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The right are so caught up in the pageantry of leadership, they don’t realize that if you’re on the ground in a disaster zone, the last thing you want is for the President, or the “head” of the EPA to come visit. You want people and resources that can actually help with logistics and such.
But I guess to them, fixing shit is a lesser photo opp than tossing paper towels out to the crowd. 
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Did JD Vance blame the victims of the disaster for their misfortune? That’s been his approach to these white Real Americans™ the Yale grad and former venture capitalist “speaks for” since at least Hillbilly Elegy.
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THIS! So much this. Every time I something like this happens in Canada this plays out. If the Prime Minister doesn’t show up, he doesn’t care about the country. If he does show up it, “Get the fuck out there you clown and let the professionals do their work.”
It’s exhausting to see it play out this way time and time again.
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There’s this weird phenomenon in basketball fandom on YT. There’s this obsession with Larry Bird. He was a great player in his time and has all kinds of awards and recognition, so it’s not like he’s some talentless slob. But the way so many fans talk about him, like he’d be dominating the game right now, it’s got this White Supremacy undertone. The videos often take a form of
[legendary Black basketball player] says Larry Bird would {kill, destroy, dominate} current NBA players
It’s pretty disgusting, and yet the Algorithm throws these videos at me constantly, apparently because I like basketball? It’s like getting served Prager U ads despite watching only progressive political videos.
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Yikes…
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I’m not much of a basketball fan, but from what I remember as a kid, it was Dr. J and others who were in the spotlight back then. 
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I remember the 80s the big thing prior to the rise of Michael Jordan was the Bird-Johnson rivalry (Celtics-Lakers).
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Yeah. Celtics-Lakers, with the substory of Magic-Bird, which gave way to Pistons-Bulls and the substory of MJ-Isaiah Thomas.
Frankly, none of those players would be as dominant in the current NBA. Both Magic and Bird would be way too slow. I mean, glacial. Most plays would be over by the time they got down the court. MJ would still be an excellent player, but his athleticism would be pretty pedestrian now. His greatest attribute that would carry over is his competitiveness. Isaiah Thomas might actually be the most capable of those players in today’s NBA, but more as a ball handler and distributor than as a scorer. /sportsball monologue
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Probably so…
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Sorry. You caught me monologuing.
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I learned something, so!
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Whenever someone talks sports around me…
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Big Tech is not our friend 
good job, way to fill airtime between commercials
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They were slow back then. Most nights now Lebron is the slowest down the court, but he still dominates. Luka’s slow too. Twice reigning MVP Jokić is slower than any of them. Slow and skilled still wins. Magic and Bird would absolutely be top 5 players in the modern nba.
But, getting back to your main point. Yes the Larry Bird worship has always had a lot of white-supremacist fantasy undertones to it. And Bird’s own take on that is pretty mixed.
Bird on the epic racism of sports fans in Boston:
Well, I don’t know. To me, Boston is just a hardworking, tough town that loves their sports. I heard a little bit about all [the racism]. I know how Bill Russell was treated when he was there, and it gives you a feeling in your stomach. It makes you want to throw up. But I can’t speak for anybody else that said that it’s forgotten because I didn’t go through that. I didn’t see a lot of that when I was out there. All I knew is when we came into the game that they wanted you to win. But you hear about things.
and from the same 2019 interview, Bird came out with some fucked-up “white men win with hard work while Black athletes are naturally gifted” bullshit:
I have said over the years that the black man is the better athlete, so to overcome that you’ve got to be special.
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Lebron is still fast in bursts. He just can’t go like that for 48 minutes anymore. Luca isn’t as slow as you think. The whole game is played at a different scale. Watch some old video of Bird “running” the floor and track the seconds. He took 8 seconds to run the length of the floor on a “fast” break. Current players are twice as fast, positions 1-4 and sometimes 5.
Jokic is a 7 footer - they aren’t expected to lead the break. He trails and pops 3s or distributes. No modern team can afford a 6’8” Jokic.
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