#(said on twitter i might gif monday by the end of the weekend if i felt motivated but........i'm lazy and sleepy)

[highroadsteve]

secrets — t.h.

a/n: this is for @peeterparkr’s 3k writing challenge! congrats!

pairing: tom holland x reader

prompt: “If Walls Could Talk” by 5sos

word count: 1.9k

warnings: angst, lots of swearing, mentions of fighting/arguing. (possible trigger warning)

summary: y/n and tom have been broken up for a year and harrison has been there through every single moment leading up to it.

(flashbacks are in italics, texts are in bold)

Having a bday party tonight at my house, you up for it?

Tom looked at the text from Zendaya and confirmed that he was attending, to which she replied with a smiley face. He put his phone down on the counter and ate his breakfast with the tv playing softly in the background.

Harrison walked in, rubbing his eyes and muttering a groaned ‘morning’ before getting a bowl to serve himself some cereal. Tom responded back and continued eating.

“You get that invite from Z?” Harrison asked as he leaned against the counter, right across from him. Tom nodded, grabbing his phone and checking through his twitter.

“Are you going?” He asked again with hesitance, knowing that Tom doesn’t really attend Z’s parties only for the reason that Y/N might be there. There was still a slightly awkward tension that was present in the atmosphere when those two talked. Sure, they claimed they were friends but it will never be the same when they dated for two years, ending with a cheating scandal that had happened over a year ago.

Harrison was sitting there with his earphones in trying to block out all of the noise. This has been happening recently— Y/N and Tom getting into petty arguments and Harrison having to deal with it because he lives with them. He did interfere sometimes when he felt that one of them was getting a little too angry but always felt rude about doing it at any other time. So he just puts his earphones in, listens to some good music and texts as many people as he can while his heart is beating out of his chest.

This time was a little different. Of course, Harrison had his earphones in and he was distracted but he only heard Y/N’s voice yelling and Tom’s talking voice. Harrison turned down his volume, trying to listen in to what they were saying.

“How could you fucking do this to me?!”

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t—“

“Oh yeah because you obviously didn’t fucking mean to put your tongue down her throat! You’re a fucking liar, I hate you!”

And with that, Harrison jumped up at the sound of broken glass. He quickly ran to Tom and Y/N’s room to see her crying, throwing clothes into a suitcase and Tom cleaning up the broken vase on the floor.

“A-are you guys okay?” Harrison gulped, his heart rate beating a hundred times a minute. His voice was barely above a whisper and he was terrified, he had no idea why but seeing his best friends get into a fight this bad left him feeling so powerless and so heartbroken.

“No Haz, we’re not. I’m sorry you had to be here. I-I’ll call you later, alright?” Y/N responds with a shaky inhale, hugging him with one arm and leaving as quickly as she could, one suitcase in hand.

Tom nodded, his mouth filled with the last spoonful of cereal as he put his bowl in the sink. Harrison nodded before doing the same.

The truth is, Tom still felt devastated every single time he had to face her. Not only did he feel guilty, he felt ashamed, angry, confused because why the fuck would he do it in the first place? He was drunk and he was pissed at Y/N for a reason he can’t even remember anymore, which proves just how unnecessary his act of spite had been. He’s had so many regrets in his life, but that’s the only one he would take back with no hesitation.

It was ten at night and Tom and Harrison were out at some party to celebrate Tom’s role in the new Avengers movie. Y/N was too busy with exams at her university so she decided to stay home and study; however, she wanted to take some time to go to the store and buy Tom a quick little present to compensate for not being able to attend.

So she went to the supermarket to see if there was any available flowers or balloons or something because it’s already so late and she’s just trying to get out as fast as she could.

She ended up finding a decent-sized teddy bear and a couple of balloons that say ‘happy birthday’ so she desperately hoped that Tom sees it as a joke and not as a ‘wow she didn't even put effort into finding congratulation balloons’ situation because that’d be embarrassing. So she tied the balloon strings to the teddy bear’s bowtie and started driving towards the party.

She pulled up the loud party, and went inside with the balloons and the bear in her arms. She spotted Zendaya who laughed in excitement at the stuff she’s holding, offering her some help and a drink. Y/N explained the situation, only dropping off the stuff and then leaving to go study and Z nodded understandingly.

Y/N looked around for Tom, not seeing him at all with the people he usually hangs around with so she was starting to get frustrated. She finally spotted Harrison and Jacob playing beer pong and screaming their heads off as they made it into the opposing team’s cup. She smiled and went up to greet them, getting an excited scream and a group hug in return.

She asked them if they knew where Tom was and they said no, Harrison pausing before giving his answer. So Y/N groaned in annoyance and left the stuff on the dining table, telling Harrison to make sure it gets to Tom, and then she leaves.

That next morning she woke up to texts from Tom and Harrison on her phone that were sent at one in the morning.

I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you.

Tom arrived at Z’s house with Harrison by his side, a birthday gift in each of their hands. The door was open and revealed a beautiful Zendaya with the brightest smile on her face.

“Hey losers, glad you could make it.” She greeted each of them with a small hug and welcomed them inside. Her house was huge, people everywhere socializing and laughing, Bruno Mars was playing on the loud speakers (of course), and there were dogs running everywhere. Tom and Harrison made their way outside where they spotted Jacob, Laura, and Y/N.

Tom locked eyes with her, his face starting to burn up with embarrassment when she smiled and waved.

She went up to them and hugged them both, Tom catching a whiff of her soft scent. He smiled and spoke softly, telling her how it was nice to see her. She smiled back and returned the greeting, saying the same thing to Harrison.

Tom had just gotten the news that he was going to be a part of Avengers: Infinity War. He was with Harrison at the moment, shopping for something that he knew he wanted to do for a long time now.

