performative vice signal

disambig from? 2nd 4 23

it's really just PC woke?

SEE BAD FAITH/ FAKE OUTRAGE

see wedge culture war

SEE NANCY MACE HEGS MILLER

// TROLL CAUCUS

see own the libs

see CRUEL SADISM SADO-POPULISM // PSEUDO- FASCISM

see pseudo event

note projection reverse: doing what they accused s j warrior; bad faith accusation?

performance /declaration of tribal allegiance, [ideological purity/fervor/sincerity

AHA righteous anger is appropriate and good vs snowlflake own libs hysterical thus irraTIONAL

---

AHA PREVIOUS provocateur intentionally say something offensive to trigger own libs, that is provoke an emotion in enemy, whereas performative cruelty is to excite your base allies

---

cosplay ice ride along noem 4 25 with a badge boyfriend cory lew

big gun pted at aGENT

selfie in el salv gulag cecot

---

7 25 trump hegs deploy nat gd usmc in LA

7.8/25 APC horse battle rattle griffin pk? kids summer camp

---

9 25

In an article for the New York Timespublished Sunday, Steven Pinker, a professor of psychology at Harvard University, argued that modern political outrage operates according to what he calls mob logic, a form of communal outrage grounded in shared expectations and social coordination.

Pinker began by describing how theassassination of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk elicited an intense wave of symbolic reactions: Kirk was sanctified as a martyr, and dissenters were attacked for failing to show proper devotion.

The response, he contended, aligns with the phenomenon that economist Thomas Schelling and anthropologist John Tooby termed “common knowledge,” in which an event becomes a shared social signal that everyone knows, and everyone knows that everyone knows, and so on.

According to Pinker, communal outrage follows a predictable sequence:

A public attack is framed as targeting a person because of group identity. The story spreads rapidly — sometimes amplified or distorted. The victim becomes a symbolic figure for the group. The incident is treated as an intolerable violation, and doubt or questioning is stigmatized.

IFrame Content

The group then retaliates disproportionately, often targeting perceived enemies regardless of their actual involvement.

Pinker sees the post‑Kirk reaction as a textbook case: political leaders threatened reprisals, agencies pressured media, and public figures called for broad retribution. Meanwhile, private citizens demanded firings and punishments of anyone whose statements deviated from the sanctified narrative.

*The psychologist distinguished communal outrage from calculated revenge. He noted that revenge is targeted, proportional and strategic. Communal outrage, by contrast, solves a coordination dilemma — the problem of how a group acts in concert when multiple strategies exist but only one can succeed. Outrage becomes a focal point: a visible, unanimous act that signals dominance and enforces internal solidarity, he argued.

He identified two coordination problems that outrage resolves:

Dominance contest, when a group that fails to defend a member signals weakness and invites further attacks. A conspicuous rebuttal reasserts status in the face of the audience of rivals.

Internal cohesion, which means Individuals may hesitate to act unless they see others doing so. An outrage incident makes public the moment to unite and act together.

Pinker drew parallels with historical episodes of communal outrage — from the U.S. battleship Maine explosion, to the Reichstag fire, to the Arab Spring, to the reaction sparked by George Floyd’s killing — and notes that the outcomes differ depending on how the incident is framed and how “outrage entrepreneurs” shape the narrative.

"It’s often been pointed out that Mr. Trump and the MAGA movement have a chronic sense of being disrespected. Mr. Trump fumed for decades about being looked down on by coastal elites, and his pique has grown with each investigation, indictment and impeachment. For many of his followers, these insults merged with a smoldering resentment at the creeping takeover by leftist values in public life, from government mandates to popular entertainment," Pinker wrote.

He added: "Mr. Kirk’s killing is, for all of them, a perfect outrage incident. As an advocate of MAGA willing to take the battle to the enemy, Mr. Kirk was a pre-eminent symbol of the coalition. And his suspected killer, an internet-addled loner with a gun, nonetheless has enough left-adjacent trappings (a transgender partner, some antifascist memes) that he can be mentally fitted into a vast liberal conspiracy. The shooting was an unendurable public offense, which mobilized the coalition to muster its forces, in this case a combination of government muscle and social media shaming mobs, to rectify the affront."

---

AN 7 25

TX FLOODS

'ICE Barbie': Trump DHS secretary slammed for social media stunt during Texas tragedy

---

xmas card w assault weapons common?!

https://www.alternet.org/insensitive-creepy-and-ghoulish-republicans-are-doing-gunowners-more-harm-than-good-conservative/

an 4 23

no linx

daily Beast opinion columnist and Never Trump conservative Matt Lewis has his share of disagreements with liberals and progressives where gun control is concerned. Lewis considers himself staunchly pro-2nd Amendment, and he isn't shy about saying that he grew up around a "gun culture."

But in a scathing column published on April 17, Lewis takes issue with the "insensitive, creepy, and ghoulish" way in which many "Republican politicians" address the gun control issue. And he believes that the theatrics of Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem and other MAGA Republicans are doing the 2nd Amendment more harm than good.

