At this point there is little value in wasting much ammunition on paid trolls at national magazines who drive traffic by cooking up excuses for the existence of Donald J. Trump that would embarrass a geek show waterhead drunk who makes his room and board by sitting in his own shit biting the heads off pigeons.
But there is probably value in noting their names and journalistic affiliations so that when we get to the Great Asshole Roundup phase of President Sanders' or President Clinton's first 100 Day Agenda, we will know who they are and where to find them.
Today's Very Special Friend is named Josh Kraushaar. Josh is (provisionally) a human person who works at the National Journal, cheek-by-jowl with Ron "Severe Dementia" Fournier where together they spend their days pulling miles and miles of nonsense straight out of their respective asses and stitching it together into a solar sail big enough to carry them into interstellar space.
Observe (no link because why would I do that to you?)
How Al Franken Paved the Way for Donald Trump
If Obama didn’t have a Senate supermajority for his ambitious agenda when he was first elected, Washington would look a lot different than it does today.
See, this is what I like about my new Very Special Friend Josh. No wind-up. No stretching exercises. No farting around. Just a headline announcing right up front that "I Am A Giant Douchbag Who Trolls For Money". Gotta respect that.
My new Very Special Friend Josh continues:
Looking for a culprit to blame for all the polarization, gridlock, and bad feelings in Washington? Point to Sen. Al Franken. No, that’s not a joke....Without a Democratic super-majority, Obama would have been forced to negotiate with Republicans (or, at least, former Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine) and settle for the incremental health care legislation that his then-Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel recommended. The GOP would still have been opposed to any Democratic health care reforms, but the antipathy would have been muted because a few Republicans would have supported the legislation. Instead of provoking a pitched partisan showdown that culminated with then-House Minority Leader John Boehner exclaiming that the Congress had “shatter[ed] the bonds of trust” with the American people, Obama could have tempered the wrath of the Republican opposition.
The only "bond" I can imagine that Boehner ever worrying about shattering is bottled-in-bond and sold by the case at Binny's. That said, Josh, I never for one moment thought this was a joke, No siree! In fact you are continuing a long and proud tradition of making a buck by cynically selling cheap, Drano-laced ideological smack to twitchy, hysterical Both Siderist junkies who are watching the fast rising tide of Republican fascism wash their sand castles away.
The marketplace created the demand for this sludge and you are profiting by meeting that demand. So congratulations, Josh, you're not a mercenary hack, you're a capitalist hero! The Martin Shkreli of low-end wingnut crank dealers!
Of course, very quickly my new Very Special Friend Josh runs up against Muse of Inconvenient History who is cruel and vindictive and has been known to rudely wave established-but-inconvenient facts like The Caucus Room Conspiracy in people's faces:
But as padawan to Sith Both Siderist Master Ron Fournier, my Very Special Friend Josh knows exactly what to do when the Muse of Inconvenient History blocks the road to another glorious Both Siderist Victory: kick her through a box fan and boldly proceed --
“In a democracy, you can only ignore the will of the people for so long and get away with it,” Boehner presciently argued before the House’s fateful Obamacare vote....The notion that Obama was fated to face an intransigent Republican opposition has always been off-base.
And now, the punch line:
That’s where Al Franken comes in. If it weren’t for 312 voters in Minnesota, Obama’s ambitions would at least have been curtailed by legislative realities, and the trajectory of his presidency would have looked much different. Franken, the first insult comic to get elected to the Senate, circuitously paved the way for the rise of a much different type of entertainer—Donald J. Trump.
Not much to add besides a reminder that, like all such charlatans-with-a-byline, my Very Special Friend Josh is actually paid actual money to hang out on the corner and deal poison like this.
* (Yes, I know the band spells it "Blessid".)
9 comments:
To theorize nonsense in plain view of documentation must cost some small part of passes for their shriveled souls to fashion this bygone reality that they keep flogging. Was it so golden way back in the days of the fanciful notion of bipartisanship in service to the people, when Democrats quietly took it in the ass by Republicans shaming dissent as treason. They may want it so but we know that shining city on a hill never existed in the first place. Especially if you happened to be of color.
Comparing Al Franken to Donald Trump? And blaming Franken, alone, for ACA? Wow. I guess, at this point, I'm somewhat impressed by this particular display of both siderisms... or is it really just ye olde "it's all the horrid LIEbruls fault!!11!!"
Yeah, yeah, Al Franken is responsible for Trump. If he hadn't beat the fabulous Norm Coleman, there would be sparkle unicorns sh*tting rainbows on every corner. Yeah, yeah, Al Franken. That's the ticket!
Young Josh also appears to be confusing "supermajority" with "majority". The Democrats did not hold 60 seats in the Senate.
I'll not have you slandering perfectly decent crank dealers by comparing them to this bozo...
-Doug in Oakland
Good god, I can smell the reek of desperation wafting off this fucker from out here in Nowhere, Indiana.
You suuure know how to pick 'em, DG.
From the time of ancient empires through the medieval monarchies until today, there has always been an overabundant supply of fawning courtiers like this doofus. [I am reminded in particular of one of the acolytes at National Review who marvelled to William Buckley that he "had the profile of a young Caesar!"]
Once they have put on their conservative kneepads and conveyanced their souls to the Dark Side, they then have only to check the current set of 3x5 doctrine cards and pound home the message that the problem is not and has never been the Dark Side, it's "both sides".
I don't get why Al Franken is not pleased to take credit. Should not Barack Obama be happy to add this to his legacy? "He governed very effectively despite unrelenting obstruction from the Republicans. The failure to ruin his presidency drove the Republican base batshit crazy enough to go for Trump."
That's pretty much the case for "Obama is to blame for Trump" isn't it? Part of me agrees with the analysis. The Republicans have been marching to the crazier for decades, but Obama frustrated them so much they went screaming over a cliff.
Credit where credit is due, I say.
Al Franken will go down in history for writing the what is possibly funniest sketch every shown on SNL, 'The Final Days' with Aykroyd and Belushi as Nixon and Kissinger. Josh couldn't qualify as a comma in a footnote.
Some very thorny history. If not for Act Blue bigfooting MN Democrats and endorsing Al Franken over one year out from the election, Franken would have been more aggressively primaried and would have emerged tested and ready for living sleaze embodiment Norm "Iranian businessmen buy my suits" Coleman.
Jesse Ventura could have beaten Norm Coleman (actually, he did). That it took Franken six months to get seated was a tribute to how poorly things work when out of staters get involved in state party issues. (It's also a tribute to the DFL's insanely counter-productive caucus/endorsement process, which tries heroically to thwart actual grassroots candidates.)
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