Someone in the morning thread mentioned a column in The Post by Gary Abernathy, and because I’m addicted to rage like a common Trumper, I went over and read it. I wish I hadn’t, but now that I’ve suffered, I’m asking you to suffer with me by hearing my thoughts on it.*
First, some context. Remember when The Times channeled its self-doubt, repressed guilt, etc., about not foreseeing the outcome of the 2016 election into a series of idiotic Midwestern diner interviews, which were ostensibly about trying to understand Trump voters? They weren’t the only outlet that did that, and they and fellow media anthropologists have been rightly ridiculed for that pointless exercise. But there are worse things. Things like Abernathy.
The Post is a better paper, at least when it comes to covering national politics. They screw up — a lot, sometimes — but their Beltway crew is generally heads and shoulders above The Times, IMO. That said, in a way, The Post’s reaction to the self-doubt, etc., occasioned by being blindsided by the 2016 election outcome was worse than The Times’ tiresome Cletus Safari reaction. The Post went out and bagged themselves a gen-yoo-wine Cletus, carried him metaphorically back to DC and placed him in their opinion page.
That’s Abernathy, Voice of Cletus, a state Republican Party operative and former editor at a Trump-supporting rag in some Christ-forsaken Ohio hellhole.** And ever since he got his Post gig, Abernathy’s output is exactly what you’d expect, i.e., somewhat less interesting than the diner drivel because there’s not even the menu and atmospherics to discuss. It’s been four solid years of unalloyed apologetics for an increasingly unhinged authoritarian wannabe president and defensive screeds about how elitist libs made the Common Clay turn Nazi by being woke scolds.
Okay, enough context. Today’s Abernathy column is different from its predecessors in one way: a new mission intruded on Abernathy’s usual shtick, and that was the need to make “move on from Trump” an attractive offer to “both sides,” i.e., to Trump supporters and to woke scolds. It doesn’t work. The column’s title, written (whether by Abernathy or not, I do not know) from the Trump supporters’ perspective, foretells its failure: “You can disavow Trump without apologizing for his presidency.”
Actually, no, you can’t. Abernathy’s premise is that while Trump is flawed, his supporters are pure and have nothing to apologize for, and Democrats should stop insisting that they apologize and we’ll all just move on like it’s 2015 again. Unpossible, as Abernathy demonstrates. But first, he establishes his Trump voter spokesman bona fides:
I think I can safely speak for millions of Trump voters when I say that the disparaging things said about us by people who never liked us anyway only make us more obstinate.
He’s got the aggrieved tone right. The sentence conveys the ever-present Trumpist delusions of persecution and channels Trumpism’s mass oppositional defiance disorder pretty well. It puts us libs on notice that haranguing Trump supporters only makes things worse. But after dense paragraphs of false equivalences and both-sidesing, Abernathy fails to stick the landing at the nut graf aimed at Trump supporters. He fails because he assumes his fellow Trumpers are where he, Abernathy, is:
But they [Trump voters] must also acknowledge that Trump’s refusal to admit his election loss, and his reckless admonition to “show strength” in order to “stop the steal” just before an angry mob marched on our U.S. Capitol, are acts that no patriotic American can defend.
Abernathy probably realizes the importance of repudiating the Big Lie because he’s an embedded cog in a conservative propaganda machine that exists to sell unpopular plutocrat-friendly policies to the so-called Heartland and Deep South by packaging it in belligerent culture war bullshit. As such, Abernathy knows national instability from whatever quarter is bad for business, a fact Trump propagandists (as opposed to true believers) receive as relevant and actionable information.
But the problem for Abernathy and fellow propagandists is that an indeterminately large portion of Trump voters are true believers, and among their beliefs is that the election was stolen from Trump. They therefore view insurrection as a good thing. Maybe this distinction is less of an abstraction to me than it is to Abernathy because I saw my Trump-poisoned neighbors screaming about it for weeks in front of the local courthouse. Or maybe Abernathy knows that and is just being disingenuous to shoo them along.
Regardless, everyone who carried Trump’s water as he lied constantly and ultimately fomented a violent attack on the US Capitol is responsible for the present national crisis, including Abernathy. I don’t give a shit about their feelings, and I don’t care if they ever apologize. What their support for a malignant, bigoted, incompetent narcissist says about their character is something they need to figure out for themselves if they’re interested in personal growth.
But while we don’t have to give a fuck about their feelings, what we do have to see before we “move on” is that a sufficiently large plurality of the Trump cult is willing to crawl back under its rock instead of engaging in further destabilizing sedition. When the question of whether Trumpism will destroy American democracy is settled — when those who violently turned on our democracy are held to account and those who cheered them on acknowledge reality in deeds if not in words — then we can move on. And not one second sooner.
Open thread.
*Or just skip all the horseshit above and use this as an open thread. That’s my recommendation, actually.
**I live in a Christ-forsaken, swampy Florida hellhole, which I love and have no intention of ever leaving, so I describe Abernathy’s hometown in that way without judgment. I assume his hellhole, like mine, has its unique delights and saving graces too.
Chetan Murthy
It’s an open thread, so I’ll just say that I read a comment from another commenter, that they watched Jen Psaki’s daily press conferences, as a form of therapy. With a glass of wine.