"When I was around ten," Lewis recalls, "my grandfather gave me a real shotgun. My dad intervened to make sure that I did not have unfettered access to it, and that I could only shoot it with his direct supervision. My dad was a prison guard and an avid hunter. He took gun ownership seriously. All this to say, I'm not a gun-grabbing city slicker — though I do think there are common sense reforms we should consider, including red flag laws and background checks."

READ MORE: Guns don't kill Americans, Republicans do

Lewis continues, "I’m not offended by law-abiding Americans who have guns for hunting and protection. What I am offended by are weirdos who want to go out of their way to constantly remind you that they are armed to the teeth."

The conservative columnist has no problem with conservatives debating liberals and progressives vigorously on gun control; what he objects to are the "bizarre" and "weird" theatrics — especially when they follow a mass shooting.

"In the wake of all the violence we have seen in recent decades," Lewis laments, "I would expect 2nd Amendment advocates to go out of their way to demonstrate responsible gun ownership. Remember the Party of Personal Responsibility? Instead, it seems like Republican politicians are going out of their way to fetishize guns. They are more than just for protection or sport. They are a way of life, a religion, a culture."

Even Republicans with strong pro-2nd Amendment voting records, Lewis argues, risk being attacked as "squishy RINOs" by MAGA Republicans if they aren't "performative" enough.

READ MORE: How the gun-loving South dominates these United States

"Clearly, what we are seeing is some sort of vice signaling, presumably because the demand to be perceived as a performatively tough Second Amendment advocate is so intense that mere words and past votes are no longer persuasive enough," Lewis observes. "In addition to supporting the right to bear arms, you now also have to demonstrate that you are a gun fanatic."

READ MORE: Students across the country walk out of school to protest gun violence

Read Matt Lewis' full Daily Beast column at this link (subscription required).

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

'How is this still happening?' Mass shooting survivor hijacks news conference to plea for gun control ›

All extremist-related murders in 2022 were committed by right-wing radicals ›

Lauren Boebert mocked after sharing 'deadly' take on Copenhagen mall shooting ›

RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB

Justin Pearson of 'Tennessee Three' Could Be Reinstated ... ›

Justin J. Pearson: Memphis officials set to vote on returning ousted ... ›

Will Justin Pearson, expelled Tennessee lawmaker, regain his seat ... ›

---

mtg china balloon

---

an 2 23 no vid? twt

Ex-GOP congressman: 'Awful' Marjorie Taylor Greene should face 'censure' for heckling the State of the Union

David Badash and The New Civil Rights Movement February 08, 2023

U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) numerous times heckled President Joe Biden as he delivered the State of the Union Address, including repeatedly calling him a “liar.”

Not in modern history has anyone so clearly disturbed the decorum of the nationally-televised event watched live by 40 million Americans. Not even U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC), who infamously also called the President a liar – “You lie!” – during another nationally-televised event, that one by President Barack Obama in September of 2009.

OBAMA YOU LIE

youtu.be]

Tuesday night Congresswoman Greene repeatedly yelled, “You lie!” and, “Liar!” at President Biden, who, ironically, was sitting one seat back from his current position the last time it happened.

Here is that moment:

\u201cRep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) yells "you lie, you lie" and "liar" after President Biden says Republicans are proposing to sunset Medicare and Social Security.\u201d

— The Recount (@The Recount) 1675824479

Greene also heckled President Biden at other times throughout his speech – something she and Rep. Lauren Boebert did one year ago, also during the State of the Union.

Republican former U.S. Congressman Adam Kinzinger Tuesday night tweeted, “Did @RepMTG just yell ‘liar’?! Awful. Yet she will not be punished in response.”

READ MORE: ‘Salute Their Flags’: Sarah Huckabee Sanders Appears to Attack LGBTQ Americans and BLM During Angry GOP SOTU Response

He then called for Greene’s censure – and called for her fellow Republicans to do it.

“The GOP should lead the censure of @RepMTG for her behavior,” Kinzinger tweeted.

He wasn’t done.

Posting a screenshot of Greene standing during the State of the Union heckling President Biden, with her thumb pointing down, Kinzinger asked, “My fellow Republicans… you really want this as a role model for your kids? Do you really think the next generation will want to be part of this? I don’t.”

Kinzinger went one step further, reposting a tweet likening Congresswoman Greene to the fictional Disney villain Cruella de Vil – a comparison many on social media had been making during the evening’s event.

“Representative Joe Wilson was formally rebuked by the House on Tuesday for his outburst during President Obama’s health care address,” The New York Times reported, less than a week after what was at the time an unthinkable act. “The vote came after a Congressional clash over civility that showcased the deep partisan divisions in the House.”

Congressman Wilson also apologized for calling President Obama a “liar,” barely hours after his outburst.

:{:{}:

“This evening I let my emotions get the best of me when listening to the President’s remarks regarding the coverage of illegal immigrants in the health care bill,” he said in a statement. “While I disagree with the President’s statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the President for this lack of civility.”

