It was never even delusion

He’s just a liar.

For Juneteenth – the links between MAGA and the Old South

Very good article.

The Old South was in fact a totalitarian dictatorship as anyone could be conscripted into the militias for just about any purpose, including to use tax money to help a private owner recover escaped slaves. That is why every white man was expected to have a gun. That is how the proto-confederacy viewed the Second Amendment. MAGA is not about economic policy or politics even. It is not about conservatism in the Burkean sense of the word. It is about cultural identity. The article underscores the case.

On the cheap fake videos JT keeps posting

Will swing voters fall for it?

Hate crime in my old stomping grounds

This is really sad. About 35 years ago I lived near Bellingham and I subbed in the schools there – including Whatcom Middle. Bellingham has always had its problems, but this is really upsetting. This kid is going to have nightmares about this for the rest of his life.

https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/11-year-old-victim-alleged-hate-crime-bellingham-tells-his-story/6JMFOJ4H5BAKJDAYK7AIFGYFZ4/?outputType=amp&fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR2wPwMyTC7nOv0qpumKojnjrUOjDLfZSsds9lgjnmRnKMsH9nAMjWglCGg_aem_ZmFrZWR1bW15MTZieXRlcw

The Pentagon’s covert anti-vax disinformation campaign in the Philippines

It was intended to sow distrust of China. It began under Trump, but Biden didn’t stop it until several months into his administration.

“Why did you do it when people were dying? We were desperate,” said Dr. Nina Castillo-Carandang, a former adviser to the World Health Organization and Philippines government during the pandemic. “We don’t have our own vaccine capacity,” she noted, and the U.S. propaganda effort “contributed even more salt into the wound.”

….

“I’m sure that there are lots of people who died from COVID who did not need to die from COVID,” she said.

To implement the anti-vax campaign, the Defense Department overrode strong objections from top U.S. diplomats in Southeast Asia at the time, Reuters found. Sources involved in its planning and execution say the Pentagon, which ran the program through the military’s psychological operations center in Tampa, Florida, disregarded the collateral impact that such propaganda may have on innocent Filipinos.

“We weren’t looking at this from a public health perspective,” said a senior military officer involved in the program. “We were looking at how we could drag China through the mud.”

On the price of a cookie

Speaking of individual agency – if you and people like you stop paying that much for a cookie, it wouldn’t cost that much. Must be one Hell of a cookie! Maybe it’s a better cookie than it was when Trump was President. Maybe Biden’s policies made it better.

Update: Some are calling his story into question. Go figure!

This guy does not live in isolation

We like to think that if we just send this one bad antisemite to jail that we have taken care of the problem. We separate him from society, and the rest of us are all just fine. That he just decided one day that he doesn’t like Jewish people.

I do believe in individual agency. But I also believe in socialization. That’s not a contradictory position to take. We are influenced by society. We also make choices to act on that influence.

All 9 Republican Senators running for reelection voted against protection of couples to have children through in vitro fertilization

John Barrasso

Marsha Blackburn

Kevin Cramer

Ted Cruz

Deb Fischer

Josh Hawley

Pete Ricketts

Rick Scott

Roger Wicker

We discuss Hunter Biden’s legal troubles; Trump’s revenge platform; and the Alito family’s culture war

Anybody remember that “divorce?”

There is no room for even mild dissent in today’s GOP.

That being said, Paul Ryan is one of the figures who helped bring this on.