I spoke to my right-wing Republican father about the attack

[RAB910]

He is over 80 years old and needless to say we don't see eye to eye politically. He has been a somewhat lukewarm Trump supporter. So his take was that Trump tarnished his legacy by the events of 1/6. He thinks there was funny business with the elections but he has a hard time arguing with Bill Barr.

He told me that he is very afraid of Biden. He fears that with Biden in the WH and the Democrats in Congress and conservatives silenced on social media the Democrats will be ushering in communism.

I asked him if he knew what Communism was. He sort of hedged and hawed and indicated that he thought it was like socialism. He sort of admitted not knowing what it is but he has seen communist countries and they are all brutal dictatorships.

He is an avid FOX news viewer and he considers watching ABC news as hearing what liberals have to say.


It's clear the right-wing propaganda machine has got them scared of communism (even if they don't know exactly what communism actually is) to the point that they are easy to manipulate.

[brewens]

1. I've pointed out to a few people that we didn't hear "Communist China" for decades.

None of the corporations dealing with them nor Trump himself were concerned about their communism when there was money to be made. Of course in Trump's case, that didn't go so well.

[dewsgirl]

2. My DIL had the exact same convo. with her grandmother,

Fox news has brainwashed these people to a frightening degree. Her grandmother is the sweetest little old lady...minus her political beliefs.

[Hav]

3. I hope that it's not inappropriate to say

but I hope he lives long enough to witness Biden's terms and that you can talk about that subject again. If Apple, Microsoft etc. are still private businesses, then he was wrong. What he expresses is a baseless claim that is repeated by many Repubs. There has to be a way to get through to at least some of them.

[RAB910]

8. I tried to point out that he was prosperous under Obama

but FOX news has convinced him otherwise

[BlueIdaho]

4. Tell grandma and grandpa

No visiting the grandkids until they pull their heads out of their asses.

[Wounded Bear]

5. RWers never seem to know what their boogeyman words mean...

[hedda_foil]

6. He probably doesn't know what socialism is either.

[RAB910]

7. I wouldn't doubt it

[bullwinkle428]

9. Serious question : Did he fear that Barack Obama was going to take

away everyone's guns while he was in office?

[csziggy]

10. That reminds me of my Mom's reaction when Obama was elected

At the time she was 89 years old. She grew up in central Alabama though she tried hard to not be prejudiced, it was sort of baked in.

She was really frightened when Obama was election - she thought "the blacks" would try to get revenge for all the things that had been done to them over the centuries. In 2012 my sister got her an absentee ballot. Mom voted for Obama! In 2016, my sister got her another absentee ballot and asked Mom who's she rather vote for - a man who had been married three times, who'd gone bankrupt a bunch of times, or would she rather vote for a woman? Mom voted for Hillary Clinton.

I always knew Mom was much more liberal than Dad.

[mn9driver]

11. Fear motivates the right wing.

Fear of communism, even if they don’t know what it is.
Fear of socialism, even if they don’t know what it is.
Fear of Black people, even if they think they’re not racist.
Fear of Democrats, even if their guns have never been taken away.
Fear of science, even though science has never lied to them and they don’t really know what it is.
Fear of religions not their own, even if they don’t know anything about them.
Fear of Biden, even though they have no idea what he stands for.

Fear drives their beliefs and their values. Republicans know this. Fox knows this. And Trump knows this. Fear peddling came close to bringing this country down. In a few more years, it will succeed in doing so if we don’t draw the line somewhere. I don’t know how to do that, but somebody had better figure it out.

[ProfessorGAC]

13. Excellent Post!

Well done!

[maxsolomon]

12. Are you my brother?

I think you were talking to my Dad.