Well, all this is interesting to me, anyway, and that's what matters here. The Internet is a terrible thing for someone like me, who finds almost everything interesting.
Tuesday, July 28, 2015
GOP race to the bottom
You know, I thought it would be fun to have Donald Trump in the Republican presidential primary,... but now I'm starting to wonder.
Yes, he says stupid, crazy things, but the GOP base just can't get enough of stupid and crazy - especially racist stupid and crazy. And that's creating desperation among the rest of the candidates, especially those who thought they had stupid and crazy all wrapped up, themselves.
Mike Huckabee isn't even running for president, not really. He doesn't have a chance, and he knows it. He just wants the attention. He wants the name recognition, because he wants to improve his profits when selling snake oil to the rubes, ideally when he's back at Fox 'News' afterwards.
But no one has been paying any attention to him. Donald Trump has stolen the spotlight, so Huckabee is trying to out-Trump Trump - whether that causes Iran to get nuclear weapons, whether that causes more war in the Middle East, whether that irreparably damages America's influence in the world, or not. This isn't funny, it's just sickening.
Sure, Huckabee would have been stupid and crazy anyway,... but this stupid and crazy? And then there's Rick Perry, with the same worries and the same solution: to out-Trump Trump:
Yeah, that's what we need, lots more guns, lots more insecure people, lots more macho idiots in movie theaters. That way, when they hear a shot - or some other loud noise, maybe - they can all draw their guns and start shooting, in a dark theater, at all of the other shadowy gun nuts who've brought their own weapons, too!
I grew up watching cowboy shows, but even in the wild, wild west, they didn't want random idiots wandering around town with ready weapons. Even in westerns, people weren't that stupid. When random idiots were armed, it wasn't a good thing. Most towns insisted that weapons not be carried inside city limits, except by the sheriff and his deputies.
But in a dark movie theater? Oh, that would be a great place to have a gun battle, wouldn't it? Of course, we need good guys with guns to shoot the bad guys with guns (especially in the dark, with no one knowing who fired the first shot), right?
Fun fact: Do you know how to tell a 'good guy with a gun' from a 'bad guy with a gun'? They're all good guys until they pull the trigger.
Dylann Roof was a 'good guy with a gun' until he killed nine people in a black church. Alex Kozak was a 'good guy with a gun' - and an "open-carry" promoter who carried his gun everywhere - before he shot Andrea Farrington three times in the back for refusing his sexual advances. George Zimmerman was a 'good guy with a gun' before he accosted Trayvon Martin for the crime of walking while black.
Retired cop Curtis Reeves was certainly a 'good guy with a gun' - and highly trained - before he shot Chad Oulson for texting his daughter in an earlier theater shooting. And both James Pullam and Robert Taylor were 'good guys with guns' - with their concealed-carry permits and everything - before they killed each other in a road rage incident which wouldn't have happened if they hadn't both been armed.
So it's very, very easy to tell a 'good guy with a gun.' If they haven't shot anyone yet, they're a 'good guy with a gun.' Simple, huh? (And if that doesn't that make you feel safe, maybe I should start talking about all of the accidental shootings in America...)
Now sure, this is Rick Perry. And sure, it's the GOP. I'm sure we all expected crazy. But this crazy? Again, this is the Trump effect, don't you think? Trump is stupid, crazy, and very, very loud, so he's taking the spotlight from the rest of the stupid and crazy GOP field. To a candidate like Perry, that has to change.
Rick Perry, and candidates like him, are desperate to be noticed, mostly so they can get into the debates. (Fox 'News' is letting only the top ten candidates - by poll numbers - into the debates, so with a crowd this big, a lot of them aren't going to make it.) With his crazy, bigoted comments, Donald Trump is actually leading the pack. You don't think the rest of them haven't noticed that?
However, they're not competing to be the internet clown of the day. They're not competing to be reality TV stars. They're not even competing for an upcoming show on Fox 'News' (well, some of them are, I suspect). They're competing to be the next President of the United States!
