Media: They fail to note the pattern of ICE lies but make time to defend this year's John Fetterman

The country has turned on Chump and on his version of ICE.  If you doubt the latter, George Retes.  We noted him July 23rd in "Media: Why America's turned on Chump's war on immigrants."  He's the Iraq War veteran ICE assaulted in California -- Retes described the assault, "It took two officers to nail my back and then one on my neck to arrest me even though my hands were already behind my back."  In a Friday column for THE WASHINGTON POST, conservative George Will wrote about Retes:

 

One Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent’s knee was on his neck, another’s was grinding his back. Drenched with tear gas and pepper spray, George Retes might have wished that his 137 pounds were back in Kirkuk, Iraq, one of his Army deployments. Herewith a glimpse of your tax dollars at work.

Born 26 years ago in Ventura, California, where his mother was born, he enlisted after high school and calls the Army “the best job ever,” adding, “I love the infantry.” He married a woman he deployed with, thereby acquiring a stepson, soon a daughter, and a reason to leave the Army: to avoid long absences from his children.

 [. . .]

The ICE men were presumably looking for undocumented immigrants. Retes’s driver’s license, which he says the ICE men never asked to see, identifies him as “Veteran Army.” His license plate includes “DV”: disabled veteran. While ICE’s warriors were trying and ultimately succeeding in smashing his driver’s-side window (the better to pepper spray him), they apparently did not notice his rear window’s “Iraq Combat Veteran” sticker.

Amid a torrent of shouted and contradictory ICE men commands, and after he asked for an agent’s badge number, he says, Retes was dragged from his car, his wrists were zip-tied behind his back, and he was seated on the roadside ground for four hours.

 

Those are the signs of an out of control federal agency and those are the actions of Chump's gestapo force.  The actions are shocking, yes, and illegal.  

  

 

 

The actions are also not all that surprising considering who gets hired by ICE and who provides purported oversight of ICE.  Who gets hired?  The lowest of the low.  Charles P. Pierce (ESQUIRE) pull quoted from an NBC NEWS report and this might be the most disturbing part of that report:

 

Nearly half of new recruits who’ve arrived for training at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center over the past three months were later sent home because they couldn’t pass the written exam, according to the data. The academic requirement includes an exam in which officers are allowed to consult their textbooks and notes at the end of a legal course on the Immigration and Nationality Act and the Fourth Amendment, which outlines when officers can and can’t conduct searches and seizures.

 

"Oh my goodness!  They almost hired those people!"

 

No, that's not it.  It's that they hired the others -- those 'trained' people who required an open book final exam.  They weren't expected or required to know the law.  You see that reflected in their conduct repeatedly.

 

Not just with regards to their attack on the US citizen and Iraq War veteran George Retes, but on people all across the country.  They are a lawless body that terrorizes in the streets of America.   

 

They terrorize pregnant women.  They terrorize the challenged and/or disabled.  Who is safe on the streets of America when ICE is let loose?  Children?  They're tear gassing children.  When they're not zip-tying them.

 

And there is no oversight.  

 

They're a department of liars led by the lying Homeland Secuirty Secretary Kristi Noem.

  

ICE rammed a car in Chicago -- ran into it -- and they lied in statements and false charges insisting that  Dayanne Figueroa, a US citizen, ran into them:

 

Footage obtained by Newsweek appears to show armed federal agents detaining Figueroa, dragging her by the legs to remove her from her vehicle. Some agents brandish guns, and bystanders can be heard shouting, “You hit her,” as the situation unfolds.

Additional video obtained by Figueroa’s family from another witness provides a different angle of the encounter. The bystander who is filming tells federal agents: “You hit her. We all saw it.”

“You guys are f*****g scumbags, f*****g Nazis. They hit her car. You guys hit her, and you f*****g know it,” the bystander is heard saying.

“As agents were departing, the driver, a U.S. citizen, struck an unmarked government vehicle,” DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told Newsweek.

 

Tricia, like Kristi, is a repeat offender when it comes to lying to the American people. Nicole Charky-Chami (RAW STORY) notes:

A senior ICE official is under fire after publicly sharing a 13-year-old child's information — and an expert warns it "could lead to serious consequences."

DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin, 31, who is the most senior public affairs official under Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, revealed the identity, alleged criminal history and a photo of the child detained by ICE, The Daily Beast reported Monday.

McLaughlin is accused of sharing children's information not just once, but multiple times.

Her social media post and the DHS actions “could lead to serious consequences inside the government, such as an Inspector General investigation, disciplinary action, or even congressional scrutiny," Los Angeles-based criminal defense attorney Arash Hashemi told The Beast.

Public anger was rising after a Brazilian-born seventh-grader in Massachusetts was reportedly taken by federal agents to a juvenile detention center more than 500 miles away from his family.

In an attempt to stop the public criticism, McLaughlin and DHS tried to use social media.

"They claimed that the boy had an 'extensive rap sheet,' while listing some of his apparent past offenses. They also stated—falsely, it transpired—that he had been in possession of a firearm," The Beast reports.

It's illegal for DHS or law enforcement to share a child's information.

 And here's where the media keeps failing us.  Homeland Security officials have been caught in one lie after another.  It's so bad that judges can't really take their claims seriously at this point.  But the media too often repeats claims regarding ICE without noting the long pattern of lies from them this year.  

 

We were all taught about the little boy who cried wolf.  You don't lie because you'll be known as a liar and the time will come when you need to be believed but you're known as a liar.  

 

A lesson we're taught as children is too much for ICE and the officials over ICE to grasp. That might be shocking if we hadn't already addressed the relaxed 'standards' when it comes to hiring ICE agents.

 

Relaxed standards.  Ty explained to us that there were e-mails insisting that we don't call out Democrats anymore.  Huh?  The last piece we did was entitled "Media: Can Dems stop caving, can the media stop whoring" -- how do you miss that? 

 

On our last piece, we'll come back to the Dem issue in just a moment, some are bothered that we've decided we don't care if we miss a week in posting here.  It's now been twenty years and counting and we had to do a weekly media piece for 20 years.  Chump is back in the White House.  That requires a lot of energy on our part.  It requires energy not to burn out and not to be captured by fear.  It also requires energy for us to sound the alarms on Chump's crimes in zoom calls and in speaking appearances.  In a perfect world, we'd have time for everything.  Then again in a perfect world we could have spent this space right now explaining in great detail how awful CBS' 'reality' show/contest THE ROAD is.

 

Back to Dems.

  

There are something's we're not calling out.  We're focused on the mid-terms and how Dems getting both house of Congress can save the country.  

