It's Only June, and the Level of Stupid and Right-Wing Rhetoric Is Already Wearing Me Out
For three and a half years, a lot of the stupid was hidden, but now Trump supporters are returning in droves.
They are suddenly again everywhere. After Trump won in 2016, all those who feared admitting they supported him suddenly floated to the top and began shouting — “We did it.” For four years, despite the horror of the Trump presidency, the embarrassment, the corruption, and the daily blows to our collective kidneys, they made excuses for him. Then, January 6th, a day that shook the nation, happened, and most of them fell silent, their voices muted by the weight of the event.
Many of us, and I was one of them, were lulled into a belief that January 6th would become the straw that broke the back of their unwavering support. The silence was wonderful. Feeling like a parent whose five kids were suddenly taken to grandma’s house for a sleepover, the house was deliciously quiet. But Mitch McConnell, silly, Moscow Mitch, foolishly assumed that our energy vampire, Trump, January 6th becoming the wooden stake through Trump’s heart.
If only Mitch had supported a full impeachment, then none of what is going on now would be “going on now.” The cockroaches would be safely back under the kitchen cabinets and the refrigerator, and little of the greasy streaks of hate and ignorance upon which they feed would be left alone to fade away with time. People eventually grow out of certain prejudices and into new ones, but if they are not instigated to take on new ones, the vast majority just let go of them and plod along to the next day. Trump embodies the hate and gives a loud, albeit inarticulate, voice to the stupid in our society. Imagine being a dummy, and suddenly, the president says you are “smart,” actually. It’s intoxicating.
Here it is, D-Day, 2024, and it’s beginning to seem like each morning that I wake, I find myself a little bit further along into the restricting air of a coal mine. I find myself intellectually gasping for air at times, lost in a darkness so unforgiving that after a few moments, the brain begins to doubt that light ever existed.
More and more people who just last year, just last month, proclaimed that they would die before casting a vote for Trump are now declaring him the best chance for making America great again (he had his chance, and he pushed us to the brink of dangerous irrelevance — he almost destroyed us!). Right-wing propaganda has become so powerful that people can’t remember what happened eight-seven-six-five-four-three years ago. They don’t recall the criminal ineptitude that resulted in hundreds of thousands more dying during a once-in-a-century pandemic. Instead, they accuse an honored civil servant and esteemed doctor who did everything he could to keep us safe (Fauci).
The stupid is so thick that people can’t connect the dots: the pandemic knocked supply chains out of whack, resulting in worldwide inflation. The U.S. acted more aggressively to combat inflation and has had less than most other developed economies. The stupid don’t understand how Trump’s ignorant policies regarding his trade war with China never materialized into more jobs for Americans; it just raised prices on the things in Walmart. They blame this on Biden. They blame the overturning of abortion on Biden. They blame the war in Ukraine on Biden. They blame the fiasco in Afghanistan on Biden. They blame Gaza on Biden.
The hysteria is not reserved for just conservatives, though. Liberals, too, have lost touch with reality. The rhetoric coming from the left is just lunacy. “We won’t vote for Biden because he did this or that.” So, they will vote for RFK or Trump or not vote, handing a win to Trump, which will make things 1000 times worse. Where is the logic?
Sometimes, I go to the comments section on articles that report things that Trump says. Trump is now — again — saying that retribution will be his main priority. He is on record for saying that Biden, his wife, and Hillary Clinton might be imprisoned if he wins. His supporters in the comments are not just okay with this; they are parroting all of the lies and fantasies that Trump, and now most of the Republicans in Congress, push into the public record daily: the weaponization of the justice department, witch hunt, left fascist takeover, left wants to enslave Americans, sell America to China.
Insanity has become the norm. The patients have not just taken over the asylum, they have turned the asylum into our collective mind, and the crazier the shit is, the more credence it gets.
In one argument, the “independent” leaning toward Trump made a comment that shows how stupid people have become in our country.
As an independent, my №1 factor is economics. Full disclosure: Under Biden, I make more money. But under Trump, my money was worth more. And so that’s why I’m undecided. I don’t know who is the better side of the coin. I’m waiting to see who Trump chooses as his vice president (After Trump Verdict).
This is like saying, “Under Trump, I was younger,” and then blaming Biden because they got older. I don’t dare share many of the other comments because they are simply off-the-wall, bat-shit crazy; the comment here at least has some grip on reality.
As I told my wife this morning while I sipped my coffee, I am sick of it. I am sick of Putin. I am sick of the whining of Russians. I am sick that half of our country is so stupid and so weak intellectually to see that they are following the anti-Christ to our destruction. I am sick of MAGidiots and their perverse, twisted, upside-down reality. I am sick that no one seems to give a damn about the Earth we are killing with climate change. I saw an ad recently about a guy bragging about his car, which he cools for an hour before he leaves the house — he turns it on from inside and puts the AC on high. I want to kick this guy in the nuts and make him sit on a hot porch sweating. He was only like 30 years old. Does he see what’s going on?
Okay, here is it: AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
This inspires me:
The Trump Malignancy “Talented and well-practiced in every vice, a stranger to compassion or empathy, a liar and a cheat so complete in perfidy that he has elevated his dishonesty to hold it up as an ersatz moral principle, violent, so long as he can order someone else to do the dirty work, grotesque in body, graceless in action, in possession of a wounded self-regard so colossal as to smother any spark of grace, treasonous, not only to country, but to every ally he has ever had, the poisoned fruit and rankest flower of racism and contempt for women, and utterly devoid of shame for his moral and spiritual bankruptcy. That is your leader. That is to whom you give your money. That is who you follow and laud. That is whose banner you willingly carry. Why? Because he is a mirror, not a lighthouse. You see yourselves in him. He is what you would be, if you had inherited money and could shed the last vestiges of conscience and shame. No, I do not “respect your choices,” nor do I admire your loyalty and dedication to this mirific, demoniac vision. You have demonstrated not only a lack of civic virtue, loyalty to the Republic and to the rule of law, but a willingness to engage in violence and sedition at his slightest expressed wish. And you will never, ever admit you were wrong. Because you see your dark, twisted, resentful dreams in him. And to renounce him is to renounce yourselves.” ~ Advocatus Peregrini (Trump Ramps Up Violent Rhetoric).
I am sick of it, and it’s only D-Day.