We Hold These Truths to be Self Evident

Why wouldn’t you go there to drop your anchor fetus? You don’t even have to be there when the baby is born! Just go conceive it there, and your baby has Constitutionally-guaranteed American citizenship. Score!

1. something that’s good doesn’t need to be marketed
2. Jesus needs more customers
3. Christianity is a “brand” now
4. You can buy a 15 million dollar ad spot? You can pay taxes too.
5. still conflates prostitution with LGBTQ, as if your orientation is a choice

I’ll add more as I think of them.

Not just anywhere in Tennessee either. This is the state capital.

No, it’s not because people need “conservative thought” or whatever, because what passes for conservative thought these days is just a mix of Christian and White Supremacist dogma.

And that’s not hyperbole–this GOP majority in Congress has passed the least legislation in history. The reason they can’t pass any legislation is because the party, once they allowed those two groups to form their core, has begun to engage in a series of purity tests where only the most extreme members can remain. But the lack of policy isn’t why the fall of the GOP is bad for democracy. Good-faith policy must come from logic and reason, and anyone using these along with facts and evidence, whether liberal or conservative, will end up getting to the same ballpark of ideas for solutions. Thus, the choice between right and left should be just minor choices about how much or how little policymakers should push the needle in a certain direction, based on priorities.

For example, when faced with the real evidence and threat of permanent climate change, the choice IS between how fast and to what new energy sources we change to, not IF we will actually change or not. The modern Republican party has decided that their ideology demands that MORE fossil fuels be extracted and burned. Can you imagine if tobacco science came out in today’s GOP? There would be massive “get-out-the-smoke” campaigns and kids’ “smokeouts” where they gather ans mime smoking the candy cigarettes. It’s just plain crazy at this point, and it’s dangerous, but it’s not why it’s a danger to democracy in America, although it’s related.

The reason this party on the decline is a problem is that many of these people see their political foes as the same thing as America’s real enemies like Russia, and because they often see their politics in religious terms, there is no application of logic. This desperation leads to an embrace of anyone or anything that endorses their ideology, no matter how heinous. Look at Kyle Rittenhouse, who murdered two people and injured a third when he showed up armed to a protest in another state, where the locals were organizing because of another officer-involved killing of a civilian. After being acquitted by reason of self-defense, they then elevated this boy to superstar status within the party, and probably mostly because he got away with killing some liberals. That’s his claim to fame. But because it is so difficult to find people that will drink their Kool-Aid, no matter what’s in it, no questions asked, a person like this becomes a hero to them.

And look at the furor over Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce. Her crime was encouraging people to vote (in general, not necessarily for Democrats) and he said to take the vaccine. That’s it. But because of these increasingly narrow purity tests, the right-wing grift-o-sphere can’t even celebrate some of their biggest successes because they are now “libtards” infected by the “woke virus”, even though they probably see eye-to-eye on a majority of things. But painting themselves into a stupid corner by their purity tests isn’t even the most dangerous thing about a declining GOP.

It’s that the leaders they elect have been falling more and more to Russian and Chinese state-sponsored propaganda. Members of Congress themselves when questioning government officials have quoted from both countries’ propaganda networks, because whatever was written agreed with their dogma. But most importantly, they are so radicalized, so desperate for someone, ANYONE, to agree with them, that they won’t even check to see if what was written or said is verifiable or true. It doesn’t matter, really. And when you’re that starved for approval, it makes it childishly easy for foreign countries to pass off state propaganda to Americans and THEY THEMSELVES PASS IT ON as true. That also means there are no guardrails on money for them either. Unless the check says from “BIG BAD RUSSIA, LOVE PUTIN” they are not going to do any due diligence on where the money, and influence-peddling, comes from.

In fact, the former leader of the House, who was ousted by far-right of his own party last year, in 2016 claimed that a number of legislators, and even Trump himself, were compromised, and reiterated those sentiments in recent comments, saying it was the only thing that explained his colleagues’ strange decisions. Herein lies the danger — we can not trust that our GOP leaders are not compromised by our enemies, but it’s even worse: we have to conclude that many already are and are acting in the best interests of our enemies. And it’s a scary thought to think that Putin and Xi, or any crackpot with money, are secretly holding the puppet strings of a third or more of our country’s leaders. And look, there is reporting out there that indicates the GOP is straight-up parroting Kremlin talking points.

Because when you’re this desperate, you’ll do anything…and therein lies the true danger of a party in decline.

I think many Americans have come to view their political party as they view their religion or sports teams, essentially immutable choices that they can never change. But it’s really a choice like buying milk that you can change whenever you want. And to extend this analogy to the two US political parties, if you want white milk and only white milk, then the Republican party is your party. If you can’t stand any other types of “woke” milk existing, like oat or almond, then you have one choice. And the big thing is, they are doing everything they can to make you think that you have no other choices but white milk by reducing the number of stores that sell milk and the times that they are open. The Democratic party on the other hand doesn’t tell you what type of milk to drink, they let you drink whatever milk you want. And they keep the milk store open and stocked for all your milk needs. And if you want a type of milk they don’t carry, then you can request the type you like and they’ll try to get it in stock. Don’t even think about asking for chocolate milk at the GOP milk store, and GOD FORBID you ask for oat milk because that’s socialism. And let’s face it, the Republicans can’t run a store with any more ability than they run Congress, so if you actually want the milk store open at all, then there’s only one party to vote for.

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2021/10/texas-removes-suicide-hotline-lgbtq-site-hurt-gop-governors-reputation/ It would be easy to lay this at the feet of a political party where “the cruelty is the point”, but we all know where these “Texas values” come from– the religious communities that mark children as young as 6,7,8 years old as “sinners” and ostracize and shame them.

