Recently, Marjorie Taylor Greene spoke to a cheering mob of white conservatives in Alabama, who proudly hailed their low vaccination rates.
Thanks to people like them, Alabama had to throw away 65,000 vax doses. She is also on record suggesting that vax promoters should be shot.
Meanwhile, GQP racists ranging from Ron DeSantis to Rand Paul, while simultaneously bragging about their war against vaccines and sane public health, also blamed infected immigrants at the border for spreading the disease they themselves are deeply proud of and committed to spreading. DeSantis is so committed to spreading COVID that he is promoting “Don’t Fauci Florida” campaigns, punishing schools that mandate masks for children (who are at greatly increased risk for the Delta variant), and presiding over a skyrocketing infection rate and death toll. Indeed, COVID is rapidly becoming The MAGA Plague, because the virus doesn’t care about how well you own the libs with your stupid spite.
And yet, even as they deny the seriousness of the disease that has killed nearly a million Americans, the racist GQP blames it all on brown people with the weird logic: “Refugees don’t get to spread COVID, ONLY WE PURE WHITES GET TO SPREAD COVID!”
Why do this? Because as Lyndon Johnson once said, “If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.”
It is a strategy that has served racist political bosses for four centuries in the US. And as the folly of the MAGA murder/suicide cult shows, it works as well as it ever has in providing short term gains for the bosses and long-term suffering and death for their gullible racist constituents and those children and immunocompromised victims in their thrall.
Nor does it matter a whit that the whole thing is a lie and red county conservatives are their own worst enemies.
For, of course, as epidemiologist Jerry Cangelosi wrote last week:
“COVID-19 hospitalizations by county, normalized to population (from today’s NYT). See the southern border counties? They aren’t hot spots as claimed by some. Blame-the-migrants rhetoric is nonsense.
The virus is already highly prevalent in ALL American communities. All of us will be exposed sooner or later, with or without migrants among us. The good news is that most of us have control over the outcome. If we’re vaccinated, then we’re far less likely to be among the hospitalized.”
The GQP murder/suicide cult naturally tells racist lies to blame the least of these for the criminal neglect that is 100% their own fault as they willfully and malignantly spread Pandemic.
Meanwhile, Normals and decent people, who care about human beings and not about killing hostages just to make their political enemies look bad so they can claw their way back into the White House say, “Get the shot, for the sake of those who cannot get the shot yet. Delta is killing children. Protect them.”
In the final analysis, the sheer deadly perversity of the MAGA antichrist “prolife” murder/suicide cult is a mystery insoluble to human intellect. Evil, at the end of the day, does not make sense. It has a limited sort of internal logic: a fragment of Logos or reason something like a virus is a fragment of DNA. But in the larger scheme of things it is, as Augustine pointed out, an assertion of our nothingness. The cult blames the poor and brown for the evil they themselves do because it is “logical” to shift the blame in their lust for power. But in the end, the sheer perverse idiocy of their promotion of Pandemic makes no sense. Increasingly, this evil antichrist cult puts me in mind of Paul’s remark:
The coming of the lawless one by the activity of Satan will be with all power and with pretended signs and wonders, and with all wicked deception for those who are to perish, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. Therefore God sends upon them a strong delusion, to make them believe what is false, so that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness. (2 Th 2:9–12).
No. I don’t think Trump is The Antichrist or that we are living in the last days (except in the sense that it has been the Last Days since the Ascension). But I certainly believe he (along with every one of his supporters) is an antichrist (they are a dime a dozen and you can find them and their ensorcelled followers all through history from New Testament times down to the present. And what such people always demonstrate is that those who will not listen to the Spirit shall not hear him. They choose to learn from pain who will not learn from wisdom. Such is the terrifying respect God pays to the freedom of his creatures.
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19 Responses
“[T]the epistemic capture in the US of poor and working class whites by conservatives, billionaires and propagandists is one of the great social engineering success stories of the last half century. This includes an informational ecosystem that’s easy to get into and hard to get out of because it simultaneously stimulates fear and anger responses, degrades one’s own ability to reason, and breeds mistrust in outside sources and political points of view. In other words: cult conditioning.” – John Scalzi
Well, Goshes, mark! I was hoping for a Covidpalooza in my favorite religious blog this morning, and here you are.
