Meghan McCain opens mouth, says things

You know what's interesting about "The View?"
And before you say "not a god damn thing," I'm definitely not saying that watching the View would be at all interesting. You couldn't pay me to watch the View. (counterpoint: Yeah, you probably could.)
What's interesting about the existence of the View is that it's such a perfect microcosm of American politics as seen by the media types. It showcases the entire spectrum of political opinion, ranging from center-right to slightly-left of center! And it thinks it's doing important work.

And another interesting thing is that, on the lib/Dem side, you have these women who have earned everything they have the hard way. Women like Joy Behar, Whoopi Goldberg, Rosie O'Donnell who fought their way up through the hardscrabble world of comedy clubs succeeding on talent and drive. On the conservative side you have the women of whom you have only heard because of the men in their lives. Like Abby Huntsman, whose main qualification is being the daughter of  former governor and presidential campaign footnote Jon Huntsman. Or Meghan Mc Cain, of whom you have only heard because her father was famous (and whose father was only famous because of his father's influential position. Check out the Dollop episode on the Maverick.) or Elizabeth Hasselbeck who got sort of famous by marrying a third-tier NFL quarterback.


Anyway, that brings us to Meghan McCain's most recent word-twaddle.

Meghan McCain Is Kind of 'Grateful' Trump Is President: Otherwise, 'I Don’t Think I Would Be Successful' on The View

Ooookay, I see we've expanded the definition of the word "successful to include. . . whatever it is Meghan McCain does?

“If Trump wasn’t president, I don’t think I would be successful here,” the View co-host said in a new book on the show, Ladies Who Punch, which was published last week.
“For that reason, I guess I’m grateful that Trump is president,” McCain continued. “It’s just made my job a little easier because I know why it happened.”

Yeah, we all know why it happened, Meg. You're not special. Hillary Clinton wrote an entire book on how it happened. (Spoiler alert, it was everyone's fault but hers.)

Still, McCain, 34, told author Ramin Setoodeh (her friend and former editor) that she didn’t think the president — an unusually polarizing politician — was the reason The View had drawn strong ratings.
“That I don’t concede to. Everyone is like, ‘Oh, you’re popular because Trump.’ I think everyone is more interested in politics,” she said. “Young women are different now than when I was younger. Everyone is involved, civically engaged, and informed. I think that’s also why the show is doing so well.”

Ouch! That may be the saddest thing I've ever heard. If people are becoming more politically aware and engaged and are turning to the View for, what, political insight? that is as scathing an indictment of the American body politic as I've ever read.

“I think the reason I worked and other Republicans didn’t is because I’m the first real Republican that they hired,” McCain said.

Oh dear God.
How in the world are you the first "real Republican" on the View? You know they had (maybe still have?) Anna Navarro on the View, right? You may remember her from the time she spent working for the presidential campaign of. . . oh, gosh, who was it again. . . oh yeah, JOHN MCCAIN!

And she knows how that sounds: “Yes, I think I’m more of a Republican than Elisabeth is.” 

Yeah, I wouldn't brag about that. Also, whatever happened to your whole "I'm a moderate" schtick? Because if you are anything resembling a moderate, you are not "more of a Republican" than anybody.

Speaking with Setoodeh, she could hardly name other conservative co-hosts before her: “Nicolle Wallace changed parties. Candace Cameron was a social conservative. I don’t remember the other people who were on here.”

Oh my God. "I'm the only real Republican who has ever been on this show and by the way, I have no idea who else has been on this show" is pretty emblematic of the kind of thought-provoking journalism we have come to expect from America's number one fail-daughter.

And, as to Candace Cameron-Brulee, being a "social conservative" is pretty much the number one prerequisite for being a "real Republican." Do you know anything about your own party?

“He [Trump] knows it and I know it and all of you know it — he will never be a great man,” Meghan said on the show last month. “My father was his kryptonite in life, he’s his kryptonite in death.”

Okay, so you don't know what kryptonite is either, I guess.
Your father had no effect on Donald tRump. He trashed your father on television and it cost him exactly nothing. The electoral base of your father's own party sided 100% with il Douche over your father - some after tut-tutting and tsk-tsking him a bit. In death, your father is having no effect on anyone. And I'm not trying to disrespect your father. And you're right about President McCheese never being a great man. I'mm just saying that Hair Furor's utter lack of greatness has nothing to do with your father. At all.

Describing her own politics, Meghan has described herself as “a conservative first and foremost.”
“I’m a small government, America-first conservative,” she said on The View in February. “What is being presented to me on the alternative side is too radical for me.”

Oh, sure. I get that. The thought of, say, single-payer healthcare is frighteningly "radical. That's probably why it is only done in Canada.
And the UK.
And France.
And Taiwan.
And the Netherlands.
And Scandinavia.
And South Korea.
And Australia.

