The opening just has to be the claim that cats and dogs are being eaten by immigrants in Springfield Ohio. Nothing else this past week tops a presidential candidate spouting a deeply xenophobic and utterly false urban legend as “truth”.
While bizarre, it is also very much on message for today’s GOP. Accusations of immigrants being criminals, being rapists, or poisoning the blood of the nation, are now commonly tossed out by him. As I noted in last week’s article, Scottish Author Ian Banks famously made this observation …
It’s the utter idiocy, the sheer wrong-headedness of the response that beggars belief. I mean, your society’s broken, so who should we blame? Should we blame the rich, powerful people who caused it? No let’s blame the people with no power and no money and these immigrants who don’t even have the vote, yeah it must be their fucking fault.
This is not just about a few fringe and utterly whacky conspiracy theorists making a weird claim from some dark and damp basement. Trump himself was promoting this from the debate spotlight to an audience of literally millions.
Before the debate JD Vance, who as a reminder was elected to represent Ohio and so should f**king know what is really going on there, grasped hold of the stupid claim and ran hard and fast with it by amplifying it as “truth”. I really do not need to tell you this because you already know, but for completeness, here it is – The assertion that Haitian migrants living in the city of Springfield, Ohio, are supposedly abducting pets and eating them, … as confirmed by local police and officials, … is bullshit.
Period.
Despite being flagged up as BS and robustly debunked prior to the debate, Trump decides to drop it into the mix. Here is that moment in full context …
His cult of followers listened to Dear Leader say it, and so it will now be “truth” for them no matter what evidence is provided.
Within Elon’s cesspit, there were of course plenty of tweets popping up with “It’s all true, here is a leaked audio / police filing / document that proves it“, but scratch a bit and you discover that every single supposed example is either fake or turns out to be something else that has been misrepresented.
You really don’t need to be a rocket scientist to work out that painting a target sign on the backs of a group of innocent people never ever works out well. We have all now seen the bomb threats.
If this disgusts you, and it should, then there really is only one choice in the election …
In response the following has now been doing the rounds. I’ve even seen Monica Lewinsky sharing it (yes really). Does anybody know who did it, because whoever it was deserves a resounding round of applause …
Let’s move on now to cover a few of the others gems of pure lunacy that have been mined from that debate.
Ave Imperator, morituri te salutant
Beyond just cats and dogs there is a bit more to cover.
As usual much has already been said by many and the verbal combat itself was watched by millions, so I need not inflict a replay on you. However, there were indeed a few glorious moments that merit a bit of spotlighting.
How it was going to play out was never ever a deep dark secret …
The fact that he can be so easily triggered has also never been a state secret (here is a 2016 tweet from somebody you might know) …
There is also no ducking the observation made by Kamala that his drivel of simplistic and meaningless word-soup at his rallies really is not exciting.
When she tagged Donald as boring, did any of you remember the following clip. For some it was old news and they have been telling him this to his face …
What was also of course very predictable was that the stamp collection of his favourite bits disinformation came out and were once again put on display. Notable hits for the Trump drinking game included …
- His very repetition of the Big Lie that he won the 2020 election, a lie that provoked the rage that fueled the violent insurrection – and continues to threaten democracy. He also refused to answer whether he regretted watching his supporters attack the Capitol and that he failed to intervene. Instead, he called the attackers political prisoners and vowed to pardon them
- He claimed that his admission that he lost the election “by a whisker” was sarcasm.
- He claimed that everyone wanted Roe v Wade overturned. Nah, this is one of his most ridiculous lies. Most Americans opposed Trump’s Supreme Court overturning Roe. And yes, Trump’s allies are still dead-set on criminalizing abortion nationwide.
- He keeps claiming the US economy is in the toilet. The truth is far different; the US economy is among the strongest in the world.
- He dodged a question on climate change. His Project 2025 allies are planning to reverse every Biden-Harris policy on climate. That’s why their plan has been called a blueprint for destroying the planet.
… and yes, doing this as a drinking game means we all end up passed out by the end.
I do have one question. What was that phrase that she just skipped over after the word … “This” … it was an excellent bit of timing …
Meanwhile, the debate was so good that even Sara Cooper popped up …
Post Debate Reactions
Others were willing to call it right after …
MSNBC, a direct quote, “She spanked that ass” …
- Now that’s normally something Donald has to pay for.