Excellent idea! I’m doing that right now! So great!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
as I gather from twitter and the media sites that do almost daily updates on fights on The View, this is Meghan McCain’s daily shriek: “If you keep pointing out that trump voters are racist mouth-breathers, we’re just gonna get more racist and let our jaws hang lower as we stare unblinkingly at the Sean Hannity White Power Hour”
She may phrase it differently. I don’t actually watch The View
WaterGirl
If anyone is even remotely considering taking Betty’s advice and not reading this post, you have to at least read this part:
schrodingers_cat
Okay I have been meaning to ask this but WTF is Cletus
ETA: Google says a cartoon character supposed to represent a good natured yokel
hells littlest angel
I subscribe to the Post and can read anything I want, but one Abernathy column way back when was enough for me. I had the impression that he was more of a McArdle-type fatuous knucklehead than a seasoned right-winger. But perhaps that’s the impression he intended to create.
schrodingers_cat
Abernathy’s columns read like a bad DougJ parody. I never bother to read them after sampling a couple when he started with the post.
Chetan Murthy
I think it’s worth noting that Fred Hiatt [spit] is the editorial page editor. Did I mention [spit] ? He’s been there a long time, and been shitty a long time. Marty Baron is the executive editor, and I’ve read that he is a big force in the newsroom’s quality and …. adherence to truth.
I fucking hate this Abernathy fuck. And ditto Theissen, Hewitt, and a few others. But the newsroom is very distinct from that, and I try to keep that in mind.
I’m happy to be a WaPo subscriber, b/c of the news pages.
trollhattan
Those hells won’t hole themselves.
My sad husk of a local paper is down to by my count, two opinion writers, in a town built by politics. They once had a large, robust staff and would also carry from the Knight-Ridder and McClatchy empire, as well as the obligatory NYT and WaPo folks. Now, after bankruptcy and firesale everything has been churned and I see a lot from LA Times (mostly meh) and scattered other sources. The one I CAN NOT understand why they carry, and they do frequently, is somebody named Jay Ambrose. And I guarantee this motherfucker will crank your BP 20 points anytime you read him. So don’t. Trust me.
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat:
I’ve had it explained to me numerous times and then I immediately forget.
Baud
Did he offer up anything that his side would do to help us move forward?
Elizabelle
You could not pay me to read Gary Abernathy (thanks for doing so for us, BCracker) BUT
I find it interesting Abernathy’s drivel is up the same day that country star mullet-wearing every Southern man from Tennessee Morgan Wallen was “indefinitely suspended” from his record label and several platforms pulled down his recordings. Because he used the N-word, and a neighbor got it all on his Ring doorbell. This is the latest in a long series of bad behavior by Wallen.
Money, money, money, money. It’s why Dominion Voting Systems is going medieval on Fox and Giuliani and who knows who else — money, money, money, and a corporation’s survival — while the vast majority of elected Republicans in the Senate and Congress will NOT stand up for our country against a president who fomented an insurrection. Who refused to accept the results of a free and fair election, and has been caught on tape pleading with Georgia state Republicans to fudge the numbers.
A corporation and an entertainment sector will stand up for itself, and try to get damages/perform an amputation to save the patient, but to get Republicans in national office to stand up for our country and free elections and not having morons stalking Democrats and the sitting Vice President? A bridge too far.
Country music does not want to look like what a lot of country music actually is. From a quick read, the last country act that got the excommunication penalty was — the [Dixie] Chicks. For being right that George W Bush’s Iraq war was and is a disaster.
It’s just interesting to me how some bad behavior is actionable and some … is tolerated out of sheer cowardice and self-interest.
Major Major Major Major
Wow, what a dumb column. Moving on…
The Moar You Know
Every goddamn Trumper I know is under the impression that everything is just swell and we can all be buddies again.
Nope.
They crossed so many lines. I’m not even sure they understand that. So many. And with the exception of two family members who I cannot be shut of and am just going to have to wait for their inevitable deaths, they’re out of my life. And not a one of them is getting back in. I consider their decision to vote for Trump and support him on a par with the decision to molest a child. Can’t walk that one back, folks.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
They also claim that Obama was born in Kenya, Hillary Clinton is a serial killer, the country was sold to the Bankers in 1871, the earth is 4,000 years old, flat and lizard people from the planet Rigel are here to eat the human babies. That shared delusion makes any productive interaction with them impossible.
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat:
Looks as if it’s a Simpsons character. That explains why everyone acts as if it’s so obvious but I have no idea. I never watch the Simpsons.
JustRuss
Jesus that’s beautiful. Sums it up perfectly.
artem1s
ooo, let me guess… somewhere in copperhead country – SW OH – Hamilton County or some nearby bedroom community to Cincinnati?
HumboldtBlue
This the day the music died.
Roger Moore
Their apology would be significant, but only if it reflects a genuine recognition that Trump was wrong. An insincere apology given only to get the Democrats off their backs isn’t worth the breath it takes to make it.
The Thin Black Duke
I don’t need to read white bigots to know that they hate me. And I know that they will always hate me, so I won’t engage in the fraudulent charade of trying to change their minds. The voters in Georgia showed us the way: Fuck them and leave their racist white asses behind.
Eunicecycle
I think I’ve mentioned before I used to live in the same town as Abernathy. I did not know him, and it was almost 40 years ago. But I have been back for funerals and such, and it’s the same as it always has been. The county I live in now is close to purchasing Dominion Voting Machines and the public is hysterical. Sigh.
The Moar You Know
@schrodingers_cat: Been around for a long time; popularized by the Simpsons in this immortal ditty:
Amir Khalid
@schrodingers_cat:
Cletus is the stereotypical blue-collar diner patron/Trump voter. Reporters go on a Cletus safari to encounter him in his natural habitat.
