We’ve long known that Mr. Otis, despite being an Assistant US Attorney at one point in his life (under GOP control), is particularly incompetent at coherent rhetoric.
But tonight’s… may take the cake! He labels all the ills he imagines seeing, since 2000, or almost a quarter century, now… as being the fault of what he calls the “elite / expert class”. He means to equate that idea — with liberalism, generally — and Democratic Party members, specifically.
Which is so naive, as to be… charming — actually. Consider this, of his — in context [I’ve annotated the items for easy reference]:
…As Sean Trende pointed out on X, it hasn’t exactly been the best century for the expert class. Begin with the response to [i] September 11 — the [ii] Afghanistan and [iii] Iraq Wars, which were supported by bipartisan majorities. Then the [iv] financial crisis and the [v] bank bailouts. Then [vi] Brexit and the [vii] election of Trump. Then the [viii] pandemic: what was supposed to be a triumph of management for a technocratic elite instead wound up as a worst-of-all-worlds scenario with [ix] prolonged restrictions and [x] school closures and [xi] 7 million dead — from a virus possibly caused by sloppy scientific research practices. Then [xii] massive inflation, which was supposed to be a thing of the past. Throw in here, if you like, [xiii] “wokeness” and how it’s eroded trust in higher education and triggered [xiv] a cultural backlash….
Fully 12 of the 14 calamities he cites… are entirely, or mostly — from GOP stewardship.
We might quibble about bolded numbers (v) and (xii) — the 2008 bailouts, and inflation’s lingering effects into 2023 — as being at least in part “Democratic clean-ups, of GOP cock-ups“. But let’s give him those two — at least as a “halfsie” — as being seen in the main, under Democratic Administration(s).
So it is just hilarious… that saving whatever he might mean by (xiii) “wokeness” (fully progressive, I’ll grant you) and a one-half point each — for items (v) and (xii)… his GOP/MAGA cult is responsible [along with Bush 43 / Cheney] for TWELVE of the FOURTEEN “problems” he’s claimed he’s seen — with our nation’s 21st Century governance.
Finally, and almost trivially, it puzzles me though that he throws Brexit in — with his list — since Boris Johnson was really a mini-Trump — and across the pond to boot: something with which US policies had almost zero to do. But if he adds it to his list, then it counts against… Trumpism in the main — as it was clearly a populist howling, at the time, that drove it.
So okay — I will stipulate that 13 of the 14 were bad things (just for fun!). I am reserving judgment, here on the “woke” item — since (from his prior writings) it is crystal-clear he has no clue what people who use that term as a positive, as opposed to a slur… mean by it.
That is — as with the other 13, he has no idea what he’s talking about.
A G A I N.
Out.
Powerline Lies... 