I often tell people that national American politics primarily about race, that no one cares about smaller government or individual rights or any of that crap, and that the proof of this is that white southerners voted overwhelmingly for Democrats before the Civil Rights era and now vote overwhelmingly for Republicans. This George Wallace quote tells you all you need to know:
“You know, I tried to talk about good roads and good schools and all these things that have been part of my career, and nobody listened. And then I began talking about niggers, and they stomped the floor.”
There’s other stuff around the edges, people like a good economy and dislike disastrous wars, but when it comes to basic party allegiances in the main, everything boils down to race and attitudes about it. The end.
The southern strategy was the smart move (Nixon was always smarter). But it was a strategy and let’s not pretend it’s a coincidence that the Republican party became dominated by white identity politics.
When I say this out loud in real life, anyone who has even a little bit of totebagger in them looks at me like I was Ward Churchill. I don’t mean just the “David Brooks has a good point” dead-enders, I mean even the moderate totebaggers (the ones we should arm).
So fuck all that “oh no, Donald Trump is such a sad turn for the party of Lincoln”. Atrios says it well:
You know, they haven’t actually been hiding it. Even that nice Mr. Brooks isn’t, you know, nice. Respectable demeanor is not the same thing as nice. They’ve been all about kicking the poors and the blahs and the gays and the whoever they can get the press to see as a “sides disagree” issue (are black people stupid? the two sides disagree) that week as long as I can remember. Trump just isn’t as well-trained and he does not give a fuck. There are plenty of reasons to dislike Trump, but most of those are reasons to dislike most Republicans. With Trump, the people who think they should and do run the country worry they’ll lose control. That’s the main difference.
germy
Our failed media experiment:
The Murdochs have decided to remove Roger Ailes
schrodinger's cat
David Brooks in his most recent op-ed blamed multiculturalism and globalization for the rise of Trump. Yes, really.
Cermet
Hammer, meet nail – you really nailed it. This country is all about race and trying to put blacks down – period. Soon, Hispanics will be lucky to join that club here in amerika.
JPL
When Pappa Bush signed the civil right voting act, Pence wrote an open against the law, so yeah, it’s all about race.
Shell
When I first saw this post’s title I was sure it was gonna be one of Betty Cracker’s. LOL
CONGRATULATIONS!
The most irritating part of this election has been watching the GOP repeatedly insisting that Donald Trump does not represent their values.
Which may be true in the sense that Mr. Trump likes fucking the poor, not killing them, so far as I can tell.
The main problem for the GOP – and the only likable thing about Trump in my eyes – is that finally, someone is not lying about what the GOP and their voters want. Rock on, Donald. You be you. Hopefully sanity prevails and you can go back to your TV show, but if not….hey. This time we at least know what we’re getting.
Major Major Major Major
When I mention this, I too get shooed away to a different crowd at the cocktail parties and other gatherings, for being impolite about the “other side”. At the other more raucous events I’m a neoliberal sellout corporate whore, so it’s quite confusing.
Republicans want to destroy the country for personal gain, and their racist voters are more than happy to enable them. That’s the basic dynamic in American politics.
JPL
Josh Barro has a good opinion piece at Business Insider. link Trump does not have self control.
RandomMonster
It’s a laugh-a-minute these days at places like Redstate, where they’ve convinced themselves that the people who voted for Trump are crossovers from the Democratic Party. It’s the same denialism as the the bullshit “the Nazis were left-wing” argument.
Doug!
@Major Major Major Major:
I think “both sides are neoliberal shills” and “both sides do it” are just two sides of the same narcissistic coin.
Doug!
@RandomMonster:
All in all, though, I respect RedState for continuing to hate Trump.
Matt McIrvin
@Major Major Major Major:
A lot of those people have a curious blind spot about race as well; they see it as a distraction from the class war, and any race-specific complaints as just taking the bait.
dmsilev
@schrodinger’s cat: I refuse to read Brooks. Was he trying to argue that “real Americans” were feeling threatened by anything less white than the political equivalent of Wonder Bread, and that Trump is a totally understandable backlash? Or was it somehow even worse than that?
Thornton Hall
Politics in the US is about two interrelated things:
1. Race
2. Urban vs Rural
The Rurals and the Blacks have the same interest in generous govt, but the Rurals hate the blacks.
liberal
@Doug!:
Huh? The Democrats, by and large, are neoliberal shills. Certainly Obama and Hillary are. That doesn’t mean that the Republicans aren’t far, far more evil.
