That is quite a big basket of deplorables but all of them easily qualify.
Tuberville is exactly what you get when politics becomes personality. IMO, it started with Sarah Palin and has been careening downhill ever since. Whoever the moron was that thought she would be a good choice escalated stupid to a trait that most Republicans now glo…
That is quite a big basket of deplorables but all of them easily qualify.
Tuberville is exactly what you get when politics becomes personality. IMO, it started with Sarah Palin and has been careening downhill ever since. Whoever the moron was that thought she would be a good choice escalated stupid to a trait that most Republicans now glorify as "common sense" "real americans" "patriot"......
Musk is as dangerous to the future of the world as Trump is to the future of this country.....
Jeez, are you all that young? Palin was a blip. The original was Newt Gingrich, "The Man Who Broke Politics" (https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/11/newt-gingrich-says-youre-welcome/570832/ - by McKay Coppins, the same author who has written the new Mitt Romney book. The article doesn't do his damage justice; in Dana Milbank's book "The Destructionists", Gingrich gets the first 3 chapters, a sickening litany of everything from circulating a list of 65 pejoratives for Republicans to use to demonize Democrats (How to Talk Like Newt, 1990) to routinely making up damaging stories about people he wanted to take down, including throwing his weight behind the ridiculous narrative that the Clinton's had had Vince Foster killed - which ended up with sufficient legs that Republicans, including Trump, were still using it in 2016. He introduced government shutdowns and impeachment as political weapons, among other "innovations".
Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh were contemporaries and complementary, and there's a steady growth of the right-wing alternate-reality echo chamber from their day to now.
Reading Milbank's account of Gingrich's escapades, the parallels with Trump are sobering. Oh, and BTW - while Newt was rabidly publically moralizing about Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky, he was having his own affair with a 22-year-old house staffer (in 1999 he divorced his second wife, and married the staffer in 2000).
I really value Bill Kristol's contributions to the current thinking about Trump. But I can't think of Palin and what she helped start without recalling that he was an avid backer/booster of hers back then. Just more evidence that our world has gone topsy-turvy.
I seem to remember that it was Steve Schmidt a McCain campaign honcho, who recommended Palin back in 2008. Schmitt has since then offered up many, many "Mea Culpas" for that idea!
I think it started before Palin but yeah, she was the first big representative of the purely performative, populist wing of the party. The real problem for Republicans is that young conservatives were raised with Tea Party, Palin, Glenn Beck, Fox News and have no real reference for traditional, small government/family values.free market (such as it is) government. The 20 and 30-something Republicans LOVE the show. It's why they are here and I don't know how the party recovers.
Those of us a little older that had sympathies for at least some of those older views are now either conservative Dems or Dem voting (if not Dem leaning) independents. Pretty easy switch when one was only ever slightly more R than D to begin with, but unfortunately drove the sanity out of the R primary base.
I voted for McCain in the primary, although I was in the midst of my departure from the GOP then. When he selected Palin, I was out. I said then and have said it since, he put her on the ticket to appeal to the Bubba Vote - what we now call MAGA. "Ooooh weee, look at her - she's a babe and she can shoot a gun. Hot damn!"
You hit the nail on the head. When my then office-mate (a naturalized Pakistani/Muslim immigrant who had voted for George W. Bush TWICE) heard McCain had picked Palin she said "Does he think we're stupid?". She switched to Obama after that.
I thought that, too--THIS is what Republicans think is a good substitute for Hilary?? Although I'm a registered Democrat, I had been leaning toward McCain because Obama was too inexperienced in comparison. Then they trotted out Palin. The end.
I remember my Republican sister calling and saying "are you going to vote for him now? He chose a woman!" to which I said and choosing THAT woman is an insult to all of us.
Sarah Palin was, and remains, an idiot. I know Republicans who declined to vote for McCain because of her. She was political malpractice. Thankfully Alaska has moved on from her and elected much more qualified people to office. Yay, ranked choice voting!!
McCain lost a LOT of votes that day. Hours before I had said "He'll never pick Palin! Nobody in his right mind would do that! He'll lose every environmentalist instantly and that's just for starters!" (Steve Schmidt has been working to make up for that pick ever since -- though I recall the law firm hired to vet her failed to do so.)
For the first time in my adult life I was ready to vote for a GOP presidential candidate. But I'm a bit of a wonk and always watch both conventions. Five minutes into Palin's speech it was "Ah, hell no." I didn't want that dimwit to be a heartbeat away from anything resembling public office.
I think you're overthinking things when it comes to Tuberville, Mary. Whenever we discuss him, we have to remember than 75% of white Alabama voters pulled the lever for Roy Moore back in 2018, even though there was definitive evidence he had a thing for teenage girls.
I'm going to channel my inner-JVL here: the "fine folks of Alabama", when given the choice between the football coach and a career public servant, chose the former. That block of voters is awful, and they wanted someone like them.
