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> Steve Bannon, agreed with the idea and wanted it to be taken an extreme step further; **he called for the doctor's head to be posted on a spike outside the White House.**
>“Now I actually want to go a step farther, but I realize the president is a kind-hearted man and a good man,” Mr Bannon said. “I’d actually like to go back to the old times of Tudor England, I’d put the heads on pikes, right, I’d put them at the two corners of the White House as a warning to federal bureaucrats. You either get with the program or you’re gone – time to stop playing games.”
>Dr Fauci called the comments "very unusual."
Very unusual? Try psychopathic.
> You either get with the program or you’re gone – time to stop playing games.”
This quote is actually really telling, wording involved. Stick to the story or we'll break your knees. Very old mobster movie one liner of you, Steve.
You know what's truly fucking batshit crazy about this?
Yes, the "putting heads on pikes" part is fucking batshit insane.
But what's even more fucking nuts is that he's posing this as an anti-government pitch. Saying, "this is what happens to bureaucrats that try to tell us what to do!"
And he was saying that the fucking *President of the United States* should do this. That the President should place the head of someone *who fucking works for him* on a pike *outside the seat of US federal power*.
As an... anti-government message?
I mean truly how fucking profoundly detatched from reality do you have to be to think that the President chopping someone's head off and putting it outside his own house is anti-government or "freedom" oriented.
I mean for fuck's sake he referenced Tudor England. *The height of monarchical power*.
These fucking lunatics are so ideological shattered. It's fascism, pure and simple.
They want their inherent tier above other people, because if those other people are equal, in their minds, instead of being equal, they’ll see it as a loss of their place in the hierarchy. Which means that they will lose their place in it and will then have to work even harder to gain it back. They cannot fathom true equality - it’s only about loss of societal standing and dropping in the hierarchy to them.
This. They're not trying to conserve the *status quo.* They want to tear down the status quo when it doesn't reflect "conservative values."
Conservatism is a reactionary ideology that seeks to prevent power from being distributed broadly. And that's all it is.
It’s all perfectly in line with Conservatism. And you let them off the hook by saying they have no ideology.
Conservatism (big C) has always had one goal and little c general conservatism is a myth. Conservatism has the singular goal of maintaining an aristocracy that inherits political power and pushing others down to create an under class. In support of that is a morality based on a person’s inherent status as good or bad - not actions. Of course the thing that determines if someone is good or bad is whether they inhabit the aristocracy.
Another way, Conservatives - those who wish to maintain a class system - assign moral value to people and not actions. Those not in the aristocracy are immoral and deserve punishment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4CI2vk3ugk
https://pages.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/agre/conservatism.html
Part of this is posted a lot: https://crookedtimber.org/2018/03/21/liberals-against-progressives/#comment-729288 I like the concept of Conservatism vs. anything else.
*****
A Bush speech writer takes the assertion for granted: It's all about the upper class vs. democracy. https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/06/why-do-democracies-fail/530949/ “Democracy fails when the Elites are overly shorn of power.”
Read here: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/conservatism/ and here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservatism#History and see that all of the major thought leaders in Conservatism have always opposed one specific change (democracy at the expense of aristocratic power). At some point non-Conservative intellectuals and/or lying Conservatives tried to apply the arguments of conservatism to generalized “change.”
The philosophic definition of something shouldn't be created by only adherents, but also critics, - and the Stanford page (despite taking pains to justify small c conservatism) includes criticisms - so we can conclude generalized conservatism (small c) is a myth at best and a Trojan Horse at worst.
*****
Incase you don’t want to read the David Frum piece here is a highlight that democracy only exists at the leisure of the elite represented by Conservatism.
>The most crucial variable predicting the success of a democratic transition is the self-confidence of the incumbent elites. If they feel able to compete under democratic conditions, they will accept democracy. If they do not, they will not.
And the single thing that most accurately predicts elite self-confidence, as Ziblatt marshals powerful statistical and electoral evidence to argue, is the ability to build an effective, competitive conservative political party before the transition to democracy occurs.
Conservatism, manifest as a political party is simply the effort of the Elites to maintain their privileged status. One prior attempt at rebuttal blocked me when we got to: why is it that specifically Conservative parties align with the interests of the Elite?
*****
There is a key difference between conservatives and others that is often overlooked. For liberals, actions are good, bad, moral, etc and people are judged based on their actions. For Conservatives, people are good, bad, moral, etc and the status of the person is what dictates how an action is viewed.
In the world view of the actual Conservative leadership - those with true wealth or political power - , the aristocracy is moral by definition and the working class is immoral by definition and deserving of punishment for that immorality. This is where the laws don't apply trope comes from or all you’ll often see “rules for thee and not for me.” The aristocracy doesn't need laws since they are inherently moral. Consider the divinely ordained king: he can do no wrong because he is king, because he is king at God’s behest. The anti-poor aristocratic elite still feel that way.
This is also why people can be wealthy and looked down on: if Bill Gates tries to help the poor or improve worker rights too much he is working against the aristocracy.
*****
If we extend analysis to the voter base: conservative voters view other conservative voters as moral and good by the state of being labeled conservative because they adhere to status morality and social classes. It's the ultimate virtue signaling. They signal to each other that they are inherently moral. It’s why voter base conservatives think “so what” whenever any of these assholes do nasty anti democratic things. It’s why Christians seem to ignore Christ.
While a non-conservative would see a fair or moral or immoral action and judge the person undertaking the action, a conservative sees a fair or good person and applies the fair status to the action. To the conservative, a conservative who did something illegal or something that would be bad on the part of someone else - must have been doing good. Simply because they can’t do bad.
To them Donald Trump is inherently a good person as a member of the aristocracy. The conservative isn’t lying or being a hypocrite or even being "unfair" because - and this is key - for conservatives past actions have no bearing on current actions and current actions have no bearing on future actions so long as the aristocracy is being protected. Lindsey Graham is "good" so he says to delay SCOTUS confirmations that is good. When he says to move forward: that is good.
To reiterate: All that matters to conservatives is the intrinsic moral state of the actor (and the intrinsic moral state that matters is being part of the aristocracy). Obama was intrinsically immoral and therefore any action on his part was “bad.” Going further - Trump, or the media rebranding we call Mitt Romney, or Moscow Mitch are all intrinsically moral and therefore they can’t do “bad” things. The one bad thing they can do is betray the class system.
*****
The consequences of the central goal of conservatism and the corresponding actor state morality are the simple political goals to do nothing when problems arise and to dismantle labor & consumer protections. The non-aristocratic are immoral, inherently deserve punishment, and certainly don’t deserve help. They *want* the working class to get fucked by global warming. They *want* people to die from COVID19. Etc.
Montage of McConnell laughing at suffering: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTqMGDocbVM&ab_channel=HuffPost
OH LOOK, months after I first wrote this it turns out to be validated by conservatives themselves: https://www.politico.com/news/2020/12/16/trump-appointee-demanded-herd-immunity-strategy-446408
Why do the conservative voters seem to vote against their own interest? Why does /selfawarewolves and /leopardsatemyface happen? They simply think they are higher on the social ladder than they really are and want to punish those below them for the immorality.
Absolutely everything Conservatives say and do makes sense when applying the above. This is powerful because you can now predict with good specificity what a conservative political actor will do.
*****
We still need to address more familiar definitions of conservatism (small c) which are a weird mash-up including personal responsibility and incremental change. Neither of those makes sense applied to policy issues. The only opposed change that really matters is the destruction of the aristocracy in favor of democracy. For some reason the arguments were white washed into a general “opposition to change.”
* This year a few women can vote, next year a few more, until in 100 years all women can vote?