Cermet
@Major Major Major Major: No, the low information thug voters don’t want to destroy the country; they just want Ni”Chang” … I mean black gentlemen put back in their place. If it means savage cuts to welfare, medicaid, chips and so on – fine. WE know we will be treated different. AS for the 0.001% making bank, that’s ok because the Ni”chang” get what they deserve. If these voting thugs really knew what was coming – for real – no, they’d not vote that way but 1) they can’t really understand whats going on 2) the people they “trust” feed them endless bull shit and 3) what is happening to them sucks and its not being addressed. I’d pity them except they will destroy use with their stupidity and racist need to hurt Ni”chang”. Damn bell ….
NorthLeft12
We just went through a similar experience here in Canada. The Cons got turfed [soundly] when the level of disgust reached a critical point, and people began to seriously look at where our country was headed under the Cons. Mr. Trudeau called out the Cons on a number of issues that embarrassed a large number of Canadians and pointed us towards a better, though not easier way.
The fight is not over, but I feel a lot better about Canada and the direction we are headed, than I did about four years ago.
Tom Levenson
Yes, yes, one thousand times yes.
I read the Tom Nichols NYT magazine piece that commenter MattF referred to in a recent thread. Good for Nichols for being never Trump all the way through to a vote for Clinton. But when he talks about the conservatism that we liberals just don’t get, I have to ask just what he means. Because conservatism on the ground, in power, executing governmental action is as Doug! describes: a way to persuade working and middle class whites to band together against their own interest to defend themselves from the threat of the black, the brown, the gay, the urban, the everyone else…and in so doing sell their own sorry selves out to the worst people in the world.
I wish it weren’t so, but look at Kansas; look at Wisconsin; look at South Carolina and so on, and tell me that ain’t the way it is.
dmsilev
@RandomMonster: In fairness, Trump’s core support comes from the group we used to call Reagan Democrats, so they did cross over from the Democratic Party. 36 years ago.
maurinsky
White supremacy is a prime ingredient of this nation. I don’t think any rational person can argue otherwise.
Aleta
A 2 1/2 minute video from the youtube channel of the Atlanta Black Star news organization.
slag
Remember that, with Republican daddies, gender is a big deal too. We must maintain the natural order of things and keep everyone in their proper places. In other words, uppity is the new black.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@liberal: you keep on keepin’ it real, little radical, you keep on typing with commitment and your very sincere feelings. You’ll change this world yet.
Stan
“I often tell people that national American politics primarily about race, that no one cares smaller government or individual rights or any of that crap,…”
Not just at the national level. Here in my home city, every issue is decided on racial lines. Property taxes? There is an obvious racial fault line. Every element of public school policy (school enrollment zones, hiring of senior staff, class size, level of taxation, even class offerings) is racially divided. Trash taxes? racial divide. Almost all neighborhoods are segregated, and the ones that aren’t are diverse only because they are in transition.
I’ll say again – I think we’d be better off if it was illegal for white people to vote for a few decades.
Loviatar
The man who is third in line for the Presidency said this last week:
‘Openly racist’
Ryan’s tough spot was made clear when he was pressed by Zachary Marcone, a Republican who said he couldn’t support Trump because he is “openly racist.”
“Can you tell me, how can you morally justify your support for this kind of candidate?” Marcone asked.
In his answer, Ryan never disputed Marcone’s characterization of Trump as “openly racist.” Instead, Ryan responded that by failing to support Trump, “That basically means you’re going to help elect Hillary Clinton — and I don’t think Hillary Clinton is going to support any of the things that you stand for if you’re a Republican.”
—
#nodifference
gogol's wife
@germy:
лучше поздно, чем никогда
RandomMonster
@Doug!:
Agree. A few even claim they’ll vote for Hillary, which is encouraging, though most still want to get their Hillary-hate on…
gogol's wife
@germy:
Cyrillic makes my comments disappear, so I’ll transliterate it: Luchshe pozdno, chem nikogda
Doug!
@Stan:
At some local levels, too, just not all.
RandomMonster
@dmsilev: Entirely good point — and they came over because Reagan had the dog whistle down with his Welfare Queens and Young Bucks.
rikyrah
Why Journalists Should Be Concerned About the Trump/Pence Ticket
by Nancy LeTourneau
July 18, 2016 11:51 AM
David Mindich is seeing a “Murrow moment” for journalists with the Trump candidacy.
………………….
Trump began his attempts to silence the media by throwing Jorge Ramos out of a news conference for asking a question he didn’t like. That eventually turned into a blacklist of media outlets that were banned from his events. The list eventually grew to include Univision, Buzzfeed, Politico, The Daily Beast, Huffington Post, The Des Moines Register and the Washington Post.
