Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 69th Edition. TDS, Vance in the wings. Our geriatric oligarchy. Immigration spats. Banning puberty blockers. Mjuk flicka and the Mantilla Girls.

The really ugly American

Trump’s win shows us who we really are

An excellent, and exactly correct, article.

And who we are isn't very pretty.

Many people worried that the election of Donald Trump, a thoroughly reprehensible man, would mean the end of the American democracy.  It probably won't, but it does mark the complete end of the United States as a great nation in every sense. 

We have no claim, as of this last election, to any sort of exceptionalism.  A certain moral status, hard won and defended in the Civil War and the wars of the 20th Century has been forfeited, and for blisteringly limited self interest.  Indeed, much of the electorate, frankly, proved themselves ignorant, choosing the interests of billionaires over their own, based on mean and vindictive promises and a false vision of the past.  Others, limited in their  minds to a binary choice in which they felt compelled to choose between the threat of progressivism in the Democratic Party, which never saw a gender perversion or mental illness it didn't want to glorify and demand you do too, and a GOP which at least looked to some sort of sanity on such issues.  Yet others chose a narrow issue, gun control, abortion, which they highly valued and made the leap.  Others were simply mad about being lied to for decades by the Democrats and pre Trump Republicans on matters like job exportation and immigration.

Not all Trump voters are alike by any means.

But there's only one Trump.

Since being elected he's insulted Canada repeatedly in a childish manner.  On the day I'm typing this out (originally), he's threatening Panama, suggesting we're going to demand a return of the Panama Canal.  Since then he's been demanding Greenland.

The amazing thing is that in spite of the utter lunacy of these ramblings, plenty have signed on board to back them.  People who wonder how the absurdities of the Nazi Party found acceptance after 1932 now know.

I don't expect Trump to serve out his term.  Behavior like this shows that the nation's incoming Chief Executive is returning to his middle school years, years which caused his parents to send him to military school, and that return is probably organic in a man who is flabby and ancient.  We'll see, of course, but it appears to at least me that the dementia train has left the station, as it earlier clearly did for Joe Biden.  

Merely having a chief executive this age is, frankly, dangerous.

At any rate, I suspect that backers of J. D. Vance are just wanting to give things a decent interval before a cabinet finding of non compos mentis is delivered.

I'm not a Vance fan, but the sooner, the better.

Trump Derangement Syndrome

One of our dear readers, who has I might note a truly excellent blog I keep meaning to link in here, gently noted that this blog suffers from Trump Derangement Syndrome.

It's a fair accusation.

As is evident, I just can't grasp why a thoughtful highly intelligent person like our reader would vote for Trump.  I  know plenty of them I might add.  Highly educated, very well spoken, very well read, individuals who voted for a person I find nearly loathsome.

I wish they could explain it to me.

I wonder too if they fear for the nation the way that those of us who recoil form Trump do.

I will note that I perfectly grasp why people didn't vote for Harris, and wouldn't have for Biden.  Biden's descent into incapacity aside, the Democratic Party has just become, well, weird in many ways.  I noted at the time that Obergefell was decided that disaster loomed, and frankly, I was spot on.  Contrary to Kennedy's naive assumptions about his legally bankrupt ruling, Obergefell really opened the doors of a sexual and sexually perverse pandora's box, although frankly that box had been unlocked in the post war by Kinsey and Masters.

By the way, there's actually an article in Psychology Today about TDS.

Anyhow, for the Trump supporters who are routinely insulted by my posts regarding Trump, but stop in to read anyhow, thanks for doing so, and if you can explain your support for the man, I'd appreciate your doing so.

I'll confess.  I feel that Trump should have been tried for sedition and should be in prison, so my view is indeed harsh and unyielding on him.  I hope I'm proved wrong, but I expect him to be a disaster.

Waiting in the wings

Vance in uniform, and not that of a military prep school

As noted, I'm pretty confined J. D. Vance is waiting in the wings, and isn't much more of a Trump fan than I am.  I also think as a National Conservative, he's the real deal.

Love him or hate him, Vance would have made a much better contrast to Harris than Trump.  Vance actually has an intellectual concept of where he wants the country to go, and it doesn't appear in any fashion to depend on Elon Musk personally arresting the decline in the North American birth rate.

Must is a National Conservative, as noted.  He couldn't have been elected in a race against Harris.   The National Conservatives, who ranks are filled by some real intellectuals, know that they have a very limited time to get in their man.. That time is limited to the next four years.  Vance won't be able to pull off a post Trump win in 2028, and they know it.  In order to make the reforms they want, and they are genuine and massive, they need to get Vance in before then, and that depends on Trump being gone.

Age may very well remove Trump, through death.  If it doesn't, my guess is dementia will.  Then we will have Vance, and that will be quite interesting.

Oligarchs.

Drone Bee.  By Guillaume Pelletier - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=59927223

A really interesting thing about the incoming Trump administration is the now open and obvious influence of the mega rich on it.  The most obvious example is the overarching presence of the world's most wealth many, South African Elon Musk, but he's far from the only one.

It wasn't all that long ago that Republicans continually suggested that mega rich Hungarian George Soros and Mark Zuckerberg were a big problem.  Even now, Wyoming Secretary of State Chuck Gray wants to do something about "Zuck Bucks".

Love of money, as we know, is the root of all evil, and and one thing it does is to buy power.  Absolute power, we're told, such as the U.S. Supreme Court has pretty much handed over to the Executive Branch, corrupts absolutely.

Something needs to be done about this and what that something is, quite frankly, includes taxation.  Populists have to decide if they want to be drone servants of their party, or the owners of their party in this regard.

So far, it looks like the drones have it.

The immigration spat

The best argument for doing away with H1B I can imagine.  Also, not only a crude dip into vulgarity, but an unfortunate sexual insult by a man who clearly knows that's now how that actually works, given his many progeny by many willing women.  And explain to me how Evangelicals feel that this camp is moral?

