Also, they should probably ban pregnancy. That’s about 118 deaths per million, by far the worst of all developed nations.
Also guns. Of course, guns.
"what digby sez..."
Month: April 2023
Observing his glee in humiliating Floridians who don’t agree with him — from high school students to immigrants to Disney to well, everyone — this does not surprise me:
The torture regimes is well documented. We know what they did. And apparently, DeSantis was part of it, assigned to “ensure that the prisoners rights were upheld” but in fact, he oversaw torture, specifically the force feeding tactics to stop the prisoners from staging hunger strikes, (which the Pentagon fatuously defined as a form of “asymmetric warfare.”) DeSantis has been accused of overseeing the force feeding of massive amounts of Ensure causing the inmates to vomit and choke. (Don’t read this link about his time at Gitmo if you have a weak stomach.) I don’t know if it’s all true but the mere fact that DeSantis was part of this grotesque program disqualifies him from ever holding office as far as I’m concerned.
Here’s an excerpt from a piece I wrote in November of 2021:
With all of the hoopla this past week over the off-year elections, President Bidenâs foreign trip, and the ongoing drama on Capitol Hill, there was very little discussion of the latest chapter in one of the most important and horrific stories of our time.
The New York Times reported on an unprecedented sentencing hearing of a detainee held at Guantanamo Bay. It was the first time a prisoner detailed in public the torture he underwent at the hands of the U.S. government. There are no adequate words to describe the grotesque war crimes committed against this man. Timesâ reporter Carol Rosenberg, who has covered the Guantanamo legal proceedings for many years now, vividly detailed the story of 41-year-old Majid Khan, a Pakistani citizen who graduated from a Baltimore high school and, as a lost young man, took a trip back to his home country in 2002 after his mother died. There he was seduced into joining a terrorist organization. As he put it, âI went willingly to Al Qaeda. I was stupid, so incredibly stupid. But they promised to relieve my pain and purify my sins. They promised to redeem me, and I believed them.â
Khan was captured by American forces in 2003 and has been held in legal limbo ever since, despite the fact that he cooperated from the beginning. But according to his testimony, the more he cooperated, the more he was tortured. As with so many other victims of the brutal U.S. torture regime, Khan was compelled to make up tales in order to get the torture to stop. When his tales didnât pan out, he was tortured some more.
The maze of national security restrictions put on Guantanamo prisoners attempting to defend themselves (an almost 20-year long process) has generally made it impossible for them to speak out about what happened to them. But apparently, (it isnât clear from the reporting) Khanâs lawyers found a way for him to publicly detail the torture he endured without specifically accusing any individuals. So last week, in open court, he took the stand and expressed remorse for his actions and forgave his tormentors. In front of his horrified father and sister, both of whom are American citizens, he laid out for the record what happened to him.
Kahn described in detail the primitive conditions in which he was held: naked, with his hands chained above his head or shackled to the wall crouching âlike a dog,â beaten and sleep-deprived to the point of hallucination. He was waterboarded repeatedly and nearly drowned. And then there was the sexual and âmedicalâ sadism, as Rosenberg reports:
[A]fter he refused to eat, his captors âinfusedâ a purĂŠe of his lunch through his anus. The C.I.A. called it rectal refeeding. Mr. Khan called it rape.
The C.I.A. pumped water up the rectum of prisoners who would not follow a command to drink. Mr. Khan said this was done to him with âgreen garden hoses.â
âThey connected one end to the faucet, put the other in my rectum and they turned on the water,â he said, adding that he lost control of his bowels after those episodes and, to this day, has hemorrhoids.
He spoke about failed and sadistic responses to his hunger strikes and other acts of rebellion. Medics would roughly insert a feeding tube up his nose and down his throat. He would try to bite it off and, in at least one instance, he said, a C.I.A. officer used a plunger to force food inside his stomach, a technique that caused stomach cramps and diarrhea.
When CIA officers transferred Khan from one black site to another, they would insert an enema and then duct tape a diaper on him so he wouldnât have to be taken to the bathroom.
