2019, students in Hong Kong were protesting and being attacked by police. What did right-wingers think about it?
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5 years later, the same cast of characters:
The GOP lives in the eternal present of this week's scripted talking points.
Only difference between them and their mascot Trump is that the Rs do have a script and will read from it, while the orange thing prefers to wing it. But none of them will engage in a discussion on the merits of the talking points or inconsistency regarding prior viewpoints. If confronted about that, they fall back on "Admit nothing, deny everything, make counter-accusations."
However, in the case of the university protests against Israel's conduct in Gaza, it's impossible for the Rs to co-opt the demonstrations without running afoul of facts on the ground in Gaza.
The GOP talking points, however loudly retweeted or quoted on Fox, cannot resurrect a single dead Palestinian woman, child, aid worker or journalist slain in Gaza "by mistake" of Israeli military --or regarded as so much "collateral damage" the same as a pile of bombed-out housing and shops-- or currently dying of starvation and about to be treated to more of the same in the pending Israeli attack on Rafah.
How is any of that stuff morally defensible? What to do, what to do?
Well, the Rs don't really know from day to day. It depends on what Trump thinks, or more ominously, it depends on the goals of whoever last managed to whisper in Trump's ear what's a good thing to think today. That's the problem with a cultish, post-policy outlook on governing.
The Republicans platform since 2020 has been no more than an open declaration in that summer's national convention that their party is a cult attached to a monumental pile of myths and ugly truths called The Donald. Yeah, the guy who's been heading (slowly,,,, so slowly) to the dock on dozens of criminal charges in four separat trials. He's their guy! That's their platform!
The current effect of the Rs' self-inflicted paralysis of political capability is to point out to the world at large that Republicans don't give a flying fig about human rights... not those of Palestinians in Gaza under international rules of war, and not those of Americans engaging in political dissent protected by the US Constitution here at home. They take their cue from Trump, although right now he's busy paying fines for violations of gag orders at a criminal trial, and in his spare time interviewing VP hopefuls. But Trump's a law'n'order guy. He's against violence except when he's for it. He's sometimes for it when people disagree with him or he's losing an argument or an election. Hence, Republican policy.
Journalists need to call Republican officeholders out on this stuff. MAGA fans won't care but voters on the fence about Trump (those who favor tax cuts and deregulation and may be willing to overlook the dangers of Trump, like Jamie Dimon) need to be reminded every single day that the Republican Party is bankrupt of the "family values" they've abandoned in favor of authoritarian rule. Let those potential Trump voters ask themselves what if they wake up some morning on the wrong side of Republican talking points du jour.
In the meantime, just to inform the daft Republicans tweeting about sending in federal troops to shut down demonstrations: American Jews have the same constitutionally protected right as any other American to protest against Israeli conduct in Gaza on an American university campus if they're so inclined. No one has to take talking points from any political party or lobby in order to exercise protected free speech.