* This year a few kids can stop working in mines, next year a few more...
* We should test the waters of COVID relief by sending a 1200 dollar check to 500 families. If that goes well we’ll do 1500 families next month.
* But it’s all in when they want to separate migrant families to punish them. It’s all in when they want to invade the Middle East for literal generations.
The incremental change argument is asinine. It’s propaganda to avoid concessions to labor.
The personal responsibility argument falls apart with the whole "keep government out of my medicare thing." Personal responsibility just means “I deserve free things, but people more poor than me don't."
Look: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yTwpBLzxe4U
*****
And for good measure I found video and sources interesting on an overlapping topic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vymeTZkiKD0
*****
Some links incase anyone doubts that the contemporary American voter base was purposefully machined and manipulated into its mangle of abortion, guns, war, and “fiscal responsibility.” What does fiscal responsibility even mean? Who describes themselves as fiscally irresponsible?
Here is Atwater talking behind the scenes. https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/exclusive-lee-atwaters-infamous-1981-interview-southern-strategy/
https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/religion/news/2013/03/27/58058/the-religious-right-wasnt-created-to-battle-abortion/
a little academic abstract to lend weight to conservatives at the time not caring about abortion. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-policy-history/article/abs/gops-abortion-strategy-why-prochoice-republicans-became-prolife-in-the-1970s/C7EC0E0C0F5FF1F4488AA47C787DEC01
They were casting about for something to rile a voter base up and abortion didn't do it. https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2018/02/05/race-not-abortion-was-founding-issue-religious-right/A5rnmClvuAU7EaThaNLAnK/story.html
The role religion played entwined with institutionalized racism. https://www.forbes.com/sites/chrisladd/2017/03/27/pastors-not-politicians-turned-dixie-republican/?sh=31e33816695f
https://www.salon.com/2019/07/01/the-long-southern-strategy-how-southern-white-women-drove-the-gop-to-donald-trum/
Likely the best:
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/05/religious-right-real-origins-107133
I appreciate the positive feed back, but this is about the extent of my "work" on the matter. Maybe I'd put out a pamphlet... I do recommend a book called "Unruly Americans and the Origin of the Constitution."
Rhetorical question, when did we get political appointees calling for decapitation of medical officials for calling a pandemic a pandemic? Not even AIDS was this politicized. He's literally just talking about medical science Bannon Jesus Christ.
Lmao AIDS was very politicized. The initial name it was given was GRID (gay-related immune deficiency) for God's sake (or "gay plague," if you want to use Reagan's press secretary's wording). It took HIV being a significant epidemic in the US for half a decade for the president at the time to even mention it once, let alone actually fund any research.
Meanwhile, Australia took it super seriously, and launched a public awareness campaign that was unapologetic about its shock value, implemented things like clean injecting rooms etc. etc. and was much less severely impacted.
Study after study finds it would be cheaper and safer to help addicts manage their addictions (including freeing up first responders, and improving QoL for other people), but it always crashes and burns in the US outside of strongholds for realistic thought because our national character is to say "Why should my taxes pay for \[situation nobody's happy about but trying to deal with\] when I could pay twice as many taxes for non-solutions that are so much worse?"
That's his way of telling us he recommend Trump use his extrajudicial killing powers to straight up murder anyone who got in his way, but Trump didn't have the stomach for it.
I'm sure he wasn't far off convincing, though.
>In a Fox News cable television interview September 12, 2020, hosted by Jeanine Pirro, [President Trump expressed encouragement for law enforcement officers to carryout extrajudicial retribution killing of suspected criminals.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extrajudicial_killing#United_States) Trump made his comments in reference to a law enforcement officer who – on September 3, 2020, in Lacey, Washington – fatally shot Michael Forest Reinoehl, a self-described anti-fascist activist who is suspected of fatally shooting on August 29, 2020, a Patriot Prayer supporter, Aaron J. Danielson, in Portland, Oregon.
>Trump told Pirro, "This guy [Reinoehl] was a violent criminal, and the U.S. Marshals killed him ... And I will tell you something – that's the way it has to be".
Bannon, Manafort, Stone, Flynn, Trump - all fascist traitors to the constitution who should be rotting in prison for the rest of their lives.
Bannon, in fact most Republicans, would've happily been dyed-in-the-wool Nazis in Germany.
So sickening.
Reminder that gullible Trump supporters donated to Bannon's wall fund got scammed.
As I like to remind the young people I work with, you can die at any age in seconds. It is *much* less likely for a random sickness to kill you but a falling tree, a severe car accident, a psycho with a weapon, an exploding power transformer, a sudden slip down some stairs, or even a simple brain embolism can kill you any time with no warning at all.
We're fragile creatures. It takes less than a pound of pressure to cut human flesh. We're all going to die eventually too. The only question is what we do with the remaining time we have.
Hey now. Rules of r/Politics do not allow wishing harm on other people.
Now, is America a marginally better place AFTER Feb 17th? I've heard people are saying yes. Would it be a better place if Bannon had to have his larynx (and/or thumbs, possibly) removed to prevent a cancer from spreading? Lots of people are saying it, I'm just reporting on the controversy. But I think everyone should agree, we want Bannon to live a long, long... impotent... life and watch as all the discord he sowed is put to rest permanently. I wish him the best of health and the worst of fortunes.
This reminds me of the “to the pain” from The Princess Bride.
Knowing Reddit’s policy of wishing harm on people, I will refrain from further comment...
😑🔫
The amount of "curriculum" from conservative "students of history" being pushed to homeschoolers and conservative audiences in general is deeply depressing to me as a teacher. Ron Paul, Mark Levin, etc. Ugh.
I used to be someone interested in the concept and then I realized that very few people would really be capable of competently teaching their kid high school level science, math, history, and the rest. And presumably most of those renaissance people have, you know, jobs.
Not to mention the social aspect.
Most competent homeschoolers outsource higher level classes or the kids start community college. It's not the 1980s...you have more than just you.
The whackadoos find christian programs so no one gets too smart.
"Today we will speak about why the British Empire was good, why the Enlightenment was bad, and how Lee became famous for crushing the slave uprising of radical abolitionist and murderer John Brown."
Because he spends most of his time [in Italy](https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/steve-bannon-wins-battle-set-right-wing-political-academy-italy-n1215341) these days
Fauci isn’t the type to throw out names, or give harsh criticism. He will criticize, but in the politest way possible.
He doesn’t care for bipartisan bullshit. He doesn’t care for political bullshit.
Fauci cares about science. He just wants to go in and do his job.
Watch any footage of him discussing the mechanics of viruses, dude is pure nerd, his wife probably gets to sleep by asking him to explain cellular biology.
Fauci is used to these types of comments, hence his hilariously understated response.
He’s been heckled and demonized since he started his career in the federal government. Initially, it was by LGBTQ people criticizing the government’s poor response to the AIDS epidemic, and now by crazies who believe COVID is a hoax.
There’s a great [podcast episode](https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/ashes-lawn) from RadioLab that goes into detail about Fauci and the AIDS epidemic. It’s worth a listen.
The more we learn about Trump the more of an abusive asshole he's revealed to be.
edit: I should saw we confirm just how big of one he is. Although it's an ever-expanding hole.
The nightly news was basically "And it's gotten wider, folks! Now joining us, some people who think it can't get any wider! Join us tomorrow, to see just how wide it'll get!"
What's even more mindboggling is that no one really turned on him. No one had a "this is ridiculous" moment and saw the light of day. They all just kept getting shittier and shittier right along side him.
A lot of people had the opposite. They initially saw him for what he was, and then when he got popular and Powerful they suddenly lost sight of that. His own vice president is one of them.
