I'm sanguine. Liberals are push, conservatives are pull - "If you want me to vote Democratic you have to pass my 90-point purity test" vs. "Yeah Trump is awful but my family votes Republican and always has." This works up to a point: the further outside the norm both parties reside, the less votes they get. The basic platform of the Democratic Party remains center-right, much like the country. The basic platform of the Republican Party, on the other hand, is unabashedly reactionary fascist. Not only that, but they're reactionary for an era most voters never experienced - if 2024 is your first general election, Boys Don't Cry was in theaters seven years before you were born. Caitlyn Jenner came out when you were nine. You have never seen television where girls don't kiss. Dan Quayle going after Murphy Brown is about as relevant to you as Ed Sullivan. The Republicans are going to get increasingly reactionary. They are also going to get increasingly isolated. I mean, look - I think we can all agree at this point that Donald Trump is a loser. By his own standards, by his own definitions, by the bravado of all Trumpism, Donald Trump is a loser, and nobody backs a loser. It's not like victory was snatched from his clutches - he's been simping one ineffective defense after another, like a toddler being dragged off to bed. Will he still be the Republican nominee? Probably. Is Clarence Thomas going to serve out the rest of his life in the Supreme Court? Probably. But it becomes less and less relevant and effective. This is the thing that keeps the normie republicans awake at night - for the longest time, Democrats ignored the courts. Suddenly? They give a shit. And they have the bulk of the country behind them. There is nothing in Republican behavior that grows more Republicans. They know it. They're trapped. The only thing they can do is attempt to moderate the rate of incineration.
I agree with almost all of that. 16 million more Gen-Z'ers became eligible to vote between 2020 and 2024. And they seem pretty pissed, generally. The probably perceive a future more obviously crumbling before their eyes than it was for millenials like me, but at least the millenials wised up and aren't becoming more "conservative" as they age. So yeah, the eventual future looks like it could be pretty dope. But that's like 10 - 15 years out, realistically, and in the meantime, the "rate of incineration" will be dialed up to 11. The sort of legally-adjacent, cold civil war between rural and metro is really taking shape. It's always hard for me to imagine what it'll be like, but I always know it when I see it. The Tennessee House story is the perfect example of what we can expect over the next decade. So is the mifepistrone thing. Dems still don't give enough of a shit about the courts, or they'd either politely tell Feinstein to fuck off immediately unless she can make it to vote, or circumvent the blue slip Senate confirmation rules. They'd hold a vote to impeach Thomas, even with the knowledge that it'll likely fail on a party line in the House. They'd have been more publicly curious about wtf was that Eileen Cannon thing? I'm just saying, the gloves are gonna have to come off sooner or later. We got a small taste of that with Dark Brandon's Philly speech. There is no reason to pretend like appeasement is possible with reactionary fascists. Not enough establishment dems seem willing to understand. Then we can go back to pleasantries when the GOP extincts itself and the dems split into progressives and conservative dems.
My prediction is that the abortion pill thing is going to blow over quickly when the Circuit court says the plaintiffs have no standing to sue, and then severely rebuke the judge who wrote that drivel. No matter the 5th Circuit's policy preference, this is one of the least conservative rulings one could imagine. Even the WSJ EB was like wtf is this shit? However, the GOP activists judges are remarkably similar to the raptors in Jurassic Park who keep testing the electric fence in different spots. We all know there's another legally dubious ruling just around the corner, and eventually (like the Dobbs case) one of the creatures will get into the kitchen and cause havoc. Vigilance is always a must.
Let's go with the Jurassic Park metaphor. I think most Americans like theme parks. They like them to give them their money's worth. They don't want to go there every day, but when they show up, they expect expensive, greasy food, exciting rides and probably some sunburn. I think a lot of Americans went "oooh, dinosaurs!" when Sarah Palin appeared on the scene. It got even more exciting when Trump showed up because he's a T-rex with dentures. The thing of it is, though, dinosaurs aren't really theme park material (as Jurassic Park so entertainingly demonstrated). I mean, they're still cool? But fuckin' hell triceratops shit was not on your agenda. I think things got really dumb when the cages failed. Yeah, there's a few people who think this is exactly the sort of vacation they've been missing but by and large? Nobody was here to actually participate in any of this shit. They wanted to ride around in a jeep and stare at a brontosaurus from a safe distance. And I think we're at the point where there are still a few people going "DINOSAURS FUCK YEAH!" as they run around saying "Bambiraptor! Sauroposeidon!" to anyone who will listen but most people just wanna go home, man. This is not what they signed up for, they'd really rather get back to normal, what was wrong with the goddamn tilt-a-whirl, you knew what you were in for with a tilt-a-whirl. "What do you mean, an armadillo is fucking with my OB-GYN's supply chain," they say, not wanting to think about abortion, periods, misoprostol, mifiprestone or lady bits at all, really, do we need to go to war over everything now? And by and large, the Democrats are slapping the side of the tilt-a-whirl while the Republicans are looking for goats to chain to a stake. Absolutely. Vigilance is a must. But I think we can all acknowledge that this is a very different discussion in 2023 than it would have been in 2017.
