The word “deplorables” was once controversially used by you-know-who to describe Trump supporters. It was then spot on. Time has marched on and so we can now tag many for being exactly who they say they are. There are plenty of words to choose from … racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic, and much more.
If asked, many will indeed confirm “Yep, that’s me” without any shame or hint of embarrassment. To illustrate that point here is some recent polling data.
Via Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom poll (Dec 2-7 2023) – How many Republicans raised their hands to say “Yep, that will make me more likely to support Trump” when asked about the following …
- 2020 election “fraud” justifies terminating parts of the U.S. Constitution – 14%
- Immigrants who enter the U.S. illegally are “poisoning the blood” of America – 42%
- To deal with immigration, Trump would authorize “sweeping raids, giant camps, and mass deportations” – 50%
The point is this – last year, Biden described “extreme MAGA philosophy” as “semi-fascism”. Polling data like this would appear that he was right about that.
Not too long ago, we had this from Sean Hannity in December 2023:
I cannot imagine how people would react “if Donald Trump and the Trump Organization or the Trump family were making tens of millions of dollars from our top geopolitical foes like China and Russia”
Well guess what.
This past week we also got the revelation that Trump, while President, has been receiving huge payments from foreign countries (which is not just unethical but illegal) …
Oversight Democrats Release Report Proving Trump Pocketed Millions From At Least 20 Foreign Governments As President
…new documents produced by Donald Trump’s former accounting firm, Mazars USA LLC, establishing that while former President Trump was in office, he received at least $7.8 million from 20 governments, including the governments of China, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait, and Malaysia, through his businesses...
…Immediately after taking over as Oversight Committee Chairman in January 2023, Rep. James Comer allowed former President Trump’s attorneys to speak on behalf of the Committee and bury evidence by stopping the production of additional responsive records. As a result, the $7.8 million detailed in this report, based on records for just two years of his presidency, …
…The foreign payments to President Trump identified in this report are likely only a fraction of the total amount of foreign payments he received during his presidency…
Doing stuff like this is what the GOP has been desperate to tar Biden with, but has failed to product any credible evidence of anything.
Yet here is clear decisive evidence of the degree of Trump corruption, and how does MAGA respond?
They did not even blink because their idiot-in-chief lies to them and they lap it up …
Moving on, below you will once again find my usual selection of some truly bizarre and extreme claims that have popped up during the last 7 days. Each is laced with my snarky commentary.
With my usual hat tip to my various sources, let’s once again dive into this very murky pool of absurdity and stupidity.
Christian Nationalism
Rep. Mary Miller is encouraging right-wing Christians to run for office because “we need people that fear God, that believe they can’t hide from God, and ultimately they’re going to give account to God; those are the best people to hold [elected] positions.”
- Yes, let’s have lots more religious bigots dictating things because that has always worked out so well every time.
- People who are offering loving kindness to their neighbours, especially those who don’t look like them, pray like them, or think like them, might indeed be following the teachings of Jesus, but none of those are concepts that right-wing Christians embrace.
- … and yes, this “God Fearing Christian” is the same Rep Mary Miller who famously quoted Hitler and said he was right on that one thing.
Below is Ryan Walters supporting a bill to force the Ten Commandments in public schools. “The breakdown in classroom discipline over the past 40 years is in no small measure due to the elimination of the Ten Commandments…”…
- Putting a poster up on a Oklahoma classroom walls as a reminder will of course encourage students to not steal, commit adultery, or bring a golden calf into the classroom.
- Let’s be wholly clear about this, – sticking lists of religious rules on classroom walls is not education, it is indoctrination.
- When it comes to educational excellence, can you possibly guess which state ranks at the bottom.
- Hemant has also published a detailed piece on this – see here. He explains who created the bill, the text of the bill itself and much more.
Christian nationalist Bill Cook of the Black Robe Regiment proclaims that the separation of church and state is “tyranny” and asserts that Christians should not accept it, insisting that there is no “country on Earth that is contrary to the Kingdom of God.”
- The concept of “religious freedom” for these people simply means “freedom for only me, not thee”. Bill Cook uses words to mean the opposite of what they mean. “Separation of church and state is tyranny“, but the entire reason for it is to prevent tyranny. Pastors who “love religious freedom” will fight against it, yet fail to recognise that it is the only thing that preserves their religious freedom.
- If you are wondering what his supposed black robe regiment is, it’s a group of extremist and deeply whacky far-right pastors who wish to see their beliefs imposed upon all by force. The name is a reference to a mythological group of pastors that fought against the British during the revolutionary war called the Black Robe regiment.
