The recrudescence of the orange putresence
They enthusiastically embraced a convicted felon and known rapist to be their country's exemplar. Not hesitatingly, not with caveats, not in ignorance of his crimes but knowingly and cheerfully. A tainted vulgarian represents their nation, its ethos, its character. He's their role model - a man who ran for president to stay out of prison.
Trumpism was rampant across the popular vote and every single swing state. Not just a Republican Oval Office but a Republican Senate and a Republican House supplementing the Republican-stacked Supreme Court all pledging fealty to the outlandish cartoon creation of Roy Cohn and Mark Burnett without who Trump would've remained a carpet-bagging real-estate shonk ripping off creditors and assaulting women. And without Murdoch's Fox support he'd be wearing a colour-matched jumpsuit and a be-spooning Bubba would be cupping his balls in a hairy palm.
His support was spread beyond the expected rapacious oligarchs, cryptobro chancers, Christofascists, Klansmen, proto-nazis, Qrackpots and the thinking-is-hard chucklefucks.
The normalisation of the crazy was enabled by a craven GOP, a supine Merrick Garland In the DOJ and the corporate media, particularly but not solely the Fox navvies such as our very own Excretia Borgia - Mandy Devine on Murdoch's NY Post. Consequently, gormless, low information dullards will define the new America.
21 million Americans, out of the 81 million who voted for Biden in 2020 after seeing just how egregious Trump was as president the first time, swung back to support the orange burst trash bag of human failings after clear evidence he'd become even worse.
Women, the sexual assault targets and foetus incubators without recourse to abortions under any circumstance, with their menstrual cycles to be recorded and tracked, were expected to be the saviours of American democracy by overwhelmingly rejecting the dystopian Handmaid's Tale of MAGA misogyny. Yet white women voted in the majority for Trump and young women went 8% more Trumpian than they did in 2020.
45% of Latino voters (Latino men 54%) thought that Trump's disparagements and threats against their demographic was intended for those other Latinos - you know, "those ones over there, the Mexicans, not us", anyway, look - Haitians are Black and it's nice to be able to look down on someone else. Pulling the ladder up behind them - the essence of arsehole fuckwittery but all good for the Americans' version of fuck-you capitalism, doncha know you commie fuck?
Older white males were again the single biggest cohort within the Trumposphere. If you're in the group that holds the power then you stay within that group. Big surprise if it was any other way. The 'Others' who join in are a perverse group of camp followers hoping to share the spoils.
As a paid-up member of the union of old, white men I shall posit the view that some potential waverers stuck with the orange aberration as a 'fuck you' to the self-righteous wowsers who assign every wrong throughout history to the "pale, stale and male". With 18-29 year olds, white women, Latinos and Black men all edging towards Trump while 65+ was the only age bracket with a movement to Harris and with Trump’s lead among white men shrinking (from 23 points in 2020 to 20 in 2024) it's perhaps time to retire that tired old trope.
The only demographic emerging with dignity intact is Black women. "Harris won them by 85 points – a bigger lead than any other gendered and racial group measured by CNN" as reported in The Guardian. The other voters have retrospectively endorsed the 6th January coup attempt by default and were cool with his threats to do it again. They have given permission for Trump to live up to his promise of Putinesque defenestration of resistance and the shuttering of accountability.
The country that trumpets itself (pun intended) as the resolute, heroic John Wayne of the world ("USA! USA! USA!") has celebrated a bloated, cowardly dog who disparaged those with character and with courage as suckers and losers; who used an Arlington Cemetery headstone as a prop for a look-at-me, grinning, thumbs-up photo-op and who whined at acknowledging veterans' sacrifices at a WW1 commemoration because rain would risk dampening that ridiculous yellow coiffe.
They further embraced the cult by re-electing MAGA effluvia such as sporkfoot Marjorie Taylor-Green, the dumbest woman on the planet, and hand-shandy aficionado and skank-in-residence Lauren Can-I-Pull-Your-Dick Bobert. Dog abandoner Rafael Edward (Ted) Cruz who fled to Cancun when the state he represented froze over was put back into office by the very people he deserted in a crisis.
The GOP platform was built on grievance, violence and hate. The Democrats countered with unicorns farting rainbows and singing Kumbyah. Much of the GOP is comprised of cowards and collaborators, the MAGA faithful are not disturbed by Trump's vileness as it provides succour for their own awfulness and it appals those they hate. It's why they adore him and it's why over the next 4 years playing nice aint gonna butter any parsnips.
The Trump regime V2.0 will be an horrendium of freaks, kooks, criminals, morons, rent-seekers, Old Testament literalists and the miasma of resentment, retribution, white supremacy, unfettered avarice and violence.
