DL Open Thread Monday November 22nd

Rob Portman, (LAME DUCK-Ohio), and Chris Coons, (D?-Delaware), introduced bipartisan legislation to combat international wildlife trafficking. Maybe it’s a decent bill, maybe not.  Knowing Coons, however, I’m going to go ahead and assume that the bill was drafted by lobbyists for the International Wildlife Trafficking Association.

The real point of rolling out shit like this for Coons is to be seen smiling while standing next to a Fascist. Did I just call Portman a Fascist? He is a Republican isn’t he? It is impossible, even for someone like Coons, to not know that that GOP is a hard right fascist party. Any Republican who still affiliates with the party is a fascist.  And there are no good fascists. Even nice seeming ones are cogs in a machine that wants to tear down the Republic.

They don’t even deny it anymore.  Although Portman probably whispers soothing things to Coons during their junkets.  Coons, I imagine, is very easily pacified.  In fact, I can clearly picture a sepia tinted Portman and Coons enjoying a cognac in 1939 Berlin.  “Nobody really wants to kill <I>ALL</I> the Jews, my dear Chris.  That’s just talk for the amusement of the proles. ”  Portman says.    Coons nods warmly.

So, yeah.  I happen to find it utterly disgusting that Coons can continue to befriend and help prop up the reputation of the GOP, by pretending that it isn’t a fascist party.  But I’m a nobody. When my home is Kristallnacht-ed, I doubt it will even make the news. It will probably be my own fault anyway, right Coonsie?  Why was I so strident, and uncompromising?   Why, indeed.

From LGM, this post includes Umberto Ecco on fascism which knits together the toxic masculinity and hero worship that is the beating heart of the GOP’s fascism.  

In such a perspective everybody is educated to become a hero. In every mythology the hero is an exceptional being, but in Ur-Fascist ideology, heroism is the norm. This cult of heroism is strictly linked with the cult of death.

From the weekend, El Som linked to one that merits reading.  

Republicans Embrace ‘Toxic White Male Masculinity’, And Campaign On Its Behalf.  It’s also why they own so many big manly guns.  Good interview, despite the fact it’s on Politico.

And this:

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) now says that he wants to make “masculinity” his signature political issue, saying that “social messages that we teach our kids in school,” as well as unemployment, are making men watch too much porn.

“As conservatives, we’ve got to call men back to responsibility,” he told Axios.