Tom was buying an engagement ring. Yes, he’s only 21 but he has never felt sure about literally anything else in the world. He was so in love with Y/N, and the past few days have been a little rough due to Y/N being stressed from having to finish up her semester with exams, but he still felt it in his heart that the two of them were meant for each other.

So, he invited Harrison to hang out casually at the mall. They were walking around before they got the huge news about the movie, Harrison smiling with excitement and congratulating his best mate. Tom smiled at him.

“I was also wondering if you’d like to help me buy an engagement ring.” When Tom finished his sentence, Harrison jumped up from his chair and laughed, bringing Tom into the tightest hug he could give him. Tom was laughing, thanking him and his heart just filled with butterflies, knowing that this is actually real and he is actually going to pop the question.

They went to different jewelry stores and admired the glass cases that were displaying the beautiful diamonds that shine with elegance. Harrison was so excited to be doing this, the smile just couldn’t leave his face as he watched Tom pick out the best ring he could find.

“When are you going to do it?”

Tom decided he was going to throw a party that Saturday to celebrate his new role in the Avengers movie, but also propose to Y/N in front of all their close family and friends.

However, plans had changed because Y/N still had to study for the tests she had to take the following Monday so there was no way she was able to attend because she only had that weekend to finish up her studies. Tom had gotten mad at her, but truly it was because he was hurt that she wasn’t even going to celebrate a huge milestone in his life. It turned into a heated argument and the final agreement that Harrison had come up with was that it was best that Y/N stays home and they could celebrate separately.

But, Tom had gotten drunk and his anger towards Y/N just had to make an appearance when he saw one of her friends at the party.

“So, Y/N, how’s life treating you?” Harrison spoke up after their greetings, drinking from his cup of soda. Y/N immediately brightened up, her smile becoming wider and her eyes gleaming with excitement.

“It’s actually going pretty good. My job is actually something I want to do and I’m, uh, kind of dating someone now.” Y/N’s face turned a little pink, knowing that she just created a bit of tension between the group. Both Tom and Harrison raised their eyebrows in shock, not knowing at all about this news. Tom began to feel a little lightheaded as he stood there, hearing his own heart just fall down to his stomach.

After the awkward congratulations had happened, Tom excused himself to go talk to Jacob. Harrison glanced over at him, concerned about the way he’s feeling because, hell, he was going to propose to this girl who just said she’s in a relationship with someone else.

He was embarrassed, to say the least. He felt guilty and regretful that the girl he’s in love with had moved on. As Jacob made a joke to the group about Tom finally going to greet them, Tom looked over at Harrison and gave him a sad smile. Harrison did the same, and although he knows that Tom messed up, that’s still his best friend.

Harrison continued his conversation with Y/N, just catching up with each other on what they’ve been doing. He had to admit, he hated that the two of them never ended up together. He tried his best to help, and he vowed he will always keep their secrets and never say a word to anyone, especially when he knows how badly it can hurt the way they are seen. But there was just one of Tom’s secrets that he had to spill a little over six months ago, in hopes of bringing them back together again and have everything go back to the way it used to be.

“Tom was going to propose to you.”

It didn’t work.

#peeterparkr3kwritingchallenge #tom holland #tom holland x reader #tom holland imagines #tom holland fic #tom holland series #tom holland headcanon #tom holland au #tom #holland #spiderman #marvel #avengers #peter parker

[patriotsnet]

Why Are Republicans Scared Of Trump

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/why-are-republicans-scared-of-trump/

Why Are Republicans Scared Of Trump

Donald Trump Hasn’t Cowed Republicans He’s Freed Them To Pursue Their Long

Why Are Republicans Still So Afraid Of Trump? | The 11th Hour | MSNBC

Donald Trump getting the “O-K” from Joseph McCarthy and Mitch McConnell

On the eve of the impeachment vote in the House of Representatives , things are looking mighty bleak for anyone who hoped Republicans might turn over a new leaf. For the last several months, there has been plaintive hope that GOP lawmakers might be moved by the overwhelming evidence that Donald Trump is guilty of running an extortion scheme against Ukraine’s leaders to help him win re-election in 2020.

Right now, it looks like there’s no chance of any Republican defections in the House away from the GOP line that Trump did nothing wrong. The one Republican, Rep. Justin Amash of Michigan, who admitted out loud that Trump deserved to be impeached, was duly ejected from the party. In the Senate, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has been openly bragging that he intends to rig the Senate trial in Trump’s favor. Even supposedly Trump-skeptical Republican senators, such as Utah’s Mitt Romney or Maine’s Susan Collins, have been avoiding questions about whether the Senate should call witnesses for the trial.

“But this presidents actions are possible only with the craven acquiescence of congressional Republicans,” they write. “They have done no less than abdicate their Article I responsibilities.”

No, Republicans clearly feel empowered by Trump. He frees them to reveal their darkest desire which is to end democracy as we know it, and to cut any corners or break any laws necessary to get the job done.

Why Republicans Are Afraid To Challenge Trump

Juan Williams

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Republicans Now Bragging About Being Trump Big Lie Pushers

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In taking a shot at CNNs Jake Tapper, Republicans are openly boasting that theyre responsible for spreading democracy-defying conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election. 

The CNN anchor recently took a stand against inviting election deniers on his programs, saying last week that lawmakers who support former President Donald Trumps Big Liereferring to the false claim that the election was stolenare not welcome on his weekday and weekend shows. Its not a policy but a philosophy, Tapper said, noting he hasnt booked such Republicans since the election. Pro-Trump Republicans have since come forward with emails from CNN bookers requesting their presence on Tappers shows. Rep. Elise Stefanik of New Yorkwhom the GOP last month voted to replace Liz Cheney as the partys conference chairtweeted screenshots, telling Tapper to read and weep:

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Responding to these apparent gotcha attempts, Tapper said he cant account for every email from my excellent bookers whose job it is to present me with as many options as possible. He also pointed to the absurdity of Republicans rushing to prove they are, in fact, election deniers. Kind of stunning to see her proudly identify as a conspiracy theorist, he said of Stefanik.

