This past week, everybody’s favourite political shock-jock, Marjorie Taylor Greene, came up with this gem of an idea …
That’s not legal, ethical, or viable in any way, and yes the irony is not lost that Charlie’s email at the bottom there reads “freedom”, which in this case is the “Freedom” to loose your right to vote for half a decade because you committed the hideous “crime” of moving house.
This past week she also suggested a divorce between red states and blue states.
What exactly is it that makes a State either Red or Blue, how do you measure that? Let’s take a look at Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Georgia and the big ticket elections …
- For the 2020 Presidential election Georgia is a Blue state – Biden won the popular vote
- For the 2022 Senate race, Georgia is a Blue state – Democratic senator Raphael Warnock won
If her divorce actually happened, then her state would be the wrong side of the line.
To illustrate her “thinking” and “ideas”, we also got this from her during the past week …
In that now deleted tweet, due to the high embarrassment factor, she claimed that almost the entire human population on the planet, 6 Billion humans, illegally crossed the border into the US since Jan 2021.
Is she really that stupid?
Apparently yes.
This past week she, along with Jim Jordan, Lauren Boebert, Andy Biggs, Paul Gosar and other Republicans with their official “GOP House oversight Committee” hats on, sent a letter to Pete Buttigieg and the Department of Transportation asking for NTSB documents related to the East Palestine derailment.
What none of them appeared to know, because they are deeply stupid people, is that The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is an independent establishment of the US Government and NOT part of the Department of Transportation. It is absolutely nothing to do with Pete Buttigieg.
In truth MTG is really all about show for the $$$ donations and not actually doing anything. MTG knows how to press emotional buttons so that she can reap lots of small donations. It’s literally a circus of clowns. Those who see her political theatre and decide to donate truly are card carrying members of the cult of fools.
There really is also no denying that no matter how low you set your bar of expectations for MTG, she, along with her Jewish Space Laser conspiracy thinking, will continue to limbo dance right under it.
The key issue is not actually her, but rather is the observation that the GOP have enabled nutters like her to become their public face.
Moving on, below you will once again find my usual selection of some truly bizarre and extreme claims that have popped up during the last 7 days. Each is laced with my snarky commentary. With my usual hat tip to my various sources, let’s dive in.
Enjoy.
Christian Nationalism
It seems that MAGA pastor Leon Benjamin will not be able to help right-wing Christians take over “the mountain of government” after he was trounced in Virginia’s special congressional election.
- God looked down upon this guy and said “Nope, absolutely not you” … or … perhaps God does not actually rig elections ever, and the good voters in Virginia, about 74.3%, deployed a superpower called “common sense” by choosing to not vote for the religious nutter.
Lauren Witzke says the United States is “just drifting farther and farther away from God” and longs for the nation to be liberated by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
- I’m not exactly convinced that she actually parses what Putin means when he deploys the word “Liberation”. That’s a special kind of democracy when it is “one man one vote”, and “good kind Christian” Putin just happens to be that one man who has that one and only decision making vote.
- Reminder: Lauren, as God’s self-appointed representative, has also previously claimed that she used to be a drug runner for “Mexican cartels”. Let’s not forget that she is a rather strong promoter of QAnon, who claimed the vaccines were “A Satanic plot” to cause “mass death”.
Oklahoma’s Superintendent of Public Instruction says he’ll explore the possibility of putting Christian prayer and the “acknowledgment of God” into public schools. The move comes at the request of six right-wing Christian leaders in the state.
- Let’s explore it for him – it’s unconstitutional. There you go, exploring done. While students may pray privately, and join religious clubs, schools do not legally get to impose religion upon all their students.
Abortion
From the “I never thought leopards would eat MY face,’ sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People’s Faces Party“, we have this …
Hatred & Bigotry … as policy
Nick Fuentes tells conservatives to stop talking about “black violence and trannies” and focus more on “calling out women and Jews.”
- So yes, his complaint is that some are deploying the wrong king of hatred and bigotry and need to have the right kind of hatred and bigotry
Vincent James and Steven Franssen used their “White Boy Wednesday” show to complain about the fact that two Indian-American candidates—Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy—are running for Republican nomination for president: “Why don’t you leave running for president to Christian white people, Indians, and you guys just keep your frickin’ 7-Elevens?”
- Why Nikki Haley or Vivek Ramaswamy ever seriously thought that today’s GOP would embrace them is beyond my ability to parse.
Meanwhile Nick Fuentes, yes, a second item from the guy who has previously been telling us all about how much he loves Hitler, has also announced that he “will be hosting an America First rally at CPAC on Saturday, March 4th.”
- CPAC, otherwise known as Mecca for Conservatives, is apparently embracing this guy.
- Will Nick be also offering free sheets to all attendees?
Meanwhile Isabella Riley Moody wants to “Make Hate Great Again.”
- Yep, she actually said the quiet part out loud.
Steven Franssen says that “a majority of black Americans don’t like white Americans. White people, stop trying to be liked. It’s not working.”
- Sorry Steve, but the real issue here is that it is the vast majority of Americans that don’t like like you.
The Fascist Fan club
Tyler Russell says … “we’re in 2023 now, we’ve got to stop dissing the Nazis. We got to look back at our boys like Oswald [Mosley], like Francisco [Franco], like Benito [Mussolini]. We gotta be like, ‘Yo, we’re ganged up out here.’”
- @BassProShops cannot control who wears their hats, but I’ll bet they wish this guy had worn another company’s hat. This is advertising they would happily take a pass on any day.
- The Irony here is that he missed Hitler, the only literal Nazi, off his list.
