Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The GOP is a fucking disgrace.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

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

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

If you are still in the GOP, you are an extremist.

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

We’ll be taking my thoughts and prayers to the ballot box.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

I’m pretty sure there’s only one Jack Smith.

“I never thought they’d lock HIM up,” sobbed a distraught member of the Lock Her Up Party.

People are complicated. Love is not.

I really should read my own blog.

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

T R E 4 5 O N

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

It’s the corruption, stupid.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

You are here: Home / Politics / GOP Death Cult / Late Night Open Thread: Please, Murphy, Let This Herald A Great Realignment

Late Night Open Thread: Please, Murphy, Let This Herald A Great Realignment

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TFG, no longer God-Emperor of the Heartland…

Late Night Open Thread: Please, Murphy, Let This Herald A Great Realignment

Late Night Open Thread: Please, Murphy, Let This Herald A Great Realignment 1

Late Night Open Thread: Please, Murphy, Let This Herald A Great Realignment 3

Late Night Open Thread: Please, Murphy, Let This Herald A Great Realignment 2

Our Failed Media Village Idiots, the last to get the memo…

Late Night Open Thread: Please, Murphy, Let This Herald A Great Realignment 4

Late Night Open Thread: Please, Murphy, Let This Herald A Great Realignment 5

Late Night Open Thread: Please, Murphy, Let This Herald A Great Realignment 6

Reader Interactions

106Comments

  2. 2.

    ian

    I don’t know who that Nick Adams guy is, but his chutzpah really takes the cake.  Like, google mein kampf quotes dude… you don’t have to show your total ignorance like that.

  4. 4.

    Keith P.

    That’s some chutzpah for Jeff Zeleny to complain that Biden is breaking from “White House traditions”.  Seriously?!?!??!

  5. 5.

    Lyrebird

    @ian: Everything you said!

    I’ve never heard of that guy, so I don’t know if his comments are even worth being censured by the ADL, but wow.

    What Biden said was not a tenth as critical as what Drumpf used to say about protesters at his rallies, and Biden certainly did not try to sicc the crowd on protestors or press people.

    How can Nick Adams look himself in the mirror?

    Which kind of monster is that has no reflection, was it vampires?  Maybe that’s his story.  He certainly has no shame.

  6. 6.

    different-church-lady

    Barr is just pissed that Trump is trying to subvert democracy without using correct procedure.

  7. 7.

    The Oracle of Solace

    If they don’t want to be called fascists, they can stop doing fascisms.

    If they don’t want to be called threats to democracy, they can stop threatening democracy.

    Pretty simple, really.

  8. 8.

    Lyrebird

    @Keith P.:

    That’s some chutzpah for Jeff Zeleny to complain that Biden is breaking from “White House traditions”.  Seriously?!?!??!

    Hopefully someone here can get the tweet someone responded with with pictures of Pappy Bush, GW Bush, etc standing in front of Marines making speeches.

  19. 19.

    RaflW

    I think this was the key nugget of that Yair thread partly quoted in the OP

    @Yair_Rosenberg
    This is a deliberate strategy by Biden, because it either unites Republicans in backlash behind Trump, an unpopular candidate Biden already beat, or divides the Republican party over Trump, hobbling them. The point is dividing Republicans, not painting them with the same brush.

  20. 20.

    HumboldtBlue

    @Origuy:

    May I suggest as a gentle reminder, the little girl is autistic, she does not “have autism.”

    (Sister has 35 years special education experience)

  24. 24.

    RaflW

    I mentioned this in an afternoon thread, but Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-Va, retired) talked on NPR today about the terrible state of the GOP and in particular made mention that people should take note that sycophant Barr has flipped (she of course didn’t say it like that).

    But along with trashing Trump, Masters and others, she did say: Hey Barr is making a worthwhile point.

    I’ll add, he should still not be allowed in polite company. And while he was perhaps second only to Pompeo in terms of “heat seeking missile for Trump’s ass” brow-nosing in office, I’ll take the flip now, thanks.

  25. 25.

    randy khan

    Bill Barr has a keen sense of who’s winning and who’s losing, and he will never, ever back a loser.  He might bide his time to see how things will turn out, but once he knows he won’t look back.

  26. 26.

    Major Major Major Major

    I hop into a rightish subreddit sometimes to see what the nutters are up to and they are losing their shit over this speech. So the first thing I learned about it was the right wing memes, then the headlines, so I finally actually read it, and… that’s it? This is what everybody is melting down over?

