Somebody Likes The Taste Of Roasted Nom Nom Nominee
I didn’t say it was always a sane mind that was doing the contemplating.
Soon after the Thrillah on the Hill…aah, Minority Leader McConnell gave a lengthy speech on the floor of the Senate in which he decried the January 6 insurrection and blamed the violence on then-President Donald Trump. A couple of days after that, when asked if he would support Trump if he won the party’s nomination in 2024, Minority Leader McConnell replied – it’s right there. You can see it for yourself. Please don’t make me repeat it.
How can we reconcile these two positions?
Give me a minute! You think making sense of the rantings of a deplorable is easy?
Okay. I’ve got it. The first statement was made by a McConnell from another dimension; he was swapped back with the Minority Leader we all know and loathe in time to make the second statement. Or, between the first and second statement, former President Trump hired a hypnotist to make all of the Republicans forget what happened on January 6. Or, the first Minority Leader was actually an alien who had paid to inhabit the brain of a powerful person on Earth for a day (if I were him, I would demand my money back).
There you go. Three explanations for the price of one. Not a big fan of science fiction? At least it makes a change from the basket of deplorables’ usual fantasies!
The Heart Is A Lowly Haunter
How often has this happened to you? Major corporations based in Georgia threaten to move their operations if the state government goes through with a massive voter suppression law. You can’t have that! If states don’t pass voter massive suppression laws stat, the Republicans will never win another national election! That’s not how democracy is supposed to work! So, you give a speech from the heart where you tell those corporations to piss off.
The heart may not be eloquent, but it does get its point across.
When the heat of the moment passes, you realize with horror that your whole career has been built on encouraging corporations to contribute freely to political parties (especially yours), using the argument that spending money is speech. You can barely whisper when it comes time to pay the rent every month, and when it comes to buying groceries, sometimes you lose your voice entirely. But, it’s the principle of the thing. A principle you are now denouncing. So, the next day, you carve out an exception to your heart-felt plea with your budget-cutting machete.
Happens to all of us sooner or later. And, twice on Sundays.
So…according to Minority Leader McConnell, corporations should feel free to engage in economic free speech, they just shouldn’t engage in speaking free speech.
Like so many residents of the basket of deplorables, he is a master of zen koans.
I Am Turtle – Hear Me Whimper!
This statement was a response to speculation that President Joe Biden would have to reform or eliminate the filibuster. No, it is not a proud reference to a Pennsylvania town (“Filly, buster!”), or a female horse whisperer (“Filly, buster!”), or our lawyer (“Phil E. ‘Buster’ Blockhead!”). The filibuster is a Senate practice where the minority party gets to wave a magic wand and stop legislation that the duly elected majority party tries to pass. Looking at the possibility of being in the minority for a very long time, it’s not hard to understand why the Minority Leader would be protective of this prestidigitationary relic.
In fact, it isn’t hard to imagine what a scorched earth Senate would look like: Minority Leader McConnell perfected it when Barack Obama was President. Can earth be scorched more than once? Would that result in turning the earth to glass? I’m hoping it turns the earth to chocolate pudding, but that may just be because I missed lunch.
But, honestly, what can the Minority Leader do if the only weapon he has left is taken away from him? Lightly singe the earth?
In the basket of deplorables, the empty threats echo loudly.