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The US is the “bad girl” and Trump is our daddy disciplining our daddy

Posted on by Gerres
The US is the “bad girl” and Trump is our daddy disciplining our daddy

Keep your comments to yourself: This week at the Turning Point US rally for Donald Trump, former Fox News host – and now independent media mogul – Tucker Carlson expressed himself powerfully poetically:

“If you let people get away with things that are completely exaggerated and outrageous… and you don’t do anything about it… you’re going to have more of it,” he said. he startedcomparing the Trump-America relationship to that of a father and his misbehaving children.

“There has to be a moment when dad comes home,” he continued. “Yes, that’s right. Dad comes home and is pissed. Dad is pissed. He is not vengeful. He loves his children, even if they are disobedient. He loves them because they are his children.”

“Go to your room right now and think about what you have done! And when dad comes home, you know what he says? “You were a bad girl. You’ve been a bad little girl and you start spanking vigorously right now. And no, it won’t hurt me more than it will hurt you. No, I won’t lie. It will hurt you much more than it hurts me “You are being spanked vigorously because you have been a bad girl, and that is how it has to be.”

This strange, perverse monologue on the right reminded me of this terrible graphic – not the first of its kind and representative of the entire genre – on the left:

America isn’t some naughty girl, JD Vance isn’t a terrible uncle, Tim Walz isn’t a sweet dad Carhartt, Kamala isn’t mother (or “bad“), and Donald Trump is not a daddy, a disciplinarian. America is still the freest, richest and most prosperous place on Earth, not because of politicians who try to convince us that they are parental figures, but in spite of them.

There are many narratives that have emerged from this election cycle – deepening educational polarization, second-, third- and fourth-generation Latinos moving to the right, the oddity of Georgia and Arizona becoming a little bluer – but one narrative that is under-discussed is the degree to which younger generation (and apparently Tucker Carlson too!) transfers family roles and relationships to politicians and their supporters. It started with a small, stupid meme – Generation Z names people mother as a kind of approval condition, in the same way they transformed it bratit matters – but it says something about the level at which we operate: we misunderstand politics as deeply personal (which raises the temperature); interpret authority as something to be consented to or submitted to, rather than tested; think in terms of oversimplified memes rather than basic principles.

Speaking of children: “I have a young child and in the last three years my family has spent over $120,000 on child care… How can families like ours, or those with fewer resources and more children, sustain the rising costs of raising children today?” one man asked at a NewsNation town hall with Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance.

“Sometimes these issues are a little bit harder for working moms than working dads,” Vance offered — acknowledging that the gender gap that sometimes is a bit of a trigger for progressives — before launching into the real answer: “I think we need to ensure that young women and young men have more opportunities to build childcare that works for them.”

“Some would like to stay at home for maybe a few years, maybe they would like to stay at home for a few months and then go back into the job market, or maybe they would like to go back into the job market right away. The childcare regime we have in this country is essentially trying to impose a one-size-fits-all model across the country.”

He talked about Community Development Block Grants and how they only fund one type of child care. He talked about how sometimes there are grandparents, aunts/uncles, members of the church community who want to care for children, but it is very difficult for these people to receive any federal incentives that would enable them to do so financially. “The federal government is making it really difficult for anyone other than people who currently provide child care to get these jobs.” (Watch here.)

Vance is, of course, not a libertarian. At one point he supported forcing large businesses to adapt to such childcare arrangements by introducing paid leave laws. And the government’s involvement in everyone this is something that many libertarians would object to. But his basic conclusion is correct: the federal government currently subsidizes some types of behavior and not others. What would happen if we made a concerted effort to improve it to provide more choice?

“weird“ The Ohioan has its flaws, but this town hall was an example of what elections should focus on: real policy trade-offs that affect real people’s lives, and the role of government Is precisely in helping people realize their full potential.

Meanwhile in Texas: As the race draws to a close, Kamala Harris has decided to refrain from making another visit to a swing state this weekend, to choose instead, good old red Texas (my homeland).

Joined by native Texans Beyoncé and Willie Nelson, Harris appears to be trying to highlight abortion rights in a place with strict bans, and in some way increase interest and virality amid the monotony and predictability of the campaign. She will sit down with a podcaster/therapist speaking Norm-whisper/target mom Brené Brown. He’ll probably wear a cowboy hat.

Funnily enough, Donald Trump will fly to the Lone Star State to tape the interview Joe Rogan Today. It’s a funny, absurd, late-game coincidence that both presidential candidates are hitting Texas and not a state that’s actually in the game. (Unless… could it be in a game? Probably not, but that would be crazy.)

Scenes from New York: NO. Let’s think about Texas for a moment. Take a moment to think about buns and Luckenbach and gun rights, watering holes, margaritas and Tex-Mex. This is my newsletter and we’re going to spend a moment appreciating Texas, so to speak, damn it. What do I have? You What did you do today to respect Texas?

QUICK HITS

  • “Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. achieved early production efficiencies at its first plant in Arizona that outperformed similar plants nationally, marking a significant breakthrough in a U.S. expansion project initially marred by delays and labor conflicts.” reports Bloomberg. “The share of chips produced at TSMC’s Phoenix plant that are usable is about 4 percentage points higher than at comparable plants in Taiwan, Rick Cassidypresident of the American branch of TSMC, told listeners in the program a webinar Wednesday, according to a person who attended. The success rate, or efficiency, is a key metric in the semiconductor industry because it determines whether companies will be able to cover the enormous costs of a chip factory.” TL; DR, this has major implications for US competitiveness vis-à-vis China, the strategic value of Taiwan, etc.
  • ‘UK citizens arrested, prosecuted and jailed for praying silently outside abortion clinics’ reports Madeleine Kearns for Free press. “Even holding pro-life meetings in your own home could be a crime.” The whole article is really worth reading.
  • “Ask newsroom journalists who they are voting for (always with the acceptable response option ‘none of your damn business’) is a way to inform both external audiences and AND internal management some useful information about organizational tilt”, I’m writing ReasonMatt Welch in “Show Us Your Votes, Cowards!”
  • You have to be pretty desperate to want to come to Canada of all places. But seriously, this seems bad for would-be migrants (and… perhaps for the influx of immigrants from America?). Besides, what does “let our economy catch up” even mean?
  • Speaking of immigration, this might be my favorite theory circulating on X right now: