What if we discovered that the attendants in a mental institution were reassuring patients that the aliens they were seeing were real? That they should listen to and believe the voices in their heads? At the very least, we’d wonder why–what nefarious scheme could account for actions clearly motivated to confirm inmates’ insanity?
The Guardian has raised a very similar set of questions, but about the GOP. It reports that groups tied to Donald Trump’s chief of staff and several party mega-donors are funding GOP candidates who champion the QAnon conspiracy theory.
Republican party leaders linked to the White House helped boost the primary campaign of a QAnon supporter with a history of making racist and bigoted statements, campaign finance filings show.
Campaign finance reports show contributions to QAnon supporter Marjorie Taylor Green’s campaign from groups connected to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and his wife, as well as the chairman of the board of the Heritage Foundation, the attorney who represented “Covington Kid” Nicholas Sandmann (aka “the smirking kid”) in his defamation suits against the Washington Post and CNN, and multiple Republican mega-donors.
“Getting involved in a primary on behalf of an absolutely insane, conspiracy-minded, explicitly racist candidate in a seat that is reliably conservative is mind-bogglingly irresponsible,” said Tim Miller, a former spokesman for the Republican National Committee who is now political director for Republican Voters Against Trump.
For readers who may not be familiar with QAnon, it’s a conspiracy theory rooted in age-old antisemitic tropes. Followers believe that Donald Trump is waging a secret battle against an evil cabal of Democrats, celebrities and billionaires who are engaged in pedophilia, child trafficking, and even cannibalism. The movement has repeatedly inspired vigilante violence–remember the guy who shot up the D.C. pizza. parlor?– and the FBI. has warned. that it represents a potential domestic terrorism threat.
A few high-profile Republican leaders spoke out against Greene after Politico unearthed and published videos of her making racist and. anti-Semitic statements, and the Koch Industries Pac requested a refund of an earlier donation. But her campaign continued to be backed by other major Republican donors and influential political leaders. The Guardian report lists a number of them, including a Pac run by Representative Jim Jordan, who has been dogged for years by allegations that he knew and did nothing to stop sexual abuse of student athletes at Ohio State University when he worked there in the 1980s and 90s.
Greene received $2,800 from John W Childs, the former chairman of JW Childs Associates who stepped down after being charged with misdemeanor solicitation in an investigation related to the suspected human trafficking sting that led to the arrest of New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft. Childs denied the charge at the time and said he had retained a lawyer. Kraft pleaded not guilty to two misdemeanor solicitation charges.
QAnon is reminiscent of other fringe movements in the Republican Party–the John Birch Society comes to mind. (Remember when the Birchers accused President Eisenhower of being a conscious Communist agent?)
The. other morning, Mike Pence was on CBS This Morning, and was asked about QAnon. He pretended to know nothing about it. Meadows has also professed ignorance of it. Those denials ring very hollow, leaving us with two possibilities: (1) having engaged in pedophilia and/or trafficking themselves, Greene supporters from the Trump cult (aka “projection-is-us”) actually believe in QAnon, or (2) they don’t believe in QAnon, but do believe that encouraging the racism, anti-Semitism, anti-Muslim bigotry that is at its core will help them win the election.
Either way, it’s a sad–and revealing– commentary on a once-respectable political party.
I see one benefit from Trump’s insane and dangerous thus far time in office; his open approval has uncovered and brought into the open entire groups of white supremacists, anti-Semites, neo-Nazis and unmasked (NO pun intended) individuals who have heretofore remained closeted to avoid public scrutiny. He has called out to his supporters to gather in large groups, many open carrying assault weapons, and labeled them his protectors of 1st and 2nd Amendments. He has also brought into the open many of his cronies who fund groups and individuals and his reelection campaign. It is always safer to know who our enemies are by their names and their faces.
Those “high profile Republicans” have offered lip-service before but, unlike John McCain, have voted to support Trump and his followers; whether inside this administration or supporting Trump’s reelection, the inmates are running this asylum. They were never more in evidence that the past four nights of what was dangerously called the Republican National Convention.
