I hate to say "big whoop" but when the criminal foot soldiers do time and the general walks free what else is there to say?

 By Hal Brown, MSW, Retired psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapist

Four proud boys, aka known as Proud Boys, having been convicted of seditious conspiracy, will be going to prison. Article on Salon.

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Donald Trump should be exceedingly nervous today, so said Mathew Dowd on MSNBC (top of page lower right). 

Should be (or should-be, who knew?), yeah right... what the hell does this mean in this context?

In a perfectly just world the general leading these soldiers into battle, in this case the five star general, General of the Army Donald Trump, would, not should, be held as accountable as the grunts in his army who committed crimes. More so, in fairness to those who followed his orders and ended up being convicted General Trump should suffer a sentence computed by adding all of the time they were sentenced to. This would determine his sentence. Methinks that this would come out as life in prison.

If this appears harsh consider that he attempted a coup to negate a fair election. We can look to history to learn the fate other leaders who tried and failed to do the same thing in certain other countries. 

I'm not likely to appear on MSNBC to weigh in on my psychologically informed analysis of how Donald Trump is probably reacting to this news. I would hedge my comments by modifying them with phrases like "if Donald Trump was psychologically normal" when I was divining how Trump is feeling today.

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Tucker Carlson's unredacted text reveals a surprising side of him: Does he have a better angel?

 By Hal Brown. MSW, retired psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapist

Scroll down for May 7 update.

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Below is the section of the previously redacted (above with my image added) portion of the message which contributed to a chain of events that ultimately led to Mr. Carlson’s firing that is described in this NY Times article:

Carlson’s Text That Alarmed Fox Leaders: ‘It’s Not How White Men Fight’

It is being discussed on "Morning Joe" as I write this blog:

A couple of weeks ago, I was watching video of people fighting on the street in Washington. A group of Trump guys surrounded an Antifa kid and started pounding the living shit out of him. It was three against one, at least. Jumping a guy like that is dishonorable obviously. It’s not how white men fight. Yet suddenly I found myself rooting for the mob against the man, hoping they’d hit him harder, kill him. I really wanted them to hurt the kid. I could taste it. Then somewhere deep in my brain, an alarm went off: this isn’t good for me. I’m becoming something I don’t want to be. The Antifa creep is a human being. Much as I despise what he says and does, much as I’m sure I’d hate him personally if I knew him, I shouldn’t gloat over his suffering. I should be bothered by it. I should remember that somewhere somebody probably loves this kid, and would be crushed if he was killed. If I don’t care about those things, if I reduce people to their politics, how am I better than he is?

The line in the text, it's not how white men fight, that apparently alarmed Fox News executives expresses Carlson's racism. I wonder if Carlson was thinking of how Mike Tyson bit off a chuck of Evander Holyfield's ear when Holyfield. an underdog, was winning in their 1997 heavyweight championship boxing match.

It was the rest of the text that I think is surprising. Breaking it down:

* Jumping a guy like that is dishonorable obviously.

This shows that Carlson can differentiate between what is honorable and dishonorable.

* I found myself rooting for the mob against the man, hoping they’d hit him harder, kill him. I really wanted them to hurt the kid. I could taste it.

This demonstrates an ability to engage in self-reflection, to express how he feels about something. It also shows he can admit his own murderous impulses.

* Then somewhere deep in my brain, an alarm went off: this isn’t good for me. I’m becoming something I don’t want to be.

Crucially, this shows that he is cognizant of when his thoughts deviate from an ego ideal. In Freudian psychoanalysis this is the inner image of oneself as one wants to become. In the id-ego-superego (or conscience) Freudian model the ego ideal is part of the superego, that is "the individual's conscious and unconscious images of what he would like to be, patterned after certain people whom ... he regards as ideal."