You’ll never guess who not only has covid, but who is on a ventilator just AFTER testing positive, using up resources that could actually help someone innocent, like one of his victims? Maybe a child, because children are showing up more and more in hospitals? It’s all about the children, so we are told. My husband has a 14 year old in his hospital.
Or did.
Cardinal McGrumpy hisself! The very same Cardinal McGrumpy who said: “Vaccination itself cannot be imposed, in a totalitarian manner, on citizens.” Whythehell not? If government is not there to save lives of citizens, what is it there for? Why, SOME lives of course, in the form of the dictates of the church, certainly can be according to McGrumpy.
Silly, cynical me! It’s there to impose McGrumpy’s wishes on them. Well, so much for the right-to-precious-life and life-is-sacred-to-god movement, because if there is one thing that’s more important than life, it’s power. And all you have to do is see one of the many photos of McGrumpy dressed in his finest finery and shaming drag queens everywhere to get that it is all about power for him. One of my favorites is him in a 15 scarlet train. Power and expensive frocks! There’s the ticket!
Here is what he said: He has quoted groups that suggested that COVID-19 vaccines inject “a kind of microchip” that allows citizens to “be controlled by the state regarding health and about other matters which we can only imagine.” Of course! That explains everything, except how vaccines work, how syringes work, how the brain works, how microchips work, how the disease works, how government works, and how public health works. But it is an absolutely perfect understanding of how fear, religious megalomania, and manipulation for power mongering for political purposes works.
Why would he be getting “assisted” by a ventilator for testing positive? Also, if he didn’t believe in the science behind the vaccine, why does he trust the science of doctors? Maybe because his death is staring him in the face?
The cardinal also said that “it is never morally justified to develop a vaccine through the use of the cell lines of aborted fetuses,” adding that the state “is not the ultimate provider of health. God is.” Apparently, god didn’t get that message before the ventilator did. Also apparently, the precious-right-to-life movement doesn’t really care about how many dead bodies there are right now. 620,000 COUNTED ones in this country alone.
All thanks to the MAGAtry of the hyper conservatives, radtrads, and trumpanzees. Two vaccine shots weeks apart is totalitarian, but when you see death in front of you, get on a ventilator ahead of others, have the state or the hospital or the doctors control your body, take over your breathing, and feed you via a nasal cannula if you are still conscious.
That’s True Religious Freedom. That’s owning the libs!
More proof that the hell that punishes us is dealt by our own hand.
I’m pretty sure I told you about my BIL who went to hell when he was on a ventilator. He has PTSD from it. I thought he would apologize for what he’d done after it, but the doctors reassured him that it was just bad brain chemistry from the cocktail of drugs keeping him in an induced coma. If I was holding my breath for that apology I’d be dead.
I don’t wish it hell upon Burke, but I sure can hope that he will see the light.
I don’t wish it on him either, but as I have often said on these very pages, I don’t believe that the universe hands out rewards or punishments. There are simply consequences. And in this case, ignoring centuries of medical knowledge and even modicum of common sense— really, microchips?: play the covid lottery, win stupid prizes.
jj
The cult conditioning is indeed terrifying.
I was having a conversation with one of them a couple of weeks ago. We were talking about people that we mutually care about, and she stopped me abruptly, out of the blue, saying, “did you hear? They now have the *proof* that the election was stolen! Sir (something something) in British parliament has the evidence!” All I could do is protest that she changed the subject mid sentence, and get out of there.
There is no more reason or logic. Nothing in the world will change her mind. I don’t bother trying anymore. There is a group at DAILY MASS that keeps her all fired up. Even Jesus can’t get through to them. It makes me so sad. It’s like a form of possession.
We shake our heads at how Afghanistan could be so completely overrun by the Taliban, but we’re not so far from that fate ourselves…
Oh for heaven’s sake Ben, you need to write a book. “Play the Covid lottery, win stupid prizes” hahahahahaha
I just checked out Anne Lamotte’s latest book from the MV library. You make me laugh twice as much. All she does is chat about stuff in a funny way, and people eat it up.
