Freak Out Friday – May 29, 2020

FREAK OUT FRIDAY – MAY 29. 2020

We all know that Trump has no understanding whatsoever of the Constitution, the document that he falsely swore to uphold three and a half years ago in front of a far smaller audience than Barack Obama drew for his inauguration.  Since then he has sworn that the emoluments clause is “phony,” has falsely claimed that Article II gives him the power to do “whatever (he) wants,” and swore that he is going to do whatever he can to narrow the freedoms that the First Amendment provides.

And this week he has renewed his assault on freedom of speech, continuing his angle that has been parroted by dictators historically:  that the free press is the enemy.  We’ve already seen him open fire on his beloved Fox News when the right wing swinging news channel dared to criticize him.  Now, however, he has opened fire on the forum that enables him to talk directly to millions of followers:  Twitter. 

Basically Twitter dared to treat him in the same way that they would treat someone else who was violating their terms of service.  Indeed, if he’d been anyone else, they likely would have blocked his account and banned him from Twitter ages ago for his incessant lies, his name calling and his threats.   They flagged one of his false tweets about voter fraud, linking it to articles from reputable sources, and naturally Trump went ballistic.  He falsely declared that linking his tweets to news sources was the same as censorship, and unlike his sluggish nonresponse to the virus, he immediately swung into action and signed an executive order that targeted Section 230 which affords Twitter protection against law suits.  So basically he screwed himself, because all he did was give Twitter MORE incentive to carefully patrol tweets and make sure they don’t violate the terms of service since their protection would be minimized or eliminated.  If they’re worried they can be sued for libel, they will naturally delete any lies that Trump posts.  That whole nonsense about a non-existent cold case against Joe Scarborough?  Gone.  His baseless claims that Biden is mentally impaired?  History.  His contention that Obama committed the greatest fraud in political history?  Adios.  Through his own actions, he is removing any incentive that Twitter has to allow him to do whatever he wants.

His latest endeavor was this morning, when he swore he was going to send the army into Minneapolis, declaring that “when the looting starts, the shooting starts.”  Because when White supremacists run over a helpless protestor, there are very good people on both sides.  When armed idiots waving the Confederate flag show up in droves, shut down the government and threaten the Democratic political leaders, Trump applauds them.  But the moment blacks begin to riot, he’s ready to begin shooting them down.

It should be noted that if I did a tweet that said, “I can’t stand Trump blowing his own horn.  When the tooting starts, the shooting starts,” not only would Twitter delete it, but I’d likely be visited by the Secret Service.  A threat is a threat.

I suppose I should address the whole rioting thing, because naturally right wingers are loudly declaring that liberals are perfectly okay with people rioting and stealing while we strenuously objected to armed white people showing up and shutting down the government.  And it does seem that rioting and looting is an expected reaction associated with people of color.  For instance, when the verdict of O.J. Simpson was going to be handed down, Los Angeles police were bracing themselves for rioting from blacks if he was found guilty.  When he was declared not guilty, there was zero concern that angry whites would storm the streets.  Which they didn’t.   They just sat there, puzzled, while blacks cheered that they had for once gotten “white man’s justice.”

I’m not okay with rioting and theft.  But I understand it.  The attitude is likely that if they break into a Target and steal some televisions, well, the Target will repair the damage and insurance companies will reimburse them the loss.  And of course they’re right.  They do it because it satisfies their anger and their desire to strike back at the white-run system that doesn’t give the slightest of dámņš about black life.  “You take our lives, so we’ll take your stuff.”  Meanwhile, whenever they attempted to protest in a non-violent method—whether it was taking a knee at a football game or assembling in protest with no weapons—they were greeted with condemnation.  If you’re going to despise them no matter what they do, they figure they might as well hurt whites in the only place that matters:  the pocket book.  

Meanwhile a dark skinned CNN reporter was arrested while a white skinned CNN reporter wasn’t.  If that doesn’t underscore the pure difference in how whites and blacks are treated, nothing will.

And yet Trump, who has historically supported white supremacists and registered no complaints about whites killing blacks before, suddenly decides that the death of George Floyd—killed by a white cop—is outrageous and should be condemned, that the rioters are dishonoring him, and let’s shoot them.  The leader of the free world wants to shoot some citizens while he simultaneously rages against Twitter for daring to take the slightest step in holding him to the same rules they hold everyone else.

The words “I can’t even” have never seemed more appropriate.

Oh, and he is changing an environmental rule from the Obama administration so hunters in Alaska can now go into the dens of bears and killed their cubs.  

Just in time for Eric and Don Jr. to go hunting, I suppose.

PAD

3 comments on “Freak Out Friday – May 29, 2020

  1. The 1% have been looting this country since forever. Is Trump now authorizing us to start shooting rich people?

    I’m not condoning violence. I’m just asking for several million friends.

  2. What I find tragicomic about the ascent of right-wing populists like Trump and my own country’s Jair Bolsonaro is that lots of opportunistic organizations and individuals thought it was a great idea to appease them and try to “manage” them, then were rudely shown that such authoritarian personalities were impossible to manage and totally devoid of gratitude.

    Such is the case with Twitter and James Comey, for instance. Jair Bolsonaro is the same here in Brazil. Mainstream media in Brazil was always more or less “Libertarian”, that is, it tends to liberalism in social matters, but is very, very supportive of right-wing economics that favor the rich. They spent decades bashing left-wing politicians as “dirty socialists”, and more or less paved the way for Bolsonaro. But when Jair Bolsonaro became President, he started to ruthlessly persecute any TV station or newspaper that didn’t show 100% support to him.

    So, suddenly, center-right newspapers that bashed the left as a bunch of “communists” are now being accused of being “communists” themselves by Bolsonaro and his crazy followers. I see a bit of that happening with the BBC in England too, trying to appease Johnson and the Tories, and ending up being bashed by them for their troubles.

    It takes people a while to understand that with people like Trump and Bolsonaro, when you try to appease them, you must be prepared to support them 100% of the time in all matters, or else you’ll be treated as an enemy when you first cross them, and shown no more gratitude or grace than they shown to people who have always been their enemies.

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