 

So there are things that, in better times, we'd be exploring but we don't have time for right now.  The ship is sinking and we're bailing water as fast as we can.  We don't have time for everything.  

 

So we focus on what we think is most important.

 

For a week now, we've said nothing as the Dems -- certain Dems -- got behind the latest John Fetterman.

 

Remember that piece of garbage?  Dems pimped him like crazy, Bernie endorsed him yet anyone with a brain knew he shouldn't get the nomination.  He got it.  He won the election.  He was sworn into Congress and then immediately went into a hospital to receive mental treatment.  He was there for months.  No, that's not normal nor is it acceptable.  A lot of whiners among the Dems now insist that he changed due to a stroke -- that would be a stroke he had as a candidate when he could have still been replaced but certain Dems attacked anyone -- politician, the media, internet personality -- that suggested that.

 

America, meet your new John Fetterman:  Graham Platner.

 

He's one of many vying for the spot of Democratic Party nominee for a senate seat out of Maine.

 

One of many.

 

And he needs to drop out.  He was whining Monday night that the Democratic Party was attacking him -- his own party.

 

Believe his party is the Communist Party -- isn't that what he declared online.  Let's go to WIKIPEDIA:

 

In October 2025, various news outlets reported on Reddit posts by Platner from between 2013 and 2021 in which he called himself a "communist", declared that all cops are bastards, and agreed with a post calling rural white Americans "racist and stupid". In an interview with CNN, Platner said of those comments, "That was very much me f**king around the internet ... I don't think any of that is indicative of who I am today".^[39] In a 2013 Reddit discussion about anti-rape underwear, Platner commented that people worried about assault should "take some responsibility for themselves and not get so fucked up they wind up having sex with someone they don't mean to".^[40] He also referenced political violence in multiple posts; in 2018, he wrote: "Fight until you get tired of fighting with words and then fight with signs, and fists, and guns if need be." Platner also wrote that "an armed working class is a requirement for economic justice" and urged readers to "Get Armed, Get Organized. The Other Side Sure As Hell Is."^[39][41] He has said that many of the comments do not represent his current political beliefs, and that they were the product of disillusionment after his military discharge and struggles with PTSD.^[42][43] Collins called Platner's internet history "terrible" and "offensive".^[44] Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin said that while he did not approve of Platner's comments, he did not consider them "disqualifying".^[45] After the reporting on these comments, Platner's political director, former Democratic state representative Genevieve McDonald, resigned from his campaign.^[46]

Platner said in an interview with Pod Save America that he has a skull-and-bones tattoo resembling the Totenkopf, a symbol worn by the Nazi Schutzstaffel paramilitary organization. Platner said that he and some other Marines got the tattoo while on leave in Croatia in 2007, not knowing its symbolism,^[47] and that he learned that his tattoo resembled the Totenkopf only when reporters and political operatives from DC contacted him during his campaign. He said he had recently gotten it covered up.^[48][49] Maine Governor Janet Mills, one of Platner's opponents in the Democratic primary, described the tattoo as "abhorrent". She stated, "I obviously vehemently disagree with the things he's been quoted as saying and doing" but that it was "up to the people" to decide whether he should continue in the Senate race.^[50] However, Platner also called himself an anti-fascist "supersoldier" in an old Reddit comment.^[51]

 

Is there some homo-erotic desire on the part of DSA -- among others -- when it comes to male candidates who are pure trash?  Like Fetterman, Platner doesn't look like he's managed more than two showers a month and DSA tends to mistake that for fortitude.

 

Tonight, Jen Pskai was all but licking him on air on the soon to be MS NOW.  

 

Weirdo Branco Marcetic took to JACOBIN (the DSA bible) at the start of the week to insist there was a smear job being done on Platner.  

 

Not a smear job, an expose.

 

He got a Nazi tattoo.  Instead of calling that out, the DSA is acting as ridiculous as the fright-wing does when they rush to defend Confederate monuments.  And CNN's already exposed his lie that he didn't know he'd tattooed himself with a Nazi symbol until recently was a lie -- he knew as far back as 2006 when CNN was able to unearth the social media posts he'd deleted as part of his effort to run for the senate.  Part of that effort, by the way, was getting married (for the first time) last year at the age of forty.  

 

He knew it was a Nazi tattoo and he knew it nearly 20 years ago.  He's lied repeatedly and publicly.  He's also a mercenary who worked for Blackwater which is somehow being ignored.

 

Why?  Because he cites Bernie as a hero (as did Fetterman) and he cites Socialists as heroes (without noting their political affiliation) (as did Fetterman) so it's time for the same booming voices to try to shout reality down.  There are many candidates running of that Democratic Party nomination.  Why are Jen Psaki, POD SAVE AMERICA, JACOBIN and others doing advance work for his campaign while ignoring other nominees?  And on other comments, he did not minimize rape accusations as some idiots in the media keep typing, he minimized rape.  There's a big difference.  One is really bad (mining accusations), the other is outright evil (minimizing rape itself).  Christopher Wiggins (THE ADVOCATE) explained:

 

 The controversy has rattled Maine’s Democratic primary. Platner, a Marine and Army veteran and political newcomer, admitted to posting homophobic slurs and crude antigay jokes on Reddit as recently as 2021. He apologized for misogynistic and racist comments on Reddit before that. And, he covered up a tattoo he’s worn for 18 years that resembles the Nazi Totenkopf symbol, which he said he got in his 20s during his time in the Marines.

 

This is the hill Jen Psaki and others want to die on?

 

And instead of letting it play out, they're trying to rig it, they're trying to railroad the American people.   

 

 While they try to lie to us to pimp their favored candidate,  they ignore the war on immigrants and so much more.

 

For example?

 

Hey, commentators at websites, on YOUTUBE, on MSNBC, every where -- where the hell have you been?

 

Donald Chump has savaged Joe Biden over the use of an auto pen to sign documents.  He's insisted that Joe didn't even know what he was signing.  Well last week, Donald served himself up for that kind of criticism but where the hell were you?

 

David Badash noted Donald had just pardoned Changpeng Zhao:

 

 Asked on Thursday why he chose to issue the pardon, and if it had anything to do with Zhao’s involvement with the Trump family’s crypto business, the President responded, “Who is that?”

“The founder of Binance,” the reporter replied.

“The recent one, yes,” Trump said. “I believe we’re talking about the same person, ’cause I do pardon a lot of people.”

“I don’t know -- he was recommended by a lot of people,” Trump continued. “A lot of people say that -- are you talking about the crypto person?”

