I have enough rage in me right now that I’m more concerned with keeping my heart from exploding than I am in feeding the flames, but I still watched this episode of John Oliver on the RNC. I didn’t watch those smug fear-mongering Republican assholes while they were in full flower, and Oliver delivers just the right dose of their evil to keep me alert but not spasming in twitching, bleeding-from-the-ears fury.
More protests and riots, please. Tumbrels and guillotines, too. Écrasez l’infâme. Tear down the criminal regime and it’s lackeys.
I don’t know who first started calling Trump’s administration a Kleptocracy, but we seem to be closing on the “Grab what you can and GTFO” point in the kleptocratic cycle.
The lies at this point are basically a show of power. Yeah we lie and what are you going to do about it?
“…keep me alert but not spasming in twitching, bleeding-from-the-ears fury….”
Wow PZ! It must take a lot to ruffle your feathers!!
I’m impressed!!!
Unfortunately the video is blocked in my country but the fearmongering strategy of the republicans is reported on in detail here in European news outlets, so I think I get the gist.
One thing I don’t understand (ok, there are many, many things I don’t understand about the USA) is this: Trump claims that there will be riots, chaos, civil war and destruction of all things holy and good and American and stuff if he won’t be elected again. But he is in charge right now and there are riots, chaos, etc. etc. all over the place. If he is the only savior of Western civilization, why isn’t he doing anything to stop it? He is in charge at the moment, what is he waiting for? Isn’t this weird discrepancy obvious – even to Republican voters?
Instead of guillotines, I would also be happy with 90% tax rate for inheritance beyond 10 million, 99% tax rate for beyond 100 million, 99.9% tax rate for beyond 1 billion, 99.99% tax rate for beyond 10 billion, and 99.999% tax ate for beyond 100 billion.
All these fuckers, Jared, Donald, Ivanka, are incompetent assholes who just inherit their wealth and power without having any sort of talent. Did you know that Ivanka is eying the presidency and the pampered scumbag dreams about being the first woman president of USA?
strangerinastrangeland @4: you’re assuming that any of the people who support him actually care about the truth.
They don’t. They care about owning the libs and being able to go back to the good old days of being able to discriminate against and attack anyone who wasn’t a white, heterosexual cisgender man.
After all that, Trump might well get reelected again.
He is holding up well in the polls against Biden.
At least considering what he has turned the USA into.
It’s possible that it is even closer than that.
Trump and the GOP are so obviously soulless* creatures of the night that some people will lie and claim they won’t vote for him, and then…vote for him anyway.
In a rational universe, Trump should be polling about 20%.
This shows that there is something drastically wrong with the USA.
Expecting things to get better when they are steadily getting worse is becoming an extraordinary claim without a whole lot of proof.
It’s an idiom, OK.
Something drastically wrong with the USA and getting worse? Yes.
Trump, Portland mayor blame each other after deadly shooting
https://apnews.com/6706c916dc6a156b9847baca437a91de
Yikes.
@4
No. Republicans have been saying this kind of thing will happen. So now it has the force of accurate prediction. Never mind that the whole lot of these rat bastards have been egging this on for years. That’s too subtle for the bottom feeding Republican base. You see the enemy is the all powerful “deep state.” Only if good gun totin’ Americans rise up will the problem be solved. This was the message from NRA a few years back re: Dan Loesch. I wish I could find the video for you. It was a doozy.
The gullible have been prepped and primed, meanwhile it was BAU by the “very serious people” who should have seen this coming. Now they’re just confused, dithering bobble heads.
And just one more frustrating thing, the very people who should be learning from the Oliver video will watch a few seconds, if that, and conclude that he’s a mean left wing wannabe Rush Limbaugh who doesn’t know crap.
@#4, strangerinastrangeland
Yep. And in Germany immediately before the Nazis, the Nazis went and deliberately provoked riots, and then ran on a platform of “we’re the only ones who can stop all this rioting”. The idea that the right wing is reasonable, can be worked with, deserves negotiations, is always a fraud.
@#7, raven
Some of that is most likely the usual convention bounce, but Biden was always the candidate nobody was excited about, who was promising nothing the base wanted and blatantly in the pockets of the rich. Even when he made his candidacy announcement, his own supporters were notoriously unenthusiastic — polling showed, IIRC, that less than a third of people who identified as his supporters within the party were actually happy he was running. To have nominated him and then claim surprise that there’s no excitement for him is disingenuous; the Democratic Party decided it was okay to once again play Chicken with the entire country at stake on the issue of “Trump is bad so you have to vote for absolutely anybody running against him”. That turned out so well in 2016, didn’t it? I can totally understand why they would want a reprise of it.
the thing is all of his businesses have failed or have very deep problems some have been propped up by money laundering schemes. the republican policies have not succeeded either in delivering the great engine of prosperity of the free market to everyone either not in the last 60 years of steady erosion. They both have teamed up to grab and hold power but nothing in their history says that they can sustain it for any length of time really.
Money is everything to them but their policies do not and have never favored the growth of money and its distribution only debt.
If you do not tax those with money and only tax those who have little and foster an economy that pays as little as possible to all employees leaving little in the way of tax revenue to pay for the governmental services you need like police to enforce order and rely on debt, how long will it take until you run out of credit? trump found the Russian Mob willing to loan him money . Who is going to loan an american Fascist Kleptocracy that is incompetently run any money? How long before the real rich and powerful dump him to protect themselves and their fortunes.
It can not be sustained and is succeeding only in the speeches and tweets, which is not enough in the end.
will the true believers ever see the truth? maybe some not all besides they are not so stable that they can be relied indefinitely.
uncle frogy
I give the video two clenched tentacles up.
I saw this on the yutub
…the Duke of Saince Simon writes about what Louis XIV sought in his courtiers …
[my transcription]
The Vibrant Sun King of France | Louis XIV | Real Royalty
link
33:30 – 34:13
@1 Ray Ceeya
Trump’s administration a Kleptocracy
Better is a “kakistocracy”, defined as a system of government that is run by the worst, least qualified, and/or most unscrupulous citizens.
In a kleptocracy, you are likely to find at least a few competent people who will want to keep things running so they can keep stealing. Trump’s crew are stunningly incompetent as well as thieves. How many of his appointees have gone to jail or left for ethical lapses?
Russian agency created fake leftwing news outlet with fictional editors, Facebook says:
Remind me of someone who regularly – indeed, obsessively – posts here.