Perhaps even more disturbing is Trump’s proposal to loosen libel laws in order to make it easier for him to sue media outlets for reporting he doesn’t like. Callum Borchers explains how that could happen.
Trollhattan
@NorthLeft12:
Trump is generally repellent to women in his special swinging ’70s way, now Pence doubles down by being repellent in the utterly doctrinaire conservative-fundy way. Given all the de facto anti-Trump votes he’s gathered in the last year from various other cohorts I just don’t believe there are enough doooods left to push that ticket over the top.
With all that said, don’t cancel your wall just yet. We have months more surprises ahead before November.
rikyrah
Does Trump Have a Ceiling at 42%?
by David Atkins
July 17, 2016 2:53 PM
A slew of new national polls are out today showing Clinton with a modest but substantial lead over Donald Trump going into the conventions. It’s important, of course, not to put too much emphasis on national polling right now even in the aggregate. But the new numbers do make an interesting suggestion about the state of the race.
It’s obvious that Clinton has an advantage somewhere in the mid-single digits. We also know that regardless of the national numbers, Trump faces a steep uphill climb in the electoral college. But the upper bound number that demands attention in the latest three polls.
First is the ABC/Washington Post poll showing Clinton ahead of Trump by four: 47% to 43%
Second is the CNN/ORC poll giving Clinton a 7-point edge: 49% to 42%.
Third is the NBC/WSJ poll with Clinton beating Trump by 5: 46% to 41%.
On election day one of the candidates will reach 50% barring an unusually high number of third party votes. Both candidates will see their numbers rise as disaffected and undecided voters come home.
gogol's wife
@rikyrah:
“After months of holding back, modern-day journalists are acting a lot like Murrow, pushing explicitly against Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.”
Who? Nobody on TV, that’s for sure.
pamelabrown53
@NorthLeft12:
I’d love to hear about the specific issues on which Trudeau called out the cons and “embarrassed a large number of Canadians”. Do you think we could do the same here or ,IYO, are too many of us Americans are incapable of feeling embarrassed?
lollipopguild
@slag: Uppity is any person in America who does not know their place and stay in it. Only White Conservative Males are allowed to have any real power. Why? Because!
Roger Moore
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
They keep saying how awful he is, but they’re going to vote for him anyway. I guess the (R?) after his name is more important than actually agreeing with him.
rikyrah
What We Can Learn From Minnesota’s Racial Divide
by Nancy LeTourneau
July 18, 2016 9:02 AM
I have not been shy about taking the opportunity to humble-brag about my home state of Minnesota. For example, during the Republican presidential primary when a lot of eyes were on Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, I took the opportunity to compare the results of his state’s conservative trajectory with what happened in Minnesota under Democratic Governor Mark Dayton. I didn’t mention it here, but recently the Annie E. Casey Foundation released their annual “Kids Count” report and listed Minnesota as the best state in the country to raise a child. I’ll simply note as an aside that the person who is most often noted as the one who initially launched what became known as the “Minnesota Miracle” back in the 1970’s – Governor Wendell Anderson – died yesterday.
But the shooting of Philando Castile on the heels of that of Jamar Clark raise the specter of something happening in this state that is unaccounted for in all of that success. Taylor Gee looks into that and asks the question, “what is Minnesota’s secret to success?” Gee says, “The secret is you have to be white.” And this state has a lot of white people: according to the 2010 census – 85%.
The dirty little not-so-secret truth about Minnesota is that – for the relatively few people of color who live here – the racial disparities are larger than those in most every other state. That includes measures related to education, income, employment and the criminal justice system. It’s important to keep something in mind about that: a disparity compared to white people who are doing better than those in most every other state can mean actually doing better than people of color who live in states where outcomes are bad for everyone. But the reality is that Minnesota has a serious problem when it comes to the racial divide. And I can assure you that there is no shortage of talk focused on what to do about that.
hovercraft
@germy:
I’ll believe that when it actually happens, when Rupert handed the day to day functions of News Corp to the kids, there was talk of them ditching him, but dad overruled them. He won’t ditch him unless he endangers the company itself. (DNRTA)
Hillary Rettig
LBJ: “If you can convince the lowest white man that he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll even empty his pockets for you.”
Major Major Major Major
@Thornton Hall: yes. This.
