DL Open Thread Tuesday, May 21, 2024

That Trump trial in New York is getting close to its conclusion, with all the plot twists the writers could think up. Michael Cohen revealed on cross-examination that he stole money from Trump, because of course he did, and a defense witness tried to stare down the judge, which did not go well. Oh well, it will all be over soon, and I can’t imagine it ending with anything other than a hung jury.

Will the environmental news ever be so dire that governments might actually take meaningful steps to rein in oil companies and petro-states? Probably not. They might make sounds of concern when they read that the warming oceans have imperiled the majority of the world’s coral reefs. You don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone.

Democrats in the Senate are finally taking an interest in Supreme Court grifter Clarence Thomas. They want to know if he paid taxes on those unreported gifts, like his luxury RV. I’m so old I remember when this sort of sleaziness had repercussions. Even Richard Nixon had the sense and grace to resign. He set the bar, but it turns out the GOP is competing not in the high jump but the limbo.

The most exasperating thing about dealing with MAGAts is their resistance to facts and logic. Consider this story out of Texas, where a right-winger won a seat on the school board by campaigning on the usual right-wing talking points – well, shouting points in their case – and what happened next.

Gore, the co-host of a far-right online talk show, had promised that she would be a strong Republican voice on the nonpartisan school board. Citing “small town, conservative Christian values,” she pledged to inspect educational materials for inappropriate messages about sexuality and race and remove them from every campus in the 7,700-student Granbury Independent School District, an hour southwest of Fort Worth. “Over the years our American Education System has been hijacked by Leftists looking to indoctrinate our kids into the ‘progressive’ way of thinking, and yes, they’ve tried to do this in Granbury ISD,” she wrote in a September 2021 Facebook post, two months before the election. “I cannot sit by and watch their twisted worldview infiltrate Granbury ISD.”

But after taking office and examining hundreds of pages of curriculum, Gore was shocked by what she found — and didn’t find.

The pervasive indoctrination she had railed against simply did not exist. Children were not being sexualized, and she could find no examples of critical race theory, an advanced academic concept that examines systemic racism. She’d examined curriculum related to social-emotional learning, which has come under attack by Christian conservatives who say it encourages children to question gender roles and prioritizes feelings over biblical teachings. Instead, Gore found the materials taught children “how to be a good friend, a good human.”

Gore rushed to share the news with the hard-liners who had encouraged her to run for the seat. She expected them to be as relieved and excited as she had been. But she said they were indifferent, even dismissive, because “it didn’t fit the narrative that they were trying to push.”

The floor’s yours.