Yeah, it's far too crazy an idea for us to ever try here!
And taxing the rich? That's something that only a radical like Fidel Castro would do.
Or Dwight Eisenhower.
Or Woodrow Wilson.
Or John F. Kennedy.
Or Richard Nixon.

Yeah, I can definitely see how the "alternative side" is wayyyy too radical for you. I mean, what's next, a minimum wage that people can live on?

Meghan told Setoodeh she was somewhat reluctant to take The View job, given its history of getting rid of hosts who aren’t working out. But her father “convinced me to do it.” 

Transcript of John McCain convincing Meghan to take the View job:

Jeezus, Meghan! You've got to get a job! You have to do something with your life! You can't just sleep on my couch all day!

“I hope it’s in my obituary that I was the first Republican since Elisabeth Hasselbeck to survive more than one season on The View,” she said. “It’s one of my proudest moments.”
That includes her noted verbal altercations with fellow panelist Joy Behar.
“I love sparring with her,” Meghan said in Ladies Who Punch. “We’re like boxers; we punch gloves and then we’re out.”

"We punch gloves."
"We punch gloves and then we're out."
So, I guess add boxing to the list of things you know nothing about.

Yeah, this seems like a meritocracy, all right. Clearly you've earned your job being a television talking person.

What are conservatives scared of today?

Fear is conservatives' drug of choice.

Conservatives always need to be afraid of something. They neeeeed that fear. It's the only thing that makes them feel alive. Whether they're scared of the Communists or the feminists or the environmentalists or the secular humanists, they have to be terrified of something.

 

Look out, an immigrant!

So what is the number one fear of conservatives at this moment?

If you guessed MS-13, we have some lovely parting gifts for you. See, MS-136 is actually pretty scary. I mean, they would be if you ever encountered them. Most of us will never encounter MS-13, much less run afoul of them, but they're scary in the same way that tigers are scary. There';s no need for any Americans to sit up at night worrying about tigers, but if you ever did see one, do not , and I can not emphasize this enough, do NOT fuck with it.

Anyway, the answer we were looking for was "transgendered people."  

.

Why are conservatives so pants-wettingly afraid of trans folk'? It's hard to say. I mean, they seem pretty harmless.

Pretty easy on the eyes




Pretty cool, really.



And yet. . .

Mike Huckabee identifies 'biggest threat' to moral fiber of US
ANAHEIM, California — Redefining gender and sexual identity is the “greatest threat” to the moral fiber of America, said former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee

Oh, do explain, Governor!

“The biggest threat to biblical principles today is the failure to apply a biblical standard of maleness and femaleness,” Huckabee told The Christian Post during a sit-down interview last week in Anaheim, California. “We are creating this illusion that there is no gender, there is no identity."

Ah. I see. Because that is one thing that the Bible is completely unambiguous about. There must at all times and in all places be a bright line of demarcation between the male and the female.
Why, just look at this categorical statement to that effect from St Paul's letter to the Galatians:

28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Oooh. Sorry, Mike. Looks like maybe St Paul would disagree with you on that "biblical principle."  But what does Paul know about it, he's only IN the Bible!

The 2008 and 2016 Republican presidential candidate explained that California’s introduction of “no-fault divorce” in 1970 created the mindset that marriage “wasn’t really that important” and that one “could go in and out of it without a second thought.” 

Which of course has everything to do with gender-non-conforming people.

“That’s when we first started losing that sense of sacredness of what marriage meant,” he argued. 

Sure, 1970. I mean, by 1970, Elizabeth Taylor had been married five times and divorced four.
And Mickey Rooney was already on wife number seven.Jerry Lee Lewis was twice-divorced and married to his THIRTEEN-YEAR-OLD cousin. But yeah, up until then, marriage was seen as a sacred unbreakable vow.

“So I'm not really that surprised that same sex-marriage has become in vogue because the Christian Church were the ones who essentially abdicated a strict responsibility about what biblical marriage should look like.”

Um. . . the state of California and the Christian Church are two very different entities. California adopting no-fault divorce had no effect on the various Christian denominations' stance on marriage and divorce. I mean, you can't possibly think that churches around the country saw California's new law and threw in the towel on the culture wars. "Well, if California says you can get divorced without showing fault, then I guess we'll just have to change our entire moral worldview!"

“Once you've destroyed that, why can't you have any and everything?” he continued. “The gender dysphoria we're seeing today is largely due to the fact that the Church has failed to present very clearly the words of Jesus and Genesis 5:2: ‘Male and female He created them.’”

Why can't you have. . . what the hell are you talking about? NO-fault divorce became a thing in 1970. Did that throw open some floodgates to every alternative lifestyle or. . . I don't even know what point you think you're making. Hell, it took over 30 years for same-sex couples to be able to marry.