The anti-Semitism is going “ballistic” in the U.S. since it hasn’t been contested at its source in 50 years. I pointed this out to Terry a few days ago. Again, see paragraph 22 of our essay at http://www.Democracide.info.
Better late than never!
The “once respectable political party” should be called “Trumpublicans” from now on. The Republican Party I once proudly belonged to and believed in is no more.
Well, OF COURSE the wretches like Mark Meadows and Jim Jordan and Matt Gaetz, and…and…and… They are the driving forces of the ill-named Freedom Caucus, the cancerous outgrowth of the malignant, Koch-funded Tea Party. Now that these utterly corrupt and evil scumbags have formed the cult of Trump, the Republican party has no validity to anything it once stood for.
How’s that for Democracide, Marv? All it took was unlimited money to fuel a fascist takeover. What could possibly go wrong?
We need to remember what German anti-Semitism eventually brought forth to Nazi Germany. Although 300,000 Jews might have died, unfortunately, that led to millions of so-called Christians dying.
BUYER BEWARE!
Vernon,
Donald Trump is a racist, Jew-hating Fascist. When will that finally set in? Or will we remain in our “dream state” until the roof falls in?
I agree with JoAnn that it is good to know your enemy by face and name. But good Lord! The cost in human life so far! Men, women and children at the boarder, American soldiers in Afghanistan, protesters in Kenosha, worshipers in Temples, and the thousands of Covid 19 victims.
The Trump/Republican Party has a lot of blood on its hands.
But I keep reading accounts of suburban women (“housewives” as Trump calls them) who voted for Trump in ‘16, say they won’t vote for him in ‘20, but can’t bring themselves to vote for Biden because of his position on abortion. And I suspect most of them will either vote for Trump again or not vote at all.
If it were up to men Trump easily wins re-election, probably by a landslide. This election is in the hands of women of all colors of this country. One of those mothers just provided transportation to her son, who she raised to be a white terrorist, to and from the scene of protests where he indiscriminately gunned down three people.
I hope and pray enough women vote for democracy, and substantive democratic reforms, and against a totalitarian state run by a lying pathological narcissist and his heirs.
Marv I hope that 300,000 Jews that “might” have died was a typo and not an effort to down play the horror that was Nazi Germany. At least 20 times that many Jews were murdered due to Hitler. To say that 300,000 may have been killed is an insult to their memory and feeds antisemitic tropes
Trump is too obvious. He’s not going to wait for any election, he’s not that stupid. Just wait and see!
He’s a FASCIST plain and simple. The mask is off.
Why don’t we just wait around till the Russians and Chinese get together again? That might stop him.
For those who’ve bailed from the Republican Party, at least you found a political party that represents your beliefs. Those of us who are Progressives don’t have that luxury since there is no valid political party representing the people and the planet.
When corporate America backs both political parties, it’s a form of Fascism. Only when a so-called “authoritarian wanna-be” becomes, POTUS do we hear murmurs of “Fascism.”
However, a vote for either political party is a vote against the interests of the working classes. Neither party represents “We the people.”, but then again, neither party was supposed to represent the people. The Oligarchs wrote the constitution for themselves so that they would retain the power. Those who had the gold got to set the rules, so they devised a system to keep that intact, including the rights of Oligarchs to own slaves.
There was little interest in democracy then or now. It’s why the USA ranks 33rd in the world, according to the Democracy Index. Our military is being used to spread capitalism — not democracy. It’s NOT a defensive unit — it’s an offensive deployment.
As long as the Oligarchs force the people to choose between two Oligarchy-owned political parties, the people will continue to suffer. Once again, the evidence (dots) are available for anyone with an open mind (to connect).
For those who need help, I recommend this article from David Sirota, now an editor with Jacobin Magazine:
“As progressives are told to mute themselves, Team Biden last week publicly signaled that a new Democratic president might prioritize deficit reduction and budget austerity in the middle of an economic crisis — a move that is potentially deflating for millions of voters who have previously been told that President Biden’s agenda makes him the next FDR.