Kahn was eventually charged with four terrorism charges and pled guilty to delivering $50,000 from Pakistan to an Al Qaeda affiliate in early 2003 that was traced to the bombing of a Marriott hotel in Jakarta, Indonesia. At the time of the bombing, Kahn was already in custody. He also worked with Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the 9/11 mastermind, in some failed plots during his brief period with al Qaeda.
At his trial, the lead prosecutor conceded that Kahn got âextremely roughâ treatment but told the jury he was lucky to be alive when the victims of al Qaeda are not. Kahnâs lawyer said âMajid was raped at the hands of the U.S. government. He told them everything from the beginning.â
DeSantis wasn’t part of the black sites program. But the stuff they did at Guantanamo was part and parcel of the policy and all of those who participated are implicated in war crimes.
By the way, none of this surprises me. DeSantis is a monster.
The last 24 hours
I’m not saying he’s having a mental breakdown because I think he actually believes this is a good strategy. But it’s still startling to see how it looks one right after another:
Does it matter?
With former President Donald Trump now formally charged on criminal charges, a majority of Americans (53%) believe he intentionally did something illegal, according to a new ABC News/Ipsos poll.
An additional 11% say he acted wrongly but not intentionally. Only 20% believe Trump did not do anything wrong, and 16% say they don’t know, per the ABC News/Ipsos poll conducted using Ipsos’ KnowledgePanel.
As part of the Tuesday charges against the former president, Manhattan prosecutors alleged that Trump engaged in a “scheme” to boost his election chances during the 2016 presidential race through a string of hush money payments made by others to boost his campaign, and then “repeatedly and fraudulently falsified New York business records” to conceal that criminal conduct.
A “statement of facts” paired with the 34-count indictment alleges that Trump discussed the scheme while he was in the Oval Office and made reimbursement payments to his lawyer for a year while in office.
Trump pleaded not guilty to all 34 felony counts and has long denied any wrongdoing.
Democrats are largely convinced of Trump’s culpability, with 87% saying he intentionally did something illegal, and a majority of independents (57%) agree.
Of note, the former president is enjoying weaker-than-usual support from his own partisans with only a plurality of Republicans (45%) thinking Trump did nothing wrong, and the rest of the party split among the belief he intentionally did something illegal (19%), he was wrong but it was unintentional (18%) or they simply do not know (17%).
ABC News/Ipsos asked nearly identical questions of the American public in polling conducted last week immediately following the historic indictment and once again after the charges were made public and Trump was formally arraigned.
Between the weeks, some modest but clear trends have emerged.
The announcement of formal charges has nudged public opinion slightly against Trump, particularly among independent voters. As of April 1, exactly half of the public said the charges against Trump were either very or somewhat serious, and 36% said they were not. Now, after the indictment has been unsealed and the public has heard Trump’s condemnation of the investigation, 52% find the charges very or somewhat serious, and 39% deem the charges not too serious or not serious at all.
But either way, more Americans are making up their minds — While 14% of the public did not know how they felt about the severity of the charges as of April 1, that figure has shrunk to 8%.
Independents had an 11-point point shift in their views of the severity of the views, the polling showed. Last week, 43% of independents found the charges very or somewhat serious. This group, a critical voting bloc for the once-again presidential candidate, has swung against him, as 54% now say the same.
More Americans believe this week that Trump should have been charged with a crime, with 50% saying he should have been, 33% saying he should not, and 17% not knowing. Roughly the same percentages say that the charges are politically motivated, with 50% saying they are, 36% saying they aren’t, and 13% not knowing.
Slightly more Americans (48%) also believe Trump should suspend his bid for the White House, compared to the 43% who suggested so in the last ABC News/Ipsos poll. Again, independents were most likely to shift on this question, going from 41% saying he should suspend his campaign on April 1 to 52% now.
Views of Trump overall have taken a hit too, with only 25% thinking favorably of him, down 10 points since right before the last presidential election. In comparison, President Joe Biden’s favorability rating currently stands at 34%, according to the poll.
