Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Nothing says ‘pro-life’ like letting children go hungry.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

This country desperately needs a functioning fourth estate.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

If you thought you’d already seen people saying the stupidest things possible on the internet, prepare yourselves.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Dear Washington Post, you are the darkness now.

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

Humiliatingly small and eclipsed by the derision of millions.

We can’t confuse what’s necessary to win elections with the policies that we want to implement when we do.

Also, are you sure you want people to rate your comments?

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

If America since Jan 2025 hasn’t broken your heart, you haven’t loved her enough.

Hell hath no fury like a farmer bankrupted.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Hail to the Hairpiece / Open Thread: Arrogantly Clueless, or Deliberately Evil?

Open Thread: Arrogantly Clueless, or Deliberately Evil?

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When it comes to the President-Asterisk’s administration, we’ll never be sure! The Washington Post‘s art critic reports “The controversy behind the painting that will hang at Trump’s inaugural luncheon”:

… Since Ronald Reagan’s second inauguration in 1985, an American painting has served as a backdrop during the inaugural luncheon, at which members of Congress play host to the newly installed president. When Donald Trump is made the 45th president of the United States on Jan. 20, George Caleb Bingham’s “The Verdict of the People” will be the chosen painting, hanging on a partition wall behind the ceremonial head table in the Capitol’s Statuary Hall.

The painting was finished in 1855 by an artist best known for his Mississippi River scenes, which burnished the rough-and-tumble and often violent West into a benign and mythological place, ready for investment, development and full participation in American political life.

“The Verdict of the People,” which shows a large crowd celebrating or mourning election results in a Missouri town, is part of a series of three large canvasses created in the 1850s, each taking up the theme of democratic self- governance… Despite the title, “The Verdict of the People,” and the seeming jubilation of many of the figures in the picture, Bingham was representing a despairing moment in the life of his state, and American politics.

“Bingham is a Whig Painter, using these images to depict a Democratic victory,” says Adam Arenson, associate professor of history at Manhattan College in New York, and an expert on Missouri history. As a Whig, Bingham was anti-slavery while the Democratic Party, at the time, was either proslavery, or complicit in status-quo acceptance of it. “The Verdict of the People” was painted just as Congress passed the disastrous Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which put a future of slavery in Kansas to a popular vote. Thugs from Missouri got in the fray, crossing the border to attack abolitionist settlers. One of the state’s senators, David Atchison, called on his supporters “to kill every Goddamned abolitionist” if necessary to secure Kansas as a slave state.

“Bingham is painting out of a great fear that popular sovereignty and the Kansas-Nebraska act will lead to an irreparable divide in the country,” says Arenson. “It represents a moment when democracy was unable to handle the conflict of the country.”…

And so Bingham’s painting is an almost ideal emblem for a president who came to power on a promise to “Make America Great Again.” Blunt seems to read this painting as a reassuring sign that American electoral politics have always been messy and fractious. But he chose an image that in fact depicts a (likely) proslavery candidate triumphing in the name of an America that denies not only full suffrage, but basic human and constitutional freedoms to its African American population.

The painting’s use at the inauguration also highlights a problem that opponents of the new president will face again and again: Is there method in what appears to be simply blundering cultural ignorance? Is there design in casual remarks and off-the-cuff observations that seem to be deliberately provocative? …

Reader Interactions

74Comments

  2. 2.

    wag

    T minus how many days until we’re all fucked by Trump? I ready for his administration to be done already

  5. 5.

    NotMax

    Can Thomas really stand and do things anymore without having Scalia’s arm up his butt to work him like a ventriloquist’s dummy?

    Irresponsible not to speculate.

    (The sound you’ll hear as Pence is sworn in will be Thurgood Marshall spinning at warp speed.)

  7. 7.

    JordanRules

    Pence praising the ugly parts of our institutions doesn’t feel as weird as what orange booty mouth is doing, but it’s still foul and unworthy of our ideals.

  9. 9.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @amk: according to Lawrence O”Donnell, 3rd is leading a push to get photos put on social security cards in response to voter ID laws

    @NotMax: Can Thomas really stand and do things anymore without having Scalia’s arm up his butt to work him like a ventriloquist’s dummy?

    I suspect Roberts has delegated Sourpuss Alito to take over that duty.

  11. 11.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Yarrow: When I was is basic, a colonel whose office I had been sent to clean asked my what my next schooling was. I said OCS and he asked how long the course was. I told him and he said, “Hell, you can stand on your dick in corner for that long.”

  12. 12.

    SatanicPanic

    @NotMax: Thomas is a crank but he has a distinct judicial philosophy, such as it is. I don’t like him either but I think it’s a bit much to suggest he didn’t get this way on his own.

  14. 14.

