There's Nothing There

Biden's State of the Union speech was a huge success. The GOP's response? Not so much....

by Ben Cohen

Joe Biden delivered a scintillating speech at the State of the Union last night, and no one outside of the right wing media bubble believes otherwise. Polling suggested a whopping 72 percent of viewers approved of Biden’s State speech, including 43 percent of Republicans who tuned in. It was forceful, poignant and filled with concrete proposals for the coming years of his presidency. It was Biden at his best, and the GOP knew it.

The crafty veteran

Biden urged Republicans to work with him, saying that “if we could work together in the last Congress, there’s no reason we can’t work together and find consensus on important things in this Congress as well.”

Biden understands he is speaking to a party controlled by a fascist insurgency. Notably, few if any Republicans stood up to applause during his speech. They know full well their base is still controlled by Donald Trump and Tucker Carlson. If they stand for the Woke, senile, Deep State operative trying to destroy America, they lose at the ballot. So they will not work with Biden, not when Marjorie Taylor Greene is the real Speaker of the House.

Biden’s speech was designed to further separate the MAGA mob from what is left of the traditional GOP. The cabal of extremist Republicans in charge of Congress are too dimwitted to understand this, but the old guard knows full well that Biden’s veteran tactic has paid huge dividends. Last night you could see them fret and worry, nervously clapping for the President when they felt safe to do so, but never too enthusiastically.

Only one party

In functioning democracies, political parties offer competing policy platforms to voters. In the UK, the Conservative Party and the Labour Party differ significantly on economic and social policy. They have competing visions of how local government should work and be funded, differ on the organization of Britain’s vast public health care system, and have contrasting ideas on environmental policy. But both sides are serious. Former Conservative Environment Secretary Michael Gove for example, took a bold approach to the environment so forward thinking even Greenpeace praised his efforts. Climate change and environmental destruction is not up for debate in the UK. Both parties understand it is happening, and both have sensible policies to combat it.

When this happens, democracy thrives because voters have real choices. No political party should rule unchecked, regardless of how much one might agree with their agenda. This law is fundamental to the functioning of any and all democracies.

When it comes to America though, this law has all but disintegrated.

The Zombie party

The Republican response to Biden’s speech was to heckle him during it, then lie about it afterwards. When Biden was discussing overdose deaths caused by fentanyl, a Republican House member shouted, “It’s your fault!”. After the speech was finished, Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ official response was that Biden was the “first man to surrender his presidency to a woke mob that can’t even tell you what a woman is”. This despite Biden not mentioning “what a woman is” during his 1 hour and 13 minutes speech. Sanders also called Biden “unfit to serve as commander in chief,” and said that “the dividing line in America is no longer between right or left — the choice is between normal or crazy.” After Marjorie Taylor Greene patrolled the halls of Congress with a helium ballon then showed up to the speech dressed as Cruella de Vil, one can only interpret this as a deeply dysfunctional projection.

The Republican zombie party lurches forward, but it is nothing more than a sad and somewhat dangerous spectacle. Poke it and it bites, but leave it and it implodes all by itself. Biden and his speech writers knew exactly what would trigger a Republican meltdown in the United States House of Representatives last night. The President only needed to urge Americans to come together to build a better future for the conspiracy theorists to start frothing at the mouth. Biden was prepared for the hecklers and dealt with them perfectly.

During his speech, Biden declared that Republicans want to hold the country hostage over the national debt, and that "some Republicans want Medicare and Social Security to sunset every five years".

The Republicans began shouting in response, and Marjorie Taylor Greene could be seen shouting "Liar!".

Biden smiled through the heckling, offered to show proof, then checkmated them in brutal fashion. "As we all apparently agree, Social Security and Medicare is off the books now," he said.

Game, set, and match.

Nothing “there”

The truth is that there is no opposition to the Democratic Party in America. The GOP is not a political party in any meaningful definition of the term. It is bereft of ideas, has no policies to offer, and does not engage with meaningful dialogue with the opposition party. They hound vulnerable minorities and obstruct the functioning of government not because it is in the interests of their voters, but because it gets them a spot on Tucker Carlson. The dominant MAGA wing of the party does not want to govern. It wants PR and new Twitter followers.

This does not bode well for the future of democracy in America. The Democrats are not perfect and the party would benefit greatly from responsible oversight. But there is none. So for now Americans must put their faith in President Biden’s decency, and the party’s reverence for political norms. The Democrats must behave as if the GOP was still a functioning party, that they cared about following the rule of law and crafting good legislation most Americans want. Joe Biden delivered last night, and reminded the country that his party is the only force holding the country together. How long this can go on for no one knows, but no one can fault the Democrats for this mess.

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The Dumbing Down Of Right-Wing America

Tucker Carlson pretends to be a mildly brain-damaged dog watching a magic trick. But he's really doing something else.

by Justin Rosario

When I was a child back in the distant past of the 1970s and early 80s, I started to dumb myself down for the benefit of the kids around me. I was a total nerd back when being a nerd was very very bad. Almost a mortal offense. Even as popular as 1984’s “Revenge of the Nerds” was, it would take decades for the stigma to fade (and let’s be honest, it still really hasn’t). 

By the time I was in 3rd or 4th grade, I had started using smaller words so the kids around me wouldn’t be confused or annoyed. I stopped talking about complicated science concepts, even science fiction because if it wasn’t something easy to understand like “pew pew pew” laser guns, other kids rolled their eyes and threw out the dreaded “nerd” label.

I did a lot of damage to myself with this performative ignorance, but I didn’t know any better. I know better now, which makes watching the professional right dumb itself down that much harder to swallow. I know they know better but, unlike the eight year-old me, the right dumbs itself down for entirely different reasons.

Continue reading this article here.