Tuesday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Tuesday, March 12, 2024
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46 comments
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor of Political Science and a College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
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Reflecting on the STOU response by Sen Britt, particularly her story of sex trafficking, one wonders why she choose to illustrate with an episode that occurred during the Bush administration, occurred nowhere near the southern border, and the perpetrator (according to the victim) was not even associated with a Mexican cartel.
Surely, there must be some incident(s) that occurred during Biden’s administration, at the southern border, and was perpetrated by Mexican cartels.
But maybe not.
I’ve no doubt that some border child sex trafficking occurs, but I don’t know how prevalent it is when you take into consideration that in the United States, 83% of the child-victims are AMERICANS citizens. (According to Heritage Foundation -FWIW)
‘Absolute bloodbath’ at RNC as new leadership loyal to Trump purges staff
“If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed…….and we will deserve it.”
And now it comes full circle.
Trump, who has taken to referring to himself as “Honest Don,” is renewing his call to debate Biden “any time, any place.”
@CSK: BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA… gasp…. wheeze….
I’m not sure which part of that is funnier. And speaking of lying socks of sht, I read this at the Guardian:
Yeah, nobody will ever figure that one out. Their incompetence is so complete even their lies are obvious.
From Ozark’s Guardian piece above:
It’s difficult to describe how stupid this move is, coming ~8 months before the election. They are essentially gutting the organization of the people who understand how things work internally, and who manage all of these relationships with the State parties.
They’ve basically kneecapped the RNC.
@Beth:
Rude. Lol
This is our year!
@Jen:
Perhaps, but if their goal is to funnel money to Donald Trump Inc, then it’s pretty much essential they get rid of everybody who can figure out what they are doing.
Reading about Mark Robinson’s views over the past few days has been bewildering. Even with all the MAGA lunatics we’ve encountered over the past several years, he stands out for the sheer size of the paper trail of hate and insanity. While most of you have no doubt heard at least some of it already, I’ve been trying to collect all the examples I can find into one list. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far:
* Said the movie Black Panther was “created by an agnostic Jew and put to film by satanic Marxists” that was “only created to pull the shekels out of your Schvartze pockets” (using a Yiddish slur for black people).
* Appeared in an interview with pastor Sean Moon (son of the late Sun Myung Moon), who claimed that the Rothschild family was one of the “four horsemen of the apocalypse,” and that a cabal of Jewish “international bankers” rule every country’s central bank. Robinson called Moon’s “exactly right.”
* Referred to the notion that Hitler sent millions of Jews to gas chambers as “hogwash,” and on a different occasion put the phrase “6 million Jews” in quotation marks.
* Posted a Hitler quote about the virtues of preserving one’s own race.
* Referred to gay and trans people as “filth,” and compared them to cow manure, maggots, and flies.
* Advocated having trans people arrested for using a restroom not corresponding with their birth sex.
* Called Michelle Obama a man.
* Said America was better off when women didn’t have the right to vote.
* Though he’s more recently tried to walk it back, he has in the past backed abortion bans with no exceptions, despite admitting to once having paid for a girlfriend’s abortion.
* Called the founders of Planned Parenthood Satanists who practiced witchcraft.
* Despite Trump referring to him as “MLK on steroids,” he hates MLK, whom he described as a “communist” and “ersatz preacher.” Called the civil rights movement a communist plot to subvert capitalism and free choice.
* Said that black people owe reparations to slave owners.
* Defended the Kent State Massacre.
* Called coronavirus a “globalist” conspiracy to defeat Trump.
* Defended the slogan “white pride.”
* Compared (other) African Americans to monkeys and apes.
* Claimed the sexual assault allegations against Bill Cosby were orchestrated by the Illuminati.
* Called the Parkland shooting survivors “spoiled, angry, know it all CHILDREN” and “media prosti-tots.”
* Described mass shootings as “karma” for abortion.
Did I leave anything out? Undoubtedly.
@Jen: MAGA figures and fans are cheering the RNC bloodbath as swamp drainage and as elimination of anti-Trump sleeper cells within.
It’s actually just to clear the way of impediments to Trump crime family looting of RNC resources, but Trump fluffers are too addled to notice. The loss of competence and institutional knowledge at the RNC is likely to benefit Democrats up and down ballot.
It’s like Nacht der langen Messer, but Idiocracy-style, done by airheads who think toilets crusted with fake gold are the height of good taste.
Oh, I know. In fact, the article clearly states that the objective is to get rid of any overlapping teams between the RNC and Team Trump, thus the elimination of data and communications teams.
It’s almost certain that they will purge the people who know and understand the laws surrounding election finances. More crimes ahead!
Again, it’s hard to overstate what a bad idea this is (for Republicans, I mean…for Democrats, this is a gift from the gods).
I truly feel bad for those who remain. It’s going to be an awful year for them.
@Jen: It’s all about trump, first, last, and only. I wonder how far they think that will carry them.
@Jen:
What happens to the RNC when Trump loses in 2024? How long can he keep control of it? Or do we think he will take another crack in 2028 as a convict?