In Alabama, the “thing” for teenage girls is a generations old tradition among “superior” white males…and brothers and cousins!! I’m from Georgia so I can say that😁🙏🏻
I'm a "yankee", and I don't see any scenario where a teenage girl looks at the likes of Roy Moore and says to herself, "that's a fine man right there."
I’ll be a little more charitable about those that voted for the coach. So many people get caught up in thinking that someone like him (a winning record coach) demonstrated by their W-L record that they have great leadership skills. That’s not entirely wrong, but just like with entrepreneurs that become wealthy we should remember that success or intelligence in one field doesn’t prove you will be successful or have intelligence in other fields / endeavors. And aside from that I and others have some issues with his leadership as a coach (Texas Tech recruit dinner anyone?).
That said, the charitable feelings for those specific voters only go so far for me because - as you point out - many of those same voters “pulled the lever” for Roy Moore despite a history of ethical and moral challenges.
Oh Tim, I didn't mean to imply that Tuberville was anything other than an idiot. I do not have any problem calling (many of) the people of Alabama morons. I meant to imply that Palin was the first to come out full force and be backed by the party at large......
You are exactly right Mary. McCain putting Palin on the ticket was the first concession to The Crazy. And here we are, 15 years later, knee deep in the madness.
Even more remarkable is that it was universally accepted that Palin was a negative for McCain in the final analysis, and a major factor in his loss. And like a gambler on a payday loan at the blackjack table, the Base doubled down.
That is quite a big basket of deplorables but all of them easily qualify.
Tuberville is exactly what you get when politics becomes personality. IMO, it started with Sarah Palin and has been careening downhill ever since. Whoever the moron was that thought she would be a good choice escalated stupid to a trait that most Republicans now glorify as "common sense" "real americans" "patriot"......
Musk is as dangerous to the future of the world as Trump is to the future of this country.....
Hopefully we all survive.
Jeez, are you all that young? Palin was a blip. The original was Newt Gingrich, "The Man Who Broke Politics" (https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/11/newt-gingrich-says-youre-welcome/570832/ - by McKay Coppins, the same author who has written the new Mitt Romney book. The article doesn't do his damage justice; in Dana Milbank's book "The Destructionists", Gingrich gets the first 3 chapters, a sickening litany of everything from circulating a list of 65 pejoratives for Republicans to use to demonize Democrats (How to Talk Like Newt, 1990) to routinely making up damaging stories about people he wanted to take down, including throwing his weight behind the ridiculous narrative that the Clinton's had had Vince Foster killed - which ended up with sufficient legs that Republicans, including Trump, were still using it in 2016. He introduced government shutdowns and impeachment as political weapons, among other "innovations".
Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh were contemporaries and complementary, and there's a steady growth of the right-wing alternate-reality echo chamber from their day to now.
Reading Milbank's account of Gingrich's escapades, the parallels with Trump are sobering. Oh, and BTW - while Newt was rabidly publically moralizing about Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky, he was having his own affair with a 22-year-old house staffer (in 1999 he divorced his second wife, and married the staffer in 2000).
I really value Bill Kristol's contributions to the current thinking about Trump. But I can't think of Palin and what she helped start without recalling that he was an avid backer/booster of hers back then. Just more evidence that our world has gone topsy-turvy.
Ummm.... Bill Kristol, one of the founders of The Bulwark, thought Palin would be a good choice. (But you probably knew that).
I seem to remember that it was Steve Schmidt a McCain campaign honcho, who recommended Palin back in 2008. Schmitt has since then offered up many, many "Mea Culpas" for that idea!
Bill Kristol, of The Bulwark, reportedly teed her up after meeting her on some junket travel up in Alaska. Perhaps Mr Sykes or Mr Last could confirm.
Confirmed here: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/24/conservative-pundit-bill-kristol-explains-how-sarah-palin-helped-pave-trumps-path-to-the-white-house.html.
I was going to vote for McCain - until he picked Palin.
I think it started before Palin but yeah, she was the first big representative of the purely performative, populist wing of the party. The real problem for Republicans is that young conservatives were raised with Tea Party, Palin, Glenn Beck, Fox News and have no real reference for traditional, small government/family values.free market (such as it is) government. The 20 and 30-something Republicans LOVE the show. It's why they are here and I don't know how the party recovers.
Oh...that makes sense. Thanks for that insight. I'm old. I remember stuff. I forget about those less old.
Those of us a little older that had sympathies for at least some of those older views are now either conservative Dems or Dem voting (if not Dem leaning) independents. Pretty easy switch when one was only ever slightly more R than D to begin with, but unfortunately drove the sanity out of the R primary base.
I voted for McCain in the primary, although I was in the midst of my departure from the GOP then. When he selected Palin, I was out. I said then and have said it since, he put her on the ticket to appeal to the Bubba Vote - what we now call MAGA. "Ooooh weee, look at her - she's a babe and she can shoot a gun. Hot damn!"
