The most comical/infuriating aspect of this has been Trump swearing the US has no influence over El Salvador so there is no way to art-of-the-deal Garcia back. It would take one email or less. But like every aspect of this presidency, it overlaps in no way with reality -- and millions of Americans actively love the dishonesty of it. They have fallen hard in love with the idea that the New York Times and the local college look down on them, or something.
So you smug wokesters say I'm dumb, fine, I'll say the dumbest shit I can think of, I will totally contradict myself, and so will my president, and me and him'll laugh all the way to the bank!
Which reminds me: Our Mr. Brooks penned an ersatz mea culpa for The Atlantic last week in which he says, and I am barely paraphrasing here, "I don't know why I've pretended, every minute of my life since 1982 when I joined them, that the conservatives aren't often genuine fascists. They are! Therefore, today... if only liberals hadn't so smugly espoused liberal causes! Then regular people would never have supported the fascists I spent my life assisting." It is as close to a mental breakdown as we are likely to see Brooks have; luckily he has the Burkean resolve to write through the crisis until he reaches the Skinner conclusion, "No, it's the children who are wrong."
Rational conservatives like Buckley, Brooks and Sullivan have always maintained the principles are sound, its the shallow selfishness of the public and the liberal largesse bribery of the government that prevents them from accepting the hard truths they tell. Or in other words, it is the children who are wrong.
In my (fortunately limited) experience arguing this with M.A.G.A. and 'Iʼm not but theyʼve got some good points' types, they always fall-back to 'Theyʼre criminals for being here.' which is not true, or if they're smarter or care a little more about the facts '[…] for entering illegally'. The latter ignores the treaty-right to asylum in many cases, but more importantly uses 'criminal' to mean 'broke our laws' but to imply 'rape-murderer'. I forget who wrote 'One cop accepts a free cup of coffee and a doughknot from a shop-owner who likes having cops around, anothers does hits for the Mob…both are "corrupt".', and it's the Mobbed-up one who wants you to think 'All cops are corrupt!'.
I'm more concerned about keeping criminals out of _office_.
Can you blame him? Making sense of insanity will drive anyone mad.
Its not so much the lying this administration does, you can argue that every single administration has lied to the American people on matters great and small. Its the naked pettiness, the deliberate contempt for the people that know they are lying, and they know the people know. The reliance on norms to give legitimacy to their lies as they destroy those norms, a deliberate mockery. The impotence of the systems designed to prevent this, the people charged with managing them, and the elite class that has the most of all to lose, who are either complicit or invisible.
Try to wrap your head around it, it will drive you mad.
The naked pettiness (thanks for that) and mendacity are bad in themselves, but also imply a profound lack of respect for us. They're barely trying to appear to follow the law; I suppose it's better than the next step, 'The Will of the People, which we know by gnosis, trumps mere written law.' which also must read well to their evangelistic cohort raised with Christian scriptures on the superiority of Grace to The Law, which latter is described as a curse.
If you love treating people badly and we've accepted harsh punishment for 'gang-members' or 'terrorists', you have great incentive to call anyone a gang-member—terrorist (echoes of 'Jew-Bolshevik'—'See, all our enemies are as one!') .
This is just standard fascism 101. no need to pick out some small grain of truth (crime is objectively bad) out of the avalanche of lies to provide some framework of sense out of it.
The state is existentially threatened by an endless horde of criminal 'others' preying on the good herrenvolk and must be purged if the state is to reach its natural greatness.
It is considered decadent to question the pronouncements of the Leader when the State must recover it's Great Strength; impediments like 'rights' and 'due process' and other effete trappings of democracy and the rule of law are what allowed the existential threat in the first place.
For the good of the State and the Herrenvolk, we must put aside such notions in order to combat the danger.
There was an item by Krugman a while back, in which he used the phrase "the conventions of modern political reporting" to describe the filter that sanewashes the rantings of Trump, or that declines to notice that the *real* campaign story is, one side is lying their asses off about some easily verified truths.
So, yeah, the conventions of modern political reporting have really failed us, starting at least 25 years ago. Arguably around the time of 2nd Reagan. That's when I remember listening to NPR in the morning, talking about the latest outrages against the truth, and wondering "why is nobody calling him out?"
Much as the Democratic party is being dragged kicking and screaming toward a more radical position, Our Mainstream Media is likewise being forced to examine the collapse of the rule of law and democracy, very much against its will. "Taking sides" is a mortal sin of commission against the culture every working journalist has been raised and trained in, just as "opposing Republicans" violates every fiber of being in the Democratic party of working together in a democratic system. Acknowledging that democratic system is being dismantled underneath them leads to ugly choices with no guarantee or even an obvious path out of it. Its easier for them both to observe the forms, keep their heads down, and wait for it to blow over. They are starting to see it might not blow over, but turn the country to rubble instead.
It would have been nice if the media had learned the lesson "it's not gonna blow over" after 2000, when the NYT filed so many "Gore simply never tells the truth!" articles that it might have counted as an in-kind contribution to the Bush campaign. (Gore claims he invented the internet! well orrr he says he was a proponent of funding its creation. He says schools don't have desks for their students but here's a photo of desks! well orrr when he visited that school 3 weeks ago they did not have desks). Meanwhile GWB ran the most honest campaign in 50 years, I guess, and his swearing-in only got us the Iraq War, the '08 crash, rising sea levels -- luckily no *big* repercussions we still feel 25 years later. The Bush presidency blew right the fuck over.