    Ruckus

    Clueless or Deliberately Evil.
    With dense it’s both. He may be slow but what he does say or do is absolutely evil.

  16. 16.

    Yarrow

    @Omnes Omnibus: You can. If you survive. Take away the ACA and many will die. Cut us off from the intelligence sources our allies have and people will die. And then there are those pesky nuclear weapons.

    Who knows what this upcoming administration will bring. Things like this catch my attention:

    BREAKING: Chinese state-media editorial says Trump showing "strategic arrogance" and China must prepare for a "head-on confrontation"— The Int'l Spectator (@spectatorindex) January 16, 2017

    A “head-on confrontation with China sounds like something we don’t want.

  17. 17.

    WJS

    Has there ever been a time in modern American history when so many unqualified, unlikable people were ever handed so much power?

    When you line up Justice Thomas with the rest of them, the sheer lack of accomplishment in public life is stunning. Everyone makes a big deal out of Mattis, but would he really be on anyone’s short list for anything? This isn’t just the gang that couldn’t shoot straight–none of these people would be a part of a McCain, Romney, or Rubio administration. Instead, they are a cabal, a regime, and a farce.

  18. 18.

    GregB

    Why is Thomas’ service historic? Has Pence bought the revisionist rightwing lie about Thomas being the first African-American on the SC?

    If so, will he be paying to have Thurgood Marshall photoshopped out of pictures by one of his Russian handlers?

  19. 19.

    Suzanne

    @Yarrow: I am still amazed that he’s in the rainbows-and-sparkle-ponies phase of telling us all the good stuff we’re going to have re: ACA “replacement”. Like, dude, at this point, there has to be a plan. I mean, I love free shit as much as the next girl, but I can do math, and healthcare is fundamentally a math problem.

  20. 20.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Yarrow: The point is that it will hurt but that the country will survive. I don’t mean to minimize the horrors that many will experience.

    I was also trying to use black humor, but that doesn’t work with everyone.

  25. 25.

    SFAW

    @WJS:

    When you line up Justice Thomas with the rest of them

    I thought he (and the others) had to commit an actual act of treason before being sentenced to a firing squad?

    Or did you mean something else?

  26. 26.

    Miss Bianca

    @Omnes Omnibus: You insult the name of Uncle Tom by the comparison. As Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote him, he was a dignified and upright man who chose to die under torture rather than betray his trust to fellow (female) runaway slaves. I don’t think Clarence Thomas could boast as much.

  29. 29.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @SFAW: Not when the revolution comes. Of course, I still expect to be one of the first up against the wall when it comes. Leftists kill the liberals first.

  32. 32.

    SFAW

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Leftists kill the liberals first.

    That may be, but I think you being a Cheesehead outweighs that. Not in a good way, unfortunately.

    By the way, congrats on The Pack’s win. Glad it was the Cowboys what got beat.

  33. 33.

    Eric U.

    the racists have been living in the shadows for so long they specialize in weird little symbolism like the painting. And I think Uday and Qusay are deep into that stuff, so they probably asked for suggestions.

  34. 34.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @SFAW: The revolution won’t worry about state borders.

    Thanks for the ‘grats. I went for one of my final superstitions at fieldgoal time. It may have worked.

  37. 37.

    cbear

    Clarence Thomas, aside from being a major league asshole, is an intellectual and legal lightweight. His regressive, reductionist legal philosophy will be considered by future legal scholars to have had the weight of a pubic hair on Coke can.

  39. 39.

    SFAW

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    I went for one of my final superstitions at fieldgoal time.

    I’m almost tempted to ask about it, but I’m worried that it’s one of those Cole-esque, naked-floor-mopping things, and I really don’t need that image popping into my head …ah, shit, too late!

  40. 40.

    Yarrow

    @Suzanne: Didn’t you hear? We’re going to get to see the plan in a few weeks! It’s almost ready! Uh huh.

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    The point is that it will hurt but that the country will survive.

    I hope you’re right. So much is changing it’s hard for me to feel confident about that. Russia would like to see the US split up and the CalExit folks are getting plenty of funding from Putin. California is a massive economy so it’s not unrealistic to think about that.

  44. 44.

    amk

    @Another Scott:

    Doctors were few and far between, so when you got sick, you stayed that way, and often you died of it.

    he fershure hasn’t forgotten his childhood days.

  46. 46.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Suzanne: some interesting news on that front, from CNN

    MJ LeeVerified account
    ‏@ mj_lee
    Also, Price has been kept out of Trump transition team’s efforts to craft an Obamacare replacement plan:

    Tom Price *doesn’t* want to flaunt his Obamacare repeal bill at confirmation hearing. A preview of his preparations:

    I figure Price represents Pence’s influence, and him being kept out of the planning suggests the limits of Pence’s influence. I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’m optimistic, but Trump doesn’t give a fuck about Ryan or anything that crowd wants. Making Ryan et al vote for something they don’t want would be a classic trump dominance play.