Is stupid and crazy really what we want? After all, we tried that during the Bush years, and America still hasn't recovered.
No, I thought this would be a lot funnier. Instead, I mostly just feel depressed.
After a while you begin to wonder; isn't there ONE adult in the Republican Party that has the authority (and the guts) to put his foot down and say "That's enough?" Are they that consumed with their own narcissism and lust for power?
Maybe Bill Maher was right; Republicans are children.
"Are they that consumed with their own narcissism and lust for power?" Yes, Jeff. Yes, they are.
This is the party which deliberately wooed racists for political gain - and continues to do so, even today. Republican politicians aren't all racist, but you wouldn't remain in the GOP unless you were OK with using racism for your own advantage.
As racists flocked to the Republican Party, people who found that 'Southern strategy' immoral and/or distasteful left it. What's left - among the leadership, at least - are people who are so concerned with their own narcissism and lust for power that they'll do anything. Anything.
Thanks for the link. Bill Maher gets it right, sometimes.
I'm a skeptic. I think it makes sense to have reasons for what I believe, so I apportion my belief to the evidence. You're welcome to disagree. Please, tell me I'm wrong. I probably don't agree with anyone about everything. Why should disagreement be a problem? Check the Pages section below for series posts and links to book reviews and game posts, as well as contact info. Unfortunately, I rarely blog at all, anymore. So don't expect new posts. - Bill
We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true. - Robert Wilensky
It doesn't matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn't matter how smart you are. If it doesn't agree with experiment, it's wrong - Richard Feynman
The general root of superstition is that men observe when things hit, and not when they miss, and commit to memory the one, and pass over the other. - Sir Francis Bacon
When a whole nation is roaring Patriotism at the top of its voice, I am fain to explore the cleanness of its hands and purity of its heart. - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Speculation is perfectly all right, but if you stay there you've only founded a superstition. If you test it, you've started a science. - Hal Clement
No matter how many times a theory meets its tests successfully, there can be no certainty that it will not be overthrown by the next observation. This, then, is a cornerstone of modern natural philosophy. It makes no claim of attaining ultimate truth. In fact, the phrase "ultimate truth" becomes meaningless, because there is no way in which enough observations can be made to make truth certain and, therefore, "ultimate". - Isaac Asimov
The government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion. - Treaty of Tripoli, passed unanimously by the U.S. Senate and signed by President John Adams (1797)
I don't doubt the sincerity of dowsers, but even after we've demonstrated that they can't produce results that are any better than chance they'll still go away believing in their abilities... It is like the mother whose son is caught shoplifting on tape. She wonders why someone would want to frame her child by producing a fake video. - James Randi
During many ages there were witches. The Bible said so. The Bible commanded that they should not be allowed to live. Therefore the Church ... imprisoned, tortured, hanged, and burned whole hordes and armies of witches, and washed the Christian world clean with their foul blood. Then it was discovered that there was no such thing as witches, and never had been. One does not know whether to laugh or to cry. - Mark Twain
Aristotle maintained that women have fewer teeth than men; although he was twice married, it never occurred to him to verify this statement by examining his wives' mouths. - Bertrand Russell
A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything. - Friedrich Nietzsche
I have been thinking that I would make a proposition to my Republican friends... that if they will stop telling lies about the Democrats, we will stop telling the truth about them. - Adlai E. Stevenson, Jr.
