Of Big Picture Stuff

Whomever tweets for the leftist "Pod Save America" must be fired immediately.

Lovett: I just want to be very clear: Jews in Michigan have a moral obligation to support Abdul. They should do it to protect themselves from antisemitism and rising hatred in America. https://t.co/URjLmifhqh

— Pod Save America (@PodSaveAmerica) October 27, 2026

Lovett: I just want to be very clear: Jews in Michigan have a moral obligation to support Abdul. They should do it to protect themselves from antisemitism and rising hatred in America. https://t.co/URjLmifhqh

— Pod Save America (@PodSaveAmerica) October 27, 2026

As comments to the tweet/video indicate, many tweeters are responding not to the entire video, but merely to the remark about the moral obligation of Jews to support Abdul.  Electing an anti-Semite is no way to protect any individual or group from anti-semitism or rising hatred. The other is that the video included a statement which did not appear in the tweet:

And we need to have a check on Donald Trump in a Democratic Senate. Maybe Abdul is not, is going to be a reliable vote against Israel. Fine. We can handle that. But we canot handle a continued slide to this hateful, authoritarian right. It will be dangerous for us.

A slide to a hateful, authoritarian right would be dangerous for Jews, as Jon Lovett is emphasizing, though dangerous for a whole lot of other Americans.  There is no reason to believe, however, that Mike Rogers is anti-Semitic or in any way dangerous, but merely a toady for Donald Trump.... or as a longtime Philadelphia talk show host turned podcaster often put it, "a zero trying to be a one". There are worse things, and people, in the Republican Party and electing a hater of Jews- albeit a Democrat- also would not be a healthful for Jews, other minorities, or diversity in America.

Lovett cites the GOP's "othering" of Muslims, immigrants, "trans people", and Haitians. He then legitimately argues "and anyone who has allowed their concerns,, their legitimate concerns, to cloud that ultimate, larger point is missing the larger point is missing the big picture," a kind of politics on the  

We can argue about the impact of electing a compadre of Hasan Piker and the latter's cousin, Cenk Uygur, to the United States Senate would have a palliative effect on hatred of religious, racial, and sexual/gender minorities. We could, and I would if I knew Lovett. 

The recent pro-el Hasan ad has proven very controversial, in which "controversial" brings to mind the loathsome ad for Vivek Ramaswamy featuring the loathsome birth mother of opponent Amy Acton. I should have realized it did not come from the campaign itself. Rather

The ad comes from Rebellion PAC, which is fronted by left-wing political commentator Cenk Uygur. It depicts a couple in a supermarket saying they cannot afford groceries because they have to set money aside “for killing Palestinians.” It concludes by stating that the Michigan Democrat’s GOP opponent “is for they/them,” referring to Israelis.

In a statement to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, an El-Sayed campaign representative said the ad “is not affiliated in any way” with his campaign and that it did not speak for him.

“Abdul is focused on pushing back against Trump’s agenda that is raising prices for Michiganders,” campaign spokesperson Roxie Richner said in the statement. “No one speaks for Abdul but himself and his campaign.”

The campaign did not address how El-Sayed viewed the messaging behind the ad, and did not respond to a follow-up from JTA about the ad’s content.

That's not enough. The campaign's spokesperson was merely stating a fact, that there had been no collaboration. Meanwhile, Rebellion PAC defiantly defends its ad while el-Sayed's people refuse actually to criticize it in any way.

The really big picture is the number: 51.  And unfortunately, the number may be 52 because if Republicans end up with 49 members in the new Senate, the inducements which would be offered Pennsylvania senator John Fetterman to change uniforms are beyond anyone's imagination.  That is enough to wish for Abdul el-Sayed's victory, and all that there is.

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Row Over Imported Labor

                         

Vivek Ramaswamy went and did it. Boy, did he ever:

The reason top tech companies often hire foreign-born & first-generation engineers over “native” Americans isn’t because of an innate American IQ deficit (a lazy & wrong explanation). A key part of it comes down to the c-word: culture. Tough questions demand tough answers & if…

— Vivek Ramaswamy (@VivekGRamaswamy) December 26, 2024

Reading from the same hymnal

Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of Tesla (TSLA.O), vowed to go to "war" to defend the H-1B visa program for foreign tech workers late on Friday amid a dispute between President-elect Donald Trump's longtime supporters and his most recently acquired backers from the tech industry.

In a post on social media platform X, Musk said "The reason I'm in America along with so many critical people who built SpaceX, Tesla and hundreds of other companies that made America strong is because of H1B."