As progressives are told to keep quiet, Biden’s campaign leaks to Politico that the transition team building Biden’s prospective administration is being advised by Wall Street pal Larry Summers and former corporate super-lobbyist Steve Ricchetti.
And as progressives are told to muzzle themselves, corporate Democrats went scorched earth and spent $15 million to intervene in primaries, stymie progressive Democratic candidates, and tilt intraparty contests to business-friendly candidates. Meanwhile, House speaker Nancy Pelosi works to unseat Democratic senator Ed Markey, one of the Senate’s few progressive lawmakers, and to crush a spirited primary challenge to Rep. Richard Neal, who has used his committee chairmanship to block even modest health care reforms.”
https://jacobinmag.com/2020/08/joe-biden-rahm-emanuel-democratic-party-election
Marv,
I’ve been saying that about Trump- and many other things – since he came down the escalator. Trump is all the things you mention and much, much more. He is also a crime boss, a criminal and a psychopath. The list goes on. Getting him and his crime family into an orange jump suit is imperative to save the nation and the rule of law.
Patrick; your comment “can’t bring themselves to vote for Biden” has finally pushed me over the line I have been struggling to maintain. I don’t give a Fancy F*+k what any of them or any of you on this blog think of Joe Biden or what you thought of Hillary Clinton four years ago.
WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA? DO YOU WANT TO RETURN TO A LEVEL OF SANITY, WHETHER YOU LIKE THE CANDIDATE OR NOT, OR DO YOU WANT FOUR MORE YEARS OF THE ESCALATION OF DONALD TRUMP’S DICTATORSHIP? CONSIDER THE FACT THAT KEEPING HIM IN OFFICE THE NEXT FOUR YEARS COULD PUT THE CURRENT “REPUBLICAN” STRONGHOLD IN OFFICE FOR TWELVE MORE YEARS…AND ON, AND ON, AND ON. THINK PUTIN AND RUSSIA, THINK KIM JONG UN AND NORTH KOREA; THEN RETHINK JOE BIDEN IN THIS ELECTION.
You might also want to think back to Germany and the elections when Hitler was the only candidate and all Germans were forced to vote for him. Trump is doing everything in his power and beyond to try to stop all voters but those who are Republicans. The victims in Germany went beyond the Jews; they were Gypsies, blacks, foreigners, physically and mentally disabled, LGBTQs, anyone who disagreed with Hitler and the same list is used by Trump today. THINK, FOR GOD’S SAKE, THINK!
We need to “raise our strengths” to take on Trump. Those are the words of Aung San Suu Ky, she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 for her NON-VIOLENTstruggle for democracy and human rights in Myanmar (Burma).
Fortunately, some years back, I had a couple of hours with the sculpturer who was the artist who did the national statute of her. He was on a short visit to Jacksonville.
Vernon,
We have to reorganize into a COUNTERVAILING “Third Force.” That’s the only answer. If that’s successful, then a Biden victory in November will be worth something, if not he will only make matters worse.
Remember the Tea Party and Barak Obama? This time it won’t be the Tea Party, but the Fascist Party.
Jeff,
It might have been even more. Try to concentrate on the present instead of the past. That was a problem for the Jews in Germany. It helps not to make the same mistake over and over.
“…and feeds antisemitic tropes.”
What is feeding anti-Semitic tropes is the covering-up by the Anti-Defamation League, for over 50 years of the depths of anti-Semitism in the U.S., because of their tie-in with the massive funding for the State of Israel.
Marv,
That was then. This is now. Obama wasn’t trying to defeat a criminal. Obama wasn’t trying to save America from fascism…well, maybe a little.
Trump is a clear and present danger to our democracy and our Constitution. Trump is a festering carbuncle on the butt-end of humanity who is poisoning the bloodstream of our nation with every breath he takes.
