Right now, tennis bad boy, notorious anti-vaxxer and all-round shitty person Novak Djokovic is winging his way from Melbourne Australia to Dubai after being deported for violating Australian immigration laws, lying about it, and then insisting that rules don’t apply to him.  He dragged immigration officials, tournament officials, the tennis world, and indeed the entire population of Australia through almost two weeks of drama just because he doesn’t want to get a simple safe and effective vaccination.

A three federal judge panel ruled on Sunday afternoon that Australia immigration officials were within their rights doing their damn job and enforcing the country’s immigration laws.  Even better, there was no court that would receive an inevitable appeal from Djokovic.  The decision was final. The decision was unanimous and, to add insult to justice, the panel ordered Djoker to pay all of the costs incurred by the government for this sorry chapter of his life that resulted from his own decisions and conduct.

After years of bad guys all over the world getting away with actual murder, from Rodrigo Duterte Wrecking to Philippine government to Vladimir Putin’s murderous rule over Russia, to TFG’s teflon life where he’s never been personally held to account for his entire corrupt existence, wins for good guys are few and far between.  Of the thousands of Deplorables who stormed the US Capitol only about 700 were charged with crimes and most of those are only petty charges.  Less than 20 are charged with serious crimes and only 11 charged with what all were guilty, sedition.  Bad guys get off scott free on a daily basis, especially willfully ignorant anti-vaxxers who are participating in mass illness and death simply because they’re assholes.

Because bad guys win almost all the time, it’s rare when one of them gets theirs, especially famous ones like Djoker.  Like other narcissists, he believes that simply because he’s really good at hitting a tennis ball he can inflict his warped existence on everyone around him with no consequences.  Australia proved him wrong, and that victory is especially sweet.

What’s infuriating, though?  This entire episode was easily avoidable by Djokovic doing the right thing and just getting vaccinated.  Just think of all the lives he could save, especially in his native Serbia where anti-vaxxers have caused the virus to surge again in a population that’s only 47% vaccinated.  That’s the real tragedy of Djokovic’s failure at being a decent human being.

Remember back in 2008 when Sarah Palin’s lie about “death panels” in the proposed Obamacare legislation took on a life of its own?  How the entire red state noise machine took it and ran with it?  Well, irony kicked in this weekend when Palin, talking at the Turning Point USA convention brainwashing, said she’d get a vaccine “…over my dead body“.  The crowd of young conservatives fascists cheered, completely missing the irony of her statement.  Dana Milbank hit the nail on the head pointing out that Palin was an active participant in what can now only be called a death cult.

The death cult also showed its ugly head when the few people who actually paid for seats to the  Traveling Bullshit Tour stop in Dallas booed their Dear Leader, none other than TFG, when he told Bill O’Reilly that he got the booster to protect himself.  The Trumpified GOP is now actually getting people killed as the death rate from COVID in Trump counties is 5 times that of the death rate in blue counties.

The Darwin Club is actually a thing.

Dr. Jeannie Stone recently resigned her position as Superintendent of Richardson ISD. Richardson, Texas is an urban school district just North of Dallas. Stone was voted 2019 Superintendent of the year, and for good reason. Richardson ISD a majority-minority school district, and 56.9% of its students are economically disadvantaged, yet Richardson ISD graduates 91% of its kids.

Dr. Stone first drew the attention of the angry crowd when she stepped up in 2018 and met with student activists who shared tales of racism and discrimination throughout their experience with Richardson ISD. In response, she released a video listing their demands and vowed to keep the list posted on her office door until these demands were met. This alerted some parents who oppose any discussion on race to begin actively opposing her ideas to protect her students of color and focus on providing them the best possible education.

Cue COVID-19. The nationwide trend of angry parents shouting ugly personal attacks at school boards and administrators did not overlook Richardson ISD. Karen Clardy, the RISD board President, abruptly resigned in September. Richardson ISD was one of the first Texas school districts to defy Governor Abbott’s prohibition of mask mandates.

While a majority of parents agreed with the mandate, a loud minority of parents (20%) began a campaign of threats and harassment that led to the resignation of Dr. Stone and Mrs. Clardy. The losers in this situation will be the students, long after the worst of the pandemic is over.

My children attend school in a neighboring district and we have had the same issues at our school board meetings. A student stood to testify that his grandmother had a pre-existing condition and he wanted to protect her from COVID-19. Anti-mask parents stood behind him and laughed, mocking the child for his compassion.

These anti-mask parents haven’t stopped there. Emboldened by their surging numbers and media attention, they’ve now gone after Critical Race Theory. Next, they’re demanding to ban books with any references to sexual activity or transgender individuals being presented in a positive light.

The saying goes “give them an inch, and they’ll take a mile.” The 24/7 right-wing outrage media has expanded its local operation, folks, and Texas is in the thick of it. As an active, engaged, mom – I can tell you that very few people oppose masks, racially accurate curriculum, or support banning books. Those of us that desire reason over manufactured outrage have to start showing up in numbers that rival the angry crowd.