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Republicans Still Scared To Death Of Trump

Trump went on yet another unhinged rant this weekend during a speech to donors in Florida, attacking Mitch McConnell as a “stone cold loser” for refusing to go along with his attempt to steal the election, but you won’t find any profiles in courage in the GOP willing to stand up to him.

Case in point, on this weekend’s Fox News Sunday, South Dakota Republican Sen. John Thune was asked about Trump calling him “weak and inneffective RINO” earlier in the year and saying he might back a primary challenger to Thune. Thune responded telling host Chris Wallace that “I’ve been through wars in South Dakota, political wars, with my own party when I ran the first time, with the Democrats in a couple of hotly contested Senate races, so being afraid of a fight or somebody coming after me is not something that’s going to influence that decision,” but Thune refused to admonish Trump for his rhetoric, and refused to stand up for McConnell when asked about him as well.

Which is pretty much the equivalent of “I support Trump, but I really don’t like the tweeting” that we heard from so many of them over the last five or six years.

As the Fox article discussed, Trump called Thune “Mitch’s boy” when urging Gov. Kristi Noem to challenge Thune in 2022, but no amount of insults are apparently ever breaking point for these jellyfish.

The Actual Reason Why Republicans And Their Media Are Discouraging People From Getting Vaccinated

Dr. Jonathan Reiner, a CNN Medical Analyst, said last week, “A surprising amount of death will occur soon…” But why, when the deadly Delta variant is sweeping the world, are Republicans and their media warning people not to get vaccinated?

Dr. Anthony Fauci told Jake Tapper on CNN last Sunday, “I don’t have a really good reason why this is happening.”

But even if he can’t think of a reason why Republicans would trash talk vaccination and people would believe them, it’s definitely there.

Which is why it’s important to ask a couple of simple questions that all point to the actual reason why Republicans and their media are discouraging people from getting vaccinated:

1. Why did Trump get vaccinated in secret after Joe Biden won the election and his January 6th coup attempt failed?

2. Why are Fox “News” personalities discouraging people from getting vaccinated while refusing to say if they and the people they work with have been protected by vaccination?

3. Why was one of the biggest applause lines at CPAC: “They were hoping the government was hoping that they could sort of sucker 90% of the population into getting vaccinated and it isn’t happening!”

4. Why are Republican legislators in states around the country pushing laws that would “ban” private businesses from asking to see proof of vaccination status ?

Death is their electoral strategy.

Is there any other possible explanation?

So, what’s left?

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Top Republicans Are Running Scared And Relinquishing The Gop To The Monster They Helped Create

Like a bunch of lemmings, Republican lawmakers in Congress and across the country have clung to Donald Trump’s Big Lie that the only reason he lost the 2020 election was because it was riddled with fraud.

Of course, Trump never once proved a single instance of fraud in 60-plus trips to the courthouse, and he also helped ensure the massacre of at least half a million Americans due to the pandemic, so there’s that.

But instead of being willing to admit what’s plain as day to anyone with a brain and a pulse, GOP lawmakers tout Trump’s Big Lie in conservative media and then run from reporters representing every news outlet that has a shred of integrity left.

“In Washington, normally chatty senators scramble to skirt the question,” writes TheWashington Post.

Of course, there’s also the very public rift in the House GOP leadership between Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming who yet again on Monday reiterated the truth that Joe Biden was the rightful winner of the election.

“The 2020 presidential election was not stolen. Anyone who claims it was is spreading THE BIG LIE, turning their back on the rule of law, and poisoning our democratic system,” Cheney tweeted, in what amounts to GOP apostasy these days.

But the question is: Why? Why did McCarthy retreat from saying Trump “bears responsibility” for Jan. 6 to being a total Trump bootlicker? Why are chatty senators dodging reporters on Capitol Hill?

Republicans Fear Trump Will Lead To A Lost Generation Of Talent

The 45th president has brought new voices and voters to the party, but hes driven them out too. Insiders fear the repercussions.

06/01/2021 04:30 AM EDT

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As Donald Trump ponders another presidential bid, top Republicans have grown fearful about what theyre calling the partys lost generation.

In conversations with more than 20 lawmakers, ex-lawmakers, top advisers and aides, a common concern has emerged that a host of national and statewide Republicans are either leaving office or may not choose to pursue it for fear that they cant survive politically in the current GOP. The worry, these Republicans say, is that the party is embracing personality over policy, and that it is short sighted to align with Trump, who lost the general election and continues to alienate a large swath of the voting public with his grievances and false claims that the 2020 election was stolen.

Trump has driven sitting GOP lawmakers and political aspirants into early retirements ever since he burst onto the scene. But there was hope that things would change after his election loss. Instead, his influence on the GOP appears to be as solid as ever and the impact of those early shockwaves remain visible. When asked, for instance, if he feared the 45th president was causing a talent drain from the GOP ranks, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush perhaps inadvertently offered a personal demonstration of the case.

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Mcfeely: Why Are Republicans Afraid Of Everything

FARGO Republicans are afraid.

Afraid of Black people. Afraid of brown people. Afraid of red people. Afraid of yellow people. Afraid of women. Afraid of young people.

Afraid of young people voting. Afraid of people of color voting. Afraid of voting rights. Afraid of democracy.

Afraid of science. Afraid of medicine. Afraid of knowledge. Afraid of public education. Afraid of universities. Afraid of professors. Afraid of teachers.

Afraid of experts. Afraid of doctors. Afraid of Anthony Fauci. Afraid of masks. Afraid of vaccines. Afraid of vaccine passports. Afraid of vaccine chips. Afraid of things that don’t exist.

Afraid of history. Afraid of the truth. Afraid of those who tell the truth.

Afraid of books. Afraid of newspapers. Afraid of objectivity. Afraid of facts.