"I will go to war on this issue the likes of which you cannot possibly comprehend," he added.

Of course Musk will. He didn't get to become the President-in-waiting by being accomodating and

Musk, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in South Africa, has held an H-1B visa, and his electric-car company Tesla obtained 724 of the visas this year. H-1B visas are typically for three-year periods, though holders can extend them or apply for green cards.

For Musk, this is personal- personal power and finances. He has no particular affection for foreign-born individuals nor a heartfelt belief in a melting pot or the American mosaic. Thirteen months ago, Musk "tweeted his fervent agreement with an antisemitic tweet" when a tweet posted on X 

read: “Jewish communties [sic] have been pushing the exact kind of dialectical hatred against whites that they claim to want people to stop using against them.”

The billionaire owner and CTO of X, formerly Twitter, responded the same evening: “You have said the actual truth.” In another reply, he wrote: “I am deeply offended by ADL’s messaging and any other groups who push de facto anti-white racism or anti-Asian racism or racism of any kind.” Musk has feuded with the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) before, threatening to sue over its accounting of hate speech on his social media network....

Musk’s racial politics have been trending in this direction for months. In October, he wrote in response to a tweet mourning the melting down of a statue of the Confederate general Robert E Lee: “They absolutely want your extinction.” Replying to a tweet from @libsoftiktok, who he restored to X, which read: “Racism against white people is the only kind of discrimination that’s allowed,” Musk wrote last week: “It’s messed up and needs to stop.”

Defending himself from being criticized for his antagonism toward American workers, Musk tweeted in part (emphasis his)

OF COURSE my companies and I would prefer to hire Americans and we DO, as that is MUCH easier than going through the incredibly painful and slow work visa process.

HOWEVER, there is a dire shortage of extremely talented and motivated engineers in America.

Shorter Musk: "Immigrants are superior to American workers and we should make it easier to hire them, especially when I do."

But Ramaswamy, reading from the same hmymnal but singing a different hymn, took this in a somewhat different direction, decrying a culture he believes promotes mediocrity over excellence, the "prom queen over the math olympiad champ or the jock over the valedictorian."

He's wrong for attacking "normalcy," especially in a culture beset by increasing rates of suicide.However, he's right about the prom queen/math olympiad champ and the jock/valedictorian 

Ramaswamy is a little skeezy himself, obviously, and his tweet was all over the place, not unlike this post. Musk, though, is focused: focused on his own financial interests and has earned the condemnation of individuals who have learned, less than a month before he- uh, er, Donald Trump- is inaugurated.

And in news from West Palm Beach, Florida, Donald Trump now has sided with Elon Musk over the ex-President's base, which had thought that Trump was with them on immigration. Siding with Musk is not surprising, however; Donald Trump has no incentive to offend the incoming President.

   

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Blood of Our Ancestors

The 45th and possible 47th President of the United States of America:

You know, when they let, I think the real number is like 15, 16 million people into our country, when they do that, we got a lot of work to do.  They’re poisoning the blood of our country. That’s what they’ve done. They’ve poisoned ... mental institutions and prisons all over the world. Not just in South America. Not just in the three or four countries that we think about, but all over the world they’re coming into our country. From Africa, from Asia, all over the world. They’re pouring into our country. Nobody’s even looking at them. They just come in. The crime is going to be tremendous.

Mehdi Hasan asks the conventional rhetorical question.

Not sure how these people sleep at night https://t.co/JNEoCV46X7

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) December 19, 2023

Trump contends there are "like 15, 16 million people into our country, when they do that, we got a lot of work to do. They're poisoning the blood of our country." Representative Malliotakis said "He didn't say the word 'immigrants.' I think he was talking about the Democratic policies." 

Unless the ex-President meant that there are approximately 14 or 16 million Democrats "pouring into our country "from Africa, from Asia, all over the world," he was talking about immigrants.

Nonetheless, I'd ask a different question than would Hasan. We have to accept the possibility that these folks sleep well at night, either because they lack a conscience or because they actually agree with Mr. Trump. Perhaps the better question, asked rhetorically or not, would beg an explanation as to the reason such Republicans are unable or unwilling to defend the remarks they prefer to pretend the former President did not make.