Also, if you're going to say that because the first two people were one male and one female, which would have been pretty necessary for reproduction, that that means that there can now only be males and females and you're stuck with whatever you get? Oh, and also, the Bible does say that God created them male and female. But it also says that God did not "create" Adam, but formed him from clay and then had to go back later and take a rib out out of him because he had completely forgotten to create woman, so maybe Genesis isn't the most sound basis for gender policy?

Huckabee pointed out that society today celebrates single parenting and posits the idea that fathers “really aren’t necessary” when it comes to raising children.
“There are some people who are in single parenthood, not because they want to be, but because they were forced to be. And we ought to give [them] all the support,” he clarified. “But we should never pretend that it is as good as a loving mother and father in a home where a child sees both genders play out their norms because that's the modeling of behavior that would be ideal for a child to grow up in.”

Yeah, like in the Huckabee household, where a male father and female mother managed to raise one child who tortures and kills digs and another who is a professional liar in the service of a pussy-grabbing cretin who takes children away from their parents.



Okay, we all know Huckabee is a moron. Let's let someone else have a try. What's so scary about trans people?

• MEDIA

MARCH 28, 2019

A Guest on Laura Ingraham’s Show Just Said Trans People Will Create a New Species That Is Part Machine

“They are truly taking our children from us. This is child abuse.”

 

Um, what?

Seriously?

That can't really be what they said. Could it?

*sight* Now I guess I have to look.

“I think that the trans people have taken it one step further because by abandoning gender altogether, not simply rewriting it,” Nathanson said, “they’re basically trying to use social engineering to create a new species.”

A new. . . species? Do you. . . do you know what a species is? I mean, whether someone is male, female, neither, both, or whatever option you can think of, they would still be the same species. A person wouldn't become a cat. Believe me, I've tried. 

A mare, a stallion and a gelding are all members of the same species. If you took the parts you had removed from the gelding and surgically attached them to the mare, that new type of horse would still be a horse. A new species? Who the hell is this Nathanson imbecile?

Her guest, Dr. Paul Nathanson of McGill University 

Dr. Paul Nathanson, a gender relations professor and author of books including Spreading Misandry: The Teaching of Contempt for Men in Popular Culture

Oh for God's sake. Looks like I'm going to have to re-evaluate my opinion of McGill University.

Unlesssss. . . It's not Jimmy McGill University is it?

Still inexcusable!

Nathanson then explained that he questioned his gender identity when he was a child but grew up to be a cisgender gay man. “I don’t look down on people who are confused about who they are,” he said. “I just think that the solution that many are choosing, to either mutilate their bodies in one way or another in order to effect a cosmetic change—because you can’t change your chromosomes, you can only change outward appearance—I think that solution is a misguided one.”

It wasn't the right solution for me and my specific life experience, therefore it is the wrong solution for everyone! I teach at McCill!

Ingraham then derided parents who allowed their children to undergo hormone therapy, referencing a “horrifying” situation in Washington state in which a child was allegedly taken from her mother because the mother had not consented for the child to receive hormone treatment.
“They are truly taking our children from us,” Ingraham said. “This is child abuse.”

I'm just going to go ahead and assume this "alleged" incident didn't actually happen. Although, even if it did, one child being removed from one home hardly constitutes "our children being taken from us." Although, to be fair, it does sound a lot scarier this way.
And I googled this story and I can't find it anywhere, not even in the fear-mongering stories about trans kids in outlets like the Federalist and The New American dot com.

During the episode, Ingraham and Nathanson discussed the “attack on masculinity” and some of the apparent hoaxes behind it.

Oh! That's surprising. I'm pleasantly surprised that they would admit that the "attack on masculinity" is a hoax. Or should I maybe read the next sentence?

The hoax that somehow sexes are all the same or capable of being bed into one continuum, that masculinity itself is toxic, terrible and poisonous, all of those things, and in fact has to be discouraged in many ways,” Ingraham said before introducing Nathanson.

Okay, yeah. That makes more sense.

Nathanson told Ingraham that trans and non-binary movements have sprung up because “feminists challenge the notion of gender” and this has evolved into the development of feminist ideology.

Uh, feminists have challenged the notion of traditional gender roles. I don't think any feminists have ever challenged the idea of the existence of gender. If there were no gender, how would there be feminists?

“If masculinity is bad and men are inherently going to be patriarchal unless somehow we can train them, and beat this out of them—to be protectors and to be courageous, all these things that we impugn upon men—well if you get rid of all that, then the traditional family itself collapses and that's one last bastion of Western Biblically-centered morality that enveloping our, and has helped us prosper, frankly, for millennia and advance in millennia,” Ingraham said, as transcribed by Media Matters.

Mmm, that's good gibberish!

She does have a good point, though. Western Christian principles have led to so many great advancements in civilization. Why, just ask Galileo! Or Alan Turing!

