“Governor Hot Wheels” and Other Tempests in Tea Pots
Bad government loves distractions.
When cruel, intemperate people walk the corridors of power, when they are beset with incompetence, they take advantage of every opportunity to distract and draw attention away from their malfeasance.
This is what’s happening with the current administration.
A presidential portrait “controversy.”
The handwringing over Tesla boycotts and vehicle vandalism.
The would-be Jasmine Crockett debacle.
The firebrand Texas Congresswoman, one of the few standing politicians with an operational spine, publicly called Greg Abbott, the Republican governor of her state, “Governor Hot Wheels,” a reference to him being paraplegic.
The comment has roiled many.
The panel of “The View” decried her comment.
Noted font of compassion Sean Hannity said that the comment is proof that “Democrats don’t have any ideas” and “are selling hate.”
Abbott responded by saying that it was “another disaster by Democrats.”
Meanwhile, a military attack was discussed in a group chat that accidentally included a journalist.
Meanwhile, the Department of Education is being dismantled from within.
Meanwhile, Republicans are conveniently forgetting that their own president mocked a disabled reporter during his first campaign, an early sign of the dispassion and cruelty that marks his governance.
There are no excuses for Representative Crockett’s remarks but attacking her distorts legitimate issues that demand focus and attention.
It doesn’t matter whether she apologizes for her remarks.
It doesn’t matter that when they are attacked, the party that loves to proclaim its machismo and toughness manages to display the biggest, softest feelings.
What matters is that lunatics are running the government.
What matters is that our deeply flawed but functional way of life is evaporating before our eyes in a morass of incompetent, nativistic evilness.
This government is begging, pleading, and cajoling for distractions.
Even formerly dedicated MAGA cult members have looked behind the curtain, and now see a mortal where once they saw a bright orange Wizard of Oz.
Shakespeare’s Macbeth referred to life as “a tale told by an idiot, full of sounds and fury signifying nothing.”
That sounds like this administration.
Except their actions signify much.
What our country does matters far beyond our borders.
The Republicans can’t have it both ways.
They can’t be the biggest bully on the block and avoid confrontation.
They can’t be evil and expect everyone to silently assent.
They can’t behave stupidly and expect to be treated like stable geniuses.
They are wrongheaded.
They are venal.
They are capriciously cruel and malevolent.
In every moral and philosophical argument, they find the lowest common denominator and hold on with a death grip.
They will continue to try to distract us with threats, lies, and intimidation.
They will do anything to keep us from looking behind the curtain.
Because the man behind it is as small and pathetic a human being as ever lived.