Rambling praise for criminals and serial killers

My Sunday movie was The Swimmer (don’t confuse it with The Swimmers). This is an Israeli drama from 2021 about Erez at the tryouts to be the swimming contestant for the Olympics. There are five guys at the camp, only one will go to the Games. We see what they go through to get into condition. For those that enjoy this sort of thing this movie has plenty of eye candy. The lads are quite fit – they are Olympic athletes – and much of the time they wear only a Speedo. Between that and hanging out with Nevo, another competitor, Eraz sees he is aroused by it all and begins to understand he is gay. At the same time Erez feels the pressure building. The coach sees him as a leading contender. His dad is a former swimming colleague of the coach. And the coach (and nearly everyone else) reminds him that swimming is a solo sport and at camp one must focus on the training. At the end there is, of course, a race to determine which one will go to the Olympics. Though some of the race is shown, much more of it is represented by the five guys doing a dance on the bottom of the empty pool to suggest the progress of the race. That was pretty cool. At a couple of movie sites I don’t think the movie is accurately described. On Fandango, where I watched it, the end of the description is, “However, their swimming coach does not believe in friendship between competitors.” But it isn’t their friendship that is the problem, it’s their being late for practice. And IMDb says, “Sees the discriminative tendencies in sports against LGBTQ people, and how a sportsman learns to accept and love himself despite that.” But discrimination against LGBTQ people in swimming or any other sport is never mentioned or shown – unless one counts Eraz dying his hair yellow and the coach telling him to cut it. Which I don’t count. Aldous Pennyfathing of Daily Kos wrote:

Florida Sen. Rick Scott has bitter complaints about the alleged persecution of Donald Trump, and he’s using his own trials and tribulations to illustrate his point. Trump himself loves to claim he’s been treated more unfairly than any politician ever... But instead of proving that Trump is being unfairly targeted, what Scott really demonstrated is how unnervingly easy it still is for rich white men to get away with egregious s--- in America.

Scott presided over one of the worst Medicare frauds in American history, yet was still able to get elected as Florida’s governor, then its junior senator. “In other words, criming is okay if you’re a Republican—especially if you’re a rich, white, male one.” Pennyfarthing has details on Scott’s scandal. Kerry Eleveld of Kos reported that Rep. Scott Perry of PA has been pushing the Great Replacement Theory, which claims that Democrats are letting in all these brown people so they can register to vote and drown out the white vote. Yeah, they can’t be registered that fast. Perry isn’t the only one and the word “invasion” is being used by lots of Republicans to scare people about the southern border. But that has consequences. The El Paso shooter in 2019 said he acted because of the “Hispanic Invasion.” And two years ago the Buffalo shooter mentioned invasion or invaders 39 times in his screed. Only a few Republicans will use the term “replacement theory.” But so many are using “invasion” it becomes a way to track the escalation of this theory. Mark Sumner of Kos reported that the nasty guy, in his election fraud case, can’t attack the judge, jury, or witnesses. He’s already been fined for contempt of court for violating the gag order. Though the nasty guy can’t, his surrogates can and are. One of those surrogates is Gov. Doug Bergum of ND. This may be part of his bid to be the new vice nasty. Don’t “be surprised if ‘who can craft the best social media attack’ becomes the new test for Trump's would-be VPs.” An Associated Press article posted on Kos lists the major events of the case, going all the way back to 2005 when the “Access Hollywood” tape was made. It didn’t become public until 2016, just before the election. The list goes up to the start of the trial. Joan McCarter of Kos reported Speaker Mike Johnson was the latest Republican to show up at the nasty guy’s trial and speak to the cameras outside to declare how terribly unfair the trial is. That news prompted a tweet from Liz Cheney:

Have to admit I’m surprised that @SpeakerJohnson wants to be in the “I cheated on my wife with a porn star” club. I guess he’s not that concerned with teaching morality to our young people after all.

McCarter concluded:

None of this is surprising, as Johnson was an architect of Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election. But his standing by Trump and declaring a court of law illegitimate is definitely taking it a step further. Johnson is doing all of this in an attempt to consolidate his support in the fractious House GOP conference—and he’s going to need it. After these antics, he can kiss goodbye to any help from Democrats to save his ass again.

Recently there was news that Biden awarded 19 Presidential Medals of Freedom. Congress can hand out awards too, the Congressional Gold Medal. These are awarded much less often. Sumner reported six Republicans want to award one to the nasty guy as a way to suck up to him. The award would be for “dedication to strengthening America’s diplomatic relations,” apparently as in abandoning allies, enabling Putin, verbally sparring with Canada, and insulting G20 leaders. Don’t worry, the nasty guy isn’t going to get this nugget anytime soon. It’s a rough route to the House floor and when it gets there, it must get a two-thirds vote. In a pundit roundup for Kos, Chitown Kev quoted Hannah Knowles and Marianne Levine of the Washington Post:

Ambitious Republicans are eagerly parachuting onto the sidelines of the first criminal trial of a former president, with a lineup that includes former Trump critics plunging themselves into the proceedings. The pilgrimages demonstrate the imperative in today’s GOP to show loyalty to Trump and his fervent base in the midst of a case that has become a showcase of salacious scandal. ... The visits show how the party has changed in some respects since 2016, when Republicans initially scrambled to distance themselves from Trump’s suggestion on the “Access Hollywood” tape that, as a celebrity, he could kiss and grope women whenever he wanted. Now, they have provided a small army of surrogates arguing that the charges are unfair and unusual, and amplifying his often exaggerated or baseless claims about the case and the legal system.