 

Ewan Palmer (DAILY BEAST) covered the story in terms of Republcians and Democrats who objected to the pardon. 

 But there was always an important point to make that no one seemed to grasp.

 

Last month, AP reported:

 

President Donald Trump has added a Presidential Walk of Fame to the exterior of the White House, featuring portraits of each of the previous commanders-in-chief — except for one.

Instead of a headshot of Joe Biden, the Republican incumbent instead hung a photo of an autopen signing the Democrat’s name — a reference to Trump’s frequent allegation that the former president was addled by the end of his term in office and not really the one making decisions.

 

Chump doesn't know who he pardoned -- and not from earlier this year or even a month ago.  He didn't know who he just pardoned.  Seems he's guilty of everything he's accused Joe of.  Also seems like his not knowing who he pardoned is even more important after Monday's assault by the Republican controlled House Oversight Committee which stated this week their 'finding' that Joe Biden's pardons are not legitimate because they were signed with an auto pen.  That's their 'finding' and they can talk about it however they want; however, it is not a judicial finding and it has no weight at all on the pardons Joe issued which stand in spite of Chump and GOP spin. 

 

Last week, William Priest (BARRON'S) observed, "Democracy, once thought to be self-sustaining, is on defense. Like every system before it, democracy has gone through cycles of strength and weakness—but its survival is no longer guaranteed. What is at stake is not simply a style of governance, but the wealth, freedom, and happiness of its citizens."  We agree.  In the 20th century, there was communism, democracy, socialism, totalitarianism, fascism, etc.  When the USSR fell, some political observers declared it a victory for democracy.  It wasn't.  Democracy, like any political system, can fall.  We have to fight for it -- right now, we're really having to fight for it -- and we can't take it for granted.  But when we see the media refusing to cover something or refusing to cover it accurately or using their time (while wasting our time) to lie about the candidate they personally support, it becomes obvious that democracy does not mean as much to them as it does to us.  If it did, they'd be better at their jobs.

 

 

Media: Can Dems stop caving, can the media stop whoring?

Are elected Democrats bound to be losers forever?  We kind of hoped not.  We kind of hoped that as the nation suffers through its worst crisis, elected Dems were learning just like, hopefully, the left trash that pretended attacking Kamala Harris wasn't helping to put Donald Crump back in the White House.

  

 

We wondered that this morning during CNN's STATE OF THE UNION when Dana Bash spoke with Senator Mark Kelly who was apparently eager to lick all the salt of Donald Chump's nut sack.  Right now, more than ever, we need leaders not those who scrape and bow.

 

Kelly was tonguing Chump's balls  for a peace plan.

 

Did it feel good, on his knees in front of Donald, debasing himself for a 'peace plan'?

 

Since he gets off on shame, we've got some news for him: It was all for nothing.  He humiliated himself for nothing.  
 

There is no peace plan.  Phase one, the only thing that most are aware of and the only thing Hamas has really agreed to,  is a release of any living hostages in exchange for 2,000 Palestinians being held in Israeli prisons and let's Israel retain control over much of Gaza in a manner.  In fact, William Christou  and Jason Burke (GUARDIAN) observe, "If negotiators have closed gaps between Hamas and Israel over the details of the first phase of the 20-point plan announced by Trump in the White House last week, it was not immediately certain whether the parties had made any progress on thornier questions, such as how Hamas will be disarmed, as Netanyahu has demanded, and the eventual governance of Gaza."

 

Exactly.  

 

This could very well be yet another pause masked as a cease-fire.  

A true peace plan probably wouldn't result in what took place September 29th -- that's when Chump announced it . . . with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at his side  -- with only Netanyahu at his side.

 

The wilful stupidity on the part of the press and the part of elected officials when it comes to this fact speaks to a very anti-Muslim point of view.  We get that, right?  When Chump pretends to have talks of peace re: Ukraine, the press and politicians notice if a Ukrainian representative is not present.  

But leave, for example, Izz al-Din al-Haddad out of the announcement and it doesn't matter?

 

It matters and it's very significant.   

 

There is no peace plan -- certainly not one that's going to benefit the Palestinian people.  

 

How do you miss that?  If it's not assuming that Palestinians are less human -- the anti-Muslim point of view we noted above -- then it's just exhaustion over this conflict that didn't begin in October 2003.  But even that exhaustion goes to anti-Muslim bias.  Because you're ready to embrace anything just to see it 'ended' -- you're willing to ignore the Palestinian needs.

 

 Israel, to kind of Malcolm X it, didn't land on an empty land in 1948, it landed on Palestine.  

 

Maybe because the United Kingdom has publicly struggled with this issue longer (as opposed to the US media and officals which tended to run with Israel-is-a-saint-Palestinians-are-always-to-blame), their press has been much more honest  Take  Katie Stallard's conclusion at the end of her piece for THE NEW STATESMAN: 

 

  The key clause here is "if agreed," because, as Trump meandered on, it became clear that his peace plan had not, in fact, been agreed by Hamas. “We’re at a minimum, very, very close,” he said, despite the fact that his proposal was not shared with the militant group until after the press conference. By the following day, Hamas officials had said they were reviewing the plan “in good faith” but at the time the New Statesman went to press it was unclear when a response would be issued. In April, Hamas rejected demands to give up their weapons as a “red line”. During his press conference, Trump warned that “if Hamas rejects the deal” then Netanyahu would “have our full backing to do what you would have to do”.

 

Or take Alex Boyd and Tom Bateman's BBC NEWS report tonight, "Many details for the later phases of the peace plan could be hard to reach agreement on - such as the governance of Gaza, the extent of Israeli troop withdrawal, and the disarming of Hamas."

 

 Senator Mark Kelly did not look reasonable praising Chump for a fake deal.  He looked deeply stupid and deserved to.  Why is it that all the Democratic senators and House representatives and MSNBC hosts are just going along with bulls**t as opposed to telling the truth that Elaine did in "Stupid Donald Chump works to create a quagmire" -- Chump's putting US troops in the region.  Not to protect Palestinians.  So why are they there and, more to the point, considering all of known history, why is left to Elaine to explain he's creating a quagmire for the United States?

 

What we were left with from STATE OF THE UNION was the impression that Senator Kelly could handle questions about the scent of Chump's taint but not much of anything else as demonstrated when ever Dana Bash was more aware of reality than Kelly.

 

She asked him, "You mentioned looking forward, and I should mention that you visited the region several times during this conflict. There are multiple sticking points in the 20-point plan, particularly when we get to like point six, and the whole question of whether or not Hamas will lay down its arms. How realistic is that?"

