The Notorious RBG

Saturday, September 19, 2020

 
Last night's news of RBG's death has affected me in so many ways. 

First and foremost, I grieve the death of this amazing woman, and for her family. She was just...amazing. She had a towering intellect and a tenaciousness that defied societal expectations of her time. Her will was without parallel, and she was the one of the first Social Justice Warriors, with all that implied. Someone to aspire to, who worked with compassion and dignity her entire life to make life better for those without her natural gifts and her privilege. 

An amazing legacy of a life well-lived. 

So of course the Republicans will do everything they can to fuck it up, which brings us to my next emotion. Pure, unadulterated, rage. 

Of course, Mitch McConnell decides to announce that tRump's nominee (whoever that will be, but probably not a woman, because Ladybrains are not fit to decide important matters) will in fact get a hearing and a vote in the Senate during the latter part of this election year. Of course. 

Of course, the nominee will almost certainly be a bootlicking conservative of the same ilk as Brett Cavanaugh. Because tRump learned his lesson with Justice Gorsuch, with whom I don't agree politically, but nevertheless is dedicated to the rule of law and is beholden to no one. Not so Cavanaugh, an ass-kissing sycophant and possible rapist. Yeehaw. 

Of course, the newly stacked court will probably overturn cases that benefit minorities and oppressed people, cases that RBG spent her entire life championing, because fuck poor people, the BIPOC communities, women and the LGBTQ community. Fuck them. 

I'm going to quote my buddy Eric here on the impending doom of the next Associate Justice selection, because he's so very eloquent and encapsulates my feelings perfectly:

Of course McConnell is going to allow a vote. The Garland thing was obvious bullshit. Calling him a hypocrite is meaningless--he doesn't care. He has no shame. He has no pride. He has nothing but a cynical, nihilistic desire to win and ethics, morals, and principles have nothing to do with it. He doesn't care.

And for all my loathing of the son of a bitch, the thing of it is that he's the scorpion who stings the frog, the thawed-out snake who bites the sweet old lady: he is what he is and that's all he is. It's the rest of the people who still identify as Republicans who are the problem at this point. Because, unlike McConnell, they think they care; they say they have principles and it's the other side who doesn't, even if these days the other side will (just for instance) shiv somebody like Al Franken and dump him over the side of the boat faster than you can say "decontextualuzed ratfucking" because we actually do mean what we say about things like #metoo however imperfectly we match words with deeds.

Don't fucking tell me you have principles, Republicans. You don't. Trump already proved it but Mitch is gonna double down on it. You don't actually give a runny shit about any principle except scoring and your only ethic is "owning the libs". I don't want to hear any more of your sad garbage, your whataboutism and your both sides and your but her emails and all the rest of it. Take your SCOTUS seat and whatever Federalist Society bootlicker the grifter nominates, and you better hope like hell you're wrong about what we do when we eventually win--because if we decide to start governing like you jagoffs instead of like people who really do care about what we believe, you're right fucked.

So say we all. 

And finally, I am scared-to-fucking-death. I fear for the Republic. I fear for my minority friends and family who will now be marginalized and persecuted even further. I fear for the norms and institutions that make America what it is, things such as civility (yes, I know that ship has sailed), honor (however little of it politicians possess), service to the public good, voting with intellectual rigor (another sailing ship), and concern for our fellow humans. Because the disregard of our laws and norms and lack of morality embodied by tRump and his lickspittle sycophants have a very real possibility of becoming what our country is about. And that's not okay.

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