As the GOP “Clown Show” rolls on, are you as “shocked” as Captain Renault?

Commentary

You shouldn’t be…these clowns have been rehearshing since Trump came down that escalator in 2015.

Over the last week or so Republican party stalwarts “writ large”* have reached the such depths that the only way to characterize the behavior is by calling the party and their leaders a “clown show.”

*(So many pompous TV pundits are using the term “writ large” these days, I thought I’d try to match their pomposity and give it a shot.)

The fact that this GOP clown show has infected and permeated virtually the entire party, from the very top, to the presidential hopefuls, to both congressional leaders and backbenchers, to the voters that support these circus clowns, makes one wonder: Are you supporters watching? Are you listening? Are you reading? If yes to any of these questions, who are you and what are you thinking? If no, shame on you for not opening you eyes and your ears to anything but Fox and it’s ilk. (By the way, even Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal editorial board is dumping on Trump…not that I believe most Trump supporters read the WSJ.)

So, without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, for your entertainment (dis)pleasure allow me to present:

THE GOP CLOWN SHOW

Act One – The Presumptive Nominee

This has been quite a week for the indicted, fraudulent, sex offending, grifter of an ex-president who, despite all the accusations and the evidence, still leads his closest rivals in the race for 2024 GOP nomination by over 40 percentage points.

Scene One: Trump’s retribution plan: Becoming America’s first dictator (from Salon)

In her new book, “Enough,” former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson shares how during the Jan. 6 terrorist attack on the Capitol by his followers, Trump was heard chanting “hang” as Mike Pence was fleeing for his life. Cassidy’s account is but one more example of many showing how the disgraced and mentally unwell ex-president likely has what psychiatrist Dr. Justin Frank suggests is an erotic relationship to violence.

Confirming Hutchinson’s warnings, in a Sunday post on his Truth Social disinformation platform, Trump again threatened to end freedom of the press and the First Amendment if he returns to power:

They are almost all dishonest and corrupt, but Comcast, with its one-side and vicious coverage by NBC NEWS, and in particular MSNBC, often and correctly referred to as MSDNC (Democrat National Committee!), should be investigated for its “Country Threatening Treason.” Their endless coverage of the now fully debunked SCAM known as Russia, Russia, Russia, and much else, is one big Campaign Contribution to the Radical Left Democrat Party. I say up front, openly, and proudly, that when I WIN the Presidency of the United States, they and others of the LameStream Media will be thoroughly scrutinized for their knowingly dishonest and corrupt coverage of people, things, and events. Why should NBC, or any other of the corrupt & dishonest media companies, be entitled to use the very valuable Airwaves of the USA, FREE? They are a true threat to Democracy and are, in fact, THE ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE! The Fake News Media should pay a big price for what they have done to our once great Country!

At a rally in Iowa last Wednesday, Trump told his followers that he is going to invoke the Alien Enemies Act, which is a little-used law that gives the president unilateral power to deport and detain non-citizens who are older than 14 years old. The Alien Enemies Act was last used by President Roosevelt during World War 2 to put Japanese Americans in concentration camps.* Trump has also promised to reinstate a ban on travel to America from Muslim countries as well as his regime’s evil “family separation” policy – and presumably the concentration camp system that accompanied it. Trump is threatening to use the Alien Enemies Act against “drug dealers” and “suspected gang members”. Trump should not be believed: given his past behavior and announced plans to become a dictator he will likely use that law to target his personal and political enemies.

*In what many believe was one of the most disgraceful acts against citizens in American history.

Here is what Trump said in a Friday post on his Truth Social disinformation propaganda website about retiring Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley:

Mark Milley, who led perhaps the most embarrassing moment in American history with his grossly incompetent implementation of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, costing many lives, leaving behind hundreds of American citizens, and handing over BILLIONS of dollars of the finest military equipment ever made, will be leaving the military next week.

This will be a time for all citizens of the USA to celebrate!” he continued. “This guy turned out to be a Woke train wreck who, if the Fake News reporting is correct, was actually dealing with China to give them a heads up on the thinking of the President of the United States. This is an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH!