Timurid
@Thornton Hall:
3. Religion
catclub
@JPL:
who knew? I also just found out that John McCain was a POW.
schrodinger's cat
@dmsilev: Yeah pretty much and he had buried it towards the end of the op-ed.
sukabi
@CONGRATULATIONS!: while exposing the slime to light is important, I’d like to see trump FIMALLY get what he deserves, a nice quiet cell to himself.
rikyrah
Bullshyt.
He is totally their values.
Bob2
I’ve wondered why no one’s pulled a Swiftboat type thing or Joe the Plumber thing (not a perfect analogy) on Trump yet considering how many small businesses he screwed over due to nonpayment.
I mean, how hard would it be to get a few of these guys in commercials or on speaking tours explaining what Trump did to them.
Hell, Chris Christie might even want in on this.
catclub
@Trollhattan:
So does this increase the odds of a warren VP pick? Or make it even less necessary for Clinton to make extra appeals to women?
Iowa Old Lady
I’ve convinced myself Trump is unlikely to be elected, so I want to enjoy pointing and laughing. Unfortunately, even if he’s not elected, he’s thrown a lot of poison into the national conversation, and that’s still going to be there convincing people that they have every right to be racist, sexist, whatever. He’s like Fox News in that way. IMHO, they’ve damaged the country immeasurably.
ETA: IOW, what Josh Barro said in the link given upthread.
catclub
@germy: Important if true. Unless the when is – as soon as he strokes out.
Trollhattan
@germy:
I have a suggestion for Ailes’ final exit from Fox involving Gretchen Carlson, a length of chain and a gold lamé bikini. Make it so!
What Uberasshole will replace Ailes? Deep bench over there.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
OT: I should be past being shocked by now, but it continues to astound me that not one VSP has ever noticed how utterly moronic, just plain fucking stupid, John McCain and his foreign policy views are. This makes no fucking sense, and he’s treated like a soldier-statesman.
President McCain would have had boots on the sands of the Côte d’Azur and Paul Bremer in the proconsul’s suite at the Negresco. Actually it’s even dumber than that. 100,000 American military in Iraq would have prevented an attack in the South of France.
catclub
@Bob2:
Nope, Christie’s only hope of a future job in politics is not Governor of NJ or Senator from NJ, so it has to be something like AG in a Trump admin.
rikyrah
@Hillary Rettig:
Clinging to the Whiteness.
catclub
@Trollhattan:
Paul Manafort would be my best guess.
sukabi
@germy: actually, this is progress…. if Ailes falls it’s only a matter of time before the Hannity, O’Reilly and the rest are either given an ultimatum to straighten up or leave…
The down side to that is a moderated message of hate is still hate, just harder to spot.
C.S.
@Hillary Rettig:
Another Texan said the same thing, but set it to music:
“Because everybody’s gotta have somebody to look down on
Someone to feel better than at any time they please
Someone doin’ something dirty decent folks can frown on
If you can’t find nobody else, then help yourself to me.”
rikyrah
@Hillary Rettig:
When all you’ve had to hang your hat on is:
” Well, at least I’m not a Nigger.”
And, then Barack Obama is elected President, and the answer to the question:
” What do you call the President of the United States?”
is Nigger….
you are SHOOK.
Your entire worldview has been upended.
and, then, the fact that President Obama has been so utterly COMPETENT in office..
drives them CRAZY.
catclub
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I suspect they will not point that out about Mike Pence, either. Matt Yglesias had a fairly famous post years ago about him. There are actually multiples in this vein.
Ruckus
@Trollhattan:
This.
It’s not like they are going to ask Obama to come in and clean up the place when his current gig is done.
Gin & Tonic
@Iowa Old Lady:
Imagine an “October Surprise” like this: anonymous hackers release a list of USA intelligence assets in Russia and Ukraine purportedly hacked from HRC’s e-mail server. A formerly obscure Jewish businessman ends up loudly and publicly dead in London the next week. Despite the fact that the list was compiled and released covertly by the FSB, and despite HRC’s vehement denials that it was accessed from her system, her support tanks.
catclub
Better link to Mike Pence is an idiot posts.
hovercraft
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
The media has a vested interest in maintaing this charade, if they call the republicans out on their racism they will be written off as too liberal. Yes the gop already claims they are, but they know that their not, they just use the claim as an excuse to discount any criticism from the media. It’s a game, the media bend over backwards to prove they are fair by giving them more than the benefit of the doubt, the gop cries louder about bias, so the media goes harder after democrats to prove their fairness. Remember that since facts have a liberal bias the gop has proof that the media is liberal, so in order to avoid their liberal bias the media must report both sides of the debate to prove their neutrality. Meanwhile democrats pointing out gop racism and race based policy are asked to prove the gop intent before their accusations can be taken seriously. So when democrats accuse the gop of suppressing the minority vote, the media wants proof that this is a deliberate attempt at minority voter suppression, republicans accuse Hillary and Obama of killing four in Benghazi, and the media treats the 9 investigations as legitimate fact finding exercises, they must prove their innocence, and will never be cleared with out that proof.