Dollar Store Goebbles Stephen Miller and his Wannsee Conference2 app will target migrants, legitimate or not, for mass detention and deportation. Sound familiar meine Freunde?
Elmo the Space Nazi who single-handedly trashed Twitter after buying it for well-over it's value then wiping 80% off its worth will be reshaping the entire federal bureaucracy to shave off 1/3rd of its size. Good luck with your next welfare cheque, Cleetus.
RFK Jnr, who in Kennedy family tradition has come to a gruesome end being Donny's choice as anti-vax health czar and Cooker In Chief. Polio, diphtheria, meningococcal, some new viral outbreak? Character building.
Anyone participating in this regime will need to have significant MAGA credentials on their CV and be prepared to suck mushroom dick in public. Allegience to the Constitution will be entirely dispensible.
Waiting in the wings, watching the hamburger grease accumulate in Trump's colon is alleged furniture fornicator and gofer for FRWNJ tech billionaire oligarch Peter Thiel who's most revealing
quotes are:
“I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible” and
“The 1920s were the last decade in American history during which one could be genuinely optimistic about politics. Since 1920, the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women – two constituencies that are notoriously tough for libertarians – have rendered the notion of ‘capitalist democracy’ into an oxymoron.”
Vladimir Putin will of course be available at all times for consultation.
* * * * *
The face of the USA, the one it will present to the world, will be that of a bloviating simpleton, it's lips pursed like a puckered sphincter, its tiny hands concertinaing in time to meandering, narcissistic gibberish, a look of incomprehension behind the squinty, piggy eyes in those pallid tide marks within the congealed orange stucco. The self-titled Land Of The Free has opted for a moronic autocrat.
What the fuck did you just do, America?
"Cohn is best known now for the lessons he taught Trump, but even before that he was an outsized figure running through US politics and culture. To note his most flagrant hypocrisy, Cohn was a gay man who persecuted other gay people out of their government jobs during what became known as the Lavender Scare of the 1950s."
And irony of ironies given Trump's affinity with Putin and collusion with Russia: "...as an assistant prosecutor in 1951, he helped engineer the conviction and execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg as Soviet spies..."
"This much is known: Burnett anointed a financially foundering, B-list self-promoter named Donald Trump to star in Apprentice, stuck with him through 14 seasons, defined his imperious style, edited away his disastrous miscues and tirelessly promoted his dubious brand."
Why is a group of billionaires working to re-elect Trump? Robert Reich. The Guardian.
"Oligarchs like Elon Musk and Peter Thiel aren’t just hostile to progressivism. They’re hostile to American democracy itself."
The MAGA Cult has finally crossed the Rubicon! Bhagwan Donny and Ma Melania sit atop the new Orange people in the USA. Donny and Ma are merchandising all they can and they are going to milk this situation for every day of the next four years. Ma Melania has had her 'Tough Titties' moment by rejecting the White House invitation extended to her by Jill Biden, the true First Lady. As for Bhagwan Donny and his sycophants, one can only hope that Karma catches up with them and inflicts all the retribution required.
By the way, Ma Melania is not something you spread on your breakfast toast!
BTW Great lead photo. It explains why many have given away formal Christianity. The teachings of Jesus have been sidelined in the debasement of Western religion to the extent that it is just a tool of marketing and manipulation.
The hypocrisy is Puke 100.
The convicted felon, sexual abuser, had an affair with a porn star soon after his wife had given birth, the liar, the cheat, the Hail To The Thief, fraudster, boasted of "grabbing women by the pussy", gave a hand job and oral sex to a microphone on National TV, calls those who sacrificed their life in war for others "suckers" and "losers", (what does he think of Jesus on the Cross, then?), does not keep Hol…
That opening paragraph is a truth most people around the world know only too well. It is accurate, honest and principled. Yet it has been ignored largely by media who assess other things.
I cannot think of a more important election in my life, yet despite there being 4 million more eligible voters in the US than in 2020, 8 million less votes were cast.
If life is so bad there at ATM – and that can’t be doubted for 10s of millions - shouldn’t that spur more to vote?
Have too many given up hope of ever finding a good president with effective policies?
Did too many stay at home (a la Brexit and 2016) thinking “surely Trump cannot…
too depressed to write much of a comment, except thanks once again for the great work GG.
I can't even bring myself to add one of those lame phrases like "we'll get thru this", or "he'll get his comeuppance, just you wait". it's not gonna happen. he has won. he's beaten the world. trump has fucken taken the world on, and we are all his losers. christ i wish he was dead. that fucken ear-assassin, what a fricken useless dickwad! how could he miss????
A little bird has informed me that Michael Cohen and his family have fled the US to escape incarceration. A few others would be googling friendly locations no doubt. Y'all will be welcome down under, as Gomer Pyle would say: Surprise,surprise!