CSotD: Time to drop the H word
Skip to comments
Timing is everything in comedy, and timeliness is everything in editorial cartooning.
With this unrelated but relevant "ghost stories around the campfire" piece, featuring his home state's former secretary of state, Kris Kobach, head of Trump's search for voter fraud, Lee Judge gets a jump on his colleagues in the trade, who over the next few days, will be furiously commenting on Dear Leader's unhinged political diatribe, delivered to a Boy Scout Jamboree.
Judge's paper, the Kansas City Star, has commented on Kobach's search, saying
The group was formed after the president alleged “millions” of people cast illegal votes last November, costing him a popular vote victory.
Most Americans know the claim is preposterous. We expect the commission to spend the next several months and plenty of taxpayer dollars confirming that understanding.
I hope they are right about "most Americans," but I'm not so sure anymore.
Trump began his speech with a promise he immediately broke, and did so with a profanity that is mild but still not something you say in front of a group of children: "Who the hell wants to speak about politics when I'm in front of the Boy Scouts? Right?"
He then demonstrated who the hell wants to speak about politics, by reliving yet once more his triumph over the forces of dishonesty:
Do you remember that famous night on television, November 8th where they said, these dishonest people, where they said, there is no path to victory for Donald Trump. They forgot about the forgotten people.
By the way, they're not forgetting about the forgotten people anymore. They're going crazy trying to figure it out, but I told them, far too late; it's far too late.
But you remember that incredible night with the maps, and the Republicans are red and the Democrats are blue, and that map was so red it was unbelievable. And they didn't know what to say.
His attacks on those dishonest people became more specific:
Man, this is a lot of people. Turn those cameras back there, please. That is so incredible.
By the way, what do you think the chances are that this incredible massive crowd, record setting, is going to be shown on television tonight? One percent or zero?
(APPLAUSE)
The fake media will say, "President Trump spoke" — you know what is — "President Trump spoke before a small crowd of Boy Scouts today." That's some — that is some crowd. Fake media. Fake news.
He even promised them that Christianity would triumph over tolerance:
In the Scout oath, you pledge on your honor to do your best and to do your duty to God and your country.
(APPLAUSE)
And by the way, under the Trump administration you'll be saying "Merry Christmas" again when you go shopping, believe me.
(APPLAUSE)
Merry Christmas.
They've been downplaying that little beautiful phrase. You're going to be saying "Merry Christmas" again, folks.
(APPLAUSE)
While Judge isn't referencing Dear Leader's speech to the Scouts, he is referencing the administration's efforts to sow distrust in the system, a recurrent theme in Trump's speeches, and, no, it's neither too soon or too inappropriate to make comparisons to others who have sought a loyalty that would not believe opponents or even neutral analysis.
A President who counts up the votes he needs assuming they'll come only from Republicans, and speaks not as leader of the nation but his party (which he only joined in order to become their leader) is a frightening spectre; though not nearly as frightening as the fact that so few in his party are willing to break ranks with him, prefering power to justice and decency, at any cost.
As Tom Toles notes, the important thing is to stay on message.
I'm sure we'll be coming back to the Boy Scout speech over the next few days, but let me say that anyone who thinks it's funny or trivial is missing the point.
Of course it was inappropriate to give a partisan speech to children, but to criticize Trump for that is to give him credit for being able to make rational and appropriate decisions when he was elected by people who prized his tendency to fly off the handle.
If he were the most rational, Machiavellian plotter in the world, Donald Trump could not have put himself into this position. He has simply tapped years of fear and paranoia sown by Hollywood and television profiteers, as well as by extremist religious, political and talk-radio demagogues.
Establishing the Idiocracy has been a decades-long process.
Turn on your TV, particularly during the day but at any hour, and scan through the delusional historic and scientific "documentaries" capitalizing on people's inability to process information or apply logic, intermingled with shows — both fiction and nonfiction — convincing viewers that rape and murder are endemic in the streets, and carefully staged reality shows in which people scream at each other.
No wonder people are immune to facts, frightened enough to turn over all power to the police, and fast to attack, rather than debate, anyone who voices an opposing viewpoint.
Bear in mind that, long before Trump voiced any political ambition, the Sandy Hook shootings brought forth claims that it was not guns, but mental illness, that caused the shootings, from politicians who then refused — and even cut — funding for treatment of mental illness.
If the deranged slaughter of 20 small children and six teachers resulted in neither even moderate gun laws nor substantial mental health funding, why would a loony, partisan speech before 45,000 Boy Scouts change anything?
I've already used Dennis Green's "They are who we said they are" speech recently. Here's another quote I have used before:
As has been said in several popular memes going the rounds, if you've ever wondered what you would have done in the 1930s, here's your chance to find out.
Though, of course, nobody marks the disaster that never occurred.
Maybe you should wait a little longer, so that your grandchildren can ask you why you didn't step up.
Comments 3
Comments are closed.