They would not have to defend the racial aspect- "blood"- of the comment. If they want to restrict dramatically the flow of migrants to the USA, they could make the argument. But they won't. Karen Finney, of whom I'm no fan, has an interesting theory which might explain their reticence when in response to Hasan, she maintains "Trump's comments are as much about interracial/bi-racial Americans as they are about immigrants. The 'poisoning the blood' rhetoric akin to 'one drop' laws in the US. This is about a much bigger version of who is American."

Technically, she is wrong, but only technically. Trump was talking about immigrants, and only immigrants and reflects the perspective of many voters. While his words and meaning are hateful and bigoted, they make sense to a lot of people. 

Nonetheless (as Finney recognizes), when Trump speaks of "blood," he is not speaking of the "blood" of African-Americans, Asian-Americans, or Americans of Latin descent. Were he doing so, there would be no "blood" to be poisoned- it already be "poisoned," the result of sexual relations among people of different national and racial backgrounds.

Thus, when Donald Trump was speaking of "the blood of our country," he was referring to the blood of white Americans. Finney's critique is insightful insofar as she was foreseeing a slippery slop, unconsciously harkening back to Reverend Martin Niemoller. The Lutheran minister, at first a right-winger, then a critic of Adolph Hitler, after the Second World War eloquently powerfully admitted

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Actor Ronald Reagan was a fake and bad President with soaring rhetoric. So he understood what even Republicans once did, that "you can go to live in France, but you cannot become a Frenchman. You can go to live in Germany or Turkey or Japan, but you cannot become a German, a Turk, or a Japanese. But anyone, from any corner of the Earth, can come to live in America and become an American." Here, it has been not who our parents or grandparents were, but who we are, or striving to become.

But Donald Trump's acolytes, including supposed rivals Ramaswamy, DeSantis, and Haley, are in too deep. Intimidated by, or in support of, the Republican Party's leading presidential candidate, they are unable to make an argument in favor of democratic principles, institutional mores, or American values. Their silence speaks loudly. Commitment to what has made America America has given way to accepting someone who wants to decide who gets to stay and who gets shut out based upon the supposed blood of their ancestors.

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Haley's "Girl" Card

It was bound to happen,  The cliche is "even a stopped clock is right twice a day" and Vivek Ramaswamy is right maybe twice a year. The mainstream media is promoting Nikki Haley as the alternative to Donald Trump because the ex-governor is a woman. Additionally, she's also a corporate stooge who has demonstrated that she is not antagonistic to minorities. 

Nikki Haley’s gender-card schtick is pathetic & straight out of the Kamala Harris / Hillary Clinton playbook. There’s a reason why the MSM is propping her up as their token Republican. pic.twitter.com/m6Oe9zZKJv

— Vivek Ramaswamy (@VivekGRamaswamy) November 16, 2023

Nonetheless, it's the woman's card she's playing for all it's worth.

BREAKING: Nikki Haley is now saying that Vivek is only criticizing her because he 'has a girl problem'pic.twitter.com/y9DJ7bd3u1

— Jack Poso 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) November 15, 2023

Haley is seen remarking

Look what happens. He comes out of the gate. He gets the female chair of the party, he gets the female anchor on the platform, and then he hits me. And I'm not saying anything. But he might have a girl problem. 

Now serving her fourth term as chairman of the Republican National Committee, Ronna Romney McDaniel has overseen the party during three bad election cycles, in 2018, 2020, and 2022. By all indications, she has done a poor job and appears to be a gift to the Democratic Party.

Ramaswamy opposes USA support of Ukraine and has been at best, lukewarm toward Israel. By contrast, the ex-UN ambassador supports USA assistance to Ukraine and to Israel, with condemnation of Hamas which has gone beyond that of virtually anyone of prominence. More to the point, Haley is now the main challenger to Trump's nomination. Ramaswamy has been extreme in his praise of the ex-President, probably angling (in vain) to be Trump's running mate, and may even be a proxy for Trump. He's not going to go after the former President; for him, Haley is the most obvious target.

Haley's criticism of Ramaswamy as having a "girl problem" is quite rich, and not only because if any politician said a female candidate had a "girl problem" or even a "woman problem," he'd be driven out of politics in less time than it takes to spell "woke."

Donald J. Trump has been accused of sexual assault or sexual harassment of more than a dozen women, including of E. Jean Carrol, whom a jury in civil court earlier this year found had been sexually abused by Trump in 1996. The leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination is the man behind such statements as:

."If Hillary Clinton can't satisfy her husband, what makes her think she can satisfy America?" 