It is interesting, however, how a fight has suddenly broken out in the MAGA camp which is related to this.  The GOP campaign against immigrants in the general election blurred the lines between legal and illegal immigrants.  It was relatively clear that basically many hardcore Rust Belt and rural Trumpies didn't like immigrants in general.

There are, I'd note, real reasons to be concerned about the American immigration rate.  But for immigration, the US population would be falling, which contrary to widespread belief would frankly be a very good thing.  But demonizing immigrants is flat out wrong, and we're not actually having the conversation we should be, which would have a lot more to do with conservation, economics, and yes, culture, than whatever it is that we are arguing about.

One thing now that we are arguing about is H1B, a visa program.  I've seen an immigrant Pakistani Trumpy robustly claim that this program lets in illiterate people who can't speak English in Italian restaurants to, in contrast, Elon Must backing it on the basis that that he came in the country that way and as the world's richest sperm donor, he loves himself, and everyone else should too, as he's good for the country.

He's not good for the country.

Interestingly, there's some lingering questions if Musk violated the country's laws when he came in.  He probably didn't, but it's interesting.  If he did, and I'm not saying he did, that would make him one of those super nasty law breaking immigrants who should be back up and returned to their land of origin.

On other ironies which are worth noting, this spat has really taken weird turns.  Ann Coulter told Vivek Ramaswamy that she wouldn't have voted for him as he's of Indian extraction, which is as racist as can be, but at least honest.  Some Republicans are defending H1B, others are condemning it.  Steve Bannon called Musk a toddler.  Vivek Ramaswamy fought back and claimed American culture worshipped mediocrity, implying foreign cultures do not, which is ironic given that the Freedom Caucus tends to have a deep suspicion that education in general is bad.

Frankly, this debate, if it heads in the direction Ramaswamy is taking it, might be a good thing for the populists.  Populism right now does exalt the stupid and vulgar over the educated and erudite.  He used the example of the "prom queen", which is probably misplaced, unless we regard the Hawk Tuah Girl as the nation's prom queen, which right now she frankly is..  

Ramaswamy has a point.

Trump clearly is okay with some immigrants, such as ones he'll marry.  It makes me wonder what dinner talk is like at the old Trump homestead.

When things hit the news.

On this story, I had the odd experience of having somebody say the other day "I see you are now having trouble up there with immigrants too". They were from Texas, and this was a phone call.

I had to ask what he meant, but apparently the arrest of an illegal alien here made national news.

It's interesting in that this isn't all that newsworthy here.  I don't know why people would think otherwise, but rural states like Wyoming have had illegal aliens just as long as anyone else, and given the blue collar nature of work here, probably longer.

Gerontocracy

Not only are we developing an oligarch problem, it has a gerontocracy problem as well, which this past election certainly pointed out.  We have an ancient (and seemingly impaired) President, and an ancient, and rather odd acting, President Elect.

Trump is 78 years old, of course.  Locally, one of our Senators is 72, and the other 70.  Not young.  Our Congresswoman is a comparatively youthful 62.

Texas Republican Congresswoman Kay Granger is 81, and is now living in a memory care facility.  She hasn't cast a vote since July, which of course makes sense.  

Of note, she spent a year, starting in January 2023, as the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.  That says something, and what it says is that mental decline can really be rapid.

Why, as a nation, are we comfortable with this?

On a positive, if perhaps sad note, she did not seek reelection.

The UK bans puberty blockers

The US should follow suit.

The entire "trans" movement is really based on an illusion of epic proportions.  We are, truly, born male and female while some are more masculine than others, or more feminine than others, boys are boys, as they say, and girls girls.  People who are confused on this point are, in reality, very few, and those who persistently are mentally ills.  Almost all teens who claim to be "trans", aren't and the overwhelming majority of them come out of it relatively quickly.  For that matter, adults who claim to be "trans" aren't.  

Puberty blockers are child abuse on the Aktion T4 and there's no excuse for it.

Back to the populists for a second, it's insanity like giving children puberty blockers that helps explain their rise.  In future years this behavior will be regarded the same way eugenics in Nazi Germany is now.  How mass lawsuits have not broken out is beyond me.  

Mjuk flicka.  Soft Girls, Kept Women, Feminist Women, and a More Natural Life.

ICELANDIC MILKMAID ON HER MORNING ROUND

This is a fine, sturdy pony standing so stockily for his photograph, and he can make light of his burden of buxom beauty with her heavy can of milk. She cares not for saddle or stirrups, for most of these island people are born to horseback, and her everyday costume amply serves the purpose of a riding-habit for this strapping Viking's daughter, with her long tresses shining in the breeze.  

(Original caption, of interest here I wouldn't call this young lady "buxom" or "strapping", but just healthy.  This might say something about how standards have changed over time.)

Mjuk flicka a Swedish term for "a kind pleasant" girl, but it sort of translates as "soft girl".  In this context its a bit of a trend, and one that's worrying feminist.

It probably should.

We've had other threads along these lines, but its fairly clear that a fair number of women have come to the conclusion that the push into the business and working world that came along in the 1970s hasn't really done them as much as a favor as the propaganda then and now would have it.  This recalls the TikTok breakdown some young woman had that's discussed here:

Women at work. "Whoever fought, for women to get jobs. . . . why?. . . . why did you do that?" Looking at women (and men) in the workplace, and modern work itself, with a long lens.

And also here:

A lamentation. The modern "world.*

One of the odd things that the "soft girl" is exhibiting is that she's an example of reinventing old social norms backwards and highly imperfectly, and that is concerning.  Rather than acting as a very traditional wife, she's essentially reduced herself to concubinage.  Her male supporter could sever ties at the drop of a hat.  She's serving in the traditional concubine role, free of any children or responsibility, and providing what we might charitably refer to as companionship.  This is bound not to go well, which reaching back to tradition without the duties of responsibilities associated it, usually does.