With the gop and the media the gop is innocent until proven guilty, and democrats are guilty till proven innocent. Nice standard if you can get it.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@catclub: sticking with Iraq, Pence first came to my attention when he accompanied Senators C Montgomery McCain and Lindsey Smithers to Bagdad, where to prove how the Surge had worked they went, wearing helmets and bullet-proof vests, to a market patrolled by American troops, with snipers on surrounding rooftops and (IIRC) heavily armed helicopters circling, and Pence declared it was just like a farmers’ market back home in Hanover, Indiana.
catclub
@schrodinger’s cat: And I would agree that the rise of Trump is due to the reaction of people who feel threatened by that globalization and multiculturalism. Is that what Brooks wrote?
Splitting Image
@schrodinger’s cat:
He’s right though. If women and blacks still acted as though they knew their place, white males would not be feeling such a need for a white knight to put said people back in their place.
One could perhaps articulate a position that blames white males for having unrealistic expectations of women and blacks (not to mention gays, lesbians, Jews, Muslims, immigrants, etc., etc.) but if the conservative movement has taught us anything, it’s that everything bad that happens in the universe is somebody else’s fault.
catclub
@Splitting Image: It is funny that Black lives Matter is never blamed on white racists. It just appeared out of nothing.
Seth Owen
@Bob2: @Bob2: @Bob2: @Bob2: already seen some on the Internet. I think Democrats are holding back the most damaging ones to use later.
Tenar Darell
@Iowa Old Lady: I read the New Yorker Jane Meyer piece followed by the Buzzfeed McKay Coppins piece. It was like reading one continuous article showing how Trump’s ego only grew from the 1980’s until now. (I felt like I was reading evidence that anyone who thought that Trump would “settle down and move to the center” for the general election was smoking something).
aimai
I had a huge fight, a few years ago (probably during the last election come to think of it) about the history of voter suppression by white elites in this country and, specifically, the Republicans. It was with a really famous channel four presenter from the UK and one of his buddies who had just met Haley Barbour and was really impressed with Haley Barbour’s opinion about things. My jaw hit hte floor, and I hit the roof, trying to explain about the KKK, CCC, and Haley Barbour and the Republican party–and this to a guy who has made his living in the news business, is a friend of Joe Klein, and passing familiar with the US political scene. “But (aimai)” he kept saying to me ” you seem to be describing a dystopian, almost fascist, state!” I couldn’t manage to unpack all the ways he just didn’t understand how federal/state racism and electoral shit work in this country. But its not like its been hiding anywhere–its just that to outsiders it can seem weird the way at one moment (say, reconstruction or periods of post CRA democratic power) the federal government can seem like the answer to our problems and, at another (post reconstruction, republican governance) the federal government can work to actively suppress black votes, women’s votes, student votes–everyone’s votes.
Mike J
@Timurid:
Nobody in America votes based on religion unless it’s being used as a way to reinforce hierarchies. Keeping women, black people, and gay people in their places.
Mary G
They aren’t even trying to hide it anymore. GWB always had a few tokens around, like Condi Rice, but that photo of the Republican interns with Paul Ryan yesterday was Alabama in the 50s white.
Timurid
@Gin & Tonic:
The worst case October Surprise would be a mass casualty terror attack on white civilians by somebody claiming to represent blacks/people of color. That would be an order of magnitude worse than a similar attack by ISIS/Al Qaeda/random right wing nuts, because this time, for whites, it would be personal. The panic and hysteria would rival that after 9/11, even if the actual casualties were far lower.
I seriously doubt that there is any group out there organized enough to pull off a Paris-style attack. Groups like the NBPP are mainly criminals using political ideology as cover. Starting a jihad would be bad for business (see also; Brotherhood, Aryan). But lone wolves can still be very, very deadly, as in Oslo, Orlando, Nice, etc.. And lone wolves tend to feed off of and inspire each other.
This kind of event is still very unlikely, but may be slightly more likely after the events of the last two weeks. And it’s maybe the one ‘black swan’ big enough to get Trump elected…
raven
@Hillary Rettig: Fuck LBJ.
