Idon’t pay much attention to Twitter because I’m a sane adult attempting to keep some equilibrium between my professional and private life. Yet every now and then something will pop up on the platform that will spur a column to help relieve some of the day-to-day stress of having perpetual deadlines.
That happened the other day when dozens of Twitters reacted to some comments Dana Loesch, the former spokeswoman for the National Rifle Association and a former writer and editor for Breitbart News, made on a syndicated radio show she now hosts.
Loesch–who at this point isn’t speaking for anyone but herself–said she didn’t care whether or not pro-life Senate candidate Herschel Walker paid for a girlfriend’s abortion.
All she cared about was “control of the Senate.”
Which is the truth. Which is horrible. All of you who agree with her–and the demographics suggest that could be many of you–should be ashamed.
I’m not a lawyer, but can make a case for Loesch’s position. Sometimes to obtain a greater good you have to compromise, and sometimes this means working with people you’d rather not work with toward some common goal.
It’s likely that some players on the Cleveland Browns felt sick to their stomachs when they found out their team had signed sex-obsessed DeShaun Watson as their quarterback. But they’re football players, and there isn’t much they could do about the signing; Watson is an undeniably talented quarterback who, after he serves his suspension and returns to the field, will give them a better chance of winning.
Loesch didn’t choose Walker as a teammate, but he is her teammate. His winning gives her team a better chance to win. And, as she says, “Winning. Is. A. Virtue.”
I could make a really strong case, one that might even prevail in the court of public opinion. But I’m glad I don’t have to defend either Loesch or Walker.
Because her position is garbage.
Politics is not a sport–and the fact that most of the people who pretend to care about politics treat it as a sport is one of the root causes of our trouble. Politics ought to be about compromise and finding ways to incrementally improve the lives of current and future American citizens. It ought to be a calling, and be filled with drab and diligent wonks doing their best to navigate a dangerous world filled with complex and slippery problems. It shouldn’t have cheerleaders and T-shirt cannons.
But you wouldn’t watch that TV show, would you? It’s hard to sell tickets to that kind of content.
Bring on your whataboutism: Joe Biden might or might not be a nice guy– but he’s also a plagiarist hack who only achieved what he achieved because the rest of the field was so weak. Bill Clinton, as talented and capable as he was, broke his country’s heart and should have resigned in shame.
When I see 60-year-olds wearing T-shirts with cute little partisan slogans, doing the snide-speak they learned from their favorite radio shout scammer, acting all giggly over how Ron DeSantis “owned the libs,” all I can think about is how their parents failed them.
Listen up, twerps: “Let’s go, Brandon” is a juvenile chant. It makes you look like rude and pathetic children. I don’t go to a ball game to hear how much you hate Nancy Pelosi (who, by the way, does not work for you) or Donald Trump (who has never worked for you either).
I don’t see much difference between a MAGA hat and a Che Guevara T-shirt, except there’s a chance the person wearing the Che Guevara T-shirt could be simply ignorant of the political implications of the act of wearing it.
Let’s also acknowledge there are plenty of humorless lefties out there who’ll slash your tires or complain to your supervisor because you got someone’s pronouns wrong. I’ve had my run-ins with California professors and a mommy blogger who decided I was a misogynistic cigar-chompin’ caveman because I didn’t like “Eat, Pray, Love.” (Specifically, the movie. I’m agnostic about the book.)
It’s not that I don’t have ideas about politics. It’s just that some things are more important. Like being honest and not grifting, not exploiting people’s fears and prejudices. Like being decent and telling the truth even when it’s easier to dissemble.
By not lying about history to make your audience feel good, like DeSantis did recently when he alleged the “American revolution … caused people to question slavery … Nobody had questioned it before we decided as Americans that we are endowed by our creator with inalienable rights and that we are all created equal. Then that birthed abolition movements.”
(This is a lie. You could look it up, but you won’t, because … uh, squirrel!!!)
Like abiding by the social contract and not abusing the power that accrues to your position by handing out favors to your cronies and supporters, who should not be expecting any quid pro quo anyway. Like not acting like you’re the Lord High Flumperjack just because you have a seat in the statehouse.
Like a soupcon of modesty, even if it’s fake. (Successful politicians tend to be bigger divas and less emotionally intelligent than even big-face Hollywood movie stars. Part of that is our own fault for treating the hired help like royalty.)
Like Loesch, I don’t really care what Herschel Walker believes in his heart about abortion. But I do care that all the evidence suggests he’s a self-regarding idiot with a dubious grasp of reality and a broken moral compass. And that particular class is over-represented in Washington.
I know, I’m the dumb one who wishes character actually mattered. I know you are more into Vince Lombardi and Kobe Bryant: Winning is the only thing.
Yeah, I got another cliche you can put on a bumper sticker: “For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”
pmartin@adgnewsroom.com