  27. 27.

    scav

    @RaflW: Barr sure did discover worthwhile when it became personally worthwhile to put a leetle firebreak between him and the Orange In-Fürer-no.

  28. 28.

    Damien

    My favorite response so far has been “If you’re mad about Biden’s speech then you’re exactly who he’s talking about.”

  30. 30.

    Sanjeevs

    America just needs more NYTsplaining

    “There is a real difference in how the parties define democracy,” said Nicole Hemmer, a historian at Vanderbilt University and author of “Partisans,” a newly published history of the rise of conservative movement figures in the 1990s and their transformation of American politics.

    “The Republican Party at the moment subscribes to a much narrower definition, as is evident in their support for everything from voter suppression to extensive gerrymandering to the right of Republican officials to overturn voter preferences in the certification process,” she added.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/02/us/politics/trump-biden-democracy.html

  31. 31.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Major Major Major Major: Most of the rightwing folks I know cannot stand to be challenged. They’re very angry at Biden because he called them out slightly, and they’re angrier because they can’t refute him without screaming and looking like an idiot.

    Not that it stops them in their own safe spaces, though.

  32. 32.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Sanjeevs: “Republicans subscribe to a different version of democracy where only Republicans are allowed to vote or win” is not the argument this person thinks it is.

  33. 33.

    scav

    Sanjeevs: Got a narrower definition of who is recognizably human, let alone human with rights that should be non-theoretically respected when push cones to anything they fancy too. Whaddja know.  Democracy-lite.

  34. 34.

    Edmund Dantes

    @Ken: it’s okay to cry about stuff like this and not resort to euphemisms as to why we are emotionally touched by something.

  36. 36.

    dm

    @Sanjeevs: That’s kind of selective editing misrepresenting the article as a whole and Hemmer’s remarks in particular (Hemmer knows the enemy very well).

    For example, the next sentence:

    “The Democratic Party favors not only a more inclusive voting system but more robust systems to support majoritarian politics.”

    Or how about this from the article:

    When it comes to democracy in America, there is no real equivalence, of course. The elder Mr. Trump sought to use the power of his office to overturn a democratic election, pressuring state and local officials, the Justice Department, members of Congress and his own vice president to disregard the will of the people to keep him in office. When that did not work, he riled up a crowd that stormed the Capitol, disrupting the counting of Electoral College votes and threatening to execute those standing in Mr. Trump’s way.
    Since leaving office, Mr. Trump has continued to demand that the election be reversed and even suggested that he be reinstated as president, all based on lies he tells his supporters about what happened in 2020. He has forced Republican officeholders and candidates to embrace his false claims and sought to install election deniers in state positions where they can influence future vote counts.
    When Mr. Trump’s supporters express fear for democracy with pollsters, it is not about those actions but about what Mr. Trump has told them about election integrity, even if what he says is wrong. They also see Mr. Biden’s administration as far too liberal, expanding government to the point that it will invariably restrain their own freedoms.

    (I’m responding in part because I’ve heard a couple of interviews with Hemmer, and she knows the Right and how it got there.)

  37. 37.

    Cathie from Canada

    Great post!

    I have been tweeting today also about the “But the Marines!” take from way too many talking heads today — they didn’t want to talk about Biden’s warnings so they thought they could find refuge in complaining about optics.

    John Harwood was fired from CNN this morning – this Steve Schmidt tweet quoted his last comment on the Biden speech:
    https://twitter.com/SteveSchmidtSES/status/1565812216577900545?s=20&t=9-JK-WuzgFv_xV5UNFZFZg

  42. 42.

    Brachiator

    @RaflW:

    This is a deliberate strategy by Biden, because it either unites Republicans in backlash behind Trump, an unpopular candidate Biden already beat, or divides the Republican party over Trump, hobbling them. The point is dividing Republicans, not painting them with the same brush.

    I don’t know. Maybe Biden is trying to save America.

    People want to try to reduce Biden’s statements to political strategy. Why not take him at his word?

  43. 43.

    Brachiator

    @dm:

    He has forced Republican officeholders and candidates to embrace his false claims and sought to install election deniers in state positions where they can influence future vote counts.

    This is absolutely false. Trump has not forced anyone to do anything. He has endorsed candidates who believe his lies, and in many places, voters have approved these candidates in primary elections. The sad thing, the crazy thing, is how many people believe the nonsense that Trump spews and are willing to follow him.

    When Mr. Trump’s supporters express fear for democracy with pollsters, it is not about those actions but about what Mr. Trump has told them about election integrity, even if what he says is wrong.