 

Like the stereotypical beauty queen pageant drivel of "world peace," Kelly insisted, "I think it’s possible, I am concerned, that they may change their minds here."

 

Who is this 'they'?  Hamas has not signed off the 20-point plan (especially true of disarming).  

 

Mark's stupidity is only matched by CODEPINK's gross ignorance.  They spent the fall of 2024 electing Donald Chump.  That is the reality.  They now spend their final days following Kamala Harris around on her book tour, screeching and disrupting.  

 

Kamala Harris is not the president of the United States -- CODEPINK worked hard to ensure that.  And they're too scared to protest Donald Chump -- weren't out at Walter Reed on Friday, for example, despite days of notice that Chump would around  for his 'annual' six-month check up.  But they managed to boo and his Kamala.  

 

The whole country suffers today due to the actions of CODESTINK and their allies.  

 

And those dumb quacks haven't learned one damn thing.  Instead of apologizing to the country for the work they did to put Chump in the White House, they want to distract and waste time by going after Kamala Harris -- who, for the record, is not president of the United States and was not president of the United States.  Palestinians are getting screwed over with Chump's supposed peace plan and CODESTINK too busy wasting more time to fight for the people of Palestine or even to garner attention for their plight.  

 

Kelly's actions demonstrate that, even all these months later, we can't count on our elected Dems and CODEPINK's misdirected hysteria makes it clear that they're no one to depend upon either.  

 

 

 

Media: Flip the script? Acosta can't even lift it

YOUTUBE and podcasts have extended the careers of some fired from cable and network news.  Sometimes that's a good thing.  Sometimes.

 

But for every single  Mehdi Hasan there are several Jim Acosta.

 

Last week, Acosta reminded us again of how lucky the country was when CNN fired him at the start of this year.  

 

That's not to say that Acosta doesn't have some talents -- he does.  But too often he undermines what he's covering.  During Chump's first administration, he did this repeatedly.  Everything is not equal except in Jim Acosta's eyes.  In his eyes every action is equal and deserves massive attention and should make your blood boil.  That's how he helped Chump from January 2017 through January 2021.  He was such a drama queen, that he made people sympathetic to Chump or at least aware enough that somethings were just too much.

 

Now Jim worked with a staff at CNN and you could argue that the problem was his producer, for example.  But on YOUTUBE, Jim's calling all his shots and he's embarrassing and harming the cause so many times of late. 

 

There are stories that need to be told and that need to be amplified.  The new material on the Epstein and Maxwell scandal needs to be amplified, for example.  Immigration needs to be covered more -- and not justified -- remember that second point, we'll be coming back to it. 

 

He's posted a video Saturday on his YOUTUBE channel and RAW STORY thought it was noteworthy.  No, not for any reason that they're covering.  It's garbage and his guest is garbage.  It helped no one. 

 

Let's start with the topic:  They're might be more grab them by the p---- type tapes!  Someone would have them! 

Who the f**k cares?

 

What?  You want a Congressional investigation on them?  

You want to waste our damn time on this bulls**t?

 

The tapes will never see the light of day -- if they exist.  If they exist, they're not going to shock at this late date.  But there was Acosta and Billy Bush talking about creepy Mark Burnett (husband of Roma Downey) and in all their gabby and gossiping, the two couldn't even make one important point: Chump's given away another American jobs. Mark Burnett should not be the US Special Envoy to the UK.  He shouldn't.  He can be.  He can't be a US ambassador because he's not a US citizen.  But he can be one of this government's special envoy because it doesn't require US citizenship.  They usually are US citizens but they don't have to be.  Here's Chump giving away another job that could have gone to an American but instead handing it to a foreigner who doesn't even live in the United States. 

  

Some in the public -- people other than political junkies -- are paying attention to important stories.  Such as?  Epstein-Maxwell, immigration, the looming shut down, inflation, jobs, the abuse of government by targeting people like Comey, etc.

And here comes Acosta dragging in the dead bird that no one cares to see.  

Not only do we not want to see it, its harming us.  

How so?  

On the set of THE APPRENTICE are we supposed to think a rape took place?  On camera?  Chump probably said something sexist and vile and disgusting.

 

But what does it matter at this point?

 

More to the point, the middle of America sees this garbage -- this Acosta garbage -- that time is being wasted on and they see is as unserious and just an effort to get Chump.  In other words, they see it as all the work Acosta did before at CNN.

 

Acosta's not keeping us directed or focused, he's distracting us and he's giving people reason to blow off  serious complaints about Chump .

 

There was nothing of value.  Nothing.  Acosta let the disgraced Billy Bush lie about his career and he let him float support for Chump's war on immigrants.  See, Bush explained, he was just in Ireland and he spoke to some men there and they support Chump.  Oh, how we've missed Thomas Friedman and his Taxi Cab Confessions.  Whenever Friedman wanted to make a point in the '00s, he generally found a taxi cab driver to hide behind.  It's interesting, if you look at his body of work, how every tax cab driver he ever noted in those bad columns agreed with Freidman's own views.  Never once was there a NEW YORK TIMES column by Friedman about how a taxi cab driver disagreed with him

 

We disagreed with Billy Bush.  We especially disagreed with his lies about his time on THE TODAY SHOW.  He was a victim, Billy insisted, because the producer didn't want someone from ACCESS HOLLYWOOD on a news show.  

 

No, the chief producers and the entire crew and talent objected that a gossip columnist was brought on.  And that objection only grew stronger when the gossip couldn't -- or wouldn't -- nail down the facts.  Most infamously, Billy was enthralled with a male athlete who was 'attacked.'  Only, turns out, he wasn't.  And any real journalist would have asked the right questions -- the ones Billy didn't.  Not only did Billy fail at journalism, he got into an on air row with Al Roker.  Al.  Roker.  Known as the nicest man on daytime television.  And during that on air beef -- Al was right, Billy was wrong.

 

And Acosta was wrong to waste everyone's time.

 

In addition to the topics noted prior, there's also a good chance that the government will go into shut down this week.  They have until Tuesday night to pass a short term funding bill.  At midnight, it's over.  Dems were supposed to meet with Chump last week but Chump cancelled the meeting and bluffed and blustered backing off only when polling indicated that the public could blame a shut down on the Republican Party since they control the White House, the Senate and the House of Representatives. 

 

Now Chump rushes to meet with the Democrats on Monday.

 

Dems are concerned about the cuts to healthcare, to cite one important issue.  They need to stand up for their concerns.

 

Without any real messaging, they are already winning.  