I can't help but note the contrast to the Mantilla Girls I continue to run into at Mass, including Christmas vigil. Due to being in a packed church, combined with my wife' s decision making process, we ended up in the cry room.  This followed a brief pre Mass trip to the balcony, where there was room, but then the long suffering spouse brought up 200 other options which sent us back down.  Anyhow, there was room in the cry room, which also contained one extended family with a baby.  The baby never cried.  One of the parishioners in the room was a Mantilla Girl, quite attractive and very nicely dressed.

Its interesting for a variety of reasons, including the contrast to the soft girl.  The Mantilla Girls have a much more realistic grasp of the world.

Mehr Mensch sein.

Related threads:

What the Young Want.* The Visual Testimony of the Trad Girls. The Authenticity Crisis, Part One.

i nolunt

Young Diognetus in the modern world.

Last edition:

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 67th Edition. So you say you want a revolution?

Labels: 2020s, 2024, Aktion T4, Capitalism, Civil Unrest, Corporate Capitalism, Crime, Distributism, Distributist Lament, Donald Trump, Narodnaya Volya, Populism, Terrorism, The wealthy, Zeitgeist

Blog Mirror: Revitalizing the American Republic

A really shallow interview, in my opinion, but Dineen is one of the big figures in National Conservatism, so it's worth at least glancing at what he had to say:

Revitalizing the American Republic

An Open Letter to National Conservatives.

Dear National Conservatives,

First of all, allow me to say, well played.  

You well know that there was no earthly way that the public would vote for one of your members at any time in the near future, if ever.  Indeed, while your movement has risen considerably in recent years, you know that it was likely to be at most just an outside influence on the periphery of conservative thought at the very most, and likely not for long.  Your sense of urgency required a bold move, before, in your view, things were too late, and you made it.

It required your man, J. D. Vance, to lie and say outrageous things, but he proved willing to do it.  Aquinas may have declared all lies to be sins, but obviously you felt that lying for the greater cause, as you see it, would be forgivable.  You seek to reform the nation into a province of 15th Century Christendom, and you have been willing to do what is necessary to do that.

Now, of course, your next move depends on Trump getting out of the way.  You know, as well as I, that Trump isn't a member of your movement and is unpredictable.  Indeed, his philandering and serial polygamy is abhorrent to what you stand for.  Moreover, his economic policies are likely to make Vance unelectable as a successor, and you know it.  By 2028, somebody else will be waiting in the wings. Vice Presidents are not elected to office more often than not, as Kamala Harris' plight just demonstrated.  And Trump's meandering thoughts and unpredictability are just as likely to cause him to replace Mr. Vance with Jenny McCarthy or Robert Kennedy as they are to really keep your boy around.

So you have limited time.

The plan, I suspect, is to declare an increasingly addled Donald Trump mentally incompetent soon.  You can't do it in January, 2026. But you likely can by March, 2027. At any rate, the sooner the better.

Not that I'm your fan. Not hardly.  You scare me.  But you don't scare me as much as Donald Trump.  

And he should scare you too.

Sincerely,

Yeoman.  

Some election predictions.

If I were to predict who would win the election right now, I think it'll be Trump.

I dread the thought of a second Trump term, and I think he was an embarrassment to the nation in his first, but  that would be my guess.

Anyhow. . .

1.  If Trump wins J. D. Vance ends up President in 2026.

If Trump wins, J. D. Vance will end up President in 2026.

Indeed, I think National Conservatives are planning on it.

Trump already sounds really weird a fair amount of the time.  By 2026, he'll be issuing some unmistakably demented proclamations, and his cabinet will declare him unfit to serve.

And then we'll really be off in a new direction.

2.  If Harris wins, the Trumpites won't accept the results

First of all, they'll be violence for sure. Trump is already priming his most fanatic followers for the concept that the 2024 election will be stolen. The Big Lie No. 2.  

And there will be all sorts of challenges to the results.

Once that is all sorted out, Harris won't turn out to be the extreme leftist that's claimed.  She'll probably a about the same, perhaps a bit more effective, than Biden.

The 2024 Election, Part XXVI. The Early Voting Edition.

October 8, 2024.

Early voting starts today in Wyoming.

October 11, 2024

I have more complaints on grocery. The word grocery. You know, it's sorta simple word, but it sorta means like everything you eat. The stomach is speaking. It always does. And, uh, I have more complaints about that. Bacon and things going up.

Donald Trump.

I could be right now in the most beautiful ocean, on the sand, exposing my really beautiful body - so beautiful - to the sun and the surf…

Donald Trump.

Danica Patrick is going to moderate a J.D. Vance Town Hall.

cont:

Primary results: Eastern Shoshone Business Council and Entertainment Committee

October 21, 2024.

Arnold Palmer receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom from George Bush.

Donald Trump started off a campaign rally in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, with a ten minute surreal ramble a out Latrobe native son, Arnold Palmer, stating as part of them:

Arnold Palmer was all man, and I say that in all due respect to women — and I love women.  But this guy, this guy, this is a guy that was all man. This man was strong and tough. And I refuse to say it, but when he took showers with the other pros, they came out of there, they said, "Oh my God, that's unbelievable".

He also included vulgar comments about Kamala Harris.

You have to tell Kamala Harris that you've had enough, that you just can't take it anymore, we can't stand you anymore, you're a shitass vice president. The worst. You're the worst vice president. Kamala, you're fired. Get the hell out of here.

This is, to say the least, vulgar and odd.

Indeed, while it'll sound like a conspiracy theory, at  this point I'm fairly convinced that National Conservatives have backed Trump so that they can get one of their own, J. D. Vance, in a position to take over once Trump is declared mentally in competent early in a second Trump administration, should it occur.  There's no way that they could elect a candidate as President on their own, but with a weirdly acting Trump, they may very well get one in this fashion.