Lol. As always I overestimate the seriousness and underestimate the ideology of the judges Trump put on the bench. That's a lesson I just can't seem to learn. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/13/health/abortion-pill-ruling-appeal.html
Side note for breaking news: Jim Jordan earlier today threatened to indict Alvin Bragg (impossible). Alvin Bragg just sued Jim Jordan for obstruction. Can't wait to see enlightened centrists bitch about how political Braggs actions appear. Sorry, but this is exactly the kind of shit I want to see. Jordan is a grandstanding moron damaging our justice system. He has no jurisdiction here. Although not a judge, Jordan is definitely a raptor. But not a clever girl. Love that analogy, though, heh.
I think he knows he can lie and get away with it. No one on Fox will challenge him. I mean this is literally the legislative LARP'ing as the executive, I'm sure that even he realizes that. That wascally waptor
Imagine that you wanted to do your job and you just figured you didn't need to know anything about physics. Now imagine trying to make laws for a living and deciding that you really don't need to know anything about the law. It's pretty remarkable that anyone could have that level of cognitive dissonance, even though cognitive dissonance is precisely what conservative media tries really hard to create day in and day out. Apropos of nothing, I love how the raptor hunter dude is now Elmer Fudd. Beautiful mixing of metaphors.
OK this will be BY FAR the worst content of the day on here, please skip at will, hubski. The left is currently canceling The Young Turks on twitter, but it's hard to say that they haven't earned it. It all began with Ana Kasparian complaining that she doesn't want to be called a "person who can get pregnant", and exclusively requires "woman". I'm not sure who in her personal life is doing that. It's kind of a woke medical journals thing, almost exclusively, and the issue can be put to bed about 99.9% of the time by simply saying "women and people who can get pregnant". But that was more than enough for the entire Daily Wire cast to begin strategically pitting the left against itself. And Cenk and Ana have really taken the bait, I must say, and are viciously rejecting friends' good-faith criticism and critiques."If you want me to vote Democratic you have to pass my 90-point purity test"
Thus far it's the only content, so I guess it's the best and worst. Though it does remind me to be thankful that I'm not on Twitter or any other social media. What a weird world of bubbles that is. Things that matter so much inside the bubble have literally no contact with what's outside of it--totally self-contained.
So I found out today that "Kristen," who helped us out with our gender-inclusive language, is now "Liam" thank you very much. He is very much a "person who can get pregnant" who is throwing a lot of business our way. Spent the morning at the Russian spa. There were at least three people (out of maybe 12 in the whole place) whose gender was not the one they were born with, one of which who was obviously, bravely mid-transition (in a goddamn bikini - you go girl). And I mean, fuck - this shit is all so thunderously performative. Really? You're gonna be the one to whine to the cops and say "I think that woman has a penis?" You're gonna give the cops the job of junk checking for god and country? Fer fuck's sake. What a stupid fucking hill to die on.
Jesus christ. For the record? I employ four midwives, a naturopathic doctor who specializes in gender affirming care and had transgender advocates comb through our materials for gender-inclusive language and I've never heard of Ana Kasparian. This kerfuffle simply has not reached our shores. You'd think it would? 'cuz you know what? There are men - who used to be women - who have babies. We've gotten paid for helping them out. Not something that happened, culturally, just a few years ago and if we're being honest, not something anyone needs an opinion about. If these men aren't having your baby, I don't see how it matters to you. It's not a "woke medical journals" thing it's a "people gain self-esteem from claiming their gender of choice lay the fuck off" thing but you're right - pillorying someone for the thoughtcrime of having an opinion is about as 2023 as it gets. Cenk Uygur is an asshole. I would expect that anyone who works with him is asshole-adjacent.