 

And if the shut down happens?  As soon as Tuesday night turns into Wednesday morning (midnight), Democrats should be in front of every camera pointing out Chump's inability to pull a budget together.

 

It should, in fact, go something like this.

 

Minority House Leader Hakeem Jeffries:  He had time to golf but didn't have time to work on our nation's budget.

 

Minority Senate Leader Chuck Schumer:  He had time to go after James Comey but he didn't have time to put together a budget.

 

Senator Patty Murray:  He had time to repeatedly attack veterans' health care but he didn't have time to put together a budget.  

Senator Ron Wyden:  He had time to invade Portland, but he didn't have time to put together a budget.   

 

Senator Maria Cantwell: He had time to demand Microsoft fire Lisa Monaco but he didn't have time to put together a budget.

 

Senator Tammy Baldwin:  He had turn to destroy American farmers while bailing out Argentina but he didn't have time to put together a budget.  

 

US House Rep Alexandria Ocasio Cortez:   He had time to work on getting Jimmy Kimmel fired but he didn't have time to put together a budget.

 

Senator Elizabeth Warren:  He's had time to launch attacks on Social Security but he didn't have time to put together a budget.

 

US House Rep Jasmine Crockett: He made time to terrorize immigrants without criminal records but couldn't make time to put together a budget. 

 

If the country goes into a shutdown, that should be the messaging over and over.  How Chump has stuck his big nose into everything -- including in private business, in colleges, in museum, etc, etc -- but he hasn't made time to go the actual work that a president is supposed to focus on.

 

The showdown all by itself will be evidence of Chump's failure.  But Democrats can also use that event to demonstrate all the time he's wasted on everything but helping the American people.

 

That's how you flip the script. 

 

 

Media: The Stupidity Is Killng Us

In a crazy and crazed week, it made sense that Charlie Sheen would show up Friday on FOX "NEWS" to speak to speak on GUTFELD! Where else would he go?

 

 

Always be wary of programs like GUTFELD! whose titles come with an exclamation point.  Does the host  mistake himself for a show biz dynamo?  GUTFELD WITH A G!

 

 Someone should break it to the 'comedian' who couldn't even handle stand-up, his energy levels weren't high when he was young  him, as a failed stand up he couldn't keep audiences awake as a young person and he's 61 now.  In fact, if any three words best described Gutfeld they would be "low energy levels."

 

But there he was making nice with professional leper Charlie Sheen.  Charlie can't get work these days -- are you surprised? -- so he's written a book and made a NETFLIX special to try to drum up support.  The special -- and his interviews promoting it -- are filled with nothing but one lie after another.  

We know Charlie and have for years.  He's never been more embarrassing than he is currently.  He likes to claim that he's the victim when it comes to AIDS and that no one -- woman or man -- caught AIDS from him.  He doesn't know that.  No one knows that.  What is known?  Long after he was diagnosed, he continued to sleep with women and men.  

 

Creeps like Gutfeld and Bill Maher won't touch those topics.  They won't call out a person with AIDS who sleeps with people he doesn't disclose his disease -- his sexually transmitted disease -- to.

 

Maher?  

 

Yeah, Bill had him on too -- but over a week ago: September 12th.  Again, the "!" in "GUTFELD!" really needs to go. 

 

Creepy Bill Maher mainly spent his time with Sheen trying to figure out if Charlie was a top or a bottom when having sex with men.   For those of you currently being schooled in DeSantis' Florida, a top is the penetrating partner and a bottom is the one receiving.  Now don't think the bottom is just passive.  There are such things as power bottoms and even alpha bottoms.  They are still the party penetrated but they are calling the shots  We should also note that two men can have sex without anal penetration and some couples and couplings eschew anal penetration.  

 

 Yesterday with Gutfeld, Charlie was mainly attempting to audition for a job insisting that he "saw the dismissal as a potential job opening, and if they want to, you know, fix that show and get some ratings, this guy."

 

We were embarrassed for him.  It's the kind of cringe no one has seen on TV since loopy Sean Young threw together a tacky costume and went on a campaign to insist Tim Burton should cast her as Catwoman.

 

 

 

 

Though Charlie wasn't on Bill's Friday show last week, it was still embarrassing.  Alex Wagner was the token woman -- in the last years, Maher's not just screening his guests in the studio audience (he's Rushbo wanting Dittoheads only), he's also moved to only offer one woman or no women.  Again, he just wants ditto heads. 

 

He proved how useless he was by playing footsie with Tom Homan.   The closest to uncomfortable he made the acting head of ICE was when he invented this mythical waitress Carol who got deported and allowed Homan to 'address' the topic with the following:

 

What I think about every day is, again, we prioritize the worst first  and in the numbers show we do it. What I've said, from day one, if you're in the country illegally you're not off the table. You know why? Because there are millions of people standing in line, taking their tests, doing the background investigations, paying their fees to be part of the greatest nation on earth. If you want to be a part of greatest nation, there's a right way and wrong way to do it. If, like it or not, the ones who are here illegally cheated the system. 

 

 There are so many ways to respond to that nonsense. 

 

Bill Maher found none of them. 

 

"What I've said, from day one, if you're in the country illegally you're not off the table."  The most obvious response to that is, "What you've said from day one?  Nobody elected you to anything fat bitch.  The campaign promise was the worst of the worst and that came from Chump and not you, fat bitch."

 

 "We prioritize the worst first  and in the numbers show we do it."  Really?  By targeting home depot and farms?  You really think gang bangers and drug traffickers work real jobs to cover up for their secret identities?

 

Homan blustered, "Because there are millions of people standing in line, taking their tests, doing the background investigations, paying their fees to be part of the greatest nation on earth."  Yes, there are, millions taking tests, doing the background investigation, etc.  And you're targeting them.  When they show up for a court hearing, when they show up for their scheduled check ups, you're targeting them.  So, fat bitch, stop pretending you're anything but a petty crook.

 

 "Cheated the system"?  So you follow the rules, do you, fat bitch?

 

No, he doesn't and shortly after Homan and Maher skipped off together holding hands as the credits rolled, reality broke on Homan. 

 

 Maya Yang and Robert Mackey (GUARDIAN) report:

 

A new report from MSNBC on Saturday reveals that the agents recorded Homan, six weeks before the 2024 election, allegedly promising to assist in securing government contracts across the border security industry during Trump’s second term.

Six sources familiar with the matter told MSNBC that the FBI and justice department – then run by Joe Biden’s administration – had intended to hold off and assess whether Homan would follow through on his alleged promises after he was appointed as Trump’s border czar. However, the investigation stalled after Trump took office, and in recent weeks, officials appointed by Trump decided to close the case, according to MSNBC.

