All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[worstblogever]

Tom Cotton's fascist call for the military to be turned loose on private citizens this year makes him a real hard sell to a public that are rejecting autocracy. There's also the 47 Traitors moment from a few years prior to that, that he was lucky he wasn't charged with a crime for.

The fact that he looks like a fascist version of Bert from Sesame Street in the flesh is also a turn off. He's not getting love outside of the reddest of red states.

[Robotman]

I mean, there are a lot of minor implications of norms that Trump broke. A presidential library might be another one, considering he might be under indictment and unable to see to one being set up after January 2021.

Speaking of, we'll have White House Correspondents' Dinners again.

And the tradition of the previous president being present to hang the portrait of the prior president? Well, the same... I don't know if Trump will be there to be able to see his put up on a White House wall...

But I am realizing that at some point Joe Biden will get to be the one to hang the portrait of his good friend Barack. And that puts a smile on my face.

I was thinking about that too. That’s going to be a nice moment.

Instead of putting up a portrait of Trump maybe they can just rename the septic tank after him.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Tom Cotton's fascist call for the military to be turned loose on private citizens this year makes him a real hard sell to a public that are rejecting autocracy. There's also the 47 Traitors moment from a few years prior to that, that he was lucky he wasn't charged with a crime for.

The fact that he looks like a fascist version of Bert from Sesame Street in the flesh is also a turn off. He's not getting love outside of the reddest of red states.

That's good news. Cotton also cruelly blocked a nominee for a US Ambassadorship to Bahamas (essentially a sinecure position) to Obama's friend simply to in the words of a reporter, "hurt the President on a personal level". It would be horrible if this guy becomes a national level candidate or wins a President. My big fear is if the Republicans find a second Reagan.

One advice to GOP people...send in candidates who can smile and look a little happy. Cotton's a creep, Trump frowns all the time...none of these people ever look happy or look like they can make anyone around them happy. Say what you want about W. but at least he had a pleasant demeanor (whatever his other flaws, of which there are many).

I mean, there are a lot of minor implications of norms that Trump broke. A presidential library might be another one, considering he might be under indictment and unable to see to one being set up after January 2021.

Speaking of, we'll have White House Correspondents' Dinners again.

And the tradition of the previous president being present to hang the portrait of the prior president? Well, the same... I don't know if Trump will be there to be able to see his put up on a White House wall...

But I am realizing that at some point Joe Biden will get to be the one to hang the portrait of his good friend Barack. And that puts a smile on my face.

Biden's decoration of the WH will be interesting because nobody's really quizzed him about his favorite presidents and so on, since people have never treated him as a guy with real ideas, even in the liberal side. I think he's a Lyndon Johnson guy owing to the similarity of their roles to their bosses. Johnson was the Senate-man for JFK and so was Biden, Biden was the one who navigated the senate and mustered support for Obama. Of course Biden is different from the "Master of the Senate" owing to being a long career senator who never became Sen. Maj. Leader for his party.

Obama will be prominently featured of course, and there will be a lot of photo-ops with Biden communing with portrait of Obama shots in the next few years.

[worstblogever]

Also, this is one of the Trump supporters outside the Phoenix voting center upset that the state has turned blue. See if you can remember what this looks like from a few years ago in Virginia. Go ahead, mull it over:



Not even subtle.
https://www.usnews.com/news/us/artic...-after-us-vote

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I was thinking about that too. That’s going to be a nice moment.

Instead of putting up a portrait of Trump maybe they can just rename the septic tank after him.

Apparently POTUSES can choose where they hang the portraits, and the WH compound is big, with underground bunkers and so on. So why not hang Trump's portrait in the storage closet deep below where few will come across it.

I think Biden will probably be wary of naming anything after Trump, "Do we want a protest movement inevitably calling for removing his name down the line?"

[zinderel]

Making assumptions and mocking the private life of someone who doesn't fit a particular image of masculinity does seem homophobic.

That’s nice.

I don’t need to know - nor do I care - what a cishet white conservative guy thinks ‘seems’ homophobic, when that same cishet white guy supports a party that wants queer people dead - or at least silent and hidden again - in the name of Jesus.

Now, before I go on; to be clear, I want to make sure you get credit here. I know how important that is to Cishet white conservative dudes on the internet. You yourself are not seeking the death and/or silencing of queer voices, not have I seen you ever suggest it, and I appreciate that. And you yourself don’t support Trump. Just the party of which he is the exemplar/avatar/leader...and you support the party he is the standard bearer for, which has as a PLANK OF ITS PLATFORM the dehumanization of queer and trans people and the delegitimization of our lives, our relationships and our families.

So when a queer person looks at Lady G and says, “Huh...I wonder why an effeminate submissive (which is not a bad thing to be, mind...) is so vehement about damning his own people...what a tool...”, that isn’t ‘homophobia’. That is observational skills being put to use by a people who lived for decades (If not centuries) on subtext and subtle clues. Because we HAD to. To SURVIVE. Because people like those leading your party have sought to flush us out and make scapegoats of us, imprison us, castrate us, silence us, deny we exist, demonize us and make the mere fact of our pubic existence illegal. Which is why Pride is a thing...

Lindsay Graham meets all the marks, hits all the notes, and isn’t fooling anyone. He’s either a closet queen with some serious self-loathing brought on by a lifetime of his party telling him how disgusting and evil and sick and vile he is...or he’s just an effeminate, submissive straight guy who likes watching people suffer as much as the next Republican.