Congresswoman Greene likely will not apologize, and likely will not face any formal rebuke.

---

tucker is unelected member of troll caucus

aha [amanda] earth2 = --> fascism

an 2 23

The political media fascination with Rep. George Santos, the New York Republican who appears to have faked approximately 95% of his life, is such that it was inevitable that it would draw a "savvy" backlash piece scolding the press about their priorities. The wannabe party pooper finally emerged last week at the Washington Post in an opinion column headlined, "Real people don't care about George Santos." In it, self-assigned buzzkill David Byler argued "America doesn't seem to care" about Santos, which he can tell based on Google search traffic.

Our nation was founded by puritans, so as soon as people had a laugh over Santos, inevitably someone would shake their finger disapprovingly. But there were some flaws in Byler's argument, starting with his assumption that Santos' own embarrassed constituents are not "real" people. There's also the fact that Google Trends isn't a very exacting measure of interest in a subject, as it only measures if people are searching out information. It doesn't capture people who read articles they saw on social media or directly on a news website. Traffic to stories about Santos is plenty healthy on that front.

But perhaps most importantly, this narrow-minded focus on search traffic ignores what a lot of the sneered-at political observers saw coming a mile away: The imminent George Santos makeover into MAGA's Next Top Superstar.

Santos may not matter to "average" Americans, but his story is being leveraged directly into the right-wing propaganda machine that currently controls the Republican Party. On Thursday night, for instance, Santos was sanctified into the echelon of MAGA saints by the Pope of neo-fascism himself, Tucker Carlson. In a typically dishonest segment on his wildly popular Fox News show, Carlson painted Santos as a hapless victim of the bigoted news media by pretending that the only thing Santos lied about was his volleyball career. (Which is one of the more minor fake careers and hobbies Santos has claimed on his resume.) Media Matters has a sample of the extremely silly diatribe:

It was a tissue of lies constructed to deceive the American people. There was no volleyball scholarship. There was not a single dollar of volleyball scholarship. George Santos made it all up out of whole cloth, out of thin air. George Santos is an ersatz volleyball player. A fraud, a ghoul. People voted for this man believing he had played collegiate volleyball on a scholarship and he hadn't.

And yet tonight ladies and gentlemen, this thief of volleyball glory strides the halls of the United States Congress unimpeded by law enforcement. It's like another insurrection.

Carlson doesn't really have arguments or evidence, but he does do a bang-up impression of someone sarcastically brushing aside nonsense. Except what he's brushing away is usually pretty serious stuff, such as fascist attacks on democracy, attempts to save lives during a pandemic, or, in this case, unbelievable amounts of fraud that look potentially criminal in many cases. With Santos, the number of lies Carlson is ignoring is truly staggering. Santos lied about his resume, his religion, his marriage, his family history, and claimed connections he doesn't have to the Holocaust, 9/11, the Pulse nightclub shooting, and an assassination attempt that appears fictional. It is really no exaggeration to say it's easier to list the things he hasn't lied about (his age and his birthplace in Queens).

But just as Catholic saints get their status through martyrdom, the saints of MAGAdom must get theirs through falsified tales of victimhood at the hands of "woke mobs" or the "fake news media."

People right-wingers hate are alarmed at Santos and his staggering trail of fraud. So if the "libs" have a negative reaction to Santos, in the troll-based logic that drives the modern GOP, that must mean he's their newest champion. And let's just state for the record that, while Byler may not see left-leaning news consumers as "real people," he probably wouldn't say the same about the millions of Trump voters whose entire worldview is shaped by the crap that Fox News pours into their heads every day.

Carlson didn't reach the conclusion that Santos is the latest MAGA idol all on his own. Practically from the moment that Santos's deceit was exposed by the New York Times, Steve Bannon, the Joseph Goebbels-wannabe who frequently sets the GOP agenda with his popular "War Room" podcast, was championing the pathological liar. Reps. Matt Gaetz of Florida and Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia have also rallied to Santos' side, claiming he's only a target because he's a "fighter." It's unclear who he has ever "fought" for besides himself, but then again, the same could be said of most MAGA figures, from Donald Trump on down.

It's not a mystery why these leaders think the right-wing audience is ready to accept Santos as the next MAGA savior. All that matters to the modern right is "owning the liberals," and who better to do that than someone who lies constantly for no apparent reason other than the sheer thrill of it?

Certainly, Santos seems to grasp that the move that will take him from a low-level con man to the ranks of the richest MAGA grifters is to lean into trolling. So he's been rolling out the standard issue liberal-owning stunts for weeks now: Flashing the white supremacist-aligned "OK" hand signal during a House vote. (He even knew how to do it so it was clear enough to photograph but so quick he could pretend later it wasn't intentional.) Wearing an assault rifle pin while playing dumb about why it offends people to celebrate the preferred weapons of mass shooters. Feeding the press donuts and actinglike they had somehow become complicit in the evil by eating them. Getting into Twitter fights with drag queens, who are the favorite punching bag of the authoritarian right. (Santos seems to have a past as a drag queen, as well, but this is just part of a favorite right-wing trolling tactic, to recruit members of a hated minority to speak out against their own.) Dunking on former Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., for criticizing him by tweeting "cry about it."