Homan was captured on video accepting $50,000 in cash at a meeting spot in Texas on 20 September 2024, according to an internal summary of the case reviewed by MSNBC and sources who spoke to the outlet.

Four sources familiar with the matter told MSNBC that multiple federal officials believed they had a solid criminal case against Homan for conspiracy to commit bribery. However, since Homan was not a public official at the time he accepted the money and Trump had not yet become president, his actions did not meet the criteria for a standard bribery charge.

Officials eventually decided to continue monitoring Homan once he joined Trump’s second presidential administration. MSNBC reports that officials had been looking at four potential criminal charges including conspiracy, bribery and two kinds of fraud, before Trump’s new justice department shut down the investigation.

 

 

Some idiots in the media were applauding Maher.  Why?  Because he defended Jimmy Kimmel who Chump, the FCC and NEXSTAR got fired from ABC last week? 

 

Are they ignoring Chump's social media post about how ABC's THE VIEW will be the next to go?  The same program Bill has attacked repeatedly and said should be off the air in the last few months?  

 

Donald Chump is openly targeting political enemies.   Last night, he posted on social media:

 

 Pam: I have reviewed over 30 statements and posts saying that, essentially, ‘same old story as last time, all talk, no action. Nothing is being done. What about Comey, Adam “Shifty” Schiff, Leticia??? They’re all guilty as hell, but nothing is going to be done.’ Then we almost put in a Democrat supported U.S. Attorney, in Virginia, with a really bad Republican past. A Woke RINO, who was never going to do his job. That’s why two of the worst Dem Senators PUSHED him so hard. He even lied to the media and said he quit, and that we had no case. No, I fired him, and there is a GREAT CASE, and many lawyers, and legal pundits, say so. Lindsey Halligan is a really good lawyer, and likes you, a lot. We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility. They impeached me twice, and indicted me (5 times!), OVER NOTHING. JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!! President DJT

 

Robin Levinson-King (BBC NEWS) reports: 

 

The president's post came a day after federal prosecutor Erik Siebert left his post after Trump said he wanted him to resign for failing to prosecute New York Attorney General Letitia James over allegations of mortgage fraud.

The New York Times reported that Siebert had told senior justice department officials their investigations had not unearthed enough evidence to prosecute James.

James, a Democrat who won a civil fraud lawsuit against Trump in 2023, has denied the mortgage fraud allegations as "baseless" and motivated by "revenge".

 

This is a very dangerous moment.   At THE NEW YORKER, Ruth Marcus explained:

 

"I want him out," President Donald Trump declared on Friday, referring to Erik Siebert, the career prosecutor he had tapped less than five months earlier to serve as the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. Siebert, who had been in the role in an acting capacity since January and whose nomination was pending on the Senate floor, complied in short order. His resignation was not enough for Trump, who took to his social-media platform Truth Social just after midnight to make his point: “He didn’t quit, I fired him!” Trump insisted he had acted when he was informed that Siebert had received the “UNUSUALLY STRONG support of the two absolutely terrible, sleazebag Democrat Senators, from the Great State of Virginia.” He was referring to Senators Mark Warner and Tim Kaine, who, along with the state’s Republican governor, Glenn Youngkin, had recommended Siebert for the post. 

This odd justification—faulting Warner and Kaine for their bipartisanship—should fool no one. The source of Trump’s beef with Siebert was evident. According to numerous reports, Siebert had balked at bringing criminal charges against two of Trump’s supposed enemies: New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, who had sued Trump and his company for fraud; and the former F.B.I. director James Comey, whom Trump had fired during his first term. This moment was inevitable. Trump has been proclaiming for years that his political opponents should be locked up, but there is a gulf between loudly alleging criminal behavior and amassing the evidence necessary to prove the elements of an actual crime. The difference in Trump’s second term is that he is not about to be deterred by such niceties. This time around, the lawyers aren’t going to stop him.

 The Trump Administration’s modus operandi has been to flood the zone with a torrent of illegal acts. One day it uses the military to blow up boats suspected of trafficking drugs, without legal authorization and in defiance of both U.S. and international law; the next it threatens to revoke the broadcast licenses of television networks whose speech displeases the Administration. These are not discrete incidents. They are linked by the common threads of Trump’s disdain for the rule of law, his bloated conception of Presidential power, and his readiness to bend the state to his will. The scope of the assault seems intended to inure the public to the outrages it is witnessing. It is impossible, emotionally and intellectually, to be worked up about everything, everywhere, all at once.

 

But here we are. In the hierarchy of the Administration’s horrors, the Siebert firing is about as bad as it gets. Since Trump regained office, the Department of Justice has dismissed career prosecutors for an array of unjustified and self-serving reasons: for daring to have worked on the criminal cases against Trump; being the daughter of Comey; failing to remove personal pronouns in a signature block. It has dismissed pending cases to serve political ends, such as that of New York City’s mayor, Eric Adams. What’s happening now is worse. Dropping the criminal charges against Adams amounted to a political perversion of the justice system. But using the criminal law to punish political opponents as retribution inflicts far greater damage. Here, a potentially guilty person doesn’t walk free; an innocent person is harmed. The prospect of eventual acquittal in the case of an unjustified prosecution is of little comfort; as Trump well understands, being indicted and having to stand trial is ruinous enough. Firing a prosecutor for refusing to pursue a political opponent without a sufficient legal basis crosses the reddest of lines. Attorney General Pam Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche were reported to have privately defended Siebert and questioned the viability of the case against James. On Saturday evening, Trump directed a Truth Social post at his Attorney General, demanding action. “We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility,” the President wrote. “They impeached me twice, and indicted me (5 times!), OVER NOTHING. JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!! President DJT.” For good measure, Trump said he would nominate his former criminal-defense lawyer, Lindsey Halligan, to take Siebert’s place. “She will be Fair, Smart, and will provide, desperately needed, JUSTICE FOR ALL!” Trump wrote, of Halligan, who has been the White House staffer in charge of removing “improper ideology” from museums, as it’s described in an executive order. “Lindsey Halligan is a really good lawyer, and likes you, a lot,” he publicly assured Bondi.

In another era, of stiffer spines and greater integrity, we would be in Saturday Night Massacre territory. On the evening of October 20, 1973, President Richard Nixon ordered Attorney General Elliot Richardson to fire the Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox. Richardson refused and resigned, followed by Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus. (The deed was ultimately done by the No. 3 official, Solicitor General Robert Bork; unlike Richardson and Ruckelshaus, he hadn’t assured lawmakers he could not interfere with Cox’s work.) To expect a similar display of principle from Bondi and Blanche would be to ignore their track record of servility to Trump.

