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The Morning Joe Show

Republicans Are Losing, But Is the Tea Party Winning?

December 16, 2022
by Peter Feinman
The GOP is losing; the Tea Party isn't

The Morning Joe Show with Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski and Willie Geist has established certain routines. The hosts and their circle of guests in this morning talk show on MSNBC each in their turn, tell a tale of woe for the Republican Party. They bad mouth it as a party of losers that hasn’t learned anything from its defeats. Round and round they go belittling the Party for its repeated election loses. Each one wonders what it will take to get through to the adults in the room that they are on the wrong path if they want to win in the United States today. How many election loses will it take to get to through to them before they wise up and chart a new course?

On a recent show, I witnessed some pushback to this daily denunciation … and from a Republican no less! He commented that these supposed losers think they are winning. Therein lies the tale. There is no constructive purpose in belittling the Republican Party for not being the Party of Lincoln, Reagan, Bush, and McCain, and then faulting it for not changing course. The Republican Party today is not the Party the host left, it is not the Party of Lincoln, Reagan, Bush, and McCain. It has no desire to be the Party of Lincoln, Reagan, Bush, and McCain. Therefore to judge the party on traditional Republican standards is a waste of time.

TEA PARTY/FREEDOM CAUCUS

The Tea Party now Freedom Caucus has been around since prior to the 2010 election. Then the combination of midterm election for the party out of power, the new census districts, and, Obamacare, the Tea Party exploded onto the national political arena. The Tea Party won bigtime at the state and federal level. These victories enabled it to carry forward into the 2020 census and to perpetuate voter suppression. There have been long term consequences to the 2010 victories that reverberate to this very day even with some rather strange Senate candidates in subsequent elections.

My expectation back then was that the Tea Party would form its own party and selected its own presidential candidate in 2012. In effect, it would become a third party feasting on the remains on the second party. I was wrong. Instead it remained within the Republican Party feasting on its carcass. It succeeded in forcing two Republican Speakers of the House to take early retirement. Now it has a third one tied up in knots even before he becomes the Speaker. Marjorie Taylor Greene vigorously supports Kevin McCarthy for Speaker because she knows she can dominate him. The Tea Party/Freedom Caucus is prepared to move forward aggressively in 2023 through its control of committees. It will launch attack after attack against the Democrats. So on what basis is it correct to say the Tea Party/Freedom Caucus is losing?

THE REPUBLICAN PARTY

The Republican Party, however, continues to wither on vine. Its members retire because they are old and have had enough. Its members are primaried. Real Republicans have been bullied and cowed into submission. When Republicans do support bipartisan actions it often times is because they are retiring and can’t be punished.

It was bad enough that Real Republicans had to submit to every criminal act committed by the twice-impeached loser President.

It was bad enough that Real Republicans had to acquiesce to a failed insurrection.

Now the new mouthpiece for the Freedom Caucus has openly supported the January 6 insurrection. Her only objection to it is that it failed. If she and Steve Bannon, who have yet to testify under oath about it, had been in charge the results would have been different. No more pretense about Antifa. No more pretense about BLM. No more pretense about FBI plants and false flag operations. No more “normal tourist visit.” No more “legitimate political discourse.” The curtain has been pulled back. The truth has been revealed.

We want to cross the Rubicon. We want total war. We must be prepared to do battle in every arena. In the media. In the courtroom. At the ballot box. And in the streets (Gavin Wax, Young Republican).

This Party has not lost. If anything it is getting stronger within the Republican carcass. The proof is clear: Real Republicans do not denounce it. They remain silent. They acquiesce. Instead, the leaders of the Freedom Caucus are to be rewarded with positions of power in the new House.

THE DOUBLE CIVIL WAR

The Civil War so eagerly anticipated by the Freedom Caucus first will be fought within the Republican Party. Lines have already been drawn in the sand. The wrangling over the Speaker position is underway. Even with the Loser in-chief on the phones, getting to the magic 218 number remains problematic. This battling is merely a harbinger of things to come even if it is resolved.

The same applies to the debt limit. The emphatic “Hell, no!” from McCarthy is part of the political performance he needs to do to secure the votes that will put him over the top. He does not want to start his time in office with a Republican-initiated shut down of the government.

Again, all these maneuverings are even before the new Republican Speaker would take office.

THE SOUTH SHALL RISE AGAIN

Lost amidst all this discussion about the Speaker position, is the triumph of the Confederacy. LBJ famously predicted the Democratic loss of white southern voters following the passage of the Civil Rights Act (1964) and the Voting Rights Act (1965). That prediction came to pass. Over the years, the Confederates migrated to the Republican Party.

But something has been lost in the focus on race. Confederates did not like damn Yankees telling them what to do. Confederates despised the Yankee elitists dictating to them how to live their lives. Those Confederate values live on with the Freedom Caucus today. That attitude may be seen in the derisive treatment of Anthony Fauci and the resistance to wearing masks. It attests that there was more to the opposition to abolition back during the Civil War.

Confederate confrontation with the Federal Government during the COVID crisis expresses the continuation of the Civil War fought under different means. We have already seen on January 6, the Confederate flag waved in the Capitol, an action not achieved in the Civil War. Now the Confederates and their allies are poised to take over control of one of the two Houses of government. Don’t tell them that they are losing and need to change.

The Morning Joe Show needs to stand back and examine the larger picture. The Republican Party they miss also was the Union Party. Lincoln, Reagan, Bush, and McCain were all Unionists. The Freedom Caucus despises all those who support the Union cause. Their heroes are those who fought for the Confederacy. They have not lost in 2016, 2018, 2020, and 2022. Quite the contrary. They stand on the brink of power in one House. They are gunning for reducing/eliminating programs that help all Americans and support those that only help real Americans. Better not to build a municipal swimming pool than to waste taxpayer money on one that even, you know, those people can use. So instead of continually reprimanding the Republican Party for being a Party of losers, one should step back and realize the South has risen again.

