A lot of people grow tired of me calling this stuff out. I grow tired of having to call it out. But somebody’s got to do it. This stuff is not going away anytime soon. If the words of the...
CPAC
Putin is rarely mentioned at CPAC
The speakers at the pro-Trump Conservative Political Action Conference this week are in a tough spot. I am sure many of them condemn the Putin invasion of Ukraine, but they can’t do that publicly without invoking the ire of their...
Ted Cruz calls Jen Psaki “Peppermint Patty”
In a speech at the meeting of the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC), Ted Cruz referred to White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki as “Peppermint Patty.” Watch: But I wonder–is someone calling Psaki “Peppermint Patty” really an insult? Why does...
Anti-Trump Republicans will gather for the “Principles First” summit
They will meet this weekend at the National Press Club. Speakers include Liz Cheney, Adam Kinzinger, Denver Riggleman, Geoff Duncan, Brad Raffensperger, Alexander Vindman, Joe Walsh, Barbara Comstock, Bill Kristol, Charlie Sykes, Tom Nichols, Peter Wehner, and Harry Dunn. Meanwhile,...
Joe Biden is coming for your Bibles!
The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) is meeting this weekend in Dallas. After looking at the lineup of speakers, it should probably just be called Trump Political Action Conference or TPAC. (I am sure someone already came up with that...
The anti-vaxxer movement does not take its marching orders from Donald Trump
Over at The Week, Ryan Cooper thinks that Trump’s followers will get the COVID-19 vaccine if the former president will just encourage them to do so. Here is a taste of his piece: Dear Mr. Trump, I know it’s been...
Franklin Graham tells his followers to get the COVID-19 vaccine
According to a Pew Research study, white evangelicals are the least likely to get the COVID-19 vaccine. There are a lot of reasons for this. As I told Yonat Shimron of Religion News Service earlier this month, there is a...
Former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan is fundraising for Liz Cheney
Wyoming GOP congresswoman Liz Cheney voted to impeach Donald Trump. The MAGA wing of the GOP is now openly campaigning against her. At last Sunday’s CPAC speech, Trump targeted Cheney. He called Cheney a “warmonger” and said her “poll numbers...
Ambitious Republicans are realizing that they are not Trump
Elaina Pott has an interesting piece today at The New York Times on the way GOP presidential hopefuls trying to model their potential campaigns after Donald Trump. Here is a taste: Theoretically, Senator Tom Cotton was hitting the right notes....
The *Kansas City Star* hammers Josh Hawley’s view of American history
The Missouri senator’s hometown newspaper offered a sharp critique of his speech at CPAC. After watching CPAC last weekend, I not only noticed a unique political vocabulary, but I also noticed that the speeches were dripping with an off-putting and...
CPAC 2021 is over. Let’s check-in with the MAGA evangelicals
On Saturday night I published a post on the Trump evangelical response to the former president’s speech at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference. You can read it here. Let’s check-in on them today: The Liberty University Falkirk Center crowd...
MAGA evangelical at CPAC: “Conservatism is about the truth of the Word of God”
What are some of Trump’s favorite evangelicals saying about today’s CPAC speech: Charlie Kirk, the founder of Liberty University’s Falkirk Center, loved it: Actually, I thought the speech was pretty low energy: Actually, he IS the former president, Jenna. He...
Some quick thoughts on Trump’s CPAC speech
Here are some live tweets and commentary. The loser of the 2020 presidential elections started the speech with this: We also learned that Trump has no intention of starting another political party. This makes perfect sense. Why start another party...
The CPAC vocabulary. Defining terms.
I am teaching the American Revolution this semester. The other day, as we were reading and interpreting some primary documents, I asked the students to notice how the writers of these documents all seemed to use a similar political language....
The golden Trump statue was made in Mexico
Good thing they never finished that wall or else CPAC would be deprived of its Trump statue. I wonder if any of those “drug dealers, criminals [and] rapists” worked on the golden Trump. Here is The Guardian: Now the artist...
On Josh Hawley’s brazen and cynical CPAC speech
Sometime prior to November 8, 2020, four members of the Fea household voted in the presidential election. We joined millions of Pennsylvanians who voted by mail. We are the “people” of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Our voice was heard. Missouri...
GOP Congressmen skipped votes in Congress today, citing the “public health emergency.” And then they flew to Orlando for CPAC
What do Paul Gosar of Arizona, Jim Banks of Indiana, Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina, Ted Budd of North Carolina, Mark Green of Tennessee, Darrell Issa of California, Ronny Jackson of Texas, Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania, Ralph Norman of South...
“We will not live by your commandments, we’re free”
Context...
Gerson: CPAC is not conservative
As many of you know, Gerson was George W. Bush’s speechwriter. Here is a taste of his Washington Post column on CPAC: By a conservative standard, what should we make of the activists and participants at CPAC? It is worth...
Ted Cruz’s CPAC speech
Watch: He mocks AOC’s speaking voice and makes strange Star Wars and Star Trek references that seem to go over everyone’s heads. He talks about sand in a skate park and men French-kissing. His makes reference to Cancun and John...