 "Look at that face. Would anybody vote for that ((Carly Fiorina)? Can you imagine that, the face of our next president? I mean, she's a woman, and I'm not supposed to say bad things, but really, folks, come on. Are we serious?" 

She(Megyn Kelly) gets out and she starts asking me all sorts of ridiculous questions. You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever."

And so many more. Yet as recently as Wednesday, November 15, Haley stated unequivocally that she would "support the Republican nominee," who is likely to be Trump, and that the latter was "the right President at the right time."  When Dana Perino at the Republican presidential debate at the Reagan Library in California asked the candidates "which one of you on the stage tonight should be voted off the island," the obvious answer was "anyone not here to speak to Republican voters," which would have been Trump.  For Haley, it was "are you serious?"

It was a serious question, though drawing upon popular culture, and one which elicited revealing responses.  What Nikki Haley is serious about, as called out by Vivek Ramaswamy, is delivering the shtick of a tough chick act. 

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Marketer for the GOP

The operative term is "shill."

Who's going to tell him?

Hannity, after dumping Vivek Ramaswamy following a VERY heated exchange: "I think people who never held public office, like you, maybe they’re not qualified to be president!"

Yes, Hannity actually said that. pic.twitter.com/Eh0pgTmOWp

— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) October 13, 2023

On the heels of the Republican Party's second loss to Barack Obama, the GOP conducted an "autopsy," resulting in a 100-page report called the Growth and Opportunity Project, which was comprised of

an extensive plan the RNC believes will lead the party to victory with an extensive outreach to women, African-American, Asian, Hispanic and gay voters. Among the plans: hiring paid outreach staffers across the country in a $10 million push that begins right away; backing "comprehensive immigration reform"; abbreviating the presidential primary process with fewer debates, specifically saying the party would like at least half the 20 there were during the 2012 cycle; and moving the convention to June or July, as well as improving the data and digital effort.

Because it was an official plan of the Republican Party, Sean Hannity was all in. Slamming the project a decade later, the Commentary Editor of the conservative Washington Examiner wrote

That document did actually have useful things to say about modernizing how Republicans used data, but in its one foray into policy, the document recommended, “We must embrace and champion comprehensive immigration reform.”

Many Republicans took this advice to heart, including 14 Republican senators who voted with Democrats to give amnesty to over 10 million illegal immigrants. Fox News host Sean Hannity and former House Speaker John Boehner jumped on the amnesty bandwagon as well.

Less than three years after the autopsy which urged the GOP to open its door to voting blocs cool to the party and to enact comprehensive immigration reform, reality television actor Donald J. Trump rode down an escalator and announced his presidential candidacy while infamously declaring

When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.

So much for that autopsy. A harbinger of his party's turn to the left on the cultural front, Hannity had begun to alter his anti-immigration stance days after the 2012 election. Yet by March of 2018 he was falsely claiming that Donald Trump supported the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

During the 2020 presidential campaign

"The media has accused me of going soft in interviews on Republicans," the Fox News host said on his radio show last month. "I plead guilty. I absolutely plead guilty. You know why? Because I want one of them to win."

The admission came after Hannity spent weeks being accused of shilling for Donald Trump. In a rare moment of media bipartisanship, the liberal site ThinkProgress called his show a serialized Trump infomercial, and the conservative site RedState endorsed that characterization. Even Sen. Ted Cruz had accused Hannity of asking pro-Trump questions.

Hannity still is on the Trump train. That will continue as long as the ex-President is on a glide path to the GOP nomination in 2024. But if someone else soars at Trump's expense, the Fox anchor will pivot away from the ex-President. When he accuses Vivek Ramaswamny of not being qualified to be President because he lacks experience in public office, it seems to be an exquisite example of lack of self-awareness. However, Sean Hannity's only principle is expedience, the ideal job qualification to be a shill for a political party itself lacking a legitimate moral code.

 

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Advocates for Donald Trump

It really is quite extraordinary- not surprising, but extraordinary. On Monday, Brian Klaas of The Atlantic wrote

Late Friday night, the former president of the United States—and a leading candidate to be the next president—insinuated that America’s top general deserves to be put to death.

That extraordinary sentence would be unthinkable in any other rich democracy. But Donald Trump, on his social-media network, Truth Social, wrote that Mark Milley’s phone call to reassure China in the aftermath of the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021, was “an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH.” (The phone call was, in fact, explicitly authorized by Trump-administration officials.) Trump’s threats against Milley came after The Atlantic’s publication of a profile of Milley, by this magazine’s editor in chief Jeffrey Goldberg, who detailed the ways in which Milley attempted to protect the Constitution from Trump....