Cont:

Two of the panelist on This Week openly stated that the Arnold Palmer comments are due to a mental decline in Trump.  One stated it was age related, and certainly they both implied it.

Cont:

Tapper: Is the closing message you really want voters to hear from Donald Trump stories about Arnold Palmer's genitals?

Johnson: Let's put the rhetoric aside

Tapper: People have concerns about his fitness and stability. Why is he talking about Arnold Palmer's genitals in front of Pennsylvania voters?

Johnson: Don't say it again we don't have to say it

October 22, 2024

Barrasso Joins Trump At Steelers Game; Crowd Gives Ex-Pres Thunderous Welcome

Primary results: Northern Arapaho Business Council sees some shake-ups moving into the general

Cont:

I just went down and voted.

I also didn't vote for the GOP or Democratic candidates for Senate and House.  The Democrats stand no chance at either office, and they keep nominating candidates too far on the progressive scale.  The GOP Senator up for reelection is shamelessly supporting Trump even though its highly unlikely he really agrees with him on much, which makes it all the worse. The House candidate up for reelection seems to have fully adopted the populist viewpoint. 

I'm a conservative.  I wrote a couple of actual conservatives in.

I voted for the measure to allow the state constitution to be amended to add a new category for residential property, even though I'm very unsure about it. And I voted for all the city optional tax measures.

The whole time I was there some ancient man with a MAGA hat was wondering around ambushing people waiting in line with his far right populist views.  He really hit some poor coal miner hard who clearly just wanted to be left alone to vote.

One of his points was that the United States didn't invent transgenderism.  Somehow, in his mind, this assertion was a reason to vote for Trump.

Cont:

It doesn’t cost 60,000 bucks to bury a fucking Mexican!  Don’t pay it!

Trump's reaction, reportedly, to a bill received from the family of  Pvt. Vanessa Guillén after he had offered to pay funeral expenses.

Why can’t you be like the German generals?

Trump to John Kelly in showing frustration about their independence. Trump was apparently unaware of the July 20 plot, according to Kelly, and not aware that Erwin Rommel killed himself. 

Last edition:

The 2024 Election, Part XXV. The GOP yells "get off my lawn" edition.

Labels: 2020s, 2024 Election, American Solidarity Party, Democratic Party, Donald Trump, Immigration, J. D. Vance, Kamala Harris, Mental Health, Politics, Pope Francis, Populism, Republican Party

What on Earth does the Republican Party stand for?

Ronald Reagan was the first President that I was able to vote for, or against (I voted for) in my lifetime.

The GOP of that era was far from perfect, but I knew what it stood for.  

It was pro life, pro defense, tough on crime, pro fiscal responsibility, and overall conservative.

People have claimed that for the Trumpist GOP, but what of it?

1.  Pro life?

The GOP went into this election cycle claiming responsibility, which it had every right to do, for the repeal of Roe v. Wade, which returned the abortion issue to the states.  Not surprisingly, however, a controversial issue remains controversial.  Now the GOP is running from the issue as quickly as it can.  It took its pro life plank out of its platform, where it's been for decades.  And now we have Trump, who has flip flopped on the issue for decades, stating this, in regard to a proposed six week provision in Florida:

I think the six week is too short, there has to be more time

This is really a simple issue.  Either you believe that life starts at conception, or aren't sure when a human is a human and therefore you err on the side of life, or you think killing only matters at some arbitrary point in time in which you can't stomach it.

At best, the Republicans here can claim to support State's Rights, but pro life?  Donald isn't.

Added to that is this, which gets also into the next topic.

I am announcing today that under the Trump administration, your government will pay for or your insurance company will be mandated to pay for all costs associated with IVF treatment.

We want more babies!

IVF means the creation of large numbers of embryos that are later killed, and in Catholic theology, IVF  is regarded as a moral evil.  

It's notable that Vance, who is a Catholic convert, has made some statements now generally supporting IVF as he runs towards Trump and away from his Faith.

2.  Fiscal Responsibility?

Trump added 8T to the federal debt in his term in office.

And he proposed, prior to Harris, cutting income taxes on tips, which has no logical defense.  Income is income.

Trump has stood for tax cuts, which have amounted to tax cuts for the wealthy.  People, including the wealthy like Elon Musk, have noted the country is going bankrupt.  Well, this is a big part of the reason why.

Back to the above, the GOP whined endlessly about Obamacare, and now proposes to expand government support for an insurance payment. What the crud?

3. Pro defense?

The Republican willingness in many quarters to abandon Ukraine says all you need to know about this. Added to it, Trump has a weird relationship with Russia that has never been explained.

Much of the current GOP wants to return to isolationism, which worked oh so well during the 1930s.

4.  Tough on crime?

Running Trump says all you really need to know on that.

This party, in spite of what its supporters believe, stands only for reelecting Donald Trump, and nothing else.

Mind you, there were signs of this happening for some time.  The entire spectacle of Evangelical Christians lashing themselves to the decks of the Trump serial polygamy ship was never easy to fathom.  National Conservatives came on board in a calculated fashion, thinking that when Trump shuffled off his mortal coil they'd be in charge, only to see the less popular portions of their beliefs mocked and categorized as "weird".  The Hawk Tuah girl was embraced by the Lynyrd Skynyrd branch of the populist whose Christianity is rather thin and not hardly of the Mike Johnson New Apostolic Reformation variety.

So what does that do to the populist movement in the GOP and the GOP in general?  Well, quite a few real Republicans are abandoning ship, particularly those cultural conservatives who were never really Trumpites, but believed there was a moral obligation to support the GOP due to its cultural conservative positions.  The American Solidarity Party is suddenly getting a lot of attention because its actually prolife.  But a lot of the Trumpites now stand for nothing but Trump and will go down with him like stormtroopers in Berlin on May 2, 1945.  Locally those politicians who have arisen in the Populist Freedom Caucus will keep on saying the same things they've been saying, even as their leader is saying the opposite.