Scene Two: White Supremacy Meets Trump’s Version of Political Science (from Salon)

In a largely incoherent interview with conservative pundit Hugh Hewitt, Trump reiterated the white supremacist conspiracy theory lie that the “Democrats” and “the left” are “importing” black and brown people from “Third World countries” in an attempt to replace “real Americans”, i.e. White “Christians”:

These are corrupt people. These are fascists. These are Marxists. These are communists*. These are sick people that are destroying our country. We have millions of people coming in. I’m in New York right now, and I just rode through the streets. I’ve never seen anything like it. New York, I’ve never seen it looking like this. And you have thousands and thousands of people in plain sight that come from foreign countries that most people never even heard of. It’s not just countries adjoining us. It’s foreign countries that many people have never even heard of. They’re coming from all over Africa. They’re coming from areas of the world that nobody can believe, and how far it is away for them to get there. These cartels are making a fortune, and they’re destroying our country, and we’re doing nothing about it. And we have a president that’s incompetent and corrupt.

*Is it possible that these Trump enemies are some Frankenstein monster mashup of Marx, Lenin, Stalin, Hitler and Mussolini? Can one person simultaneously be a fascist, a Marxist and a communist? Did I sleep through Poly Sci 101? Or don’t they teach that at The Wharton School?

Act Two: The Second GOP Debate

Scene One: A Sorry Spectacle (from The Nation)

What better place to view the GOP Clown Show in action than the second debate. As The Nation reported:

After two hours of screaming, two hours of puerility, two hours of talking over each other and coming up with one canned line after the other, the seven GOP candidates on the debate stage at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., were asked a game-show question by co-moderator Dana Perino. Take a piece of paper, Perino instructed them, and write down which of the seven of you that you think should be voted off this island after the debate. The Fox News audience, primed to regard all of politics as an entertainment spectacle, and having been subjected to a two-hour food fight, whooped their approval.

The best way to sum up the show and the clowns? How about this subhead from The Nation’s coverage: When Ron DeSantis is trying to keep things dignified, you know the show has gone off the rails.

Act Three: The GOP Congressional Clown Show…er…Conference

Scene One: The Speaker

To paraphrase Lloyd Bentsen admonishing Dan Quayle in the 1988 vice presidential debate, “I watched Nancy Pelosi. Nancy Pelosi was one the greatest Speakers in history, Kevin, you’re no Nancy Pelosi.”

Kevin McCarthy, the Speaker whose only goal in life was to become Speaker, required 15 votes to get his wish, finally achieving his goal after acquiescing to the demands of the right-wing MAGA extremists in his caucus. Since then, McCarthy has presided over a House that has no policy agenda, has opened an impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden with no evidence, and, as you read this, just avoided a government shutdown by passing, with the Senate, a roughly 45-day continuing resolution with disaster relief funds, an extension of a federal flood insurance program and FAA reauthorization — but, critically, no Ukraine aid, He’s let the extremists take over the House. I guess he missed this poll:

Scene Two: The Impeachment Inquiry

Led by one of the dullest knives in the GOP drawer, James Comey of Kentucky, this inquiry is only about the current Republican mantra, revenge and retribution. Comer began the first hearing by stating that the panel had obtained a “mountain of evidence” showing (Biden’s) corruption. But, the three Republican witnesses who testified on Thursday all conceded they did not have firsthand knowledge of any criminal activity by Biden. Two of those witnesses, Jonathan Turley, a conservative law professor, and Bruce Dubinsky, a forensic accountant, acknowledged that the information put forward so far by the committee did not amount to corruption. But the third witness’s testimony was possibly the most “clown-like:”

Former Assistant Attorney General Eileen O’Connor said with a straight face that she had omitted the word “Hunter” from a commentary she’d written titled “You’d Go to Prison for What Biden Did” to save time.

Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-MA) didn’t let her get away with it. 

Rep. Stephen Lynch: You had mentioned in your oral testimony that you had written a commentary entitled, “You’d Go to Prison for What Biden Did.” That was, “You’d Go to Prison for What *Hunter* Biden Did,” isn’t that right?

Eileen O’Connor: That’s exactly right. I was cutting down words to stay within my five minutes.

Lynch: Yeah, that’s an important word, though, that you left out though, right.

O’Connor: It is, I regretted it immediately.

Lynch: I’d like to enter into the record unanimous consent. The article, Miss O’Connor, is, “You’d Go to Prison for What Biden Did.” I think that’s an important word. Yeah, it is. Thanks.

O’Connor: I did not delete it intentionally, only in the service of time.

(Fade out with music)

Scene Three: The Crazy Backbencher (from The Daily Beast)

Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) used his weekly email newsletter—hosted on a .gov domain that is funded by American taxpayers—on Sunday to launch a thinly veiled, homophobic attack on Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley, shockingly suggesting Milley should be put to death.

