US Politics- Enemy at the Gaetz

[Fury Resurrected]

3 hours ago, S John said:

Boehner is the only nationally elected politician I’ve ever met in person, though very briefly. It was at a Dfac (chow hall) in Afghanistan. Was eating with two of my friends and one of them nudged me and said ‘Dude the speaker of the house just walked in!’ And then he stood up. To which I replied, ‘what?’

Nobody else in the place knew who he was. JB recognized my friend recognizing him so he came straight for us. Next thing I know I’m shaking his hand and his aides are flying around taking pictures. Then he left in search of better photo ops. He is as leathery as he appears on television.

I did also follow Al Franken for a few blocks in DC once just because we were headed the same direction. And George W Bush gave my friend and I the ol double thumbs up at the dedication to the National D-Day Memorial in Bedford, Virginia. He was there to give a speech and we got out of school for it. He had to pass really close to us to get to the podium and my buddy went for the thumbs up, W saw it and bam! double thumbs up. That was 3 months before 9/11.

Al Franken went to the opening of one of my art shows. I, however, did not attend. I never attend my openings or closings because they are on weekends and I have to work, so I am just not there. But I had a show up at the (at that time) newly opened library in the town I worked in that was half my work and half pieces I curated from other artists. He did not buy any paintings and to my understanding used it as a campaign stop, which was pretty tacky.

I also met former (at that time current) MPLS mayor RT Rybak who is rumored to be the inspiration for the mayor on Portlandia. He was volunteering for the draft Obama door knocking I was doing. He was super nice.

The only big deal politician I met was Al Gore. He did a small talk on climate change as part of his prep for An Inconvenient Truth, and I went to that. He was an entirely different dude than in the campaign. If that Al Gore had run we’d be living in a very different world.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

7 hours ago, Fury Resurrected said:

Al Franken went to the opening of one of my art shows. I, however, did not attend. I never attend my openings or closings because they are on weekends and I have to work, so I am just not there. But I had a show up at the (at that time) newly opened library in the town I worked in that was half my work and half pieces I curated from other artists. He did not buy any paintings and to my understanding used it as a campaign stop, which was pretty tacky.

I've had numerous interactions with Al. I like him a lot, but he is kind of a weird guy. If you want to know more details you can PM me, but otherwise I'll just leave it at that. 

I'll lay down the trump card. FLOTUS gave me a hug at an event in 2012. Later that day I was in the VIP area at an event shooting the shit with some SS guys. I looked over as they had to leave and then VP Biden was almost standing right next to me. 

I've also turned down three chances to have my picture taken formally with Bill Clinton. Fuck him.

[Reny of Storms End]

I've never met any politicians, but I did hear Howard Dean campaigning for John Kerry while I was a freshman at the U of Oregon. He even did an Oregon related version of his famous cry/scream. 

My brother met Obama briefly and got a picture. He had helped with election efforts in NC in 08. He asked Obama if he and his coworkers could, for the picture, pick him up and have them all hold Obama horizontally. I guess Barry might have been receptive, but the SS squashed that idea

[DanteGabriel]

I stabbed my brother with a pen in front of Ted Kennedy when I was four, and I've eaten snails with Mike Dukakis.

[Jaxom 1974]

Think I've told this one before, but Paul Ryan attended a Lincoln Dinner in Kenosha in the spring of 2016. The room was half MAGA hats...but anyway...he was still Speaker then, and the guest of honor.  He came over and thanked myself and my staff very quickly, though I don't remember if he shook hands with any of us...but all I kept thinking was, here we are to serve this Rpublican Dinner, myself,  three Chinese Nationals, a Mexican young woman, a gay Mexican young man, a Jewish young man, a lesbian, an African American young woman, and a young white woman.  We all talked about it and were chuckling about it after.  When I pointed out the general humor of the staffing, the young white girl spoke up and said she didn't fit any "molds", until we reminded her she was female...