Populism always gets co-opted in the end.  Here, it already has been.  Conservatism, for its part, was simply killed in the party.

The 2024 Election, Part XXIV. Brat Girl Summer*

 

The 2024 race for the Oval Office has been so shaken up since Joe Biden dropped out, and Kamala Harris stepped in, its simply unprecedented.  Trump, armed for a race against Biden, has been, for lack of a better word for it, simply freaking out, engaging in calling Harris (and former President Obama) racist names, and even engaging in absolutely wild fantasies, such as this:

Biden wants back in?

Not hardly.  That's delusion in full flower.  It is, frankly, weird.

But then Trump is weird.

The use of the world "weird" to coin the GOP campaign has been freaking the Republicans out as well, with it really hitting home after J. D. Vance, whom Trump might very well wish to dump, was named VP.  I don't think Vance is weird, but he is a full fledged National Conservative and the risk that entailed to Trump started to hit home almost as soon as Vance was picked, and hasn't let up since.  Trump, who embraced the National Conservatives earlier, probably only dimply aware of their views and not really caring about them as he saw them as just a sales opportunity, not realizing they saw him as their ticket to power as he won't be around very long, ran away from the National Conservatives as soon as they became a liability.

As Coulter has says, Trump is like a couch, bearing the impression of the last person who sat on him.

Ever since Harris came on the scene Trump and his backers have been looking for something that hits against her and failing. And now they're doing the same thing with Tim Walz, her VP pick, launching into him nearly immediately.  Meanwhile, they're abandoning social conservatives who voted for him reluctantly, giving them a reason to move to somebody else.

I've seen the American Solidarity Party mentioned in that context now more than once.

Basic training photograph of Tim Walz.

Walz is getting flack for retiring after a long National Guard NCO career before his unit was to deploy to Iraq.  Walz was originally a Nebraska National Guardsman, and enlisted in the Guard the same year that I did.  Shoot, he may have been in basic training when I was.  He stayed in for something like 24 years and retired in 2005, several months before his unit deployed to the Middle East.  He's taking criticism for his retirement.

He was in an E9 slot at the time, but because he hadn't completed a training cycle, which a former E-9 I know states takes two years, his retirement was at the E8 level.

There are reasons to criticize Walz, in my view, for his stands on social issues. But retiring from the National Guard after 24 years in is not one of them.  Even if he simply felt like not going to Iraq that wouldn't be one of them.  It's not like we saw Donald Trump beating the doors down to go to Vietnam, now is it?

But that seems to have become a hallmark of the Boomer generation.  Lots of opinions on service by people who didn't wear a uniform.

A hallmark of recent times is that military service is something the right claims as its own, which is odd.  This has become more and more the case as the number of people who have actually served has continued to decline.  Walz would have been part of the big Cold War Army in its last decade.  Vance was not, he wa part of the 9/11 generation of servicemen.  It's easy to forget, seemingly, that a lot of figures served in uniform, and many still do, who aren't of the political right.

Slamming a National Guardsman, it might be noted, is an old tactic that makes Guard veterans, including myself, bitter.  Those joining the Guard in 81, like Walz, or me, served a longer period of time, six years minimum, than active duty servicemen of the same era did. We received the same basic and advanced training, and were in the Army when we did, and we often pulled multiple actual periods of activation  All in all, that six years, for many of us, gave us as much or nearly as much active duty time as the two years that regulars pulled.

Vance, it might be noted, served in Iraq in 2005, but he didn't see combat.

Combative Harriet Hagerman is slamming the City of Boulder, Colorado, for no real apparent reason. Boulder is notably liberal, and that seems to be the reason.  She stated in Teton County:

The pilot project is, you take out all their gas stations,” she said to a crowd of about 70 people in the Teton County Library. “We take away all their internal combustion engines — cars. We take away all of their highways and streets, because that’s all oil-and-gas-produced.

We fill out open space with windmills and solar panels, and we’ll see if we can actually run a city of 100,000 people [with] no fossil fuels whatsoever.

We’ll see if I can get that off the ground.

Boulder city councilman Mark Wallach retorted:

If she doesn’t understand the actual serious nature of the threat posed by climate change, I’m afraid she’s going to be living in a very warm state in the next decade.

If somebody wants to make light, that’s their business.  I deal in the real world, not in her fantasy world.

Having jus tsustained a loss on the ranch of her youth, Hageman's refusal to recognize what Wallach is pointing out is really remarkable.

Of course, the danger here is that somebody takes Hageman's suggestion serious and the pilot program works.

Out in the hinterlands Democrats and Republicans might actually be moving more towards the center. "Squad" member Rep. Cori Bush lost her primary in Missouri’s 1st Congressional District to St. Louis County prosecutor Wesley Bell, a moderate Democrat.  Nutty Valentina Gomez, a far-right MAGA candidate for Missouri Secretary of State is now in 6th Place, her ads showing her running around armed and burning books with a flame thrower not withstanding. 

August 12, 2024

Truck abuse.

 A surplus U.S. Army 2 1/2 ton 6x6 truck converted into a political billboard.

Dawn's Early Light's release date has been pushed back after the election.

August 13, 2024

He was rambling, babbling on about crowd sizes and immigration and President Joe Biden and whatever else seemed to pass through his mind. He was also badly slurring his words, raising questions about his health, and doing nothing to knock down rising concerns about his age and well-being.

He sounded like a disoriented, racist Daffy Duck.

The USA Today in Elon Musk's Twitter interview of Donald Trump. 

Others sources were mixed, one calling it dull.

Cont:

Teachers’ lobby targets candidates ahead of ‘pivotal’ Wyoming election: The Wyoming Education Association has publicly criticized Freedom Caucus members who oppose its positions. Some call foul.