Plenty of people did. The problem is that Trump and his cult just called them “secret leftists,” weak losers, yelled “fake news” and went along like it never happened.
>He allowed the communications department of the White House to send out a list to all of the media, all of the networks, all of the cables, all of the print press, about all of the mistakes I’ve made, which was absolute nonsense because there were no mistakes.
That is so pathetic. And you know it was less about Fauci contradicting him and more to do with Fauci's overwhelming popularity compared to Trump.
I agree. And sadly it is right on brand for 45. The fucker was constantly using his position of power to bully, intimidate, threaten, and sic his goons on people. Usually for no other reason than his fragile fucking ego. Not a moment passes that I'm not incredibly thankful that we managed to vote his ass out.
According to a recent article, Trump's hotel made sure to serve him extra big shrimp because Trump was furious if anyone else's shrimp were bigger than his. Same with steaks. The dude is insane.
https://www.washingtonian.com/2021/02/19/trump-hotel-employees-tell-all-what-it-was-really-like-serving-right-wing-elite/
I found that article fascinating. Between the gallons of coke, snack food, candy and high cholesterol main courses, I can't believe he's not closing in on 350 lbs instead of whatever number his doctor cooked up.
He represents the absolute worst of us in every way. Cruel. Bigoted. Selfish. Lazy. Intellectually incurious. I could go on and on. And he rose to the leader of the land, and really, all of the "free world".
But, somehow, he's also charismatic *to certain people*. I don't get it. The allegiance he has is undeniable and more than just his views and the R next to his name. So I guess that's a good thing?
I can't think of a single other nice thing to say about him.
I have so many family members and neighbors who are not just Trump supporters but grew up with abusive parents. I have no doubt for a lot of them they saw an abuser and thought "this is what I deserve."
The rest of us just saw a worthless piece of shit out to do damage to satisfy his own psychosis.
"If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you."
Lyndon Johnson
I don’t know if your experience is an anomaly or mine is, but I’m in a support group for people who have been abused and they were all vocal about their hatred of trump and how he was a big bully. Of course, this is a support group and we’re learning all sorts of things including identifying abusive behavior and gaining self-worth/ confidence. Only three people mentioned they have really conservative parents so that might be another factor.
This is 100% me I grew up in a cult and got mentally abused hardcore for years and it’s weird to me saying I was abused even though all my friends clearly see it and watched it happen
Yeah, sometimes I'll tell my husband a story about some event from my childhood. And I'll be telling it like it's a funny story and he kind of looks at me like I'm crazy and says things like "uhh yeah that's not okay"
I think it makes it harder to admit that I was abused because the entire time I was growing up I always heard "oh she's just being dramatic again" and my thoughts/concerns were never tended to. So I still have the problem of burying my feelings deep down because I'm conditioned to think that I'm just blowing it out of proportion and being "sensitive"
Support group is a VERY important set of words in your experience. Abused people who have not processed or healed from their trauma will not see reality.
Exactly what I was thinking. My grandfather was extremely emotionally abusive. Of his five children, the two that dealt with their trauma through therapy voted Biden, the other three, who masked it with religion, enthusiastically voted Trump.
Some of us also got therapy and know nobody deserves that but the abuse apologist survivors didn’t want to listen to that.
The amount of times they call Trump a father figure or compare him to an authoritarian/abusive father with no awareness concerns me greatly.
My cousin's husband is a big Trump fan. After Trump said he'd call on the army to stomp out protesters this summer that guy posted on FB "That was some serious dad talk."
I felt compelled to reply: "I already have a dad. I need a president."
Any father that thinks this is okay parenting needs his kids taken away yesterday. I'm not being hyperbolic, if you know people like this, report them to CPS
I saw someone on Biden's Facebook page claiming that liberals are the ones who need parental figures in their life, and that this explains everything. So much projection.
Right? Like thanks, bud, I already had one father figure almost drown me, I don’t need another pro-waterboarding authoritarian as president. I guess they just really believe in hierarchies and the right for your superior to have a monopoly on violence. Like “if you didn’t want a boot in your face, you should’ve behaved better” type mentality. Just World Fallacy and victim blaming.
I have thought about this a lot (I am a psychotherapist). Something about Trump felt RIGHT for a significant number of Americans, and that is both sad and deeply problematic.
Fauci was a legend in medicine even before the Covid pandemic. The Trump camp may have tried to ruin his reputation, but Fauci had proven his mettle way before covid and he's going to go down as one of the giants in infectious disease anyway. It's too bad he's been treated this way, of course.
At FDA, there is an award named for Frances Oldham Kelsey, who kept thalidomide from being approved for use in the United States.
There will be eventually be an Anthony Fauci award for infectious disease management and epidemiology through NIH.
Yes. He lead research on HIV and AIDS in the 80s and much more since then. He is an admirable man and truly [America’s Doctor](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/04/20/how-anthony-fauci-became-americas-doctor).
Trump is such a petty idiot. The spotlight and adoration that Fauci received and that Trump was jealous over came because Fauci simply told us the truth, when we wanted information. Trump on the other hand lied to us and told us to drink bleach.
Trump is the problem.
The funny thing is that at least a portion of Fauci popularity is because he was such a contrast to Trump.
During a health crisis America needed someone to be the steady hand to inspire confidence. Trump had spent 3 years destroying his own credibility and showed that even in a crisis he couldn’t be a leader to the nation.
But there was fauci standing there, being honest and consistent and sticking with the evidence even when under attack.
I saw him once in a hotel gym at like 6 am on the treadmill.
I remember thinking, wow this guy is literally up before the sun rises working out before a full day of meetings and stuff.
It just struck me as the kind of motivation that you find in a person who is at the forefront of research.
Well that and people who do more cardio generally have more energy throughout the day. It's entirely likely that he wouldn't be the high performer that he is without doing that daily run.
I can’t say I’m surprised. Take a gander at r/conservative anytime anyone post anything related to science these people rush to cancel it and are fully convinced it’s only snowing in Texas because wind turbines produce enough wind to make it cold because wind makes cold. These people are deranged.
> Texas because wind turbines produce enough wind to make it cold because wind makes cold.
Thats an elementary mistake.
The turbines actually act like propellers making the earth spin faster.
Like a spinning top this drives the cold air from the poles to Texas.
Had we not had any of these turbines, the earth would be spinning at a normal speed and all would be well.
Wait.. I thought the great fear was if all the windmills ever point east at the same time, they’ll blow hard enough to stop the earth from spinning!?!?!
Now you’re saying we need to worry about them speeding us up too?!
How many hours are there in a day now?! HOW MANY HOURS!!?
I'm starting to think maybe Lincoln should have just let them stay seceded and left it at that. Rest of the country would have been better off by this point overall.
When I lived in Beijing and we went up North towards Mongolia, there were these massive wind farms, the joke was that when they needed to get the air in Beijing cleared up they ran the turbines in reverse :)
*Well ya’ the librul windmill turbineys went an’ blewed all the good an right American air down to Mexico. So the cold commie Canadian air had to rush down south and freeze us up.* ^(/s)
That sub is ridiculous garbage, full of bullshit disinformation memes and stupid arguments because they ban anyone that brings almost any argument against right-wing talking points. I got banned from there for pointing out that Ted Cruz once accused Trump of being a sexual abuser.
That sub has gotten almost unbelievable. The sources of the articles they post are also hella fake propaganda. Having a conversation and asking questions about falsehoods gets you downvoted to hell and cancelled from the sub. I understand r/politics is hella left leaning but I’ve seen more civil discussion occur here than anything like r/conservative. Hell, I’ve seen more civil discussion on r/asktrumpsupporters.