HumboldtBlue
Major Major Major Major
@zhena gogolia: Seasons 2-7 have some of the greatest episodes of television ever made.
guachi
I am informed by my Michigander wife that “Christ-forsaken hellhole” describes almost all of Ohio.
Baud
This LGM post on GameStop might be of interest to some.
schrodingers_cat
@The Moar You Know: Nope I can’t be friends with people who enabled the monster who questioned my humanity and that of every immigrant
Forget T voters I am having a hard time talking to my own mother since she bought into the cult of Modi.
w_seattle
@zhena gogolia: I would go with Cletus as the goofy deputy from Dukes of Hazzard. That has the good ole boy reference… hard to say though.
germy
https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-wants-liz-cheney-gone-but-will-the-house-gop-obey
The Moar You Know
@Major Major Major Major: reason’s in the credits:
Producer: Conan O’Brien
He left and it tanked within a year; not fatally, but it was never the same.
cope
Reads like he’s just trying to position himself in such a way as to hang on to a job at the WaPo that recently might have become redundant.
Just what you quoted from Abernathy is tough to read and I can’t begin to imagine the pain induced by reading the whole thing. Thank you for once again doing yeoman’s (yeowoman’s?) work.
Amir Khalid
What were these people thinking?
cope
@Baud: I had just read that before coming here and, yes, it is very interesting.
Baud
@germy:
Bullshit.
schrodingers_cat
BTW guys an update on the Farmers protest.
The latest from the BJP troll sena
Greta Thunberg, Rihanna and Meena Harris tweets in support of the farmers protests yesterday were a part of a diabolical ISIS and/or Khalistani plot.
Ken
@schrodingers_cat: Stereotypical name for rural MAGA type. I’m not fond of it (see “stereotypical”) but it is a convenient shorthand.
Usually used when referring to reporter’s trips to deep red areas to “put their pulse on the real mood of the American middle”.
The Moar You Know
@guachi: I spent nine days of my life there that I cannot get back; the state just plain sucks.
Most of the astronaut corps for the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo missions were from Ohio, as were the Wright brothers. There’s a long standing joke that they all became pilots and astronauts to get as far away from Ohio as fast as possible.
sab
So Gary Abernathy is from Hillsboro, Ohio, 50 miles east of Cincinnati, population 6000. 76% of Ohio towns and cities of any size have a lower crime rate than Hillsboro.
So why exactly does the rest of the nation need to hear from this guy, especially since his writing isn’t particularly insightful or thoughtful?
Elizabelle
Glad to have you guys explain “Cletus.” I always thought it was slang for Bill Clinton.
satby
Following Betty’s advice and ignoring the Abernathy spew, here’s a worthy and fun thing. Girl Scout Troop 6000 is for girls in homeless shelters in NYC, and they’re having their cookie sale.
RSA
This is the part that got me:
I have a WP subscription but I’ve never come across Abernathy before. I’m wondering how his mind works: If you take away Trump’s outrages, there’s nothing left of Trumpism. There is no cause there.
sab
@The Moar You Know: Ever been to any of lower northern Michigan that wasn’t near a great lake resort town?
schrodingers_cat
@Elizabelle: That’s what I thought too. But it didn’t really makes sense in the context it was used.
germy
@Elizabelle:
No, that’s “Clenis”
The Moar You Know
@germy: Hope this lesson’s not lost on anyone here; we are free of Donald Trump clogging up our news cycles and destroying the Biden presidency because of a decision made by Jack Dorsey, one that can be reversed at any time. We need our margin of safety in our society to be a LOT more robust than that.
debbie
Oh, fuck these assholes. Make them listen to this NPR report on the traumatized Atlanta pollworkers and then tell me about your hurt fee-fees.
BruceFromOhio
@Chetan Murthy:
I just finished. Same as the last three I’ve watched – Psaki tolerates ZERO BULLSHIT, is ready to keep it light and even chuckle a wee bit if it’s appropriate, will field ANY question on any topic, sticks to the Biden script like packing tape, and has no problem taking a moment to unpack something where it makes sense. I adore this person, and what she is doing for the administration, and in a larger way, for the country.
While perfection is an elusive quality, she’s pretty damn good, and universe away from her predecessors in the previous administration. Which makes the twatters and Faux news bits feigning outrage a curious comedy.
MattF
Abernathy is a cog— he’ll offer the current party line, ‘unity’, and that’s all. The only current question, really, is whether Trump will now disappear. I go back and forth on that one.
The Moar You Know
@sab: never set foot in Michigan and don’t intend to. I’m not a cold weather kind of person.
germy
@The Moar You Know:
We needed a margin of safety enough so that someone like Trump would have been arrested before he ever got near the White House. But the attitude towards white collar criminals in NY was “giggle wink nudge”
BruceFromOhio
Me: You’re setting yourself, your party, and your country on fire with this racist bullshit.
GQP: NO, I AM NOT, AND YOU CAN’T MAKE ME ARGLE BARGLE.
Me: OK, got it.
Baud
@cope:
Did you read the underlying article?
It’s a righteous (lefteous?) dissection.
germy
@BruceFromOhio:
They’ve targeted her already:
https://www.mediaite.com/politics/biden-press-secretary-jen-psaki-called-out-for-homophobic-tweet-mocking-lindsey-graham-as-lady-g/
Amir Khalid
@Chetan Murthy:
It amazes me that Abernathy considers Trump a mere impurity, separable from the gold of Trumpism. Trumpism is no more gold than Trump himself is; it has thoroughly corrupted the Republican party, and it needs to be purged along with the man if the party wants to save itself.