“So the goal is really quite radical,” he added. “We're not talking about people who want to simply do a bit of reform here and there, add a new category. They want, they must, in fact, destroy whatever is in order to replace it with what they think should be. We're talking about revolution, not reform.”
Ingraham asks: "And the new species will be looking like what? Will be part human part animal?

Part animal? Where the hell do you come up with "part animal?" You think that the "radicals" who are suggesting that maybe not everyone fits into a nice neat male/female binary want to a: destroy the existing genders, and b: transform America into the Island of Dr. Moreau?

That's furries. You're thinking of furries.

Nathanson said, "I think human and part machine," to which Ingraham replies "part machine, hmm."

"Hmm. . . Yes, doctor. You've given me much to ponder," replied Laura Ingraham, stroking her chin thoughtfully. "I had assumed we'd be looking at a Dr. Moreau scenario, but perhaps a Terminator situation is more likely."


Okay, we've just got a couple minutes left. Anyone else want to chime in? Anyone want to put zero effort into their half-assed objection to recognizing gender-non-conforming people?

Trump could become ‘first female president’ under new legislation, GOP lawmaker says

Jeezus, Gaetz, I thought you'd at least try a little!

Rep. Matt Gaetz R-Fla., said Tuesday he will not support The Equality Act in part because its provisions that seek to prohibit discrimination of transgender individuals could hypothetically lead to President Trump declaring himself the first female president.
“[I]f President Trump were to say, ‘I’m am now the first female president,’ who would celebrate that?” said Gaetz in a House Judiciary Committee hearing on the legislation. 

Honestly, so what if he did? Who would that hurt? It's not like there's prize money for being the first female president that should rightly be going to Elizabeth Warren. If you're going to try to be scary, you have to pretend that there's the possibility of something bad happening.

The bill being pushed by Democratic lawmakers would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the protections under the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Gaetz said he would not support the legislation because of the possibility of people abusing the new protections in the bill.

How? How could people possibly abuse that provision?

I guess you're maybe thinking that cis people are going to pretend to be trans so that they can, what exactly, just act with impunity? You know, just like how in the sixties, after the original Civil Rights bill was passed, all these white guys pretended to be black so they could flout society's rules and get away with it? Is that what you think might happen?

“I strongly support the rights of transgender individuals,” Gaetz said. 

**Ron Howard voice** "He did not support the rights of transgendered individuals."

 “But I am concerned about the potential bad actors who would exploit the provisions for their own gain.”

**Ron Howard voice** "He was not concerned about that potentiality."

So, what have we learned today? Well, one thing really. If you want to terrify your FOX-watching relatives or co-workers, just show them a trans person!

BOO!

Works every time!

We don't need Mr. Nice Guy

Opinion

Why You Love Mayor Pete

By David Brooks

Opinion Columnist

• April 1, 2019

Okay. like most Americans, I do not love "Mayor Pete." Like most of us, I know very little about Pete Buttigieg. He seems like a good enough fella, but I certainly don't know enough about him to either love or hate him. I can't honestly say that I like or dislike him. Once again, Mr. Brooks, you have your finger on the very pulse of the American electorate!

Pete Buttigieg has some kind of magic right now. His campaign bio, “Shortest Way Home,” was the 25th-best-selling book on Amazon when I checked on Monday. That put him just a few dozen places behind Michelle Obama

Twenty-Fifth. That puts him just slightly more than TWO dozen places behind Michelle Obama. Not a few. A dozen is twelve. Twenty five is two dozen plus one place. It's probably not an important point, but for God's sake, man, you're a professional writer!

In a recent Iowa poll he surged to third place

Oh my God, how long have you been doing this? How long have you been following campaigns, and you think that a poll taken a year before the Iowa caucus means anything? You know that in October 2011 Herman God Damn Cain was leading the polls in Iowa? Five months before that, Michele Bachmann was neck-and-neck with Mitt Romney with Cain a respectable third. Do you have fond memories of the Cain Administration? Are you at all nostalgic for the Bachmann presidency? "mayor Pete" is the flavor of the month. He's the guy that Iowa voters have just now heard of, so he's the name that pops into their heads when they are asked for the millionth fucking time who they're planning on voting for. It means nothing. You have to know this.

His campaign just announced that it’s raised an impressive $7 million since January.

Oh. That is impressive. I mean, Kamala Harris has raised $12 million. Bernie Sanders has raised $18 million, but obviously, Buttigieg's whopping 7 proves that he is the candidate America loves!

And I can’t tell you how many Democrats in places as diverse as Nebraska, Indiana, New York and Washington have come up to me over the last few weeks raving about the guy. 

