How nice of Axios to show such compassion for conservative parents who are being brainwashed by lies and propaganda. The fractious Republican Party is consolidating around a “Protect the children” platform for 2024 that aggressively targets school policies on gender identity and how racial issues are taught. A year before presidential primaries begin, Republicans see this as a winning formula that can fire up their base and attract some independents, pointing to the recent electoral success of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin. Much of the battle is being fought at the state and local levels, giving an edge to GOP officials such as DeSantis and Youngkin — both potential presidential candidates who recognized the potency of educational issues early on. Driving the news: Former President Trump is now leaning hard into this strategy, unveiling sweeping proposals in the past week to ban gender-affirming care for minors nationwide and cut off federal funding for schools that teach “critical race theory” and “gender ideology” — without defining what exactly those terms mean.
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I know I’m probably paying way to much attention to Tucker Carlson lately but he’s an especially dangerous force in our politics and half the time he’s an Orbanesque white nationalist and the rest of the time he’s just nuts. I don’t know quite what to make of it but I feel instinctively that we shouldn’t look away. There’s something going on here and it’s not good. Philip Bump looked at the numbers and it’s worth taking note: In the right-wing media universe, the 500-pound gorilla is now and has long been Fox News. There have been challengers, certainly, including some robust ones. Breitbart’s effectiveness in pulling rhetoric from the fringe into the mainstream conversation about a decade ago, for example, and cable news start-ups like One America and Newsmax more recently. But Fox News has weathered such challenges through co-option, heft, institutional support and combinations of the three. So, when Republicans are asked where they get their news, they are most likely to say Fox. And within the Fox News universe, the 500-pound gorilla is Tucker Carlson.
Governing is for losers GOP gotcha exercises this week in Congress are for pre-positioning ammunition for blaring 2024 TV ads (with fine-print footers) against Democrats for being un-American. The party of arrested development de-prioritizes governing. The MAGA-led House is on a tear. In the judiciary committee Wednesday, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) proposed that committee members recite the pledge of allegiance before meetings. Never mind that members do that at the opening of every session. He wants Democrats on record voting not to a second time. An hour-long debate ensued with Democrats snidely pushing back on whether “insurrectionists” on the committee could lead the pledge. Ultimately, Democrats voted with Republicans for supplemental performative patriotism. HORRORS! The U.S. House voted Wednesday on a resolution “denouncing the horrors of socialism.” That’s it. The rest is boilerplate. On the floor, Republicans railed against socialism’s evils that they did not enumerate in H. Res. 83. The conservative base programmed for a century or more to view the nine-letter word as a four-letter word, Republicans did not need to.
Orange Julius Caesar sez: In other words:
It’s all right here in this commentary from the man who tried to kill Nancy Pelosi’s husband: “Liberty isn’t dying, it’s being killed systematically and deliberately.” The “people killing it have names and addresses, so I got their names and addresses so I could pay them a little visit … have a heart-to-heart chat about their bad behavior.” “I want to apologize to everyone. I messed up. What I did was really bad. I’m so sorry I didn’t get more of them. It’s my own fault. No one else is to blame. I should have come better prepared.” It’s all right out of the wingnut playbook whether it’s Fox, Breitbart, Truth Social, 8-Chan, Newsmax, or OAN. And yes, Facebook and twitter too. It’s what compelled all those rioters to storm the Capitol and go hunting for Nancy Pelosi and Mike Pence. It’s why they were screaming incoherently “this is MY house!”, telling the cops and anyone else to leave. It isn’t just this nut. He happened to take action and he isn’t the only one. But they all believe it …
This is the highest rated show on cable news and the most influential right wing media figure in America. Just a sample of his latest because I think you need to know what the right is seeing and believing so I’ll post excerpts from time to time. Don’t look away. This is what’s frying the brains of Fox “News” voters and they are one election away from running the country: As I said the other day, I think he might be losing his mind. Those short barks of inappropriate laughter are just weird. But interspersed with his crazy little segments about M&Ms and Don Lemon’s hoodie are ideas that are penetrating into the collective lizard brains of the right. And those ideas are straight up patriarchal, white, nationalism.
AKA the Republicans David Frum: Let’s say you’re a politician in a close race and your opponent suffers a stroke. What do you do? If you are Mehmet Oz running as a Republican for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, what you do is mock your opponent’s affliction. In August, the Oz campaign released a list of “concessions” it would offer to the Democrat John Fetterman in a candidates’ debate, including: “We will allow John to have all of his notes in front of him along with an earpiece so he can have the answers given to him by his staff, in real time.” And: “We will pay for any additional medical personnel he might need to have on standby.” Oz’s derision of his opponent’s medical condition continued right up until Oz lost the race by more than 250,000 votes. Oz’s defeat flipped the Pennsylvania seat from Republican to Democrat, dooming GOP hopes of a Senate majority in 2023. A growing number of Republicans are now pointing their finger at Donald Trump for the party’s disappointments in the 2022 elections, with good reason.
DeSantis’ latest move to own the libs is really something. Will it be possible for him to go too far? I wonder. His refusal to allow the AP Black history course resulted in the college board changing the curriculum… sigh: The College Board purged the names of many Black writers and scholars associated with critical race theory, the queer experience and Black feminism. It ushered out some politically fraught topics, like Black Lives Matter, from the formal curriculum. And it added something new: “Black conservatism” is now offered as an idea for a research project. So much for academic freedom. Wingnuts are now in charge of education, not scholars and educators. What could go wrong?
Democrats codify right to abortion in L’Étoile du Nord It’s surprising that this isn’t getting more notice (The New Republic): One day after the Republican National Committee directed Republicans to “go on offense” against abortion rights, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz signed a bill codifying abortion rights as a guaranteed right to Minnesotans. The legislation will shield residents from any looming Republican attacks, even those that come from the courts. The Protect Reproductive Options Act, or PRO Act, codifies protections to reproductive health care, including abortion, birth control, sterilization, and family planning and fertility services. The act, just a page long, guarantees that “every individual has a fundamental right to make autonomous decisions about the individual’s own reproductive health.” The new law comes as Minnesota Democrats now lead all three chambers of the government, as they maintained the state House and governorship, and took control of the state Senate in November. In a midterm election partially defined by backlash against the overturning of Roe v.
Make it stop! Even readers not “of a certain age” have seen the inescapable Medicare Advantage ads on TV promising seniors more health care for less. Why, they’ll even add money to your Social Security check every single month! It sounds too good to be true. You know why. Consumer complaints about the ads have doubled in just the last year, reports Forbes. A Senate committee found “evidence that beneficiaries are being inundated with aggressive marketing tactics as well as false and misleading information.” Congressman Mark Pocan, Democrat of Wisconsin and former co-chair of the congressional progressive caucus (CPC), has seen enough. He may be in the House minority, but he’s playing “the long game.” On Wednesday, he will reintroduce the Save Medicare Act aimed at reinforcing traditional Medicare. It may go nowhere this session, but he’s building support for when Democrats regain a House majority (The Guardian): The bill targets Medicare Advantage plans, which Pocan and his allies say the plans have turned into a cash grab for insurance companies.