    Trump supporters don’t express fear for democracy. They want their guy installed as president. No matter what the actual evidence says, they only believe Trump. And Trump has never said anything meaningful about election integrity. He has simply asserted that if he didn’t win, it must be because of cheating. And he brazenly asked Georgia officials to find him the votes he needed.

    They also see Mr. Biden’s administration as far too liberal, expanding government to the point that it will invariably restrain their own freedoms.

    Horse shit. These people seem to believe that Biden’s policies are illegitimate and un American, and that accordingly, voters have no right to elect anyone but a Republican to higher office. They rarely speak in terms of democracy or their own freedoms, but instead blandly insist that Biden wants to give free money to unworthy people.

    It is perverse to attempt to describe these people as trying to save democracy.

  44. 44.

    Sanjeevs

    @dm: I looked at tweets and I agree with you about Hemmer.

    But the tone of the article and the headline is classic NYT

  45. 45.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Brachiator:

    Trump has not forced anyone to do anything.

    That’s so unfair!  Let he who has never adopted fascist positions in order to keep his cushy job throw the first stone[THUD! THUD! THUD!]

    OK, I stand corrected.

  47. 47.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Lyrebird: Hopefully someone here can get the tweet someone responded with with pictures of Pappy Bush, GW Bush, etc standing in front of Marines making speeches.

    Or on an aircraft carrier, in a flight suite.

  48. 48.

    eversor

    Barr has always said it’s cause Jesus.  We going to take down Christianity yet because that’s the one side, the other side is we hand them a free win because “don’t want to hurt peoples feelings”.

    Christianity again is the root of all our issues.  So take it out or give up.

  49. 49.

    eversor

    @ian:

    He’s from The American Conservative and a Christian.  Again.  The issue is Christianity.  Take it out or give up.  It’s always Christianity.

  50. 50.

    Chetan Murthy

    @eversor: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_the_United_States#:~:text=Christianity%20is%20the%20most%20prevalent,Christian%20(about%20210%20million).

    Christianity is the most prevalent religion in the United States. Estimates from 2017 suggest that between 65% and 75% of the US population is Christian (about 230 to 250 million). More recent estimates from 2021 suggest that 63% of the US population is Christian (about 210 million).

    An electoral gold seam, I tellsya, an electoral gold seam!

  52. 52.

    steve g

    @Sanjeevs:

    (NYTsplaining)

    At some point, you have stop saying they are “redefining democracy,” and recognize that the GOP are flat out rejecting it.

  53. 53.

    Chetan Murthy

    @steve g: David Frum enters NYT editorial offices, wielding a baseball bat.

    viz. “If conservatives become convinced that they cannot win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy.”—David Frum.

  55. 55.

    Major Major Major Major

    @Betsy: Biden is an unusually earnest politician in some ways but this speech has some flourishes that are obviously there to poke the bear and cause backbiting. At least that was my read, no I don’t remember examples I’m going to bed

  59. 59.

    Shalimar

    @sab: An alpha male is an asshole who thinks he is better than everyone else.  It’s usually self-defined, because everyone else sees the asshole part clearly but no so much the better than part.

  60. 60.

    sab

    @Shalimar: Just what I thought.A stands for alpha and also asshole. Can’t these guys even see how they project?

    I have a seriously damaged by back surgery husband at home here. He is large ( 6′ 2″ ) and I am small but I have never been afraid of him. Twenty years of marriage where he was always ( sometimes obtrusavely)  protective.

    Frankly I don’t know how he would be getting through this back surgery without me. My baby sister’s eyes bugged out of her head when she saw me do the antibiotic i.v.

    But I don’t know how I would have lived the last tumultuous twenty years without him.

    That’s a good marriage. Ups and downs together.

    But I still want a German Shepherd.

  62. 62.

    Sally

    @sab: Ha – GSD’s are fabulous creatures to share a life with.

    On another note, there is nothing BB could do to climb his way out of trumpov’s  traitorous arse. The entanglement is such that no number of parsecs will disengage them from each other’s warm, dark embrace.

  64. 64.

    Matt McIrvin

    I’ve been looking at their “Liberal Hunting License” bumper stickers and other invocations of violence for 45 years and the etiquette convention was that we just had to be polite about it. We had a President who would hold rallies where he came right up to the edge of telling the audience to lynch the reporters in the press box and they were “oh, that lovable scamp, he’s so unpredictable.” But a President actually mentions all this and they lose their shit.