Rightwing extremists who continue to support the insurrectionists arrested in the aftermath of the attack on the US government at the Capitol on January 6th are organizing a “rally” at the Capitol for tomorrow to protest the arrests, charges, and detention of hundreds of criminals who destroyed property, assaulted police, and attempted to stop the Congress from certifying the Electoral College vote.  To publicize their rally, they’re spreading the hashtag #JusticeforJ6 all over social media.  Ironically, supporters of insurrectionists are calling these criminals “political prisoners”.  Worse, The Former Guy took a break from golf and commentating at cheesy boxing matches to publicly support the insurrectionists and the rally.  Yesterday, still banned from social media, he issued a statement saying:

“Our hearts and minds are with the people being persecuted so unfairly relating to the January 6th protest concerning the Rigged Presidential Election.  In addition to everything else, it has proven conclusively that we are a two-tiered system of justice. In the end, however, JUSTICE WILL PREVAIL!”

So, the guy who incited the riot and attack on the US Capitol is STILL fomenting violence against the US, the country he’s trying to take over again for his own benefit.  The Great Unwashed Brainwashed white supremacists are beyond redemption, believing they are in the right and following a dangerous ideology where they actually the “patriots” when they are actually the problem.  The fact that the police and national guard are being called on to reinstall the perimeter fence around the Capitol with HD cameras and 24 hour patrols should tell normal people everything they need to know about the danger of disinformation and hate.

Trumpists are using #JusticeforJ6 for publicity. I say that’s fine as long as you add #JusticeforJ65to20 to represent the prison sentences they should receive. I’ve got another idea, also; in June, Facebook banned Trump for 2 years with reinstatement conditioned on him changing his behavior.  They should modify the ban by extending it for 2 years from the date of his latest self-serving, anti-government rant.  That should do it.

#JusticeforJ65t020

We’ve talked at length about QAnon adherents bending reality, believing wild conspiracy theories, being anti-vaxxers, anti-mask, anti-science, and anti-common sense.  Most amazing about this phenomenon, though, is there absolute devotion to their delusion to the point of dying for it.  To wit, I give you Veronica Wolski, a high profile QAnon advocate from Chicago, who publicly protested against masks, vaccines, and against all things not Trump and who died of COVID this week.  Her dying is not the story, though; the story was that Lin Wood (yes, THAT Lin Wood) whipped up a QAnon protest last week in an attempt to force the hospital she was in to administer Ivermectin, the horse de-wormer, as treatment for COVID.  He has now declared that the hospital, Amita Health Resurrection Medical Center, caused her death through…wait for it…malpractice. He’s also made the same claim against the hospitals where Herman Cain died and another right wing activist and GOP party operative Presley Stutts.  Of course, Cain and Stutts died after being infected while not practicing normal masking and distancing protocols.  In fact, it’s likely that Cain was infected at the Trump campaign rally in Tulsa.

In an unrelated story, the fifth hate radio talker died this week.  He was Bob Enyart, an anti-science talking head and bible thumping preacher.  He was a charming fellow who made his career by bashing AIDS patients, calling for the death penalty for women who received abortions, and spreading the lie that the vaccines were made from aborted fetal tissue.  The irony is so thick you can cut it with a knife.

The stupidity of these people wouldn’t be so bad if they were only killing themselves, but they’re risking the lives of many other people AND stressing the medical staffs who are having to risk their own lives to treat these self destructive idiots.

Jesus.  Literally.

January 6th is burned into the memories of billions of people around the world where thousands of angry white guys, enraged by bullshit fed them by the president of the United States and his cronies, violently stormed the US Capitol with the intent of halting  the certification of an election, the result of which they didn’t like.  They stormed both chambers of Congress with the intent of making “citizens’ arrests” of duly elected representatives who they also didn’t like.

Win Mcnamee/Getty Images

The notion of vigilantes “arresting” people they don’t like or disagree with is not just silly fantasy; it’s an extremely dangerous behavior, coddled in many states like Texas, Georgia, and Arizona where gun nuts and goofballs control the politics.  Said gun nuts and goofballs, fed a continuous stream of nonsense about their “rights” on rightwing social media and television, actually believe they are somehow deputized to enforce non-existent laws they unilaterally have decided violate their absolute right to do what they want.  Law enforcement and elected officials have let them get away with it, and that’s how you get dozens of “militias” marching into cities to “provide security” during racist demonstrations and brainwashed extremists storming the Capitol with zip tie handcuffs to “arrest” elected officials.

It happened again last week when a father and two of his friends showed up at an elementary school in Arizona brandishing zip tie handcuffs to “arrest” the principal for “breaking the law”.  The supposed law she broke was asking the father to quarantine his son after he was exposed to a COVID positive classmate at the school.  The brainwashed father was outraged by public health policy established to protect citizens, and in his libertarian fever dream believed he had the authority to stop that public policy by “arresting” the principal.  Lord knows what would have happened to her had they accomplished their self appointed task.  The principal stood up to them and when they refused to leave, called police.  The man had one of his friends stream the confrontation on Instagram, stupidly incriminating himself and his pals.  He was later arrested, and charges were being prepared for the other two goons.

This latest episode of brainwashed extremists acting as vigilantes is yet another example of the danger of disinformation and cynical use of propaganda to achieve political success.  Republicans in Congress are actually attempting to conceal the conspiracy with Trump to overturn the election, and others are using non-existent voter fraud, disinformation about public health policy, and the divisive abortion issue to keep the base in a froth and as an excuse to enact cruel public policy to serve their own political ends.

I keep waiting for the political pendulum to begin swinging back the other way, but it keeps its inexorable climb on the far right end of the arc towards more insanity and cruelty.  Short of a complete collapse of the GOP, I fear this won’t end well as violence seems to be the default response to sane public policy.