Thursday, February 06, 2020

On Speaking Murrican


Before turning his full attention to promoting Bloody Bill Kristol's super-awesome podcast, MSNBC's Brian Williams huddled up with retired, Blue Dog Conserva-Dem Joe Donnelly (because who better!) to complain that Democrats need to learn to Speak American.
Donnelly:  When we're in Michigan we need to talk about jobs and we need to talk about the future. When we're in places like Florida, we need to talk about climate change, about the environment. These are the things that Donald Trump can't touch us on, is the opportunity to make sure that tariffs go away, so we don't have our farmers in a place where bankruptcies are going up 20%, that we don't have the debt exploding. We talk about these meat and potato things, about the fact that if you have cancer, we were the party that brought you the opportunity to have health care. And Donald Trump is trying to take it away.

Williams:  Hillary Clinton goes into coal country, says we're going to close your mine but don't worry, we're going to get you green jobs, which of course never materialized. Donald Trump, make of this what you will, runs on a pro-coal platform, carries Joe Manchin's state of West Virginia by 42 points. Are you teaching democrats how to speak American?

Donnelly:  I hope that's what we're trying to do, is to tell them look, you cannot talk about changing your lives without providing hope and a plan and aspiration and a chance for success. That coal miner at the end of the day has children at the table who are counting on him or her to come through for them. And so as you say, and it's a great way to put it, Brian, we need to talk American to all the Americans, not just those on either coast.

Williams:  Former Indiana Democratic Senator Joe Donnelly, thank you, Senator, for joining us tonight and taking our questions.

You know what, Brian?  We Democrats speak American just fine.  In fact, if you'd like to drop around Springfield sometime, I'd be more than happy to deconstruct your failings as a journalist in some genuine, Midwest, heartland idiomatic American right to your face.  Sure, I'm definitely gonna use some words you've never heard from the sycophants on your cable news panels (unless you eavesdrop on them in the Green Room) but I promise you the gist of them will be perfectly clear.

And speaking of speaking American, when Hillary Clinton went to coal country she absolutely spoke to the people there as Americans.  As Adult American, with families and deep roots in their communities who are facing the implacable reality of being at the bitter end of a dying industry.  And in genuine, Midwest heartland American she offered them a vision of a different future.  A better future.

When Trump went to coal country he brayed at them like idiot children, promising everyone a pony, and a cookie, and great health care that would cover everyone for a fraction of what it costs now, and to turn back the clock to 1950 when Coal and Jim Crow were King.  So maybe the problem is that, in the specific example you're using, the voters in question have let Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity take a daily dump in their skulls for so long that they are no longer competent to make adult decisions.

Oh and by the way, if you trouble yourself to listen to any Democratic candidate's stump speeches, or any of their town halls, all of them are talking pretty plainly and clearly and Americanly about jobs and college and health care and clean water and air and a better future for our kids.  But of course acknowledging that would blow all the fuses on the "Snooty coastal elites don't know how to talk to Real Murricans!" line of ersatz homespun horseshit you pass off as journalism, so as we say here in the middle of Middle America, how about just taking a flying fuck at the moon instead?



Behold, a Tip Jar!

6 comments:

Dan Kleiner said...

wqait...never MATERIALIZED? great googly-MOOGLY...hey, fucking MORON. they never MATERIALIZED because the fucking fascist gop stole the fucking ELECTION and clinton isn't the fucking PRESIDENT.

how these people get paid?!?! i dunno.

bowtiejack said...

EXCELLENT!

Bruce.desertrat said...

I'm am getting seriously, angrily, 'steam coming outta my ears', 'fixing to start burning shit down' furious at all these assholes (who are supposedly on the same side of the political divide as I am) calling me "Not Really American" because I don't live in Middle Wypipostan.

dinthebeast said...

According to this morning's Los Angeles Times, 49 coal fired power plants in the West have been shut down or given shut down dates leaving 20 of them mostly in Wyoming, Montana, and Utah with no announced shutdown dates.
In the time of Fergus and despite his feeble attempts to "save" them.
Meanwhile, in China, a program is well underway to create 13 million jobs in the solar industry, using technology they mostly got from us. They are training coal miners as solar technicians, and unlike our 30~50K remaining coal miners, they are fucking thrilled to be making their living above ground away from coal dust and mine collapses.
Of course, their government, who really are vicious fuckers, is heavily subsidizing the transition, and unlike our government, utterly failing to propagandize the wonders of the coal industry.
How many good, recession-proof, jobs in the solar, wind, and other renewable forms of energy sectors we have accidentally offshored in Republicans' lust for every available fossil fuel dollar we can't say, but it seems like we could have at least gotten a chunk of that 13 million, and maybe gotten a jump on the future we know is coming and used some of our own fucking technology to better position the children of those recalcitrant fossil fuel workers to make a living in the real world.
Brian Williams can fuck right off.

-Doug in Sugar Pine

Unknown said...

Stay strong minded

dervy scram said...

hmmm, sounds familiar. now where have I heard shit like this before? oh yeah. is this y'all's Never Trump savior?

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/07/john-sununu-i-wish-this-president-would-learn-how-to-be-an-american/259948/