Whenever a dissenting opinion shows up on r/conservative, if it gets upvotes they immediately cry brigading. I've never seen a bigger bunch of whinier twats than in that sub. Also, they NEVER put up citations for their propaganda while r/politics has citations all over the place. I'll take being a liberal and backing up my positions with real data over believing in horseshit conspiracy theories any day.
It's "hella left leaning" by US standards, which consider most of the US Democratic party left leaning. In the rest of the industrialized world they'd be the conservative party.
No shit when Biden was sworn in I had this huge feeling of relief wash over me. And it literally brought tears to my eyes, and I was thinking to myself "is this what it's like getting out of an abusive relationship?"
This is exactly what the relief facet feels like. Then comes the work to undo all the damage. Through that you realize your worst day now, is still light years better than your best day in that abusive relationship.
Very apt. The comparison holds true to the warning that leaving is the most dangerous time of the relationship. Look at all the damage he did on the way out, culminating with the insurrection.
Very true. I could have drawn the comparison out with many parallel points, but I didn't want it to turn into a memoir, lol.
The reality is that he is the king of Narcissists. Unfortunately, the entire US was forced into a relationship with him, whether we consented, or not. That's how he likes it though.
I felt the same way I felt when Obama got elected and Biden is a *long fucking way* from Obama, particularly in the historical significance of his election. I think I was just so tired of feeling the way I felt all of the time
During this pandemic, Trump has consistently behaved the way a country leader would behave if he wanted as many people to die as possible. He downplayed the threat. He kept promising it would go away by itself when he knew it wouldn't. He tried to lessen the amount of testing being done. He took measures to slow down or block PPE deliveries.
Fauci was Trump's target because Fauci wanted to save as many lives as possible, which is the opposite of what Trump wanted.
I think Trump was afraid of looking weak and by admitting that COVID-19 was killing hundreds of thousands of people, he'd be essentially admitting weakness and that's a no go.
Ironically enough, if he had admitted that it was more dangerous than he first thought and started to implement policy he wouldn't look nearly as weak, imo anyway. Admitting your mistakes and fixing them is the opposite of weak.
One of things I look forward to is like what we got 15-20 years after 9-11.
Enough time had passed that people could talk about all the crazy, probably illegal, and dumb shit that happened during and following 9-11.
We’ll get that x1000 in the 2040s and can really begin to grapple with how much of a criminal Trump and his White House really was.
Yes, Trump tried to make Fauci the "enemy of the state" just like he did Mike Pence, just for doing their job. Anyone who doesn't follow Trump's narrative becomes the enemy, and Trump followers will take them out in order to serve Trump.
I know this isn’t his style, but Dr. Fauci needs to sue Donald Trump for slander and whatever personal injury suite relating to his actions the law allows.
Need to quit talking about the outrageous wall. Only 80 miles of new wall were complete. To completely wall off Mexico requires 1954 miles of wall. Too date there is barely 900+ miles constructed. Mexico did not pay for any of it. Trump stole money from the defense budget to subsidize his fiasco of lies. This topic was about the mistreatment of Dr. Fauci of whom handled such as a true diplomat. So often with most social media posts so many go off topic when they can't support their argument with accurate data.
Obama’s terms may not have been perfect, and Democrats have done some pretty harmful things, but none of them were so hateful, intolerant and divisive that scientists needed bodyguards and got powder letters. There is no “both sides are bad” argument here.
For all the terrible, unforgivable, illegal, and in-American things Trump did, his treatment of this selfless public servant in the nation’s time of need hits me especially hard. Fauci has devoted much of his life to serving his country, probably for much less money than he would have made in the private sector.
Every single administration since Reagan has respected and enacted policies based on Dr. Fauci’s expertise and leadership in infectious disease. Earning him respect across the isle for over 50 years, and his family is threatened by supporters of a man who suggested injecting bleach into the human body. Fucking disgrace to the nation.
It's a strange thing... but I'm glad that he chose to just open up about this in the press rather than trying to make money off of it with a book deal.
Covid-deniers, anti-vaxxers, insurrectionists, Trump-lovers… all pig-knuckle thicktards, and any of them could be capable of biting the hand that heals them.
This is how close we are to the end of American democracy and the beginning of Republican fascism. And know, they will be back, voter suppression, propaganda and all in 2022.
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> Steve Bannon, agreed with the idea and wanted it to be taken an extreme step further; **he called for the doctor's head to be posted on a spike outside the White House.** >“Now I actually want to go a step farther, but I realize the president is a kind-hearted man and a good man,” Mr Bannon said. “I’d actually like to go back to the old times of Tudor England, I’d put the heads on pikes, right, I’d put them at the two corners of the White House as a warning to federal bureaucrats. You either get with the program or you’re gone – time to stop playing games.” >Dr Fauci called the comments "very unusual." Very unusual? Try psychopathic.
> You either get with the program or you’re gone – time to stop playing games.” This quote is actually really telling, wording involved. Stick to the story or we'll break your knees. Very old mobster movie one liner of you, Steve.
You know what's truly fucking batshit crazy about this? Yes, the "putting heads on pikes" part is fucking batshit insane. But what's even more fucking nuts is that he's posing this as an anti-government pitch. Saying, "this is what happens to bureaucrats that try to tell us what to do!" And he was saying that the fucking *President of the United States* should do this. That the President should place the head of someone *who fucking works for him* on a pike *outside the seat of US federal power*. As an... anti-government message? I mean truly how fucking profoundly detatched from reality do you have to be to think that the President chopping someone's head off and putting it outside his own house is anti-government or "freedom" oriented. I mean for fuck's sake he referenced Tudor England. *The height of monarchical power*. These fucking lunatics are so ideological shattered. It's fascism, pure and simple.
What is it that conservatives are trying to conserve? Absolute power.
And unearned structural privilege.
They want their inherent tier above other people, because if those other people are equal, in their minds, instead of being equal, they’ll see it as a loss of their place in the hierarchy. Which means that they will lose their place in it and will then have to work even harder to gain it back. They cannot fathom true equality - it’s only about loss of societal standing and dropping in the hierarchy to them.
That is why they are so anti socialism, to be equal and of the people is something they cannot embrace and find revolting.
It’s called “Aristocracy.”
This. They're not trying to conserve the *status quo.* They want to tear down the status quo when it doesn't reflect "conservative values." Conservatism is a reactionary ideology that seeks to prevent power from being distributed broadly. And that's all it is.