August 14, 2024

Secretary of State Chuck Gray on Monday called for some county clerks to retest electronic voting systems with just over a week before the 2024 primary election. The request was made through a letter sent out on Monday to all 23 Wyoming county clerks

Casper Star Tribune, August 14, 2024.

Ilhan Omar her fourth Democratic Party nomination for her seat in Minnesota. 

August 15, 2024

Some good economic news:

August 15, 2024

Inflation has hit a three year low.

From the Casper Star Tribune:

Total employment in Wyoming grew by a scant 1.3% from first quarter 2023 to first quarter 2024, but total payroll grew by 4.1% over the year, the Research and Planning section of the Wyoming Department of Workforce Services reported Friday. Average weekly wage in the state grew by 2.8%.

In spite of this, however, GOP politicians are still campaigning on inflation.

It makes very little sense.

Consider this chart from the US Inflation Calculator:

Table: Annual Inflation Rates

To find annual inflation rates for a calendar year, look to the December column. For instance, the inflation rate in 2023 was 3.4%. Meanwhile, the "Ave" column shows the average inflation rate for each year using CPI data. In 2023, the average inflation rate was 4.1%. These average rates are published by the BLS but are rarely discussed in the news media, taking a back seat to the actual rate of inflation for a given calendar year.

Year	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	Ave
2024	3.1	3.2	3.5	3.4	3.3	3.0	2.9	Avail. Sept. 11
2023	6.4	6.0	5.0	4.9	4.0	3.0	3.2	3.7	3.7	3.2	3.1	3.4	4.1
2022	7.5	7.9	8.5	8.3	8.6	9.1	8.5	8.3	8.2	7.7	7.1	6.5	8.0
2021	1.4	1.7	2.6	4.2	5.0	5.4	5.4	5.3	5.4	6.2	6.8	7.0	4.7
2020	2.5	2.3	1.5	0.3	0.1	0.6	1.0	1.3	1.4	1.2	1.2	1.4	1.2
2019	1.6	1.5	1.9	2.0	1.8	1.6	1.8	1.7	1.7	1.8	2.1	2.3	1.8
2018	2.1	2.2	2.4	2.5	2.8	2.9	2.9	2.7	2.3	2.5	2.2	1.9	2.4
2017	2.5	2.7	2.4	2.2	1.9	1.6	1.7	1.9	2.2	2.0	2.2	2.1	2.1
2016	1.4	1.0	0.9	1.1	1.0	1.0	0.8	1.1	1.5	1.6	1.7	2.1	1.3
2015	-0.1	0.0	-0.1	-0.2	0.0	0.1	0.2	0.2	0.0	0.2	0.5	0.7	0.1
2014	1.6	1.1	1.5	2.0	2.1	2.1	2.0	1.7	1.7	1.7	1.3	0.8	1.6
2013	1.6	2.0	1.5	1.1	1.4	1.8	2.0	1.5	1.2	1.0	1.2	1.5	1.5
2012	2.9	2.9	2.7	2.3	1.7	1.7	1.4	1.7	2.0	2.2	1.8	1.7	2.1
2011	1.6	2.1	2.7	3.2	3.6	3.6	3.6	3.8	3.9	3.5	3.4	3.0	3.2
2010	2.6	2.1	2.3	2.2	2.0	1.1	1.2	1.1	1.1	1.2	1.1	1.5	1.6
2009	0	0.2	-0.4	-0.7	-1.3	-1.4	-2.1	-1.5	-1.3	-0.2	1.8	2.7	-0.4
2008	4.3	4.0	4.0	3.9	4.2	5.0	5.6	5.4	4.9	3.7	1.1	0.1	3.8
2007	2.1	2.4	2.8	2.6	2.7	2.7	2.4	2.0	2.8	3.5	4.3	4.1	2.8
2006	4.0	3.6	3.4	3.5	4.2	4.3	4.1	3.8	2.1	1.3	2.0	2.5	3.2
2005	3.0	3.0	3.1	3.5	2.8	2.5	3.2	3.6	4.7	4.3	3.5	3.4	3.4
2004	1.9	1.7	1.7	2.3	3.1	3.3	3.0	2.7	2.5	3.2	3.5	3.3	2.7
2003	2.6	3.0	3.0	2.2	2.1	2.1	2.1	2.2	2.3	2.0	1.8	1.9	2.3
2002	1.1	1.1	1.5	1.6	1.2	1.1	1.5	1.8	1.5	2.0	2.2	2.4	1.6
2001	3.7	3.5	2.9	3.3	3.6	3.2	2.7	2.7	2.6	2.1	1.9	1.6	2.8
2000													3.4

*Data Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: All items in U.S. city average, all urban consumers, not seasonally adjusted.

This would indicate that average rates reach this rate relatively frequently.  We would note that they were down below 2% in 2019 and 2020, right before COVID hit, and during Trump's Presidency, but they were at .1 in 2015, right before Trump took office.

The Federal target rate of inflation is 2%. We're about 1% higher than that right now, but generally the rate has been down around there under Democratic and Republican Presidents for the past twenty years, with some notable exceptions that were somewhat higher or somewhat lower.  What seems to be routinely missed in the Republican complains here is the giant war in the grainbelt for the third world and southern Europe going on, and the massive impact of a global pandemic.

We have of course recently been tracking the Great War, which featured similar economic shocks.  What happened then?

Massive inflation caused by the war, combined with the destruction of global trade to such an extent that by some measures it had only recovered. . . just before COVID 19.

Oh well, in the current political era facts and analysis are deflated.

Regarding facts, I've noted it before without being hugely pointed about it but the race in Senate District 28 has featured some truly disgusting campaigning by Bryce Reece.  It's appalling.

Floods of flyers for Reece, who is challenging Jim Anderson, regarded as the most effective Senator in Wyoming's legislature, have been sent out and they contain lies.  One calls Anderson a "gun grabber".