Of course, he COULD be like Richard Grenell and be both gay AND someone who enjoys watching others suffer while they themselves stockpile wealth, but...

Anyway, the queer community calling him out as a closet case is, at WORST, pointing out the devastating effects of his hypocrisy and offering Graham a handy - and genuine - escape hatch. If he just admitted what we all know, then we could approach this honestly and offer a potential support network to help him come out and be proud and get away from his abusers. It’s us saying, “You may be a monster to us, but we get you. Come out. Come home. We’ll help you. Stop hurting yourself. You don’t deserve to live this way.”

Because the other option is ‘soulless, hateful coward who only wants to submit to a real man in jackboots so hard, y’all...’. And that sorta person deserves zero compassion or pity...

But yes, my point: DON’T you, a cishet white conservative, EVER deign to tell a queer person what is ‘homophobic’. Same rule that applies when talking to people of color about what is or isn’t racist.

It’s not.

Your.

Place.

And it comes across as smug and condescending, along the lines of ‘So much for the tolerant left...’

You like to be accurate and correct in your speech to a pedantic level...apply it here.

[PwrdOn]

What about Tom Cotton? He's been talked up as a POTUS candidate for the right, for some time now? Granted the dude looks a little creepy and he has really extreme political views.

I really have a hard time seeing Cotton as a serious presidential candidate, he's just a complete charisma black hole whenever he's on camera. Although if the Democrats were smart, they should spend some energy trying to surreptitiously boost his profile and nudge the Republicans into nominating him 2024 so that they can score an easy win.

[Adam Allen]

Interesting. And I guess the stuff about the codes and so on that we actually know about isn't the full detail to protect classified information and all that. So obviously the codes are changed regularly I should hope.

Yeah, it's a lot of moving pieces that are all being moved/changed regularly, so even if any individual person was somehow compromised, there's still several separate layers you wouldn't have any way of knowing, between you and an ability to launch. So, again -- you could have a president who just decided to just nuke some stuff because he wanted to, but there would be a whole chain of other human beings who would have to decide to go along with that, before it would actually happen.

[numberthirty]

Biden doing better than some Democratic Congressional candidates indicates that SOME Republican voters went to him, so maybe the Lincoln Project had a bit of an effect in getting us Georgia, for example.

I'd hope that it wasn't any notable amount.

If it actually was?

That would mean that Democrats needed a "Jones"/"Moore" situation to create an opening where they could win.

If that was the case, any real shift back to "Business As Usual..." for those Republican voters would potentially put Republicans in a spot where they could win it back the same way Biden won some things back this time out.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Yeah, it's a lot of moving pieces that are all being moved/changed regularly, so even if any individual person was somehow compromised, there's still several separate layers you wouldn't have any way of knowing, between you and an ability to launch. So, again -- you could have a president who just decided to just nuke some stuff because he wanted to, but there would be a whole chain of other human beings who would have to decide to go along with that, before it would actually happen.

So Trump can't say order a nuke on Philadelphia and Atlanta on the way out? Good to know.

I really have a hard time seeing Cotton as a serious presidential candidate, he's just a complete charisma black hole whenever he's on camera. Although if the Democrats were smart, they should spend some energy trying to surreptitiously boost his profile and nudge the Republicans into nominating him 2024 so that they can score an easy win.

Charisma is by no means a decisive factor for a candidate to win the Presidency. It helps of course but per Lichtman, it's just one of the Keys (Challenger Charisma) but not the major deciding one.

If Cotton gets the candidacy of the GOP Base (among whom he seems popular and so on) he can contest the Democrats.

[Hypestyle]

Also, this is one of the Trump supporters outside the Phoenix voting center upset that the state has turned blue. See if you can remember what this looks like from a few years ago in Virginia. Go ahead, mull it over:



Not even subtle.
https://www.usnews.com/news/us/artic...-after-us-vote

Uh... please tell me that "metal mulisha" is the name of a rock band who deliberately spelled it that way... lol.. whoo boy..

[numberthirty]

Trump's PA, NV, and GA lawsuits have been tossed.

Toomey, Graham, and a couple other Rs have come out saying Trump's rhetoric is damaging and false.

Is it time to sharpen the knives yet?

Not sure, but it is mildly encouraging to see Graham take a step back from "Rodeo Clown..." territory.

[worstblogever]

Uh... please tell me that "metal mulisha" is the name of a rock band who deliberately spelled it that way... lol.. whoo boy..

It's a line of clothing for metalhead poseurs who shop at Wal-Mart.

[PwrdOn]

So Trump can't say order a nuke on Philadelphia and Atlanta on the way out? Good to know.



Charisma is by no means a decisive factor for a candidate to win the Presidency. It helps of course but per Lichtman, it's just one of the Keys (Challenger Charisma) but not the major deciding one.

If Cotton gets the candidacy of the GOP Base (among whom he seems popular and so on) he can contest the Democrats.

Yeah but I feel like if Cotton was the GOP nominee he'd make for a pretty easy target for all sorts of attacks, particularly to try and paint the entire party with his extreme views, and he doesn't quite have that Teflon Don quality that Trump has.

[numberthirty]

Uh... please tell me that "metal mulisha" is the name of a rock band who deliberately spelled it that way... lol.. whoo boy..

Kind of suspect that "MAGA" color coordination cut in front of "Metal Street Cred" when this dude was making his call.