Note that only 19% of Republicans think he intentionally did something wrong.
I think Trump drags Biden down too with this crap because the whole saga adds to the sour mood the country is in. It just feels like politics is a shit hole and I suspect there’s a strong “pox on both their houses” effect at work. Bur elections are choices between two candidates and Trump is very likely going to be the nominee so …
Tiffany Dover is ready to exit the shadows
The conspiracy caucus’ legacy may linger long enough to bite us the next time a nasty virus appears. Brandy Zadrozny interviews Tiffany Dover, a Tennessee nurse unwillingly placed by anti-vaxxers at the center of their conspiracy theories (NBC News):
Iâd been following Tiffany since that day, Dec. 17, 2020. Like thousands of others, I first saw her on a livestream during the national rollout of Covid vaccines to front-line workers, where Tiffany became one of the first people in the U.S. to get a shot. I was also watching when she fainted immediately after, launching a wave of misinformation and conspiracy theories that would eventually unravel her life.
The modern anti-vaccine movement was powered by unverified stories of the dead and damaged. Tiffany wasnât the first person to be swallowed up in an anti-vaccine propaganda campaign, and she wouldnât be the last.
The unsettling thing about it â to me and the more well-meaning conspiracy theorists who took up an interest in Tiffanyâs case â was that she seemed to just disappear.
Imaginations ran wild. Rumors of her death shambled along like zombies. Pursuers made her life and her childrens’ hell. She never posted a video otherwise addressed the rumors. She’s refused to talk until now and only to Zadrozny.
Soon after receiving her vaccine at CHI Memorial Hospital Chattanooga, reporters eagerly questioned her about getting the shot. âIâm sorry,â she said, and fainted.
Dover recovered quickly and went back to work. But she’d been caught on a Facebook livestream. Things went downhill from there.
Within 24 hours, Tiffany, or as she was being referred to at the time, âTennessee nurse,â was trending on every social media platform. That night, she was featured on the conspiracy theory internet show Infowars. New videos about Tiffany were being posted to YouTube every 19 minutes, according to Paola Pascual-FerrĂĄ, an associate professor of communication at Baltimoreâs Loyola University Maryland, who was tracking the spread in real time. And Tiffany was going global: Most of the videos and posts about her were coming from outside the U.S., Pascual-FerrĂĄ said.
The posts werenât just replays of Tiffanyâs fall. The conspiracy theories were evolving quickly with what seemed like the whole world contributing to an investigation where the conclusion had already been determined. For the thousands of people posting about Tiffany, she didnât just faint. She was dead. And a fake death certificate started making the rounds.
She’d wanted to respond to the rumors and thousands of social media comments, but the CHI Memorialâs public relations department advised against it, Dover says. Overwhelmed with calls, the hospital would handle it. A short âNursing Leadership Supports Tiffany!â video with everyone in masks simply spawned coverup rumors. Conspiracists decided Dover’s colleague, Amber Honea, had been substituted as a body double. Honea drew harrassment and hate mail. Dover’s disappearance did not help.
âAny aberration from the normal is just evidence for these conspiracy theorists,â said Rachel Moran, a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Washington Center for an Informed Public.
Likewise, in media and crisis communications, a related tactic known as âstrategic silenceâ suggests that often the best response to rumors or conspiracy theories is to do nothing or risk amplifying the very things you hope to deflate. That, too, may be outdated.
When Dover finally posted vaction photos to her Instagram account months later, she drew a reprimand from the hospital questioning the âappropriateness and representation of self and hospital via social media.â
Her mother and grandmother contracted Covid. Her grandmother died in Dover’s unit.
The rumors continued to circulate. QAnon added Dover’s story to their portfolio of lunacy. The fallout for others concerns her.
âPeople have said Iâm responsible for people not getting the vaccine,â Tiffany says. âThat was hard to process. If people are using my name and my story to say, âDonât get the vaccine,â how many people didnât receive it because of me? Thatâs hard.â
After over two years of silence, Dover is ready to respond with videos Zadrozny promises to post throughout the day.
