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Okay, so if I went into a bank and the guy who was ready to help me open a new account was wearing shorts and a Hawaiian shirt, I dunno, but I’d likely think he wasn’t a real serious guy. I’d be highly unlikely to give him my money.

So, I’m gonna say something and I do not want to hear about misogyny. This ain’t that.

One of the reasons I cannot take Jim Jordan seriously is that he doesn’t take his appearance as a congressman seriously. When he is not in the actual capitol complex, I don’t care what he wears as long as it covers his private parts. I would add that I don’t think he should ever, in any place for any reason I can think of, dress in an attempt to look provocative. I do not know of any way Jim Jordan could look provocative but that’s just my opinion. Eric Swalwell, well that’s just a whole ‘nother thing.

Anyway, I wrote all that to talk about this:

Someone I know said that Kyrsten Sinema dressed that way to show her “independent spirit.” No, she wore that dress to show her “bad taste.” Honey, she should have left that dress hanging from the curtain rod.

And then there’s that woman who wore a white fur coat to remind everybody of the Chinese spy balloon.

Seriously, she thought she was embarrassing Joe Biden, but ended up scaring Dalmatians.

She really thought the balloon was going to be the big story of the night but discovered that if people were all that concerned about privacy they would unplug Alexia and destroy all their neighbors’ Ring.

Majorie Taylor Green spent $600 on a coat to look like a joke. However, she does a pretty damn good job of it for free.

“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” — Unknown

The above quote used to be attributed to Sinclair Lewis, but Politifact has stated that this was not his quote. Either way, this quote is prescient now. The large difference between the past and the present is that the quiet part is now being said out loud.

The notorious MTG has already called for a move to Christian Nationalism. Obviously, my commentary on religion has been a lightening rod. So, I won’t try to belabor this point too much, but the whole concept of Christian nationalism is a bastardization of Christianity.

In the gospel of John, a story is told about the woman at the well. Jesus approaches the woman at the well and asks for some water. The Samaritan woman has a conversation with Jesus and if you believe the wording in the translation, she convinces him that he is supposed to be the savior for the whole world.

So, how do we take a savior that is the savior for the whole world and somehow shrink him down to a savior of just your own country? Obviously, the answer is that those doing this and those listening to it have no earthly clue what the key point of Christianity really is.

Really this is about the love of team. The best analogy I could give is that of being a sports fan. Everyone wants their team to win the big game. Whether it is the World Series, NBA Championship, or Super Bowl you feel an immense amount of joy when your team wins. The problem comes when you are willing to sacrifice your personal beliefs and borders on common decency.

So, you have to ask yourself if you are willing to root for a scumbag on your team. Are you willing to root for Deshaun Watson? Are you willing to root for Trevor Bauer? Are you rooting for Kyrie Irving? What happens in fascism is that the team becomes more important than any personal feelings on morality and decency.

If we make this portable to the political world then this becomes very clear. There are Democrats that are scumbags. There are Republicans that are scumbags. Yet, these scumbags are members of our team. So, we are going to root for them to succeed even though we know they are horrible people.

If you have any doubts about this, just check out the number of people that call themselves a patriots or have a bunch of flags around their name. Are they not all rabid conservatives? You will notice that anyone that comes across them on social media and states something wrong those people will not politely invite you to leave the country.

People that have to say they are patriots are just like the people that feel the need to tell you they are nice guys or that they are smart. How smart and how nice are they really? If you feel the need to tell me you love America then how much do you really love America? You love a certain part of America which means you hate other parts of America. That’s when we get to another of the pillars of fascism. Stay tuned…

When you go to different museums chronicling World War II you will occasionally see different examples of propaganda. This was particularly true in the Holocaust Museum. One of the things they included were the fourteen signs of fascism. I’ll list them below.

• Powerful and Continuing Nationalism
• Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights
• Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying cause
• Supremacy of the Military
• Rampant Sexism
• Controlled Mass Media
• Obsession with National Security
• Religion and Government are Intertwined
• Corporate Power is Protected
• Labor Power is Suppressed
• Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts
• Obsession with Crime and Punishment
• Rampant Cronyism and Corruption
• Fraudulent Elections
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These can probably split into two categories just like the people that are involved with it. Some of these are absolute prerequisites for fascism to take hold. Others are more just side effects that happen to occur with fascism. All of them sound scary in the extreme and yet we can see the seeds of these things now.

The same is true for people. Some people genuinely want some of these things in moderation and are really not fascists personally, but may be fascist adjacent. Others know exactly what they are doing and know exactly the direction they are headed. So, over the next few weeks we will take a longer look at each of these individually.

Well, I know you guys like freaky things on candidates’ campaign and expenditures accounts and here’s one you can use about Ted Cruz, as if you need more.  But, this one lets your imagination run wacky.

VOLUME SOCIAL CLUB LLC
1834 WESTHEIMER RD UNIT 1/2
HOUSTON, Texas 77098
12/31/2022
PERSONNEL/SERVICE EQUIPMENT
234.00

New Years Eve – Volume Social Club in Houston.

Your guess is as good as mine.

McCarthy and the TFG Wing of the GOP are suddenly clutching their pearls and swooning over federal spending and budget deficits under the Biden administration.  And during such pearl clutching, they keep citing “$31 trillion in debt,” and that “we need to get spending under control.”  At the same time as he’s introducing turmoil into every American’s life by threatening the global economy, he’s decrying causing turmoil.  Saying he wants “government to work,” he’s guaranteeing on several fronts that it doesn’t.

The debt is currently about $31 trillion dollars, which sound like a huge number, right?  It is, but let’s look at it in perspective.  US debt was at $20 trillion when TFG took office.  When he left office, it was $28 trillion, caused by a gigantic tax cut to billionaires, a huge spending spree on his wall, defense spending, and bungling of the pandemic response which caused the highest unemployment rate in history as well as collapsing the economy.  In fact, that $8 trillion increase represents 25% of all US debt today.  And it goes without saying that McCarthy and his Trumpist friends increased the debt limit THREE TIMES without conditions during that same period of time to fund the TFG spending spree.

So Kevin, let’s stop bullshitting ourselves about spending and the debt.  The facts are that when there is a GOP president in office, spending and deficits don’t matter.  When a Dem is in office there’s nothing more critical than spending and deficits with a 24/7 hysteria over spending.  This is blatant mob style hostage taking to keep their base whipped up going into 2024.  Like 2011, Republicans are once again threatening the GLOBAL economy to extract unspecified spending cuts (except for threatening seniors with cuts to social security and medicare, AGAIN).  Obama learned the hard way not to negotiate with hostage takers.  Thankfully, Biden was there and learned that same lesson.  All McCarthy deserves from him is the middle finger.

I’m personally sick to death of McCarthy’s bullshit.  I know it won’t change anything, but I feel better at least telling him so.