susceptible to conservative BS artistes. The grifting is then pushed via non-mass media and social networks and stuff.
Meanwhile, far too many pay far too little attention to the way things work, making them marks for grifters and BS artists.
And here we are with crazies, the nihilists and the pigs in charge…
"The mass media first fills the griftees brain with bullshit"
Not disagreeing with that, but what makes our time unique is the right's move away from mass indoctrination with general-purpose bullshit to specially-curated bullshit intended only for a narrow audience. Most people won't even see it, and if they did, they wouldn't understand it, but today's right-wingers don't care what the normies know or believe, they're focused so closely up their own assholes.
Look at any right-wing propaganda campaign, they repeatedly abjure any argument that might go over with the non-insane in favor of the craziest amped-up nonsense that drives their core followers wild. Works great if you're trying to build a following on Nazi Substack, but I'm increasingly optimistic it's not gonna work for a major political party.
Trump. Just Trump. His base truly believes (most of – they are as transactional as the rest of us) what he says about himself, his unmatched powers, his world-ruling acumen, his wealth...
They do not give anyone else that level of adoration, and they never will (maybe their spawn will latch onto another Griftero Supremo sometime).
All the rest of the rightists/wrongists are along for the ride, but when LOTUS is gone they'll discover their shit stinks just like everyone else's.
True, but about the level of adoration he receives, a recent poll found that 30% of Republican voters say they'd either stay home, vote for Biden or vote third party if Trump is the nominee. And yes, 70% is a substantial majority, but not so substantial when it's your own party and they all voted for you to be President twice already.
Not sure I understand you there but I think I agree.
Everything’s been atomized. There are few huge groups, the majority of people are elected by anything they elect. Nearly every group’s a niche.
The best example I can think of is their attack on Biden. I think you could craft a pretty effective attack with "Sure, nice enough fella, means well, but he's just not up to the job." Effective because it doesn't require you to hate Biden to vote against him. Doesn't actually require you to know anything about Biden except that he's old.
But no, let's go with "Head of international crime family" instead. Can't buy that unless you hate Biden, but doesn't everybody? Everybody I know does, that's for sure! Yeah, let's use that one, it's a sure winner!
"I hate Hillary Clinton"
morphs into
"Hillary is part of the Satanic Democrat conspiracy to eat the brains of frightened children in the catacombs underneath Comet Ping-pong Pizza"
So far, their hubris despite their narrow, hateful lives never ceases to amaze.
Poor Pauline Kael let slip once that she didn't know anyone who voted for Nixon, and we liberals were all expected to hang our heads in shame for the next 50 years for not getting outside our liberal bubble to know more conservatives. Funny it doesn't work in the other direction.
Yeah, praise of MLK from the Right was always a bad, awkward fit. They pretended to like the One Quote because it was the only thing out of Dr. King’s mouth that could conceivably have its meaning twisted enough to appear to support their anti-affirmative action, and now anti-CRT/DEI agenda.
So given where conservatives have been heading with Trump leading the charge -- which is right off a cliff into full-on fascism -- it’s predictable the Right feels like it’s a good time to redefine MLK from National Icon of Heroism to The Father Of (DEI) Lies. They want to make sure ALL the ground has been softened up.
Hatin' on MLK just FEELS good, and Trump is the official spokesperson for If It Feels Good, Do It.
Soon:
"Pettis: A Bridge Too Far"
followed soon thereafter by
"What 'r black churches doin' stealin' our religion??!!"
"Pettis: A Bridge Too Far" came perilously close to making me spit out coffee. Well done.
Save the coffee!
"'What'r black churches doin' stealin' our religion??!!'"
(s) Better blow 'em up. Only way to be sure. (/s)
Not just stealin', they're actually readin' what this Jesus feller actually said and tellin' others! Not like God intended, just take the hate straight from your suburban mega-church pastor.
Charlie Kirk's one of those guys I see him and I think" I hope that asshole gets a spot on his dick that won't go away and maybe one day, he's walking through busy downtown and is so worried about the spot on his dick that he doesn't pay attention to traffic and ends up getting hit by a car. "
I used to feel bad thinking that way but not so much anymore. I guess I hate them all but I hate some more than others. CK is pretty high on the list.
https://substack.com/@brawlatthepoetscafe/note/c-47338547?r=insr
I like yer style...