West of the Rockies
We’ve done something far worse than eliminating Trump… We’ve hurt him. And we wish to go on… hurting him.*
*hat tip to Khan
BruceFromOhio
@The Moar You Know:
The roads are awful. Come to Ohio instead! At least ODOT will pave the interstates once every 20 years whether it needs it or not.
Ken
@Amir Khalid: I understand that clearly-fake announcements like that are often used in tests, since if they accidentally get out, people won’t think there’s a real emergency. There’s other consequences, but at least you don’t waste resources on a six-state manhunt.
Of course, “clearly-fake” is carrying a lot of weight there, given what people are ready to believe nowadays.
schrodingers_cat
@germy: NYC was a British stronghold during the Revolutionary War and was sympathetic to the Confederacy (Copper Heads) during the Civil War? So people like the Orange Menace fit in with that tradition.
Just an observation.
Chetan Murthy
“The President has of course spoken with a number of European allies …”
Oh god, I want to have Joe Biden’s baby, delivered by Dr. Jen Psaki, to be sure.
debbie
@schrodingers_cat:
Thank you for asking. I’ve never been sure myself, but I’ll go with this from the Urban Dictionary:
Ken
@germy: Trumps vs. Cheneys, definitely a rooting-for-injuries situation. But I’m pretty sure any stomping will be very one-sided, and the victims won’t even see it coming.
Baud
TIL cletus ≠ clenis.
The Moar You Know
@BruceFromOhio: I didn’t comment on WHY I found your state a hellhole but yeah, your roads…damn. I used to bitch about our roads here in CA but have never seen a pothole big enough to break an axle. Which you have. As you know.
Ken
@The Moar You Know: You remind me of the old joke about the New England farmer, who after sixty years was told that due to an old surveying error, his farm was actually in New Hampshire, not Vermont. “Thank God,” he said, “I don’t think I could have taken another of those Vermont winters.”
debbie
@germy:
Based on that alone, I hope the censure/expulsion/whatever fails.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Elizabelle: that’s “Bubba”, but it’s the same cultural code, based in TBH anti-Southern stereotypes. Charlie Pierce named the NYT (et al) hunt for non-racist explanations for trump voters in PA, MI, OH and WI “Cletus Safaris”, but it’s based in the idea (to borrow again from Pierce) that it can’t be about race, because nothing is ever about race, at least north of the Mason-Dixon line. It’s easy for college-educated, overwhelmingly white and (culturally at least) Northern, upper-middle class journos to dismiss racism as a Southern thing, a “white trash” thing. It gets harder when it’s about your Uncle Donnie in Cleveland who used to take you out on his boat (he’s economically anxious, don’t you know), your grandparents in Scranton who would never use That Word (at least not in front of you), or (gasp!) your parents back in Grosse Pointe who belong to the country club and don’t have a racist bone in their bodies (but….) and voted for Obama, at least the first time…
HumboldtBlue
Vic Dibitetto speaks for all of us.
debbie
@guachi:
Is her assumption that living in that state up north is a good place?
Dan B
@guachi: Having been born and raised in small town Ohio, and escaping forever at age 20, Ohio is not as hellish as Arkansas and much of the deep south. There are some sizeable liberal pockets, and cities, in Ohio. Arkansas is limited to much of Fayetteville, neighborhoods of Little Rock, Hot Springs – sorta – and Eureka Springs, a small town that has a few blocks of gay friendly businesses plus a huge Cross on the hill. Conway, another small college town is supposed to be okay but surrounded by an ocean of crazy.. I feel my chest constricting when I think about it.
sanjeevs
From the Financial Times
I wonder what she did for the opportunity to buy a Park Avenue apartment for 1.5 million
Starboard Tack
@West of the Rockies:
Tie him to a metaphorical rock and let his liver be ripped by all and sundry.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@sab:
IS that the middle part of the mitten? Or the south coast of the UP?
Ken
“In exchange for the agreements, Democrats agreed to allow Republicans to see the text of future bills before starting the reconciliation process.”
Chetan Murthy
@BruceFromOhio: I was talking with my mom today, and I described how, every day for the last four years, I’d wake up and wonder what the fuck the orange man had done today, what new atrocity, with new horror.
And now, instead, we wake up every day in our bed, and Mom’s knocking at the door, with a different and delicious breakfast-in-bed, and IT’S A SNOW DAY so as soon as we finish breakfast, we can go out and play!
God, it’s so great.
P.S. I called my congresswoman (Nancy SMASH!) and Senator and Senate Majority Leader, to thank then and cheer them on. It’s so …. holey moley, it’s so nice.
P.P.S. Esp. learning that the Biden admin is gonna pay for all hotel, food, etc, support for people isolating from covid. Oh lordy, I had forgotten what competence looked like.
debbie
@germy:
Those comments! I think “Goebbels” is a goose-step too far.
BruceFromOhio
@The Moar You Know: I’m sorry you found no redeeming qualities here (and I know I’m painting the target, go for it). The combination of more rapid freeze-thaw cycle, the refusal to increase the gasoline tax to generate revenue to fix what’s already here, the evaporation of industry and the revenue-generating jobs that go with it, the steady erosion of federal highway funds have all combined for years of ‘perfect storming’ that results in relentless, grinding infrastructure failure. Throw in the lurch and zombie-like shuffling towards fascism, and it does have hell-hole qualities.