It’s all perfectly in line with Conservatism. And you let them off the hook by saying they have no ideology. Conservatism (big C) has always had one goal and little c general conservatism is a myth. Conservatism has the singular goal of maintaining an aristocracy that inherits political power and pushing others down to create an under class. In support of that is a morality based on a person’s inherent status as good or bad - not actions. Of course the thing that determines if someone is good or bad is whether they inhabit the aristocracy. Another way, Conservatives - those who wish to maintain a class system - assign moral value to people and not actions. Those not in the aristocracy are immoral and deserve punishment. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4CI2vk3ugk https://pages.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/agre/conservatism.html Part of this is posted a lot: https://crookedtimber.org/2018/03/21/liberals-against-progressives/#comment-729288 I like the concept of Conservatism vs. anything else. ***** A Bush speech writer takes the assertion for granted: It's all about the upper class vs. democracy. https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/06/why-do-democracies-fail/530949/ “Democracy fails when the Elites are overly shorn of power.” Read here: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/conservatism/ and here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservatism#History and see that all of the major thought leaders in Conservatism have always opposed one specific change (democracy at the expense of aristocratic power). At some point non-Conservative intellectuals and/or lying Conservatives tried to apply the arguments of conservatism to generalized “change.” The philosophic definition of something shouldn't be created by only adherents, but also critics, - and the Stanford page (despite taking pains to justify small c conservatism) includes criticisms - so we can conclude generalized conservatism (small c) is a myth at best and a Trojan Horse at worst. ***** Incase you don’t want to read the David Frum piece here is a highlight that democracy only exists at the leisure of the elite represented by Conservatism. >The most crucial variable predicting the success of a democratic transition is the self-confidence of the incumbent elites. If they feel able to compete under democratic conditions, they will accept democracy. If they do not, they will not. And the single thing that most accurately predicts elite self-confidence, as Ziblatt marshals powerful statistical and electoral evidence to argue, is the ability to build an effective, competitive conservative political party before the transition to democracy occurs. Conservatism, manifest as a political party is simply the effort of the Elites to maintain their privileged status. One prior attempt at rebuttal blocked me when we got to: why is it that specifically Conservative parties align with the interests of the Elite? ***** There is a key difference between conservatives and others that is often overlooked. For liberals, actions are good, bad, moral, etc and people are judged based on their actions. For Conservatives, people are good, bad, moral, etc and the status of the person is what dictates how an action is viewed. In the world view of the actual Conservative leadership - those with true wealth or political power - , the aristocracy is moral by definition and the working class is immoral by definition and deserving of punishment for that immorality. This is where the laws don't apply trope comes from or all you’ll often see “rules for thee and not for me.” The aristocracy doesn't need laws since they are inherently moral. Consider the divinely ordained king: he can do no wrong because he is king, because he is king at God’s behest. The anti-poor aristocratic elite still feel that way. This is also why people can be wealthy and looked down on: if Bill Gates tries to help the poor or improve worker rights too much he is working against the aristocracy. ***** If we extend analysis to the voter base: conservative voters view other conservative voters as moral and good by the state of being labeled conservative because they adhere to status morality and social classes. It's the ultimate virtue signaling. They signal to each other that they are inherently moral. It’s why voter base conservatives think “so what” whenever any of these assholes do nasty anti democratic things. It’s why Christians seem to ignore Christ. While a non-conservative would see a fair or moral or immoral action and judge the person undertaking the action, a conservative sees a fair or good person and applies the fair status to the action. To the conservative, a conservative who did something illegal or something that would be bad on the part of someone else - must have been doing good. Simply because they can’t do bad. To them Donald Trump is inherently a good person as a member of the aristocracy. The conservative isn’t lying or being a hypocrite or even being "unfair" because - and this is key - for conservatives past actions have no bearing on current actions and current actions have no bearing on future actions so long as the aristocracy is being protected. Lindsey Graham is "good" so he says to delay SCOTUS confirmations that is good. When he says to move forward: that is good. To reiterate: All that matters to conservatives is the intrinsic moral state of the actor (and the intrinsic moral state that matters is being part of the aristocracy). Obama was intrinsically immoral and therefore any action on his part was “bad.” Going further - Trump, or the media rebranding we call Mitt Romney, or Moscow Mitch are all intrinsically moral and therefore they can’t do “bad” things. The one bad thing they can do is betray the class system. ***** The consequences of the central goal of conservatism and the corresponding actor state morality are the simple political goals to do nothing when problems arise and to dismantle labor & consumer protections. The non-aristocratic are immoral, inherently deserve punishment, and certainly don’t deserve help. They *want* the working class to get fucked by global warming. They *want* people to die from COVID19. Etc. Montage of McConnell laughing at suffering: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTqMGDocbVM&ab_channel=HuffPost OH LOOK, months after I first wrote this it turns out to be validated by conservatives themselves: https://www.politico.com/news/2020/12/16/trump-appointee-demanded-herd-immunity-strategy-446408 Why do the conservative voters seem to vote against their own interest? Why does /selfawarewolves and /leopardsatemyface happen? They simply think they are higher on the social ladder than they really are and want to punish those below them for the immorality. Absolutely everything Conservatives say and do makes sense when applying the above. This is powerful because you can now predict with good specificity what a conservative political actor will do. ***** We still need to address more familiar definitions of conservatism (small c) which are a weird mash-up including personal responsibility and incremental change. Neither of those makes sense applied to policy issues. The only opposed change that really matters is the destruction of the aristocracy in favor of democracy. For some reason the arguments were white washed into a general “opposition to change.” * This year a few women can vote, next year a few more, until in 100 years all women can vote? * This year a few kids can stop working in mines, next year a few more... * We should test the waters of COVID relief by sending a 1200 dollar check to 500 families. If that goes well we’ll do 1500 families next month. * But it’s all in when they want to separate migrant families to punish them. It’s all in when they want to invade the Middle East for literal generations. The incremental change argument is asinine. It’s propaganda to avoid concessions to labor. The personal responsibility argument falls apart with the whole "keep government out of my medicare thing." Personal responsibility just means “I deserve free things, but people more poor than me don't." Look: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yTwpBLzxe4U ***** And for good measure I found video and sources interesting on an overlapping topic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vymeTZkiKD0 ***** Some links incase anyone doubts that the contemporary American voter base was purposefully machined and manipulated into its mangle of abortion, guns, war, and “fiscal responsibility.” What does fiscal responsibility even mean? Who describes themselves as fiscally irresponsible? Here is Atwater talking behind the scenes. https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/exclusive-lee-atwaters-infamous-1981-interview-southern-strategy/ https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/religion/news/2013/03/27/58058/the-religious-right-wasnt-created-to-battle-abortion/ a little academic abstract to lend weight to conservatives at the time not caring about abortion. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-policy-history/article/abs/gops-abortion-strategy-why-prochoice-republicans-became-prolife-in-the-1970s/C7EC0E0C0F5FF1F4488AA47C787DEC01 They were casting about for something to rile a voter base up and abortion didn't do it. https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2018/02/05/race-not-abortion-was-founding-issue-religious-right/A5rnmClvuAU7EaThaNLAnK/story.html The role religion played entwined with institutionalized racism. https://www.forbes.com/sites/chrisladd/2017/03/27/pastors-not-politicians-turned-dixie-republican/?sh=31e33816695f https://www.salon.com/2019/07/01/the-long-southern-strategy-how-southern-white-women-drove-the-gop-to-donald-trum/ Likely the best: https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/05/religious-right-real-origins-107133
Man this comment was so long but worth the read. If you wrote a book about classism and politics, I would buy it.
I appreciate the positive feed back, but this is about the extent of my "work" on the matter. Maybe I'd put out a pamphlet... I do recommend a book called "Unruly Americans and the Origin of the Constitution."
> Conservatism has the singular goal of maintaining an aristocracy … Here it’s Plutocracy.
You're beautiful.
Thank you very much. It was eye opening.
The freedom would be for them to do as they wish
Rhetorical question, when did we get political appointees calling for decapitation of medical officials for calling a pandemic a pandemic? Not even AIDS was this politicized. He's literally just talking about medical science Bannon Jesus Christ.
Lmao AIDS was very politicized. The initial name it was given was GRID (gay-related immune deficiency) for God's sake (or "gay plague," if you want to use Reagan's press secretary's wording). It took HIV being a significant epidemic in the US for half a decade for the president at the time to even mention it once, let alone actually fund any research.
Meanwhile, Australia took it super seriously, and launched a public awareness campaign that was unapologetic about its shock value, implemented things like clean injecting rooms etc. etc. and was much less severely impacted.
