MAGA Republicans Are A Threat To Our Democracy

[Rick Plant]

Ron Johnson accidentally says 'I condone' white supremacy in 'all-time Freudian slip'



Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) mistakenly said he "condones" white supremacy before correcting himself.

Johnson made the remark during a Tuesday interview on Fox Business.

"When I was chairman of Homeland Security, we would have an annual threat hearing," the senator told host Maria Bartiromo. "My ranking member would always be bringing up white supremacy, which I condone."

Realizing that he had made a mistake, Johnson quickly stuttered out the words, "I condemn."

The clip was shared by an American Bridge researcher, who called the remark an "all-time Freudian slip from Ron Johnson."

Johnson has previously said that he would have been "concerned" if Black Lives Matter stormed the Capitol while calling the Jan. 6 rioters "people that love this country, that truly respect law enforcement."

Watch the video clip: https://twitter.com/i/status/1572205660363792390

[Rick Plant]

Biden’s right – Trump and “Maga Republicans” are a threat to democracy

But the US won’t be saved by a speech

WASHINGTON DC – Last week, the US president Joe Biden said that the former president, Donald Trump, and his most ardent supporters represent “semi-fascism”. Last night (1 September), in a speech in Philadelphia, he made it clear that this was no slip of the tongue. In a 24-minute address, he said that Trump and “Maga Republicans” – “Maga” being the acronym of “Make America Great Again”, Trump’s catchphrase – are extremists and constitute a threat to democracy.

“Not every Republican. Not even a majority… But there’s no question that the Republican Party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the Maga Republicans.” And that, he said, was a threat to American democracy.

To put it plainly: Biden was right. Trump, having falsely claimed that he won the 2020 presidential election, now makes veiled threats of political violence should he face consequences for his actions, which reportedly include taking classified information involving nuclear secrets with him from the White House. Republican leaders have not broken with him, and indeed continue to cast aspersions on those who would keep this aspiring demagogue from breaking the remaining checks on executive power and abuses thereof, claiming that the Department of Justice and FBI are running political errands.

Biden has insisted, repeatedly, that there are Republicans who are reasonable, and with whom he can compromise. So it was revelatory to hear him say out loud what is already evident to many of us: that one of the US’s two major political parties is threatening to burn the whole place down if it and its leader are not allowed to do what they want when they want, and that it considers any election that it loses to be fraudulent. Indeed, the Republican senator Tom Cotton essentially said Alaska’s voting system, known as ranked-choice voting, was invalid after Sarah Palin lost her congressional election to a Democrat on Wednesday.

Yet I have two main criticisms of Biden’s speech. The first is that the president spoke as though the country just had to try and get back to the way it was, back to an idealised past. But the way it was featured slavery, segregation, repression and inequity. America shouldn’t go back to the way it was; it needs to build something better.

And the second is that democracy won’t be saved by a speech. US democracy, if it is to be saved, will be saved because those with the power and responsibility to do something have demonstrated that democracy is worth saving. Biden, after what seemed like a year of passivity and a Supreme Court session in which Americans saw their civil rights – including their right to an abortion – stripped away, has had a remarkable summer. He and congressional Democrats managed to pass a major piece of legislation that will constitute a significant investment in tackling the climate crisis. He finally moved to cancel some student debt, which will be a significant boon to many Americans. Polls show that voters are moved by the threat to abortion rights, and are not falling for Republican claims that the Supreme Court decision that stripped millions in this country of their federal right to an abortion is not an insignificant change.

But Biden cannot rely on words alone. Democracy will survive, maybe, if voters see people fighting for it in deeds as well as in words. This is particularly true with respect to abortion rights; if this is the issue animating voters to not support people who would have free and fair election results thrown out, it would behove this administration to show it is more serious in fighting for those rights.

Still, I felt some relief listening to the speech. Polls show that more than two thirds of Americans believe democracy is at risk. Good. They should. It is. And it is encouraging that their legitimately elected president does not lie to them about what’s at stake. Americans deserve, in what is maybe the 11th hour of the republic, leaders who call things by what they are, and tell the people what position they are in – and show them where, if they refuse to give up on the whole American project, they could be.