Notably missing from the court are the nasty guy’s wife and daughter. Down in the comments are a cartoon and a meme. The first is the editorial cartoon for the West Central Tribune. It shows a man talking to a woman wearing a “MAGA” hat and “Freedom” shirt.

Man: We are going to mandate that everyone wear a mask until this pandemic is over. Woman: What?! The government can’t tell me what to do with my body! Man: We’re going to force you to have a baby whether you want to or not. Woman: Okie-dokie!

The meme was posted by user exlrrp. It shows a photo of the nasty guy, his wife, and Stormy Daniels. The text says, “A Bible salesman, his pregnant wife, and the woman he never ever ever ever met, but paid her $130,000 for something they never ever ever ever did...” Eleveld reported the nasty guy’s campaign is trying to say they are focusing on quality over quantity. I’m not sure what that means. Quality of what? Votes? How does one get higher quality votes? What it probably means is quality of field offices. Lots of Republican state strategists are wondering why there are so few of them, especially in battleground states. Perhaps it is because so much of his and RNC campaign dollars are going to legal fees? Sumner wrote about the New York Times coverage of the nasty guy’s speech in Wildwood, New Jersey. Sumner wrote that few news outlets reported what the nasty guy actually said.

That was certainly true of The New York Times, which breezed through 99% of Trump’s speech: “Mr. Trump’s speech largely consisted of what has become his standard fare.” This oversimplification of Trump’s speech failed to mention Trump’s comparing himself to Al Capone, praise for fictional serial killer Hannibal Lecter, or his bizarre series of statements that an unidentified “they” were “emptying out their mental institutions into the United States.” Instead, The New York Times edited down Trump’s speech to create the candidate they want to exist: one who is romping to victory and threatening to win a solid blue state.

The parts left out included: Grade-school insults aimed at perceived enemies. His attacks on the trial judge. His tossing off a series of nonsensical statements. That thousands walked out as his rambling included praise for criminals and serial killers.

As Esquire points out, the Times coverage is a masterclass in how not to cover an event. “The only story to be written about this event is that a huge crowd gathered to see and hear the presumptive presidential candidate have some sort of episode in public,” wrote Esquire’s Charles P. Pierce.. Instead, the Times created such an object lesson in normalization that it “ought to be taught in journalism schools as an example of what never to do.”

I’ve heard that Biden challenged the nasty guy to a couple debates and the challenge was accepted. If the nasty guy is tossing off series of nonsensical statements I think Biden will have no trouble eating his lunch – and drawing a strong contrast between a competent and a senile mind. But I’d be torn between avoiding debates as I usually do and wanting to watch the takedown. Popcorn, anyone? Sumner used Colorado and Tennessee as examples of what a state controlled by Democrats can accomplish compared to one controlled by Republicans. Colorado: Two free years of college, making school funding less dependent on community property wealth, tax credits to reduce child poverty, zoning changes to increase affordable housing, and fees on oil and gas to promote transit, conservation, and renewable energy. Tennessee: A bill to arm teachers, another to fortify campuses, a third to require age appropriate firearms training starting in pre-kindergarten. And a law requiring teachers to out trans students. An article by Piper Hutchinson of the Louisiana Illuminator posted on Kos reported state Rep. Beau Beaullieu (R), on behalf of Gov. Jeff Landry (R), is preparing legislation to call for a constitutional convention. The primary purpose is to take things out of the state constitution and turn them into ordinary laws that are a lot easier for legislators to change. Since many things, especially rights, are put into constitutions to protect them from meddling legislators we know what this is all about. A big reason why this news is getting a lot of exposure is because of a piece that is reportedly to be left in the new constitution. That is the ban on same-sex marriage. That’s even though 62% of residents support same-sex marriage. Half of Republicans nationwide also support it. That piece is currently not operational because of the Supreme Court decision back in 2015 that declared such bans as unconstitutional. But Republicans want to leave it in the state constitution because of all the talk from various Supremes that they’re looking for a case to overturn the 2015 decision. Even if Beaullieu’s bill passes, convention delegates may decide on their own what to leave in and take out. And even if a new constitution is written it must be approved by voters. But this is Louisiana. I’ve written a few times about Project 2025, the 920 page Kos document of how to implement Christian Nationalism when the next Republican becomes president. Dartagnan of the Kos community reported Republican senators are laying groundwork by introducing ...

an Orwellian bill that would establish a federal website, Pregnancy.gov. The website would enable the Department of Health and Human Services to solicit and collect personal identifying information on pregnant women and others, ostensibly for the purpose of providing them with prenatal advice on how to proceed with their pregnancies... Innocently termed the MOMS Act, the explicit purpose of the legislation is to “support, encourage and assist” women in “carry[ing] their pregnancies to term,” by directing them to so-called pregnancy crisis centers whose purpose is to discourage—and often intimidate—women and others from terminating their pregnancies. The proposed law provides for direct, personal contact to be initiated by a cadre of newly installed, theocratic government employees toward pregnant patients who register their contact information with the site in order to pressure them in their reproductive decisions. It also implements a federalized regimen for child support payments that commences at the moment of pregnancy, laying the groundwork for governmental regulation that treats “fetal personhood” as a recognized status under U.S. law. This legislation is being touted by Republicans—stung by recent electoral defeats by voters who abhor their forced-birth policies—as an example of their compassion toward women and others who become pregnant. What it reveals, however, is not compassion, but coercion, harassment, and ultimately, control.