SiubhanDuinne
@Tenar Darell:
I did the same. In fact, I read the first McCay Coppins piece (from February 2014) before I read his update. So three long-form articles basically tracking Drumpf from the ’80s to the present day.
C.S.
@raven: You take that back!
SiubhanDuinne
@Mary G:
Ah, yes, that picture. Finally, we know who’s who.
catclub
@SiubhanDuinne: And the right wing is convinced that Barack Obama is completely self-absorbed, but does not notice it in Trump.
Iowa Old Lady
I know we’re annoyed at Colbert, but he was tossed out of the R convention arena this morning after he seized control of the podium in a blue wig and delivered a Hunger Games speech.
catclub
@SiubhanDuinne: I have my suspicions about those names.
Jeffro
@schrodinger’s cat:
Dmsilev, you have to read Brooks, the man has raised disingenuousness to such an art form, it’ll take your breath away. Right before you rip your Times to shreds. He’ll say anything to distract people from what is a very clear choice: if Trump is the end of community, civility, etc etc – all these things that Brooks supposedly cares oh so very much about – then just. vote. for. Clinton.
How much does an ad in the NYT cost, anyway? If I hit Powerball Wednesday, I’ll spell it all out for ol’ DB
catclub
@SiubhanDuinne: I have my suspicions that some of those names might be made up.
I laughed.
scav
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Best I can figure, the first sentence there is merely the trite universally acknowledged military wisdom is that willing wars is always necessarily followed by permanent occupation and pointed ignoring all promises made in treaties or otherwise. The second sentence might might be a glimmr of recognition and self-awareness that Mccain might only be spouting this view for a short period but reserves the right to babble something utterly different when it best serves him. Or, that his other beef with President Obama that he doesn’t have knee-jerk, but blissfully quick, reactions to complex situations. Which together sort of works out to “Hit ’em quick and never leave, yeeeee-haw!”
Given that two of the recent shooters (or more, depending on definition of recent) have been ex-military, I suppose his plan of keeping US boots on the ground permanently over there may in fact result in fewer shootings (and occupations) over here. Or Something.
Nah, basically a mess. A.K.A. plain fucking stupid, but sometimes it’s just good to double-check the addition.
Trollhattan
@raven:
The wait killing me, thanks!
NorthLeft12
@pamelabrown53:
1. Our inaction regarding accepting refugees, particularly Syrians.
2. Our inaction regarding climate change. For people who pride themselves on our love of the outdoors, this stung.
3. Our abandonment of peace keeping policies to active bombing and occupation.
4. Cuts to the Health Care and Canada Pension programs. More of the “we can’t afford these programs” philosophy.
5. Poor treatment of the aboriginal population in Canada.
The HarperCons were pointing towards a bleak and austere future that very few were interested in. The Cons still got their 30% of the vote and they are the official opposition, but Trudeau and the Liberals got a very large majority.
Bob2
@catclub: That was a joke. Watching Christie get neutered by Trump in public was amazing.
@Seth Owen: Oh I’m sure they’re saving it til after the convention and into August and September, but really there’s no reason to wait.
jake the antisoshul soshulist
@schrodinger’s cat:
He is right in the sense that white nationalist backlash is caused by “multiculturalism”.
Doug R
@pamelabrown53: Conservatives tried to make the fact that some women wear the niqab an issue. The NDP stumbled and Trudeau slid right in with just the right tone.
Fair Economist
@Bob2:
Quite a few have come forward. Some were even mentioned by Hillary by name. The media ignores it.
Your liberal media at work.
Ridnik Chrome
@sukabi: I read somewhere that Murdoch’s kids don’t like Ailes and wanted him out even before this business with Carlson came out.
ruemara
@aimai: I have found most of the UK/EU pundits fall under the sway of the “but they couldn’t be that bad, they were nice to me” reasoning.
gogol's wife
@Iowa Old Lady:
Really?
Doug R
@Doug R: The issue being wearing the full head covering during the citizenship ceremony. The fact that these women were willing to show their faces to the officials in private was something I think the Cons were hoping would get drowned out in the outrage.
John Revolta
@scav: The first sentence is also a complete lie. Obama in fact wanted to keep some troops over there and the Iraqis said no, we got this, don’t let the doorknob hitcha. God forbid someone should call Gramps out on his bullshit.
Iowa Old Lady
@gogol’s wife: Yup. Take a look.
D58826
@scav:
Actually a total mis-representation. It’s not a lie because Obama did order the troops out but only because
1. the freely elected democratic (remember the purple fingers?)Iraqi government wanted us GONE
2. a status of forces agreement signed by W (remember the flying shoe)requiring all troops be out by the end of 2011.
slag
@SiubhanDuinne: That photo will come in handy when it comes time to identify Brooks Brothers (part two) rioters.