Reports suggest Santos is delighted by all the negative attention he's getting in the press. An exceptionally short-lived aide recorded a conversation in which Santos was dressing him down, and right in the middle of it, Santos suddenly exclaims, "Don Lemon just texted me — I'm sorry, I'm listening to you — Don Lemon just texted me!" Getting his name on CNN, even during a story on how he is the worst, was just that thrilling to Santos.

Santos even hired former Steve Bannon employee and professional troll, Vish Burra, as a top aide. Burra's defense of Santos is cynical and self-congratulatory: The lying is a form of "shitposting," which is internet speak for saying outlandish things to draw outrage and attention. For the Trumpist right, aggressive trolling is what politics is all about.

Imagining that they're outraging the left is what the GOP audience gets out of this. (No one tell them that the left's reaction to Santos is more amusement than genuine fury.) But there's an even darker reason that Carlson, Bannon, Taylor Greene, etc. have decided to rally round Santos: He's very useful as a weapon in their larger war on truth.

As with Trump, it's overly simplistic to look at these people, with their non-stop disinformation, as mere liars. Liars are people who are sincerely trying to deceive people. In many cases, it's not at all evident that right-wing audiences actually believe the asinine B.S. that is rolled out by the likes of Carlson and Bannon. For instance, the "outrage" over M&M spokescandy shoe choices is less sincere anger than it is a collective bit of performance art. Both Carlson and his audience merely pretend to be mad as a way to keep ironic distance from their own weird sexual hang-ups. Similarly, conspiracy theories like Trump's Big Lie are often less about true belief and more about displaying fealty to their tribe.

There's a point to right-wingers constantly saying and "believing" things they know not to be true. It's about devaluing empirical reality. Fascists want "truth" to flow from what the right-wing authority figures say is "true," not from lived experience or verifiable facts.They are trying to construct a world where facts don't matter, and only power does. The first step is getting their tribal community to agree collectively to stop distinguishing between true and false and to only claim to believe what is convenient for their leaders or their cause.

For that goal, Santos is useful. He is living the fascist dream of a man whose entire existence seems unmoored from the power of facts. If the MAGA leaders can turn him into a hero, he'd be a living exemplar of their post-truth yearnings: "Truth" can be whatever you want it to be. After all, right-wingers already hate the way facts — Trump lost the election, COVID-19 is real, LGBTQ people exist — get in the way of their desires. They just need permission to let go of that last tendril of reality and start living purely in their authoritarian fantasy world. Santos shows the way. It's unlikely he will be going away any time soon.

---

an 2 23 edit bd

The Iowa Republican party is proposingdraconian new restrictions on what food can be purchased with the state’s food stamps, or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

This attack on the poor at the state level is coming at the same time as the national GOP has successfullyblocked the continuation of the Child Tax Credit, a program which substantially, demonstrably reduced child poverty.

The GOP’s priorities are clear. They don’t want to reduce poverty. They want to police, control and torment the poor. The party that constantly touts liberty doesn’t want liberty for all. They want liberty for the powerful to impose their will on the most vulnerable.

Republican ire

SNAP is a crucial safety net and the country’s most effective anti-hunger program. In 2021, itensured that 41 million Americans — 12 percent of the population — could afford an adequate diet every month.

SNAP also provides valuable emergency economic stability. SNAP enrollment increases in downturns, putting money into the economy to combat recession and boost recovery.

Despite its importance, or because of it, SNAP has long been a target of Republican ire.

Matthew Gritter’s 2017 monographUndeserving: SNAP Reform and Conceptions of the Deserving Poor chronicles how politicians have moved to regulate food stamps in recent decades. They’ve tried to put limits on what foods could be purchased and to prevent people without disabilities or dependents from getting aid.

They’ve also pushed drug testing — an ideaintroduced by former KKK leader and Louisiana Senator David Duke, and instituted in states like Florida and Utah.

Gritter concludes in an earlier paper that the goal of these interventions appears to be to replace “a safety net of last resort” with “a costly method to impose punitive measures on the poor.”

“Evidence suggests that reforms will reduce enrollment without changing the circumstances that led people to seek assistance,” he says.

Iowa is the latest attempt to target SNAP.

Canned tuna and salmon

The new bill,House File 3, would putharsh limits on what low-income families could purchase in Iowa when receiving federal SNAP food stamp funds for healthy food options.

It wouldrestrict purchases to those covered by the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program, which uses federal funds for food assistance to pregnant people and new parents.

According to theIowa Hunger Coalition, “this bill would restrict SNAP participants’ ability to make their own food choices, take food away from Iowans, and increase hunger and food insecurity in our state.”

Families under House File 3 could no longer buy white bread, American cheese, coffee, snack foods, canned fruit and vegetables, bottled water, crackers and more.