And it’s home. The reasons to stay exceed this comment, perhaps this thread.
zhena gogolia
@w_seattle:
I thought he was Enos.
Redshift
This put me in mind of the striking difference from when the 2000 election aftermath was dragging out. I went to a protest at the Naval Observatory (the VP’s residence), and despite the fact that the election really was being stolen, everyone on both sides was good-natured. Since it was after Gingrich, undoubtedly the Rush-and-Foxification “you must believe all Democrats are subhuman scum” was already underway, but it wasn’t everywhere yet.
zhena gogolia
@The Moar You Know:
Didn’t Ohio produce the greatest number of presidents? My husband says tied with Virginia.
J R in WV
The day Trump resumes tweeting is the day Jack Dorsey must be arrested for facilitating sedition, conspiracy to commit sedition, plain old sedition, participating in a felony murder, and other crimes you need to be a trial lawyer to be able to adequately describe.
This Abernathy guy needs to be interviewed on a weekly basis by some really stone-faced federal criminal investigators, to inquire into his knowledge of sedition, people who support sedition, people who conspire to commit sedition, his own feelings about insurrection, who he knows that may have aided and abetted insurrection and anything else that he might be able to help federal criminal investigators with.
On alternate weeks federal counter-intelligence agents should interview him at his workplace, where they should also interview his fellow workers about his, Abernathy’s activities with regard to Russian interference in elections, Russian actions against our Constitution.
I wonder if Abernathy has ever had occasion to swear to support and defend our constitution against all enemies foreign or domestic? A question that should be asked of his supervisors at the WaPo, once a weeks, by counter-intelligence investigators, in a blunt and threatening manner.
Can you tell I’m quite done with the activities of anti-democratic moles in our political sphere? I’m really completely done with anti-democratic moles actually facilitating the activities of Russia in our politics~!!~
Those people all need to be put away somewhere from which they can no longer interfere in our democratic processes. Like a federal prison with no cell phone or internet connectivity whatsoever.
zhena gogolia
@BruceFromOhio:
I love her so much. She is the DIAMETRICAL OPPOSITE of McEnany.
debbie
@Dan B:
The one good surprise when I moved back to Ohio in 1995 was finding that my city (Columbus) was more gay friendly than I had seen in Manhattan. But then came the GOP…
Ken
So, Lawful Good?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@guachi: I never knew about the intensity of the Michigan-Ohio thing until I started following Michigander/UM alum Jonathan Chait on twitter.
I mean, I knew about the war, but I thought they were over it.
MattF
@sanjeevs: Vrablic earned a chapter for herself in David Enrich’s book about Deutche Bank, Dark Towers. She was the central person in Trump’s relationship with the bank.
Redshift
The Rude Pundit had a very good essay today about the trauma that congresspeople and staffers have gone through, how trauma changes you, and the awfulness of the insistence that “unity” requires us to just “move on” and pretend it didn’t happen.
As they say, read the whole thing.
cope
@Baud: I did read it, yes. Hence my agreement that it was interesting. I often read posts there that I have to go over multiple times to make sure my simple mind understands them. This was one of those posts.
Starboard Tack
@BruceFromOhio:
In the early 70’s I worked on a road crew in Summit County in the summer. We took care of the township and county roads in the north end. They were in decent shape then. When I was back a few years ago, I didn’t notice much deterioration.
Geminid
There will be many Republican opinion pieces like the one featured in the post. Traditional establishment Republicans will try to lay out formulas by which the radical, trumpist “populists” can be reconciled with the “vision” of the Wall Street Journal. Trying to square the circle, so to speak. Judging from comments so far, Abernathy’s argument does not impress Democrats. Some traditional Republicans may read it optimistically and say, “You know, Abernathy might be on to something here!” The trumpers will pay such articles no mind. They are on a RINO hunt, and they want blood. By the time Kemp and Raffensperger face challenges from the right in the 2022 Georgia primaries, along with Republican incumbents elsewhere, Abernathy will be singing a different tune.
Dan B
@cope: I’m thinking of the converse to Abernathy’s “You elite lie-bruls mean words drive us to moar extremes, because, “Everyone knows this to be God’s truth.”
Soooo. If we’re nice and polite, and agree with his politics moar, I will moderate my views, (And stop hating you with a blind fury.)
Does anyone here believe this will happen? Does anyone believe that his rage will be replaced with sweet, sweet love and kindness?
I don’t believe he has a reason to get out of bed in the morning without his caffeine and rage-gasms. He at least must have his tsk-tsk-tsks at our inferior understanding of the (his) world and lack of openness about our true disdain. There’s a mix of stimulating anger and projection that’s beyond weird.
NotMax
@The Moar You Know
Two Cleveland boys created Superman. Just sayin’.
;)
Anne Laurie
After fifteen years as a Michigander, I know there is only one thing upon which Michigan and Ohio will ever agree: At least we’re not Indiana!
jackmac
Thanks for reading Abernathy so I didn’t have to. And then I went and read his drivel anyway. Moreover, I ventured onto his website to view even more and quickly fled back to BJ. That’s 20 minutes I’ll never get back.
Starboard Tack
@Anne Laurie:
Elkhart!!!! (face palm)
Mike in NC
One of our local rags prints Jay Ambrose about every other week. Seems like your typical wingnut asshole pundit. I was surprised he liked Joe Biden’s inaugural address, but that must be an anomaly.
NotMax
@zhena gogolia
When adjudged by state of residence affiliation rather than only state of birth the tally is New York (7), Ohio (6), Virginia (5).
