Oh boy, this is going to be good.
Roy Moore has issued a fiery video statement explaining why he has not conceded the race. He says that all the provisional and military ballots have not been counted yet and that the secretary of state (a Moore supporter) has not certified the result. He seems to think that his god will carry out a miracle on his behalf. But it seems likely that the secretary will certify the result soon and then I am not sure what Moore will do.
In the video, he says that the country is going to hell in a hand basket, giving a litany of the usual things that right-wing Christians trot out. Ironically, he also says that the election was ‘tainted’ by large amounts of outside money, which is of course the very thing that the Republican party has worked hard to allow because it helps them.
Some highlights:
“Today, we no longer recognize the universal truth that God is the author of our life and liberty. Abortion, sodomy and materialism have taken the place of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness…. We have stopped prayer in schools… We’ve redefined marriage and destroyed the basis of family…. We’ve even begun to recognize the right of a man to claim to be a woman and vice versa.”
I notice that he did not include pedophilia or grown men hanging around malls and high school sports events and ogling girls as one of the evils ruining the country. I wonder why?
Moore continuing his campaign is adding fuel to the Republican party infighting that is going on between the party establishment and the insurgents led by Steve Bannon as to whom to blame for the loss and which way the party should go.
While the Trump administration is malevolent in its actions. it also has the elements of a soap opera and the latter was in abundant evidence yesterday by the abrupt departure of Omarosa Manigault Newman, a Trump confidante who had appeared on his TV shows but whose duties were not clear to other White House staffers who were irritated by her erratic and self-serving behavior, and they were ecstatic about her removal.
Reports are mixed. Wags have suggested that Donald Trump was furious that 98% of black women in Alabama voted for Doug Jones and in an act of revenge, fired the only black woman who worked for him. Some say that she was fired by chief of staff Jack Kelly and had to be dragged out of the building cursing and swearing. On the other hand, White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders says that although Newman no longer works there, she resigned effective January 20, 2018.
Why would she be denied access but yet be on the payroll until January 20? It may be that she gets some benefits from having worked for at least one year. What seems factual is that the Secret Service has immediately taken away her White House access pass.
Meanwhile Seth Meyers gives his own thoughts on Tuesday’s shock election result.
“…large amounts of outside money…”
Oh! No! that must the symbolic $10 I sent to Mr Jones from TX.
Mea culpa! Mea maxima culpa!
My comment from PZ’s thread may as well be repeated here:
No, it was more out of a horrified fascination at the possibility that a person very credibly accused of child molestation might actually become a US senator. We marvel at the sheer filth the Republican party tolerates amongst their own membership.
Pretty rich coming from a guy who recently stated that america was at its greatest in the era that predated the female and the non-white vote, still had active military campaigns against -- and corralling of -- the original inhabitants, and of course still had slavery. A man that has stated he is against every amendment except the first ten does not get to claim any moral high ground whatsoever. What a sickening man.
The CNN link has the text of the creepy statement I most remember Manigault Newman for:
Which I think was deliberately modeled on the triumphalist language of Isaiah 45:23-24 —
By myself I have sworn, my mouth has uttered in all integrity a word that will not be revoked: Before me every knee will bow; by me every tongue will swear. They will say of me, ‘In the Lord alone are deliverance and strength.’ ” All who have raged against him will come to him and be put to shame. (NIV)
I find myself wondering if she thought of herself as the High Priestess of the Church of Trump.
Im hoping Moore tries to take on Trump for Republican presidential candidate or something. The debates will be so interesting.
” we no longer recognize the universal truth that God is the author of our life and liberty”
This the same god who refused to even share fruit with Adam & Eve?
Wild thought:
Seth Meyers said “There is no way Trump wrote that [the tweet congratulating Doug Jones]”
You know, I think Meyers may have a point, there. The style is just too conciliatory; lacking in Trump’s usual vindictiveness, especially given the partisan rhetoric Trump was spouting in favor of Roy Moore and against Doug Jones in the days prior to the election.
What if . . . what if Omarosa Manigault Newman wrote and posted that tweet, and that is why she had to go the very next day?
When I heard Omerosa’s “bow down before Trump” I thought of Superman II.
You will bow down before Zod!
Somewhat different wording in the Superman II line(s) (It’s said more than once:)
Kneel before Zod
(my emph)