They also couldn’t buy any meat except canned tuna and salmon. This despite the fact that meat, poultry and seafood is thetop expenditure category for SNAP recipients, accounting for 19 percent of money spent on food.

The Iowa GOP also wants a limit of $2,750 on household assets for receiving SNAP benefits; the cap is raised to $4,250 in assets if one family member is over 59 or is disabled. Houses and one vehicle would be excluded. Children’s savings accounts would not.

These low caps mean that people could not save for emergencies, because doing so would mean they would lose SNAP benefits. Nor could they own a second vehicle — a necessity for getting to work in many rural areas.

Historic low

The assault on SNAP is ugly because we have just conducted a sweeping experiment demonstrating that no-strings assistance to the poor is wildly successful at lifting children out of poverty with virtually no downsides.

The expanded Child Tax Creditinstituted in 2021 provided monthly cash payments to low-income families with children. It closed a loophole that prevented the poorest families from receiving assistance, and increased payments for everyone.

The result? Child poverty dropped to a historic low of 5.2 percent.

Lawmakers allowed the expanded CTC to expire.

Inevitably, child poverty rateswent back up.

Lawmakers refused to renew the expanded CTC in part because, mirroring attitudes towards SNAP, they believed that the people receiving the money were not deserving.

West Virginia’s conservative Democratic Senator Joe Manchin saidhe was worried parents would use benefits to buy drugs. He also wanted to institute work requirements for recipients.

But increasing restrictions prevents the neediest people from receiving benefits. It also mayprevent people from working.

A study of those in line to receive CTC funds found that recipientsbelieved the additional money would allow them to pay for childcare and increase their work hours.

Sure enough, in studies of the program conducted after it expired, there wasno evidence that CTC payments reduced workforce participation.

Undeserving

We know that SNAP is effective at reducing hunger. We know that simply giving people money, without conditions, is an incredibly effective means of pulling children out of poverty.

But conservatives don’t care. That’s because they’re not actually concerned with helping the poor.

They are concerned with policing them.

Conservatives want a poverty policy that is focused onpreventing people from accessing benefits. The goal is to punish the undeserving. And all poor people are assumed to be undeserving.

The success of the CTC shows that poverty and hunger are not intractable problems. They are deliberate policy choices.

The wealthy and powerful impose misery on the poor because they believe desperate people are more tractable and less able to organize.

Or perhaps they attack the poor simply because they don’t like the poor and believe they should suffer.

In any case, the expiration of the CTC, and the Iowa GOP’s assault on the SNAP program, shows that neither the pandemic nor the 2022 midterms have changed Republican commitments. GOP politicians like to cosplay as champions of the working class.

But the truth is they hold people of modest means in contempt and relish the chance to take food out of their mouths.

---

an ah 1 23

In Washington, D.C. smoking is banned from office buildings. But that rule doesn’t apply to the U.S. Capitol Building, where House Republicans have lifted a ban on smoking in that branch of Congress.

Fox News’ Tucker Carlson and other far-right pundits have been quick to applaud the move. Sounding a lot like the late radio host Rush Limbaugh, Carlson told viewers, “Nicotine frees your mind, and THC makes you compliant and passive.”

In a scathing article published by The Nation on January 23, journalist Joan Walsh slams House Republicans and their supporters for promoting something as unhealthy as smoking and argues that they are “killing” their “own voters.”

READ MORE: 'The smell of freedom': Tucker Carlson and House Republican defend tobacco smoking inside the Capitol

“I honestly thought it was fake news,” Walsh writes. “Just after Kevin McCarthy became House speaker, giving away his power to right-wing antagonists the first week in January, I read about Congress members smoking on the GOP side of the aisle. Just a projection from my liberal allies of Republicans’ intent to erode public health, I assumed. Funny GIF to come. But it was true. Rep. Tom Cole was smoking cigars in his office. Others were reportedly smoking cigarettes in other places.”

Walsh notes that “House lawmakers’ private offices aren’t governed by” either the District of Columbia’s anti-smoking ordinance” or “a Bill Clinton executive order” that “prohibits smoking in federal buildings that are under the authority of the executive branch.”

“Under McCarthy, smoking is allowed not just in members’ offices, but in public areas too,” Walsh explains. “Now comes more carcinogenic propaganda from right-wing losers. Last week, Fox’s Tucker Carlson began preaching a return to smoking as a return to American values. Tobacco is so much more American than increasingly legal and available weed, he told his stoned-on-lies audience.”

On Fox News, Carlson made cigarette smoking a culture war issue, telling viewers that liberals “hate nicotine” but “love THC.”

READ MORE: ‘You gaslighting cartoon’: Kellyanne Conway brutally mocked for conflating opioid deaths with marijuana

Walsh comments, “I shouldn’t be surprised at Carlson’s tribute to tobacco…. Republicans have long opposed anti-smoking measures, at least partly out of fealty to Big Tobacco. Former GOP Speaker John Boehner became infamous for handing out checks from tobacco lobbyists on the House floor in 1995. As Indiana governor, Mike Pence railed against tobacco restrictions and insisted ‘smoking doesn’t kill.’ But the recent pro-smoking crusade seems to be inspired more by culture war imperatives than by defending the tobacco industry.”