Todd keeps whining about progressives not having a viable alternative. BUNK! The assurance of a Trump reelection is people not voting or, repeating the disaster of 2016, voting for a third party. Remember, third-party candidates received almost 3 million votes in 2016. Add that number to the almost 3 million more votes that Clinton got than Trump and you discover that the idiots in places like the Upper Peninsula of Michigan get the dictator they’ve always wanted.
Vernon,
We’ve never been on the same “wavelength.” Nothing has changed. I’m not talking about a THIRD PARTY in competition with Biden. I’m talking about a movement, a THIRD FORCE that will truly “speak truth to power before it’s too late. You have to go deeper than what is possible within America’s two-party system. And that’s not your thing. Your thing is mostly writing books which you do as well, or possibly better than anyone, but has shown not to be enough.
The Democratic Party alone can’t change anything. The Republican Party changed a lot when they had the help of the TEA PARTY. I still have to laugh, when I remember the Democratic Party had the help of the COFFEE PARTY, what a “bad joke.” I attended one of their meetings. I believe it might still be in existence.
Pardon me, but I need to walk over to the hospital, overlooking the beautiful St. John’s River, for a short, radiation treatment. ” I shall return,” in the words of General Douglas MacArthur.
The Oligarchs here in America will cheerfully fund the Rabid-Right Wing-Reactionary-Evangelical candidates. When the rubber hits the road they will vote for the 1% and Steroid Wall Street Crony-Capitalism, that all that counts. The Social Issues are used as distractions and stealth to get out the vote. Law and Order is another stealth issue, maintaining control is an absolute must for the Oligarchs.
The demonstrations across America must be deeply distressing to the Oligarchs. Thus the need to have these gun-toting militias walking around to maintain Law and Order. Right Wing Reactionary ideologies are especially appealing to the Rabid Right.
I have not read about it being confirmed but Kyle Rittenhouse, the 17-year-old from Illinois, who killed two people in Wisconsin was driven there by his mother. Illinois law requires anyone who owns any kind of firearm in that state to have a Firearm Owners Identification card, but that is only available to someone 21 or older, or someone with a sponsor who is 21 and eligible for a card. Under Wisconsin law, Rittenhouse, who is 17, was too young to legally posses the rifle he was alleged to have been carrying at the protests.
Already the Right Wing Reactionaries are rallying around Rittenhouse as simply defending himself. Left out of their convoluted defense is why a 17 year old teenager from Illinois would need to go to Wisconsin carrying a weapon.
Since Rittenhouse is a minor his parents maybe legally responsible for him in a Civil Case, in which event his parents should put their heads between their legs and Kiss their Assets Goodbye.
I wish this blog could accept images, at least images that pertain to the subject of discussion. I must show you what a real political painting relating to our subject today looks like? But, I am left with no option to accomplish that but a resort to a link.
Check out “Suicide by Administration” at https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Suicide-by-Administration/662664/7898138/view?fbclid=IwAR3cY-nnk5fCz-NrwBSztZ36enJrSu5eP_DOWO1qXAZFF0gCO3yeySF9TQI
Sixty-seven more of my political art pieces are viewable on https://www.snapfish.com/library/photos?website=snapfish_us&cobrand=snapfish&locale=en_US&fbclid=IwAR067PO5fknI2EvvqmxyC5kJ5y9esXGi45mQ4jHUwWZr_zUK2osse0mcOQE&lredirect_1=true
Are you all right, Marv? What’s this about radiation treatments? Back to the blog > You and Vern don’t disagree; you’re just talking about different things. A movement is not a political party and vice versa.. Thus an apple is not an orange, though both are fruits.
To change the subject > Much is being made of the some 1,500 guests who attended the last night of the RNC, aka Trump lovefest, to wit: that these maskless people and their presence within inches of one another will show up big time in about 15 days and that they will be sorry they took the advice of Trump over that of Fauci while struggling to breathe hooked up to a ventilator. While I agree, I think far worse that there will be perhaps hundreds of thousands more hooked up to ventilators among the watching audience who will have been influenced by such misconduct, and following such modeling, I expect a bump in our infection count and, ultimately, deaths. Thanks, Don. You sure know how to up the count. At the very least you could and should model behavior known to reduce the infection rate, and ultimately, death. How about coming in from your dreamworld to ours?