Even after it, he continues to duck a key question, then runs …
- The media should do their job and keep pressing him on this.
There has been a lot of post-debate “Hey it was rigged, he got fact checked so much and she did not“. As noted by Mehdi, some such as Bill, who are saying this are ever so close to a revelation … but can’t quite make that last step …
Some really have seriously embraced the thought that ABC rigged it. Well yes, in one sense they did indeed rig it … by stepping back and permitting him to hang himself with his own words …
It really did go very well.
Apparently, for one of the self-appointed prophets, the reason Kamala did so well is due to witchcraft …
Others such as Pastor Mario Murillo ranted that Tuesday night’s presidential debate was “truly the debate of Satan.”
To ensure he also tossed his hat into this crazy ring, Trump cultist Eric Metaxas also advised that “brazen lying” and “wicked contempt for truth” in the presidential debate was evidence of “demonic activity.”
- We don’t think he was talking about Trump, even though “brazen lying and wicked contempt for the truth” could practically be a motto for the MAGA movement.
Sean Feucht simply declares that ”KAMALA IS A RADICAL BABY KILLING MANIAC!”. He had also previously hosted a pre-debate livestream in which he prayed that “Trump does not take the bait from Harris.” Well, that didn’t work.
So what are they all worried about here. If a god really is on heir side then, as far-right pastor E.W. Jackson told a gathering of Christian nationalists, God will not allow Kamala Harris to become president.
- The reason is of course that deep down they do know that such claims are BS, so they are desperate to try and manipulate people to stay on team.
As far as Trump is concerned, he won, and cited polls that supposedly confirmed this when he went into the spin room right after the debate to try and influence the immediate media narrative.
Oh come now, is that a surprise, declaring victory is what he always does when he is very robustly defeated.
“What polls?” he was asked by reporters, but he ignored that question. Turns out these polls were ah-hoc twitter polls run by MAGA people that non-mega generally don’t follow, and by Newsmax, again only voted on by MAGA. “Slightly flawed” does not even begin to cut it.
Meanwhile, if you would like a reasonable measurement of how it really went, then here is what the market said …
DJT is, IMHO, actually a worthless stock. The only business under it is Trump’s Truth Social and that has a tiny user base when compared to other platforms. Truth Social is loss making and currently has no credible path to ever being profitable … but … if he actually won the election then the value it has would be greatly altered by that. People have bought as a bet that in the event of an election win DJT would rise dramatically.
As you can see from the above, the day after the debate, the DJT stock tanked. So forget the various MAGA opinions on how he did, the market has spoken. Longer term over the last six months it has in fact tanked 60%.
It really is a cult
- As beautifully put by once commentator seeing the above … “It’s crazy on a subatomic level. It’s finding comfort wandering blindly in a fog of lies. It’s like falling in love with the cancer that’s eating you alive.“
Meanwhile … He continues to promote lies about Immigrants
He never stops with this BS, and yet it is he himself who is the rapist and criminal …
OK, let’s move on beyond the debate now to some of the other crazy stuff from the past week.
Christian Nationalism
Sen. Josh Hawley claims that “the United States of America is the greatest country in the history of the world because it is founded on the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ.“
- Side question: what does “greatest” even mean, how do you actually measure that?
- Neither stupidity nor ignorance explain his stance, he is a Stanford and Yale graduate. Hawley knows this is a lie, but also knows that if he rides this wave, he gains supporters. This is deliberate disinformation that is designed to manipulate.
Christian nationalist Jason Rapert declares that Christians must run for office “so that godly people will be in office passing godly laws allowing us to do godly things” because “the ungodly have had too much free rein in America up to this point.”
- The supposedly “godly” ones have not only rallied behind a sexual abuser and convicted felon for election to high office, but have also striven for policies that are the exact opposite of all the teachings of Jesus. Taking a hard pass on these grifters is the only moral and ethical stance available.
House Speaker Mike Johnson was with Christian nationalist pseudo-historian David Barton in Washington, D.C., this past week. In 2021, Johnson declared that Barton’s work “has had such a profound influence on me and my work and my life.”
- It’s deeply tragic that Johnson has been so completely conned by this grifter. He really does need to start reading some actual biblical scholars and historians.