The most comical/infuriating aspect of this has been Trump swearing the US has no influence over El Salvador so there is no way to art-of-the-deal Garcia back. It would take one email or less. But like every aspect of this presidency, it overlaps in no way with reality -- and millions of Americans actively love the dishonesty of it. They have fallen hard in love with the idea that the New York Times and the local college look down on them, or something.
So you smug wokesters say I'm dumb, fine, I'll say the dumbest shit I can think of, I will totally contradict myself, and so will my president, and me and him'll laugh all the way to the bank!
Which reminds me: Our Mr. Brooks penned an ersatz mea culpa for The Atlantic last week in which he says, and I am barely paraphrasing here, "I don't know why I've pretended, every minute of my life since 1982 when I joined them, that the conservatives aren't often genuine fascists. They are! Therefore, today... if only liberals hadn't so smugly espoused liberal causes! Then regular people would never have supported the fascists I spent my life assisting." It is as close to a mental breakdown as we are likely to see Brooks have; luckily he has the Burkean resolve to write through the crisis until he reaches the Skinner conclusion, "No, it's the children who are wrong."
Rational conservatives like Buckley, Brooks and Sullivan have always maintained the principles are sound, its the shallow selfishness of the public and the liberal largesse bribery of the government that prevents them from accepting the hard truths they tell. Or in other words, it is the children who are wrong.
Right on vis a vie all aspects of your comment.
The kidz are almost always alright. Who do we blame? You know who.
In my (fortunately limited) experience arguing this with M.A.G.A. and 'Iʼm not but theyʼve got some good points' types, they always fall-back to 'Theyʼre criminals for being here.' which is not true, or if they're smarter or care a little more about the facts '[…] for entering illegally'. The latter ignores the treaty-right to asylum in many cases, but more importantly uses 'criminal' to mean 'broke our laws' but to imply 'rape-murderer'. I forget who wrote 'One cop accepts a free cup of coffee and a doughknot from a shop-owner who likes having cops around, anothers does hits for the Mob…both are "corrupt".', and it's the Mobbed-up one who wants you to think 'All cops are corrupt!'.
I'm more concerned about keeping criminals out of _office_.
I guess you're still angry
Can you blame him? Making sense of insanity will drive anyone mad.
Its not so much the lying this administration does, you can argue that every single administration has lied to the American people on matters great and small. Its the naked pettiness, the deliberate contempt for the people that know they are lying, and they know the people know. The reliance on norms to give legitimacy to their lies as they destroy those norms, a deliberate mockery. The impotence of the systems designed to prevent this, the people charged with managing them, and the elite class that has the most of all to lose, who are either complicit or invisible.
Try to wrap your head around it, it will drive you mad.
The naked pettiness (thanks for that) and mendacity are bad in themselves, but also imply a profound lack of respect for us. They're barely trying to appear to follow the law; I suppose it's better than the next step, 'The Will of the People, which we know by gnosis, trumps mere written law.' which also must read well to their evangelistic cohort raised with Christian scriptures on the superiority of Grace to The Law, which latter is described as a curse.
"To live outside the law you must be honest"
- Bob Dylan "Absolutely Sweet Marie"
Bless you for writing about this. The current powers that be in our capital city makes my head hurt so bad that Tylenol no longer works.
If you love treating people badly and we've accepted harsh punishment for 'gang-members' or 'terrorists', you have great incentive to call anyone a gang-member—terrorist (echoes of 'Jew-Bolshevik'—'See, all our enemies are as one!') .
This is just standard fascism 101. no need to pick out some small grain of truth (crime is objectively bad) out of the avalanche of lies to provide some framework of sense out of it.
The state is existentially threatened by an endless horde of criminal 'others' preying on the good herrenvolk and must be purged if the state is to reach its natural greatness.
It is considered decadent to question the pronouncements of the Leader when the State must recover it's Great Strength; impediments like 'rights' and 'due process' and other effete trappings of democracy and the rule of law are what allowed the existential threat in the first place.
For the good of the State and the Herrenvolk, we must put aside such notions in order to combat the danger.
There was an item by Krugman a while back, in which he used the phrase "the conventions of modern political reporting" to describe the filter that sanewashes the rantings of Trump, or that declines to notice that the *real* campaign story is, one side is lying their asses off about some easily verified truths.
So, yeah, the conventions of modern political reporting have really failed us, starting at least 25 years ago. Arguably around the time of 2nd Reagan. That's when I remember listening to NPR in the morning, talking about the latest outrages against the truth, and wondering "why is nobody calling him out?"
Much as the Democratic party is being dragged kicking and screaming toward a more radical position, Our Mainstream Media is likewise being forced to examine the collapse of the rule of law and democracy, very much against its will. "Taking sides" is a mortal sin of commission against the culture every working journalist has been raised and trained in, just as "opposing Republicans" violates every fiber of being in the Democratic party of working together in a democratic system. Acknowledging that democratic system is being dismantled underneath them leads to ugly choices with no guarantee or even an obvious path out of it. Its easier for them both to observe the forms, keep their heads down, and wait for it to blow over. They are starting to see it might not blow over, but turn the country to rubble instead.
It would have been nice if the media had learned the lesson "it's not gonna blow over" after 2000, when the NYT filed so many "Gore simply never tells the truth!" articles that it might have counted as an in-kind contribution to the Bush campaign. (Gore claims he invented the internet! well orrr he says he was a proponent of funding its creation. He says schools don't have desks for their students but here's a photo of desks! well orrr when he visited that school 3 weeks ago they did not have desks). Meanwhile GWB ran the most honest campaign in 50 years, I guess, and his swearing-in only got us the Iraq War, the '08 crash, rising sea levels -- luckily no *big* repercussions we still feel 25 years later. The Bush presidency blew right the fuck over.