Some days, I’m not sure what irritates me most. Farthest left activists see a dark cloud in every silver lining; every accomplishment is a betrayal, every compromise a sellout. Or the lunatics who (with foreign help) inhabit a non-Earth reality (and our state houses). There, pizza slices mean child sexual abuse and government-approved vaccines implant microchips so, presumably, the Deep State can keep track of our dead bodies.
Where have you gone, Walter Cronkite? A nation turns its lonely eyes to you.
They’ll have Trumpism without so much Trump in it
The persistent Mr. Frank Luntz delights us with yet another look into the minds and desires of Trump voters. He finds them, curiously, outside rural diners. He doesn’t specify how he selects his focus groups â more than two dozen! â and gets them to sit still for him.
Some things haven’t changed. Like their sense of victimization (New York Times):
Many felt ignored and forgotten by the professional political class before Mr. Trump, and victimized and ridiculed for liking him now. Like Republican primary voters nationwide, the focus group participants still respect him, most still believe in him, a majority think the 2020 election was stolen, and half still want him to run again in 2024.
Others want Trump without so much Trumpiness in a 2024 presidential candidate. They want “a candidate who champions Mr. Trumpâs agenda but with decency, civility and a commitment to personal responsibility and accountability.”
Um, no, they don’t. That’s the difference between Luntz reporting what Trump voters say they want and considering what their choices actually reflect. Trump’s agenda? What was Trump’s agenda besides Trump? Can any of them say? Luntz doesn’t mention asking.
Decency, civility, personal responsibility? Did any of these Trump fans ever attend one of his “Lock Her Up” superspreader rallies? Did Luntz ask how many “FUCK YOUR FEELINGS” tee shirts his interviewees owned between them?
I hear Veruca Salt singing:
I want the world
I want the whole world
I want to lock it all up in my pocket
It’s my bar of chocolate
Okay, Trump’s shtick has grown tired. “For more than seven years, he has used the same lines, the same rallies, the same jokes and the same chants,” and they want new material. But other Republican candidates would be mistaken in criticizing Trump:
So applaud the administration before you criticize the man. âDonald Trump was a great president, but he wasnât always a great role model. Today, more than ever, we need character â not just courage. We donât need to insult people to make a point, or make a difference.â
But the insults are what drew cheers and wild applause at those rallies. Would this crowd travel the country and camp out overnight for decency? Would they shower a decency Republican with donations the way they do for Trump when he rings the bell?
Make 2024 about our grandchildren, Luntz suggests, observing that Trump’s base is not just old but “really old.” Old people love their grandkids, right? So pitching the threat to their futures posed by the debt ceiling vote is “the perfect hook”!
The national debt ran up tremendously under Trump, amounting to “the third-biggest increase, relative to the size of the economy, of any U.S. presidential administration,” according to Eugene Steuerle, co-founder of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. Luntz recommends: Hype the “debt crisis.” Think of our grandchildren!
Mr. Trump will say he was fiscally responsible, but the actual numbers donât lie. âWe canât afford these deficits. We canât afford this debt. We canât afford Donald Trump.â
No mention that Trumpâs 2017 supply-side tax cut and “the lack of any serious spending restraint” were the largest contributor to the debt increase during his administration. So do Luntz’s focus groups want to preserve that part of Trump’s “agenda” or not? Would they increase taxes to reduce the national debt for our grandchildren? Or would they just further slash the social safety net their grandchildren may need and that MAGA Republicans in Congress will demand?
I want today
I want tomorrow
I want to wear ’em like braids in my hair
And I don’t want to share ’em
Says Luntz, “Republicans want just about everything Mr. Trump did, without everything Mr. Trump is or says.
Luntz is a creature of Republican Washington. That he still gets a paycheck is because of that. His focus groups always seem to tell establishment Republicans what Luntz thinks they want to hear. Tapping the id of his focus groups is tougher than simply spitting back what randos will say for the record, so he never bothers to dig. His funders get what they pay for.