- Quote via this link here: “Barton is almost single-handedly responsible for creating the Christian nationalist myths that the far-right uses to justify its push to enact harmful public policies that weaken the separation of church and state, undermine women’s rights, and deny legal equality to LGBTQ Americans.“
Pushing back against this stuff matters. It causes real harm, and that is not an opinion, it’s an empirically based fact that has been verified via a new study …
- Here is the link to Hemant’s article
- Here is the link to the paper published in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion– Christian Nationalism and Violence Against Religious Minorities in the United States: A Quantitative Analysis (Open access)
- The abstract reads …
This study examines the relationship between Christian nationalism—a political theology and cultural framework that seeks to amalgamate the Christian faith and a country’s political life and privilege Christianity in the public square over other faith traditions—and attacks against religious minorities in the United States. Some Christian nationalists believe that it is justifiable to undertake violent actions in order to realize the goals of Christian nationalism. We theorize that the political empowerment of Christian nationalist ideology in the form of politicians expressing Christian nationalist sentiments corresponds to physical attacks on religious minorities carried out by self-professing Christians. We test this theory using a cross-sectional, time-series analysis of antiminority violence in the United States. The results provide robust support for our theory.
They are coming to persecute you
Yes, every single damn election year, for literally decades, we get this fear fetish stuff, and so here are a few examples from the past week. Basically it is the execution of a strategy that is basically “Motivate them with fear and gaslight them with lies“
Donald Trump’s “spiritual adviser” Paula White says Christians “should have a bit of a fear factor” about Kamala Harris becoming president: “People of faith will be persecuted and prosecuted on a level that you have never seen before.“
- So … we are supposed to believe that when elected to high office Kamala will do this, yet ignore the rather glaring fact that she is currently holding a position of high office since 2020 and has not done this?
- This grifter will metaphorically jump into bed with anybody if it offers her some advantage. For example, when in Korea she did joint events with the Moony cult at the end of 2021.
- This thrice married grifter, Paula White, will also literally jump into bed with others, such as grifter Benny Hinn, so yes, they were caught.
Michele Bachmann also popped up to say that under a Harris/Walz administration, religious freedom will be destroyed: “Mark my words, they will take away your freedom of speech … and [that] will take away our freedom of religion.“
- Its deeply weird how none of this happened under the current Biden/Harris administration, yet she wants us to believe it will happen in a Harris/Walz administration. This is also the exact same stupid claim she delivered for Obama.
- Reminder: As the Tea Party pinup back in the day, Bachmann was doing weird long before it became popular and went mainstream : Business Insider (2011) – The 9 Craziest Things Michele Bachmann Has Ever Said
- Speaking of weird, this latest clip appears to be her streaming from her bathroom … really.
- To paraphrase Inigo Montoya “You keep using that phrase ‘religious freedom’, but I do not think it means what you think it does!‘
Homophobia on Steroids
There is Homophobia, and then then there is the next level up which is this …
- The claim that the suspected shooter was gay and/or transgender is false. It comes via spin: for example, when the Daily Mail reported that that father of the alleged shooter claimed his son was “bullied for being gay,” far-right anti-LGBTQ activists spun the news as proof that the shooter was gay. Example 2: When CNN reported that the shooter had allegedly “expressed frustration with the acceptance of transgender people,” those same activists spun it to insist that the shooter was angry about the lack of acceptance of transgender people.
- It’s blatantly false crap like this that stirs up hatred.
Weird Conspiracy Claims
We also got the earphones claim … but in this specific case the community notes under it nails it as raw BS …
- It was such a popular claim that CBS looked into it, and so they also debunked it.
- Meanwhile, as noted by a few, how exactly would her wearing earphones have forced him to spout stupid shit?
Weirdest of the Weird
Lucas Gage (no not the actor, another guy, this guy, who is a neo-nazi.) claims that the Holocaust is “the most asinine story” made up by Jews “to gain sympathy.”
- This guy is so Toxic that even Elon’s X has banned him. That X bar is so high now it is in orbit, but he managed to reach it.
There is something deeply wild about listening to Nick Fuentes rant about “mixed-race” and “non-White” people taking over the U.S., given that Fuentes admits that his own father is “half-White [and] half-Mexican.”
This past week Ryan Walters has reached the “finding out” phase for this bit of political theatre …
- For context, Walters claimed she broke the law, but that was not the case, and despite that he pushed ahead anyway in a closed session and revoked her teaching license. He needs to now explain why this was done – as in, you can’t just yank a license for no viable reason, and so here we are now.
