Monday, August 30, 2021

Outrage Is So Easily Generated

"My heart goes out to their families," she remarked, "but if you have been silent about the averaging of nine soldiers dying every month for the last 20 years, if you have never once talked about the 20,000 soldiers that have come back wounded from this war, if you don't talk about the veteran suicide rate that is currently plaguing our veterans stateside, I hate to tell you this but you are not the advocate for the military that you think you are." 

"Your strings are being puppeted by the propaganda machine and you are being told to be angry," Triplett continued. "I'm going to politely ask you to stop using those heroes' deaths to prop up your political agenda. It's disgusting."

I continue to think the manipulation is by a handful of office holders and media (more on-line than anywhere else, even with FoxNews in the mix) trying to continue the behaviors and strategies that succeeded so well for the right-wing and the GOP in this country we got four years of Trump because another Clinton was an unacceptable option.

I think, with that awkward introduction, that after four years of Trump such manipulations have finally run their course.  Yes, angry white men (and women) continue to rant about their "freedoms" and their "constitutional rights" which they don't have and don't understand, but they saw the culmination of their efforts in Trump, and now they know the game is over.  The calls for Biden's resignation or impeachment are farcical, even as he proves a POTUS who knows how to lead can accomplish things the clown Trump couldn't imagine.

I hate to even publicize this (well, as much anything on this blog can be considered "publicized"), but this is the former President calling into a radio show last night:

"Because Afghanistan is not even something that can be discussed in a rational way," Trump said. "The level of stupidity — and we had a great agreement. And Biden admitted the other day, he made a mistake because they didn't want him to say that no people have been killed since this agreement was signed."

"And the media, which is fake and crooked and corrupt, they're the worst people, they're the most corrupt people," Trump added. "The only thing I don't understand is why. They've got to hate our country. And they are in fact the enemy of the people. But the corrupt media shows the hurricane all night long."

Two things there:  one, the vacuous criticism of the media, and two:  connecting that criticism of a media that "hate[s] our country" and are "the enemy of the people," with "show[ing] the hurricane all night long."  The entire city of New Orleans is without power of any kind (so no power to cell towers, to pumping stations, to emergency services, to anything) and we haven't even started to look at the destruction from wind, much less flooding, not to mention the devastation to smaller communities:

(Now you have the visuals) and this raving jackass is complaining about that?  Yeah, do you miss him yet?  Because I think fewer and fewer people do, all the time.  We're thinking about the people, about the losses, about the trauma; Trump is thinking about how it draws attention away from what he wants to rant about.

The game the GOP played successfully since at least Gingrich was in the House (it was the game that made him Speaker, however briefly) is played out.  The efforts at manipulation are looking farcical not just because Biden is acting like the adult in the White House (Obama did, too, especially if you compare him to his Democratic predecessor, Bill Clinton), but because Biden is unashamedly championing the policies of LBJ and FDR for the first time since, well, LBJ.

This may not, in the end, be a sea change in government in D.C.  But the old game is over; and it's going to be a long time before the GOP puts together a new one.  In that time, maybe we can get a few things done.
Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)