Ah yes, killed by Spotted Dick. English food will do that.
especially toad in the hole
Do you know how long you'll have to wait for their socialist National Health Service to schedule you for a Toadectomy?
Gee, Mr B – how'd you find out about that?
Let's just say I'm guarding my hole more carefully next time.
Hate to say I toad you so...
no no no no no
it's supposed to be a gerbil!
You probably don't know this about MLK, and the reason you don't know it is because I just made it up this morning. See how the liberal media deceives you? They didn't write about this thing I just made up this morning! Why? Because if you knew about this, you would know that there's no need for civil rights, or even to treat Black people civilly.
Teach the false equivalence.
I was told there would be no test (of our supremacy)
"You see the way the elites look down on us? They won't even take the trouble to read our minds! Their contempt is so apparent. Time to have another chat with the NYT and WaPo reporters who are permanently assigned to our local diner."
I think the program those papers of record have established to reinvigorate local economies is brilliant. Sure, them small towns are toast, but the diners carry on...
Angry white people is their one inexhaustible resource.
"Why, I got outraged about something I saw on Facebook this morning and I had to wait til lunch to unload on that New York Times reporter! I demand better service!"
And by then the coffee was cold!
YOU’RE BEING SILENCED!!
Grrr: by 4am, local wingers were posting "what about MLK's womanizing?".
Aaron McGruder's "The Bookdocks" provides the perpetually useful MLK Day gif:
A bowtied white guy says "I think if Martin Luther King were alive he'd -": and a folding chair bowls him over and Huey, McGruder's activist child hero leaps up to start punching him.
https://youtu.be/MmFqAuVZMTY?si=IX31TJc2Mf8Aq7xb
When saying "shut the fuck up" is simply insufficient, lol. I'd forgotten about The Boondocks, thanks for the reminder.
Let's be fair, they simply can't imagine or understand how people could be motivated by ideas or principles, our admiration of King must be simple-minded hero-worship and nothing else. Tell us he cheated on his wife and we'll have to give him up, plus everything he ever stood for. How else could it work?
“...in which the Civil Rights Act and everything like it is an error to be eradicated.” And they have the Supreme Court to do it. Alito’s pseudo-originalism will say equality for nonwhite, non male, non land owners isn’t in the Founders’ Constitution and the amendments after the Civil War aren’t valid because women and Blacks didn’t vote for them and what self-contradiction? You’re the contradiction!
Good point and at this time, too subtle for these guys. Give it time, maybe Chris Rufo will get there.
I think Darling Nikki was headed there when she said the Civil War was about "the government tellin' people how to live." If she's still around in a month we'll see how far she goes with this shit.
Yeah, I was just tryin' it out, but ick.
Darling Nikki, saw her in a hotel lobby burnin' a magazine
To each his (or her) own kink.
"...met her in a hotel lobby misinterpretin' a magazine."
The magazine was Highlights.
You have to be impressed by the level of cognitive dissonance in a daughter of immigrants, an Indian-American woman, thinking she can win over the Republican base. Honey, no matter how much you y’all it up while spewing vicious fascist garbage, the Repubs still see you as one of “them” and will be howling for your blood in due course.
Frankly I don't think the immigrant thing is nearly as bad in the GOP mind as the female thing.
True, sadly. But she’s got all the bases covered except for “Muslim,” yet she doesn’t see herself as a walking slab of red meat for a vicious right-wing mob.
There was a woman on MSNBC, she'd been doing focus groups with Republican voters for the past coupla years, poor woman, and she said she had one just recently where 5 out of 7 said they would never vote for a woman - any woman - for President. Assuming you'd never put together a focus group with 5 men and only 2 women, there must have been at least one woman who would never vote for a woman.
And am I wrong in thinking they're more open about this now? Maybe in the past the men in the group would have kept this to themselves? Well, the misogynist cat is out of the bag now.
Considering how much of their ideology is about lesser people being put in their "proper place", this tracks.
Two words: Phyllis Schlafly.