Cat48
Trump is blaming Hillary for all the violent acts. She evidently told Obama what to do bc he was too stupid ( I guess bc he’s black??). That’s a horrible piece of fiction since Hillary left 4 yrs ago. I guess their just going to lie their way thru the convention. It started last night with Manafort with his lie as to why the FBI didn’t arrest her. I really hate,people who continually lie. He has so many pants on fire Fact Checks, I don’t know how they have the strength to do anymore fact checks. I don’t know how to get thru this shit. I don’t think I have strong enough medication to get thru the next few months. Woe is me.
Marc McKenzie
@liberal: Ah, no. Just no.
But thanks for playing the “both sides” game–too bad that 1) it’s stupid and 2) it has been proven wrong time and time again.
Suzanne
Mediocre rich white dudes know that they are losing their role as the leaders of this country in every arena—government, business, culture, academia—and they’re pissed about it. The GOP has been one of their vehicles for dominance, they used it to protect their position, and it’s clear that their dominance is over. They no longer drive the bus. Oh well. You had a good run while it lasted, MRWDs.
I don’t see any sense in pretending that their anger was ever about anything more high-minded. They had the cookies. Now they have to share the cookies. Toddlers don’t like sharing.
Jeffro
@catclub:
9th row, and the first name of the 10th row…omg…
scav
@John Revolta: @D58826: Of course they’re lies, I was just playing with the internal logic for shits and giggles. Building a house with vodka Jello and broken DVDs is probably a bad idea, but then using the plans for a crocheted sweater doesn’t improve the situation.
schrodinger's cat
@catclub: He went further, he said it was an understandable and a legitimate reaction.
catclub
@Fair Economist: I think part of the problem is the huge array of possible lines of attack.
Obama culled it down to one theme against Romney, but I wanted to see more, and varied! But I am not the target of those ads.
So far it looks like the ‘Trump is unsteady or scary when it comes to foreign policy’ is the main line they are pushing.
Not failed businessman. Or big businessman cheats small businesses. Or congenital liar. Though they have touched on all those.
I sure other people have their favorites.
catclub
@schrodinger’s cat: Understandable is ok. Legitimate isn’t. Fair enough.
gogol's wife
@Iowa Old Lady:
It doesn’t speak well for their security arrangements!
Revrick
@liberal: For crying out loud, “neoliberal” has become just another piece of namecalling with little substance attached.
Neoliberals are all for deregulation. Obama, through the ACA and Dodd-Frank has greatly increased regulations in two of the biggest parts of our economy. Hillary proposed what essentially passed in 2007-08 as part of her campaign, including a slew of financial regulations.
Neoliberals are for free trade. Well, guilty there…except every single Democratic President since Andrew Jackson has been in favor of free trade. The Whigs were the ones who wanted to impose tariffs.
Neoliberals want to cut taxes. Bill Clinton and Barack Obama hiked taxes on the top earners.
Neoliberals want to slash the welfare state. While it’s true, that Bill Clinton agreed to the Republican bill ending the AFDC entitlement, he also got CHIP and a vast expansion of EITC. And let’s be honest. Democrats were getting killed on AFDC. (See it’s all about the race, bout the race, bout the race). I remember hearing bitter comments in my white, working class neighborhood as a kid back in the 50’s about welfare, and even I knew what was meant.) Meanwhile, Obama has vastly expanded Medicaid via the ACA.
It seems to me that the “neoliberal” insult centers around a fetishistic worshipping of Glass-Steagall, which, by the way, even JFK’s Comptroller of the Currency wanted to unwind.
polyorchnid octopunch
@pamelabrown53: I’ll hop in on that. Let me put it to you this way; I recently commented to some US friends on a private form about the Cons (hello there fellow IWTHMers!) What I said was something along the lines of “they’re not handling the loss of power very well. They’re not exactly covering themselves in glory here, unless by covering themselves in glory you mean getting some on themselves as they jerk off to ragegasm about their old bugaboos muslims and first nations.”
In the last federal election, the bigot contingent made their big play and got their ass handed to them. What they didn’t understand is that outside the very thinly populated rural areas of Canada are a whole bunch of white people who have grown up knowing muslims and first nations folks now and we don’t buy their bullshit (oh, and Roma… they took a real run at justifying the political selection of who is and is not a refugee by trying to say Hungary was a safe country, and that the Roma seeking refugee status were just a bunch of thieves looking for easier pickings in Canada anyway).