Afraid of wind towers. Afraid of solar power. Afraid of environmentalists. Afraid of the Green New Deal. Afraid of Greta Thunberg. Afraid of change.

Afraid of the media. Afraid of The New York Times. Afraid of The Washington Post. Afraid of MSNBC. Afraid of CNN.

Afraid of Twitter. Afraid of Facebook. Afraid of Google. Afraid of big tech. Afraid of the government. Afraid of the establishment.

Afraid of Democrats. Afraid of Black Lives Matter. Afraid of antifa. Afraid of Democratic Socialists.

Afraid of Bernie Sanders. Afraid of AOC. Afraid of Elizabeth Warren. Afraid of Nancy Pelosi. Afraid of Barack Obama. Afraid of Kamala Harris. Afraid of Joe Biden. Afraid of Mitt Romney. Afraid of Liz Cheney. Afraid of RINOs.

Opinion: Stop Saying Republicans Are Cowards Who Fear Trump The Truth Is Far Worse

âRepublicans Are Afraid Of Donald Trumpâ Despite Election Loss, Kasie Hunt Says | TODAY

Rep. Adam Kinzinger, Republican of Illinois, deserves great credit for demanding that his party fully repudiate Donald Trumps big lie about the 2020 election and acknowledge its role in inciting the Jan. 6 insurrection. But Kinzinger is getting one big thing wrong.

In a Sunday appearance on CBS, Kinzinger repeatedly said fellow Republicans are fundamentally driven by fear of Trump. They dont want to confront Trumps lies, Kinzinger lamented, adding that theyre scared to death of him.

As a broad description of our current moment, this is profoundly insufficient. It risks misleading people about the true nature of the threat posed by the GOPs ongoing radicalization.

With House Republicans expected this week to oust Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming from leadership for vocally making the same case that Kinzinger is, the idea that Republicans are primarily driven by cowardice is everywhere.

Liz is a living reproach to all these cowards, one friend of Cheney told the New Yorker, a quote that drew tons of Twitter approval. Similarly, former GOP speechwriter Peggy Noonan ripped into Cheneys fellow Republicans as a House of Cowards who are jumpy and scared.

Meanwhile, now that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has endorsed Rep. Elise Stefanik to replace Cheney in the House GOP leadership, Democrats are pounding McCarthy for cowardice.

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How Long Can Trumps Gop Stranglehold Last

Liz Cheneys ouster from Republican leadership on Wednesday was a big win for the man she has refused to placate Donald Trump. I spoke with Washington correspondent Olivia Nuzzi about the considerable shadow the former president continues to cast over Republicans from his perch at Mar-a-Lago.

Ben: President Trump has in some ways been reduced to a background presence in the political landscape. Facebooks ban on him was upheld for now, hes off Twitter forever, and hes churning out statements on a junky-looking website that doesnt see a lot of traffic.

But in other ways, the Republican party is as dependent on validating Trumps view of the world as ever. Lindsey Graham says the GOP cant grow without him; party leaders are making pilgrimages to Mar-a-Lago to seek his wisdom, such as it is, and approval. And, of course, Liz Cheney was ousted from GOP leadership on Wednesday for banging on too loudly about the stolen-election conspiracy theory that rules the ex-presidents world and which a large majority of GOP voters believe.

In your view, does Trump have exactly the same kind of stranglehold over the party he did when he was president? Will the GOP just continue to stay in the thrall of a losing presidential candidate indefinitely?

Olivia: I feel like Im taking a multiple-choice test Im gonna have to go with B on this one.

Ben: I was taught that C was the most common correct answer. Not sure this holds true anymore.

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Indeed, a recent poll from the Democratic firm Democracy Corps, surveying voters in battleground states and districts, found that two-thirds of GOP voters there still strongly approve of Trump. These Trump loyalists are also among the most likely to say theyre very interested in the 2022 elections at this point. And in a CNN/SSRS poll from April, 70 percent of Republican respondents said Biden did not legitimately get enough votes to win the presidency. Faced with all this, any attempt to purge Trumpian influence from the party outright is doomed.

While the electoral incentives for the party overall are to unify and look forward before the 2022 midterms, the incentives for individual politicians can be different. Josh Mandel, a candidate in whats likely to be a fiercely contested US Senate GOP primary in Ohio, recently told a crowd that the election was stolen from Donald Trump. He added: My squishy establishment opponents in this race wont say those words. But I will.

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Donald Trump And The Politics Of Fear

Trumps candidacy relies on the power of fear. It could be the only way for him to win.

People are scared, Donald Trump said recently, and he was not wrong.

Fear is in the air, and fear is surging. Americans are more afraid today than they have been in a long time: Polls show majorities of Americans worried about being victims of terrorism and crime, numbers that have surged over the past year to highs not seen for more than a decade. Every week seems to bring a new large- or small-scale terrorist attack, at home or abroad. Mass shootings form a constant drumbeat. Protests have shut down large cities repeatedly, and some have turned violent. Overall crime rates may be down, but a sense of disorder is constant.

Fear pervades Americans livesand American politics. Trump is a master of fear, invoking it in concrete and abstract ways, summoning and validating it. More than most politicians, he grasps and channels the fear coursing through the electorate. And if Trump still stands a chance to win in November, fear could be the key.

Fear and anger are often cited in tandem as the sources of Trumps particular political appeal, so frequently paired that they become a refrain: fear and anger, anger and fear. But fear is not the same as anger; it is a unique political force. Its ebbs and flows through American political history have pulled on elections, reordering and destabilizing the electoral landscape.