Trump loves to hide behind the thin veneer of plausible deniability, but he knows exactly what he’s doing. If a mob boss were to say, “In times gone by, people like you would have had their legs broken,” nobody would mistake that for a historical observation. The suggestion is clear, and it comes from a man who has one of America’s loudest megaphones—one that is directed squarely at millions of extremists who are well armed, who insist that the government is illegitimate, and who believe that people like Milley are part of a “deep state” plot against the country.

Noting that a member of the House of Representatives has echoed Trump's wish with “in a better society, quislings like the strange sodomy-promoting General Milley would be hung," Klaas' primary concern is political violence, a growing likelihood in the USA.

That possibility is serious enough but would not even be the most devastating outcome of Trump's threats. In the past week, the ex-President has encouraged assassination of a general and has denounced a major media company, which he said "should be investigated for its 'Country Threatening Treason." Attacking the 2020 election, last December he posted  "A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.”

The wish list thus includes termination of military officers performing their duty, media which questions him, and the entire framework of the rule of law, including the Constitution. It's clear Donald J. Trump intends to corral the military and all law enforcement as the next President, and it's not to maintain a democratic republic.

Then on Wednesday evening, several Republican candidates for President participated in a debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California. Chris Christie, Nikki Haley, and Ron DeSantis criticized the leading candidate, Donald J. Trump, for not showing up.  Christie further knocked the ex-President for running up the national debt and cozying up to Vladimir Putin, as he maintained Presidents Biden, Obama, and GW Bush had done. Haley knocked her ex-boss for largely ignoring the threat posed by China.

Seven candidates, fewer than half would criticize Donald Trump for not joining them on stage, two for a policy issue, and none for supporting totalitarianism.

Then it got worse. At evening's end, Dana Perino would ask what seemed like a silly question, but for which the response was telling:

And candidates, it’s now obvious that if you all stay, in the race, former President Donald Trump wins the nomination. None of you have indicated that you’re dropping out. So, which one of you, on stage, tonight, should be voted off the island?  Please use your marker, to write your choice, on the notepad, in front of you. 15 seconds, starting now. Of the people on the stage, who should be voted —

They are competing for a presidential nomination. Thus far, the leading candidate has refused to show them the courtesy or respect by engaging in debate. He obviously is taking both them and the voters for granted.

Perino gave the candidates an opportunity to say that in so doing Donald Trump had forfeited his right to be the nominee of their party, or at least that he should step aside for one of the worthy candidates.

Only Christie offered up Trump. Two (Pence, Burgum) said nothing while four of their colleagues explicitly ruled out answering the question. 

Six of the seven thereby either actively or passively defended their main rival by implying that he should remain in the race. At a (bare) minimum, they could have said, "any candidate who doesn't respect Republican voters should not be the nominee." They wouldn't even have had to utter the name "Trump."

Their rival has been indicted four times, including for encouraging a coup against the government of the United States of America and for purloining top secret documents, even ones disclosing nuclear secrets and plans for possible military action against an enemy. That individual now has given the thumbs up to assassinating a general, closing down a media company not subservient to him, and terminating the Constitution.

MAGA this, MAGA that. By contrast, Chris Christie, Nikki Haley, Mike Pence, and Tim Scott all are part of the non-chaos wing of the Republican Party, which much of the media ignorantly characterize as "moderate." And all but one of those, a guy who hates unions, teachers, and reproductive care for women, appear perfectly fine with Donald J. Trump becoming the 47th President of the USA.

Bring him on! Four more years! Trump for President, cry GOP voters- and the candidates for President. If I didn't know any better, I'd think it's one political party alone responsible for polarization of the nation.

 

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If Those Are "Pro-American Values," We're In a Lot of Trouble

With a straight, even smiling, face, Vivek (rhymes with "fake") Ramaswamy says for the camera

Chris, I know you went to Penn State and know what? You might be part of a different political party but forget about the partisan affiliation. Stand for pro-American values. Answer what it means to be an American.

If you share the same American values, we're on the same team. Leave the rest to details. But the same values? That's what makes us American.

The dividing line in America right now isn’t between rich and poor, black and white, or even Democrat and Republican.