[Martell Spy]

How Lil Nas X Flipped Conservatives’ Culture-War Playbook
Never mind “owning the libs.” The meme rapper pushed one button and the right did his publicity for him.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/04/10/lil-nas-x-montero-satan-devil-politics-controversy-religion-480655

Quote

 

Far more interesting than the song is its video, specifically how through it Nas used one of America’s most reliable engines for cultural outrage to his advantage: the conservative media ecosystem.

The video pushes sacrilegious buttons by depicting the aforementioned sexual encounter with Satan, which, if it sounds a little old-fashioned as a cultural provocation, was followed by the announcement of a bootlegged, custom line of Nikes that included real human blood. (Unsurprisingly, Nike swiftly sued to prevent their release.) Among rap fans, and especially Nas “stans,” as artists’ die-hard, cult-like supporters are called, it made a decent-size splash, its outre visuals and loopy premise generating the expected hype for the artist’s forthcoming full-length debut. But in conservative media, ever-eager to talk about something besides the pandemic and Matt Gaetz, it was like touching a match to dry leaves.

Since the video’s release and the sneaker announcement, Ben Shapiro’s Daily Wire has published no fewer than nine (!) articles about the video and sneaker controversy, and Christian journalist Raymond Arroyo teamed up with Fox News’ Laura Ingraham to condemn the video on her weeknight program (“Rapper embraces Satan just in time for Holy Week,” the chyron read). The sneakers earned an official slapdown from South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, a potential 2024 presidential candidate, who sent her 400,000 followers a tweet that helpfully included the product shots.

As conservative media worked itself into a frenzy, Nas himself was all too happy to fan the flames, posting a trolling fake “apology” video and joking about evening the score with a line of Chick-fil-A-themed sneakers.

With the “Montero” video, Nas affirmed his personal identity as one of vanishingly few out gay rappers by expressing himself as flamboyantly and unabashedly as possible. He actively courted the controversy, measuring his success by the outrage and teeth-gnashing of his opponents — an approach straight out of the conservative culture-war playbook.

 

 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

20 hours ago, IheartIheartTesla said:

The left has never tried the experiment of running a 'non-moderate' in the general as opposed to a moderate in recent memory. The right did, and they had a 50/50 result (of course, speaking of Trump here). This is of course a debate as old as the trees, swing voters versus hidden voters.

Unfortunately, there appear to be more hidden white males without a college degree voters than any other demographic, so one can understand why the Democrats are so risk averse. Maybe when the alternate is someone relatively palatable (i.e., a bland moderate GoP candidate) they can go for it.

Are you talking about in recent memory?  Could George McGovern really be called a moderate?

[DanteGabriel]

9 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Are you talking about in recent memory?  Could George McGovern really be called a moderate?

"In recent memory" is right there in the part you quoted.

I would have brought up McGovern myself, but for that phrase. Did McGovern's defeat in the cycle after the clusterfuck of the 1968 election shape the institutional attitude of the Democratic Party? Is that the origination of their timidity and fear of being labelled too lefty?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Just now, DanteGabriel said:

"In recent memory" is right there in the part you quoted.

I would have brought up McGovern myself, but for that phrase. Did McGovern's defeat in the cycle after the clusterfuck of the 1968 election shape the institutional attitude of the Democratic Party? Is that the origination of their timidity and fear of being labelled too lefty?

It makes sense.  It was the last time the Democratic Party really “went left” with a Presidential nominee.  

I wonder if pushing left from the top down is really viable.  It plays into the (complete bullshit) “deep state” narrative the Trumpanistas push.  

Going from the Local and State level to shift left makes those moves more palletable because it’s “Bob” or “Kimberly” down the way suggesting it.  Not the “faceless bueraucrat” Trumpanistas play on to frighten people.

[DMC]

4 minutes ago, DanteGabriel said:

Did McGovern's defeat in the cycle after the clusterfuck of the 1968 election shape the institutional attitude of the Democratic Party? Is that the origination of their timidity and fear of being labelled too lefty?

Basically, yes.  After the 68 election, the McGovern-Fraser commission nationalized primaries, then McGovern won the nomination and got destroyed.  Ten years later, after Carter similarly got trounced by Reagan, the party instituted superdelegates.  This obviously paid immediate dividends as they proceeded to nominate Mondale who lost 49 states, then Dukakis lost 40 states..and the superdelegates played no role in their nominations.