This is a hobby-horse I will die on. The characterization of racism as a black-and-white division in the Republican mind is a oversimplification. A person of color who code-talks and behaves correctly is Of the Body. It would be only when they are isolated from that culture in a hostile environment (say, a rural community where they are not known as "one of the good ones") where they would be at risk, and they could likely calm the locals with the correct language. The stereotypical 19th century century small-town sheriff and white supremacist militiamen with a blanket hatred do exist and are accepted as Of the Body, but they are tolerated.
So, what "racism" is these days is about white privilege. Anyone who accepts white privilege can be Of the Body regardless of color, just as Italians and Irish are now White as freshly-fallen snow. The hatred is directed at the Other, the expression of non-white culture. Rap, saggy pants, Ebonics, demands for equality and justice, that kind of thing. If people of color give up their language, culture, demands, and accept white privilege they too can be White. They can celebrate their history ironically, like the Irish with st. Patrick's Day and the Italians with The Sopranos, something they have transcended.
Other paths to whiteness: Work for the cops or the military or as a prison guard or, best of all, Customs and Border Patrol.
Sing country like a white boy (just keep all yer work in the studio and never perform live).
Or Supreme Court justice who votes correctly.
The CW itself is invalid! Them yanks done started 'er! States Got Rights! Far Rights!
https://hueyfreemanonlyspeaksthetruth.tumblr.com/post/73900745808/you-dont-get-to-use-martin-luther-king-jr-as/amp
Hearted, tho the "Please Stand By" is these days a little jarring given the previous guy's message to his undeservedly proud boyz...
None the less, I just set the "Please Stand By" image as my login desktop. Much obliged!
I am compelled, every time his name is mentioned, to note that Steven Crowder once voiced the Brain on the PBS series Arthur. Which is funny enough, but, because the Brain's family was black, he ended up singing a Kwanzaa song on their Christmas special. The world is so weird.
say wut
The way my eyebrows went up. . .
(Steven "Get The Money First" Crowder)
To be fair, it was the closest Crowder could get to doing blackface in 1998.
Yet another right winger who could’ve turned out differently if they’d only been successful in entertainment or art? Like Breitbart? Ben Shapiro? Herr Schickelgrüber?
seems unlikely
So I'm forced to choose between two alternate universes, one where Stephen Crowder is a successful comedian, the other where Stephen Crowder is... well, Stephen Crowder? I'm sorry, is there a "none of the above" option?
Steven Crowder, eaten by a rabid octopus during a day at the beach in 1973
Somebody buy me a ticket on this timeline.
Jeezus, how am I gonna break this to my [adult. now] children?’
Comforting lies are fine.
First these fascists appropriate MLK Jr.’s speeches for their own political agenda. Then they denigrate the guy by reiterating debunked nonsense and using his affairs as ad hominem attacks.
Now apparently, MLK Jr., was the racist and white nationalist’s are the victims.
Last week we talked about Haley’s comment that slavery wasn’t responsible for the Civil War. If anyone had any doubt before, they shouldn’t. Below is part of a speech from the “Cornerstone“ speech by Alexander Stephens, Vice President of the Confederacy:
“Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth. This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all other truths in the various departments of science. It has been so even amongst us. Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well, that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. The errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago. Those at the North, who still cling to these errors, with a zeal above knowledge, we justly denominate fanatics.”--Alexander Stephen’s
Need I say more? Happy MLK Jr. Day, all...:)
Meaning? What was he a CINO (Confederate in Name Only) at the time? He was the VP of the Confederacy. These are his words and the sentiment of the entire South and Confederate States of America.
Every Confederate State had slavery embedded in their respective state constitutions. So whether or not the Civil War was fought over slavery is absurd.
When republicans talk of state rights it’s the equivalence of admitting that the Civil War was fought over slavery since it’s only a matter of semantics.
If the war was fought over state rights, then it’s the state’s right to allow its citizens to own slaves; end of story!....:)
Sorry, I didn’t understand it; my bad...:)
I love sarcasm and irony. I read it too quickly and it went way over my head...:)
Doncha know "racism" these days is anything that makes white folks feel bad. It's okay to discuss the validity of existence of minorities, but don't make whitey feel guilty.
(FWIW, I'm about four miles, as the crow flies, from where that speech was given.)
I vote stochastic terrorism.