It’s between those who are fundamentally pro-American and those who are anti-American. pic.twitter.com/z6Rs2A3Cb6

— Vivek Ramaswamy (@VivekGRamaswamy) September 19, 2023

 

Actually, the dividing line in the USA is between, well, not rich and poor but between the rich and the rest of us.  As of three years ago (when the gap probably was smaller than now), the richest 1% of Americans possessed 30.4% of all household wealth in the nation while the bottom 50% held 1.9% of all wealth. Of course, the top 20% held a much greater percentage of the wealth than a mere 30.4%.

Of course, right-wing libertarian Ramaswamy would only be delighted to hear those numbers. However, he would claim that he adores "pro-American values." 

These values might include the rule of law, equal protection under the law, and a preference for democracy. 

Ramaswamy promises as President he would pardon all "non-violent" offenders arrested after the insurrection on January 6, 2021 to overthrow the Us government. Though it is unclear how he would define "non-violent," it appears that he would include many defendants who stormed the U.S. Capitol after overwhelming law enforcement officers, whether they were among those who helped erect a gallows and cheered "kill Mike Pence."

The candidate also vows to pardon- "on day one"- without verdict by a jury, the ex-President who has been indicted four times. If federal, New York City, and Fulton County, Ga. grand juries have it right, Donald J. Trump has done such things as falsifying business records to cover up hush money payments; worked to overthrow illegally the results of the 2020 presidential election; willfully retained national defense documents and obstructed justice in concealing retention of those documents. But Vivek Ramaswamy wants to give the defendant a free pass, with or without evidence being presented to a jury of the defendant's peers.

And so Ramaswamy has declared "Donald Trump, I believe, was the best president of the 20th century." The candidate is doubtless aware that his hero:

- wouldn't attend a memorial in France for U.S. soldiers and others killed during World War I because of rain

- asked generals to throw him an opulent parade for Independence Day, 2022 while adding "look, I don't want any wounded guys in the parade" because "this doesn't look good for me";

-  pressured the Saudis to cut oil production, with the intended effect of raising oil prices for American consumers;

- on his way out the door; stole from the White House documents of the highest, "top secret" classification, pertaining to "defense and weapons capabilities of both the United States and foreign countries; United States nuclear programs; potential vulnerabilities of the United States and its allies to military attack; and plans for a possible retaliation in response to a foreign attack

- downplayed at least 50 times the impact of a coronavirus while in early 2019 privately informing a journalist that SARS-CoV-2 was a far greater threat than anyone knew

And those are only a few of President Trump's greatest hits while in office.  Who can forget his criticism of John McCain because "he's a war hero 'cause he was captured. I like people that weren't caputured, O.K.?" (Can you sense a pattern here?)  And there was one of my favorites, which captures Trump's "pro-American values" better than almost anything he ever said or did:

 

This isn't even considering the history of lies and misleading statements- evidently a pro-American value, according to Vivek Ramaswamy- which characterize the former President's political career. It's those "pro-American values" which, it appears clear, mean as much to Ramaswamy as do "family values" to various Republican politicians.

- 

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Tweeter Misses the Point About Ramaswamy

Right conclusion, wrong reason.

And this is why this moron does not deserve to be anywhere near public office. Just terrible. https://t.co/RqyttPmQUT

— Jemele Hill (@jemelehill) August 27, 2023

The food fight began when an Iowa voter asked 

Ramaswamy, whose parents immigrated to the U.S. from India, if critics would blame him for white supremacy or call him part of white supremacy.

Ramaswamy responded by saying, "Ayanna Pressley, she's in the Congress today. She's a member of 'the squad.' Her words, not mine: 'We don't want any more black faces that don't want to be a black voice. We don't want any more brown faces that don't want to be a brown voice.'"

Pressley, of Massachusetts, is a prominent progressive voice among House Democrats and the first Black woman elected to Congress from her state.

Ramaswamy then quoted bestselling author Kendi from his book "How To Be Anti-Racist."

"Here's what it says," said Ramaswamy. "Opening lines: 'The remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination."

"These are the words of the modern grand wizards of the modern KKK," said Ramaswamy.

The passage of Kendi's book is surrounded by descriptions of anti-racist discrimination as “temporarily assisting an underrepresented racial group into relative wealth and power until equity is reached.”

Talking to reporters after the town hall, Ramaswamy doubled down on his comments.

"The fact that we're taught to see each other on the basis of our genetic attributes is something that would make the old wizards of the KKK proud," said Ramaswamy.

When pressed by NBC News on whether he was calling Pressley and Kendi "grand wizards of the KKK," Ramaswamy said what "the whole movement represented" is what would make "the grand wizards of the KKK proud."