* The Antifa creep is a human being. Much as I despise what he says and does, much as I’m sure I’d hate him personally if I knew him, I shouldn’t gloat over his suffering. I should be bothered by it. I should remember that somewhere somebody probably loves this kid, and would be crushed if he was killed. If I don’t care about those things, if I reduce people to their politics, how am I better than he is?

The entire section above comes across as if it he has a better angel, his conscience, sitting on his shoulder whispering in his ear.

I don't view empathy as an either you have it or you don't characteristic. Some people, malignant narcissists for example, are incapable of experiencing empathy, period, full stop. Donald Trump fits all the indices of being a malignant narcissist. I do not think Trump has empathy for anybody.

I don't know if this is true of Carlson. He may have empathy for family members and his friends. 

There are people who are sociopaths who aren't at all narcissistic. I think of depictions of Mafiosi in fiction. They can kill or order a hit on someone and still feel deep love and empathy for their family. This doesn't mean family members and girlfriends can rest easy. Uncle Junior ordered a hit on Tony Soprano, Christopher regretfully ordered Sylvio  to kill his girlfriend Adriana.

Hitler, a psychopath who wasn't a grandiose narcissist like Trump, probably truly loved and had empathy for Eva Braun. He was extremely fond of his German Shepherd, Blondi, and even let her sleep in his bed in his bunker. Apparently Trump has never has a pet in his life.

I've digressed, so I ought to conclude with my clinical assessment of Tucker Carlson. 

I think he has many characteristics of malignant narcissism. He shares these with Donald Trump: extreme narcissism, antisocial behavior or sociopathy, sadism, being a bully, grandiosity, liking to raise hostility levels, and dehumanizing people and groups of people.

He is different from Trump in one respect, aside from being much more intelligent. He has an awareness that he is incapable of empathy and that to at least some degree knows he'd be a better person if he felt it.

Update: 

Scoop: Tucker Carlson ready to torch Fox News

My response:

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Stop calling the GOP anti-woke hysteria weird. Weird is wonderful. Call it wiggy instead.

By Hal Brown

The GOP has gone wiggy in their war on woke.

The author lives in a suburb of wonderfully weird Portland, Oregon.

Click above and below to enlarge the images

Here in Portland, Oregon we are proud of being weird and wonderful. Keep Portland Weird is a frequently used slogan (read about it on Wikipedia).

This is the webpage of Travel Portland:

This conveys how Portland is both weird and woke.

This is from the website Boundless Roads:

Cities like Portland aren't the only promoters of weird and woke as a positive image. For example Weird N Woke is a line of clothing which combines weird with woke in their name  .

The company, founded in Lancaster, PA, offers clothing like the Liberty is Dead t-shirt. Here's their Facebook page. I am now a fan of the company and appreciate that the founder Austin Welk (about him) resides in the Republican Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. It voted GOP in every presidential election since 2000 and in the last Presidential election the vote was Republican, 56.9% to 41.2% Democrat. 

Another way weird is used in a positive sense is in services. For example some of these are described here.

The first column I read this morning was this (subscription):

One word in a sentence prompted me to write a comment in the article:

But Biden’s biggest advantage has to do with the opposition — the Republican Party has gotten weird.

Here's my comment:

I live in Portland, Orgeon, which proudly proclaims (as does Denver) itself as wonderfully weird. Thus I suggest that calling the Republican Party weird is a misnomer and does weirdness a disservice. I suggest the word wiggy which includes weird in the definition: emotionally uncontrolled or weird.

At this writing seven readers there recommended my comment:

Following posting this I realized I should have included Austin as a proudly weird city.

Then I looked at Raw Story where I saw this article:

The word was used in this sentence:

As a result, “They have to win the endorsement of a crowd in an echo chamber having a conversation that the rest of the country thinks is too nasty or weird to join,” he wrote.

Headline writers often use alliterations so anti-woke weird warriors sound good. In my opinion wiggy is a better word in this context.

This is how my online dictionary defines weird and wiggy:

Weird

weird | wird | adjective suggesting something supernatural; uncanny: the weird crying of a seal. • informal very strange; bizarre: a weird coincidence | all sorts of weird and wonderful characters. • archaic connected with fate.

