Month: December 2017

 
North Carolina pastor John Pavlovitz is impatient with moral rationalizations. He asks us to stop, please stop, trying so hard, then even harder, to achieve an empathy with Trump supporters, excusing them as captives of an alternate reality composed of falsehoods.

“I’m sorry but this isn’t an acceptable justification,” he says.

Our readers react:

Ryan:

Some “understanding” liberals even expect us to feel guilty over how we have neglected and looked down upon conservative territories, figures, and culture. Never mind how justified we are in rejecting their bigotry, desire for a Christian government, conspiracy theories, disdain for expertise and higher education, and so on.

Never mind how they look down upon us as well, elitism not being limited to the Left. Never mind how many conservatives seem gleeful over government that, rather than focus on constructive policy that tries to help everyone, punishes their enemies. Never mind that they have given us a president like Trump even though he was never even one of them and even though his idiocy and myriad other flaws were clearly on display for everyone long before he was elected.

We should feel very bad about conservatives’ poor little feelings because, after all, they care so much about what we think and would change their ways if only we were kinder. We could even learn a thing or two from their attitude toward gay people, continued support for the Confederacy, abstinence-only education, and rejection of scientific consensus.

Yes, if only we would just listen to their grievances, conservatives would accept us godless, baby-killing, communist perverts.

Dave Dubya, who writes at Freedom Rants:

Ignorance is not a compelling argument.

Con-servatives and Trumpists are willfully ignorant and bask in their resentments.

They have no excuse for their abandonment of reason and reality. They have no excuse for the resulting moral rot and moral relativism behind their bigotry and hate for others. They embraced the far Right indoctrination.

They are a damn cult in every sense of the word. They are no different from the “good Germans” who allowed fascism to destroy their country. And don’t think for a second it can’t happen here. It already has. Just sit back and watch the dying of a nation, brought down by apathetic fools, gullible dupes, rubes, racists and arrogant buffoons.

Their fascist leaders are making America hate again. Humans will suffer and die from their rule.

If Trump doesn’t go down for obstruction of justice, its all over, kids.

Our Last American Prophet, George Carlin told us, “This country is finished…You don’t have rights, you have owners.”

These are the words corpo-dems, the Kochs, Murdoch, Adelson, Sinclair, Mercer, Republicans and Trump are fulfilling.

Can’t say we weren’t warned… Perhaps we are all arrogant buffoons for thinking it can’t happen here. (Hat tip to T. Paine.)

Have a safe weekend.

 
From Frances Langum:

Hey Marco! You’re not supposed to TELL people that tax cuts for billionaires is a way to get cuts to Social Security done!

Rubio told a “Politico Playbook Interview sponsored by the Financial Services Roundtable” (so much wrong, but I digress) that people his age, 46, might want to kiss the money they’re paying into Social Security right now, goodbye forever.

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From Dave Dubya:

Item One: A PBS feature on “Tar Heel family illustrates why Trump appeals to the South”

“First time voter” and Trump volunteer Grace Tilly was finally getting the candidate she loves. She sports tattoos “88” (code for “HH”, Heil Hitler) and the Celtic cross used by Nazi site Stormfront as a logo. Her Trump supporting husband Ferron is wanted for armed robbery. Farron Tilly’s YouTube channel shows up when using his username, farron666. It includes videos for “Nature’s Eternal Religion” under the playlist “WhitePrideIsAllRight.” Dad shrugs these details aside. Pete “Kids These Days” Tilly has a “Veterans for Trump founder” patch on his jacket.

Item Two: A New York Times article titled, “A Voice of Hate in America’s Heartland”

He is the Nazi sympathizer next door, polite and low-key at a time the old boundaries of accepted political activity can seem alarmingly in flux. Most Americans would be disgusted and baffled by his casually approving remarks about Hitler, disdain for democracy and belief that the races are better off separate… On Facebook, Mr. Hovater posted a picture purporting to show what life would have looked like if Germany had won World War II: a streetscape full of happy white people, a bustling American-style diner and swastikas everywhere. “What part is supposed to look unappealing?” he wrote… After he attended the Charlottesville rally, in which a white nationalist plowed his car into a group of left-wing protesters, killing one of them, Mr. Hovater wrote that he was proud of the comrades who joined him there: “We made history. Hail victory.” In German, “Hail victory” is “Sieg heil.”

Yes, Virginia, there are American Nazis.

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From Jonathan Bernstein:

Trump hasn’t demonstrated firm positions on specific items in the budget talks, nor has he proved effective at pushing through any particular initiative. In his public statements, he’s given very little evidence that he understands the issues involved, whether it’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals or suspended Obamacare payments to insurers or the policy questions surrounding raising budget caps. On all those issues, he’s come down on both sides in recent months. Does he even understand the congressional context and rules involved in reaching an agreement? There’s no evidence of that. And he’s broken commitments to leadership (on both sides of the aisle) before.

So the smartest thing for all concerned is to just treat the president as if he would automatically sign on to any deal that was reached while ignoring any specific input he may have up to that point.

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From Jon Perr at PERRspectives:

Despite the hemorrhage of red ink produced by the Reagan and Bush tax cuts, Trump White House economic adviser Gary Cohn bragged, We think we can pay for the entire tax cut through growth over the cycle,” a point echoed by Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin on November 13. The 10-year, $1.5 trillion windfall for the wealthy will “not only … pay for itself,” Mnuchin boasted, “but it will pay down debt” as well. Unfortunately, analyses from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT), the Wharton School, the Tax Policy Center (TPC) and even the conservative friendly Tax Foundation (TF) concluded otherwise. And even without seeing the president’s past tax returns, we know that Donald Trump was lying through his teeth when he said the GOP tax plan was “going to cost me a fortune” and that his own finances were “going to get killed in this bill.”

So, neither the House nor the Senate versions of the GOP’s “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act” (TCJA) does a very good job of actually delivering tax cuts, except to corporations and the wealthiest people in America. But as it turns out, the TCJA doesn’t do much to create jobs, either.

Of course, you’d never know it listening to Paul Ryan.

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Wondering why a few conservative friends are less than impressed.