[Fragile Bird]

I just saw that Jim Carey’s Truman movie was shot in the Gaetz family home. You can’t make this stuff up.

And yesterday, in his first public speech since all hell broke loose, before a Republican audience, he said “they’re not coming after me, they’re coming after you!”. You can’t make this stuff up.

[Zorral]

George McGovern, an extreme leftist?   From Nixon's perspective, Reagan's -- but anyone on the other side of Goldwater was a commie. This hasn't changed since the days of FDR when it comes to rethugs and business.  Is this forgetting political history again?

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/02/bernie-sanders-george-mcgovern/606883/

 

[Ormond]

23 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

I just saw that Jim Carey’s Truman movie was shot in the Gaetz family home. You can’t make this stuff up.

And yesterday, in his first public speech since all hell broke loose, before a Republican audience, he said “they’re not coming after me, they’re coming after you!”. You can’t make this stuff up.

Your first line is a fascinating coincidence, but your second point seems far from "you can't make this stuff up" to me. That is exactly the sort of thing I'd expect sleazy politicians to say to try to get their voters to continue to support them. 

[DMC]

19 minutes ago, Zorral said:

George McGovern, an extreme leftist?   From Nixon's perspective, Reagan's -- but anyone on the other side of Goldwater was a commie. This hasn't changed since the days of FDR when it comes to rethugs and business.  Is this forgetting political history again?

Democrats believing McGovern was too far left for a presidential nominee and overreacting to it - stupidly and ineffectively - is political history.

[Mlle. Zabzie]

Back to politicians we have met:

John Warner (S-Va-R) - I worked for him.  Great guy, old school and very thoughtful.  “Lizbeth” stopped by once (they were still friends), so that was cool.  Since I worked on the Hill I met all kinds of others, include Strom (ick), Ben Nighthorse Campbell (interesting guy - was right when he switched parties, which is how I met him).  

I also worked as Tom Davis when he was chair of the NRCC as his social secretary for a summer.  That was interesting.....

I have met and spent a decent amount of time with Bill Clinton (really put my teeth on edge - I didn’t find him very genuine), Ralph Nader (he’s a total bummer in person), and Jack Straw (UK Foreign Secretary - very charming).

I attended a Kerry event with my now husband - he was fine, but uninspiring.  

I hired Mikie Sherrill to work at my firm a million years ago (then she broke my heart and became a litigator, but worked with my husband, so I guess it is fine).

Through those jobs when I was a wee Zabs, and now through my job I also have met incidentally lots of other political types.  Tend to be more on the appointee side these days.  I now have a blanket rule that I do not donate to campaigns.  You may ask why - it is because clients come inbound with asks A LOT, and I refuse to get sucked into donating to the likes of Ted Cruz* by a pushy client, so I have a stock and true answer that I do not donate but will make a donation to a charity of the client’s choice (they never seem to want the charitable donation in these circumstances).

 

*Based on actual events.

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

2 hours ago, DanteGabriel said:

"In recent memory" is right there in the part you quoted.

I would have brought up McGovern myself, but for that phrase. Did McGovern's defeat in the cycle after the clusterfuck of the 1968 election shape the institutional attitude of the Democratic Party? Is that the origination of their timidity and fear of being labelled too lefty?

My college thesis focused on three presidential campaigns: 1972, 1980 and 2008. 1972 was truly a bizarre cycle. McGovern had a ton of policies that polled well while Nixon was viewed negatively in a number of ways. And yet the latter, who did absolutely nothing in WW2, portrayed himself as a strong vet while the real WW2 bomber pilot war hero was seen as a weak hippy and Nixon rode that to a landslide victory. Murika! 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

1 hour ago, Zorral said:

George McGovern, an extreme leftist?   From Nixon's perspective, Reagan's -- but anyone on the other side of Goldwater was a commie. This hasn't changed since the days of FDR when it comes to rethugs and business.  Is this forgetting political history again?

