Bad combover. Check. Too long red tie. Check. Orange spray tan. Check. Tiny hands. Check. Cluelessness. Check…
This morning:
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
At the request of Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, I am directing Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, to provide all necessary Troops to protect War ravaged Portland, and any of our ICE Facilities under siege from attack by Antifa, and other domestic terrorists. I am also authorizing Full Force, if necessary. Thank you for your attention to this matter!
Rep. Vicky Hartzler @RepHartzler
I just wrapped up a call with @DHS_Wolf on efforts to protect the federal courthouse in #Portland from destruction.
245 officers have been injured. Mobs have attacked with weapons for 60 straight nights.
Nothing about this is “peaceful protesting.” Order must be restored NOW! 1:03 PM · Jul 29, 2020
“…efforts to protect the federal courthouse…” A building. However, the Constitution is optional.
“…Nothing about this is ‘peaceful protesting.'” Nothing? Really? And de-escalation as a crowd control strategy is never an option.
And spray paint, leaf blowers, Lacrosse sticks, and harsh words are weapons of mass destruction. You might be able to make a case for pissed off moms and grandmas, however.
Vicky Hartzler (r) [2016 file photo].
Some of the responses:
Every day is a new low. Congrats on the consistency.
One must ask – why are things so out of control under the leadership of @realDonaldTrump?
….Fiore gave this advice to militant Sandy Anderson about writing her story: “Be detailed Sandy, be very, very detailed,” Fiore said. “Like that author did in Fifty Shades of Grey….”
The giant asteroid needs to strike the planet now so that it can reboot.
….At the refuge Tuesday evening, occupier Jason Patrick reported no unusual activity. “It’s pretty quiet here,” Patrick said. He said no one was leaving as of 6 p.m.
Hours later, Patrick said the refuge remained quiet but “we’re all standing here ready to defend our peaceful resolution.” He wouldn’t elaborate….
“…we’re all standing here ready to defend our peaceful resolution…”
“…. Struggles to coerce uniformity of sentiment in support of some end thought essential to their time and country have been waged by many good as well as by evil men. Nationalism is a relatively recent phenomenon but at other times and places the ends have been racial or territorial security, support of a dynasty or regime, and particular plans for saving souls. As first and moderate methods to attain unity have failed, those bent on its accomplishment must resort to an ever-increasing severity. As governmental pressure toward unity becomes greater, so strife becomes more bitter as to whose unity it shall be. Probably no deeper division of our people could proceed from any provocation than from finding it necessary to choose what doctrine and whose program public educational officials shall compel youth to unite in embracing. Ultimate futility of such attempts to compel coherence is the lesson of every such effort from the Roman drive to stamp out Christianity as a disturber of its pagan unity, the Inquisition, as a means to religious and dynastic unity, the Siberian exiles as a means to Russian unity, down to the fast failing efforts of our present totalitarian enemies. Those who begin coercive elimination of dissent soon find themselves exterminating dissenters. Compulsory unification of opinion achieves only the unanimity of the graveyard….”
“….If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein. If there are any circumstances which permit an exception, they do not now occur to us….”
December 07, 2014 at 5:28 PM, updated December 07, 2014 at 6:10 PM
Two Oregon Ducks men’s basketball players held their hands up during the playing of the Star Spangled Banner before a game against Ole Miss….
[….]
The actions are thought to be demonstrations linked to recent federal grand juries decisions to not indict police officers who had slain two African-American men, Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and Eric Garner in Staten Island, New York….
[….]
The self-righteous indignation in some of the comments under the news story are priceless.
This has been making the rounds in the progressive blogosphere, but I thought it worth highlighting here as a comparison to our own situation in Missouri. Jeff Merkley’s campaign manager sat down with OregonLive.com to share his thoughts on their successful primary campaign for US Senate in Oregon. Merkley, the Speaker of the Oregon House, narrowly defeated political activist Steve Novick in last week’s primary 45% to 42%.
The passage from the interview most often quoted by bloggers (for obvious reasons):
Q: Did the Novick campaign reach a level of support you hadn’t expected in this race?
Isaacs: Here’s how I would put it. I think one of the things we saw in this campaign, particularly in the Portland area, was that the Internet has real reach…Novick had built his name recognition, he had built his favorable ratings with very little television, particularly with his first two ads [which poked fund at his disabilities and went viral on the internet].
Basically, Novick had little institutional support, a lot less money, and spent very little on TV ads. Yet he won the vote in Portland, and came close elsewhere, partially by word-of-mouth in the blogosphere and YouTube. He turned his own brash character and odd appearance (Novick is only 4’9″ and has a metal hook for a left hand) into positives using a brilliant series of viral videos. Here’s one of them:
We’ve got some way to go as compared to Oregon’s blogosphere in terms of audience (there are four times as many progressive blogs in Oregon as in Missouri, and Blue Oregon dwarfs Fired Up Missouri in Alexa ratings) and influence, but this is perhaps a vision of things to come in Missouri. If you look over at the blogroll in the left sidebar, there are a lot of good people working hard in the Missouri blogosphere. More Missourians will use the internet as a place to gather and discuss political news. Our audiences and savvy will only grow by next cycle.
So will the internet awareness of local politicians. From my own point of view, Jeff Harris, Jay Nixon, and Kay Barnes all come in for particular praise for their ability to work with blogs in spreading their message, while Margaret Donnelly (and lately Chris Koster) are getting better at it. Byron DeLear is working at it, too. Others have been cooperative when asked for information, but not many others have been very proactive with the blogosphere. Here’s hoping that changes, because while smaller, blog audiences can do a lot more for candidates than a passive TV or newspaper audience, if one gets them motivated. Novick proved that in Oregon.
