Poor Princess Tone Deaf. This always happens. She sets out to make such a contribution to being relevant and culturally hip, unlike her dense younger brother and her stoned older one, and it backfires. Today’s foot thrust into the excrement was when Ivanka went on Instagram to share her vaccination shot, “Today I got the shot. I hope you do too. Thank you Nurse Torres!” and boy, did she get a backlash. Raw Story:
“I’m losing respect for the Trump family. So over this virtue signaling,” said one poster. Another said, “No thanks! Don’t want to be a lab rat. #justsayno.” Yet another replied, “Your personal choice but please don’t push on others.”
“No thanks! With a 99% survival rate, I shall pass. With Bill Gates involved I will not get one,” said Rice448.
“Hell no. Why would you post this?” asked kenny_vv.
“Nope not putting that in my body,” said call_me_g95.
“Bummer. I was hoping you were above this kind of virtue signaling,” rmgvd commented.
“Wow that’s extremely disappointing, but honestly I’m not surprised,” said heather_15la.
“Nope and please stop trying to manipulate us into doing so. It’s surprising to see you doing this now like the left and Hollywood have been,” said the__real__american.
Now, here’s the deal. If Ivanka wants to be a senator someday or run for Matt Gaetz’ seat when he loses it, whatever, she’s got.to.follow.the.playbook. Here’s the playbook. It’s written by Matt Stavers, who runs Liberty Counsel, a group which purports itself to be religious in nature and what it does in reality is fear monger for contributions. Here’s what they’re pitching. Right Wing Watch:
Long before COVID, a plan was hatched to steal your freedom.
COVID was the springboard to get people to give up freedom for “safety.” Now dark forces are pushing the greatest crackdown on freedom yet — it comes straight from Communist China under the guise of a “vaccine passport” to restrict travel and entry to businesses and events based on the government’s directives.
Will America bow to Big Tech and an app that will track where you buy groceries, dine, shop, work, attend school, attend a political rally or even go to church? A few states are now pushing back, but we need more pushback!
The “globalists” headed by none other than Bill Gates, who will do as an anti-Christ figure until the real one shows up, are using the vaccination to institute “constant surveillance and social control.”
This is a primo conspiracy theory, one of the better ones I’ve seen. Stavers knows that an inexpensive malaria drug will cure the coronavirus, but of course the fake news media won’t tell you about it, which means only Stavers can get it for you, and if you send him money, he’ll not only tell you about it, he’ll burn up the fax machines in Congress for you.
And that brings us to the money ask: Liberty Counsel has apparently figured out, like other right-wing groups and politicians, that peddling anti-vaccine messages can be a lucrative source of cash. Staver’s email repeatedly asked supporters to pay for Liberty Counsel to fax messages to members of Congress and governors—ranging from $5 for a fax to congressional leaders to $75 for faxes to congressional leaders, governors, members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and all House and Senate Republicans. The messages oppose mandatory vaccines and the use of “vaccine passports.” Staver praised right-wing Govs. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Greg Abbott of Texas for acting to “ban vaccine passports”—in other words, prevent businesses from requiring customers to provide proof of vaccination to do things like get on a cruise ship.
Staver followed up with yet another email Tuesday, charging that President Joe Biden wants to “federalize mass surveillance and vaccination of citizens via their cell phones,” which he described as “effectively turning America into the People’s Republic of China!”
Staver described a mandatory phone app that he said allows the Chinese government to switch a person’s “code” to red, which prevents them from entering public buildings, stores, or restaurants, essentially consigning them to home arrest. “And Biden wants to bring this liberty-killing travesty here!” Staver claimed.
I really like the code change. That is bad dystopian sci fi at it’s best. And it’s all about money. The red tribe wants you to send tons of money to its leaders so it can combat the evil blue tribe. Max Boot wrote about it today and he said, “the right-wing money machine has become the tale wagging the Republican elephant.” Washington Post:
As Terry Dolan of the National Conservative Political Action Committee said: “The shriller you are, the better it is to raise money.” Conservative fundraising appeals, now on the Internet, depend on “triggering” right-wing voters on incendiary issues such as abortion, gun rights, marriage equality, transgender rights, immigrant “invasions,” and now “cancel culture” and “wokeism,” while warning of imminent doom unless you send in your donation today. That creates a financial imperative to wage culture wars to keep the cash registers ringing.
Mickey Edwards, a former Republican member of Congress from Oklahoma, recently wrote in the Bulwark about his experience as chairman of the American Conservative Union in the early 1980s, when the process was just beginning:
“The ACU, and conservatives generally, had long been focused on a few things — keeping taxes low, keeping regulation in bounds, adequately funding national defense, and, more generally (this was how conservatism was defined in political terms), prudence and skepticism in the face of proposals for sweeping overhauls. However, what I found in the fundraising letters I was being sent to sign were harangues centered on social issues. Waging the culture war was a more effective way of raising money.”
