Up Is Down, And You’re a Commie If You Don’t Agree
Did you know San Diego is one of the unhealthiest places to live in the United States? It must be true, they even had a graphic about it on Fox News.
Other talking heads at that network may inspire outrage, but they’re going to have to work real hard to top Dan Bongino’s effort this past Saturday.
During his weekly “Unfiltered” segment Bongino presented a graphic reading, “Top Ten Most Unhealthy U.S. Cities,” with the aim of making a connection with municipal governments dominated by Democrats.
I guess he’s pretty sure his viewers won’t be bothered to check up on his source for this heapin’ pile of malarkey. The ten cities listed by his source –Wallethub– were actually listed as the “healthiest places to live in the U.S.”
Lest anyone think Bongino was out there on his own with this truth flip-flop, the network let the commentary run intact on the late-night re-run of the program, sans the offending graphic.
The second time around, Bongino’s narrative was presented over videos of apparently homeless people in unidentified locations.
A Fox News spokesperson, in response to inquiries about the claims, said “On Saturday night’s episode of Unfiltered with Dan Bongino, a graphic was aired with inaccurate information on the unhealthiest cities in the country. We regret the error which will be corrected on next week’s program.”
Riiight. I’m sure they will, in a crawler of the teenyist type possible, and with one of those announcers used to speed read terms and conditions or drug side effects on ads.
I can only hope they’ll notice that they got Irving, Texas confused with Irvine, California.
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This brings me to the second part of today’s rant, namely the now-GOP-mainstream mantra about Democrats and socialism.
The second Whereas in the Republican National Committee censure of Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger–the one that decried the persecution of “ordinary citizens who engaged in legitimate political discourse”-- starts off with
The Biden Administration and Democrats in Congress have embarked on a systematic effort to replace liberty with socialism…
I keep waiting for some enterprising reporter to ask a Republican what is meant by “socialism,” mostly because I’m certain most of them wouldn’t know to say anything beyond mouthing the words “Green New Deal,” “George Soros,” or “AOC.”
The RNC’s use of the S word is considered reasonable because the GOP’s real nutcases are saying Democrats are bringing communism to America. Some of them are even saying Dems are doing this dastardly deed at the behest of the Chinese Communist Party.
Xi Jinping, the politician with the titles of General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, Chairman of the Central Military Commission, and President of the People's Republic of China, would likely get a chuckle out of these claims. And then he’d realize that anybody stupid enough to be saying this sort of mumbo-jumbo isn’t worthy of his attention.
It’s not that the Chinese don’t have ambitions about dominating the world in the 21st century; they do. But their formula for domination of territories not historically part of their empire isn’t really big on being involved in governance. Their model is more like the mafia: they’d like to control the purse strings without the day-to-day hassles of forced labor camps. (But they’ll sell us the barbed wire and technology needed.)
It’s been that way for decades now. Take a look at all the countries in the southern hemisphere where the Chinese have made significant infrastructure improvements with a few amenities like a soccer stadium thrown in with a “pay us later” financing program that includes dropping any contacts with Taiwan.
The Chinese would rather (financially) conquer Silicon Valley or Wall Street than Washington DC any day.
In the old days, GOP hardliners would have been yapping about Soviet Communism, but now that they are beholden to Uncle Vlad, the Chinese will have to do.
After all, with the Red Square Republicans celebrating July 4th, 2018 in Moscow, including Sens. Richard C. Shelby (Ala.), Steve Daines (Mont.), John Hoeven (N.D.), John Neely Kennedy (La.), Jerry Moran (Kan.), John Thune (S.D.) and Ron Johnson (WI), plus Rep. Kay Granger (Tex.), it’s not like they’re going to bite the hand that’s feeding them.
At the bottom of this socialism/communism fear fest is the ideological underpinning of our current gilded age, namely, Americans' collective distraction from considering the impact of their actions on others.
The idea of a Rising Tide Lifting All Boats has gone away, to be replaced by I’m Gonna Do It My Way. Consideration of the societal whole or empathy for individuals are considered threats to “freedom.”
We live in a mixed political economy. Social security is socialism. Medicare is socialism. Public libraries are socialism. Public education is socialism.
That’s why so many right wing policy ideas involve ultimately weakening or destroying all those things.
Unfortunately, it’s not possible currently to have public discussion about what “we as a society” should do. Thirty percent of the population don’t have enough respect for their fellow humans to take even the smallest of actions to protect the weakest of us.
And if you should ask them to wear a mask/get a shot/wear a seatbelt, it’s a personal attack, often worthy of threats or actual violence.
If the Communist Menace as portrayed back in the days of the Cold War were alive these days, the Red Army would already be in our midst, secure in the knowledge that a significant part of the population would rather shoot their neighbors than help them.
Email me at WritetoDougPorter@Gmail.com