This is not about proof. Science does not use proof. We favor evidence, and the work consists largely of the slow accumulation of evidence in support of ideas, not magically potent proofs that establish an idea as unassailable. - PZ Myers
No, people don't expect government to solve all their problems. But they sense, deep in their bones, that with just a slight change in priorities, we can make sure that every child in America has a decent shot at life, and that the doors of opportunity remain open to all. - President Barack Obama
The formula was very simple: build this really flexible, really open economy, tolerate creative destruction so dead capital is quickly redeployed to better ideas and companies, pour into it the most diverse, smart and energetic immigrants from every corner of the world and then stir and repeat, stir and repeat, stir and repeat, stir and repeat. - Shekhar Gupta
We are prodding, challenging, seeking contradictions or small, persistent residual errors, proposing alternative explanations, encouraging heresy. We give our highest rewards to those who convincingly disprove established beliefs. - Carl Sagan
We are all atheists about most of the gods that societies have ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further. - Richard Dawkins
120 million of us place the big bang 2,500 years after the Babylonians and Sumerians learned to brew beer. - Sam Harris
To kill a man is not to defend a doctrine, but to kill a man. - Michael Servetus, burned at the stake in 1553
Democracy is not about majority rule; it is about minority rights. If there is no culture of not simply tolerating minorities, but actually treating them with equal rights, real democracy can't take root. - Thomas L. Friedman
We cannot absolutely prove that those are in error who tell us that society has reached a turning point, that we have seen our best days. But so said all who came before us and with just as much apparent reason. - Thomas Macauley, 1830
It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me, and I think that's pretty important. - Martin Luther King, Jr.
We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven into an age of unreason if we dig deep into our history and remember we are not descended from fearful men. - Edward R. Murrow
The deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence. Science is simply common sense at its best - that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic. - Thomas Huxley
There is no absurdity so obvious that it cannot be firmly planted in the human head if you only begin to impose it before the age of five, by constantly repeating it with an air of great solemnity. - Arthur Schopenhauer
Because religious belief, or non-belief, is such an important part of every person's life, freedom of religion affects every individual. ... Erecting the "wall of separation between church and state," therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society. - President Thomas Jefferson
To be elected in America, no matter from what party, the candidates have no choice but to year after year pledge to lower taxes further and further. We have become the nation of Ken and Barbie, looking good but very poor at the math. - Rack Jite
Invisible Pink Unicorns are beings of great spiritual power. We know this because they are capable of being invisible and pink at the same time. Like all religions, the Faith of the Invisible Pink Unicorns is based upon both logic and faith. We have faith that they are pink; we logically know that they are invisible because we can't see them. - Steve Eley
We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics. - President Franklin D. Roosevelt
I have been attacked by Rush Limbaugh on the air, an experience somewhat akin to being gummed by a newt. It doesn't actually hurt, but it leaves you with slimy stuff on your ankle. - Molly Ivins
In this world of sin and sorrow there is always something to be thankful for; as for me, I rejoice that I am not a Republican. - H. L. Mencken
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts. - Winston Churchill
Interview About Hal Clement
-
*Science Fiction Book Club*
*Interview with Paul Levinson (October 2024)*
*Our expert is Paul Levinson, a writer, singer-songwriter, and professor ...
Old Man vs. Front Lawn (Round 2)
-
by James Wallace Harris, 10/25/24 Like I said in the first round, I don’t
care about having a perfect lawn. I’m using converting my front lawn from
mostly ...
The SFF Blog
-
To all readers of my blog: I have decided that this will be my final post.
Not that I am about to expire in the near future (I hope) but I have become ...
Death!
-
Like nearly two thirds of Americans, as a young man I was in favor of the
death penalty. Since I lived in Nebraska, that was an easy position to
take - on...
Posts
2 comments:
After a while you begin to wonder; isn't there ONE adult in the Republican Party that has the authority (and the guts) to put his foot down and say "That's enough?" Are they that consumed with their own narcissism and lust for power?
Maybe Bill Maher was right; Republicans are children.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5vBPC3MF18
"Are they that consumed with their own narcissism and lust for power?" Yes, Jeff. Yes, they are.
This is the party which deliberately wooed racists for political gain - and continues to do so, even today. Republican politicians aren't all racist, but you wouldn't remain in the GOP unless you were OK with using racism for your own advantage.
As racists flocked to the Republican Party, people who found that 'Southern strategy' immoral and/or distasteful left it. What's left - among the leadership, at least - are people who are so concerned with their own narcissism and lust for power that they'll do anything. Anything.
Thanks for the link. Bill Maher gets it right, sometimes.
Post a Comment