Comments by "wily wascal" (@wilywascal2024) on "Liz Cheney weighs in on potential Trump 2024 run" video.

  1. GOP cult: “Democracy is great…only so long as we can subvert it with lies, cheating, a multitude of Jim Crow voter suppression laws, egregious gerrymandering, obstruction, coups, election interference, sedition, and terrorism to gain power and maintain our corrupt, plutocratic, minority fascist rule!”
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  2. Setting aside the sleazy immoral Reich-wing grifters at the top -- people like Trump, Congressional Republicans, Reich-wing demagogues and media -- the rank-and-file of the GOP has become a fascist cult. To be clear, Trump did not create the cult, it existed before him. He merely served as a unifying figure they chose to rally around and worship as their fool's gold god. Trump appealed to their basest nature and told them what they wanted to hear. Now, those Reich-wing grifters may have cultivated their cult to exploit for their own greed, power and vanity, but at least to some extent the Republican cult in turn seeks to exploit the GOP for their own various misguided purposes. They CHOOSE to be willfully ignorant, to believe or espouse the lies, because as a political calculus they shortsightedly see it as expedient to their ends. What must also be taken into consideration are the characteristics of a cult. Why do people join a cult? Why do they choose to remain in a cult? No need to go into detail; the answers are largely common knowledge or easily researched. But it should be pointed out that in a complex world, the simplistic and rigid beliefs embraced by cults can be very alluring, no matter how fantastical and removed from reality. It should also be acknowledged that the Republican cult is not a monolithic entity, but an amalgamation of sects, including White supremacists, Christian nationalists, libertarians, sovereign nationals, anarchists, tax resistors, Qanon and other extremist fringe groups. Of course, not every Republican is an extremist, a fascist, or untethered from reality. But this latter more benign group is nevertheless part of the fascist Republican cult, complicit in their support of the whole, whether through their silent acquiescence and votes or willing assistance. It's a very dangerous feedback loop, a vicious circle, one that as it sinks further into depravity its threat correspondingly rises, for as the Republican cult has over time been becoming increasingly more radicalized, we witness the election of more radical politicians to represent them, more radicalized Reich-wing media and demagogues to feed them propaganda. While some Republicans are leaving the GOP and some others are speaking out and trying to save their party, they constitute a weak minority, unfortunately. In a normal, sane world, the Republican cult would have ended or been marginalized after the Mueller Report, after Trump's Ukraine shakedown and impeachment, after Trump's horrendous handling of a deadly global pandemic, after his election defeat, or after January 6th and his second impeachment. But that hasn't happened. Instead, the Republican cult continues to become increasingly more radicalized and extreme. As President Biden says, "We are in a battle for the soul of this nation." And the fight is far from over.
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  3. It's a game of asymmetrical warfare the Republicans are playing, as they don't care if they burn the government down if they can't have minority rule, while Democrats value democracy----win or lose----and want to make government work for the American people. It's clear that this situation with Republicans isn't something Democrats want or with which they are comfortable but find themselves forced to deal with as best they can. I do fault Democrats like Charlie Brown Manchin and Silly Sinema, who want to play pretend that the situation is normal, when it's more than obvious that Republicans are unwilling to operate in good faith or practice bipartisanship in any serious way, and the GOP is embracing nihilism and fascism. Both Congressional Democrats and Garland's DOJ need to start playing hardball, or we may not have a democracy for much longer. They urgently need to hold those most responsible for January 6 to account, protect the voting franchise, and deliver for the American people. There is no time to waste.
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  4. Let's just call January 6 what it actually was -- a Republican smash and grab, an act of violent larceny against democracy and our government, sedition employing domestic terrorism right out in open sight. It was just one of Trump's failed attempts to achieve an autogolpe. "Without accountability, an attempted autogolpe and insurrection is just practice." "What happened on January 6 is the very definition of sedition." ― Former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson So, why has Traitor Trump not been charged yet by the DOJ? That's what a lot of people are wondering! Not just prosecution of Trump, but all his accomplices, too! Obstruction charges outlined in the Mueller Report, the Ukraine extortion racket, inciting an insurrection, sedition, and federal election interference. The evidence is all in plain sight, where are the indictments, the arrests? Our democracy hangs in the balance; this is no time to play nice, there is no time to waste! The DOJ shouldn't be worried about appearances, either, because it's a matter of impartially enforcing the law and not setting bad precedent that encourages future lawlessness and authoritarianism by the Executive Branch. Because our democracy, our institutions, and our very security is seriously endangered. And because rule of law and justice for all really does matter.
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  5. "Call this civic barbarism. Instead of promoting the values of responsible citizenship, Trump, Republican leadership, and their media enablers have elevated and blessed the very worst among us. They are making many Americans less suited for self-government and more dangerous to their neighbors. And they are doing so for the reason some of the Founders most feared: To lead the mob against true democracy." ― Michael Gerson, from 'Trumpism is American Fascism' (NOTE: Gerson is a staunch life-long conservative, who served as former President George W. Bush's chief speech writer.) As political commentator and former Republican presidential advisor Mark McKinnon so aptly put it recently, "The Republican party is at dysfunction junction." May disagree with conservative ideology and with their stances on many issues but do value and respect LOYAL opposition--a duty that the GOP has for too long forgotten and abdicated, putting personal and party interests before country. That is not only harmful to their party, it is harmful to our democracy and institutions. And it has come to represent a serious threat to our very security. "Until Republicans return to reality and become responsible, they should not be trusted with power again." ― Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney More Americans need to understand this. The constant lies, denials, deceits, delusions, gaslighting, dog-whistles, crackpot conspiracy theories, projectionism, Whataboutism, jingoism, bogus victimhood, and hypocrisy of Republicans is disgusting and alarming. Republicans have been programmed into a mindless fascist partisan cult that is unhinged, delusional and evil. The Republican cult has poisoned itself with its own propaganda, choosing to live in a dystopian fascist Orwellian fantasy world. The Republican cult has been radicalized to such extent that it poses a clear and present danger to our society, our democracy, our country, and the world. They have essentially become a domestic terrorist group, and we should be targeting the leaders of that group with the same vigor and determination we would a foreign terrorist group attacking our country. Don't know of a time since the Civil War when our nation has been at greater peril, and we need to recognize that, acknowledge it, and act upon it accordingly.
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