Trump is facing multiple legal challenges and this is how he chooses who to represent him?
Seated far to the left of the defendant, former President Donald J. Trump, in a Manhattan criminal courtroom on Tuesday was a lawyer who has never tried a case in court, whose phone was seized by federal agents executing a warrant last year, and who once hosted syndicated news segments bombastically defending the Trump White House.
Seated to Mr. Trumpâs far right was Todd Blanche, a newly hired criminal defense lawyer who also represents the lawyer at the far-left end of the table, Boris Epshteyn. In between them was Joe Tacopina, a combative presence on cable television who recently represented Mr. Trumpâs future daughter-in-law, Kimberly Guilfoyle, before the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
The tableau, rounded out by another lawyer, Susan R. Necheles, from Mr. Trumpâs arraignment on felony charges of falsifying business records, revealed more about the client than about the case at hand. It was emblematic of his relentless search for the perfect lawyer â and of his frequent replacement of his lawyers when they fail to live up to his ideal for how the perfect lawyer should operate.
Mr. Trump has long been obsessed with lawyers: obsessed with finding what he thinks are good lawyers, and obsessed with ensuring that his lawyers defend him zealously in the court of public opinion.
His lawyersâ own foibles are seldom disqualifying, so long as they defend him in the manner he desires.
That often means measuring up to the example of Roy M. Cohn, Mr. Trumpâs first fixer-lawyer, who represented him in the 1970s and early 1980s. Mr. Cohn, whose background included being indicted himself and who was eventually disbarred, earned a reputation for practicing with threats, scorched-earth attacks and media manipulation.
Mr. Trumpâs continual efforts to identify and recruit the newest Roy Cohn have always been unusual and impulsive, according to interviews with a half-dozen people who have represented or been involved in Mr. Trumpâs legal travails over the past seven years.
He has occasionally hired lawyers after only the briefest phone call, knowing little to nothing about their background but having been impressed by a quick introduction or by seeing them praise him on Fox News.
It took only an introduction over the phone by Mr. Epshteyn on a conference call for Mr. Trump to hire Evan Corcoran, a former federal prosecutor, to handle discussions with the government over its efforts to recover classified materials in Mr. Trumpâs possession. (Mr. Corcoran has since become the focus of government efforts to pierce attorney-client privilege and learn about his discussions with Mr. Trump in connection with a grand-jury subpoena for classified material at Mar-a-Lago, as the government amasses evidence of obstruction of justice. Prosecutors believe Mr. Trump may have misled Mr. Corcoran during those discussions.)
Mr. Trump hired Jim Trusty, a former federal prosecutor, to work on the classified-documents case after seeing him discuss one of Mr. Trumpâs legal entanglements as a commentator on television.
âThatâs one of the first questions: âCan you go on TV?â He picks his lawyers literally off of TV,â said one lawyer who used to represent Mr. Trump, who insisted on anonymity to avoid publicly breaking confidence with a former client. âItâs more important that you go on TV for him, and how you look on TV, than what you actually say in the courtroom.â
The same lawyer cited Mr. Trumpâs lawsuits against the journalist Bob Woodward and the Pulitzer Prize Board as actions that any experienced lawyer would have known would get him or her âlaughed out of court.â
Trump is a TV addict who has formed his entire worldview based upon what he sees on the screen. And he didn’t learn otherwise as president which is still astonishing. So it’s not unusual for him to judge the acumen of a lawyer from the way they defend him on Fox News.
The real question, as always, is how so many Republicans can support him, knowing this about him.
Is DeSantis already spent?
Those of you who read this blog regularly know that I’ve been saying the smart move for DeSantis would have been to wait until 2028. Trump is still dominant and there’s just no way for anyone to get around it. It looks like some of his fans are starting to come to that realization as well:
Among the 15-20 Republican mega-donors who control the purse strings in G.O.P. politics, thereâs growing concern that Ron DeSantis, the great white knight from Tallahassee, might not be the one, or at least not yet. Most of these top dogsâSteve Schwarzman, Ken Griffin, Paul Singer, Ken Langone, etceteraâare moderate-ish Bush-era billionaires who loved Trumpâs corporate tax cuts but have appeared ready to move on from the candidate, despite the former presidentâs efforts to win them back by circulating memos highlighting his poll numbers or working the room at John Paulsonâs Palm Beach housewarming party.
