It’s exciting to write article after article, pay a subscription to several prominent political publications, and then wait patiently for months, years, or even decades to finally see your own original ancient cognitions in actual print! What great fun! All hail our intelligentsia! I kid the smart people. In an Atlantic article this week, republican commentator Peter Wehner reminded us how he nailed the Trump personality disorder diagnoses back in 2016, yet he’s still botching the bigger picture. He said, “Trump never found a way to escape the antisocial demons that haunt him. But here’s what turned a personal tragedy into a national calamity: He imprinted his moral pathologies, his will-to-power ethic, on the Republican Party.” Wow. This is like pondering that chicken or the egg question and then ordering the waffles. Imprinting? Really? That chapter usually ends for humans around age two, so how about dimprinting? Wait, I guess that does make sense for the GOP. And don’t bring Nietzsche into this; were he alive today he’d thrash you with his giant mustache. First off, I diagnosed the republican party with a personality disorder as a collective, ages ago. Second, I predicted a sociopathic choice would emerge on the republican ticket, because circe 2016 only braindead Gordon-Gekko types need apply. For the last time, Trump did not fall out of right field. This was a steady downward trend, like The Discord site stats. Also, from a psych perspective, one does not easily overcome one’s ‘antisocial demons’. Some can charm their way through any role, which is usually more dangerous, but personality disorders are the hardest fix over in the psych department. A President Desantis may introduce us all to a more effective Axis-II package. Can’t wait. The republican party is like a psych class I never wanted to take. Is it too late to major in full-contact anthropology? 

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For those who missed it, this week confirmed what most of us already knew: former AG William Barr covered for Trump’s obstruction of justice during the Mueller investigation. I would add another sarcastic surprise-emoji face, but Winslow needs to order more. Here’s the highlight reel of the memo between Mueller and Barr (paraphrased):

DOJ: There was no collusion, no underlying crime.

Team Mueller: That’s not what our report said. It said that there’s evidence. It’s just that we didn’t think there was evidence beyond a reasonable doubt to prove conspiracy, because it’s a high bar, Barr.

DOJ: Well, you can’t hit someone with obstruction, if you can’t prove a crime.

Team Mueller: Not true, which is why we added all the precedencies right in the friggin’ report. Trump obstructed our investigation, plain and simple. Interesting interpretation there, Sparky.

DOJ: Well, we’re not going to make this memo public, because it will make us look like dicks.

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Sure, that headline is a bold statement, but I am basing my hypothesis on both my blogvesary’s latest Stop the Steal article, as well as the deeply disturbing fact that roughly 70% of R-Anywhere still agree with the stolen election premise. Yes. Here we are. It begs the question: are average republicans shifting right of even Alex Jones’s typical schitznik? Think about that, and then check your dual citizenship status. This should further discourage our Flat Earther friends, because anyone right of that guy should plunge off the map. Hey, we could market it as the rapture. But I find it fascinating that, regardless of how many details unravel, the main premise of any given false narrative holds. The wrong remains the same. Rightwingers can hang onto any factoid, in any situation, regardless of how many pieces of their overall puzzle fall off the table and roll behind the couch. It’s a like my grandmother back in the day; she could make a delicious and hardy soup out of a potato and half a stick of celery. But, in this case, the soup isn’t so much delicious as seditious.

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Looks like I owe you an apology, Pokey. You were right about the existence of an IRS scandal. You just got the wrong president, is all. America runs on Dunkin? Sure, but The GOP runs on projection. Former Spooks Andrew McCabe and James Comey were both audited by the IRS under Trumpsylvania. What are the chances? We’ll get to that, but first: the NYTs claims these special and specific audits originated from the same tiny division of the IRS:

“According to the I.R.S., there were about 5,000 such audits in 2017, 4,000 in 2018, and 8,000 in 2019 — chosen from about 154 million individual tax returns each year. Mr. Comey’s audit was for his 2017 tax return; Mr. McCabe’s was for his 2019 return.”

Never during the darkest hours of the invented Obama-IRS scandal did we have such a clear picture of auditular wrongdoing (yes, that’s a word). Still, it could be just a coincidence, right? Stranger Things have happened …in Hawkinsville.

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For those who missed it, 7 of Stephen Colbert’s employees were arrested at the Capitol this week for trespassing, so our rightwing false-equivalency-maestros wasted no time claiming this comedy troupe’s shenanigans were akin to an all-out insurrection. Kidding, wasting time is all they do. This was an authorized shoot but, apparently, this band of jokesters wandered off a bit—a situation that totally parallels the events of January 6th, 2021 …well, unless you are familiar with the concept of sketch comedy, or mob violence, or the term ‘parallel’ itself. But, you know when these comedians receive the equivalent of a slapstick on the wrist, Fox & Friends are going to lose their minds. Kidding, having one of those is a prerequisite for that activity.

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I’ve always had a certain level of suspicion, after all, I spent the better part of my college career hanging out with a dude in a fedora and a ‘Question Authority’ t-shirt. My instincts, thereby, are to follow folks down these rabbit holes, depending on the fairy tale, of course. But rarely have I found these deep dives into the right-wing conspiracy trenches worthwhile, as they typically list toward the Jay Ward ‘fractured’ variety. Twenty years of this endeavor can be captured best by YouTubing QAnon predictions to the Depp-Heard trial transcript, while being waterboarded. Some disturbing details are typically uncovered regarding “how the sausage is made,” and then interest wanes when the indictment fervor fades. Simple reform isn’t among the rightwinger’s hobby interests. The punch line comes from the deeper dive, when you uncover who made such actions legal in the first place. More of these roads lead to Lord Reagan than I ever imagined. The DNC’s treatment of Bernie Sanders in 2016—particularly Hillary’s role—is probably the most tangible wrongdoing on the left, but on some level republicans appreciate such tactics and probably took notes. Despite this, staying vigilant in the Age of Misinformation is important because this mountain-sized pile of Foxal matter represents the perfect place to hide a real scandal. It’s the virtual haystack in which to drop any size needle. If Hillary does murder someone, she has but to drop a breadcrumb over at Infowars, and she’s golden. On other side, Donald Trump just shot someone in the face on 5th Avenue and said, “See?”

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