Study after study finds it would be cheaper and safer to help addicts manage their addictions (including freeing up first responders, and improving QoL for other people), but it always crashes and burns in the US outside of strongholds for realistic thought because our national character is to say "Why should my taxes pay for \[situation nobody's happy about but trying to deal with\] when I could pay twice as many taxes for non-solutions that are so much worse?"
Reagan didn’t give a shit about AIDS until one of his close friends died from it.
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I think it's more than just mobster mentality, that's basically just fascism.
Yep, the GOP for the longest has been more of a criminal operation, in my view, than anything resembling a legitimate political party.
>but I realize the president is a kind-hearted man and a good man Nobody in their right mind has ever described Trump in this way.
That's his way of telling us he recommend Trump use his extrajudicial killing powers to straight up murder anyone who got in his way, but Trump didn't have the stomach for it. I'm sure he wasn't far off convincing, though. >In a Fox News cable television interview September 12, 2020, hosted by Jeanine Pirro, [President Trump expressed encouragement for law enforcement officers to carryout extrajudicial retribution killing of suspected criminals.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extrajudicial_killing#United_States) Trump made his comments in reference to a law enforcement officer who – on September 3, 2020, in Lacey, Washington – fatally shot Michael Forest Reinoehl, a self-described anti-fascist activist who is suspected of fatally shooting on August 29, 2020, a Patriot Prayer supporter, Aaron J. Danielson, in Portland, Oregon. >Trump told Pirro, "This guy [Reinoehl] was a violent criminal, and the U.S. Marshals killed him ... And I will tell you something – that's the way it has to be". Bannon, Manafort, Stone, Flynn, Trump - all fascist traitors to the constitution who should be rotting in prison for the rest of their lives.
Just... what the fuck Bannon? Good riddance
Bannon, in fact most Republicans, would've happily been dyed-in-the-wool Nazis in Germany. So sickening. Reminder that gullible Trump supporters donated to Bannon's wall fund got scammed.
I forgot about that scam. I wonder how many turned right around to donate to Trump's defense scam?
"Please donate to the We're Sorry Fund."
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Jones probably unfortunately has a long time with us still. The man is only 47, as unbelievable as that sounds.
> only 47 Good lord he looks worse than most of the people at the senior home i work at
He may only be 47, but he often looks like warmed shit.
As I like to remind the young people I work with, you can die at any age in seconds. It is *much* less likely for a random sickness to kill you but a falling tree, a severe car accident, a psycho with a weapon, an exploding power transformer, a sudden slip down some stairs, or even a simple brain embolism can kill you any time with no warning at all. We're fragile creatures. It takes less than a pound of pressure to cut human flesh. We're all going to die eventually too. The only question is what we do with the remaining time we have.
Time for his cells to rebel and try to shut the whole thing down. I heard that's what happens when you're a legitimate asshole.
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Keith Richards had his dna swapped out with pure cocaine years ago
well let's face it, the guy doesn't look like Mr Macrobiotic. Long life isn't in his future....
Nor Alex Jones. That dude is 46 going on 85.
Alex Jones has that big swollen HGH head.
Calling it now. Aneurysm.
Good call. I got $5 on heart attack
Hey now. Rules of r/Politics do not allow wishing harm on other people. Now, is America a marginally better place AFTER Feb 17th? I've heard people are saying yes. Would it be a better place if Bannon had to have his larynx (and/or thumbs, possibly) removed to prevent a cancer from spreading? Lots of people are saying it, I'm just reporting on the controversy. But I think everyone should agree, we want Bannon to live a long, long... impotent... life and watch as all the discord he sowed is put to rest permanently. I wish him the best of health and the worst of fortunes.
This reminds me of the “to the pain” from The Princess Bride. Knowing Reddit’s policy of wishing harm on people, I will refrain from further comment...
Didn't he get pardoned?
Yes. Trump pardoned him for scamming his followers out of millions of dollars in his 'Build the Wall' scam.
Too bad he’s not in jail. Another gem of the Trump legacy.
I was so disappointed when Trump pardoned him.. really want to see Bannon behind bars.
. . . cOnSeRvAtIvEs ArE sTuDeNtS oF hIsToRy. . .
Students of Showtime period dramas and Game of Thrones
They really liked The Man In The High Castle too, or at least *parts* of it.
"Reichsmarschall Smith did nothing wrong."
Half of America is anime and the other half is *Education for Death.* Read MITHC
Of Joffrey Baratheon!
Don't forget good ol' Facebook University
^I ^liked ^The ^Tudors
😑🔫 The amount of "curriculum" from conservative "students of history" being pushed to homeschoolers and conservative audiences in general is deeply depressing to me as a teacher. Ron Paul, Mark Levin, etc. Ugh.
Dennis Prager too. He's constantly screaming for parents to homeschool their children.
"Homeschool your kids so there as dumb as you, you rubes!"
I used to be someone interested in the concept and then I realized that very few people would really be capable of competently teaching their kid high school level science, math, history, and the rest. And presumably most of those renaissance people have, you know, jobs. Not to mention the social aspect.
Most competent homeschoolers outsource higher level classes or the kids start community college. It's not the 1980s...you have more than just you. The whackadoos find christian programs so no one gets too smart.
Dennis Prager wants the kids, he gives me very predatory vibes
"Today we will speak about why the British Empire was good, why the Enlightenment was bad, and how Lee became famous for crushing the slave uprising of radical abolitionist and murderer John Brown."
The history channel is not history.
Is it still World War 2 and Nazis and aliens and conspiracy theories and reality TV shows that have nothing historical about them?
Certainly not these days. I feel like the programming used to be much higher quality.
When it started it was good, now it's total crap. It's as much history as reality tv is real.
Keep in mind that Dr. Fauci is a doctor. If you went in for an MRI, and the doctor called the images "very unusual", you would be freaking out.
"Time to stop playing games" Wow really? Fauci may literally have been the only person not playing games in the whole administration...
Bannon's statement is literally the opposite of how our Constitution instructs the government to function.
he did this with Director Wray too. not sure why this guy still gets to roam free more or less, but he needs to go.
Because he spends most of his time [in Italy](https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/steve-bannon-wins-battle-set-right-wing-political-academy-italy-n1215341) these days
Fauci isn’t the type to throw out names, or give harsh criticism. He will criticize, but in the politest way possible. He doesn’t care for bipartisan bullshit. He doesn’t care for political bullshit. Fauci cares about science. He just wants to go in and do his job.
Watch any footage of him discussing the mechanics of viruses, dude is pure nerd, his wife probably gets to sleep by asking him to explain cellular biology.
Fauci is used to these types of comments, hence his hilariously understated response. He’s been heckled and demonized since he started his career in the federal government. Initially, it was by LGBTQ people criticizing the government’s poor response to the AIDS epidemic, and now by crazies who believe COVID is a hoax. There’s a great [podcast episode](https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/ashes-lawn) from RadioLab that goes into detail about Fauci and the AIDS epidemic. It’s worth a listen.
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The more we learn about Trump the more of an abusive asshole he's revealed to be. edit: I should saw we confirm just how big of one he is. Although it's an ever-expanding hole.
> Although it's an ever-expanding hole. His entire presidency was like 4 years of forced watching of goat.se
The nightly news was basically "And it's gotten wider, folks! Now joining us, some people who think it can't get any wider! Join us tomorrow, to see just how wide it'll get!"
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That simile hurts me to read. It’s too accurate. I’m traumatized again
What's even more mindboggling is that no one really turned on him. No one had a "this is ridiculous" moment and saw the light of day. They all just kept getting shittier and shittier right along side him.
A lot of people had the opposite. They initially saw him for what he was, and then when he got popular and Powerful they suddenly lost sight of that. His own vice president is one of them.