The journalist points out that Limbaugh spent decades vigorously defending cigarette smoking on his radio show — before dying of lung cancer in 2021.

“Killing your own voters seems like a bad electoral strategy,” Walsh writes. “Salon’s Amanda Marcotte calls it ‘getting lung cancer to own the libs.’ Sadly, Republicans are mostly giving their base voters what they think they want.”

READ MORE: Tobacco giant exploiting murders of George Floyd and Eric Garner for profit: report

---

https://www.alternet.org/arizona-taxpayers-200-billion-border/

border containers cost 200m$?

---

house Republicans remove metal detectors from the Capitol

Rodric Hurdle-Bradford Raw Story

January 03, 2023

According to Axios, one of the first actions of the new Republican-controlled House of Representatives was to remove metal detectors outside of the House chambers.

---

aha: gt replacement mainstreams licenses racism/xenophobia "you won't have a country anymore"

strict fr, cruel is the pt /state of exception/margin makes persecution ok; desantis and abbott have duelling deport stunts (even after martha v blowback); own the libs: you say u are compassionate and there's plenty of room, prove it/ YOU deal w/ it. the coastal blue state elite have no idea how tough/dangerous it is down here on the border, so we will educate them give reality check

https://www.alternet.org/greg-abbott-migrants-christmas-dc/

---

an ah 10 22

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas has long been a highly performative and theatrical politician, annoying not only liberals and progressives, but also, older conservatives who long for the days of Sen. Barry Goldwater, President Ronald Reagan, Sen. Bob Dole and National Review publisher William F. Buckley. And the far-right Republican senator has certainly been performative during the 2022 midterms, whether he’s stumping for fellow Republicans, trolling Democrats with inflammatory tweets, or appearing on his favorite media safe space, Fox News.

Never Trump conservative Jim Swift, in an article published by The Bulwark on October 26, argues that Cruz has a major reason for his recent midterms antics: He’s planning another presidential run.

“The Cruz-aligned Truth and Courage PAChas been putting on events for the Texas senator throughout the country, driving a decked-out, two-story bus on which fans can write whatever they want,” Swift explains. “On the surface, the goal is to help try to elect Republicans and take back Congress. In reality, though, the tour is Cruz’s shadow campaign for the presidency in 2024 — aimed at boosting his profile among the Republican base, having various officeholders owe him favors, and getting everything ready for the possibility, however remote, that Donald Trump won’t run again and Cruz can try to snatch the nomination.”

Swift adds, “Cruz’s 2016 campaign logo of a flame is cleverly incorporated into a new logo on the side of the bus, the face of a lion that looks vaguely like the bearded Cruz. But ‘Truth and Courage’ hardly seem like the right words to describe a guy who spent four years abasing himself to stay relevant after Donald Trump lied about his loved ones.”

The conservative journalist describes Cruz’s recent visit to Virginia, where he was campaigning for Yesli Vega — the Republican who is trying to unseat centrist Democratic Rep. Abigail Spanberger. That race has found a deputy sheriff, Vega, running against a former CIA agent: Spanberger.

Cruz’s speech, Swift observes, was full of “lame quips about inflation” such as “Look, it’s so bad, Antifa can’t afford bricks” and “It’s so bad Hunter Biden can’t afford crack cocaine.” Cruz, according to Swift, not only gave a speech — he gave a performance designed to fire up his MAGA base, and that performance demonstrated that Cruz “clearly does not want to be a senator anymore.”

“In private,” Swift notes, “Cruz can be very different from how he is in public — he can be a whole lot more honest and likable. But when he’s in front of reporters, Cruz tends to be like one of those children’s toys where you squeeze its palm and he blurts out a canned line about (Nancy) Pelosi and planes, or (Joe) Biden and the Easter Bunny, and nothing else.”

Swift points out that “one thing” he “didn’t hear” at the rally in Virginia “was any mention of Donald Trump.”

“As best as I can tell, no one at the Virginia rally, not a single speaker, uttered the former president’s name,” Swift writes. “Not even once. But he remains the most important figure in the Republican Party, and if he decides to run again for the presidency, then Cruz will presumably be in for four more years of subservient abasement. There’s no getting away from that fact, whether you try to escape by bus or plane.”

---

2024 gop nom race:

martha vineyard immigrant stunt

girl athletes recall rt xian natl are fine with big gubmint to go after enemy or threat

https://www.alternet.org/2022/10/florida-history-of-mentrual-periods/

---

an ah 9 22

It won’t take a major red wave for Republicans to retake the U.S. House of Representatives in the 2022 midterms. Democrats have only a small House majority — definitely smaller than in 2019 or 2020 — and Republicans won’t need to flip a lot of Democrat-held seats to obtain a House majority.

