ripe

 

(I was wondering what a weasel looked like...)

Bloomberg

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 | |  Billionaire Jerry Jones, the owner of the NFL's Dallas Cowboys, is one of three business executives who each donated $500,000 to Texas Governor Greg Abbott's campaign in the final weeks before the Nov. 8 election.

The contribution from Jones is the largest he has ever made in a Texas statewide election, according to filings from the Texas Ethics Commission dating back to 2000.  The governor also received half-a-million-dollar donations from billionaire Ken Fisher of Fisher Investments and oil mogul Syed Javaid Anwar, the founder of Midland Energy Inc.

Messages left for Jones, Fisher and Anwar weren't immediately returned. ------------------- [end, article-clip]

Abbott is the Texas governor who, the same week as the Uvalde shooting, said he was going to go ahead and attend the NRA convention and give a speech.

        Then the next day he said he would not attend, out of respect to the parents who experienced the school shooting tragedy.

        Then he ended up taping himself talking and sent that to the convention.

        (I was going to compare his behavior to that of a "weasel" -- you know, the expression? -- but then thought, I'm not sure the Weasel Community deserves to be defamed in this manner....)

        'More guns is what we need' seems to be his belief -- and it seems like it kind of naturally leads to 'more shootings is what we need.'

I wouldn't vote for this person if I lived in Texas, but he'll probably get re-elected.

        I remember Chris Matthews saying, and repeating once for emphasis, "Things are the way they are because the politicians want it that way."

        And we could add to that:  "And the people want it this way."  Because "we" vote them in.

But then someone will make the point that our votes don't count because Republicans have gerrymandered states so that instead of the voters picking candidates, candidates pick their voters.

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New York Times reader comments

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My2Cents

NYC

This has been Russia's agenda all along.  I'm surprised that we are surprised.  Their goal was to install as much chaos as possible -- elections, culture wars, etc.  Most importantly, it should be asked why certain news outlets are promoting Russia talking points and how we allow social media to amplify those points all in the name of free speech.

GFM

Ft. Collins, Colorado

Point taken, but the Russians are latecomers to the game.  Rupert Murdoch is the true architect of polarization in this country.  He recognized almost 30 years ago that a huge block of US voters never read, ever, and were ripe for manipulation and propaganda.  

        His formula was merely copied and granularized by Russia into social media, where Zuckerberg et al were more than glad to profitably help out.  Murdoch is the real seditionist, even more so than Trump, and should be in jail 40 times over.

        

Ethan Allen 

Vermont

The answer to the question posed by the headline is - a slow motion coup, staged unapologetically and in plain sight over 40 years, which anyone paying attention could see if they cared to.

However, too many people have spent the intervening years wringing their hands and expressing their 'optimism' and faith in the people of our nation.

And it has been this kind of willful Pollyanna-ism in the face of all evidence to the contrary that has paved the road to our collective perdition.

Just as the current stark choice makes clear that a vote for any candidate but a Democrat is a vote for autocracy, it is equally clear that any choice to reside in (or even visit) a red state is a vote against the Union, a vote for tyranny, and a vote for a rematch of the civil war.

Gustav

Durango

Human Nature has not changed in the last 40 years.  So what has?  Fox News and Rush Limbaugh ushered in this era of disrespectful discourse, fear-mongering on a widespread scale, and disinformation.  

1987 is when it started when Reagan stopped enforcing the Fairness Doctrine and then vetoed Congress' efforts to make it into law, actions which have now reached their disastrous conclusion.  

Some presidential mistakes are more existential than others.

New York

I share your fear.  And I feel particularly bad for young Americans, including children, who are growing up in an environment of political violence, and hate.  They are not witnessing good behavior in adults.  I do hope, at some point, more rational, mature, voices are heard, and heeded.

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