Ah well, many people have made the same mistake about him. 😉 (couldn’t resist)
@EddieinCA:
How long can he drag it out in court trying to keep control of it.
The GQP will literally have to pry their money out of his cold, tiny, dead hands.
@Jen:
When I read that paragraph I was just awestruck by how dumb it was. Like, I get that the RNC (and DNC) aren’t some mythical power centers, but I was under the impression that they were important money and data funnels to the various candidates. Now, 100% all the money is going to Trump (his lawyers) and all the data is now suspect. Should we all just start taking bets about in-fighting and leaks as the summer warms up?
The whole day will be spent on that asshat Hur and that’s going to generate a million Biden is old stories. In my mind, Trump absolutely looting the RNC is a much bigger, more significant, story that is going to get ignored.
@DK:
I’ve lately been reading Timothy Snyder’s The Road to Unfreedom. He talks about one Ivan Ilyan, a “right Hegelian” philosopher whose Eurasianism is a big influence on Putin. Putin is playing the role of Ilyan’s “redeemer” saving poor, innocent Russia from the perpetual attacks of the evil, corrupt West, and in the process has supported a kleptocracy that has made Putin possibly the richest man in the world. Trump is playing the same game, but has to settle for protecting us against record low unemployment and largely imaginary “woke”. And in the process may have bankrupted himself. “Idiocracy” indeed.
It would be screamingly funny if it weren’t possibly deadly.
On Truth Social, Trump just unveiled a new nickname for himself: Honest Don.
My God, he’s literally doing the Honest John’s Dealership trope.
Please, Donald, pretty please with a lump of sugar, make this your official nickname for the campaign. I’d pay you for it. Seriously.
@Bob@Youngstown:
An observation: Laken Riley was murdered by an “illegal” immigrant. I seem to recall a similar horror story in CA several years ago. I have yet to hear the first horror story about someone being assaulted and unable to defend themselves because their sacred Second Amendment rights had been taken away by a red flag law or domestic charge. After Roe was overturned it took what, a week?, before the ten year old rape victim in OH hit the news and there’s been a steady stream of horror stories since. Maybe one party’s fears are more grounded in reality than the other’s.
@Kylopod: When my mom died, we took what we wanted, gave the decent stuff to charity, and then called a company to get rid of the rest. The company was called Dependable Don. Don himself was like a character out of a sitcom, short, stocky with an unlit cigar hanging out of his mouth. He charged us $750 minus 40% of what he could get for the stuff. We ended up getting $500 from him because what we thought were some junky “antiques” turned out be real antiques. He was much more suited to call himself Honest Don than Trump. Also more suited to be POTUS.
@Kylopod: “Honest Don” as opposed to the other, lying crime syndicate leaders?
@Beth:
WaPo, NYT, and WSJ published dozens of pieces attacking Biden for being old, following Hur’s partisan hitjob.
Washington Compost today, after reviewing the full transcript: “Biden doesn’t come across as being as absent-minded as Hur has made him out to be,” noting “the transcript provides more detail on those exchanges, with questioning jumping around the timeline in some instances.”
The New York Slimes, backtracking today:
A Times natl sec. reporter, transcript finally on hand, shredding Hur’s credibility on Twitter: “Based on a garbled moment, Hur claimed Biden forgot that the US ambassador to Afghanistan was an ally who shared his opposition to the surge. Hur omitted that a few minutes later, Biden brought up the ambassador again in a way that made clear he knew that.”
So, standard slip-ups, lapses, and verbal miscues that befall interrogated witnesses of any age, let alone a president testifying about years-old events in the midst of a major foreign policy crisis (the interview was on Oct 8-9) with questioning jumping back-and-forth between dates.
A la But Her Emails, the boring letdown won’t get the coverage volume the smears got. Where does Joe Biden go to get his apology?
I’ve just read a book on Apollo 1, the mission where three astronauts died in a fire while conducting tests on the ground.
It got me thinking some “what if”scenarios.
Work is really bad right now (I was away all morning busy with samples), so here’s one, but without much explanation:
What if Kennedy had not made a commitment to land a man on the Moon “before this decade is out”? That is, without a deadline?
My prediction, no one would have landed on the Moon once it became apparent the Soviets couldn’t hack it. Combine slow progress and massive costs, plus the Soviets crashing their N-1s with abandon, and odds are a mission for the mid-70s would just get cancelled, or be the only one.
Trivia: In one speech following the one alluded above, Kennedy says something like “We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.”
Any idea what “the other things” refers to?
I admit I don’t know.
According to the NYT, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has approached Jesse Ventura and Aaron Rogers about being his running mate.
@Kylopod:
Sounds as if he might be a fine running mate for Honest Don.
@Kathy:
Along with Marilyn Monroe…He might have been referring to what later became known as LBJ’s Great Society. The agenda which the Kennedy administration had started but couldn’t get off the ground. Took a master politician and a Southerner with the momentum of a national tragedy behind him to get it through.