  47. 47.

    SFAW

    @cbear:

    Clarence Thomas, aside from being a major league asshole, is an intellectual and legal lightweight.

    Someone here — don’t recall who, but not one of the trolls — once told me that Thomas actually had a sharp legal mind, vis-a-vis SCOTUS cases. Not being a lawyer, I cannot dispute that in any effective manner. I was not convinced, but could also not refute it. Not even THUS!

  51. 51.

    Another Scott

    @Timurid: Ouch!

    Seriously, just reading the biographical summary at the web page (in my earlier comment) is painful. In each little story we get to the point where we think, “Ah, the right choice is clear! Surely he’s going to make the right choice this time!!” And he doesn’t.

    The story of him and Bolton kinda shocked me. I had a very conservative friend in early high school in Cobb Co, GA (he was an actual Bircher). We had interesting conversations about politics and lots of things, but when he gave me “None Call it Conspiracy” to read and I saw the bit about (very roughly) “… if you believe that is a coincidence, well then there have been no less than 9,147 coincidences since …” even my teenage self could see that it was stupid nonsense. It sounds like Clarence hit that “figuring out what I believe about politics” phase much, much too late and it stuck.

    Neurologists would have a fascinating time taking his brain apart, I’ll bet.

    :-/

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  53. 53.

    randy khan

    @O. Felix Culpa:

    I’m not remotely a fan, but Thomas does have a judicial philosophy, which he applies very consistently. It’s antediluvian in the extreme, but it is consistent. (In fact, as Scalia got more ideological over time, he and Thomas started to split a bit.) And, of course, none of this is to ignore his personal failings.

  56. 56.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    Doesn’t anybody in the incoming Cheeto Benito regime know about the MLK day of service? Or do they just think that’s for the little people? Or are they doing theirs very quietly, as Matthew suggests prayer is appropriate?

  57. 57.

    randy khan

    @SFAW:

    Thomas isn’t stupid. He’s stubborn and would fit nicely on the Taney Court, but he’s not stupid.

    All that said, he was manifestly unqualified to be nominated to the Supreme Court, even not considering Anita Thomas (and, lest we forget, the other women who didn’t get to testify). He wasn’t even really qualified for the D.C. Circuit, where he’d sat for something like a year before Bush I picked him.

  58. 58.

    Timurid

    @Another Scott:

    Some of the most incorrigible misanthropes are self made men. “I did it, so nobody in the history of the world had, has or will have an excuse.” My copy went to the used book store unread. Unopened, even. The 15 seconds it took me to skim the blurb on the back of the dust jacket… I would like those back.

  60. 60.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @randy khan: He wasn’t even really qualified for the D.C. Circuit, where he’d sat for something like a year before Bush I picked him.

    Didn’t Bush put him on that court cause they figured Marshall was getting old and they wanted a “pro-life” black person with a law degree to replace him? I guess we should be glad Janice Rogers Brown wasn’t on their radar.

  61. 61.

    No One You Know

    I’m pleased to report that Trumpify has done its job on the Book of Faces infomercial. As a result, I can imagine that my inaugural invite, had I chosen to apply, would have emitted itself from a Dusty Barrel of Fermented Pee-pee.

  62. 62.

    Another Scott

    @randy khan: s /Anita Thomas / Anita Hill/

    IIRC, he has written unanimous opinions for the SCOTUS, so, like you said, he’s not a stupid man.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  63. 63.

    SFAW

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Dear god, I would never call him sharp.

    Indeed. As I said above, tweren’t you I wuz talking about.

    Which is not to say that I won’t reverse that statement, if the Pack wins SBLIII and you become annoying about it.

  65. 65.

    SFAW

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:
    I think a large part of his selection was an early application of Cleek’s Law.

    ETA: And Bush et al. did not force Marshall out, his health did. It’s unfortunate that he couldn’t hold out for another couple of years, but then again, Bill Clinton was not much on the radar in 1991.

  70. 70.

    PIGL

    @rikyrah: along with the large population they apparently have some very excellent anti-ship munitions. If they really do have the capacity to take out the carrier strikeforce from over the horizon… then no we really don’t want a war.

  73. 73.

    Shalimar

    @NotMax: Clarence Thomas has disagreed with Scalia over the years as much as he has with any other conservative justice. Thomas isn’t one of the rare great justices, but he is as competent as most other choices at the time would have been. You don’t get considered for an appointment without meeting the basic standard for being a Justice, Harriet Miers possibly excepted.

    The idea that Thomas is incapable of forming his own opinions is a mixture of his unwillingness to speak from the bench and blatant racism. It needs to die. Clarence Thomas is just as evil and horribly original in his own way as Scalia was.

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