House Republicans, in their “:{Commitment to America,” have discussed their plans for the House in 2023 if they become its majority party — and liberal Washington Post opinion column Eugene Robinson, in a biting September 26 column, slams it as devoid of substance. Above all else, Robinson stresses, Republicans’ plans for the House are motivated by a desire for “revenge.”}:

“Pay no attention to the House Republicans’ substance-free ‘Commitment to America,’” Robinson argues. “The actual GOP plan, if the party takes control of the lower chamber in January, is a campaign of performative revenge.”

Robinson, a frequent guest on MSNBC, continues, “Ginned-up investigations, cruel attacks on the marginalized, even a concocted impeachment of President Biden — that’s what the nation has to look forward to if Republicans win the House. Those are the only things the party agrees on, except fealty to Donald Trump and an all-consuming desire for power.”

The liberal columnist notes that although House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy “made a big deal” of the release of the “Commitment to America,” it was full of empty rhetoric calling for “a nation that’s safe” and “a future that’s built on freedom.”

“A Republican majority would disband the select committee investigating the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the Capitol, ending its important work,” Robinson notes. “Perhaps the Senate could try to take up the baton if Democrats retain control there. But it might be that the Justice Department is left on its own to finish writing the definitive story of what happened on that awful day and why. McCarthy and his committee chairs would also quickly launch a series ofshow-trial investigations. Think Benghazi after Benghazi after Benghazi.”

If McCarthy becomes House speaker, Robinson warns, anti-abortion bills are a possibility.

“On culture-war issues, how far the House would try to go under McCarthy would depend on how vulnerable he feels to the far-right wing of his caucus,” Robinson explains. “Opinion polls indicate, for example, that any attempt to pass a nationwide abortion ban would hurt the GOP among independent voters. But if enough House Republicans want to barrel down that road, McCarthy might be compelled to go along.”

===

4/22 edit bd

I don’t follow what every Democrat says. No one can. There’s no way for me to know whether the tenor and tone of their collective rhetoric changed last week. But it felt like it got stronger, sharper and angrier.

Consider Brian Schatz.

The Hawaii Senator took to the Senate floor to scorch his colleague Josh Hawley of Missouri, who’s been holding up appointments to the Department of Defense that are necessary to America’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Before he signs off, he said, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin must resign for his “failures” in Afghanistan.

Schatz said that’s rich coming from a guy who raised his fist in solidarity with the J6 insurrectionists and who voted to acquit the former president for the high crime of extorting Ukraine’s president.

“This comes from a guy who before the Russian invasion suggested that maybe it would be wise for [Volodymyr] Zelenskyy to make a few concessions about Ukraine and their willingness to join NATO.”

He added:

“They withheld lethal aid until, unless Zelenskyy released false smears against Joe Biden's son. Then [Hawley] voted to exonerate President Trump for this. So spare me the new solidarity with the Ukrainians and with the free world, because this man's record is exactly the opposite.”

His tirade amazed those of us longing for the Democrats to take a strong stand against the Republican Party’s lies and bad faith. Perhaps we’ll see more now that Greg Sargent put a brighter light on it.

The Post columnist interviewed Brian Schatz on Friday. “Democrats need to make more noise,” the Senator conceded. “We have to scream from the rooftops because this is a battle for the free world now.”

Let’s not forget what Schatz said, however.

He said Hawley is “doing a very specific thing.”

“He is damaging the Department of Defense.”

So far, Schatz is the only Democrat seeing what needs seeing.

Though he says he’s outraged by the US pullout from Afghanistan, Josh Hawley is also attacking, directly, the military leadership itself. (He won’t move on appointments until the secretary of defense resigns.)

Demanding Austin’s resignation is not a “reasonable request,” Schatz said. It can’t be. The point is sabotaging civilian control of the military.

You read that right.

The point is cleaving the ranks. The point is to create conditions in which military personnel feel inspired to take action that’s favorable to the Republicans’ (perhaps the former president’s) return to power.

They are picking up where the J6 insurrection left off. But next time, it won’t be a mob of schlubs. It will be an army of highly-trained insurgents bent on restoring whiteness to the center of the republic.

At gunpoint.

Everyone should see what Schatz sees.

So I interviewed Fred Wellman, founder of Beer Hall Project and a 20-year Army veteran who served when Secretary Austin was General Austin. I called Fred after US Rep. Matt Gaetz failed to humiliate the secretary in testimony before the House Arms Services Committee.

Fred said: “A standing army can’t be a tool of a political party. Under the Trump years, it became more partisan. Now Matt Gaetz and his peers in the Republican Party are directly undermining the apolitical and nonpolitical nature of the military by dividing troops from leaders.”

Matt Gaetz and US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. Thoughts?

My main frustration has always been with the “performance wing” of the Republican Party. They don’t want to govern. They want to act.

In this case, Matt Gaetz tried convincing people that “wokeism,” or trying to get a more diverse American military force, is hurting our ability to fight wars. It shows how monumentally stupid he is.