In a fundraising appeal, the Pressley team responded “We typically don’t engage in these bad-faith attacks but yesterday a line was crossed. A GOP candidate referred to Ayanna as ‘a modern grand wizard of the KKK’ because she speaks out against racial injustice. This is backwards and harmful, but that is the point.”

In the clip to which Jemele Hill has linked, Ramaswamy is seen saying

What I said is the Grand Wizards of the KKK would be proud of what they would hear her saying because there is nothing more racist than saying that your skin color predicts something about the content of your viewpoint or your ideas." Bash reminded him that he had added "these are the words of the modern Grand Wizard of the modern KKK," to which the candidate replied "I think it is the same spirit to say that I can look at you and say just based on your skin color that I know something about the content of your character."

Saying that a person's skin color may reflect the viewpoint of the ideas of the individual is not racist. Ethnic background, associated with race, often informs the individual's viewpoint and perspective.  However, if Ramaswamy had said merely that he would not know the content of one's color based on his/her skin color, he would have been correct. Moreover, notwithstanding the Pressley claim, Ramaswamy did not maintain that the congresswoman is "a modern grand wizard of the KKK."  Reflecting the spirit or even speaking the words of a person is not equivalent to being a modern version of him.

But all that is mere detail and neither Pressley, Ramaswamy, or Hill is much interested in details or minimally more in facts.  The candidate's charge is over the top, exaggeration he should regret, but does not. 

Nonetheless, these remarks are not why he "does not deserve to be anywhere near public office." The more important reason is

"The Department of Education, the FBI, the ATF, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the IRS, the Department of Commerce. Many of these should not exist," Ramaswamy told Fox News Digital in an interview on Wednesday before adding "the CDC" to the list.

"I'm going to be the president of government shut down, as in literally shutting down the administrative state that sits under the executive branch," he said. "That will be a big part of my domestic policy legacy because that will also stimulate our economy. The regulatory state is the wet blanket on businesses across this country. So not only will we restore our three-branch constitutional republic, we will also restore four-plus percent GDP growth in this country. That's two wins."

The claim about the gross domestic product is balderdash. Further, this is a prescription for the wild, wild, West, with big-time drug dealers and gun runners having a field day while public education is gutted. Nonetheless, Beijing and Moscow will celebrate when there is no Internal Revenue Service to collect taxes to support armed forces or weapons of deterrent. However, that might matter for only a few years, given that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission helps "ensure the safe use of radioactive materials" and "regulates commercial nuclear power plants." Take away that function, and after a little while there may be no country or world for us to worry about anymore.

Alternatively, we can feel aggrieved and be indignant because Vivek Ramaswamy says that he is anti-anti-racism. It's our choice, really.

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Christie and Two Democratic Presidents

In a very indirect way, this tweet has a connection to Wednesday night's GOP presidential debate and illustrates a trait cutting across party lines.

He’s literally done the same exact thing to like 50 other people already.

Anyway, Jenna Ellis said all of this is well with her soul so…

It’s above her now. 🤷🏽‍♀️ pic.twitter.com/dd8UrmfZaq

— Renee (@PettyLupone) August 15, 2023

At 4:38 of the video below, former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, slamming Vivek Ramaswamy, bellows

I've had enough already tonight of a guy who sounds like Chat GPT and the last person at one of these debates, Bret, who stood in the middle of the stage and said "what's a skinny guy with an odd last name doing up here" was Barack Obama and I'm afraid we're dealing with the same type of amateur standing on the stage tonight. 

             .

That was a powerful line, especially directed at the Republican street, which has a score to settle with Barack Obama because he was elected twice and still- still!- that awful liberal media won't admit that racism is dead in the country. Nonetheless, Ramaswamy was up to the challenge, remarking "give me a hug, just like you did to Obama and you'll help elect me just as you did..." (the rest drowned out by the audience).

Ramaswamy was responding not to a hug but to the effusive praise given President Obama by Governor Christie when the latter two toured the New Jersey Shore following the devastation wrought by Hurricane Sandy. It was a few days before the presidential election Obama would go on to win and a year before Christie's own successful re-election campaign, assisted by the lovefest, the following year. Christie was disloyal to GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney, for whom he had been a surrogate but undercut shortly before the election with the over-the-top applause for Romney's opponent.