Reece also sent out a letter from his wife in which she makes appeals to religion, noting how they devout they are (from the text it's clear they are members of some branch of Evangelical Protestantism).**  

Lying is a sin, and in some circumstances a grave sin.  

Reece at one time was a sheep rancher, but is notably hostile to the science regarding COVID 19.  I really don't grasp why people believe that COVID 19 was exaggerated, which Reece's propaganda asserts.  The disease has ripped through the ranching community, however, due to similar beliefs, even while ranchers continue to vaccinate their livestock without hesitation for animal diseases. 

At any rate, I've never seen more lies circulated in a Wyoming election year in my lifetime, all of which are originating in the far populist right.  This isn't unique to Reece by any means.  I'm only aware of it here, as I pick up propaganda in favor of him nearly every day.  It's going on all over the state.

Interestingly yesterday one of the things that came was a flyer for this area including all the populist far right candidates together.  Included was House candidate Pete Fox, who has not run a nasty campaign,  but who is clearly on the far right, incumbent Jim Allemand and Jeanette Ward.  I don't recall who else was on it. At the same time, precinct committee members for the GOP, who here are not extremist, sent out their own flyer endorsing Senator Jim Anderson and Elissa Campbell for the House.  They also listed Casey Coates and Paul Bertoglio for County Commissioner, and Amber Pollack and Pat Sweeney for Casper City Council.

In the far right oddities category, far right candidate for the Senate, Reid Rasner, is getting no love from the organized populists, which is interesting.  At the same time that they're locally willing to rip to shreds other Republicans, including incumbents, and resort to lies, they're ignoring Rasner, who is as far right as they are (but who hasn't been telling outrageous lies).  In the race for the U.S. Senate, he's the real deal, while frankly Barrasso is basically posing as being from the far right, bending to the wind in order to fend off the challenge.  In a year in which the far right has even accused a prominent member of the legislature as supporting the Chinese Communist Party (an absurd claim), you'd think that the populist would attack Barrasso as its a safe thing to do Republican seat wise.

Nope.

Of course, Barrasso has done a good job of adopting their themes, although I frankly doubt he believes hardly any of them.

On PACS

Competing PACs in the Wyoming GOP raked in tens of thousands so far this year

August 16, 2024

Somebody left a threatening message on Chuck Gray's voicemail, which stated:

You’re playing with fire. I want you to know that if you start cheating, stealing, election denying this time around and shit hits the fan in November — you’re going to fucking get it Mr. Chuck Gray,

Gray resorted to his usual line in regard to this, it's the media's fault.  The Tribune reports that he wrote them, stating:

False media reporting incites individuals like this. As mentioned by the individual leaving the message, the message was clearly triggered  by false reporting by publications such as WyoFile and their syndication partners around the state.

WyoFile hasn't been reporting falsely, and Gray did make false statements in the last election about the election being stolen, none of which justifies threatening him.

Regarding false statements, I received a text of all things referencing the attack ads in favor of Bryce Reece noting that they were paid for by an organization located in Virginia. This was some sort of unsolicited text, like spam.

Anyhow, I haven't checked it out, but that information is basically of the type that's otherwise been in the news.  It's disturbing that an out of state organization would sink money in Wyoming in favor of a populist candidate and circulate lies.

Donald Trump apparently gave a long rambling press conference yesterday.  It's full of odd statements and has been real fodder for his critics.

Included in them was a claim about China's nuclear arsenal equalling the U.S's one, which China immediately corrected, noting also that China, unlike the US, has an official no first use of nuclear weapons policy.

China termed the U.S. arsenal, correctly, as "way bigger".

Also in Trump's comments was this item, we've already commented about:

Dr. Marx?

You're all going to be thrown into a communist system. You will be thrown into a system where everybody gets health care . . .

Donald Trump. 

So the Red Horde was actually fighting for universal health care?

In fairness, that was just apparently a snippet of what he said.  In the same speech he accused Harris of "badness" to an unnamed ally.  But, in terms of speech, well this is, um, weird.

Other gems included the following.

Concerning the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Medal of Honor, which are not equivalent in any sense:

When we gave her the Presidential Medal of Freedom… It’s the equivalent of the Congressional Medal of Honor— it’s actually much better because everyone who gets the Congressional Medal, they’re soldiers. They’re either in very bad shape because they’ve been hit so many times by bullets or they’re dead. She gets it and she’s a healthy beautiful woman.

This is a bizarre comment and once again into Trump's world outlook.  Trump seems to have a problem with injured people and he doesn't seem to respect military service much.  

It's worth noting, although it probably deserves a separate thread, that I've pretty much come to the conclusion that everyone should:

1) Be or live poor at some time.  I'm not keen on poverty, and I wish nobody had to stay poor, but having had to live poor at some point, which a lot of people do when they are students, really serves as a great leveler.  People who are rich their whole lives often believe they're super smart or superior to other people, when often circumstances of birth or luck have as much to do with that as anything;

2) Work a labor job.  By that I mean be in the Army, work in the oilfield, work in a gas station, and not for your parents.  People who've never had to do that often don't really respect those who do have to do that, or want to do that. 

Working for your parents, I'd note, doesn't count.  

I don't know much about young Trump, and I'm not going to bother to learn, but he's been rich his entire life, didn't serve in the Army, and has never, in so far as I know, worked a labor type job.  His character seems to suffer for it.

The Harris campaign replied.

Regarding the "weird" tag: 

She actually called me weird. He is weird. It was just a sound bite and she called JD and I weird. He's not weird. He was a great student at Yale.

For the record, I don't think J. D. Vance is weird.  I do think there's reason to be concerned that something is wrong with Trump's mental status.  And this "great student at Yale" thing is interesting.  Nothing keeps you from being a great student, and weird.

Regarding a Taliban leader:

He called me 'Your Excellency.' I wonder if he calls that to Biden. I doubt it.

Um. . . . 