Interesting piece on transgender surgery in the VA system. It is currently not allowed. Article notes that trans people are 2-3 times more likely to have served in the military which I didnt know. Article makes the case that surgery reduces suicide risk and VA should offer it. Many links to good articles I think.
https://www.peprec.research.va.gov/PEPRECRESEARCH/docs/Policy_Brief_24a_Gender_Affirming_Surgeries.pdf
Steve
@dazedandconfused:
Could have been Vietnam, too. or the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1963. There are numerous possibilities.
@CSK: Nothing says “I’m a serious candidate” like asking Jesse Ventura to join the ticket. 😐
@dazedandconfused:
@CSK:
I’ve never read up on Kennedy in particular. I’ve read a lot about the general era, about the US specifically and the world in general. Maybe I’ll give JFK and LBJ a whirl.
Is the book “Thirteen Days” worth reading? May as well begin with the real crisis.
@Kathy:
Haven’t read it, but did see the movie made out of it on Youtube. “Missiles of October” which was damn good. Fascinating account of how civilization-as-we-know-it was pretty much down to a coin flip for a couple of those days, and the high art of kinetic communication (perhaps “signaling” is a better word for it) between the two people who could not really communicate directly and plainly, Khrushchev and Kennedy.
The US public would not be as cavalier as they are about having a game show host as POTUS if this story had a lick of salience today, I suspect.
Whoo boy. During the interview, Hur told Biden, “We have some photographs to show you, but you have — appear to have photographic understanding and recall of the house.”
Democrats wanted Hur to explain why he left this out of his report vis a vis Biden’s memory, but he could not. Pfft!
@DK:
Merrick Garland needs to be stuffed in a cannon and fired off in a random direction. I wish he was fired now. That guy is perhaps the dumbest man in Washington.
@dazedandconfused:
I’ll second that. The Missiles of October was very good.
@CSK: I think it was Vietnam. JFK ran for president on a muscular, interventionist foreign policy. He talked about the missile gap, which referred to Soviet satellite success, and prestige, which referred to Kruchshev’s ebullient style in international relations. We, Americans, were shocked by the success of Sputnik, and the race to the moon reversed our seeming shortcomings. In the 1950s and early 1960s, European colonists were expelled from many parts of Africa and Asia. Regimes that were not actively unfriendly to the Soviets arose. Krushchev visited the US in 1959 and achieved some successful photo-ops. Vietman was a chance to show those commies who was who especially when we were unable to dislodge Castro on our very doorstep.
@Beth: I get it and understand the sentiment. But maybe Garland’s decision not to interfere and just to let Hur hang himself was the right move long-term, albeit initially painful. Nobody can accuse the DOJ of running interference for Biden. That should help America long term — provided the media and enough swing state voters recognize Hur’s bias and dishonesty.
Although I maintain Obama erred in 2016 by nominating Garland to replace Scalia, instead of a cynical identitarian pick (gay, black, Asian, Latino etc) whose mistreatment by Moscow Mitch might’ve galvanized more voters to rally to Hillary.
@dazedandconfused:
I know the events fairly well, but have not read up on it in detail.
I know what happened, but not much about how it happened. What advice was Kennedy getting and from who, who advised to nuke the Soviets or the Cubans, etc.
@DK:
That’s a pretty big (and possibly questionable) “provided the”.
In an organization as big as the DOJ one would think there would be someone that would have been able to do that job in an unimpeachable fashion. Garland decided to play Sideshow Bob with every rake on the East Coast instead.
@Beth:
Lololol. Apropos.
@Bob@Youngstown:
I honestly believe she intentionally used this ‘story’ as a nod-and-a-wink to Trump and the MAGA base, a kind of ‘not strictly speaking entirely accurate, but close enough, right?’
It was typical cynical sleaze by this major-remodeled Republican Party. I expect nothing less. This is a very radical Republican Party that senses it is on the brink of a major transformative victory. They will do anything to win power. Anything.
@Kathy: The speech was basically a condensed “history of human advancement” (from caves to nukes and everything in between), so I believe he was alluding to, just, like, all the stuff.
That part of the speech is actually my favorite, because most people remember “We choose to go to the moon … not because [it is] easy but because [it is] hard!”, so even though what he actually said was a little clunkier, nobody even remembers that it was clunkier.
@DK:
Nobody can honestly make that accusation.
Which means Lardass and the Republiqan Party will do so.
@ptfe:
I’ve run across this part of the speech a number of times. In history books, in a science fiction novel (I think Clarke’s Imperial Earth), in documentaries. And what I remember most is “the other things.”
Random thought to close out a long workday:
Is Brave New World essentially a Utilitarian fantasy?
Keep talking. Donald. Keep talking.
Trump says pardoning Capitol attackers will be one of his first acts if elected again
@Kathy:
In what sense? As in Huxley’s fantasy? Or that it would be the ideal for a committed utilitarian?
Huxley intended it to be dystopian. He didn’t think that a rigid police state could have a long shelf life–more likely innovations in technology and communication would provide other paths to airtight social engineering. Specifically that they would lead to individuals participating in their own imprisonment.
@Kurtz:
It would be an ideal for a committed utilitarian. Suffering is minimized, there’s plenty of pleasure, and everyone is content.