Reminder that there is now a fence around the MLK Jr. family home because a mentally ill Black woman tried to set the house on fire last month (https://www.npr.org/2023/12/08/1218155405/woman-tries-to-set-fire-to-mlk-home). Was she influenced by (right-wing) voices?
This reminds me of the murder of MLK Jr.'s mother, Alberta, in 1974 as she played the organ during a church service. The assassin was a Black Hebrew Israelite preacher who felt the Kings were serving a false god and misleading black people. I don't think either incidents were right-wing stochastic terrorism; rather, I think of them as the result of living with racism while mentally ill.
"a mentally ill Black woman tried to set the house on fire last month"
Kristina Karamo?
she was too busy screwing up the Michigan Republican Party
Does she still have control of the website? Ha ha, the Republican party officials who thought they could vote her out and that she would respect the results of an election.
Roy, I hope you make this column free, because people need to see it.
It is free!
Free at last, free at last
Can I be the first to say Thank God Almighty?
For I have BEEN to Roy's Substack, and I have SEEN the promised post!
I think we can all agree on this today:
OOF.
Hey, I could be using the holiday to sell discounted mattresses. "You'll have a dream on our new pillow-top Queen set!"
For the record, it may be free, but you do a wonderful job each day and it’s appreciated, so I am a happy and paid subscriber.
No one should work for free; especially talented writers....:)
That's very kind of you.
They got years of mileage from claiming The One Quote in order to drown out everything else MLK ever said. Can't have the public knowing about the other stuff and taking it to heart. Misdirection always works on the crowd Jonathan Metzl writes about https://www.dyingofwhiteness.com/
The most fitting MLK quote they’ll never know: "We may all have come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now."
Mississippi just announced it's joining 15 other Republican-led states in refusing federal money to provide a food benefit to families whose kids qualify for the school lunch program. Just in the summer, when the kids are out of school, the family gets an extra FORTY DOLLARS added to their EBT card each month, because 40 bucks is more than enough to pay for lunch for one kid for a month ('You get one PBJ sandwich, kid, but sorry, milk puts us over-budget, so choke it down.")
Of course, lots of poor white families will also miss out on the benefit, probably the majority of poor families who miss out will be white. The vast majority won't even know this was available and that it's Republicans keeping it from them.
Ol' Tater said they wuz agin welfare
Unapologetic Fat-Shaming ON, because that fucker looks like he never missed a meal.
85% of conservative men are either bloated or scrawny, and stupid either way.
Is it cuz they're fat? Because that's what the gov of Nebraska says.
Iowa’s governor also said no money for childhood nutrition because something something childhood obesity. Republican motto: “Every child is precious. But no fatties.”
And again with the GOP commitment to following the science. Pretty sure starvation isn't the best possible solution to childhood obesity.
Also, could obesity ever be caused by poor nutrition—e.g., eating the cheapest, most calorie-dense and nutrition-empty foods available because the family is on a limited budget? If only we had some way of knowing.
So, like, offering a nutritious meal on a reliable timeline could actually be a healthy alternative to whatever crap food can be scrounged up at the corner store? Well, not if it's gonna cost the taxpayer 67 cents (or whatever) a day!
Both weight gain AND diabetes from the processed high fructose corn syrup hell of low-end American cuisine. But, hey, the agribusiness CEOs gotta eat too, so whatcha gonna do.
"Iowa’s governor also said no money for childhood nutrition because something something childhood obesity."
You mean the Governor of the Great State of High-Fructose Corn Syrup?
And I really can't be bothered, but if one were to look back at her political and legislative record, would one find ANYTHING that indicates a concern about childhood obesity other than this ONE thing? You know, like the people who became SUDDENLY and INTENSELY interested in the question of fairness in competitive women's swimming?
The Kim Reaper, as Kim Reynolds is referred to by our friends in Cedar Falls, is nothing if not a hypocrite.
The "content of their character" thing always amuses me. So, for just one example, Trump declines to be admired for his lovely orange-Creamsicle-like skin tone, and would rather be judged for his serial lawbreaking and hatemongering?
The purity of his sleaze demands our admiration.
The content of Trump's character is like the ingredient list on those Ultra-Processed foods they keep warning us about.
I'm thinking George Carlin's routine about meatcake. "It has absolutely no taste whatsoever!"
That is a slur on orange Creamsicles!
mmmmm...
Creamsicle...