Monday, November 7, 2016

The New New Ten Commandments

According to Casey Seiler. Wonderful piece of writing in the Times Union, my new newspaper.

1. Thou shalt not select thy candidates from the ranks of thy reality television stars. Beware the man or woman who has suckled at the breast of Nielsen ratings, for to them sense and logic shall matter less than the false god whose names are legion but who is known in the fleshpots as Attention, be it of the holy or the wicked stripe. Watch their movements for imminent TV deals.

2. Thou shalt not covet a private server for public emails. Henceforth let it be known that the business of the people shall be conveyed on the People's Server exclusively, and the dealing of the private household shall find its hearth upon the Household Server, and let them forevermore be not entwined.

3. Defend thine email systems like the fortress on the borderland. Be like the falcon on watch for enemies who would like a thief in the night spirit away thine online communications, for they are unholy and base and in some cases used to work for the KGB.

4. When thy candidates shall come together on stage to debate the people's business, thou shalt not include time for "open exchange." This will devolve into squabbling and plagues of Twitter hot takes that are abominable to the eyes of Heaven.

5. Thou shalt not make apologies for the man who brags of grabbing women by a certain part of their anatomy, thus profaning this land. On second thought, let's expand that to someone who brags about grabbing any part of a women's anatomy, period. When the people of the Lord wandered in the desert, that was the sort of thing that got you horsewhipped — we are just saying.

7. We really want to stress the no-reality-stars thing.

I was going to just go with the first five and make you go to the link for the other five. But, it's really important "to stress the no-reality-stars thing."

And then, there's innocence lost

The single most frightening, anti-democratic phrase of modern presidential history came in Trump’s convention speech: “I alone can fix it.” A Trump victory would be a mandate for an authoritarian politics. Trump’s ambitions would be bounded by strong legislative and legal institutions and by his own risible ignorance of real leadership. But a Trump administration would be a concession to the idea that America needs a little more China, a little more Russia, a little more “so let it be written, so let it be done,” in its executive branch.

I never imagined that Republican leaders — many of whom I know and have respected — would fall in line with such dangerous delusions, on the theory that anything is better than Hillary Clinton. Most options are better than Clinton. But not all. And not this. The GOP has largely accommodated itself to a candidate with no respect for, or knowledge of, the constitutional order. Every constitutional conservative should be revolted. Those who are complicit have adopted a particularly dangerous form of power-loving hypocrisy.

Poor Michael Gerson. Never in his wildest dreams did he think the Republican Party could nominate a monster. Yet, there it is. Trumpenstein.

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