143 Comments

No, Dr Oz, he dresses like a working class Pennsylvanian. You might never have met such a person, being as you are from Jersey

Expand full comment

No, Dr Oz, he dresses like a working class Pennsylvanian. You might never have met such a person, being as you are from Jersey

Expand full comment

Given the level of genuine hatred the MAGA mites feel toward their opponents (like me, or any other Bulwark reader), I expect we'll see real violence if they get the dictatorship they want. I don't think it will be as non-violent as Orban in Hungary, it will be more like Putin's Russia, with people imprisoned or turning up dead, if not by the state then by militants who the state won't prosecute or who get pardoned. They've already tried to legalize ramming your car into protestors, which in itself is a pretty big step. The signs are everywhere that this is going to be a really brutal, violent tyranny.

Expand full comment

We've talked about the "cruelty is the point" among Trump's Pets. Apparently cruelty to family is also the point. See what Lara Trump did to her poor child as Ian was beginning to hit Florida. (Politicususa, and it's on Twitter). Where was her useless turd of a husband?

Expand full comment

"The once magisterial voice of the conservative worldview looked at the race for governor in Arizona and airily overlooked reality. School choice? Are they out of their minds?"

Mental defect would be the charitable interpretation. The other one is that they know exactly what they're doing.

Expand full comment

I can't help but laugh & scoff at all the fake tough guy rhetoric from guys like Trump & Stone. Guys who have never been in a single fist fight in their lives acting like famed thespian Stephen Seagal.

Expand full comment

That American Greatness (hah!) article is just mind blowing to me. The left is violent daily?! The right is too peaceful?! How are there people in this country that are so deluded?

Expand full comment

Portland = The left violent daily.

MAGA restraining himself from taking his AR-15 to town on the next person who dares to announce their pronouns = too peaceful.

Expand full comment

Lust for violence ... and vengeance.

Particularly against women.

Forcing a woman to birth her rapist's or her father's baby is a form of violence, imo.

Expand full comment

I couldn't agree more with Mona's assessment of the once vaunted Wall Street Journal. It has gone MAGA. As an Arizona resident and registered voter I don't want crazy Kari Lake or any of the other MAGA wingnuts in charge of the levers of government. AZ has had a succession mediocre to bad Republican governors since 2009. Don't get me started on Jan Brewer. Doug Ducey, meh. Spineless part-time sycophant. I want my elected officials to do governance not make headlines for outrageous statements or behavior. When did running for high office be reduced the equivalent of a junior high school popularity contest? Kari Lake is nothing more than Trump in a dress. I want elected officials to be work horses not show ponies. Kari Lake is a show pony.

Expand full comment

Someone should point out to Michael Anton that democratic countries can emerge without a revolution. Canada is a good example of an independent, self-governing country that did not begin with a revolution. Yes, we chose to have a monarch but that has no bearing on our independence or our democratic elections. If America had foregone the revolution and been allowed to grow up a bit before leaving home, perhaps there would not be right wing blowhards citing 1776 as an example in their attempt to establish a fascist regime. Violence breeds violence. American can’t even claim taxation without representation as an excuse this time around.

Expand full comment

I know this can come across as rah rah America, but I do think there is something to the concept of the UK learning a bit of a lesson from America and moderating the way it handled its other continent spanning colonies. Would be strange to suggest that the UK, Canada, Australia, etc. learned nothing from it.

It is a question that can't be fully answered, but had America foregone a revolution, would it have been allowed to 'leave home'? Did the UK need one of her children to violently leave home to prove the point that an island can't rule a continent?

Also, what do you mean by, 'grow up a bit'? Keep in mind that the parent and her siblings were all various forms of Monarchy with all manner of colonial exploitation going on. The US didn't emerge as a paragon of virtue by any remote standard, but I'm not sure what growing up needed to occur compared to how the adults on the world stage were acting at the time.

Expand full comment

To continue the analogy, some kids leave home as soon as they can and learn a lot of life’s lessons without the stability of a family structure, assuming it is a family structure that works as a family. Many Canadians point to the difference between how Canadian troops were treated by Britain in the two World Wars of the 20th Century. In WWI Canadian troops had British commanders and were treated as cannon fodder, being thrown into hopeless situation where the had little chance of succeeding. Sometimes they succeed against all odds but there was unnecessary slaughter. For WWII, Canada insisted on having its own commanders and proved even more effective Under our own leadership.

After WWI Canadian courts became the final arbiter in law and Canada no longer had to seek ultimate authority in the Privy Council. Canada finally repatriation its Constitution in 1982. It might have been faster if we had staged a revolution but we very possibly avoided much internal strife (and possibly a civil war)by waiting until we had proven ourselves and left Britain on good terms.

We will never know how history would have been without the American Revolution. Perhaps America would not be bedeviled by the Second Amendment if you had not staged an armed rebellion against authority. Canada’s major wars have never been with itself although the beginnings of the RCMP were to put down a minor rebellion in what are now the prairie provinces. Canada has not had the cultural equivalent of America’s Civil War. Perhaps that is a reason we are a less militaristic country. We also were fortunate enough not to become a major world power.

Expand full comment

I wish Fetterman was running in Texas.

Expand full comment

Damnit, there is no way I can get free on 10/20.

Frick.

Expand full comment

How is Roger Stone still walking around as a free man? Him and his ilk commit crimes and have the audacity to do so in front of cameras. They don't even bother to have consistent defences.

DOJ is really dropping the balll here.

Expand full comment

No, the noose is tightening.

Expand full comment
Sep 28, 2022·edited Sep 28, 2022

If Anton wants to talk about First Principles. how's "No taxation (or governing at all) without duly elected representation"?

Beyond taxation without representation, the Colonists had a list of reality-based grievances numbering 27 in all, laid out in the Declaration of Independence. Anton's got...what? Bupkis.

Expand full comment

Re Roger Stone - I feel sick. The WSJ - I may lose my breakfast.

Expand full comment

It is eternally frustrating and infuriating to see these people fomenting violence and calling for revolution. What are these privileged, wealthy people like Stone, MJT, Noem fighting against? What is the revolution against? Wokeism? Cancel culture? Racial and sexual equality? Legal abortion? Trans culture? What in their privileged lives have they experienced that this has actually affected them? Disagreement and discomfort? What would they replace it with?

The American Revolution was about big matters. Taxation. Foreign rule. Independence. It was a revolution to make change, to move forward to a more perfect union. What they are proposing is a revolution based on petty squabbles and fighting change. Or a revolution to reverse time to a fictional past.

If they get what they wish for and the US does fall into a time of violence and unrest, they will likely live to regret their rhetoric while they watch their fortunes fall as the US loses it's global standing and our economy and reputation plunges.

Expand full comment

Yeah, like how do they think capitalism does amidst chaos?

Expand full comment