Brachiator
@Anne Laurie:
Drove through Indiana coming from college. I remember it being flat. Like being at one end of the state and seeing rain and lightning at the other end.
Michigan was fun.
Never been to Ohio.
Dan B
@schrodingers_cat: Greta, Rihanna, and Meena are obviously terrifying young women.
It’s so transparent that BJP’s mother’s milk is fear, especially of the “other” but also anyone that threatens their patriarchal hegemony. If it can’t be argued with it must be demonized.
We know where this leads when chaos ensues.
I hope there are enough reasonable strongholds besides Kerala. How are the tech centers like Bengaluru doing?
BruceFromOhio
@Starboard Tack:
It’s very uneven. In poorer Cleveland city neighborhoods, way out in the country, or just a few streets from this leafy suburban enclave of Chez FromOhio, there are axle-busters and wheel-benders galore if you don’t know how to read the road. Then three years ago my township paved my street for the first time since I moved here 20 years ago, and the teens in the ‘hood regularly ignore the 25-mph speed limit because the road is straight, flat, and smooth. And then everything in between. It really depends on where you are, and who is in charge. Summit County/Akron and the surround are small enough to keep up and stay ahead, and ODOT just finished a major rebuild of the I-77/I-276 spur near Fairlawn. That was a pothole-infested hell for a minute or two.
It’s not all bad.
w_seattle
@zhena gogolia: I believe Enos was a similar character. But there was a Cletus Hogg who fits the friendly-but-dim stereotype noted above in the Urban Dictionary definition.
NotMax
@NotMax
Although by one metric NY could lay claim to 8, due to Grover Cleveland’s non-sequential terms.
Faithful Lurker
I read a comment in TPM this morning that resonated. A evolutionary biologist who studies sexual behaviors in great apes says that Trump is more like a gorilla or a chimp than a modern man. Dominance of others in the tribe is the only thing of importance. Trump doesn’t read, doesn’t think, knows nothing of history, etc. the only thing that matters is dominance. Much like a gorilla leader.
Chetan Murthy
Boy, I hope McCarthy’s reproduced all he and his wife wanna, b/c MTG really cut off his balls, didn’t she? I mean, she’s an abomination, but you gotta respect the work nonetheless.
That cuck.
schrodingers_cat
@Dan B: Karnataka, the state where Bengaluru is, is a hotbed of Sangh induced insanity.
Patriarchal and casteist hegemony.
zhena gogolia
Not a lot of social distancing, but charming
Subsole
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
“We only beat you because you won’t stop crying…”
Red Cedar
@satby: thank you! As a former Girl Scout and almost-cookie-champion of my troop (it was a bitter loss and I clearly will never recover), I always feel morally obligated to buy as many Girl Scout cookies as humanly possible BUT I am now at an age/weight where eating as many as I feel I should buy is, um, a really bad idea. But the Troop 6000 page lets you buy cookies that will not only support the troop for homeless Girl Scouts, it also lets you DONATE those cookies to NYC food banks! What a terrific win-win! So excited. THANK YOU!!!
sanjeevs
@MattF: I’ll have to add that to my reading list.
Vance and co. better not screw that up.
MomSense
@debbie:
One of my favorite poets lives in Columbus. Have you ever read Hanif Abdurraqib?
Subsole
@schrodingers_cat: Basically a dumb hick. Usually small minded and crass in the bargain.
MisterForkbeard
@The Moar You Know: This is key. They do not understand that they crossed unacceptable lines.
They think we’re pissed like they were when Obama was President. That Obama went after conservatives (no), ran roughshod over the constitution (no), and tried to destroy America (no). In their view whatever Trump did wasn’t as bad as that.
They don’t understand that they happily accepted racism. Incompetence. Sexism. Glorified assault. Stole from the nation. Punished blue states for no reason. Locked children in cages, stole them from their parents and bragged about it. Completely blew a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic for no reason and then made efforts to get it under control even harder. And then lied and screamed about election theft that didn’t happen and caused an insurrection attempt to literally kill congressfolk.
They don’t understand that any one of these is a giant moral failing and that they crossed a line. And they don’t understand that taunting the rest of us about it was another line.
They just think it was all in good fun or even laudatory.
sab
@The Moar You Know: We had a pothole that turned into a smallish sinkhole when they scraped our street for its 20 year repaving. Right in front of our driveway. Four feet deep and wide, six feet long.
J R in WV
@schrodingers_cat:
My parents are gone, and my “life-long republican” mother told me on her death bed that she had quit voting for Republicans long ago, when they turned against reproductive health care. And “Don’t tell your father!” which I never did.
But my younger brother… that’s a whole different question. I try not to talk politics with him, ever, because he is a Right Wing Nut Job. Partly because he married a RWNJ Georgia gurl, dumber than a rock. But he was an R from a young age, so I can’t blame it all on her.
I’m sorry about your mother, it’s a shame to have that between yourself and someone beloved. Take care up there in the frozen North!!
NotMax
@Subsole
May not have made the transition to more modern dictionaries but one definition of the word Hoosier was “an ignorant rustic.”
West of the Rockies
@Starboard Tack:
Ah, The Myth of Trumpyphus. I like it!
sab
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: The northern half of the mitten.
Ascap_scab
Kenosha shooter Kyle Rittenhouse skips town, maybe country. Ricky Schroeder and MyPillow Guy on hook for $2M bail.
https://www.wisn.com/article/prosecutors-kyle-rittenhouse-violated-conditions-of-release/35410096?fbclid=IwAR3KjOfg8RyhCn6yZYNEoKth7SFmZ2RAxlOLNwO_t06VndJL6ynW_uaXvIE#
Dan B
@debbie: In the 60’s Columbus was very conservative and very insular. It was more so than Cincinnati.