- The deep embarrassment (for him and his followers) is that there never was a black robe regiment. Via here: … “The phrase “Black-Robed Regiment” began as an epithet coined during the American Revolution by British pamphleteers. They hoped to disparage Americans as religious fanatics whipped into a seditious frenzy“. In other words, by claiming the label “Black Robed Regiment”, they are literally self-identifying themselves as … “religious fanatics whipped into a seditious frenzy“
Here is one further Bill Cook highlight that was also reported by RRW this past week. He claims God told him that he’ll soon start killing FBI agents for arresting those involved in the Jan. 6 insurrection at the US Capitol: “Death is about to execute a no-knock warrant on you.”
- God told me to advise Bill that he did not tell him that and that God will soon be changing his name and phone number and will not be taking any more calls from Bill.
- It takes a lot of deeply wild hubris to stand before people and tell them, not your opinion or what you fear, but to speak of God as your personal hitman, and to tell people they’re doomed. This truly is an encapsulation of all that is morally wrong about fanatical fundamentalism.
- Mixing religion and politics has never ever worked out well for any nation at any point in human history. A faction that rises to the top and gains power always strives to obliterate all other strands of belief and non-belief. Dressing up politics with religion is an attempt to put the politics beyond criticism – it is an attempt to deflect criticism of their wackiness and claim it is an attack upon their deity.
- The icing on the cake here is that if you check the video of Bill Cook saying all this, you will observe that via a textual overlay he is shilling for My Pillow. Doing stuff like that is always a big bold red flag.
- Right Wing Watch has a longer write-up that they published this past week – here.
Lance Wallnau, who openly declared himself to be a Christian nationalist, now says the left is trying to smear Trump supports by labeling them as Christian nationalists before declaring that he’s actually a “Christian internationalist:” “I think Jesus is lord of every nation.”
- Lance himself has openly declared himself to be a Christian nationalist. If that’s a smear, then he did this to himself – here he is doing exactly this.
- Turns out that the globalists intent on world domination that guys like this have been warning us about is actually themselves.
The Cult of Trump
Lauren Witzke wants to see the United States turned into a hereditary “theocratic monarchy” under the control of the Trump family: “King Trump, for life. Let’s go.”
- I bet you thought we had sorted out this Monarchy gig back in 1776 … but … apparently not.
- Meanwhile, here is my perpetual reminder that Lauren was arrested in 2017 for possession of heroin and meth, resisting arrest and admitted to being a drug mule.
Trump Supporters Deny ‘Vast’ Evidence About Jan. 6 Insurrection; Right Wing Watch Has Receipts
- We all watched it live on TV and so they are literally ignoring the evidence of their own eyes and ears.
- Quote: “New polling suggests that millions of Americans—including 34 percent of Republicans—wrongly believe the FBI organized and encouraged the insurrection, a theory promoted by far-right media and political figures for the past three years. As the Washington Post has noted, Trump true believers who embrace the theory are not moved by “the vast legal and evidentiary record” about Jan. 6 – much like those who believe Trump’s false claims about the legitimacy of President Joe Biden’s victory.” – there is no polite way to put it, it’s a cult of fools.
Homophobia
A Trio of Anti-LGBTQ Bigots Long for the Days When Gays Were Beaten Up and Forced Into the Closet – Christian fascists Edward Szall, Vincent James, and Lauren Witzke agree that gay people should be forced back into the closet … for their own good: “We beat up the kid at school who had two dads. And we weren’t jerks for that, that’s just what we did.”
- (Narrator voice over: “They were in fact jerks then, and they still are jerks”)
- Who are these people? One is Vincent James, an unapologetic racist, antisemite, misogynist, conspiracy theorist, and fascist who currently serves as the treasurer of white nationalist Nick Fuentes’ America First organization. The other two are racist conspiracy theorists Edward Szall and Lauren Witzke
- Is this the “christian love and compassion” we keep hearing so much about?
- Revelation – the supposed “moral majority” are neither moral, nor a majority.
Kim Davis is in the News again. Once again we discover that her actions really do have consequences …
- To translate this into bible speak so that she can understand it all … “whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” Galatians 6:7
- This supposedly “good Christian Woman” who claimed that what she did what motivated by her desire to “preserve the sanctity of marriage” is the same lady who, in this order, married Husband 1, had twins with Husband 3, divorced Husband 1, married Husband 2, divorced Husband 2, married Husband 3, divorced husband 3, and then remarried Husband 2. You need an excel spreadsheet to try and keep track all of that.
The Big Lie
Ken Block @ USA Today: Trump paid me to find voter fraud. Then he lied after I found 2020 election wasn’t stolen.
- He is the expert hired by the Trump Campaign and he found nothing. That conclusion was directly fed back to Trump and then ignored.
- To this day the lies keep flowing from Trump.
Update on Boebert Jumping from CO 3rd to CO 4th
Her Bonkers New Excuse For Bailing On Her District via the HuffPo … “It’s coming from Hollywood when you have Barbra Streisand coming in and donating to the Democrat, when you have Ryan Reynolds coming in and donating to the Democrat,”
- Fact Check: Yep, they did both donate, that’s factual. However, FEC records show Reynolds contributed $1,500 in 2023, while Streisand contributed $1,000, and so the sum of money that supposedly scared her off was $2,500 in total. Damn, if only we had known that this is all it took, we could have all chipped in a few cents and had this sorted long ago.