  65. 65.

    raven

    @sab: I broke my back in a wreck almost 50 years ago. I spent two months in the hospital and I always have said that it was worse for my wife (at the time) than it was for me.

  67. 67.

    Barbara

    @Starfish: ​That’s just . . . Wow. Like a mental health disorder. Oddly, however, it reinforces my view that Trump’s successors are unlikely to command the same level of fealty. It’s bizarre and more than a little disturbing to think that 20 years from now these people will still be pining for Trump, but that’s the way it seems to be heading.​

  68. 68.

    Barbara

    @sab: ​If you have to tell people you are an alpha it’s kind of an admission that they aren’t in alignment with your preferred narrative. They either reject the category entirely or don’t think you qualify for it.

  74. 74.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    Dump would scream “the media is the enemy of the people” and revoke press credentials into the WH and they would run to their laptops and post their 80th “pivot” article with a sidebar on “but her emails”.

  76. 76.

    MattF

    Steve Benen reminds us that Trump’s version of the motive for the FBI search of MAL is totally, completely, unreservedly nutso. They were searching for Hillary Clinton emails, he says. And also too, for good measure, ‘Russia hoax’.

  78. 78.

    germy shoemangler

    @Frank Wilhoit:

    In my mind, the only NIck Adams is the TV “Rebel” who died of a pill overdose.

    Okay, maybe the Hemingway character… but that’s it.  I don’t recognize this new guy.

  80. 80.

    Geminid

    @Barbara: I’m hoping that they’re still pining for trump and telling their friends, “I voted for trump in 2020 because we had a chance to make America great again. Then the RINOs stabbed him in the back and I haven’t voted since.” Some will.

  81. 81.

    germy shoemangler

    1/2: In 2020, Trump called Democrats "fascists" in '20 while surrounded by military officials.

    No one remembers it bc Dems didn't feel threatened by his false claim.

    Today, MAGA Republicans are angry at President Biden for a similar remark. Because they know it's true. pic.twitter.com/ran6LASOys

    — Matthew Sheffield (@mattsheffield) September 2, 2022

  83. 83.

    ian

    @eversor:

    Take it out or give up.

    What really cracks me up is that you share a logical fallacy with the people you are so bitterly opposed to

    one of the common fallacies in Western philosophy called ‘all or nothing (AON)’. AON presents a false dilemma by suggesting that there are only two options – either all or nothing – when in fact there are many more options in the middle ground between those two extremes.

  85. 85.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    @germy shoemangler: ​
      Fun fact: “After James Dean’s death late in production [Giant], Nick Adams overdubbed some of Dean’s lines, which were nearly inaudible, as [Jet] Rink’s voice.”

  86. 86.

    CCL

    Late to the thread, but on Tuesday when I drove to the town offices, I passed the giant bedsheet sized American flag that’s been stretched out between two trees since the 4th of July and at another house the gazillion Maggot signs of the “no Biden,” “Trump won” etc ilk that have been up and constantly added to since Jan, 2020.

    Friday, same route – all gone, drive was through serene, empty of signs, green.

  89. 89.

    Honus

    @Barbara: that “best albums of all time” list is a hoot.  Kid Rock and Ted Nugent better than Pet Sounds, Blonde on Blonde and Revolver.

  91. 91.

    Honus

    @Barbara: precisely.  Other people will tell you if you are an alpha male by allowing you to lead them in completing a task.  “Alpha males” like Adams usually lead a crew of one.

  92. 92.

    Honus

    @eclare: her daughter, Rosa Brooks, taught law at UVA and wrote a column for the LA Times. She live right down the road from me in Free Union. I believe she’s at Georgetown now and still writing.

  93. 93.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @dm: Gotta disagree with this statement from the article:

    He has forced Republican officeholders and candidates to embrace his false claims…

    Those officeholders and candidates had and have a choice: democracy or fascism. They chose fascism. Why pretend otherwise? They are adults. They have agency. Hell, they are vying for LEADERSHIP roles in our country. They should be held to a HIGHER standard than the person in the street. They do NOT deserve some sort of benefit of the doubt. Indeed, a campaign and election is conducted to find leaders who don’t need the benefit of the doubt, citizens who are the best of us, not mediocre, and certainly not the worst.

  94. 94.

    J R in WV

    @Lyrebird: ​
     

    @Keith P.: That’s some chutzpah for Jeff Zeleny to complain that Biden is breaking from “White House traditions”. Seriously?!?!??!

    Hopefully someone here can get the tweet someone responded with with pictures of Pappy Bush, GW Bush, etc standing in front of Marines making speeches.