We still have some major issues around how the state wants to use its power to selectively silence people on the Israel/Palestine issue, but I’m hoping that over time that will end up working out all right. I just keep pointing people to the article that Desmond Tutu wrote about Israeli apartheid with the comment that “I suspect that guy knows apartheid from apartheid”.
Such shitstains those guys. If you’d like to get a flavour, go google up “The Rebel” and Ezra Levant. We’ve got our crazies up here, but they’re far more on the margin now that the last election when they made their play they woke up a bunch of folks who hadn’t really been paying attention to what racist misogynist bigots they actually were.
Jeffro
@D58826:
True on both counts, and what’s more:
3. Hey media – remember who got us in that mess in the first place? No matter how badly anyone sees Obama handling us departing, he’s not the one who put our troops there in the first place.
4. Hey media, hey GOP: exactly how long did you want us to stay over there, anyway? (And related…you’re okay with your kid serving in Iraq, right?)
NorthLeft12
@pamelabrown53: As to the second part of your question, I don’t know enough Americans to say whether the obvious racism, bigotry, and greed has embarrassed them or motivated enough of them to effect actual change. Seems to me that your society is actually changing, but whether that is because of a change of heart, or just changing demographics is better answered by Americans.
glory b
@raven: yeah, so what.
Even a blind squirrel finds a nut every now and then.
Thornton Hall
@Timurid: Religion is just another way to say “not urban”.
Matt McIrvin
@NorthLeft12: A while back there was a study that got a lot of attention showing that white millennials and white GenXers were really only slightly less racist than white Boomers.
That was the headline, but the thing that I found interesting was that it found a big difference between Boomers and the “Silent Generation” who preceded them; the Silents who grew up before the 20th century civil rights movement were way, way more racist. And some of them are still around and voting, though they’re dying off. I think they actually comprise a lot of the most intractable Fox News Geezers.
So to the extent that white Americans are getting less racist, I think that’s part of it, and then there’s also the fact that younger generations are just much less white.
bupalos
Tuned in for just a bit of the Republiclan convention, just because having been in there mucho on much happier occasions I wanted to see how the Q was decked out and whether Lebron left any steamers there for the “delegates” to step in.
They paraded out a couple really horrible speakers, and the crowd starts chanting “we want TRUMP, we want TRUMP!!” This is going to be a pack of rabid raccoons when stuff gets going. They let the guys from Guam say something and I swore they were just trying to mock people with funny accents, but I guess that was legit. But you know half those “delegates” are launching credential challenges on those guys after hearing supposed real true murkican republicans talking funny-like, and they’re feeling even more that WE WANT TRUMP WE WANT TRUMP!!!
Seeing an arena of folks chanting that really brings this ?@!# home. This is a disaster. Then they bring out the first and only non-white person I saw in any camera shot and it’s some kind of firebrand SC minister to deliver a hell and brimstone “prayer” about please Jesus protect Trump HE LOVES JESUS AND HILLARY CLINTON IS THE ENEMY….” Not in any kind of “love and forgive your enemy” kind of way, but more like “please smite our enemy” kind of thing.
Klown
Here’s a couple other quotes by Wallace:
sukabi
@Ridnik Chrome: yeah, think a few years ago when the old man was getting ready to start handing over the reigns there was a bit of drama over Ailes..
sukabi
@catclub: did you see the tweet storm Warren brought down on the Trumppence ticket the other day? She’s bringimg the BIG ARTILLERY.
J R in WV
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Not only that, but the fact is that the Bush administration negotiated an agreement with the Iraqi government that specified how the number of US troops in country were to be reduced.
So to blame Obama is to tell a huge lie. He would have needed a new agreement with Iraq to keep additional troops in country, and the Iraqis were not willing to do that.
I’ll stop now, and going on would be off topic – McCain is not a national candidate, needs to work hard to maintain his Senate seat.
Paul in KY
@Major Major Major Major: The owners of the Republican Party want that. Very true.
Paul in KY
@dmsilev: Disagree sortof. A lot of his support is from the racist Democrats in South who left in 68.
Paul in KY
@gogol’s wife: Well, thanks for that!
Paul in KY
@Hillary Rettig: True then, true today! LBJ did have a way with succinct comments that cut right to the bone of an issue.
Paul in KY
@Fair Economist: I’m sure you’ll see some nice commercials that will skewer him on that.
Dianne
Content is very important but, if there
is no links won’t do well in serps
Shared on Reddit, it will be useful to people over there