 

 At dangerous moments like this, we need a strong media.  Sadly, our media keeps failing.  Take Jimmy Kimmel losing his job.  That would never have happened had a compromised and lying media not wanted to ride the easy ratings bandwagon by turning The Demagogue shot dead into a hero -- see our previous reports "Media: The canonization of a demagogue" and "Media Failures."

 

As we noted, it was the Whiteness of it all, the shutting Black people out of the conversation, the bond among the media with their White skin.  We'd also refer you to Ta-Nehisi Coates piece for VANITY FAIR last week:

 

Before he was killed last week, Charlie Kirk left a helpful compendium of words—ones that would greatly aid those who sought to understand his legacy and import. It is somewhat difficult to match these words with the manner in which Kirk is presently being memorialized in mainstream discourse. New York Times columnist Ezra Klein dubbed Kirk “one of the era’s most effective practitioners of persuasion” and a man who “was practicing politics in exactly the right way.” California governor Gavin Newsom hailed Kirk’s “passion and commitment to debate,” advising us to continue Kirk’s work by engaging “with each other, across ideology, through spirited discourse.” Atlantic writer Sally Jenkins saluted Kirk, claiming he “argued with civility” and asserting that his death was “a significant loss for those who believe engagement can help bridge disagreements.” 

 The mentions of “debate” and “engagement” are references to Kirk’s campus tours, during which he visited various colleges to take on whoever come may. That this aspect of Kirk’s work would be so attractive to writers and politicians is understandable. There is, after all, a pervasive worry, among the political class, that college students, ensconced in their own bubbles, could use a bit of shock therapy from a man unconcerned with preferred pronouns, trigger warnings, and the humanity of Palestinians. But it also shows how the political class’s obsession with universities blinds it to everything else. And the everything-else of Kirk’s politics amounted to little more than a loathing of those whose mere existence provoked his ire.

It is not just, for instance, that Kirk held disagreeable views—that he was pro-life, that he believed in public executions, or that he rejected the separation of church and state. It’s that Kirk reveled in open bigotry. Indeed, claims of Kirk’s “civility” are tough to square with his penchant for demeaning members of the LGBTQ+ community as “freaks” and referring to trans people with the slur “tranny.” Faced with the prospect of a Kamala Harris presidency, Kirk told his audience that the threat had to be averted because Harris wanted to “kidnap your child via the trans agenda.” Garden-variety transphobia is sadly unremarkable. But Kirk was a master of folding seemingly discordant bigotries into each other, as when he defined “the American way of life” as marriage, home ownership, and child-rearing free of “the lesbian, gay, transgender garbage in their school,” adding that he did not want kids to “have to hear the Muslim call to prayer five times a day.” The American way of life was “Christendom,” Kirk claimed, and Islam—“the sword the left is using to slit the throat of America”—was antithetical to that. Large “dedicated” Islamic areas were “a threat to America,” Kirk asserted, and New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani was a “Mohammedan,” with Kirk supposing that anyone trying to see “Mohammedism take over the West” would love to have New York—a “prior Anglo center”—“under Mohammedan rule.” 

 Kirk habitually railed against “Black crime,” claiming that “prowling Blacks go around for fun to go target white people.” He repeated the rape accusations against Yusef Salaam, a member of the exonerated Central Park Five who is now a New York City councilman, calling him a “disgusting pig” who had gotten away with “gang rape.” Whatever distaste Kirk held for Blacks was multiplied when he turned to those from Haiti. Haiti was, by Kirk’s lights, a country “infested with demonic voodoo,” whose migrants were “raping your women and hunting you down at night.” These Haitians, as well as undocumented immigrants from other countries, were “having a field day,” per Kirk, and “coming for your daughter next.” The only hope was Donald Trump, who had to prevail, lest Haitians “become your masters.” 

 

  We refer to the person as The Demagogue and we don't normally include links to hate speech but Coates has written a very important article.  Klein's not the only one distorting truth -- and as Coates points out later in the article, to canonize TD, you have to refuse to quote his words.

 

And that's what they did -- even on MSNBC -- in the days after the murder.  

 

And when Jimmy Kimmel got pulled from the airwaves last week, they still didn't have their act together.  See the "The Snapshot"  for September 18th, we're not going into it again.  But we will note that when you do a segment on it, if you're factual, you don't say Jimmy Kimmel was incorrect in what he stated and you also don't refuse to quote what he actually said. 

He was attacking TD!  He was lying!  

 

And there's an MSNBC host refusing to quote what he actually said while she  insists he got his facts wrong.

 

What was Jimmy Kimmel's 'objectionable' statement:

 

The MAGA Gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered [The Demagogue] as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it. 

 

 That is not a lie.  It is factual.  They went to town with the murder until they learned about the family of the shooter.  Then they backed off.  Then they rushed in to claim that it was because he was radicalized in college (one semester at Utah State University -- they leave out his multiple years after at a trade school Dixie Technical College where you get certificates, not degrees).  Then they wanted to blame it on his roommate who is apparently transgender.  The shooter is the shooter.  And they've bent the truth repeatedly throughout their telling of The Demagogue's life and murder. 

When the stupidity bled into the coverage of Jimmy Kimmel, it was noted we can't afford this stupidity.  We never really could but especially not in these dark times. 

 

Chump is committing crimes.  Unlike Nixon, Chump's doing it right out in the open.

 

And we can't afford the stupidity.  

 

Which brings us back to the idiots praising Bill Maher.  He didn't need to invent "Carol."  Chump's deported at least 200,000 people so far this year.  He could have addressed the three US children -- one with cancer -- deported to Honduras.  He could have noted the deportation of high schooler Maykol Bogoya-Duarte.  He could have noted California's Gladys and Nelson Gonzalez.  But facts and real people were too much for lazy ass Bill Maher.  Inventing someone saves him time from actually having to research what he's going to be talking about.  The stupidity is killing us.

 

 

Media: The canonization of a demagogue

Last week,was really something.  The media and various politicians made it clear that GET OUT wasn't just a film, it was their actual attitude.  