Senior Republicans Should Recoil In Horror At Trump But Too Many Still Fear Him

The fate of the United States now rests on the stark choice the divided party faces: Trumps way or democracy

Surely this would be the moment. Surely the sight of a horde storming the US Capitol, smashing windows and breaking down doors, determined to use brute, mob strength to overturn a free and fair election, surely that would mark the red line. After five years dismissing those who warned that Donald Trump posed a clear and present danger to US democracy, branding them hysterics suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome, surely this moment when they saw the citadel of that democracy overrun by men clothed in the slogans of neo-Nazism , waving the Confederate flag of slavery, racism and treason and carrying zip ties, apparently to bind the wrists and ankles of any hostages would, at long last, make Republicans recoil from the man who had led them to this horror.

Hours into the attempted and planned insurrection, Trump again made plain the bonds that connect him to the men of havoc. We love you, he told them in a video message, gently suggesting they go home. Youre very special. None of that is a surprise. They were only there for him, summoned to Washington by Trumps big lie that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen through fraud that they had been robbed of their champion by a wicked conspiracy that took in everyone from the Chinese Communist party to his own vice-president.

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist

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John Kasich Says Republicans Are ‘afraid’ Of Trump

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Former Ohio Gov. John Kasich speaks with NPR’s Leila Fadel about the GOP’s unwillingness to stand up to President Trump, who still refuses to accept the results of the presidential election.

LEILA FADEL, HOST:

Last night, President Trump received another loss in court. A federal judge in Pennsylvania dismissed the campaign’s attempts to stop the certification of Pennsylvania’s votes. This is just the latest of more than two dozen failed challenges brought by the Trump campaign to overturn the election results. President Trump refuses to concede, and for the most part, his party has supported his efforts to pursue legal challenges based on false allegations of widespread voter fraud.

Very few high-profile Republicans have publicly acknowledged Joe Biden as the winner, but one of them is John Kasich. He’s the former governor of Ohio and a 2016 Republican presidential candidate, and he joins us now.

Governor Kasich, welcome.

JOHN KASICH: Thanks, Leila. Glad to be with you.

FADEL: So you endorsed President-elect Joe Biden. He won this election. What do you make of President Trump’s attempts to overturn the results?

KASICH: It’s just absurd. The whole thing is – it’s just – it’s ridiculous. I mean, he has clearly won this election. And it is just sort of amazing to me that Republicans just keep sitting on their hands. It makes no sense.

FADEL: That was the former Republican governor of Ohio, John Kasich.

Governor Kasich, thanks for speaking with us.

This Next Presidential Nomination Could Improve Things Or Make Them Even Worse

Is there a way out of this downward spiral? The optimistic case offered by Republicans who dislike the trends toward conspiracism in the party is pretty simple: They want to hang on and deal with Trump until 2024, and hope whoever wins the nomination will help steer the party in a healthy direction.

The Washington Examiners Byron York laid out this line of thinking in a recent column. There is a robust field of Republicans preparing to run. DeSantis, Pompeo, Pence, Haley, Cotton, Hawley, Noem, and several other possible candidates, York writes. Put them together and that is a strong group of contenders, all of whom will run on some theme of incorporating Trumps achievements into a new kind of Republican platform.

Theres variation among these Republicans about just how indulgent they were to Trumps stolen election claims Hawley was clearly the least responsible of that bunch. But most of the others indeed seem unlikely to push things anywhere near as far as Trump would if they end up losing the 2024 general election. And while they may have their faults, they seem unlikely to make conspiratorial thinking as central to their politics as Trump did.

The more unsavory tendencies in the Republican base surely wont vanish entirely if a more traditional Republican wins. But if the leader of the party stops throwing fuel on that fire, their influence would likely weaken.

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What Are Republicans So Afraid Of

Instead of conspiracy-mongering about an election they did well in, they could try to win real majorities.

By Jamelle Bouie

Opinion Columnist

There was a time, in recent memory, when the Republican Party both believed it could win a national majority and actively worked to build one.

Take the last Republican president before Donald Trump, George W. Bush. His chief political adviser, Karl Rove, envisioned a durable Republican majority, if not a permanent one. And Bush would try to make this a reality.

To appeal to moderate suburban voters, Bush would make education a priority and promise a compassionate conservatism. To strengthen the partys hold on white evangelicals, Bush emphasized his Christianity and worked to polarize the country over abortion, same-sex marriage and other questions of sexual ethics and morality. Bush courted Black and Hispanic voters with the promise of homeownership and signed a giveaway to seniors in the form of the Medicare prescription drug benefit. He also made it a point to have a diverse cabinet, elevating figures like Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and Alberto Gonzales.

Whether shrewd or misguided, cynical or sincere or outright cruel and divisive these gambits were each part of an effort to expand the Republican coalition as far as it could go without abandoning Reaganite conservatism itself. It was the work of a self-assured political movement, confident that it could secure a position as the nations de facto governing party.

Why Dont Republicans Stand Up To Trump Heres The Answer

Why Are Republicans So Afraid Of Lev Parnas? | Velshi & Ruhle | MSNBC

Rep. Mark Sanford

If youre still flummoxed by the abject servility of congressional Republicans, by their refusal to confront Trump and stand up for American values, check out last nights primary election in South Carolina. The purging of Mark Sanford says it all.

Sanford is a long-serving conservative lawmaker who typically votes with his party, but on a few public occasions, he has actually dared to suggest that Trump is not the supreme very stable genius that the deluded Republican base deems Trump to be. The result: Sanford loses his job.

For the inexcusable sin of speaking his mind about factual reality, the Republican base voters in Sanfords House district threw him out last night, handing the GOP nomination to a far-right Trumper who repeatedly denounced Sanford as disloyal.

This is why rank-and-file Republican lawmakers refuse to speak out. Theyre afraid of their own constituents. Its Trumps party now, and the constituents in red districts virtually worship the guy. Forget about putting country over party, because its actually worse than that. Sanfords colleagues wont put country over career. Theyll vow that what just happened to Sanford will not happen to them.