FYI my great uncle Ralph Mershon donated his fortune to Ohio State, hence the auditorium and more. We were the only relatives but didn’t get a dime. We did get a private tour of the auditorium, some silver carving and serving utensils. And my father got his tuition to University of Illinois during the depression.
It’s good to hear reports that Columbus is one of the better places to live in the Midwest.
sab
@Anne Laurie: I have a Raygun t–shirt with Midwest Map- Rivalry Edition. Ohio to Michigan: we only use you for your lakes. The Upper Peninsula was just : freedom!
Subsole
@schrodingers_cat: Not being terribly familiar with Indian politics, is the Khalistani movement a major boogeyman over there, like BLM is for our conservatives?
Citizen Alan
@Chetan Murthy:
I have absolutely no idea who this Abernathy muppet is. But the fact that Thiessen still works there is why I refuse to get a Post subscription. I genuinely feel like I would be tacitly supporting torture if I did so.
Subsole
@Ken:
Yeah. It usually conjures images of a dumb hayseed redneck in a holler somewhere. Poor white trash too stooopid and small to ever learn better and too inherently inferior to ever try.
Instead of the ACTUAL Trump voters: affluent suburban white teash of means who can certainly afford enough education and graces to know better. And often do, in fact, know better on at least on a subconscious level.
Subsole
@sab: Quota hire.
Dan B
@schrodingers_cat: Sad to hear. That’s what I thought. Bengaluru and Madras seemed to be pleasant and promising cities but I thought I’d heard that tech and education couldn’t compensate.
Subsole
@Elizabelle: nonononono….
Nooooooo. That is something else COMPLETELY different.
Spoiler: The Clenis is a dick.
The Cletus is an asshole.
debbie
@MomSense:
Not until now, but I’ve found a bunch of stuff to read about him.
sab
@Dan B: My sister got a job teaching at Ohio State because she misled them into thinking she was from Ohio and might stay on the job.. Her parents and grandparents were, but she was off in school when we moved back so she had only spent a couple of summers here when she wasn’t off at school.
Thirty years later she likes it and is planning to retire from there soon.
When I lived in Columbus for one year in the mid-1980s they didn’t have an orchestra or an art museum. Everything was OSU sports or state government.
NotMax
@Ascap_scab
From your link:
Documented serving of those under 21? Deep doo-doo for the owner of the liquor license.
Subsole
@RSA: Right?
“Being a bigoted loudmouth douche-turbine is a noble goal, if we can just stop being so bigoted and loud about it.”
Citizen Alan
@Elizabelle: I believe you have “Cletus” confused with “Clenis” which is something quite different.
WaterGirl
@Ascap_scab: Why the hell would they let a murderer out of bail?
Narrator: he’s white.
debbie
@Dan B:
Yes, that would have been when I was growing up. I bet the full-sized tank the governor ordered to shut down riots at Ohio State after Kent State rumbled by your great uncle’s auditorium. (Also a great place to see the Dead.)
debbie
@sab:
Actually, they had both even then. They were just very small (today’s Art Museum was just an Art Gallery back then).
sab
@NotMax: Apparently he was with his mother, so it was okay since she bought it for him. A lot of midwest states allow underage drinking if the parent, while present, gives kid permission.
karen marie
@satby: I don’t know whether to send you a virtual hug or shake my virtual fist in your general direction.
Girl Scout cookie sales begin in my local area tomorrow!
sab
@debbie: And their zoo. When Jack Hanna arrived there and took a taxi to the zoo for his job imterview, the cabbie told him they didn’t have a zoo. Now it’s world class.
Citizen Alan
@zhena gogolia: Cletus Hogg was the even dumber version of Enos Strait who took over when Enos was given a spin-off series (which, IIRC, I thought was completely awful even when I was eleven). Enos came back and Cletus got demoted.
MomSense
@debbie:
He’s really special.
debbie
@sab:
How could I forget the zoo??? Jack’s finally retired. I don’t know what he’ll do with his time.
Starboard Tack
@debbie:
I never saw Garcia et al there but saw a lot of other bands there. Is Mershon still standing?
I saw the Dead once in Athens in 1968. They were ok. Not a huge fan. No matter.
debbie
@MomSense:
Thanks, I’m looking forward to learning more about him.
debbie
@Starboard Tack:
As far as I know, it is still standing.
Subsole
@NotMax: Did not know that.
TJWeston
This guy Abernathy has been showing up on The News Hour since late summer and he’s really frosting my tote bag.
Hoodie
It’s not whether a sufficient plurality of the cult is willing to crawl back under the rock, it’s whether we can develop a critical political mass to force them back there. Perhaps what we need to do is convince a smaller segment of the GOP – namely, some of the rational business interests the fund the Abernathys – that they need to choose between civilization and barbarism. The mass of the Trump cult is pretty much immune to any rational persuasion and will only crawl back under their rock when it becomes fruitless for them to think they should be anywhere else.
karensky
@MisterForkbeard:
And, they don’t care that almost 450m fellow Americans have died of Covid-19.