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/02/bernie-sanders-george-mcgovern/606883/

 

He is significantly left of center for American Presidential Politics.

[Starkess]

The only politician I can think of that I met was Obama. He was the speaker at my graduation and shook my hand and gave me my diploma. I don't even remember what he said, though. I have a picture of it at least. (Amusingly enough, I actually had voted for McCain in '08--sorry, I've reformed--and McCain Jr was a classmate of mine so McCain Sr was there as well.)

Oh and former Representative Tom Latham came to my high school government class once, and I met him briefly afterwards. He was also the one who gave me my nomination to USNA, actually, but I don't think I ever met him during that process--the interview was done by a committee on his behalf and then he just signed whatever letter I got sent afterwards.

[DireWolfSpirit]

Have met Hillary who spoke at our Trades training center when I lived out West. Back in the Midwest I've met both Governors Granholm and Engler, also Pres. candidate Perot in Lansing. Here in Wisconsin Both Trump and Pence have given speeches where I work.

All in all, I've managed to bump into a fair amount of muckedy mucks for never having any type of occupation that's in politics. But being a union tradesman in swing states gets you solicited a bit nowadays.

I imagine any New Hampshire or Iowa posters could tell us stories.

[S John]

10 hours ago, Martell Spy said:

How Lil Nas X Flipped Conservatives’ Culture-War Playbook
Never mind “owning the libs.” The meme rapper pushed one button and the right did his publicity for him.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/04/10/lil-nas-x-montero-satan-devil-politics-controversy-religion-480655

 

So tangentially related to this, since it involves Satan, and I promise I’ll tie it back in - we are working on getting my son Baptized. I am a confirmed but non-practicing Roman Catholic and my wife is basically ‘no religion’.

Last week we did the zoom class with a bunch of other parents and the priest at our local parish. Catholics require classes for everything so I was ready for that part. The class opened with a lengthy retelling of the garden of eden story from Genesis as a way of making us all understand why baptism is considered so important and I realized rather quickly how far I have fallen from the dogma tree.

This guy is telling us well, God would have forgiven them if they had just admitted that they ate the fruit (that the talking snake told them to eat) but since they didn’t they got cast out and now all of us experience hardship in life because of Adam and Eve getting humans banished from the garden of Eden. And then he went on to say that sometimes he felt annoyed at Adam and Eve for this.

And I’m sitting there thinking Wow. This guy really believes this story! It was a reminder of something I have always struggled with in terms of religion. It is not so much that people have faith. That isn’t hard for me to grasp. It’s that so many of them are so sure of it that they can relate to me a story of a talking snake and an eternal punishment for Apple-eating without a hint of reservation. How? 

and one other aside that I thought was interesting about the Catholic baptism process. One of the parents needed to be a fully initiated Catholic (me), but not both and they didn’t really care if I was a good Catholic or not... which is good because they definitely won’t recognize me from mass.  But they DO very much care that the godparents both be Catholic. I suppose in the event of my demise they want to ensure a Catholic upbringing. But they went into the restrictions on non-Catholic godparents after telling us how important it was to have your child baptized because of original sin. You’re telling me, that despite how important it is, you won’t do it if I can’t scrounge up a pair of Catholics? Or you’d prefer Catholic Aunt Meth-head over agnostic Aunt Has a stable job and can support a child? You’d rather send an infant to purgatory in the event of a very early death than just suck it up and have Methodist godparents? It’s stupid. Luckily my sister is Catholic and she and her husband are who we want, so we will be ok, but fucking hell. The nerve to tell me that my kid desperately needs to be saved from something that is the fault of a snake and an ancient woman, but they’ll refuse you unless they can reasonably guarantee satisfactory indoctrination.. bullshit. That doesn’t sound like concern for his soul as much as it sounds like insuring that someone, somewhere is putting checks in the donation basket.

anyway I didn’t bring this up to take a pot shot at believers, just that if you are a secular person, or even a person who was raised religious and has lived secularly for a long time - like myself, it is very easy to forget how central it is to people’s lives and that accordingly they take it very seriously. The Lil Nas X controversy was a national level reminder of something I was personally reminded of this week.