Wiggy: 

wiggy | ˈwiɡē | 

adjective (wiggier, wiggiest) informal, mainly North American emotionally uncontrolled or weird: you've been acting all wiggy.

Since both word have the soft W sound wiggy can be used in phrases with anti-woke and warrior as an alliteration. Both words can mean bizarre. Wiggy adds emotionally uncontrolled to the definition. Therefore it describes the Republican war on wokeness. Not only does weird have a positive connotation, but another reason I'd like wiggy used instead is that weird is overused and wiggy is a far less used word.

Addendum:

We can thank Ron DeSantis for pushing the war against woke to and beyond the breaking point by going after Disney and continuing to dig in his heals in his utter bigotry. For example: 

DeSantis declines to say if he supports ‘mainstream human rights’

Here's one of my blogs about him.

Here's what an hysterical bigot had to say in a Fox News opinion piece.   I found his essay when I did my web search for woke and weird.

Here's what my tour around America taught me about the weird, woke and wicked

Here's what I'm hearing from panicked parents around the country

The author spews intolerance.

* "Why is there a seemingly sudden increase in pedophiles, sexual deviants? Why do we have so many amoral—or plainly immoral—educators, school administrators, school boards, politicians, community leaders, and even judges, hell-bent on advancing the sexualization of our innocent children, and pushing perversion into the hearts and minds of the most impressionable among us?

*Why are too many of these leaders hiding their aberrant "sex education" and "gender-affirming" curricula from the parents of their students, stripping moms and dads of their rights to determine when and how their children are exposed to sensitive topics in school?

* What do these groups of decadent influencers have to gain?  In short, their ambition is the total breakdown and collapse of the family. Their target is our children.  Their goal is social chaos.  In some cases, they have been successful. Tragically successful.

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Weekly stats for the blog. Note the number of readers from Russia. I would like to have international readers comment about what they think about what is happening in America.

Click above to enlarge

Move over QAnon shaman, Ye, and Nick Fuentes, there's a new MAGA wingnut in the media spotlight

Above, QAnon shaman Jacob Chansley, Ye (Kanye West) and white supremacist Nick Fuentes. Obviously Trump doesn't care who he embraces. He's now making the news for literally embracing another fringe supporter. Can you guess to whom I am referring?

I turned on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" (part of my morning multitasking as regular readers of this blog know). This is what they were discussing:

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"Morning Joe" was fortunate in that they had interviewed a woman in September of 2022 who is now on the way to becoming, thanks to Donald Trump, as well known as this guy for pretty much the same reason:

"QAnon shaman"

The likelihood that you probably already knew who she was prior to reading this far suggests that she is well on the way to achieving MAGA celebrity status.

Morning Joe just re-aired this Sept. 2022 interview: 
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How famous is Micki Larson-Olson, the woman shown above? I'll never have my photo in The Washington Post for my opinions but thanks to her flamboyant attention grabbing outfit and Trump she's now relevant enough to have a 900+ word article about her in The Washington Post (here, subscription).

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Here's are some tidbits from The Washington Post article about her and the incident which I wasn't aware of in my bold:

• She identified herself as a member of a spinoff of the QAnon extremist movement known as Negative 48 that has frequented Trump rallies and campaign stops since last year.
• On Thursday, Larson-Olson wore her usual costume of a skintight red, white and blue jumpsuit and bedazzled cap, but she replaced her usual QAnon badge with a button displaying the Pledge of Allegiance, sinceQAnon paraphernalia is not allowed inside Trump events. 
• They (she and another Trumper) both got another chance to see Trump, however, when a member of the former president’s event team (Foley identified him as Secret Service, but the campaign said he was a local volunteer wearing an earpiece) took note of Foley’s jacket, featuring a stylized image of Trump as a matador. Foley said the person told him that Trump would stop by a famous nearby diner, the Red Arrow, after the speech. So Foley and Larson-Olson headed over.
• Here are some more facts about Larson-Olson from another article.