It seems to me we are living in a halcyon era when Trump, Pence, and Jordan, along with all the proud racists they have coaxed out of the closet since Trump started arguing that Obama was a Kenyan, still feel the obligation to argue that they are not racist and are anti QAnon. This era may soon morph into a period when they realize that there are enough racist votes “in the real America” that they can halt the hypocrisy, declare their feelings openly and still win elections. When the businessman/mayor of Pawleys Island tweets that BLM is a “terrorist organization,” he has made a careful calculation that he can spew redneck bile without hurting his local business or his political gig.
Trump’s visceral hatred for other races won’t stay bottled up much longer. Despite countervailing demographic trends, he may, at any moment, decide that the time has arrived to enlighten the rest of us about the attitudinal realities that allowed him to win the 2016 election and that don’t appear to affecting him too negatively in his current campaign. I hate saying this, but it looks possible that if it weren’t for his ham-handed handling of the coronavirus, he might now be leading in the polls. He has declared that the coronavirus is over, so stay tuned.
I hate even worse that the best arguments and most compelling Socratic logic ever produced will not be sufficient to alter the values that his kakistocracy promotes and his followers cling to.
Gerald,
Thanks for asking. On the positive side of my treatment, it allows me to have this great lunch at the hospital cafeteria and enjoy the view of the river. Plus, back and forth, it’s a ten-block walk.
I have a touch of Kaposi’s Sarcoma, it generally isn’t fatal. It’s much more dangerous with those suffering from HIV because of their immune system being so seriously compromised. I don’t have HIV but my immune system had been compromised somewhat back when I had my heart valve repaired, successfully, not replaced, about five years ago, and contacted a disease in the hospital called Ileus. It usually lasts 3-6 days, I had it for 10. That’s probably why I have the problem.
Before the AIDS epidemic, although very rare, the cancer was generally found among the Jews and others with genes from the Middle East. A very close friend was a professor of nursing at the time I was in the hospital five years ago, she warned me that the Ileus would probably cause complications later.
She was right. The cancer is on the bottom of my left foot. It’ll go away, permanently, after 15 days of treatment, but it can come back again somewhere else. The real danger to life is when the cancer becomes internal instead of external.
This is the third time I’ve needed to be treated. Probably not, but hopefully the last. But otherwise, for someone who is 83, I’m in very good health.
It must have come from eating Wheaties “The Breakfast of Champions” during my early youth.
Gerald,
“You and Vern don’t disagree; you’re just talking about different things. A movement is not a political party and vice versa.. Thus an apple is not an orange, though both are fruits”.
Good point.
We can’t defend the Jews, that’s up to them. On the other hand, we can fight Trump and his anti-Semitism, because it will, eventually, affect us all.
The Germans figured that out too late. I hope we have learned something from that debacle. But, I doubt it.
Hey, Marv, sounds like you will challenge Methuselah, who per scripture lived to be 969 years old, but a ten block walk with a sore foot? Ouch! Your telling me that you are 83, my junior by 10 years, reminds me of an 83 year old judge who was still smoking cigars that I knew. I was in his office one day and observed to him that everyone had to go, he had to go, I had to go etc., and I then asked him how he wanted to go, heart attack, cancer or whatever; and after a big puff on his cigar he said: “Jerry, I want to be shot by a jealous husband.”
I offer this anecdote publically in an attempt to offset the brutal reality of having a looney fascist at the helm in hopes that it will at least provoke a muffled guffaw.
Gerald,
“Jerry, I want to be shot by a jealous husband.”
