Political Theatre category archive
Dis Coarse Discourse, Pivotal Moments Dept. 2
The Washington press corps loves to talk about the “pivot.”
They have a fanciful notion that a candidate can be one person during primary campaigns and turn into someone else, or “pivot,” during a general election campaign. They are waiting anxiously for Donald Trump to pivot, to become “more presidential” (whatever the hell that is–maybe refraining from insulting peoples, cultures, races, and communities for a day or so, maybe not threatening to rain death on foreign peoples as causally as others discuss baseball scores, maybe just not wearing baseball caps indoors–who can say what they mean?).
We recall how well the “pivot” worked for Mitt “Etch-a-Sketch” Romney and John “McMaverick” McCain.
The notion of the pivot highlights the ultimate hollowness of a certain style of political reportage, one that holds no truck with substance. Rather, it believes that strategy is not just everything, it’s the only thing. They care not that somebody’s drugging the race horses and bribing the jockeys, so long as the horse race is exciting. Hell, they’ll quite happily drug the horses and bribe the jockeys themselves if it makes the race more exciting.
They also clearly believe that the voting public is incapable of remembering anything that a politician said or did prior to the most recent pivot. Furthermore, and this is the truly craven part, even as they pat themselves on the back for their “journalistic excellence,” they forsake–nay, they flee–their journalistic responsibility to remind the polity that what some politician said or did yesterday directly contradicts what he or she did or said today.
The true noxiousness of the narrative of the pivot, though, is that it reveals empty souls, souls with no substance and no values, souls which believe only in appearances, which eschew fact, which pay no attention to the men and women behind the curtain.
Aside:
I don’t have any secret methods for identifying who these “journalists” are other than paying attention to the discourse and reading Driftglass, who specializes in analyzing dis coarse discourse, but a good starting point would be a list of the “journalists” who most frequently appear on the Sunday talk shows.
Twits on Twitter 0
Twits who know that a picture is worth 10,000 words.
One Dare Call It Treason 0
Andy Parker, whose daughter was gunned down on live TV, minces no words. A snippet:
Their Mantra — “Thoughts & Prayers.”
My Mantra — “Treason.”
The definition of treason: “The act of betraying one’s country.”
(snip)
Just like in the aftermath of San Bernardino, Umpqua, or my daughter Alison’s murder, the likes of Mitch McConnell, Bob Goodlatte, Michael McCaul and their fellow traitors trot out their universal catch phase — “You’re in our thoughts and prayers”.
I’m sure it’s engraved on a plaque somewhere in their offices that came along with the monthly NRA check.
Read the rest.
Dreams in the Witchhouse* 0
Logistics of Lethal 0
Aside from Maddow’s main point, the commercial she discusses illustrates clearly the extent to which the NRA and its acolytes form a cult of the phallus.
Via Raw Story.
Party uber Alles 0
Some Democrats are fond of saying that, if Ronald Reagan were alive today, he would be drummed out of party. What follows would seem to indicate that there is more to that statement than partisan hyperbole:
A while ago, Doug Elmets, adviser to Reagan and many other Republicans through the years, announced that he could not bring himself to vote for Donald Trump, but instead, would be voting for a Democratic Presidential candidate for the first time in his life. He finds himself dismayed at Republican reaction to his statement. Here’s a bit:
But apparently some Americans – including some Republicans I call friends – equate political independence with unthinkable heresy. They’d rather cling to the party line and hand the Oval Office to a petulant, dangerously unbalanced reality TV star than support a Democrat.
More reactionary reaction at the link.
The Gerrymeanderings of Randy Forbes 0
I would not have voted for either one in November, but, in the local Republican primary, the evil of two lessers went down to defeat.
There is a back story which makes this even more delicious. Randy Forbes was gerrymandered into a safe seat, then he was ungerrymandered right back out of it, so he decided to commute to Virginia Beach, because, as a member of the entitlement society–oh, never mind.
Now, come November, I will get to vote against a local Republican rather than an interloper from down the road a piece.
Where There’s Fire, There’s Smoke
0
In the Bangor Daily News, Philip Duffy reports that some Congresspersons want to take jurisdiction over the laws of chemistry, likely at the behest of the lumber industry (emphasis added):
The amendment would mandate that all federal agencies treat the burning of wood from forests as a “renewable energy resource” that is “carbon neutral,” meaning it does not add carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Reality is more complex, but forest bioenergy certainly is not carbon neutral. The carbon footprint of bioenergy should be measured scientifically on a case-by-case basis rather than broadly specified by legislation.
Follow the link to see Duffy delve into the lamer rationale for this endeavor.
I don’t quite know what’s worse about this: the stupid or the craven.
“This Pampered Princeling” 0
Jonathan Kirshner doesn’t think much of Donald Trump.
This horrifying turn of events (and if you are not horrified, you have not been paying adequate attention) is unprecedented—and it is un-American. A Trump presidency would not make America great again; it would make America ordinary, . . .
And that’s just the beginning.
“A Thin-Skinned Racist Bully” 0
Elizabeth Warren plays Trump.
I ordered my Hillary Clinton bumper sticker last night because consider the alternative.
I hope to be the first on my block to have one. (Actually, who am I kidding? I will almost certainly be the first on my block to have one.)
Video via Raw Story.
Plus Ca Change 0
Leonard Pitts, Jr., reads history.
The Green Candidate 0
The results are in!
Fourteen percent were “undecided.”
More at the link.
Bernie Bros 0
I have not discussed Bernie Bros much here.
I don’t need to.
They are their own worst advertisement.
If you care what I think of Bernie Bros, read my comments to this post at Delaware Liberal.
Nothing To Do, Nowhere To Go 0
Slightly better.
(snip)
The four-week moving average, a less volatile measure than the weekly claims numbers, decreased to 269,500 last week from 277,000.
Filings have been below 300,000 for 66 consecutive weeks — the longest stretch since 1973 and a level economists say is typically consistent with a healthy labor market.
The number of people continuing to receive jobless benefits dropped 77,000 in the week ended May 28. The unemployment rate among people eligible for benefits decreased to a record-low 1.5 percent. These data are reported with a one-week lag.