The diatribe came in a section commenting on former Capitol Police Chief Stephen Sund’s testimony to the House Committee on Administration last week, in which Sund discussed the Capitol riot. Sund called the events of Jan. 6 “an intelligence failure” and said he wished several agencies and individuals—from the Pentagon to then-President Donald Trump—had reacted more swiftly to provide back-up for local law enforcement.

But in Gosar’s recantation of the day’s events, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) remained the villain of the riots, though it was Milley—“the homosexual-promoting-BLM-activist Chairman of the military joint chiefs”—who delayed the deployment of the National Guard, Gosar claimed.

“Of course, we now know that the deviant Milley was coordinating with Nancy Pelosi to hurt President Trump, and treasonously working behind Trump’s back,” Gosar wrote in a screed far-removed from the truth. “In a better society, quislings like the strange sodomy-promoting General Milley would be hung.”

Gosar also accused Milley of being a “traitor” who coordinated with the Chinese military and actively worked against Trump. The attacks echo what Trump himself seemed to wish upon Milley, writing in a Truth Social post on Friday that “in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH!”

To both Trump’s and Gosar’s accusations of Milley’s traitorous actions, Milley made two calls to a Chinese general both before and after the 2020 election to defuse tensions between the two nations after China received intelligence that Trump would attack the country. He later told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the calls, which Trump has previously labeled treasonous, were an effort to “deconflict military actions, manage crisis, and prevent war between great powers that are armed with the world’s most deadliest weapons.”

By the way, Gosar is not only a wing-nut Congressman, he’s also a dentist. I guess listening to his rant is akin to going to him for a root canal!

Finale: It Can’t Happen Here

Scene One: Trump’s Plans for a Second Term Are So Bad That They Almost Make the First One Look Good (from Vanity Fair)

Career civil servants are out, die-hard loyalists are in

Shortly before the 2020 election, Trump signed an executive order known as Schedule F, allowing his administration to gut employment protections for thousands of career federal employees whose jobs—which range from making sure the air is clean to ensuring food and drugs are safe—are not supposed to be subject to the whims of whomever is in the White House at the time. Stripped of such protections, the move would have given Trump the power to fire whoever he wanted, and replace them with individuals whose chief qualifications were unflagging loyalty.

No restraints on Trump’s impulses

In his first term, Trump initially surrounded himself with aides who sought to temper his impulses: White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly, Defense Secretary James N. Mattis—even, occasionally, Atty. Gen. Jeff Sessions. Those moderating influences are gone. If he wins this time, he’ll bring a team of loyal aides who have been planning their return to power for months, and who intend to start by purging bureaucrats who stand in their way.

Another war on immigrants

Trump has vowed to “carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American History.” He’s said he’ll expand his travel ban, which barred people from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the US; send thousands of troops to the US-Mexico border; and sign an executive order “on Day One” to end birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants.

Speaking of the economy:

In August, Trump announced that should he win a second term, he’ll “automatically” slap a 10 percent tariff on virtually all foreign goods coming into the country—an that ideaeconomists on both sides of the aisle criticized.

“You know we’re not supposed to do that”

“I will send in the National Guard until law and order is restored. You know we’re not supposed to do that,” is a real thing Trump said at CPAC in March, while speaking about crime in cities, adding, “Frankly, the federal government should take over control and management of Washington,DC. I wouldn’t even call the mayor.”

Trump has said that he will pardon a “large portion” of the people convicted of federal crimes following their participation in the January 6, 2021, attack on the USCapitol, and that many will receive an “apology.”

Trump claims he’ll cut federal funding for schools that teach critical race theory or what he calls “transgender insanity.” He’s also said he’ll bring back his “1776 Commission,” which was notably devoid of any actual professional historians, to promote a “patriotic” curriculum. And, naturally, he wants parents to be able to fire principals.

I could go on, but you get the drift.*

*For a complete copy of the VF story about Trump’s dystopian America, click below.

Final Thoughts

The circus world has traditionally been home to three types of clowns: the comedic “White Face” clown; the somewhat down and out “Hobo” or “Tramp” clown; and the “Auguste,” a mixture of Whiteface and Tramp. The GOP Clown Show is devoid or any of those, but instead has taken on the face of a clown type popularized in the late 20th century in film and on TV: the “Scary” Clown. The “Joker” from the “Batman” franchise comes to mind.

Unfortunately, “scary” is too mild a word!