Be careful. That’s getting a little close to home. In that regard, I offer the following from “Gag Rule: On the Suppression of Dissent and the Stifling of Democracy” by Lewis H. Lapham [one of my all-time favorite writers] (The Penguin Press, New York, 2004)p. 124:
“On more than one occasion in New York City over the last few years, while taking part in a public discussion of American foreign policy toward Israel, I’ve been informed by members of the audience that my opinions on the subject were worthless because I was not a Jew. When George Soros on November 5, 2003, informed an audience of Jewish philanthropists in New York that in Europe “there is a resurgence of anti-Semitism” and that the policies of the Bush administration “contribute to that,” his remarks were denounced, within a matter of days, by Congressman Eliot Engel (D.-N.Y.) as “ridiculous and outrageous” and “morally reprehensible.”
[This is the same Eliot Engel who was just ousted by Jamaal Bowman in a stunning upset back in July]
“Like all taboos, the one forbidding criticism of Israel DEFENDS THE PAST AGAINST THE FUTURE. The Pentagon’s cadre of high-ranking geopolitical strategists consists largely of fierce and visionary ideologues who make little distinction between the objectives of the BUSH administration in Washington and the SHARON government in Jerusalem, but requests for further clarification—and possibly a way out of the maze of bloodshed—invite the charge of bigotry. Jews who ask questions find themselves modified by the adjective “self-hating.”
Earlier in the late ‘8os, I led a movement to prevent Ariel Sharon from coming to Dallas at the invite of the then Mayor, Annette Strauss. We were successful in keeping him from entering the U.S. based on his involvement with the massacres at Sabra and Shatila at the refugee camp in West Beruit, Lebanon.
Sometimes, you just have to do the right thing and not worry about the retaliation. If not, the “bad guys” will always win and the “good guys and dolls” will always lose.
Well this explains the folks in Mt. Juliet, TN last weekend with posters stating things like pediphelia is not a disease and other weird things but this is the town where some church sent Roger Stone their tithe money for him to come and speak. Some spooky church on some windy country road that did get vandalized with spray paint stating to repent and fascists beware.
I keep hearing how Democrats cut up babies after they or born or will do forced abortions at 8 and 9 months. I have decided to put a Democratic donkey bumper sticker underneath a sticker from my church, just to piss off people since I have been told more tahn once that you can’t can’t be a Christian AND a Democrat. LOL
Gerald,
Just to keep the record straight, my foot doesn’t hurt. The sarcomas that I have experienced are smaller than a dime. The outward part, in this instance, had already been removed by my dermatologist, in order to send off for a lab test. It’s the inward core that has to be treated by the radiation. So far there has never been any pain associated with the problem.
The 10 blocks were just good exercise. I always need a good excuse.
Elaine,
Good luck!
Trump’s insanity has broken every rule of law and common decency to feed is gluttonous ego; using our tax dollars to destroy democracy and us in the process. His nepotism and crony based administration and the Republican Congress, along with his White Nationalist supporters, have united to accomplish Bannon’s “deconstruction” of our government and the Constitution. It is their unity that beat us in 2016 and their unity which is beating us today; it will beat us on November 3rd and beyond if we do not unite to stop them.
They have united with QAnon; because it is a smaller version of conspiracy theorists to add to Trump’s conspiracy to strengthen White Nationalism as the foundation of this nation. The Republicans presented and today maintain a united front with Trump beginning in 2015 when he slithered down that escalator. So; who are the insane ones as we flounder about as we did in 2016, unable to support the party nominee for the presidency.
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” Albert Einstein
Trump and Bannon “hijacked” the THEOCRATIC movement of both Bush presidents and went for FASCISM. The American society was ripe for that attempt, but it was not a realistic one, as all Trump can do is now is destroy, but not rule.
Using a Nazi playbook that was used against the Jews of Germany, who were less than 1% of the population, won’t work in a multi-racial society like the U.S. At the beginning, Adolph Hitler led the German nation forward out of the Depression, this fool has been leading us backward ever since he took control and is now faced with the destruction that will come from the Coronavirus pandemic.
He can’t defend against the TRUTH, but do we have the CIVIC COURAGE to “speak truth to power?” So far we haven’t. Maybe it’s impossible. The next few weeks will be telling