   

Eight years later, the man who had served as Obama's vice-president would behave similarly. Obversely, it would not be a case of disloyalty but of loyalty to someone who had been insulting to him. In an early campaign debate, in June of 2019

California Sen. Kamala Harris called out Biden on the issue of race, saying the way he recently described his past working relationship with two segregationist lawmakers was “hurtful.”

Biden, at a campaign event earlier this month, had cited his ability to get things done even with segregationist senators as examples of the type of “civility” in Congress that has since disappeared. Numerous Democratic presidential candidates took Biden to task for the comments, though some, including civil rights icon John Lewis, defended the 2020 frontrunner’s remarks.

Harris also accused Biden of opposing busing, which Biden disputed.

“There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools, and she was bused to school every day, and that little girl was me,” Harris said.

“I will tell you that on this subject, it cannot be an intellectual debate among Democrats. We have to take it seriously. We have to act swiftly.”

It turned out that the stunt was months in the making and within hours t-shirts reading "That little girl was me" were selling on her website for $29.

Harris, it was discovered, had held the almost identical view of busing has had the man she characterized as dangerously insensitive to blacks (my phrase).  "Dangerously insensitive to blacks" would appear euphemistic to some individuals, such as to Joe Biden's wife herself, who criticized Harris for allegedly accusing her husband of being racist.

That's "racist," as in  

I think that they were looking at the past. I mean, the one thing you cannot say about Joe is that he’s a racist. I mean, he got into politics because of his commitment to civil rights. And then to be elected with Barack Obama, and then someone is saying, you know, you’re a racist?

Twelve months after being justifiably condemned by the woman Joe Biden professes his love and admiration for, Harris was nominated by the77-year-old  presumptive Democratic nominee to be his running mate and with victory in November, a heartbeat from the presidency. 

There were many other individuals, including black women, qualified to be on the ticket, but only one had publicly berated Joe for being insensitive, bigoted, or racist. But- or maybe therefore- she was the one selected.

Donald J. Trump should be criticized for innumerable things, one of which is lack of loyalty, as Jenna Ellis apparently now realizes. However, lack of loyalty is not the worse of his sins, especially when considering that it's not an uncommon trait among very successful politicians. 

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That Elusive Reasonable Republican

Not a President Biden fan but even less a Donald Trump fan, Arnold Schwarzenegger told CNN's Dana Bash on Wednesday

Being a frontrunner of one party and letting them dig this hold deeper and deeper is going to make it easy for the Democrats in the end to win. It's sad to see that they couldn't come up with a new talent with a new face that is a, a reasonable, smart, intelligent person that can lead this country in a Republican way.

                 

"Smart and intelligent," sure. However, one doesn't have to pay attention to the battle between the governor of Florida and Disney to recognize that the leading alternative to Donald Trump, whom Schwarzenegger is convinced would surely lose, is not reasonable. DeSantis is a fanatic in the Trump mold.

Then there is former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley, who compared to DeSantis, Trump, Vivek Ramaswamy, and fellow South Carolinian Tim Scott (expected to join the race), is a moderate. No, really, compared to them, Haley is a veritable RINO. But of course:

Meanwhile, Nikki Haley, presidential candidate and former Governor of South Carolina,... shows her support for unbridled gun violence,...by posing with a great big honkin' assault rifle.

"Yay, assault rifles on our streets!" https://t.co/VPYPQiFyQv pic.twitter.com/IXDlKIKkxU

— Roshan Rinaldi (@Roshan_Rinaldi) April 30, 2023

This is par for the course for GOP politicians of the day. Republican U.S. Representative Thomas Massie, as his 2021 Christmas card:

And of course, Lauren Boebert, from her Twiitter account via the Daily Beast, also during the 2021 Christmas season:

From Facebook via USA Today, Representative Andy Ogles of Tennessee, same time period:

There must be something about Christmas that draws out the Republican, the true Christmas spirit, in Republicans. A year later, Marjorie Taylor Greene, now the de facto Assistant Majority Leader in the House of Representatives, would tell (deriding the idea that she was involved in the insurrection) a GOP gathering

Then Jan. 6 happens and next thing you know, I organized the whole thing along with Steve Bannon here. And I will tell you something: If Steve Bannon and I had organized that, we would have won. Not to mention, it would’ve been armed.

So Arnold Schwarzenegger pines for a "reasonable, smart, intelligent" Republican to challenge Donald Trump for the GOP nomination. The message to the former California governor should be: "When you find that reasonable Republican who wants to run- or even not to run- for President, let us know. Take all the time you want."

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