Edwards edited out the social issues, but over time they took precedence in Republican politics — and policy. “These fights began to creep into Congress as well,” Edwards wrote, “the usual partisan squabbles over tax policy, defense spending, foreign policy, assistance programs, and budget levels joined by bitter and continuous partisan fights over social issues: abortion, gay rights, women’s empowerment, etc.”
Fast-forward to today. I recently received a fundraising email from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R.-Ga.), the kook who blames Jewish space lasers for wildfires. Alongside a picture of her holding an assault rifle, she writes that she will “fight” President Biden “with everything I have.” “Will you stand with me against Joe Biden’s tyranny?” she demands, seeking a “gift of $50, $100, or even $1,000 TODAY!” Such violent appeals work: According to Politico, Greene raked in a whopping $3.2 million in the first three months of 2021 despite (or, more likely, because of) being kicked off her House committees for her extremist rhetoric.
So this is what Ivanka needs to get hip about and fast, if she wants a political career in right-wingnuttia, because this is what it is. You find out which issues are hot buttons ones, and you fundraise off of them. Ivanka doesn’t know which side of the cultural divide she’s on and that has to stop fast, if she wants to follow in daddy’s footsteps.
“Mama says stupid is as stupid does.” Forrest gump
Fund raise by paying for a FAX?
What century is this?
I could be wrong, but aren’t these anti-vaxxers the same people that attack Asians verbally and physically for bringing the pandemic? They can’t seem to make up their minds. Is Covid nothing to be afraid of, or what?
Wannabe Princess Ivanka is again trying to dance along the edge of the razor blade. Daddy HID his getting vaccinated – how what passes for how his mind functions is anybody’s guess but somewhere in there was a recognition that making a show of getting vaccinated probably would make the MAGA goobers he preaches to (about COVID being a hoax and related bullshit) say WTF? and maybe question their to-date unconditional trust. Now she’s gone and made a big deal of getting vaccinated to try (again) to create some separation from daddy’s crazy talk and create her own image that SHE is fit for polite, upper-crust society. And the reaction (as you’ve noted) from MAGA land is rather less than supportive. In fact it’s downright derisive!
Wannabe Princess Ivanka has tried all along to have it both ways – making money off daddy’s company and “brand” but keeping enough distance from him that she and her hubby could run around and play on the fringes of official NYC society. Jarvanka might not have been full members of that club but they were at least allowed in the proverbial clubhouse back before Trump got into elective politics. I wonder how many times they’ve wished they’d just stayed up in NYC and tried to keep a low profile. However, to quote the schtick from a John Belushi SNL character “But NOOOOOOO!” As I said there was this attempt to have it both ways, and maybe use “influence” from the WH to build their own separate (from Trump) brand and of course it has backfired. Big time.
Now we see Wannabe Princess Ivanka nurturing dreams of her own big time political career and cursed with the knowledge that in addition to the goobers of MAGA land she will need some old-school GOP support (probably realizes that daddy has burned too many bridges – she saw what happened in 2018!) and even some crossover. Doing the “I got my shot and you should too!” thingy might have seemed like a good idea but she’s sat silently for far too long as daddy did his thing. Like others in her family she isn’t as smart or savvy as she thinks she is and didn’t get that she could have it both ways – full devotion (as Trump’s daughter) from MAGAts AND crossover appeal into non-MAGA nation. She didn’t realize that it’s an either/or thing and now she’s getting skewered. I’m not shedding any tears over it and sleep I lost last night was over stuff worth losing sleep over like the George Floyd trial, GOP voter suppression bills, Russia’s threatening major fighting in Ukraine…stuff that is worthy of concern. Wannabe Princess Ivanka’s budding political career and hurt fee-fees don’t register as anything other than entertainment that brings a smile to my face over her dismay – as well as imagining her frustration in spoiled daddy’s girl stamping her foot in anger over not being able to twist daddy around her little finger on this one.
Think about it. Really. Can’t you just imagine her whining to daddy that people are being mean to her? All those people he (Trump) has such a hold on that they are sending in all that money and keeping the whole family one step ahead of financial collapse? And DEMANDING that daddy speak up on her behalf and his refusing to do so? If you want your smile to turn into a big ole belly laugh then this thought should do it – imagine Trump taking his little Wannabe Princess to task for embarrassing HIM by making a show of getting vaccinated! And Ivanka running from the room in tears! (If enjoying the thought of that makes me an asshole then I’m ok with it!) Because that’s likely what went down yesterday evening.
Ivanka has always thought she’s had a special status among Trump’s evil spawn. Now and then she gets reminded that he will throw her under the bus just like he does her brothers. And will to Tiffany too, who probably won’t ever be a full member of the family anyway. This week our Wannabe Princess is getting reminded again that no matter how much daddy lusts after her she’s nothing more than a piece of ass he can’t have, and even if she was as sick and twisted as him and willing to give in that’s all she’ll ever be to him. Just another trophy like his wives.
So I’m going to enjoy the hell out of her self-inflicted skewering by the Trump faithful in MAGA land. I take my entertainment where I can find it.