How famous is she? She is this famous:

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You can watch a video of this encounter here. You can hear a man shouting "I'm the college Republican leader, can I have a picture" but near as I can tell Trump ignores him and responds to Larson-Olson.

Of course there are two meanings to the word embrace, and thanks to Trump's hugging this woman we have pundits like Jonathan Lemire saying as he just did on "Morning Joe" that Republicans like Trump are literally embracing extremists.

We now have an oddity named Trump who is worthy of Ripley's Believe It Or Not. He's a freak who embraces freaks. 

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He makes the news by behaving in outlandish ways. He doesn't appear to care in the least about this behavior being suggestive that his political judgment is severely impaired. He has pushed the envelope of what used to be considered acceptable behavior for politicians so far without it being detrimental to his career that he is not likely to clean up his act.

There are lots of vulgar phrases to describe how little he cares what people think about this kind of behavior. I won't go into the gutter to end this blog with one of them.

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My title is too clever by half, but Republicans really row Roe up the river

 By Hal Brown

Original uploader was Brett Weinstein (Nrbelex)
 at en.wikipedia - Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons

I grew up in a suburb of New York City where everyone knew what up the river meant. Up the river referred literally to Sing Sing Prison which was about 30 miles up the Hudson River from New York City. 

Going up the river had nothing to do with navigating against the current. Inmates obviously wouldn't arrive on a boat. If they came from New York City they might arrive in one of these:

The virtual museum of the American Police Car

When I was a kid Ossining was rural. We used to go on picnics at nearby Pound Ridge Park and there probably were campgrounds in the area (they currently have them). Quite obviously, anyone sent up the river was decidedly not a happy camper. 

Now we have the ass-backwards position that the GOP has adopted as a major part of their positioning as they campaign for the 2024 elections to represent the country 2024.

They are rowing up the river against the current, meaning the majority opinion about favoring abortion with various restrictions. More than any other of the GOP positions their anti-abortion stance is the one that most Americans are against.

If you've every rowed a rowboat or are into skulling you know that you literally sit backwards as you row. Thus they are leading with their asses.

Public domain from Wiki

The boat they are rowing is certain to capsize. Even the Coast Guard won't be able to save them:

Put another way, they have hitched their campaign cart to asses that are, well, too stubborn to go anywhere.

Adapted by author

Remember how the Democrats defined the tendency to shoot themselves in the foot when it came to campaigning? For example, Hillary and her basket of deplorables comment might have cost her the election.

"Basket of deplorables" is a phrase from a 2016 presidential election campaign speech delivered by Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton on September 9, 2016, at a campaign fundraising event. She used the phrase to describe "half" of the supporters of her opponent, Republican nominee Donald Trump, saying, "They're racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic". The next day, she expressed regret for "saying half", while insisting that Trump had deplorably amplified "hateful views and voices". Wiki.

It isn't only the Republican candidates and their anti-abortion extremism that is rowing them up the river against the majority of the beliefs of the population. The entire so-called anti-woke agenda earns a hokum ho-hum from the majority, some of whom don't even know what woke or elements of woke like Critical Race Theory are.

Add to that the fact that the majority don't see LGBTQ+ people as carriers of a disease deadly as diphtheria and drag as dangerous as dengue fever. Quite the opposite, so many people have friends, family, and acquaintances who are members of the LGBTQ+ community that they know from personal experience that they are just as human as everyone else.

The pundits I follow lean towards saying that Trump would be an easier candidate for Biden to defeat and express concern than DeSantis would be more difficult. In fact because both of them, and also all of the other candidates described as likely GOP candidates, are embracing and running on, positions and policies not supported by the majority.

This is why I say they should dig their dumbass ditch deeper and deeper because the more they do so no ladder will be long enough for them to climb out of.

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