Mart
For Xmas friends email chain I typed get this lying fucker out of our house, and attached the Robert Cray song covering it. A couple Texas Trumper friends of my wife and I from college were outraged I had no respect for their fee fees. I wrote back with a couple pictures of Fuck Your Feelings Trump 2016 2020 “t” shirts. And wrote that after all the fucking shit you have hollered at me the past five years, and now you care about feelings? Anyway, pretty sure we will never see them again. Fuck ’em.
Nora Lenderbee
Trump’s banning from Twitter makes it easier for the GQP to pretend the craziness and nastiness never happened and everything’s back to normal.
Steve in the ATL
@Chetan Murthy:
“Glass” and “bottle” are basically the same, right? I’m on my second glass….
Geminid
@NotMax: By state of birth, Ohio with seven Presidents is second to Virginia with eight. Although I’ll sometimes ask people to name the nine Presidents born in Virginia. They’ll say “Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Munroe, Harrison, Tyler, Taylor, Wilson…but that’s all!” And I’ll say, “You’re leaving out Sam Houston! He was born in Rockbridge County, and went on to become the first President of Texas.”
Tazj
I’ve commented about this before but during Trump’s presidency I would occasionally check the social media of some conservative “intellectuals” to find out what they thought of Trump. These are people who weren’t ever never-Trumpers but lawyers and writers who would claim that they didn’t like Trump but liked Republican policies. I was curious to find out how they could possibly defend his presidency but somehow they always did.
Up until the morning of January 6th these people were spending the majority of their time criticizing Democrats and calling them hysterical for uttering the word sedition.After all, Trump had every right to question the results of the election, he was just asking for a fair accounting of all the votes, like Democrats had done in 2000.
Now it’s the same thing with MTG, they’re in denial. No one knows who she is, working people don’t pay attention to this stuff. I saw a report that she received a standing ovation at some Republican meeting so unfortunately for them and us, she’s not an outlier in conservative politics.
I know Mitt Romney and Mitch McConnell have criticized her but it doesn’t appear Kevin McCarthy will. If they don’t want to be looked down on they could stop voting for people like MTG, or at least hold her accountable.
Kathleen
@artem1s: An hour away from Cincinnati in beautiful downtown Highland County.
schrodingers_cat
@Subsole: There was a major Sikh separatist movement in the 1980s for Khalistan. BJP is hell bent on ripping the seams that hold India together.
schrodingers_cat
@J R in WV: Thanks. She has changed and I can’t seem to reach her.
BruceFromOhio
@Subsole:
Daddy drinks because you make mommy cry.
Another Scott
@Brachiator:
Obligatory…
:-)
Cheers,
Scott.
BruceFromOhio
@The Moar You Know:
@MisterForkbeard:
Thank you both for putting this so succinctly. So much happened so quickly up to and after 1/6, it’s really helpful to read it in stark, unflinching terms.
smedley the uncertain
@satby: Done. Some for us and some to be distributed where needed. Thanks for the tip.
Jeffro
@The Moar You Know:
I hear you, I’m with you, all of this.
Btw, Betty, I’m glad you checked out that Abernathy column I (dis)recommended to everyone this morning. Your reaction, your words, are far better than I could have put it. “It doesn’t work” – so true!
Benno
@The Moar You Know: yeah, tanked….25 more seasons since and counting.
I haven’t watched it in over a decade, and largely agree with you (the couple episodes I’ve dropped in on the last few years…blech. I’d rather watch a Chuck Lorre show), but when I moved to Pakistan I brought the first 15 seasons with me. I’d say the first couple seasons without Conan were as good as the first couple seasons with him.
Benno
@The Moar You Know: say what you will about Ohio, it takes a licking and keeps on ticking.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Licking_County,_Ohio
Benno
@Ken: I would think McEnany would be lawful evil. She wasn’t a bomb thrower. She has an agenda, and agenda delivered to her by her superiors, and she pursued it with single-mindedness.
Origuy
The glaciers stopped south of Indianapolis, just north of Bloomington. From there it gets hilly and much more wooded.
Ruckus
@Amir Khalid:
What I believe that trump has done is make it OK for the republican party to be what it’s been hiding about itself for the last 50+ years. So no it isn’t actually about trump it’s about what he’s made it “OK” to say and do. It seems like this is a massive change but it’s really not, most of them haven’t changed other than feeling that they can be more open about how they feel. They didn’t turn racist because of trump, they just saw that it was OK to be open about it. This is the progression that the republican party has been going in for decades, slowly bring back out in the open, the racism that was the defining trait of the KKK. trump just kicked that can down the road a decade or two. That’s the out loud part, the other part has been the theft of so much of our economy in the bullshit name of not destroying business. Except their concepts and entire premise is doing exactly that, getting us back to the same place the gave us the 1929 crash and depression. Every ignorant thing they do for the “economy” trashes it more.
moops
@Amir Khalid:You can’t purify the product here. Trumpism IS the ore that they’ve been smelting from the right wing for decades. They just happened to leap ahead in purity by a huge amount in one primary. Now all the GOP is addicted to the pure stuff.
The GOP has to somehow craft a party from the waste products of conservatism. From the slag of fellating plutocrats, and abortion banning and gun rights and the other refactory additives that kept the slurry from solidifying. Now that the pure distillate has precipitated it is turning out to be an irreversible process.
JAFD
Greetings from New Jersey, where diners are what we argue about – I mean, I used to live in Burlington County, where Mastoris v Vincentown v Red Lion is an argument more heated than Iggles v Jints…
Anyway, would recommend
https://stoehr.substack.com/p/why-marjorie-taylor-greene-could
on conservative child-rearing, or “Quit crying or I’ll give you something to cry about”