Odds and Ends Vol 35

Odds and Ends

Sorry for being absent so much. The truth is that I’m just a lot more focused on horror films these days. I’ve started a Diary over at Psychotronic Review. It’s the one place on the site where I allow myself to vent. The idea of the site is to appreciate what is good in any given film. But it is true that I get annoyed from time to time.

A problem I’ve been having a lot recently is watching a good film that is at least lessened by a terrible ending or coda. For example, The House of the Devil is pretty good and then they add a coda that destroys a good ending and offends me by making explicit what was clear in the film. Ugh! But it’s still better than American politics…

Impeachment

I was shocked that 7 Republicans voted for impeachment. I wasn’t even certain that Mitt Romney would vote to convict. I’m pretty sure it all came down to the big news (which wasn’t new) that Trump talked to Kevin McCarthy during the Capitol siege and he was indifferent. He reportedly said, “I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are.”

Of particular note is Senator Bill Cassidy (R-LA) who said that he voted to convict Trump because he thought he was guilty. It’s a shockingly simple statement compared to the likes of McConnell who come up with procedural reasons to acquit. It’s always the same: if they want to vote a certain way, a politician can always come up with a plausible reason to justify it.

But the truth is that it doesn’t matter what individuals in the Republican Party do. The party itself is committed to Donald Trump because the base is committed to him because he provides the clearest expression of why they’ve been voting for Republicans all along: he hates the people they hate.

How I Would Vote

I would have voted to convict Trump for the same reason that Cassidy did. But I will admit that I don’t find the case that compelling that Trump incited an insurrection with his acts on that day.

Trump incited an insurrection for months — going back well before the election itself. The problem with this is that this means that the majority of Republican office-holders also incited an insurrection. And they did! But threading the needle and talking mostly about January 6th didn’t stop Republicans from seeing their own culpability.

GOP at the State Level

We’ve seen all kinds of censure announcements of Republicans from state-level organizations. This is nothing new, of course. The GOP has always been fanatical about purity in a way that can only exist when a party has a huge systemic advantage at the polls.

But it’s interesting that these censures have nothing to do with ideology. All those decades of the GOP dog-whistling to their authoritarian base has come home. It is no longer a political party. It’s now a cult of personality.

I wonder what happens if Trump dies.

Mitch McConnell — Impeachment Next Time

If this situation comes up again to impeach a Democratic president who is out of office, McConnell will make a 180° turn and vote to acquit. I know what his argument will be. He’ll say, “The Senate established that you can convict a president after he’s left office. Live by the sword, die by the sword.”

And the media will report it as though McConnell is making a good argument. Sure, people at The Nation will note that McConnell voted against conviction because he said it was unconstitutional even though the Senate voted that it wasn’t. (Not that it is up to the Senate.)

People claim McConnell is brilliant but that isn’t the case. It’s just that our media system is hopeless. In my dark moments, I think any system that can be so effectively manipulated by the likes of McConnell deserves to die.

Mitt Romney — Again

I paid over 18 percent of my income in federal taxes this year. It would have been over 20 percent except for a special COVID-19 tax credit. That’s on less than $27,000 in total income. I want to put that into perspective.

When he was running for president, Mitt Romney released his 2011 taxes. He paid 14.1 percent in federal taxes on his $13.7 million in income. I’ve always assumed (with good reason) that he paid more that year because he knew it would be public.

So he made over 500 times as much money as I did and paid a smaller percentage in taxes. This is the man who was complaining about poor people paying no federal income taxes. This is the man that the mainstream press holds up as a good Republican.

Fuck. Mitt. Romney.

Note: I don’t think there is anything wrong with my paying this amount of tax. And I do it happily because I am a patriot.

Jonathan Chait’s Lazy Apologetics

Jonathan Chait wrote an article defending Gina Carano’s firing. I’m sympathetic about this because I really don’t like to see people fired. I’m not keen on public shaming either, to be honest. But Jeet Heer pushed back on Chait’s argument in a way I very much agree with (I admire Ilhan Omar and the freak-outs about her are racist):

Check out the image on the right that shows one thing that Gina Carano tweeted. In a response to Heer, Chait wrote a whole article in response. And this is what he says of the image:

Is this image anti-Semitic? On the one hand, it suggests certain populist conspiratorial themes that are consistent with anti-Semitism. On the other, it lacks any identifiable Jewish features.

As regulars around here know, I’m not very good at recognizing people and I don’t know much about what’s going on in pop culture. But the most obvious figure in that image is George Soros. Chait is incapable of admitting error and this claim shows the lengths that he will go to avoid it.

Tonya Harding

Tonya Harding is the reason that I lost all respect for institutional figure skating. She made me see that it wasn’t really a sport. At her peak, she was probably the best figure skater in the world — certainly in the US. Yet she struggled because she wasn’t the right kind of person and body type for the sport.

I’ve always thought she got a raw deal. So I was thrilled to hear about a new podcast called You’re Wrong About. They look at past events and show that what people think they know is actually wrong. They did two shows about Harding (part 1, part 2).

I highly recommend the podcast. I’ve listened to a ton of episodes now on a lot of things (they get far afield of their stated mission). Check it out!

TTYL

I’ll talk to you later!

6 thoughts on “Odds and Ends Vol 35

  1. If Trump dies anytime soon, half his hardcore followers will think liberals murdered him. And the other half will believe he’s still alive.

    The only redeeming moment of Trump’s presidency was getting Mitt Romney to kiss the ring, then rewarding Romney’s fealty with the coveted appointment, Secretary of Squat.

    The thing is, George Romney was actually a fairly principled Republican! If the Mormon afterlife conception is right, and families are united together forever in Heaven… Mitt’s gonna have some explaining to do.

    • But I really think that those old Republican principles were contingent. If Mitt were in politics in the 60s and 70s, he’d be roughly as good as his old man and vice versa. If we follow Cory Robin, conservatives are all just reactionaries. So the only thing that matters is how much they lean into that. Look at the COVID-19 bill right now. Lots of the Republicans in the House would have voted for it if Trump were still president. None of them voted for it this time. In contrast, when the Republicans stood to gain from a bill a year ago, the Democrats were all onboard. There is something very wrong with the Republican Party. But it’s long been there because it is a problem with the conservative mind. (I know you agree with this. And clearly, George Romney was far superior to his son.)

      Speaking of kissing Trump’s ring, look who he’s suing!

      • Oh, that lawsuit is brilliant. They pledge devotion to him, and he says “I only get to fundraise for me!” Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas. Although, for the record, I’ve never once gotten fleas from a dog, so I don’t know how accurate that saying is. Still applies to the GOP and Trump, though.

        • My thought on Trump and the GOP is that the party simply never thought they could get away with someone like Trump. They love him. He’s the president they’ve been wanting since the 1950s

  2. Wow, that was long, but fascinating. And sad. The fact that the assailant bashed open a plexiglass door with his head is just… solid gold with a chef’s kiss.

    • Oh yeah, the Tonya Harding story is mind-blowing! I love the “well, actually it’s more complicated” aspect of that show.

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