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Stop taking the bait from Republican bomb throwers

There are a few Republican members of Congress who have no particular power (committee chairmanships, long tenures, etc.) and exist solely to say outrageous things that will get them a hit on Fox News. Off the top of my head, they are:

  • Lauren Boebert
  • Marjorie Taylor Greene
  • Matt Gaetz
  • Marsha Blackburn
  • Madison Cawthorn

These are not mere idiots, like Ron Johnson or Louie Gohmert. They are bomb throwers who say idiotic stuff as part of a conscious plan to get themselves attention.

Nor are they influential members of Congress, like Kevin McCarthy or Jim Jordan, that we have to pay attention to because they have institutional power.

So I propose that we all boycott them. Just stop mentioning them. Don't waste neurons highlighting their latest outrageous utterance. Allow them to fester in the fever swamps of the right. The end.

42 thoughts on “Stop taking the bait from Republican bomb throwers

  1. ConstanceReader

    Yes, they are influential, because their fellow racists/misogynists/bigots/ficus-plant-level-IQ creatures send them lots of money. That's all it takes to have influence in the GOP and, really, the US at large.

    1. MontyTheClipArtMongoose

      Yup.

      Ten years ago, the calls for Amendment 2 Remedies were coming from unelected (& at the time unelectable) people like Susan Angell & Christine O'Donnell. Today, the GQP has put these kind of people -- Wheels Cawthorn, Matt GOATSE, Crossfit Cuckolder, GED -- into power.

      Stochastica resulted when Angell said it -- as Gabby Giffords & Sen. Mark Kelly know too well -- & will come again in glory in fulfillment of the Storm

  2. Atticus

    I'm a republican and I fully support this boycott idea. I wish the vast majority of my party would boycott these idiots as well.

      1. MontyTheClipArtMongoose

        If I am being charitable to Atticus, I think his primary partisan/ideologic driver is pwning that libz.

        Really, with the exception of businessmen GQP in country club dining rooms & Loq Qabins, that's all that drives both hardright fauxpulist insurrectionists & hardleft fauxpulist revolutionaries.

  3. clawback

    Sure, if centrist pundits will stop telling us that a leftist or two saying "defund the police" are going to doom us all. Deal?

  4. cld

    If Republicans take back the House next time there's a really excellent chance of Marjorie Taylor Greene becoming speaker.

    If it's between her and Kevin McCarthy, he has no chance. And neither have we, unless enough Republicans actually vote for Nancy Pelosi.

  5. painedumonde

    Convince the commentariat of this and we may get somewhere (boycotting may not work, for they do so love to hear themselves jibber).

  6. bbleh

    I agree we should not take their bait, but I think there are ways of actively opposing their influence that don't amount to that, notably mockery, but also, say, sneering denigration, or casual ignorance. ("Who? Is she the one that looks like a third-string Hooters waitress?" "Wasn't he an extra in some Nazi movie?")

    Rising to the bait suggests some degree of respect for them, or at least their "ideas." Show them -- and by extension their fans -- disrespect.

    1. cld

      I know who you mean, the one who was fired from Hooters for having all the wrong kind of tattoos, and the ex-lawyer who tried to join some neo-Nazi organization but they rejected because they thought he was too big of a jerk.

      1. MontyTheClipArtMongoose

        But he also defended Katie Hill when no one else would.

        (Ms. Hill's friendship with Matt GOATSE has long had her identified as sus in my book.)

  7. Eric Nyman

    This follows from the fact that what used to be local stories now quickly go viral and national. Back in the day if your local congressperson said or did something stupid, it would appear on the local news and in the local paper and that was it. Nowadays it gets picked up by the national media.

    The right does something similar in magnifying the voices of "The Squad" to make them seem much more powerful and influential than they actually are given that they are just in their first couple of terms. It's not as though any of them will be Speaker or committee chairs anytime soon, especially since Democrats still have a lot of respect for the seniority system in terms of choosing their party leadership.

    1. MontyTheClipArtMongoose

      Imagine if a married Sen. Pete Domenici were to knock up the teenage daughter of his colleague Sen. Paul Laxalt today. It would make Larry Craig's toetapping abortive hookup look like shoplifting gum at a Hudson News.

  8. jte21

    Then can we at least mention -- often -- that the contemporary GOP has now become basically a mindless hive of bomb-throwing media whores?

    What difference does it make that they don't have leadership positions like Kevin McCarthy? He covers for them and enables them.

    1. MontyTheClipArtMongoose

      I say we let Boebert & Omer fight.

      Might make the rests of the horseshoe fauxpulists think twice after seeing Lauren & Ihlan bloodied of face & concussed like Herschel Walker aftersquaring off with Samurai Mike in a 1991 Vikings-Bears tilt.

  9. ProgressOne

    "Allow them to fester in the fever swamps of the right."

    The problem is that today the fever swamp has a massive megaphone called Fox News. You can't completely ignore the vile stuff coming out of that megaphone. And oh, the internet is a pretty big amplifier too.

  10. kenalovell

    I understand Kevin's point, but I suggest there are considerable political benefits to be gained by making the Kindergarden Caucus the public face of the Trump Republican Party. Apart from other factors, it drives home the message that Trump is not an outlier. Electing Republicans means putting lunatics in power.

    1. colbatguano

      Yep. Ignoring these idiots helps normalize the Republican party. The non-bomb throwers vote for the same terrible policies as the dummies.

  11. GrueBleen

    "Allow them to fester in the fever swamps of the right. The end."

    Oh, if only that were feasible, KD, if only. But may I remind you of 74,222,958 votes, or 46.8 percent of the votes cast - the second highest presidential vote in American history.

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