This week, one of Tennessee’s two senators had some exceedingly dumb words to say in relation to Taylor Swift, one of the state’s residents who she lost the support of. But this Senator, as we might say in Mississippi, a neighbor of Tennessee, is dumb as a box of rocks. She claims that “Marxist, socialist societies, they do not allow women to dress, or sing, or be on stage, or to entertain”. For starters, she conflates Marxism/Communism and Socialism which are not even remotely the same system. America and other western countries are all socialist, because capitalism doesn’t maintain and build roads and bridges. Capitalism doesn’t enforce the law. Capitalism doesn’t keep your water and food and safe nor does it give money to Grandma and Grandpa when they get too old to work so they don’t suffer in the final years of their lives. All of those things are socialist. Even China isn’t completely communist, as there is some level of autonomy throughout the economy and there isn’t forced sharing of resources or many of the other features of pure communist systems. But putting aside all of that which should have been learned in 8th grade government class, the idea that any regime of any type in the last 100 years has actually stopped singers from singing is preposterous and just, honestly, a flat-out lie. Even at the height of the Russian version of communism, they had female singing stars. China has singing stars RIGHT NOW. Even though I know what Republican politics looks like these days, bereft of solutions, delivering only outrage and fear to their constituents, every once in a while something like this still stands out as being exceptionally stupid and mendacious. The new GOP–blurring the line between ignorance and lying. What a time to be alive!

Which was it? Surely both of these can’t be true. The first quote was, of course, the original statement from the police spokesperson, and this is the reason that I feel absolutely no satisfaction or joy at the verdict just handed down. Nor do I feel that any fundamental changes have taken place in police departments across the nation after this conviction. I think everyone knows in their hearts that if video hadn’t surfaced of Floyd’s murder, the “medical incident” lie would have stood and there would be no justice today. During the final days of the trial itself, yet another unarmed black man was killed in the Minneapolis area, and that’s in one state, in one metro area. In 2020, there were over 1,000 people killed by police. And until bad cops like Chauvin are removed from the system, and as long as police departments and their fellow officers cover up for criminal activity, this will continue on forever. So even though right now, before appeal, in this case, justice seems to have been served, I feel absolutely nothing.

After the second mass shooting in only a week, this one (at last count) claiming the lives of 10 people, it becomes clearer by the day that the GOP is far, far beyond being a political party. With their opposition to masks, vaccines, and support of guns, they make it clear that there is no one they won’t kill or let die (including themselves) to advance whatever their current goals are. Were it not for abortion, guns, religious discrimination of the LGBT community, and white supremacy, there wouldn’t even be a Republican party. I challenge anyone to state clearly what the current GOP’s policy goals are. “Cancel culture”, the cause du jour for the current right wing, is not only not an issue, but not an issue where legislation would be constitutional and effective. But while claiming to be pro-life, the GOP absolutely love murder, if not in practice, at least the idea of it. For example, they support endless wars with non-state enemies, murder by gun owner, cop killings, the death penalty, and murder by attempted coup, and that’s only the direct murders. They also believe the government has no role in preventing the indirect deaths caused by businesses killing you with bad food, pollution, or opioids, by allowing people and in fact encouraging people to not wear masks and take vaccines. and by allowing hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths each year through lack of health coverage. And yet, they carve out one tiny exception to their death urge for embryos, while ignoring the life of the person carrying it. (Abortion of viable fetuses is already illegal, so any claim that this is happening and that’s what they’re trying to prevent is a lie.) They really seem to embrace the Hobbesian view that life in civilization, as opposed to the state of nature where civilization has collapsed, should be “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” For everything that’s not an embryo, that is.

The newly elected Senator from Georgia has been killing the GOP (with words) lately. For the people he is talking to and about, words are ineffective, since their whole idea of power is about the pure exercise of it without consequence, and that power in the south and in the rural areas is always, always aimed at non-whites and non-christians, or anyone who opposes their shared delusions, even if those people are in the majority. Senator Warnock had this to say about the filibuster, which is currently standing in the way of most major federal legislation: “The filibuster, at the end of the day, is about minority rights in the Senate. How are you going to insist on protecting minority rights in the Senate, while refusing to protect minority rights in the society?” And on the topic of guns in Georgia after a brutal killing spree: “This shooter was able to kill all of these folks the same day he purchased a firearm but right now what is our legislature doing? … [Preventing] people from being able to vote the same day they register.” He is finding a truth that is unassailable, and then lambasting them with it, with no defense available.

Governor Kemp, who likely stole the governorship through similar underhanded tactics, signed the latest voting “rights” bill in Georgia, which criminalizes handing out water to people waiting in line to vote, amongst other penalties and barriers for people simply trying to exercise one of their most basic constitutional rights–the right to vote. The beauty of how evil this is is that the GOP is the one causing the long voting lines in the first place. And their voters, who cannot see the danger that these fascist tactics pose, continue to vote for the GOP for one of two reasons…guns or abortion or both. I cannot see another reason people would support their party, except for the white supremacy thing that their party is unable to purge. The Republicans are so lost now that they can’t even vote for popular legislation at the national level, which is why they all voted against the COVID stimulus bill.

And Senator Warnock is correct–no other issue will be important if Republicans are successfully able to steal democracy away from the majority. If they’re willing to do something this blatant, citing a vague non-reason of “election security” while failing to adequately define what that is and why it is necessary, then it will be hard to imagine what they would do when their fascistic takeover of democracy is finished.