Electing Assault Free 

May 26, 2017

Remember back last year when the Donald bragged he could shoot someone, on Fifth Avenue, and his voters would still support him? At the time, most of us thought his bluster just the rantings of an egomaniac. Of course, now we know the rantings of an egomaniac aren’t necessarily false. There are people who support the Donald regardless of the Donald’s behavior – lots of them. It’s like a religion, with a single doctrine: love Trump.

And now, one-hundred-ninety-nine days after his faithful voted him into office, the Donald’s consequence free charisma has begun spread to other needy Republicans. For instance, Greg Gianforte of the great state of Montana, who attacked a reporter, was charged with assault (but was not arrested, being white, rich, male and all), lied about it to the press, was discredited by FOX news and, yet, won election to the House of Representatives – all within twenty-four hours.

Greg’s campaign had been the quintessential Trump high-energy shit show, but with a tough-guy beating up a reporter grand finale – and it worked. He was rewarded with a six-point win and a consequence free indulgence, by the people he’s about to screw. Fucking fascinating.

Of course, Greg was favored: Montana went to Trump by twenty points, the national Dems didn’t assist their candidate, early votes had been cast before the assault and local TV didn’t cover the incident – but, at the end of the day, Greg beat-up a guy and still won.

Gianforte mouthed a generic apology for the attack at his victory celebration. He said “sorry” and went with the ever popular “lessons learned” rationalization. Yeah, he learned something: he learned he could assault a man, in public, and get away with it. A lesson that, assuredly, will shape his future behavior – as a US Congressman.

The republic expects every thug elected to act like a thug with federal authority. The basic question here isn’t “How did they elect Greg?”, but rather “Why isn’t Greg in jail like anyone else would be under similar circumstances?” – just saying.

(The national Democrats, as usual, claim moral victory, because they didn’t get crushed with a twenty-point loss. Yeah, the party leadership’s getting really good at virtual wins. Maybe they should consider handing over the reins to the Bernie wing, you know, to people with less experience with “moral victory”.)

In Peace and Justice,
osv