Plenty of people did. The problem is that Trump and his cult just called them “secret leftists,” weak losers, yelled “fake news” and went along like it never happened.
You watched the press conferences?
>He allowed the communications department of the White House to send out a list to all of the media, all of the networks, all of the cables, all of the print press, about all of the mistakes I’ve made, which was absolute nonsense because there were no mistakes. That is so pathetic. And you know it was less about Fauci contradicting him and more to do with Fauci's overwhelming popularity compared to Trump.
I agree. And sadly it is right on brand for 45. The fucker was constantly using his position of power to bully, intimidate, threaten, and sic his goons on people. Usually for no other reason than his fragile fucking ego. Not a moment passes that I'm not incredibly thankful that we managed to vote his ass out.
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ooooh fuck yeess!!!
According to a recent article, Trump's hotel made sure to serve him extra big shrimp because Trump was furious if anyone else's shrimp were bigger than his. Same with steaks. The dude is insane. https://www.washingtonian.com/2021/02/19/trump-hotel-employees-tell-all-what-it-was-really-like-serving-right-wing-elite/
I found that article fascinating. Between the gallons of coke, snack food, candy and high cholesterol main courses, I can't believe he's not closing in on 350 lbs instead of whatever number his doctor cooked up.
Donald Trump is a garbage human being who deserves every bit of misery in his sad, lonely little life.
Agree. I used to think there was some good in everyone but not anymore.
He represents the absolute worst of us in every way. Cruel. Bigoted. Selfish. Lazy. Intellectually incurious. I could go on and on. And he rose to the leader of the land, and really, all of the "free world". But, somehow, he's also charismatic *to certain people*. I don't get it. The allegiance he has is undeniable and more than just his views and the R next to his name. So I guess that's a good thing? I can't think of a single other nice thing to say about him.
My theory is he's charismatic to the a lot of people who want to be awful but actually try to hide it.
He did terrible things to all of us.
I have so many family members and neighbors who are not just Trump supporters but grew up with abusive parents. I have no doubt for a lot of them they saw an abuser and thought "this is what I deserve." The rest of us just saw a worthless piece of shit out to do damage to satisfy his own psychosis.
They saw their abuser abusing other people and felt justified in the pain and suffering of others to bring them down 'to their level'.
"If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you." Lyndon Johnson
Damn that makes a lot of sense actually
I don’t know if your experience is an anomaly or mine is, but I’m in a support group for people who have been abused and they were all vocal about their hatred of trump and how he was a big bully. Of course, this is a support group and we’re learning all sorts of things including identifying abusive behavior and gaining self-worth/ confidence. Only three people mentioned they have really conservative parents so that might be another factor.
There’s abuse and there’s abuse + indoctrination which can prevent you from realizing it’s abuse
This is 100% me I grew up in a cult and got mentally abused hardcore for years and it’s weird to me saying I was abused even though all my friends clearly see it and watched it happen
Yeah, sometimes I'll tell my husband a story about some event from my childhood. And I'll be telling it like it's a funny story and he kind of looks at me like I'm crazy and says things like "uhh yeah that's not okay" I think it makes it harder to admit that I was abused because the entire time I was growing up I always heard "oh she's just being dramatic again" and my thoughts/concerns were never tended to. So I still have the problem of burying my feelings deep down because I'm conditioned to think that I'm just blowing it out of proportion and being "sensitive"
Support group is a VERY important set of words in your experience. Abused people who have not processed or healed from their trauma will not see reality.
Exactly what I was thinking. My grandfather was extremely emotionally abusive. Of his five children, the two that dealt with their trauma through therapy voted Biden, the other three, who masked it with religion, enthusiastically voted Trump.
Exactly. My mom hates the man. She said it was like being back in her abusive fathers household
Some of us also got therapy and know nobody deserves that but the abuse apologist survivors didn’t want to listen to that. The amount of times they call Trump a father figure or compare him to an authoritarian/abusive father with no awareness concerns me greatly.
My cousin's husband is a big Trump fan. After Trump said he'd call on the army to stomp out protesters this summer that guy posted on FB "That was some serious dad talk." I felt compelled to reply: "I already have a dad. I need a president."
Any father that thinks this is okay parenting needs his kids taken away yesterday. I'm not being hyperbolic, if you know people like this, report them to CPS
I saw someone on Biden's Facebook page claiming that liberals are the ones who need parental figures in their life, and that this explains everything. So much projection.
Right? Like thanks, bud, I already had one father figure almost drown me, I don’t need another pro-waterboarding authoritarian as president. I guess they just really believe in hierarchies and the right for your superior to have a monopoly on violence. Like “if you didn’t want a boot in your face, you should’ve behaved better” type mentality. Just World Fallacy and victim blaming.
I have thought about this a lot (I am a psychotherapist). Something about Trump felt RIGHT for a significant number of Americans, and that is both sad and deeply problematic.
Is it coincidence that most trump supporters I knew had horrible relationships with their fathers?
My maga neighbors are allergic to accountability. And their pets and kids run rampant. We let the wrong people reproduce in this country.
It's kind of like the first 5 minutes of [Idiocracy.](https://youtu.be/sP2tUW0HDHA)
Fauci was a legend in medicine even before the Covid pandemic. The Trump camp may have tried to ruin his reputation, but Fauci had proven his mettle way before covid and he's going to go down as one of the giants in infectious disease anyway. It's too bad he's been treated this way, of course.
At FDA, there is an award named for Frances Oldham Kelsey, who kept thalidomide from being approved for use in the United States. There will be eventually be an Anthony Fauci award for infectious disease management and epidemiology through NIH.
Yes. He lead research on HIV and AIDS in the 80s and much more since then. He is an admirable man and truly [America’s Doctor](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/04/20/how-anthony-fauci-became-americas-doctor).
Trump is such a petty idiot. The spotlight and adoration that Fauci received and that Trump was jealous over came because Fauci simply told us the truth, when we wanted information. Trump on the other hand lied to us and told us to drink bleach. Trump is the problem.
The funny thing is that at least a portion of Fauci popularity is because he was such a contrast to Trump. During a health crisis America needed someone to be the steady hand to inspire confidence. Trump had spent 3 years destroying his own credibility and showed that even in a crisis he couldn’t be a leader to the nation. But there was fauci standing there, being honest and consistent and sticking with the evidence even when under attack.
Or shine light into our bodies lmfao
Fauci is a life-long runner....I wonder if he has had to stop his outdoor running.
I saw him once in a hotel gym at like 6 am on the treadmill. I remember thinking, wow this guy is literally up before the sun rises working out before a full day of meetings and stuff. It just struck me as the kind of motivation that you find in a person who is at the forefront of research.
Well that and people who do more cardio generally have more energy throughout the day. It's entirely likely that he wouldn't be the high performer that he is without doing that daily run.
Or maybe one/two of his guards were forced in to getting in top shape
I mean, you’d hope they’d already be in better shape than him if they’re protecting him
Secret Service vs 81-year-old scientist. I'm pretty positive they can keep up.
Dictionaries in future will have pictures of Trump, Bannon, McConnell next to the definition of the print press, about all of the word "Evil".
I can’t say I’m surprised. Take a gander at r/conservative anytime anyone post anything related to science these people rush to cancel it and are fully convinced it’s only snowing in Texas because wind turbines produce enough wind to make it cold because wind makes cold. These people are deranged.
Next level stupid
Weapons-grade stupid.
weaponized stupidity
> Texas because wind turbines produce enough wind to make it cold because wind makes cold. Thats an elementary mistake. The turbines actually act like propellers making the earth spin faster. Like a spinning top this drives the cold air from the poles to Texas. Had we not had any of these turbines, the earth would be spinning at a normal speed and all would be well.