He's dragging culture wars into national defense. That he does so while sitting on the House Armed Service Committee is outrageous.

It’s a committee responsible for oversight of the men and women in uniform, but it’s oversight partially provided by someone as monumentally asinine as Matt Gaetz – that’s just disgusting to me.

Good point. When a country sends people overseas, the presumption should be that leaders will take that responsibility deadly seriously. Deadly serious responsibility is the opposite of Matt Gaetz.

I'm a 20-year Army veteran. I rose through the ranks to be a lieutenant colonel. I retired after Desert Storm and three Iraq tours. I’m the son of a World War II Marine veteran. My son is an Army veteran. My son-in-law continues to serve in the National Guard.

But not everybody can serve.

Less than 7 percent of our nation is veterans. Less than 1 percent serve at all. Less than one-third of the eligible population is capable of serving. I'm talking about fitness, criminal record, mental health, etc. This is the reality of maintaining and growing an all-volunteer force.

That's the point of trying to increase the diversity of the officer corps. That's the point of trying to increase the diversity of the pilot corps. That's the point of welcoming all races and creeds. As Secretary Austin said, anybody who's eligible, who has the capability to serve, should be welcomed even if they're non-binary, gay, straight, whatever.

If they're capable of serving, of meeting the physical and mental requirements we need in our military, we've got to open our arms.

There are just not enough white dudes left.

When you have someone like the Florida congressman directly attacking that, that turns away possible recruits. Gaetz is literally undermining those who serve and who may serve in the future.

Sounds like you’re angry?

I am angry.

The Matt Gaetzs and Marsha Blackburns of the world are openly undermining good order and military discipline with a culture war for political effect. A representative sitting on the Armed Services Committee should understand the challenges of an all-volunteer force.

Civilian oversight of the military matters even though those civilians may never have served, may not have been qualified to serve. People like me, people like Secretary Austin – we understand that. Someone who rose to the rank of four-star understands he’s going to answer to some 25-year-old kid on the Armed Services Committee.

That's the nature of it.

But what frustrates me is the lack of respect for the office and a lack of respect for the military as an apolitical and non-political entity.

One of the biggest fears of our founding fathers was a standing army. They didn't want one and that undermined efforts early on in the republic because of rebellions. We had no army to address them.

Even Washington was like, man, we need an army.

A standing army can’t be a tool of a political party. Under the Trump years, it became more partisan. Now Matt Gaetz and his peers in the Republican Party are directly undermining the apolitical and nonpolitical nature of the military by dividing troops from leaders.

The troops love Trump, they believe, but the troops are being failed by “woke” leaders. Where the fuck do you think the leaders are? You don't just magically make a general. Secretary Austin started as a fucking second lieutenant. He rose through the ranks. This is dangerous.

I do not say this lightly.

This is incredibly dangerous.

They attack the military leadership as “woke” because they're trying to cause a break in the ranks. They're literally undermining good order and military discipline deliberately to break the chain of command.

I've never seen that in my lifetime.

You’re describing national security risk. Is that overstating it?

No, I don't think so.

The very nature of our republic relies on an apolitical military every American knows serves them, no matter their race, creed, religion, color, region, political party, whatever. Our republic depends on everyone knowing a standing army is not a threat to the country.

Many in the Republican Party are super-fans of Putin, let's be honest. They're having CPAC in Hungary, for God's sake, a country led by a rightwing dictator, a Putin fan. Imagine a scenario in which they’re in power and we can't fight because they’ve undermined the military.

It's terrifying to think where this could go.

I've seen reports of white nationalism gaining traction in the ranks of the military. There's an effort from above to deal with that.

I learned in military science 101 at West Point that an all-volunteer force is a direct reflection of our society. You raised your children for 18 years before they get into the military. I give them 12 weeks of basic training. That won’t overcome 18 years of raising them as racists.

All I can do is ensure they don't act on those beliefs and undermine good order and military discipline. If they do behave inappropriately, we use the separate military system to discipline them appropriately and remove them from the military as they're no longer a threat.

But we do know white nationalist and patriot front-type groups have been actively sending “their troops,” if you will, into the military for military training. Right-wing nationalist groups are infiltrating the ranks and recruiting veterans after they get out of the military.

At one point, 10 percent of Jan6 cases were United States military and veterans. One of them is an active-duty Marine Corps major!

How horrifying that is.

Talk about the fundamental tension between universal values, like honor, and individual interest, like investment in whiteness.

Some really extreme right-wing politicians say universal values are an attack on conservative thought. It's not against conservative thought.

Conservative thought should mean taxes and “pulling up my bootstraps and raising myself up by going into the military” – that's fine.

Saying Black people are inferior soldiers, assaulting the ranks, inciting homophobia and transphobia and attacking fellow service members – That’s not conservative. That’s extremism, white nationalism.

That needs to be stomped out.

There have been several surveys of service members saying the biggest threat they face isn’t Muslim terrorists. It’s extremism in the ranks....