Presumably these are the same rugged blue-collar guys tearfully hugging Cheeto Mussolini, thanking him for saving their coal mines or steel mills. You know, those guys who don't exist and are totally made up.
I mean, imagine you're some Democratic guy or gal in Nebraska or Indiana, just minding your own business, going about your day when suddenly you spy a familiar face. "Why, Maude, I do believe that's New York Times columnist David Brooks over there, I just gotta go over to him and tell him how excited I am about this mayor what's-his-name than I only heard of for the first time yesterday!" Because there's nothing that Midwestern Democrats enjoy more than wealthy conservative New Yorkers who like to pretend they understand the "common folk."

This is the biggest star-is-born moment since Lady Gaga started singing “Shallow.”

Oh. . . don't. Don't try to be "hep" and "with it."
Honestly, it's just. . . sad.

Anyway, now that you've clearly established that we DO, in fact,looooove Mayor Pete, perhaps you'd care to explain to us WHY we love him so.

Why are people so in love with the mayor of South Bend, Ind., who almost nobody had heard of until he did a CNN town hall on March 10?
It’s important to remember that when Democrats vote next year, they’ll not only be choosing a policy alternative to Donald Trump, they’ll also be making a statement about what kind of country they want America to be.

Yeah. Like every Presidential election.

The Trump era has been all about dissolving moral norms and waging vicious attacks. This has been an era of culture war, class warfare and identity politics. It’s been an era in which call-out culture, reality TV melodrama and tribal grandstanding have overshadowed policymaking and the challenges of actually governing.
The Buttigieg surge suggests that there are a lot of Democrats who want to say goodbye to all that. They don’t want to fight fire and divisiveness with more fire and divisiveness. They don’t want to fight white identity politics with another kind of identity politics.

They want to lose.

They are sick of the moral melodrama altogether. They just want a person who is more about governing than virtue-signaling, more about friendliness and basic decency than media circus and rhetorical war.

Hmm, that sounds familiar. . . almost as if maybe that kind of candidate may have been seen before. . .
 

Yeah, playing nice sounds like a sure-fire formula for success!

Buttigieg’s secret is that he transcends many of the tensions that run through our society in a way that makes people on all sides feel comfortable.

So does chicken soup. Being inoffensive to people on "all sides" requires being dull, unremarkable and unmemorable, inspiring no one. You can't excite your base while not offending your opponents.

First, he is young and represents the rising generation, but he is also an older person’s idea of what a young person should be. 

Yeah, that's not a compliment.
"Buttigieg has a tidy appearance, defers to his elders and isn't crazy about the blacks!"
Also, I'm pretty sure most older people's idea of what a young man should be does not include the phrase "married to another man."

He’d be the first millennial president, but Buttigieg doesn’t fit any of the stereotypes that have been affixed to America’s young people.

Well, neither do most of America's young people, but that doesn't stop New York Times columnists from affixing those stereotypes to them.

Young people are supposed to be woke social justice warriors who are disgusted by their elders. Buttigieg is the model young man who made his way impressing his elders — Harvard, Rhodes scholar, McKinsey, the Navy.

Ah, yes. We can all identify with the Rhodes scholar from Harvard who worked for a management strategy consulting firm.
But seriously, you say "woke social justice warrior" as if that were a foolish and ridiculous thing to be, but that term would perfectly describe historical figures like Martin Luther King, Jr, Susan B. Anthony, Cesar Chavez, Harvey Milk, Gandhi. I don't get why the idea of fighting for social justice is supposed to worthy of ridicule such that the term "SJW" is supposed to be widely assumed to be an insult. I'm no milenial, but I have a hell of a lot more respect for someone who fights for social justice than a Harvard boy who chose to fight in Afghanistan.

Young hipsters are supposed to flock to coastal places like Brooklyn and Portland; after college, Buttigieg returned to Indiana.

Yes. All people under 40 live in Portland or Brooklyn. There are no hipster coffee shops or nightclubs or art spaces in Indianapolis. I live in Atlanta and I have never seen anyone under 30.

Young people are supposed to be anti-institutional, but Buttigieg is very institutional — his life has been defined by his service to organizations, not his rebellion against them.

Ooooh. Service to organizations! That'll get the voters excited!Hey, you know who else dedicated their adult lives to service to organizations?

Second, he is gay and personifies the progress made by the L.G.B.T.Q. movement, but he doesn't do so in a way that feels threatening or transgressive to social conservatives.

Are you serious?

His very existence feels threatening and transgressive to "social conservatives!"
Do you think that there are some Pat Robertson-watching, Rush Limbaugh-listening Red State-reading Bible thumpers out there who are looking at Mayor Pete and thinking "well, he's not real, ya know, flamboyant about it. He doesn't dress like a Village Person, I guess he's okay?" You think that "social conservatives" who vote on abortion, anti-gay rights, guns, and abortion again, are going to vote for a  pro-choice gay Democrat because he's not, you know TOO gay?

My religion-based homophobia will not allow me to vote for a "Jack," but a "Will?" Why not?

