I watched part of the RNC this morning...

[MrScorpio]

Since the late 80’s I watch both the DNC and the RNC every four years. And in the past, I had no problem with watching both conventions back-to-back. Despite how much I disagreed with the Republican message of prior to the Trump era, it didn’t actually horrify me. This time, however, I realized from what I witnessed this morning, that I can’t continue to look at this horror show.

Once I turned off the RNC today, I had rather to watch a fantasy horror story, so I caught up with the latest installment of “Lovecraft Country” and “Terminator: Dark Fate” instead. Which I did as a much needed palette cleanser.

Watching fantasy creatures engage in make-believe gore and mayhem was strangely comforting after looking at several hours of mindless droning at the RNC. It decompressed me.

The gaslighting from the RNC’s morning collection of hack speakers so appalling and I also had to endure the surrealist and deranged speeches from both Pence and Trump so disturbing as I watched them uninterrupted on C-Span. It was a glittering display of white mediocrity, something that was painfully apparent in what would be the doom for us all.

In spite of that, to me the most disturbing and disgusting part, however, was the call-in segment with I-don’t-know-who calling from around the country during the break that actually approved of the preceding clown show. Was this a rat-fucking exercise by the RNC to flood all three lines for Democrats, Republicans and Independents with people who approved of the previous real-life horror show, or was it an honest reaction from America’s dark side to remind us how irreparably broken this country’s psyche actually is? I have no idea.

But at that point, my sense of dread and disappointment became overwhelming and I realized that I could not spend night after night listening to the anger, racism, lies and all the pure, unmitigated evil that came with it for four straight nights.

America is going down a dark path under Trump, the RNC is a cruel reflection of that darkness and too many, mostly white people are embracing that darkness. The banality of evil is on full display at this year’s RNC and it’s more horrifying than any monster show that I’ve ever seen.

Because this time, the real monsters are everywhere and all too real. If we can’t stop this horror show from being renewed, America’s future is doomed.

[betsuni]

1. At this point there really isn't a Republican Party anymore.

The things Republicans used to keep them in power because Republican voters don't actually like their policies have taken over. The Christian Right, NRA. right-wing media.


"These groups had little interest in the conventional approach to party-building. Parties generally seek to reach out to the uncommitted or weakly committed, the swing voters who decide close elections. Parties generally thrive on ambiguity that allow many factions to gather under one big tent. Outrage groups care first and foremost about survival ... . They gain the members and money they need to survive by building ranks of passionate followers and ramping up those followers' sense of threat. They disdain swing voters and ambiguity. They seek to tear down the big tent.

"Thus, like some ill-fated conservative parties in the past, Republicans came to depend on extreme factions that provided valued resources but also pulled the party further toward the fringe. Each new ally offered the party an inroad into precincts of the electorate it might otherwise lose. But each new ally came at a price. By contracting out the task of persuasion, the GOP increasingly lost the capacity to shape its own agenda and fight elections on its own terms. Indeed, the Republican Party itself eventually became a weaker part of the Republican coalition, spending less than powerful private interests allied with the party and doing less to mobilize voters. Surrogates and their extreme agendas came to permeate the GOP so completely that it became increasingly difficult for party leaders to chart a moderate course. By the time a true master of outrage came along, a party that had outsourced identity-building would be easy prey."

Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson, "Let Them Eat Tweets"

[fierywoman]

2. The lies. The constant 100% lies. The lies that in actuality are them projecting onto the

Democratic party.

[Hekate]

3. Mr S, I couldn't bear to watch more than a few minutes, even the bits on DU...

We caught part of Brian Williams with Joy, Nicolle, and Rachel — that I can endure.

DUers played bits of the speeches by Guilfoyle and Junior, but I could not discern anything humorous in what people swore was a coked-up performance.

The horror.

Stay safe.

[Rhiannon12866]

4. Same here.

I was able to sit through bits when the pundits on MSNBC took them apart afterwards. And, of course, Stephen Colbert's take on this horror show. I'm trying to keep up and remain informed, but the Trump-supporting advocates have said nothing that I need to know. I don't know how anyone can swallow this crap...