 

 

 

If you missed it -- how could you, it had wall to wall coverage drowning everything else -- a right-wing demagogue was shot dead and every outlet tried to act as though the target was a combination of MLK, Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi . . .   In fact, one insane fool, a preacher in another country, actually said TD (The Demagogue, which is how we'll refer to the deceased throughout the rest of this article) was Jesus Christ, put it up on YOUTUBE on September 11th, the day after the man died.  We've searched this morning's news outlets and not one word that TD rose from the dead yesterday so, hate to break it freaks who distort the Gospel of Jesus, but three days  is the number required.   Three days after his death, Jesus rose.  We searched and searched but found no witnesses to a miracle on Saturday.

 

TD was just  a hate merchant who offered nothing but hatred aimed at Black people, aimed at women who believed they had rights, aimed at the LGBTQ+ community, aimed at Muslims, aimed at Jews, aimed at everyone who wasn't Anglo White and straight and either dominating a woman or a woman allowing herself to be dominated. 

 

But somehow this didn't matter.  

 

And those of us who aren't Anglo White weren't supposed to notice.  

 And we certainly weren't supposed to notice when Matthew Dowd tried to provide perspective early on, MSNBC fired him.  He told no lie.  Everything he said was accurate.

 

 Ted Johnson (DEADLINE) explains:

 

Around 3 p.m. ET, as networks were scrambling for more details of what happened, MSNBC’s Katy Tur spoke about Utah’s gun laws before asking Dowd to talk about the “environment in which a shooting like this happens.” He told her, “We don’t know if this was a supporter shooting their gun off in celebration. So we have no idea about this.”

He added about [TD], “He’s been one of the most divisive, especially divisive younger figures in this, who is constantly sort of pushing this sort of hate speech or sort of aimed at certain groups. And I always go back to, hateful thoughts lead to hateful words, which then lead to hateful actions. And I think that is the environment we are in. You can’t stop with these sort of awful thoughts you have and then saying these awful words and not expect awful actions to take place. And that’s the unfortunate environment we are in.”

 

Two things on that, first, it wasn't ourageous, it was perspective.  Meanwhile at the same time FOX NEWS" had a host calling for the homeless to be executed:

 

Fox News host Brian Kilmeade suggested the best way to deal with violent homeless people, if they refuse government help or are not sent to prison, could be to execute them.

Kilmeade shared his suggestion on the Sept. 10 episode of Fox & Friends. 

“Involuntary lethal injection or something,” Kilmeade said. “Just kill ’em.”

 

Four days later, today, he shows up to deliver this note of 'contrition:'

 

Now during that discussion, I wrongly said they should get lethal injections. I apologize for that extremely callous remark. I am obviously aware that not all mentally ill, homeless people act as the perpetrator did in North Carolina and that so many homeless people deserve our empathy and compassion. 

 

Scapegoat an entire group of people -- you know, the way TD did his entire adult life -- and someone who points that reality out is fired but call for the homeless to be executed and offer a three sentence "apology" 

 

Second, it wasn't just that MSNBC fired him.  It was the silence from all the anchors on air.  Joy Reid gets fired -- we thought that was wrong -- and there's a really around her after the fact.  A useless rally as some -- including Reid -- felt.  No effort to keep her on but the firing of a Black woman from solo hosting a show is disturbing -- especially for those of us on the left.  So to a lot of us, some of the MSNBC on airs 'protesting' Joy's firing after the fact appeared to just be attempting to look like they cared about diversity.  

 

We saw no concern over diversity on Wednesday, Thursday or Friday from MSNBC -- and CBS and NBC and ABC.  

 

The very Whiteness of their coverage, in fact, made clear that a line existed -- had always existed -- even on the left.  The line where White people are friends with one another at the end regardless of politics or racism or anything else.  To watch even MSNBC was, for those of us who are not Anglo White, to grasp that TD was their friend due to skin color and that, also due to skin color, we were not.  Or as Barbra Streisand's character tells the epitome of Whiteness Robert Redford in THE WAY WE WERE, "Your friends make me feel like I'm invited for drinks and everyone else is staying for supper."

 

 The rest of us got in on a guest pass and that pass is now being revoked.

 

That does explain how what happened with the media.  

 

If we dared to point out reality -- and this was true even for White people who tried to point out reality -- we were attacked. 

 

It never should have happened.  

 

That response never should have happened.  It especially shouldn't have been the response of Cowardly Democrats.  The Democratic Party's base -- their most loyal voters -- are Blacks, women and LGBTQIA+ people.  And those groups got shoved to the ground as various elected Dems rushes to reassure the country that White is right.  Always.

 

The party didn't just tick off voters, they also begged for attacks from the Republicans.

 

Someone was shot and they died  That event happens multiple times a day.  And multiple times a day, Nancy Pelosi, Bernie Sanders and so many other elected Dems do not feel the need to go before microphones or release statements saying "That's bad.  That's wrong."

 

But there they were showing up in public, wearing hairshirts, self-flagellating as though it was a sexual turn on.

 

It's murder.  We've made it a crime as a nation because we believe it's wrong.   

 

TD was not well known before his death.

 

Most Americans had no idea who he was.  Sorry to break it to the political types -- whether you provide commentary, serve in Congress or work on campaigns, most Americans don't know who you are and don't care.  The last true political celebrities emerged in 1992 and their names are  Mary Matalin and James Carville.  Their couple hood inspired a film (SPEECHLESS with Geena Davis and Michael Keaton). She worked on George HW Bush's campaign while he worked on Bill Clinton's campaign and they fell in love and married (and are still married today).  It gave a human interest quality and it made them famous.  No one knows who David Axelrod is married to -- not even the limited number of Americans who know the name David Axelrod is.

 

But damned if the panty-pissing, flood the zone that MSNBC led on and others followed didn't canonize TD.  Especially when they wouldn't allow reality to be presented.  Only hagiography.  And as hour after hour was wasted on TD, the message became: Here is someone wonderful.  

 

Why else would you be talking about them constantly?  Especially when you weren't broadcasting the truth about them. 

 

Chump saw the reaction, Chump saw it and used it.  He and others calling for leftists to be arrested for remarks.  The left's being demonized and it's a direct result of the coverage supposedly left MSNBC provided.  There were real issues if you were going to cover the death of TD but MSNBC made clear with the firing of Matthew Dodd that real issues would not be allowed on air.

 

So the message they sent to those uninformed was: A very wonderful and important person has died.

 

And the message they sent to those of us who were the targets of TD's hate speech -- women, LGBTQ+ people, Black people, immigrants, Muslims and Jews -- was that we don't matter and we're not part of their group.  They're not going to stand up for us but they will canonize a hate merchant provided he's White.  

 

Again, Jordan Peele's GET OUT made it very clear that was a bonding feature but MSNBC and the rest of the media made even clearer last week.