    Just think back to W Bush on the flight deck of the USS Abe Lincoln, after landing in a fighter wearing a flight suit, and making a political speech surrounded by thousands of Navy and Marine military personnel. Press fawning all over W Bush.

    But Biden having two Marines behind him? Unthinkable!

    How does that compute?

  95. 95.

    UncleEbeneezer

    “People involved in negotiations over Thursday’s address said the networks deemed Biden’s remarks as “political” in nature and therefore decided not to televise it.”

    This is like the howl that we are “politicizing” something when we point out that racist thing X is done almost exclusively by Republicans, is racist.  Build The Wall, Caravans, Birtherism, Voter Suppression etc.  It’s totes unfair of us to point out things are racist if (mostly) only one party does them.

  96. 96.

    J R in WV

    @Leto: ​
     

    “Evil, racist, ghost-pig.” Hard laugh at that

    Edit: Nevermind, HumboltBlue got there at comment #1. Note to self: next time, read comments first.

    That’s OK, Leto, it’s worth repeating, even several times!

  98. 98.

    Matt McIrvin

    @germy shoemangler: Personally, I felt threatened when Trump said that shit. Not because I thought it was true but because I thought he was going to kill us. There was no telling what he was going to do. Fortunately he had trouble getting the guys with the uniforms and guns to cooperate, but that might not be true forever.

  99. 99.

    opiejeanne

    @sab: This alpha male nonsense applied to men is based on the concept that male wolves who lead a pack are the alphas, but their belief is that it means being a bully.

  101. 101.

    Matt McIrvin

    @opiejeanne: And it’s worth reiterating that the studies that established that concept were of unrelated wolves held in captivity under unnatural, stressful situations, like a prison gang. In the wild, the “alpha” couple that leads a pack is generally just Mom and Dad, and didn’t particularly get there through a bullying competition.

  102. 102.

    Bill Arnold

    @J R in WV:
    Watch the video at @germy shoemangler: it is literally D.J. Trump calling Democrats fascists while flanked by two uniformed men in the background. (Trump is reading a speech clearly written by one of his fascist staffers.)
    The thread has a few more examples of Trump calling Democrats/his opponents fascists.

  103. 103.

    Wapiti

    Related to the OP, there’s a WaPo column from McArdle, yesterday, titled “It’s time for Republicans to save themselves”. She argues that there may be short term losses, but the Republicans do need to deal with the Trumpism – no one else can fix the Republican Party except Republicans.  They’re where they are now because every candidate in their 2016 primary wanted someone else to fix the problem.

  104. 104.

    Chris Johnson

    @randy khan: I think Barr looked scared but determined. I think he knows a lot of the truth about what’s going on, and has made his assessment of who’s gonna prevail and is going to go forward with that regardless of consequences because he has no control over the consequences and knows it.

    I think he knows Trump was turning over secrets to the Russians (selling? He was working for them the whole time, there is no ‘selling’, he has no money, he’s a puppet man)

    I think Barr knows the Russians are fucked at this stage, well and truly caught. And it’s a matter of how to hide as much as possible from the American people, and he’s already got his Supreme Court justices and everything he could have got from assisting Trump while he was relevant. Now that is over, and all that’s left is the threat of getting whacked by Russian mobsters… and those mobsters are going to have to be very busy boys, and the US government ain’t playing anymore.

    Barr is right to flip. Yes he runs a risk by turning against Russia’s puppet man, but to stay is WAY worse at this stage. I think he’s scared but determined, and will align with the USA out of simple self-preservation. Him flipping is a very revealing thing about what it looks like to the higher-echelon traitors and spies at this point. Particularly the smart ones, not like cannon fodder Trump. Hasn’t McConnell long since flipped?

  105. 105.

    El Muneco

    @Barbara: “​If you have to tell people you are an alpha it’s kind of an admission that they aren’t in alignment with your preferred narrative. They either reject the category entirely or don’t think you qualify for it.”

    A true alpha male is like Russell Crowe in _Gladiator_. He inspires loyalty, affection, and devotion from others just by being himself and showing an example. He doesn’t posture, preen, or even really acknowledge his alpha-hood since the effect is just an inherent part of who he is. Fear and intimidation aren’t part of the equation.

    Anyone who requests, demands, or proclaims the status of alpha male – isn’t one.

  106. 106.

    Citizen Alan

    @Barbara:  Twenty years from now, these freaks will believe that Shitgibbon is still alive and plotting his comeback along with John F. Kennedy junior and Elvis.

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