He has conservative family values; it’s just that his spouse is a husband, not a wife. 

Yeah, that's. . . do you even know what people mean when they say "conservative family values?" They mean "not gay." Do you think they look at the thrice-married serial adulterer in the White House and thought "hey, that's not family values! That's not what the Bible says at all!" No, they said "all three of his wives have vaginas, right? And all the women he had affairs with? And all the women he sexually assaulted? And all the underage girls whose dressing rooms he barged into? They're all biologically female, right? Yeah? Okay, he's good."
Saying he has conservative family values except that his spouse is a man is like saying he's a vegetarian, except instead of vegetables he eats cheeseburgers. It means you have no concept of the meaning of the term.

He speaks comfortably about his faith and says that when he goes to church he prefers a conservative liturgy to anything experimental.

Yeah, you know who's a good churchgoing family man? Barack Obama. You know who absolutely is fucking not? Donald Trump. Which one did the "social conservatives" vote for again? And which one did they say might be the actual literal antichrist? I forget.




Oh, right.

 Social conservatives will always - always - vote for the candidate with the (R) after his name. If St Peter ran as a Democrat with the Virgin Mary as his running mate, they would vote for the Republican. These are not people who can be reasoned with. No Democrat is ever going to attract the religious right vote. And shouldn't. They're terrible and they want terrible policies. Also, it's a fool's errand. Anything  a democratic candidate does to try to appeal to "social conservatives" will not only net zero "social conservative" votes, it will alienate the Democratic base.

Third, he is a localist and a Washington outsider, but he carries no populist resentment and can easily speak the language of the coastal elite.

Oh, yeah. People hate populist resentment. I mean, it's not like populist resentment was a winning strategy for the current president or anyth. . .oh, right!

You know, or you would know if you ever got out of your NY/DC bubble, people are angry. People are pissed off about the current state of affairs. Especially the milenials who followed the sage advice of the establishment and took on thousands of dollars in debt to pay for college only to find that there are no jobs for them.
People are angry that home ownership has become a luxury for the elite that working stiffs can no longer reasonably aspire to. And that retirement is fast becoming another thing that their parents took for granted but could be a pipe dream for them.
And people are angry that they can't afford medicine. And that even the relatively weak tea of Obamacare has been sabotaged at every step by Republicans who now want to gut Medicare to pay for tax cuts for the millionaires.
People are furious when they see a company like Sears closing down stores, laying off employees, then getting the okay from the courts to pay out obscene bonuses to the executives who destroyed the company, then turn around and cancel retired employees' life insurance.

If the Dem nominee doesn't bring some goddamm populist resentment, we're gonna get 4 more years of the Turd Reich.

Buttigieg has spent his political career in Indiana, where pols are expected to go to county fairs and eat the catfish fillet and cheesecake on a stick. He wasn’t alive when the Studebaker plant shut down in South Bend, but he has the trauma of Midwestern deindustrialization in his bones. He lives in a house near his mother where the mortgage comes to about $450 a month. On the other hand, he was friends with Mark Zuckerberg at Harvard, earned a first at Oxford and thrived as a corporate consultant.

Yeah, everybody hates Mark Zuckerberg. And everyone hates corporate consultants. You really have no idea how normal people think, do you? If you didn't spend your time at Georgetown cocktail parties with corporate consultants,, tech billionaires and the people who rely on "contributions" from corporate consultants and tech billionaires you'd understand that normal people don't see "I was friends with Mark Zuckerberg" as a selling pont.

Finally, he’s a progressive on policy issues, but he doesn’t sound like an angry revolutionary.


he's not, though. He doesn't support single-payer healthcare, He's proposing something called "All-payer rate setting" which leaves Americans' healthcare in the hands of private for-profit insurance companies. He's for universal background checks but not as assault weapons ban.

"We had an assault weapons ban in this country in the '90s. I would like to see more research on the effect it had. . . Somewhere between a slingshot and a nuclear weapon, we’ve decided that the American people would draw a line. Whether, for example, an AR-15 is on this side or that side of the line, I’m skeptical that it belongs in our neighborhoods in peacetime, but let’s at least have a healthy national debate about what’s best for keeping our families, our homes, and our schools safe."

So that means nothing. We don't need to have a "healthy national debate" about assault weapons. We know what those weapons do. WE don't need "more research" on the effectiveness of the ban. We need to ban assault weapons.

And his prescription for dealing with the climate emergency is weak as hell:

 He supports every U.S. house becoming “net zero” consumer of energy, and is in favor of the government subsidizing solar panels. 

Finally, he’s a progressive on policy issues, but he doesn’t sound like an angry revolutionary. Buttigieg’s policy positions are not all that different from the more identifiable leftist candidates. But he eschews grand ideological conflict.