Jim Jordan Does Not Have the Courage of His Convictions

April 30, 2022
by Peter Feinman
"I don't think about things I don't think about" Questioning Marjorie Taylor Greene under oath

Jim Jordan does not have the courage of his convictions. Nor do any of the conspirators who sought to steal the 2020 presidential election, overthrow the government, and replace the Constitution with the rule of Trump. Even now we are still learning new information about how extensive the conspiracy was in the White House, the House of Representatives, the Senate, the media, and the family of the loser President. Who knows how much more we will learn before the House Select Committee begins to tell the story in public sessions in June?

JOHN HANCOCK VERSUS JIM JORDAN

One of the iconic legacies of the American Revolution is the signing of the Declaration of Independence by John Hancock. He was the first person to sign. He did not merely sign the document, he signed in large “font” so there would be no doubt. His bold action immortalized him in American culture. “Put your John Hancock here” became a way of asking someone to sign a document the way he had when what was becoming the United States declared its independence from Great Britain. King George III had no doubt what the Americans had done.

Let us imagine for a moment that Jim Jordan or any of the conspirators had the courage of their convictions … assuming they had any convictions beyond “winning isn’t the only thing, it’s everything.” Suppose Roger Stone, Steve Bannon, or Jim Jordan was to say something like:

“The election was stolen. We have mountains of evidence to prove that the election was stolen. We have not had the opportunity to present the mountains of evidence to Congress which has been collected in Georgia, Arizona, Pennsylvania, and elsewhere to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the election was stolen.”

Then just as the Declaration itemizes 27 charges against King George III, the conspirators would produce a report that:

1. names the names of the people who voted multiple times
2. names the names of the people who voted for dead people
3. names the names of the people who voted in districts not their own
4. names the names of the people who voted who were not American citizens or eligible to vote
5. names the election workers who counted Biden votes more than once
6. names the election workers who did not count Trump voters
7. names the voting machine companies who rigged the counting process
8. names the countries of foreign entities which manipulated the vote.

Strangely enough, the conspirators have produced no such document. They have had every opportunity on their own to produce a report document. So far only Pillowhead has done so when he revealed the secret computer code that had been used. Of course, he is being sued for everything he’s got.

At this point it is safe to say that none of the conspirators will proudly state what they did in an attempt to save the country.

WHAT HAVE THE GUTLESS COWARDS DONE?

Instead of having the courage of their convictions, what have the conspirators done instead?

Jim Jordan – By now the videos of him responding to questions about his phone calls to the President have made him a laughingstock. On more than one occasion, he has been asked about the phone calls he made on January 6. His responses have been compiled and show him as a person with something to hide and not doing a good job doing it. It is no wonder he has the nickname Gutless Jim Jordan. When you hear the word “gutless,” think Jim Jordan.

Kevin McCarthy – The last week or so has not been kind to the would-be Speaker of the House. He already has been ridiculed for the comparison of what he said in the House of Representatives just after the failed insurrection attempt that threatened his own life and him kissing the ring of his master in Florida days later. It has been known that he was on the phone with the President as the assault was occurring. Now we have the record of what he was saying to his fellow Republican House leaders as well. These conversations included Liz Chaney back when he was in agreement with her and wondering how to implement the 25th Amendment to remove the President from office.

Truth be told, I cannot help but wonder if The New York Times set him up for the kill. First it released the claim of what McCarthy said. Second it allowed him time to refute the accusations. Third, it released the tape exposing him as a liar. Now he has been revealed in a double dose of seditious dishonesty. The result has been the charge that he is a traitor and a liar. So when you hear him referred to as Kevin McLiar, you know exactly who is meant and why.

Marjorie Taylor Greene – No review of the Trump contortionists would be complete without reference to the Representative already renowned before being an airhead. Under oath, she claimed not to remember almost as many times as Roger Stone pleaded the Fifth. She does not even remember when her life was on the line and she was pleading not the Fifth but for help!

In response to her testimony, I could not help but think of one of the great court room exchanges in cinematic history based on real court testimony. In Inherit the Wind, Clarence Darrow is questioning three-time presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan on his expertise on the Bible. During the exchange about the lack of any priests to officiate at the marriages of the pre-Flood patriarchs (Gen. 5), Darrow exposes that Bryan does not have an answer for the questions he is posing. The following exchange ensues:

Matthew Harrison Brady (Bryan):
I do not think about things I do not think about.

Henry Drummond (Darrow):
Do you ever think about things that you do think about?

The audience laughs at the nonsense their former hero for what he has just said. I have always assumed that no one other than Bryan himself could ever say something so stupid under oath. I underestimated the airhead mind. For a member of Congress to fake having Alzheimer is something no one could have anticipated. Instead of being Marjorie Taylor Airhead, she has become Marjorie Taylor Alzheimer.

The willingness of members of the House of Representatives to twist themselves into knots on behalf of their Lord and Savior is staggering to behold. Undoubtedly there is more to come.

On The Morning Joe Show, they like to talk about how Trump is a loser. They like to talk about how he lost the presidency, the Senate, and the House, a rare trifecta of defeat in America politics. They like to talk about how the Loser especially contributed to the loss of two Republican Senate seats in Georgia thereby giving the Democrats the majority in the Senate. They also like to talk about the poll results in that state. The loser of one of those Senate races and handpicked candidate by the Loser Kingmaker for the governor’s race on the issue of the stolen election is being trounced.

What you do not hear being talked about on The Morning Joe Show is that McLiar, Gutless, and Alzheimer will be running the House of Representatives in just eight months.