Brilliant post by Atrios wrt the Sensible Center and Racists

The Bigger Issue
Is over the past several decades, our discourse progressed something like this:

Guys, the're racists.

Sensible Center: No, they just believe the very important science that suggests that black people are stupid. Also, crime and poverty. Black people are poor and get arrested a lot and stop&frisk is not racist so stop saying that. QED

Guys, they're white supremacists.

Sensible center: No, they're just celebrating the very important heritage of the Confederacy, which is their history, even in places like Pennsylvania and Ohio, which were very important Confederate states. I don't see any actual Klan hoods. Maybe they are white nationalists, which just means they want to preserve their culture. QED

Guys, they're Nazis.

Sensible center: Actually, I don't see much evidence (some, but not too much) of anti-Semitism, which seems to be an important feature of Nazism, right? I mean, the obsession with George Soros and the word globalist is simply political. Obviously they have some views about race which liberals don't support, but it isn't racism, and it certainly isn't Nazism.

Nazis: hey, uh we're Nazis.

Sensible center: No, I really don't think you are.

Nazis: No, really, we're fucking Nazis. Heil Hitler! Check out my Nazi tattoos! We're Nazis!

Sensible center: This is disturbing, but Stalin was bad, too, so, really, both sides.

Democratic message: "Republicans are killing you. We won't kill you"

You'd think that would be a message that will resonate with voters. If the Democrats aren't too polite to use it.

Everything the GOP wants to do equals death.

More guns
More poison
More war
Less money/worse economy
More death penalty
More targeted killing by police with no repurcussion
Less Medicaid
Less Medicare
Less Social Security
Less CHIP
Less Education
Fewer safety regs

It is all killing us.

A massive tax cut for the wealthy will crash the economy

It always does. If we don't take money away from those at the top and re-circulate it through people at the bottom and middle (who end up trading it for goods and services to those at the top again), then that money just stagnates, disappears from the economy, or is used to blow up investment bubbles that also crash and wreck the economy.

This latest health care bill atrocity is Shock Doctrine technique

At its finest. Do something the wealthy want done that is extremely unpopular, but do it fast so that everyone is shocked by its cruelty and avarice. Naomi Klein is a prophet.

For your viewing (dis)pleasure: one of the thickest AE callers of all time, and the Burden of Proof!

I find it amazing that there might still be enough rule of law left in this country

that Trump might actually be held accountable for something in his long, miserable life.

Strange to see the machinery of a once-functional legal system actually working and threatening the elite in power. This must have been what Watergate felt like.

Short Term Memory Loss is Epidemic on DU

I often wonder what it is like to wake up every day and be struck afresh by the fact that a certain Senator who is very progressive and works hard with the Democrats for progressive policies is not actually a member of the Democratic party.

Like Drew Barrymore in 50 First Dates, they awake this to factoid every day, and are so gobsmacked by it, they feel they need to post it whenever the Senator is mentioned. And sometimes when he is not!

The best we can do for our afflicted friends is to gently remind them that we all already know this fact, and that even though it seems like it is of paramount importance, the rest of us don't actually give a shit.

Why can't conservatives spell?

There is a PhD in neuroscience awaiting the person who can figure out what the link is between the spelling centers in the brain and being an asshole.

Trump is his own picture of Dorian Gray

His life of hideous actions and attitudes etched into his monstrous visage.