Yuge: On Teeny Tinpot Triumphs Served In Popcorn Tubs To Boot
We know, we know: Per Dylan, "It's not dark yet, but it's gettin' there." Still, we call bullshit on that "historic," "landslide," "resounding" win by the Bad Orange Guy at Iowa's GOP caucus. In truth - SAD! - in an abysmally low turnout, he won an underwhelming 56,260 votes from just half of 14% of Iowa's Republicans who, in a surreal touch, stuffed their hand-ripped, unvetted, "downright Rockwellian" ballots into grocery bags and popcorn buckets. Behold, stately American democracy at work.
The nation's first dodgy contest - what Digby dubbed "this little superfluous pageant" - of the upcoming presidential election drew just 110,298 Iowans in one of the lowest caucus turnouts in history. The 2016 caucus, in contrast, drew over 187,000. Yes, it was cold. But Iowa is usually cold, and their beloved leader had told them to go vote even if they died as a result: "It will be worth it!" he said, as only the most malignant of malignant narcissists could say. But Iowa has 2.08 million voters. Of those, 718,900 are registered Republicans. Of those, just 14% turned out. And of those, roughly 7% voted for Trump, giving him a slim 51% of votes; DeSantis won 21%, Nikki Haley 19%. Trump's total tally of 56,260 is smaller than the average Super Bowl crowd, and 0.000168% of the population of the country. This, as the de facto GOP incumbent in a deeply MAGA-y state - white, old, rural, reactionary - where two-thirds of caucus voters, many evangelicals voting for a rapist, think Biden wasn't the real winner in 2020.
Still, mainstream commentators somehow heralded the avalanche of a win - one skeptic: "Maybe calm down, media - and right-wing trolls were "already picking out drapes for the new concentration camps" with sinister pronouncements: "2025. Fani Willis: Arrested. Jack Smith: Arrested. Merrick Garland: Arrested." Not so fast, others suggest of a weak, multi-indicted-facing-91- criminal-charges candidate in a deeply dysfunctional party whose inept opponents have stayed busy sniping at each other and making no progress while ignoring, excusing, emulating or thanking the con man who leads them. Thankfully, understandably, the BOG's support is pretty soft: If Trump is the nominee, a Des Moines Register poll found, 11% of GOPers would vote for Biden and 14% would vote for someone else; if he's convicted, a third of caucus voters would (finally) deem him unfit. Finally, notes Aaron Rupar, Iowa's record on choosing winners is execrable: You all remember Presidents Cruz and Santorum, right?
In one final twist of dystopia and down-home funk, it turns out the upright Republicans of Iowa made their sober presidential choices by scribbling the name of their favored candidates on scraps of paper torn from notebooks and then dropping them into brown paper Hyvee grocery bags - "Ballot" scrawled across them - and movie-theater popcorn buckets casually passed around by anonymous caucus workers, thus avoiding all that sketchy business about Hugo Chavez' Chinese Dominion voting machines rigging the vote. "Just grab 'em and count 'em, there ya go, stuff 'em in, pass it on," said MSNBC's Chris Hayes on the "mind-blowing" hypocrisy of GOPers, including a vile Giuliani defaming two black election workers, who for four years have feverishly parroted the Big Lie about election integrity. Watching the slapdash Iowa caucus at work, he quotes The Nation's Elie Mystal: "This is what voting looks like when white people know only white people will be allowed to cast ballots."
Orange Adolf, meanwhile, went on to New Hampshire, where he declared his sad sack win "amazing" and whined that CNN and NBC "refused to air my victory speech - dutiful boos from the cult - which was a lie. CNN cut away when he started trashing immigrants, and MSNBC, Rachel Maddow explained, made the tough call to stop "knowingly broadcasting untrue things." For their enemy-of-the-people crimes, Trump said, the outlets "should have their licenses, or whatever they have, taken away." Gearing up for his fascist future, he rambled on about democratic nonsense like having to admit losing an election. "When I left, which was ridiculous that we had to leave...Isn’t it amazing? They don’t investigate the people that cheated...They investigate the people that understand they cheated and go after them." Jesus. We are so done with this evil, lying, tiresome motherfucker. "So God Made Trump," went a recent bonkers diatribe by some Nazi fans. The Lincoln Project gets it right: "So God made a dictator."
Election integrity at Iowa caucus: Grocery bags, notepaper ballots, zero IDPhoto by Michael Zamora/NPR
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