Nevertheless, these are businessmen, hedge fund founders, and private equity moguls who appreciate optionality and are now looking to hedge their risk, as I reported last week. âIf DeSantis is the guy, weâre ready to go for it and weâre ready to throw our weight behind him,â one major donor told me. âWe want one or two of them rather than Trump. DeSantis should not misread early support for him, which Iâm sure DeSantis hates. Weâre ready to support two Trump alternative candidates, because why wouldnât we?â
Sure, DeSantis already has about $200 million in the bank, but itâs been a rough month or so. Heâs been trending downward in early polling and was completely upstaged by Trumpâs indictment and arrest in New York, an oxygen-annihilating media event that seemed, somehow, to have caught the Florida governor and his staff off-guardâfirst with his disingenuous, chatbot-esque performance during a softball interview with Piers Morgan, during which he fumbled his response to questions about Trumpâs looming indictment, and again when he was put on the spot regarding whether he would stand in the way of Trumpâs potential extradition.
The trouble with DeSantis is that his candidacy is more compelling on paper than it is in practice. Of course, any would-be presidentâs ambitions eclipse their accomplishments. But DeSantis, despite ruling over a state of 20 million people, has yet to be tested on a national stage. Heâs also revealed a reactive and potentially short-sighted political instinct with his recent moves to legalize permitless concealed carry in Florida and his plan to sign a six-week abortion banâtwo base-revving policies that would unquestionably come back to haunt him in a general election.
Other missteps have been stylistic, donors say, like his desire to always appear as the smartest person in the room. Perhaps he should embrace a more genial approach, like their north star George W. Bush, the guy who didnât drink but whom you would grab a beer with. (Though look how that turned outâŚ)
DeSantisâs people brush off this grumbling as a bunch of moderates who donât understand what it takes to win the Republican primary these days. Sure, the six-week abortion ban might upset them, but if heâs going to beat Trump in the primary, he needs to campaign to the hard right. But the partyâs moneymen worry heâs being myopic, or naive. âHeâs showing signs of stress and that only he and his wife Casey are in his inner camp,â the major donor told me. âDeSantis has to do whatever he can to stop the bill from getting the six-week abortion ban to his desk.â
In fact, these donors see it as a real test. One called it a âdeath warrant.â Thatâs why youâre starting to hear the intensified grumbling that perhaps DeSantis should do a headfake and sit this one out for 2028. Iâve been in Florida reporting for the past two weeks and have heard this inside conversation at all levels, from voters to G.O.P. leaders to top donors who wonder if DeSantis should really run.
Three months ago, DeSantis was on top of the world, having beaten Trump in a poll of G.O.P. voters in New Hampshire and enjoying his own sense of political inevitability. Now, the conversation among donors has shifted to whether they need to identify another âgame-winning relief pitcher in the bullpen,â in case DeSantis doesnât have the gas to go the distance. (I know, more sports metaphors, but these are obviously all men talking.) The de facto option for these guys is to pick someone most like themâa man who understands the economic and political universe as they see it; a former private equity hero and centimillionaire on their level. Yes, weâre talking once again about Glenn Youngkin.
Iâm reliably told that Youngkin has made it clear that he will not run before the state legislature elections in Virginia, in November. Heâs dead set on flipping the state red and making that his signature success story, outside of his manufactured C.R.T. platform, which DeSantis snatched up and turbocharged. Of course, a very late entry would put him at a sizable disadvantageâespecially if it means missing debates, potentially failing to qualify for the ballot in certain states, and arriving without a national campaign apparatus in place. But surely, the argument goes, Youngkin can spend $20 million of his own cash immediately to make up any lost ground, and heâd be able to call on his peers to help bridge the delta. Heâs got significant evangelical support waiting in the wings. And by waiting on the sidelines, Youngkin avoids months of Trump attacks.
