Conservative BS: Indiana Edition

Braun rallies students at packed Turning Point USA event at Indiana University (Indiana Capital Chronicle) sounds innocuous enough - barring any hesitancy at Indiana's Governor being the opening act for Tucker Carlson.

What gets noxious comes down in the story, when it starts quoting Indiana's Governor:

Braun, a former U.S. senator who left Washington, D.C. to lead Indiana, framed the moment as traditional values vs. prioritizing government over individual liberty. 

“We’re in a classic battle between those values and folks that believe government is the most important thing in your life. Don’t ever go there. Always resist it. Be loud about it. Can I count on you for that?” he asked. 

***

Braun warned that conservatives have been caught “flat-footed” while opponents dominate the media and campuses. He praised TPUSA’s growth to thousands of chapters, urging the audience to be “foot soldiers.” 

Let us see what the Republicans/conservatives/MAGA are doing for individual liberty:

1. Using the courts to persecute President Trump's enemies.
2. Ignoring the civil liberties of US citizens in their anti-migrant raids.
3. Using the National Guard to invade Democrat cities.
4. Declaring war on free speech and assembly.
5. Using government money to blackmail universities.

Get over the idea that MAGA is about protecting individual rights.

Get over the idea that MAGA is about using government power as broadly as possible against American citizens.

As for being the minority oppressed by the liberal press:

1. MAGA had no problem cancelling Jimmy Kimmel and using the FCC to do so.
2. CBS cancelled Stephen Colbert when it needed to get a merger approved.
3. No major newspaper has hounded Trump about his mental and physical health as they did with Biden.
4. The press has not pressed any questions about Trump's graft. 
5. Columbia University publicly bent the knee to Trump; Harvard seems to have been more discreet. 

MAGA, you are oppressed only in the sense that you must have complete obedience; the slightest disagreement cannot be tolerated.

Yes, Governor Braun, you are an idiot and full of BS. 

sch 

Update at 8:59:

Trump Keeps Attacking Americans. Why Does He Get Away With It? (The New Republic)

The sitting president of the United States posted a video depicting himself defecating on millions of American citizens for the crime of protesting his administration. And the response from Republicans? Silence. From the media? Some articles (and many danced around the topic), but they didn’t exactly dominate the Sunday shows. House Speaker Mike Johnson went on ABC’s This Week and wasn’t asked a single question about it.

Compare that to what happens when a Democrat makes even the mildest critical observation about conservative voters. In 2008, Barack Obama tried to explain why economically struggling voters might “cling to guns or religion” as a way to make sense of their frustrations. He was trying to express empathy, to understand why his message wasn’t connecting. Nearly two decades later, conservatives still cite that comment as proof that Obama despised “real Americans.”

Or take Hillary Clinton’s “basket of deplorables” comment from 2016. Clinton was specifically trying to draw a distinction between Trump supporters generally and the white nationalists and conspiracy theorists who’d been energized by his campaign. She said you could put half of Trump’s supporters, who were “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic” in a “basket of deplorables.” Then she said the other half were “people who feel that the government has let them down” and deserve respect and understanding.

But that nuance didn’t matter. The entire Republican Party erupted in coordinated outrage. The comment became a defining moment of the campaign, cited endlessly as proof that Clinton had contempt for half the country. And the media amplified that narrative for weeks.

Here’s what almost never gets mentioned: Clinton was right about the first group. The Proud Boys, the Three Percenters, the neo-Nazis marching in Charlottesville, chanting “Jews will not replace us”—those people were absolutely part of Trump’s coalition, and anyone with any sense could and in fact should write them off as “deplorable.” Saying so wasn’t an insult to all Trump voters. It was an accurate observation about a specific faction. But Republicans acted as though she’d attacked every single person who’d ever considered voting for Trump, and the media let them get away with it.

Now look at what Trump does routinely. He doesn’t make careful distinctions between Democratic voters and extremists. He attacks entire cities, entire states, entire swaths of the country. And nobody freaks out.

 Yeah, pity the poor conservatives who being attacked by the "liberal" media.

Trump Building National Police Force Using Local ICE Partners (The Intercept)

The aggressive, nationwide law enforcement regime, all taking place under orders from the White House, amounts to what scholars, attorneys, and now a federal judge say are steps toward the creation of a national police force. And the ranks of ICE partners won’t be filled with just local cops: In at least three states, the administration is joining forces with agencies typically tasked with environmental and marine protection, lottery control, and gaming to target immigrants.

And what limit is there over such concentration of power to protect individual liberties?

sch