Regarding job creation under Biden:

Substantially more than 100% of job creation went to migrants.

 Um. . . . 

Concerning Iran:

I’m not looking to be bad to Iran. We’re going to be friendly, I hope, with Iran. Maybe. But maybe not. But we’re going to be friendly, I hope. We’re going to be friendly.

Regarding windmills:

You want to see a bird cemetery, just go under a windmill, you see thousands of birds dead. The bald eagle, if you kill an eagle, they put you in jail for years. And yet these windmills knock them out like nothing.

Regarding acting like a 7th grade snot:

As far as the personal attacks, I’m very angry at her because of what she’s done to the country. I’m very angry at her that she weaponized the justice system against me and other people —- very angry at her, I think I'm entitled to personal attacks. I don't have a lot of respect for her. I don't have a lot of respect for her intelligence.

Intelligence is one of the things Trump brings up a lot.  To some degree, I wonder if he's insecure about his intelligence.

Regarding Harris:

 She's a very strong Communist lean.

That's nonsense as well as grammatically nonsensical.

Also regarding Harris:

She's been unbelievable in terms of badness to some of our great allies. You know who I'm talking about.

Badness? 

Regarding a millionaires mutual admiration society:

Elon endorsed me strongly, the most powerful endorsement, said it three or four times the other night during our little chat. A chat that was very well listened to and attended, we know that, right? Broke every single record I think in history.

On Harris replacing Biden, combined with what was supposed to be a comment on inflation:

It was a coup by people that wanted him out, and they didn’t do it the way, not the way they’re supposed to do it. $129 more on energy, and $241 more. This is all per month on rent,

Choice words from a person who tried to subvert the election.

And, on wars and inflation, oddly.

We have wars breaking out in the Middle East. We have the horrible war going on with Ukraine and Russia. All these things would have never happened if I was president. Would have never, ever happened, and they didn’t happen. Since Harris took office, car insurance is up 55%,

August 18, 2024

The Democratic National Convention is next week which means its time for the Democrats to do something really dumb.

Hillary Clinton will speak at the convention. 

Regular voters can't stand her.  Having her speak is not a good idea.

And, in a Trump rally:

I am much better looking than her. I'm a better looking person than Kamala.

Weird. 

August 19, 2024

And the verbal oddness just keeps on keeping on:

When you get the Medal of Honor, generally speaking…It’s much more painful to get…Where’s the Presidential Medal of Freedom, to my knowledge, I don't think anybody suffered

Trump.

The VFW is unhappy.

"Asinine" is a pretty strong condemnation.

August 20, 2024

Trump slapped his loyal supporter in the GOP Primary, Reid Rasner, in the face by re-endorsing John Barrasso.  He also re-endorsed Harriet Hageman.

The Trump campaign bizarrely posted fake AI generated images suggesting that Taylor Swift had endorsed Trump.

Predictably, the fake effort blew up rapidly and helps give rise, once again, to the word "weird" being used in regard to the Trump campaign.

Weirder yet, at one rally female Trump supporters were buying bottles labeled as if they were J. D. Vance semen samples, which is pretty darned weird.

In a really sad example of how Baby Boomers still rule the roost in American politics, James Taylor was scheduled to sing and play at last night's Democratic National Convention, apparently.

Taylor, I'm convinced, is an example of the cultural conspiracy phenomenon in which everyone pretends somebody is funny/talented/pretty when they are not.  His music is dull beyond tolerance, but it's of the Boomer generation.

Something really interesting that will be on the Natrona County Primary ballot today is the question of a Senior District, comprising the entire county, which would add 1 mill to property taxes to fund things that help seniors, like Meals On Wheels and the Senior Centers.

I'll be curious if it passes in the current anti tax climate, but I'm also curious as I think its an example of forced charity, which is something I'm not comfortable with.

Funding for senior services has been in serious decline as donations have dried up locally, as the same time that the Baby Boomers are really starting to need them, and also at the same time in which Wyoming has become somewhat of a destination for aging people who have made their fortunes and lives elsewhere and then abandon the places they lived and worked in order to come here.  I have a problem with that latter fact in general.

Additionally, the last legislature reduced property taxes for long time residents of a single dwelling, which is this generation, and its impossible not to notice that the backers of the proposition to limit property taxes are also made up of it.

You can't condemn an entire generation for a trend, but the overall trend here is noticeable.  Old people need help, because of the train wreck of American culture they don't tend to get it from their families, particularly if they have moved away from them or vice versa, they don't like paying property taxes, the state's policies have encouraged property taxes to rise, and now the agencies that support them want to raise property taxes, albeit only a little.

In effect, with all of this combined, the tax burden will disproportionately fall on the young.  

What a surprise.

No generation has benefitted as much from economic times, medicine, and governmental services than the Baby Boomers. But there has to be a stop to it somewhere.  If overall policies have made things difficult for them, and they may have, things need to be rethought.

I voted against the district.

Thus Concluded This Edition.

Footnotes:

*"Brat" used to be negative thing to call somebody, but in recent years young women have embraced it as symbolizing assertiveness and somebody has an album coming out this summer called "Brat".  Harris' supporters, and Harris, have embraced it, claiming this summer as "Brat Girl Summer".

**Included in the letter is statement that both she and her husband believe the U.S. Constitution is a divinely inspired document.  Few Christians believe that, but it is a minority view in certain strains of American Protestantism and the LDS.

Related Threads:

Woke v. Weird? The race we should have had (and still could save for Republican cowardice and populist subversion).

National Conservatism, Donald Trump, J. D. Vance, and The Law of Unintended Consequences.* **

Last edition:

The 2024 Election, Part XXIII. It's a new race.

Labels: 2020s, 2024, 2024 Election, Democratic Party, Donald Trump, Ethnicities, J. D. Vance, Joe Manchin, Joseph Biden, Kamala Harris, Populism, Republican Party, Sic transit Gloria Mundi, Wyoming