As conservative commentator Erick Erickson said today, Mark Sanford losing in South Carolina is pretty much proof positive that the GOP is not really a conservative party that cares about limited government. It is now fully a cult of personality.

I stand by every word.

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Michael Che And Colin Jost On 'SNL,' Hosting The Emmys And Hating Twitter

Saturday Night Live head writers and Weekend Update hosts Colin Jost and Michael Che have different attitudes toward co-hosting the Emmy awards Monday night.

Jost admits to being nervous about hosting — especially when he thinks about the show ahead of time: “I’m thinking about it in advance. That’s more nerve racking than when you’re actually out on stage.”

Che, meanwhile, takes a more laid back approach to the show. “You can’t be nervous. It’s comedy,” he says. “If I was a fireman I’d be scared. Firemen should be afraid. … But for comedy, we’re literally going out there and we’re just going to tell some jokes and people are going to like them or not. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

As co-head writers for SNL Jost and Che are used to the high pressure. “Head writer” sounds like a great and lofty title, Che says, but it’s really more of a supervisory role — someone whose job it is to think about the show overall. “We’re competing to get stuff on just like any other writer,” he explains. “You don’t walk around with a big ol’ cigar or anything like that.”

As for what being a head writer means to Jost? He answers: “Great question, we would love someone to explain it to us.”

SNL is up for 21 Emmys — including a the award for outstanding writing for a variety series.

Interview Highlights

On writing the show up to the very last minute

Colin Jost: The first part [of the show] is usually the part that’s figured out last, which is what makes the job stressful.

Michael Che: Because the news cycle is so quick now that what seems relevant Monday probably won’t by Saturday.

Jost: [SNL executive producer] Lorne [Michaels] always talks about how the first 15 minutes of the show are the most important, because if you’re tuning in, that’s your real chance to hook a viewer. The monologue is such a tricky thing always, because you want to show off who this person is, maybe in a way you haven’t seen them before … and the cold open is such a different animal, and that’s constantly shifting. The number of weeks where the cold open and the monologue are both even vaguely figured out before Thursday, it almost never happens. If it does, you just cross your fingers that those will hold up by Saturday.

On what it was like to have Donald Trump host SNL when he was campaigning for president, and whether he would be interested in having Trump back on the show

Che: [It was] working with an unfunny, insecure dude. … For me, I don’t mind anybody being on the show, because I think something good can come out of anything in comedy. But I wouldn’t go for it [again]. … I don’t know what the “win” is. I don’t think people find him funny.

On behind-the-scenes at SNL after the 2016 presidential election with host Dave Chappelle

Jost: The next day when we were there for the table read, [Chappelle] was like, “The reason you’re in comedy is to react to things that are going on and make them funny, to find humor even in whatever’s the weird, darkest things. You have to figure out how to still put on a comedy show, because that’s why you’re doing this.” I think that was just the right motivation for everyone to try to put a show together by Saturday that was still a comedy show, and I think that was reflected in his monologue really well.

Che, on his decision to comment on comedian Louis C.K. returning to the stage after admitting to sexual misconduct

Che: I truly think him going onstage and not addressing anything was insane. I don’t fault the attempt of making it right; I do fault the execution of not making it right. I think everybody has the right to defend themselves. Everybody has the right to take the opportunity to clarify or apologize or make any bad situation right, but when you don’t do it, you can’t — it’s indefensible.

On disliking Twitter — Che deleted his account several years ago

Che: I don’t like Twitter, because no one is as angry as they say they are and no one is as happy as they say they are. It’s just kind of this land of hyperbole. I have a platform. We go on TV and we’re lucky enough to be able to tweet to a camera. It’s not for me. I just don’t like the way it makes people feel. I don’t like the way it makes people gang up on other people — justly or not, it’s just uncomfortable. I don’t like it at all. It’s just a cesspool of everybody just yelling at each other. Anger and extreme joy are the only voices that get heard on Twitter.

Jost: It also used to have a great function, because you’d follow comedians or your friends who were really funny and every time you’d go on you’d see a great joke. … Having Twitter on your phone is like being with a journalist that hates you 24 hours a day. Anything you say on that can be spun. Truly, that’s what you have to think of it as.

Che: It’s like walking around with the district attorney and everything you say is just going to the district attorney.

Heidi Saman and Thea Chaloner produced and edited this interview for broadcast. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Beth Novey adapted it for the Web.

Copyright 2018 Fresh Air. To see more, visit Fresh Air.

TERRY GROSS, HOST:

This is FRESH AIR. I’m Terry Gross. My guests are Colin Jost and Michael Che, the anchors of “Saturday Night Live’s” “Weekend Update.” They’re also preparing to host the Emmys Monday night, and they’re nominated along with “SNL’s” other writers for best writing for a variety series. Last January, they became head writers of “SNL.” Jost had held that position once before but gave it up after becoming an update anchor. “SNL’s” new season begins September 29. Let’s start with a clip from one of last season’s final episodes. Here’s Jost and Che on May 5.

(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, “SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE”)

COLIN JOST: This Stormy Daniels payment has turned out to be the loudest hush money in history. And during his “Kings Of Dementia” comedy tour, Giuliani…

(LAUGHTER)

JOST: …Giuliani also said that the hush money was, quote, “funneled through a law firm.” Dude, funneled is not typically a word innocent people use when talking about money.

(LAUGHTER)

JOST: No one says, yeah, my grandma funneled me $5 in my birthday card.

(LAUGHTER)

MICHAEL CHE: Rudy Giuliani is claiming that President Trump only learned a week ago that he was reimbursed in Michael Cohen’s payment to Stormy Daniels in $35,000 installments. I have a couple questions.

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: Like, what kind of billionaire pays for stuff in installments?

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: You’re the president of the United States. Why are you paying for sex like it’s a NordicTrack?

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: And how did y’all land on $130,000? That’s such an oddly specific number. I asked Stormy to come on “Update” and explain it, but her agent said no because if she’s seen on camera with a black guy, her price goes down.