Bill Kristol played a large role in promoting Palin to be the VP. I've read an assessment of his choice he offered after he co-founded The Bulwark. In 2018, he said he "didn’t realize that we were going into a celebrity culture . . . I don’t think Palin really led to Trump. Was this somehow a bit of a precursor or something? I’m willing to say, ‘Maybe so.’" (https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/24/conservative-pundit-bill-kristol-explains-how-sarah-palin-helped-pave-trumps-path-to-the-white-house.html).
Has he written or spoken about his promotion of her more recently and whether she led to Trump?
I also thought it had a lot to do with trying to appeal to disaffected Hillary voters in a typically ham fisted GOP way.
"Look here, ladies...a woman!"
So insulting.
"So insulting."
You hit the nail on the head. When my then office-mate (a naturalized Pakistani/Muslim immigrant who had voted for George W. Bush TWICE) heard McCain had picked Palin she said "Does he think we're stupid?". She switched to Obama after that.
I thought that, too--THIS is what Republicans think is a good substitute for Hilary?? Although I'm a registered Democrat, I had been leaning toward McCain because Obama was too inexperienced in comparison. Then they trotted out Palin. The end.
I remember my Republican sister calling and saying "are you going to vote for him now? He chose a woman!" to which I said and choosing THAT woman is an insult to all of us.
Same experience with all on this thread!
Those same qualities turned off a lot of would-have-been Republican voters.
Sarah Palin was, and remains, an idiot. I know Republicans who declined to vote for McCain because of her. She was political malpractice. Thankfully Alaska has moved on from her and elected much more qualified people to office. Yay, ranked choice voting!!
McCain lost a LOT of votes that day. Hours before I had said "He'll never pick Palin! Nobody in his right mind would do that! He'll lose every environmentalist instantly and that's just for starters!" (Steve Schmidt has been working to make up for that pick ever since -- though I recall the law firm hired to vet her failed to do so.)
For the first time in my adult life I was ready to vote for a GOP presidential candidate. But I'm a bit of a wonk and always watch both conventions. Five minutes into Palin's speech it was "Ah, hell no." I didn't want that dimwit to be a heartbeat away from anything resembling public office.
John Boehner thougth Palin was hot and encouraged McCain to pick her on that basis
<cough> Bill Kristol boosted her too. He's since expressed regret for it.
So has Steve Schmidt voiced his regret.
Yeah, I remember that. That's got to be tough to sit with.
The deeper he was in his cups, the hotter she looked to him.
A 10:00 2 is a 2:00 10?
I think you're overthinking things when it comes to Tuberville, Mary. Whenever we discuss him, we have to remember than 75% of white Alabama voters pulled the lever for Roy Moore back in 2018, even though there was definitive evidence he had a thing for teenage girls.
I'm going to channel my inner-JVL here: the "fine folks of Alabama", when given the choice between the football coach and a career public servant, chose the former. That block of voters is awful, and they wanted someone like them.
In Alabama, the “thing” for teenage girls is a generations old tradition among “superior” white males…and brothers and cousins!! I’m from Georgia so I can say that😁🙏🏻
I'm a "yankee", and I don't see any scenario where a teenage girl looks at the likes of Roy Moore and says to herself, "that's a fine man right there."
Of course, I admit I could be completely wrong.
I’ll be a little more charitable about those that voted for the coach. So many people get caught up in thinking that someone like him (a winning record coach) demonstrated by their W-L record that they have great leadership skills. That’s not entirely wrong, but just like with entrepreneurs that become wealthy we should remember that success or intelligence in one field doesn’t prove you will be successful or have intelligence in other fields / endeavors. And aside from that I and others have some issues with his leadership as a coach (Texas Tech recruit dinner anyone?).
That said, the charitable feelings for those specific voters only go so far for me because - as you point out - many of those same voters “pulled the lever” for Roy Moore despite a history of ethical and moral challenges.
I was reading this with a Foghorn Leghorn accent in my mind
Oh Tim, I didn't mean to imply that Tuberville was anything other than an idiot. I do not have any problem calling (many of) the people of Alabama morons. I meant to imply that Palin was the first to come out full force and be backed by the party at large......
You're right. But Palin burned out pretty fast. I think it had something to do with she wanted to be a celebrity more than a politician.
I left Ga 50 years ago for that reason. Not any better - the moron quotient, that is.
Perhaps the decent folks could apply for asylum and resettlement in the USA.
You are exactly right Mary. McCain putting Palin on the ticket was the first concession to The Crazy. And here we are, 15 years later, knee deep in the madness.
Even more remarkable is that it was universally accepted that Palin was a negative for McCain in the final analysis, and a major factor in his loss. And like a gambler on a payday loan at the blackjack table, the Base doubled down.