The photos of the "crowds" at the tank parade remind me of when Bill Hicks would come on stage in an almost-empty club, scan the room slowly, and announce "I've had more people in bed than this" ...
When the president sends a cabinet member on TV to announce "We are using the military to liberate an American city from its elected leaders," where do you go from there. What is left to say. The idea of that being anything short of a near-universal "Wait, what the fuck is going on" moment proves how far we've backslid.
This is from 2022 but it was absolutely right. The practiced buffoonery of Trump 1, all the "just kiddings" and "seriously but not literallys" absolutely succeeded in desensitizing people who are hardly paying any attention to the harder stuff they always intended to do next. ...
The basic fallacy in chasing votes by being "tough on immigration" is that the modal American's position on the issue is "Deport the Bad ones and keep the Good ones," and they alone know who is which, and that simply does not translate into workable policy. So this kind of gestapo stuff horrifies some of the same people who cheered when Trump promised to do it. There are true sociopaths who love this, but "No, I meant only the BAD immigrants! Not my coworker/friend/neighbor!" is as likely a reaction as enthusiasm. You cannot do immigration policy that satisfies these people because what they want is nonsensical.
So by the time center-left parties fully commit to chasing the far right by "getting tough" on immigration, the backlash has already begun to build and they walk right into it. "I thought you people wanted this!" No, they want something impossible and convinced themselves they'd could have it - the "eat whatever you want AND lose weight!" of immigration policies.
It is hard to grasp but large masses of Americans are both racist/xenophobic AND not racist/xenophobic enough to applaud what Trump is doing. It's goldilocks shit, they want a level of racism/xenophobia calibrated exactly to their personal preferences, and you just can't make that policy. Don't try. ...
AP: Trump extends olive branch, invites Musk to White House cellar to taste some brand new amontillado ...
Mo says:
Fucking That Straw Man, a ripping Winger fanfic yarn
Best comment about the author:
"if he doesn't stop typing stories like this he's going to go blind."
Dbp says:
The right wing is just as appalled by the refugees as they are by Isis. Isis beheads people, but the refugees are brown and over here, well in Europe and the middle east but those places are too close for comfort.
wetcasements says:
Those pussified Euro wussies like France and Germany and the UK are taking in _hundreds of thousands_ of refugees, while our Republican governors can't be bothered to take in 10K.
The greatest lie the GOP ever told itself (and believed 100%) is that they were a pack of Realist He-Men.
In fact, they're the worst sorts of cowards. Complete cravens.
HoosierPoli says:
Wetcasements: If Germany and company could have made the decision whether to take refugees or not, you bet your britches they would have said no.
I live in Passau, hundreds of thousands of refugees have come through here since the summer. The refugees are HERE and now we have to decide what to do with them; there was no decision-making process beforehand. We just ignored the problem until it was on our doorstep.