Sure itâs a longshot, but this may be Youngkinâs last chance at the White House. Whereas donors are telling DeSantis to consider sitting back and waiting until 2028, after Trump is out of the picture, Youngkin is being advised that 2028 is too far away. His term as governor is up in 2025, and heâs term limited from running again. Without a political platform to stand on, he runs the risk of becoming just another rich guy with presidential dreams.
Oh, and thereâs the Rupert Murdoch factor, too. Iâm told that both Youngkin and DeSantis met with Murdoch, separately, at his $200 million Montana ranch last year, and the Fox and News Corp. owner seemed to get on better with the fleece-wearing former Carlyle co-C.E.O. than he did with the former Navy lawyer.
Itâs not just the monied class whose confidence DeSantis appears to be losing; his appeal with the grassroots is also being tested. To wit, multiple sources noted to me that the New Hampshire G.O.P. is still struggling to sell tickets, at every level up from entry-level tickets to $5,000 dinner sponsorships, for the annual Amos Tuck Dinner on April 14, featuring DeSantis as the special guest. With only one week to go, organizers are apparently underwhelmed by the interest in an event theyâd hoped would sell out. Meanwhile, The Daily Beast has a story out about how everyone from G.O.P. donors to organizers have been frustrated by the lack of responsiveness from the DeSantis team, as well as his insistence on doing as little media as possible. New Hampshire activists have been particularly miffed that they need to submit requests to the governorâs office to see him while heâs in townâa hurdle theyâre not used to as influencers in the first-in-the-nation primary. (A New Hampshire G.O.P. spokesperson declined to comment.)
But maybe DeSantis doesnât care about New Hampshire or Iowa. NBC News is reporting that heâs instead focusing on outlasting Trump and winning more delegates overallâwhat people in the know are already calling âthe Rudy Guiliani strategy.â Which by the way, didnât work.
They’re stuck with the latest Great Whitebread Hope Glenn Youngkin? Lol.
DeSantis may have already screwed himself. His culture war strategy is outrageous and out of step with the country. By 2028 it’s going to be seen as a relic from the past. (Not that they won’t be extreme, it’s just that the next big thing will be something different and all this silly “woke” business will be hung around his neck. )
DeSantis is a loathesome, calculated wingnut machine. Nothing would make me happier than to see him and his cynical strategy destroyed.
Less than 24 hours after a jury found an Army sergeant guilty of shooting and killing a protester, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced that he would pardon the convicted killer as soon as a request “hits my desk”
The killer posted on Facebook that he might âkill a few people on my way to work,â got in his car, ran a red light, drove directly into a Black Lives Matter protest, and shot and killed a protester because he felt âthreatened.â
Both parties were openly carrying, as is legal in Texas. So when this racist consciously drove into the protest he was confronted by a man with a gun and he shot him, just as he clearly planned to do.
Perryâs defense team argued that he acted in self-defense, but prosecutors contended that Perry instigated what happened. They highlighted a series of social media posts and Facebook messages in which Perry made statements that they said indicated his state of mind, such as he might âkill a few people on my way to work. They are rioting outside my apartment complex.â
A friend responded, âCan you legally do so?â Perry replied, âIf they attack me or try to pull me out of my car then yes.â
The Kyle Rittenhouse defense. It didn’t work with this jury but that doesn’t seem to matter. Because Tucker Carlson says so:
Fox’s Carlson decried the conviction in a two-minute segment on his show, referring to the Austin protesters as a âmob of riotersâ who surrounded Perryâs car and began pounding on it. He said Perry fired when Foster raised his rifle.
âThis is a legal atrocity,â Carlson said. âThere is no right of self-defense in Texas.â
He invited Abbott on to the show on Monday to discuss the pardon. I’m sure Abbot is thrilled to be summoned by the master.
This is anarchy and it’s going to happen more and more as everyone in these states is packing heat. It’s probably best to stay away from them.