But back to the topic at hand: I am very chagrined to admit that I still haven’t immunized my 12 y.o. She is a tiny little thing, and didn’t even register in the low zone for her age in the growth zone for most of her life. We are a bunch of late-bloomers…My logic is that she has the body of a 10-11 year old, and I won’t bring her in until they approve the 11 year olds. A 350 lb. man shouldn’t get the same dose as an 80 lb. wisp of a girl.
So yes, I rushed to get my shot at first opportunity, but I understand SOME paranoia. I don’t have the patience for the microchip weirdoes, –but WHY are they holding out on the 11 year olds?? School is starting, and Delta should give them all of the reasons to fast track it. Something is up.
I hate how writing doesn’t allow us to convey certain emotions. So much second guessing,
I just wanted to say hat I appreciate what you have to say.
@taco
Thanks. I appreciate that.
I will just squint a little longer at someone who doesn’t always.
@taco
As far as I can understand, the dosage is not calculated by age or body weight. Kids are showing up in the ICU. I think the pediatric ICU beds in Mississippi are completely full. The one in my husband’s hospital died. 14 years old, and her life is over. Even people that are fully vaccinated are getting sick, though only a very small percentage are ending up in the hospital because of it. I would say to get your daughter vaccinated as soon as possible to protect everyone else in your family.
Yes, it’s better for her to have her growth stunted than die. She is only five feet tall and her sister is 5′ 7″. Her sister was tiny at 12. She missed the puberty bus for YEARS.
Why else are they not vaccinating kids under 12? It has to be that.
Did the 14 y.o. have a pre-existing condition? 🙁 So incredibly sad.
They’re not vaccinating kids under 12 because they haven’t yet completed clinical trials on kids under 12. They hope to have FDA approval for kids down to 2 this fall.
Why didn’t they start with a kids’ vaccine? Because COVID last year was mainly killing the elderly – kids were shrugging it off with barely a sniffle. They didn’t foresee the delta variant, which is currently putting little kids in the ICU on ventilators.
Please vaccinate your daughter.
@Joel, of course I will vaccinate my daughter. I will do it the moment they approve the 11 -year-olds. She’s 85 pounds and five feet tall–like an eleven year old. Delayed puberty has to do with genes and interestingly enough, extended breastfeeding.
I have a seventeen -year-old ( vaccinated) who declares quite confidently to me that masks don’t work. Instead of fighting with him I made him admit that he doesn’t know this for absolute certain–as in 100%. So I will say the same to you: you don’t know with 100% certainty why the vaccine roll out for children is not already under way.
As a Catholic, I believe it is important to deny myself comfort for the sake of my neighbor. This is why I don’t understand the odd right wing Catholic response to masks. They should know better. Their Catholic forbearers wore hairshirts and fasted. To err on the side of charity should be like muscle memory. In the case of my daughter, it’s not clear cut. She needs to have parents who scrupulously advocate for her, given all of the information that is available. I wanted to say ‘fearlessly”, but I can’t. Her situation is not clear cut. Thankfully she is healthy.
With love and all due respect as concerns your daughter, I offer the following observations.
1. My husband’s first wife was 4’10”, weighed 85 pounds, as a grown woman. Her delicate size was not a negative in her life.
2. I am not a vaccine scientist, so I don’t *know* how vaccine rollouts are calculated based on age. But I do know that I have read that because of the need for speed in vaccine deployment, testing was done in different age tranches, adults first, 17-12 later, testing on immunities and side effects for younger kids came last.
Honest question to you — why would you think that a vaccine would stunt anybody’s growth?
Hi Lise,
Thank you for your input. I don’t know that it will stunt her growth. In fact I’m the worst scientist in the world. But I can power read like an internet junkie when I’m worried. (and I have)
We have super tall genes and the opposite, but my daughter came to my shoulder in the 8th grade, and now towers over me.
At first I didn’t have symptoms with my own shot, and then weeks later had some weird hormonal reactions. Maybe God just wants me to be like Elizabeth and have a baby in my 50’s.
*my older daughter
Mark: I do not know what “pingback” means, but there is a box about one of those beasts, just above “tacoanybody”‘s last 2 comments on Aug. 17. I clicked on the last 2 words (World news) and got a warning from my computer security system (Avast) that this site had not been allowed to open in my computer because there is a dangerous and serious virus in it. Maybe you would know how to remove that threat, if it is real.
Deleted.