(LAUGHTER)

GROSS: Colin Jost, Michael Che, welcome back to FRESH AIR. Congratulations on your writing nomination and on hosting. Before we get to other things, I want to talk with you about, regarding the Emmys and “SNL,” you know, I’m thinking as we record this Wednesday afternoon, East Coast time, it’s earlier than that on the West Coast, where you are. There’s a hurricane, like, a catastrophic hurricane, heading toward the Carolinas. And that’s something that you might have to – like, assuming the hurricane is anything like what they’re saying it will be, that’s something you’ll probably have to address at the Emmys. And, you know, it’s really awkward to have a celebration when people are suffering like that. So is that something you’re thinking through? Like, how are you going to deal with it?

JOST: Yeah. I don’t know. I mean, it definitely crossed my mind yesterday. I mean, you never really know what’s going to happen leading up to a big event because you’re planning it for so long and then something could dominate the news that day. But when it’s something that’s a tragedy, again, we don’t know exactly what’s going to happen yet. But the biggest thing, I think, sometimes we face at “SNL” is you want to show as much support as you can. And, you know, you want to use that moment to maybe just actually raise money for people who are there because you have a mouthpiece to tell people, go online, give money. The people in that room have money, generally. And, you know, you hope you can make it a moment just even to get support for those people.

GROSS: So the last time we spoke, Donald Trump was a presidential candidate. He wasn’t the president. It was just, like, days before the election. So the first show after the election, Dave Chappelle hosted. Chris Rock made a guest appearance. A Tribe Called Quest were the music guest. These were all people with, like, strong political points of view. And instead of an opening sketch, the opening was Kate McKinnon dressed as Hillary at the piano singing Leonard Cohen’s song, “Hallelujah.” And she ended it by saying, I’m not giving up, and neither should you. Can you take us behind the scenes a little bit and tell us what it was like, after the president was elected, trying to figure out what the first show of post-election Trump era should be?

JOST: Well, the sort of, like, amazing move from Lorne was that he had offered him that date, like, at the end of that summer. So I think he just sensed that whatever was going to happen in the election was going to be this huge moment, and he wanted to make sure whoever the host was would be someone that could deal with that and who, at that moment, people in America wanted to hear from. And that’s – I mean, Dave is basically the ideal person to do that. So he had the foresight to book that way in advance.

And then that night, you know, the election night was insane because you – I don’t know, I assumed, like, most people probably thought Hillary was going to win. And you were watching the results come in. And, you know, people were having all kinds of reactions around the office. It was very intense. And you’re then trying to write comedy and, you know, not everyone even attempted to write comedy. Some people, understandably, were very upset.

And Dave was the perfect host at that moment because the next day when we were there for the table read, you know, he was just like, the reason you’re in comedy is to react to things that are going on and make them funny, to find humor even in whatever is the weird, darkest things. You have to figure out how to still put on a comedy show ’cause that’s why you’re doing this. And I think that was just the right kind of motivation for everyone to try to put a show together by Saturday that was still a comedy show. And, you know, I think that was reflected in his monologue really well.

GROSS: So you all watched the election results at the office?

JOST: Yeah. I mean, we were there. Tuesday night is our writing night. So we’re basically there all night. You’re mostly there all night until the table read, which is Wednesday afternoon. You kind of go straight through. So normally, it would have been a later start than normal because you’re watching election results roll in. But then it was even more delayed because people were processing what was happening. I mean, it was just very shocking. Whatever – you know, whatever you expected going in, I think it was still shocking.

GROSS: So I’m asking some of these questions ’cause you’re head writers as well as “Update” anchors. Who came up with the idea of Kate McKinnon as Hillary singing “Hallelujah?”

JOST: Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider and Kate had an idea of doing some kind of song. I forget what the original – I think they had a different song originally. But they had the idea of doing something in that vein. But I don’t know if it was just Kate or if it was a whole group from the cast. I forget the original version or original origin of it. And then I know Lorne had thought of “Hallelujah” because Leonard Cohen had just – I think he had just died that week or…

GROSS: That’s right.

JOST: …Before? I forget the exact timing. And I think he just thought that might be a song that would be – that would seem sort of doubly appropriate in some way.

GROSS: So getting back to “Update,” when you do “Update” on Saturday night, it’s really Sunday morning on the East Coast ’cause by the time, you know, you’re on, it’s after midnight. Every late-night comic has done bits on the week’s news. And so, like, you’re kind of, like, late to the game in that respect. So how do you find things that are going to feel fresh at the very, very end of the week or the very beginning of the new week?

CHE: Fortunately, there’s not a lot of people that I think think like me. So I never really have a problem with finding interesting takes because I feel like when you kind of do your own thing, it’s not going to bump. You know? If I have a thought and five other comedians have that same thought then I’d feel like it’s not even worth saying. You know?

GROSS: What’s an example of a joke that you can say that you feel like other comics can’t? Can you think of one?

CHE: Well, nobody else is calling the president a cracker on national TV.

(LAUGHTER)

GROSS: Yeah (laughter). That got you a lot of love.

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: Yeah. It sure did.

(LAUGHTER)

GROSS: What kind of reaction were you…

CHE: And also…

GROSS: …Expecting? Yeah. Go ahead. No. I’m kind of being sarcastic. You got it from both sides for that.

CHE: Of course.

GROSS: Yeah.

CHE: But to me, that’s interesting. That’s compelling TV.

GROSS: So…

CHE: ‘Cause there’s a lot of – I think there’s a lot of people that felt that way and was probably thinking it, as well. And I think there’s a lot of people that understood where that emotion was coming from. Sometimes – you know, it’s the same with Kate at the piano. People watching it, and some people liked it. Some people didn’t. But the thing is you believe Kate felt that, and that’s what makes it interesting. So it was honest. You know? It really came from her. It really came from a real place.