Yeah, well guess what. We are currently, as we speak, at this moment in history, IN a grand ideological conflict. This is like the 1930s with hard right reractionary governments taking power in places like Brazil, Turkey, the Philippines, Hungary. And with the US President openly admiring of them. The US is currently trying to overthrow the democratically elected government of Venezuela and install a far-right usurper. In our own country, racism and hate crimes have risen alarmingly in the last two years, we have a president who encourages violence against his enemies, and the extreme religious right is packing the courts with monsters who will be deciding policy for a generation. This is no time to try and make friends across the aisle. These people need to be defeated and sent to the dustbin of history where they belong. And playing nice is not going to do it.

Anti-Vaxxers, Militarized Cops, and Wingnuts, oh my!

U.S.

Anti-Vax Mom Wouldn’t Take Her Sick Toddler to the Hospital, So Police Intervened

 Amanda Tarlton,Fatherly 7 hours ago 

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Last weekend Arizona police raided the home of an anti-vaxxer who refused to take her unvaccinated toddler, who had a fever of 105, to the emergency room.

So my first thought was "Good!"
These idiot parents can not be allowed to endanger their children's health because of whatever stupid dumbass beliefs they have.

Then I saw the accompanying picture.




Jesus Christ! We have really come to this.

They kick in the door and storm in, guns drawn, like they're expecting Al Capone to be inside, not a horribly sick child and a couple of  hare-brained parents who aren't trying to harm their child, they're just fucking morons. I'm glad the police intervened. I'm glad the child was taken to the hospital, but how did we get to the point where cops approach every situation like they were going door to door in Fallujah?

Police say that when they arrived at the house with a search warrant, they heard a child coughing inside. After Beck’s husband, Brooks Bryce, refused to let them in, the officers stormed into the home with guns drawn and forcibly removed the sick two-year-old and the couple’s other two children.

There was really no other way? You couldn't have convinced the father to open up? You couldn't have cajoled, threatened, negotiated? You had to bust in with your guns drawn?

But okay. The important thing is that the child was taken to the hospital for proper medical care. The tactics used by the cops can be debated later, at least we can all agree that the end result was a positive.

Well, not all of us apparently.

The incident is raising a lot of important questions about parental rights.

Seriously? people are "concerned" that the parent's rights might have been infringed? Not worrying about the sick toddler, worried about the idiot parents?

 Some people, like representative Kelly Townsend, believe that the authorities overstepped. “What has our country become that we can tear down the doorway of a family who has a child with a high fever that disagrees with their doctor?” she said to the Arizona Republic. “What about parents’ rights to decide what’s best for their child?”

Really?
Look, parents have a lot of choices when it comes to how to raise their children. They can choose what, if any, religion to bring them up in. They can decide how strict or permissive to be. They can even infect their kids with horrible political beliefs. But they do NOT - DO NOT - have the right to sit back and watch their child die because they think they know better than their doctor.
"What about parents' rights to decide what's best for their child?" Well, once you decide that what's best for your child is to not have his 105-degree fever treated, you have proven that you are not capable of making those decisions. You have forfeited that right.
And Kelly Townsend feels so upset about these poor parents whose only crime was "disagreeing with their doctor?"
Look, if you don't think that your doctor's advice sounds right, you should absolutely get a second opinion. FROM ANOTHER DOCTOR. You should not just decide that you don't like that advice so you're going to ignore it. I mean, if you're the patient, you're an adult, you can certainly feel free to say "no, I'd rather take my chances with chicken soup and warm thoughts than take medicine," but you do not get to make that decision for your child. You do not have the right to sacrifice your child on the altar of anti-intellectualism. (Praise Jenny McCarthy!)

Where did this idea come from in the first place that a parent automatically knows what's best for their child? There are a lot of stupid parents out there. There are parents who are insane. No matter how well you know your child, you do not know more about her medical needs than her pediatrician. It's absurd!

So, anyway, who is this Kelly Townsend?

I had no idea, so I Googled her.
And I found http://www.electkellytownsend.com/ which is her campaign website.



Top and center of the site is an endorsement:



"Kelly is a leader among leaders"
Garrett Humbertson, Convention of States Project


Convention of States Project? That sounds like it might be a bit nutty.
Let's just check the old Googlator. . .






YUP!
Pretty much what you'd think!

WHY CALL A CONVENTION OF STATES?
Simple: to bring power back to the states and the people, where it belongs. Unelected bureaucrats in Washington, D.C. shouldn’t be allowed to make sweeping decisions that impact millions of Americans. But right now, they do. So it all boils down to one question: Who do you think should decide what’s best for you and your family? You, or the feds? We’d vote for the American people every single time.

WHO’S BEHIND THIS THING?

The American people. We thought you’d never ask! The Convention of States Project is first and foremost a movement of grassroots citizens who are fed up with business as usual in D.C. We’re funded by thousands of everyday patriots who have committed their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor to protecting liberty for future generations.