“I have no doubt that this is who we will be,” Biden said, depicting a future in which the country is a shining beacon, a democratic example to others. I didn’t believe him. But listening, I wanted to. He had articulated the problem. If I tried hard enough, I could pretend that we could find a solution. And maybe that’s half the battle.

https://www.newstatesman.com/quickfire/2022/09/biden-trump-extreme-maga-republicans-democracy

[Rick Plant]

Not only are MAGA Republicans a threat to our democracy they are a threat to the lives of women as they include "no exception for the life of the mother" in their radical and inhumane anti abortion bills.

So, if a woman in your family has a medical emergency due to her pregnancy, and her life is on the line and she needs an abortion to live, far right wing extremist MAGA Republicans say she cannot have an abortion because of their radical religious beliefs. So the woman will most likely die because radical MAGA Republicans made it law. Are you ok with that?

If these Republicans ever take control of Congress, they will pass a national abortion ban with no exceptions, meaning the lives of women in all 50 states will be at risk. Lindsey Graham is already calling for a national abortion ban and Marco Rubio supports the legislation. 

Red states are already putting the "no exception" abortion ban into their anti abortion laws.

https://khn.org/morning-breakout/abortion-exception-to-save-mothers-life-rejected-by-idaho-republicans/

[Rick Plant]

The GOP is the party of #DeathPanels … pass it on!


DCCC @dccc

Republican @BurnsForNH is proposing an actual death panel to decide if a woman's life should be saved. Truly disgusting. #NH02 #NHPolitics

Watch: https://twitter.com/i/status/1572597247514411016

https://twitter.com/dccc/status/1572597247514411016

[Rick Plant]

Republicans are forcing women to give birth with their inhumane anti abortion laws and now Trump endorsed MAGA candidates don't want women to even vote or work. The Republican party is clearly anti women.   

This is an excellent article from Vox showing the Republican assault on our democracy explained in 13 charts.


The Republican revolt against democracy, explained in 13 charts
The Trump years revealed a dark truth: The Republican Party is no longer committed to democracy. These charts tell the story.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/22274429/republicans-anti-democracy-13-charts


Trump-backed GOP candidate argued against women voting and working: report

One of Donald Trump's endorsed candidates for Congress once argued against women being able to vote, saying the country had "suffered" since the 19th Amendment gave women the right to vote nationwide.

CNN reported Wednesday, "John Gibbs, who defeated in the primary an incumbent Republican who had voted to impeach Trump, also made comments in the early 2000s praising an organization trying to repeal the 19th Amendment which also argued that women’s suffrage had made the United States into a 'totalitarian state.'"

CNN reported Gibbs founded the "Society for the Critique of Feminism" while a student a Stanford and argued women did not “posess (sic) the characteristics necessary to govern."

Gibbs argued for a patriarchal society, CNN reported, and then tried to cover-up the evidence.

"Gibbs requested the website for the think tank be removed from the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine in 2016, according to a spokesman for the Internet Archive. But CNN’s KFile reviewed it on a different archiving service," the network reported. "CNN’s KFile previously reported that Gibbs’ history of conspiratorial and inflammatory tweets included baselessly accusing Democrats of taking part in satanic rituals and defending a notorious anti-Semitic troll banned by Twitter."

When Trump endorsed Gibbs in November, he described him as a "fabulous talent."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

96% of House Republicans voted against legislation that would make it harder to overturn future presidential elections. 96%!

So, Republicans tried to end our democracy by stealing the election from the American people so they could install Donald Trump as their cult leader, and now almost the entire Republican House voted against a bill that would make it harder to overturn future presidential elections.

Republicans are indeed a threat to our democracy because they want to be able to overturn election results they don't like.

That is anti democracy.

The reason is obvious why Republicans voted against this bill because they want to try to overturn the 2024 election when they lose again.   

The Republican vote is on full display proving once again how Republicans are a threat to our democracy.

[Rick Plant]

The GOP Is a Grave Threat to American Democracy
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/gop-grave-threat-american-democracy/618693/