I’ve been trying to refrain from resorting to obvious Southern stereotypes here, but they make that really difficult with their Biblical defenses of what would be statutory rape.
Side note: Bannon complaining about how the Post “dropped a dime” on Moore, and that it was “politically motivated” . . . the guy runs Breitbart ferchrissakes!!
Steve Bannon : “How DARE they dig up dirt on an opposition candidate!”
The contortions that politicians and supporters will go through to defend one of ‘their own’ charged with something unforgivable reveal everything about their moral system. My Party Right or Wrong appears to trump (no pun intended) every other consideration. They’d rather bend over backward to find excuses for their chosen candidate than even yield so much as a soundbite that might conceivably help their opponent. And this is true of all parties, in every country, not just the Republicans.
I do think it’s very revealing that they’ve gone straight to the justifications. A savvy politician – or even an honest one – might say “These are extremely serious allegations, but let me remind you that they are entirely unproven. Anyone can say anything but it doesn’t make it true. Frankly, I don’t believe them. They’re at odds with everything I know of Roy Moore, who is a person of great integrity. They come from a source that has published a lot of untrue things about Republicans in the past, at a key moment in an important senate race. I think they’re politically motivated lies. I believe Roy, not the Washington Post.”
Something along those lines would be enough to defend their candidate without digging them into a hole they’ll find it hard to get out of later. Yet they’ve gone straight to minimization – “Listen, it was only attempted statutory rape in one of the four cases, jeez, lighten up people,” – or justification – “Hey, if it was OK for Mary and Joseph, it’s OK for Roy.” If Moore had been accused of robbing banks, would they say “But there was almost no money in that bank,” or “Well, Jesus also attacked the moneylenders”?
This makes me wonder if at least some of his defenders, possibly the ones who know Moore best, don’t find the allegations entirely implausible. Was it perhaps one of those not-quite-open secrets in the local community: “Roy’s a great guy, but don’t leave your kids alone with him”? I’m getting a strong flavor of ‘lack of surprise’ about this one.
TGOP is OK with anything as long as you are racist enough.
I don’t get it. I coach teenage girls…and never once have I ever looked at one of them and thought anything other than “that is a child!!”. I know they are young woman who want to be seen as maturing ladies and young adults, and whatever other labels they want on themselves…but I see kids.
I’ve watched men my age check our a young twenty-something and comment and I turn and say “What?! Dude…that’s a child! I’ve got scars older than her. I’ve been missing teeth for longer than she has been breathing!”
I don’t get it. I never will.
I assume that if Edgar Maddison were not in prison, he would go after Roy Moore? How about the rest of the Pizzagaters who are motivated by protecting the children from adult predators?
As I said in another thread - that there shows that in politics having any hope of applying principles or ethics during an election go right out the window. They’d rather eat that shit sandwich than concede power for the next 4 (or how ever many that seat is) years. If they condemn and withdraw they will for sure lose. Try to frame it as dirty tricks or lies or down play it means they might still pull it off.
To paraphrase FDR (supposedly)
“He’s a child fucker, but he’s our child fucker.”
“Mary was a teenager and Joseph was an adult carpenter”
To paraphrase someone on twitter: It’s been a while since I was in Sunday school, but I recall that Mary and Joseph not having sex was fairly integral to that story.
If you can stand it, check out the Breitbart comments on the Moore story (the lib Satanists’ evil attempt to bring down a god fearing man) and the Louis CK story (another disgusting filthy dem). A little lesson in inverse correlation.
On a side note, anyone else who monitors the right wing news sites to check the caloric efficiency of the fascist diet on the populace notice that calls to revolution are amping up? Evidently Trump’s agenda must be protected at all costs, even if the constitution needs to be suspended to achieve. Ugh.
Yeah, but the Bible doesn’t say anything about whether Joseph occasionally copped a feel or took off all his clothes in front of Mary. You know, normal, healthy stuff like that.
I think the operating GOP slogan is more like, ‘We don’t give a shit, as long as we can win elections and do what we want.’
Did anyone really expect anything less?
In my head, the first thing I imagined them saying was the Mary/Jesus argument.
NEW King Trumps Bible:
Matthew 1:20 - But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph bro, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: she is totally into it, it’s totally normal in this buisness…
♪ What, never? ♫
I have noticed that the older I get, the older my definition of “kid” becomes.
The US government vehemently criticises other countries for their child marriages:
https://www.state.gov/documents/organization/254904.pdf
Ultimately CEFM [Child, early, and forced marriage] arises from, and often perpetuates, gender inequality. It is a human rights abuse that contributes to economic hardship and leads to under-investment in girls’ educational and health care needs.
The usual hypocrisy …
I would have expected lawmakers to know that we have laws and religion is no excuse for breaking them. Now, if they believe religion is an excuse to break the law, and it seems they do, then we need to question their adherence to their oath of office and remove them.
That these people are so willing to defend a child molester rather than risk Democrats winning a senate seat demonstrates how deep their contempt is for people on the left. They’re screaming loud and proud: "Child sex predators: hooray, yes! Decent people with whom we disagree: fuck no, never!” There is a serious political divide in the US, it’s getting wider, and there’s no indication of it stopping.
It’s pretty fucking scary, if you ask me.
You know those conservatives threatening armed revolt should Trump be impeached: I’m not so sure that their threats are empty, and they’ll probably threaten the same if the Republicans lose the congressional majority. The GOP base includes armed separatist militias and people who horde hoards of guns and ammunition “just in case the government needs to be overthrown”: people who have been preparing for some sort of civil war and, I think, desire it deeply.
They’re on the losing side of history, and they probably suspect that, but they’re not going down without a fight. Defending sexual predators like Trump and Moore is part of that fight. Their hatred for their fellow left-leaning citizens is so strong that they’ll do anything to prevent the left from governing, even defend the indefensible. It’s disgusting. I can’t imagine that hatred will go away anytime soon. Is it even possible for the division in this country to improve before it get’s horrifically worse?
I mean for crying out loud we still refer to her as “The VIRGIN Mary.”