Yeah. They have committed their lives, fortunes and sacred honor. That's a hell of a fancy-ass way to say "signed a petition."

So what are her "Top Issues?"

Protecting 

• The Constitution
• The Unborn
• Local residents
• Veterans' Rights
• Property Rights
• ​Family Values
• Parental Rights
• Religious Rights

yeah, yeah, yeah. Standard Republican boilerplate. Protecting the "unborn," protecting "family values,"  blah blah blah. Oh, wait. I missed one.

• Salt River Horses

Did not see that one coming!

And there's this handy illustration of her educational priorities:







I don't know when it became an article of faith amongst the right-wing nutjobs that public schools are teaching kids about "Democratic Socialism."  Has any kid ever come answered the "what did you learn at school today" question with "oh, mommy. Teacher told us all about the pitfalls of unfettered capitalism and how important trade unionism has been historically to the building of a strong working-class identity!"?


Oh. I also found this when I Googled Ms Townsend:


‘Something is in those vaccines’: Lawmaker says mandatory measles shots are ‘Communist’

 . . . Republican State Rep. Kelly Townsend, a five-term state representative who is no stranger to making controversial and befuddling statements on social media, took to Facebook on Thursday to bemoan that Arizona was “prepared to give up our liberty, the very sovereignty of our body, because of measles.”

Okay, quick aside here. Kelly Townsend is a Five-term Representative in the state of Arizona. According to her website, these are some of the things she "promotes."

Promoting 

• ​Improved Education
• More Jobs & a Better Economy
• A Secure Border
• An Article V Convention of States
  • Balanced Budget
  • Term Limits
  • Restore a balance of power

I don't know to how many terms she wants office-holders to be limited, but apparently it's more than five!
Remember when Newt Gingrich and his gaggle of goons brought out that stupid "contract with America?" And one of the things they were going to implement would be term limits? And then it turned out that term limits would only apply to officials elected after the "contract" went into effect? Anyone already in office would be grandfathered in? It's almost as if the people who promote things like term limits actually don't give a single damn about limiting terms. At least not for themselves. Funny that!

Anyway, back to the unhinged rantings of Rep. Townsend.

Townsend demanded that instead of continuing to push for widespread vaccination against the disease, the government and the pharmaceutical industry instead invest money into “discovering what in these vaccines is causing so much injury.”
“The problem is something is in those vaccines,” Townsend said.

Oy. Kelly, Kelly, Kelly. The Communists are not putting harmful things in your child's vaccines. That's crazy. Everyone knows they cause all the harm they need to by putting flouride in the water! It's been proven, wake up, sheeple!

Townsend says her opposition is rooted in her experience. The legislator’s 22-year-old daughter has significant medical problems that she blames on a vaccine she received when she was 10 months old. She says no scientific evidence will convince her otherwise.

Okay, there is something wrong with you, Kelly Townsend. And unfortunately, this something is wrong with a whole lot of Americans these days. You believe that your child's problems were caused by a vaccine. Doctors, scientists, the AMA, the CDC, and the WHO all say that you are incorrect. On their side, they have voluminous research, studies, experiments, knowledge, and education. On the other hand, you have a "gut feeling." And you somehow can't understand that your gut feeling means nothing, while scientific research actually means a whole hell of a lot. See, this is why parents can't be allowed to have complete control over their children's medical decisions. Because too many parents are like Kelly Townsend. And if we let them make important decisions like whether or not to vaccinate their children, or whether or not to take them to the hospital when they are in need of medical care, children will die as a result.

I mean, how irresponsible is it to allow life-or-death decisions to be made by someone who writes something like this?

app-facebook

Representative Kelly Townsend

about a month ago

Our country is sovereign, our State is sovereign, our family is sovereign, our God is sovereign and the most holy and sacred last frontier of sovereignty is our own body.

Dearest friends and people of Arizona, it seems we are prepared to give up our liberty, the very sovereignty of our body, because of measles. I read yesterday that the idea is being floated that if not enough people get vaccinated, then we are going to force them to. The idea that we force someone to give up their liberty for the sake of the collective is not based on American values but rather, Communist.

I have sworn an oath to the Constitution five times, now, and I take that oath very seriously. It was not just something I repeated in order to get sworn in to an office. I do not make my decisions based on my next election or what the populace demands if it violates that oath.

Folks, I am going to ask you to educate your children, educate your family, educate those around you about the fundamentals of liberty and what that means. It seems we have lost those fundamentals along the way and are chasing our fears.

And finally, I am going to demand, as a mother of an injured child from her vaccines, that we insist that we spend the time and money on discovering what in these vaccines is causing so much injury, instead of insisting on taking your liberty in the name of the collective.

Benjamin Franklin once said, "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

Live free or die,
Rep. Kelly Townsend

Live free or die? Christ, she didn't even get the state right!