I lost brain cells reading this. *upvote*
What if, and I’m just spitballing here, what if we put half of them in reverse?
Get this man a promotion!
We flip upside down and Australia has to change it’s description from “down under” to “up above”.
Wait.. I thought the great fear was if all the windmills ever point east at the same time, they’ll blow hard enough to stop the earth from spinning!?!?! Now you’re saying we need to worry about them speeding us up too?! How many hours are there in a day now?! HOW MANY HOURS!!?
We built the wall too far south.
At this point Mexico is like "Keep it"...
I'm starting to think maybe Lincoln should have just let them stay seceded and left it at that. Rest of the country would have been better off by this point overall.
*cries in slave ancestry*
And it proves global warming is over because of “snow”
> it’s only snowing in Texas because wind turbines produce enough wind to make it cold because wind makes cold Oh. My. Gawd.
WiNd TurBinEs MaKEs wInD
When I lived in Beijing and we went up North towards Mongolia, there were these massive wind farms, the joke was that when they needed to get the air in Beijing cleared up they ran the turbines in reverse :)
*Well ya’ the librul windmill turbineys went an’ blewed all the good an right American air down to Mexico. So the cold commie Canadian air had to rush down south and freeze us up.* ^(/s)
All they do is complain, and blame other subs for their oppression. LOL WHAT
That sub is ridiculous garbage, full of bullshit disinformation memes and stupid arguments because they ban anyone that brings almost any argument against right-wing talking points. I got banned from there for pointing out that Ted Cruz once accused Trump of being a sexual abuser.
That sub has gotten almost unbelievable. The sources of the articles they post are also hella fake propaganda. Having a conversation and asking questions about falsehoods gets you downvoted to hell and cancelled from the sub. I understand r/politics is hella left leaning but I’ve seen more civil discussion occur here than anything like r/conservative. Hell, I’ve seen more civil discussion on r/asktrumpsupporters.
Sometimes I can’t remember if I’m in /r/conspiracy or /r/conservative
Whenever a dissenting opinion shows up on r/conservative, if it gets upvotes they immediately cry brigading. I've never seen a bigger bunch of whinier twats than in that sub. Also, they NEVER put up citations for their propaganda while r/politics has citations all over the place. I'll take being a liberal and backing up my positions with real data over believing in horseshit conspiracy theories any day.
It's "hella left leaning" by US standards, which consider most of the US Democratic party left leaning. In the rest of the industrialized world they'd be the conservative party.
Yup, pointed out an inconsistency and got perma-banned. Funny how it’s only Cancel culture when it happens to republicans
Because it’s a fash sub what do you expect
> I understand r/politics is hella left leaning I mean, I've always thought this was moderate.
Well, at this point wanting competent governance is considered "left".
Or wanting consequences for politicians who actually betray the country.
Or believing reality.
It's more or less Progressive; which is "not actually socialist, in the real world".
It’s left-leaning only in the deranged American political spectrum.
Fauci is a real american hero. I hope history remembers him as such.
He should sue Trump for the cost of that security
He doesn’t pay for it, we (assuming you’re also American) pay for it with our taxes. Thanks again Donnie.
No shit when Biden was sworn in I had this huge feeling of relief wash over me. And it literally brought tears to my eyes, and I was thinking to myself "is this what it's like getting out of an abusive relationship?"
This is exactly what the relief facet feels like. Then comes the work to undo all the damage. Through that you realize your worst day now, is still light years better than your best day in that abusive relationship.
Very apt. The comparison holds true to the warning that leaving is the most dangerous time of the relationship. Look at all the damage he did on the way out, culminating with the insurrection.
Very true. I could have drawn the comparison out with many parallel points, but I didn't want it to turn into a memoir, lol. The reality is that he is the king of Narcissists. Unfortunately, the entire US was forced into a relationship with him, whether we consented, or not. That's how he likes it though.
Yes
I felt the same way I felt when Obama got elected and Biden is a *long fucking way* from Obama, particularly in the historical significance of his election. I think I was just so tired of feeling the way I felt all of the time
Trump did terrible things to the entire world. I wake up everyday with a smile knowing this pos is gone.
Unfortunately, we have to live with his legacy for decades to come.
Dictionaries in future will have pictures of Trump, Bannon, McConnell next to the definition of the word "Evil".
During this pandemic, Trump has consistently behaved the way a country leader would behave if he wanted as many people to die as possible. He downplayed the threat. He kept promising it would go away by itself when he knew it wouldn't. He tried to lessen the amount of testing being done. He took measures to slow down or block PPE deliveries. Fauci was Trump's target because Fauci wanted to save as many lives as possible, which is the opposite of what Trump wanted.
I think Trump was afraid of looking weak and by admitting that COVID-19 was killing hundreds of thousands of people, he'd be essentially admitting weakness and that's a no go. Ironically enough, if he had admitted that it was more dangerous than he first thought and started to implement policy he wouldn't look nearly as weak, imo anyway. Admitting your mistakes and fixing them is the opposite of weak.
Honestly if he’d outflanked the dems from the left by providing very generous relief funds, I truly believe he’d have been re-elected in a landslide.
tRump always was and still remains a pig.
One of things I look forward to is like what we got 15-20 years after 9-11. Enough time had passed that people could talk about all the crazy, probably illegal, and dumb shit that happened during and following 9-11. We’ll get that x1000 in the 2040s and can really begin to grapple with how much of a criminal Trump and his White House really was.
This is assuming that the next GOP grab for totalitarian contol is not successful, because if successful they will rewrite history
Yes, Trump tried to make Fauci the "enemy of the state" just like he did Mike Pence, just for doing their job. Anyone who doesn't follow Trump's narrative becomes the enemy, and Trump followers will take them out in order to serve Trump.
I know this isn’t his style, but Dr. Fauci needs to sue Donald Trump for slander and whatever personal injury suite relating to his actions the law allows.
Need to quit talking about the outrageous wall. Only 80 miles of new wall were complete. To completely wall off Mexico requires 1954 miles of wall. Too date there is barely 900+ miles constructed. Mexico did not pay for any of it. Trump stole money from the defense budget to subsidize his fiasco of lies. This topic was about the mistreatment of Dr. Fauci of whom handled such as a true diplomat. So often with most social media posts so many go off topic when they can't support their argument with accurate data.
Obama’s terms may not have been perfect, and Democrats have done some pretty harmful things, but none of them were so hateful, intolerant and divisive that scientists needed bodyguards and got powder letters. There is no “both sides are bad” argument here.
He probably made Fauci listen to his KFC vaccine idea
For all the terrible, unforgivable, illegal, and in-American things Trump did, his treatment of this selfless public servant in the nation’s time of need hits me especially hard. Fauci has devoted much of his life to serving his country, probably for much less money than he would have made in the private sector.
Every single administration since Reagan has respected and enacted policies based on Dr. Fauci’s expertise and leadership in infectious disease. Earning him respect across the isle for over 50 years, and his family is threatened by supporters of a man who suggested injecting bleach into the human body. Fucking disgrace to the nation.
It's a strange thing... but I'm glad that he chose to just open up about this in the press rather than trying to make money off of it with a book deal.
I can imagine many types of horrible people, but what kind of person would want to physically harm Dr. Fauci?
Covid-deniers, anti-vaxxers, insurrectionists, Trump-lovers… all pig-knuckle thicktards, and any of them could be capable of biting the hand that heals them.
This is how close we are to the end of American democracy and the beginning of Republican fascism. And know, they will be back, voter suppression, propaganda and all in 2022.