Plagiarism
As is often the case, right-wing activists attempt to manufacture a narrative … but that often falls apart …
Deeply Weird
So yes, the Transformed Wife is being her usual weird self …
- I dread to think what the topic of conversation is at her house during dinner.
Charlie Kirk says that couples without children are a “bunch of morally bankrupt people who secretly feel guilty for being selfish parasites in a dumb attempt to normalize awful behavior.”
- According to Mr Kirk you need to vigorously breed lots of good little Republicans like Charlie and not doing so makes you a “morally bankrupt selfish parasite”.
Ben Zeisloft defends the destruction of a satanic display in the Iowa state capitol because the capitol is “supposed to honor Christ as Lord.”
- Does he think state capitols are religious temples? … Nope, it’s a tad weirder than that. His actual argument is that religious freedom only applies to his specific religion, and no other.
Scott Lively declares that if he … “were a mentally enslaved leftist, [he] would want someone to free me from my self-destructive insanity.” Therefore, “we should – politically speaking – go to war like we mean it, fighting fire with fire (within well reasoned legal and ethical boundaries – e.g. no ‘swatting’) until they have nowhere left to turn but rationality or dormancy.”
- For a bit of background context, Scott is responsible for a literal body count. His voracious anti-gay campaigning in Uganda inspired the introduction of legislation there that introduced the death penalty for the crime of being born gay. (really).
- The extract above is from his latest word soup diatribe on WND (a.k.a. Wing Nut Daily). It was done in the context of his support for legally “going after Biden because that’s what they did to Trump” … except for the rather glaring little inconsistency there in that Trump credibly attempted an insurrection and there is no evidence of Biden breaking any laws.
John Guandolo wants to see Republicans tried for treason and executed for allowing “the enemies of America” (i.e., Democrats) to destroy the United States.
- For a bit of background, John Guandolo is the guy who quit the FBI in total disgrace because when working a corruption case it was discovered that he had been bonking a key witness. He went on to launch a career as a conspiracy theorist
- He is literally telling on himself here. Political purges to ensure the purity and loyalty of the party is a thing that crazy fascists do. The idea is pulled directly from a handbook that would be at home in North Korea, Stalin’s Soviet Union, or Hitler’s Reich.
The False Profit$
Greg is being Greg. He claims he “verified” this and also that it aligns with his prophecy …
- You have to wonder why Greg is the only guy to notice this
- The scary part is that these “prophets” can make up literally anything and there are gullible people who will accept it as truth
- Also Greg: “I’ve got verifiable facts but I’m not gonna tell you where I got them from or how they got verified.”
Right-wing pastor and “prophet” Curt Landry attempts to explain what is really going on heading into the 2024 elections. Good luck trying to follow whatever it is he’s saying.
- Curt who? … He is a complete nutcase. For example he has claimed Trump was chosen by God, and has also claimed the COVID vaccine is from hell … so yes, nutty enough to be considered an entire fruitcake.
- What he says sounds profound … but only if you are prepared to not actually strive to parse his word salad.
Being a prophet seems to be a lucrative job for Chuck Pierce, who is earning over $2 million a year.
- It really is just for the $$$ and nothing else.
Failed 2023 Predictions
So these people predicted very specific things in 2023, and yet here we are in 2024 and their predictions are a no-show.
Jim Baker’s ability to never get a “prophecy” right remains on track. If you made a “prophecy” that he would be wrong, then you were totally right …
Sherri Tenpenny, the alpha source for a lot of whacky COVID vaccine claims, is also successfully maintaining her alpha kook status …
- She also promised me magnetic superpowers and vastly improved 5G coverage if I got vaccinated, but alas it was a dud on both of those, so whom should I complain to?
Activist Chaz Stevens makes a splash
Chaz gets written up in an article because he is taking a stand …
Here are a few quotes from that article …
… has filed a lawsuit to block Trump from the ticket.
“I’m just saying, ‘Listen, not on my watch,’” he told Florida Politics on Tuesday shortly after filing the complaint.
“Maybe this goes somewhere. Maybe it doesn’t. Maybe the court throws it back over the transom and says, ‘Get the hell out of here.’ But at least I’m standing up as one of many people to say, “Not today. No way.’”…
Excellent News: Insulin Costs capped
- A common rebuttal is that Trump also did this … but … dig into that claim and you discover he simply claimed it, but failed to actually deliver.
- So who do you vote for? – the con man who promises stuff but fails to deliver, or the guy who delivers?
Nebraska Update
It will be interesting to see how legislators feel about the Death Penalty when its them that have to personally do the killing …
- I have a horrible feeling that many GOP legislators would be quite excited by this.
Finally…
