We have all wondered what the GOP has in mind post-Trump. Wonder no more, because J.D. Vance is going to tell you. Donald Trump would keel over if he knew how completely expendable he is to the current Republican establishment. They know full well what an idiot Trump is but for the moment he’s a useful idiot, their useful idiot. The GOP is desperate and desperate people do crazy things. Before you listen to both this tape and the one below it, let me remind you of David Frum’s comment in 2018: “When conservatives realize that they cannot win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy.” Reject democracy and replace it with what exactly? Ahhh. So glad you asked. Let Senator Vance explain it to you. Now. Before it’s too late.
The people behind project 2025 only need Trump for his base. They just need him to get the presidency, then they won’t need him anymore…pic.twitter.com/BELSfHNj8o
— PoliticsGirl (@IAmPoliticsGirl) September 16, 2024
The theme of overthrowing the government is one that seems to resonate with the dregs of what once was the Republican party. Trump was only too happy to put his vice president’s life in danger on January 6, 2021. That was a small price to pay. And Vance has made it clear that if he had been in Pence’s position, he would have gone along with the coup d’etat.
This is who Vance is. This is who Trump is. This is who the GOP is. Believe them, because they are telling you who they are. The only part of this that is laughable is that Trump thinks that this election is all about him. Au contraire. He’s a pain in the ass. Ironically, the Republicans hate Trump as much as the Democrats do. But they are more than willing to put up with him if they can get hold of the Oval Office and then who knows? Cholesterol might do her job. Or a tainted Diet Coke. Or an open window, as stated.
Democracy could be gone in a heartbeat. This “movement” that is spoken of has indeed been operating for the past 50 years. Even Dwight D. Eisenhower spoke of such things back in the day. He saw with clarity the direction that things were going in a post-WWII, Cold War world.
Richard Nixon made no bones about who he was. And we have certainly seen the dark side of the Republican party in every single Republican administration since Eisenhower.
Vance is ready to become a dictator. He’s a millenial. He doesn’t have the enculturation that boomers have, having learned about WWII and all that it meant at our parents’ knee. And if Trump is actually the figurehead to become a dictator first, all the better. Vance was hand picked and it was said to be a disastrous choice. But it was a choice made for reasons which are quite obvious. Dan Rather kicks in his two cents on Vance:
The most startling takeaway from a deep dive into Vance’s legion of interviews is that he is a wildly ambitious and opportunistic chameleon. He has transformed from a fairly moderate conservative, a self-described “never Trumper” who called the former president “cultural heroin,” “reprehensible,” and “America’s Hitler,” to a lapdog loyalist who has seemingly been absolved by Trump — perhaps because he has proven to be the anti-Mike Pence, willing to do anything to “win” an election.
Last week, on the “All-In” podcast, Vance said that in 2020, he “would have asked the states to submit alternative slates of electors and let the country have the debate about what actually matters and what kind of an election that we had,” thus throwing the presidential election results into complete chaos. He would have done this with no evidence of any election fraud, much less widespread fraud. Vance is an authoritarian in the making.
Just a reminder: Vance is willing to become vice president for a man who sent an angry mob to kill his last vice president.
Vance’s total and complete transformation into the MAGA heir-apparent happened as he sycophantically sought Trump’s endorsement of his 2022 Senate candidacy.
Vance converted to Catholicism from atheism five years ago. He now identifies as Christian nationalist. His reactionary views on gun control and same-sex marriage are not surprising. What is much less mainstream, even for MAGA, is when he veers into strident misogyny. Vance opposes abortion, including in cases of rape and incest. He believes a pregnancy resulting from rape should not be considered “inconvenient.” He has said that professional women “choose a path to misery” by picking careers over having children. He has called child care subsidies “class war against normal people” and opposes no-fault divorces, suggesting women should stay in abusive marriages.
With views as radical as these, even some Republicans have questioned Trump’s choice of Vance as his running mate. But if it’s an attack dog Trump wanted, he got it.
It was Vance who gave legs to the now infamous lie about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, eating residents’ pets. He told Trump about it. One might think that after the political fallout from Trump regurgitating the story several times during the debate, and the real fallout in Springfield, where hospitals, schools, and even city hall have been threatened, he would let it go. He did not. On Sunday, Vance made the rounds of the political talk shows doubling down on his false narrative.
He told CNN’s Dana Bash that “the American media totally ignored this stuff until Donald Trump and I started talking about cat memes. If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I’m going to do.”
Bash replied, “You just said that this is a story that you created.”
Vance then tripled down. “It comes from firsthand accounts from my constituents. I say that we’re creating a story, meaning we’re creating the American media focusing on it. I didn’t create 20,000 illegal migrants coming into Springfield thanks to Kamala Harris’s policies.”
A point of clarification: The Haitian immigrants in Springfield are there legally and came because the city needed workers, according to the mayor.
So Trump gets his toadying pit bull, and we might get a dangerous politico who makes decisions based on what it will mean for his future, not for ours. In the meantime, the Trump-Vance lies continue to distract and dominate news coverage.
This election isn’t about Democrat v. Republican. This is about democracy versus fascism. If Trump/Vance is resoundingly defeated, then the GOP — what’s left of it — will have to come up with something else. Or, maybe this is the new normal for what’s left of the GOP. MAGA may become one party, backed by billionaires, which is the state of play right now. And it is possible that the right-wing or right of center GOPers can and will form a new conservative party post-election. We won’t know and we can’t know what the options for a post-MAGA world is from today’s perspective. We can only watch this hand of cards be played out and see what happens after November 5.
Ironically, Trump is always saying that “November 5 is the most important day in the history of America.” Even the broken clock is right twice a day.
Hey America…don’t look at Germany during the Olympics there in the 30s, with a veneer of decency, albeit it was propaganda…look at it in 1945…millions dead and the country destroyed. Want that for our children? Better vote against it. You’ve been warned.
Oh, golly, you mean even more of them are nothin’ but transactional game show hosts with visions of grandeur? Who woulda thunk?!?
I would rather vote for Old Joe, Winnie the Pooh, Ronald McDonald, Buggs Bunny, or Kamala Harris, OR ANY HOMELESS PERSON YOU CAN FIND DOING THE ROBOT ON THE SIDE OF A ROAD, than as a conservative I would EVER vote for Donald Trump and Vance.
PERIOD.
“A point of clarification: The Haitian immigrants in Springfield are there legally and came because the city needed workers, according to the mayor.”
During the tRump Administration!!!