Criticizing Republicans is like shooting fish in a barrel

But what the heck, I’m going to do it anyway.

An interesting Atlantic article looks at how Republicans, even those initially opposed, caved in to Trump; Lindsay Graham, for example, defends his devoted toadying to Trump as a need to “stay relevant.” LGM says this reflects how much politics resembles celebrity — Graham, Kevin McCarthy and the others profiled don’t “seem to have any genuine political commitments per se: they are pure careerists, and their ‘careers’ consist of simply trying to be and remain famous. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz Lauren Boebert don’t even pretend, they’re all about mugging and saying outrageous things for the cameras. Of course, Sarah Palin blazed the trail for them.

Some Republican pundits are now triangulating to argue if liberals oppose Trump, they should support Ron DeSantis. If Trump gets the nomination in 2024, the same pundits will forget they ever said it. And in answer to their question, DeFascist isn’t much of an improvement. Thanks to his Don’t Say Gay policies, for instance, the Orange County school district is telling gay teachers they can’t talk about their spouse or put photos of their spouse on their desk. As Fred Clark says, right-wingers think their right to take offense trumps the freedom to exist.

While DeSantis pretends Don’t Say Gay is all about fighting groomers, he says absolutely nothing about groomers in the Christian right. Nor will groups accusing librarians of being groomers for stocking gay-friendly books give a crap. But as noted at the link, they will happily make it easier to sue librarians.

NC State Rep. Ben Moss is very upset that some local governments offer EV chargers for free. So upset he wants our state to budget $50,000 to destroy all chargers on public property. Unless, of course, there’s a free gas pump as well. Oh, and if the charger’s on private property, such as a restaurant or store, receipts have to show how much of the customer’s payment went to fund the charger. That part has me scratching my head; is Moss getting his payoff from Big Oil or (as suggested at the link) electric-car dealers who don’t want competition for their chargers?

Republicans in Pennsylvania want the state constitution to ban abortion. Kayleigh McEnany lies that there’s no way anyone will ban interstate travel for abortions so Biden’s executive order on abortion rights is pointless. As I keep saying, right-wingers have been assuring us abortion rights are safe since at least Kavanaugh’s nomination. I think they all know better. And then there’s Texas.

I knew Virginia Republicans Tim Anderson and Tommy Altman had sued Barnes & Noble for selling the graphic novel Gender Queer but now they’re also suing the author and publisher for obscenity.

Sen. Marco “smirk like a sociopath” Rubio is one of those Republicans coming up with ways to help families cope with kids post-Dobbs. His solutions: a child tax credit unavailable to low earners and paid parental leave that parents pay back later by docking their Social Security.

Along with whiny fascist J.D. Vance, Peter Thiel has another protege running for office, Arizona’s Blake Masters, who’s also been endorsed by neo-Nazi Andrew Anglin. “You’d think it would be easy for a serious statewide Republican candidate to simply attack a kook like this as evil. Instead, Masters pivoted from a pro forma rejection to blaming the media. Rather than renounce any of Anglin’s beliefs or assert that his positions have nothing in common with them, Masters attacked reporters for smearing “anybody who believes in common sense border security as some kind of ‘Nazi.’” Dude, Anglin is a Nazi, he’s quite open about it.

Also from Arizona Rep. Debbie Lesko not only says she wants guns to protect her family, she says to protect her right to guns she’d kill her children.

Nikki Haley is very bad with numbers.

Republican Florida Man Randy Fine invited a convicted war criminal and murderer to a July 4 event.

It’s worth noting that while Biden has been criticized for not doing enough to fix our current situation, he has been using the bully pulpit to speak up, and pushing what he can through the Senate despite the massive obstacle of Manchin and Sinema. While we’re once again seeing calls for a moderate third party, most of what they say they want, the Democrats are already supporting. The Dems are far from perfect, but they’re far, far better than the alternative.