- So yes, he is simply ripping off the Nick Fuentes playbook. Tyler is what happens when Fuentes is your “inspiration”. Meanwhile this guy has a band of about 100 supporters, mostly teens and early 20s, and strives to recruit 14 year old kids into their fascist beliefs via his chat room. (If curious you can find a detailed expose of him here)
Homophobia on Steroids really does have consequences
Isabella Riley Moody, yes her again, discovers the perils of being a bigoted troll, insisting that she is “not really homophobic” after asserting last week that she wishes “we were a homophobic society” and bragging that the word “f*ggot” is “in my everyday vocabulary.”
- Quote: “I’m a troll, I like to say offensive things, if you don’t like it don’t be friends with me” … yep, I’m totally on board with her guidance, none of us are not going to be friends with her.
- I’d place good money on a bet that she also uses the N word and claims that she has black friends.
Truly Bizarre
Christian apologist Alex McFarland says the existence of math “proves there must be a God.” He adds that public school teachers could share that information without getting into legal trouble.
- Alex’s math: … 2+2=Jesus
- Any decent math teacher would actually teach their students to not make weird unsubstantiated assertions like this.
- Translation of his “proof”: “I have no clue what math is, therefore God“.
Ali Alexander is confident that “everything I know and believe will become popular. Everything my opponents says now will be extinct.”
- Counter Prediction: He is not popular, and never will be. There is however a clinical term for folks like this.
- He will however continue to be unintentionally funny and entertaining. That’s the rather natural outcome when you claim to be Like Jesus and also claim that you can time travel.
David Barton calls for Congress to investigate DirecTV’s decision to drop Newsmax from its lineup because he says these are the types of developments that could lead to a modern-day Inquisition.
- Fact Check: Newsmax were dropped when they demanded DirectTV pay them an inflated carriage fee for the privilege of broadcasting them, and DirectTV said “Nope”. This is a decision that Newsmax made, they did this to themselves.
- Meanwhile, David Barton has a well-established reputation as a public liar. You can more or less guarantee that if he claims something, then there exists a very high probability that it is not true. He remains popular amongst some evangelicals and MAGA because he tells them stuff they like hearing.
The False Profit$
Christian “prophet” Nathan French says his team raised someone from the dead last year.
- This is unbelievable … I mean that literally, I do not believe this is as described.
- No names, no dates, no details at all, just a vague fuzzy claim. Listen and you hear a story of some guy who collapsed and supposedly died. Then when somebody prayed, he came back to life … well gosh, it just can’t have been an example of somebody simply fainting … right?
- It’s a common pattern since the year dot. Matthew 27:51:53 claims that lots of people rose up from their graves and wandered into Jerusalem, but strangely, beyond that one claim in Matthew, no contemporary writers at that time appear to have noticed.
Just over one year ago in 2021, self-appointed “Prophetess” Kat Kerr claimed she had been “taken forward in time” where she was shown the media announcing that former President Donald Trump was once again president. She said it would happen within a couple of weeks or, at most, a couple of months.
- And here we are two years later.
- Remind me again what the bible says should be done with false prophets.
What can be done about all this madness?
Here is an example of an excellent start by one Democrat …
Interesting Articles
- Isaac Stanley-Becker @ The Washington Post: James O’Keefe is out at Project Veritas after internal power struggle.
- Jeremy W. Peters and Katie Robertson @ The New York Times: Fox Stars Privately Expressed Disbelief About Election Fraud Claims. ‘Crazy Stuff.’
- Ken Meyer @ Mediaite: ‘We Need a National Divorce’: Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene Calls for Republican States to Secede From the Union.
- Matt Cohen @ The American Independence: Meet the groups backing right-wing Wisconsin Supreme Court candidates.
- Tom Boggioni @ Raw Story: Gay GOP group called out for hiring ‘influencer’ who wishes ‘we were a homophobic society.’
- Eric Hananoki @ Media Matters: Eric Trump is touring with another antisemite who shares pro-Hitler propaganda.
- Cameron Joseph @ Vice News: GOP Elects QAnon Conspiracist Who Thinks Yoga Is Satanic as Party Chair in Michigan.
- David Edwards @ Raw Story: Charlie Kirk claims ‘witches’ made him ‘sick’ as he attacks Trump grand jury foreperson.
- Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Isaac Stanley-Becker @ The Washington Post: Arizona’s top prosecutor concealed records debunking election fraud claims.
- Anya Zoledziowski and David Gilbert @ Vice News: The Far Right Is Calling for the Execution of Teachers and Doctors.
- Tim Dickinson @ Rolling Stone: The Christian Nationalist Machine Turning Hate Into Law.
- David Badash @ The New Civil Rights Movement: Alaska GOP Lawmaker Says It’s a ‘Benefit to Society’ When ‘Child Abuse Is Fatal’ Because There’s a ‘Cost Savings.’
- Justin Baragona @ The Daily Beast: Fully Unhinged ‘Dilbert’ Guy Tells White People to ‘Get the Fuck Away’ From Black People.
- Matt Dixon @ Politico: DeSantis wants to roll back press freedoms — with an eye toward overturning Supreme Court ruling.
Statistic of the week
The data tells you what is coming …
Once upon a time religion was associated in many minds with words such as “honesty” and “decency”. Today the words that now spring to mind are “lies”, “corruption”, “extremism”, “intolerance”, “hatred”, “ignorance”, and much more.
What the above charts reveal is that the younger and less invested in religion you are, the greater your “no religion” is. Ryan’s point is that as the older generations pass, the “no religion” crowd will become a majority. The data is telling us that this is a certainty.