- Details of how it played out is here – The evidence is now clear that there have no justification for the removal of her teaching license, so the next step will be for the court to order her teaching license to be restored.
Off to Mars …
- Forget reaching Mars. He can’t even reach Taylor Swift’s attention.
- Reminder: He had also previously assured people that we would be on the way to Mars by 2018 … and that we would have people there by 2024.
Prior to 2016, Alex Jones was too crazy even for Glenn Beck and the two regularly attacked and mocked one another. Then Trump became president and now they’re doing friendly interviews, which tells you everything you need to know about the state of the right today.
Laura Loomer
Yea, we better cover this one.
The speculation is rife that she is the chosen one, candidate number four. They go everywhere together. When he attended the 9/11 memorial this past week, she was the one by his side. Yes, he brought a 9/11 Truther to the 9/11 memorial.
His literal embrace of her will be really good for Kamala’s campaign …
It is of course a strictly professional relationship, she is there because she is on staff, and he as a married man, the chosen one of god, so he would never ever do anything to break his marital vows to Melania … right?
“Yea right” … declares the crowd, who point out that past experience is an indicator of future behaviour.
For those unfamiliar with who she is, then here it is. She is so nuts that she leaves other weird people so far behind that they look normal…
- She is big into being so utterly obnoxious and toxic that she has managed to collect a rather impressive collection of bans. She has been banned from almost every social media platform going … and also every payment platform (GoFundMe, PayPal, Venmo)) … and ride sharing company (Uber and Lyft). The Bitcoin conference has banned her, and even CPAC have banned her.
- She is also very big on whacky conspiracy theories … Stolen Elections – Tick; School Shootings where staged – Tick; 9/11 was an inside job – Tick; etc…
- “They are eating cats and dogs” … come now, where do you think he got this from. It was, we can speculate, pillow talk. Just the day prior to the debate she was promoting this claim. Even the BBC speculates he picked this up from her.
For more insights into her, the BBC have, no doubt in anticipation of her deep importance to Trump, done a deep dive into her.
If indeed Trump and this infamous right-wing bigot and conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer are becoming an item in the middle of his presidential campaign, then that is a story that the American public deserves daily front-page reminders about it until Election Day, and that especially includes the evangelicals, the supposedly family values club, who also just love to claim that he is the chosen one of god and has now found Jesus, and have opted for him to be the hill that that their beliefs will die on.
Meanwhile, the news really is out …
… and for some it is a huge disappointment …
The False Profit$
Last Monday, for the first time ever, I did actually hope there really was a God that listens to Hank’s prayer and acted on it, but no he just spewed lots of lies again …
Self-proclaimed “prophet” Robin Bullock claims that he traveled into the future and prevented an assassination attempt against Trump.
- He appears to be attempting to participate within Trump’s game of “What is the most ridiculous BS I can claim and get away with“
- One other insight here is that the GOP really does appear to have created lots of new jobs within the fantasy-peddling grifting job market
Fighting Religion with Religion
Often the best way to make a point regarding religious fanaticism is to do stuff like this …
Taylor Swift takes a Public Stance
Yes, this also happened.
Here is Tim Walz finding out in real-time …
Gen Z really do get it
Unlike rather a lot of journalists, Gen Z really do get it and call him out as he really is …
An excellent bit of Trolling
Political Cartoons from the past week
Many of the cartoonists just loved that debate and have clearly been having a blast with it as a source of inspiration. Here are some excellent examples …
Finally…
They really are not the smartest people. It appears that some highly “intelligent” Trump Supporters translated Trump’s campaign sign for Latino voters. Instead of translating it into Spanish they translated it into Latin …
- Clearly they are going for the crucial Centurion vote with less focus on gladiators, women, and slaves given that they as non-citizens do not have a vote.
- Conversation currently happening in RNC headquarters … “So you are saying Latin people do not speak Latin?“
- Stupiditas molesta/acerba esse debet
The issue with guns is that we have too many guns, and the “solution” is apparently more guns …
You might of course be wondering if the guys were at the debate. The answer is yes, they sure were. A few highlights – They asked Kristi Noem about her dog, and they asked Stephen Miller about how he felt being called weird and creepy …