GROSS: So – yeah. Go ahead.

JOST: That week, too – I was just remembering, too, that week, I forget if we worked on it later in the week together, Che, too. But on election night, too, then we woke up after the next day or, like, you know, in our office. But I was – Neal Brennan was there, too, working on the show. He’s a writer. He worked with Chappelle on “Chappelle’s Show.” But we wrote a sketch that was in the show that week that was about the election results coming in and people watching and sort of a time lapse of how the night went as the results came in. And we wrote that essentially in response to what was happening in real time in our office that night before because, you know, the discussions were – you know, it was sort of like early joking around. Like, uh-oh, Hillary didn’t win Alabama. I bet – watch out. And then it got to, like, wait; she’s going to lose Michigan. It was like – it was that kind of thing.

And it was perfect for Dave and Chris Rock, who came in and did it, too, later in the week because they were not surprised. They were like, yeah, of course. This is how America’s going to go. And it was – they could play that attitude in the sketch. And it kind of reflected what was actually – what we were all actually figuring out in real time that night.

And I think when we read it at the table on Wednesday, which is, you know, the day after the election obviously. When we read it at the table read, it didn’t even necessarily play that hot because people were also kind of – it was very raw, so no one really wanted to relive what had just happened the night before in sketch form. But then by the – by Saturday, I think people were ready to at least laugh about it even if it was in a cathartic way. And I think that was another one where, like, Dave and Chris were perfect for that kind of – to come in and have that perspective.

CHE: It’s very helpful to have a veteran or legendary comedian like Dave where you kind of – you know, I think one of the things that years in comedy gets you is trust. And people understand how honest you are. And I think it’s a little bit more – it makes people more comfortable when they know that you’re about to speak. And it’s something that we all write toward. And hopefully someday we will create that kind of relationship with the audience.

So coming from other comedians, it might have even been a really, really tough plane to land. But Dave being who he is and people understanding how measured Dave is as a – just as a voice and as a role model I think – coming from him, it worked perfectly because I think people believed it. People said, yeah, I could see that there are people – black people and people of color that seen this happen and was probably like, yep, America’s right on time with this one, you know?

JOST: (Laughter).

CHE: I think that was kind of the tone that he was trying to – that was kind of the point. And it was kind of cool to watch because not – like I said, not a lot of shows can get away with that. And not a lot of comedians can get away with that, and so that’s what makes our show special.

GROSS: Well, let’s take a short break here, and then we’ll talk some more. If you’re just joining us, my guests are Colin Jost and Michael Che, the anchors of “Weekend Update.” They’re head writers on “Saturday Night Live.” And they’re preparing to host the Emmys on Monday. We’ll be right back. This is FRESH AIR.

(SOUNDBITE OF TONY Z’S “IT’S ALL THE SAME”)

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. And if you’re just joining us, my guests are Colin Jost and Michael Che, anchors of “Weekend Update,” head writers at “Saturday Night Live.” And now they’re preparing to host the Emmys on Monday.

So what is the job of head writer?

JOST: Great question. I mean, we would love someone to explain it to us.

GROSS: (Laughter).

CHE: Yeah, it’s a great title. People think – when they hear head writer, they think, oh, that’s the guy that writes everything and delegates. But it’s really not. It’s really more of kind of a supervisor role. But we’re competing to get stuff on just like any other writer, you know? There’s no – you don’t walk around with a big old cigar or anything like that.

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: It’s not like the brochure.

JOST: No, it’s very – and very often, the – some of the time – usually the writers that are – there’s writers that are getting the most on that aren’t the head writer…

CHE: Yeah.

JOST: …Because sometimes as a head writer, you’re stuck in meetings for a while. You’re talking to the host in a different way, or you’re more hearing ideas than you are getting to write your own. So you still definitely contribute as a writer. And part of it I think is sort of trying to lead by example and just write things you think are funny.

And then the other part of it is trying as much as you can to help newer writers if they have an idea that you think could be really funny, and they’re new, so they might not totally know the structure of it or how to cast it or that kind of thing – just to help them with that because that’s what happened to us when we were new. People who are more senior, you know, really looked out and tried to make what we wrote better ’cause otherwise, it’s hard to get things on when you’re new.

CHE: Also, you’re – more so than any other writers, you’re thinking of the entire body of the show. Like, you’re thinking of the cold open. You’re thinking of the monologue. You’re thinking of the first sketch out of monologue. You’re thinking of, you know, what would be interesting, you know, what bumps. And things like that, as a head writer, you kind of have to consider more of the show as a whole as opposed to when you’re a writer, you’re just thinking about your piece and if you have a tag for somebody else’s thing or whatever. But as head writer, you kind of have to think about the entire show more so than…

JOST: In the beginning – the first part is usually the part that’s figured out last…

CHE: Right.

JOST: …Which is what makes the job stressful…

CHE: Right…

JOST: …You know?

CHE: …’Cause the news cycle is so quick now that what seems relevant Monday probably won’t by Saturday.

JOST: Yeah. You know, Lorne always talks about how the first 15 minutes of the show are the most important because that’s when you’re – if you’re tuning in, that’s your real chance to hook a viewer.

CHE: Right.

JOST: The monologue is such a tricky thing always because you want to show off who this person is maybe in a way you haven’t seen them before. And that’s a thing we often have to at least help figure out. And then the cold open is such a different animal, and that’s constantly shifting. And, you know, the number of weeks where the cold open and the monologue are both even vaguely figured out before Thursday – it almost never happens. If it does, you just cross your fingers that those will hold up by Saturday because those are – those feels like a luxury.

GROSS: The cold open is usually where the political sketch is. And if, like, Alec Baldwin is doing Trump, that’s where it is. And usually, like, if Kate McKinnon is doing Jeff Sessions, that’s where it’s going to be. So I can see why that would be kind of last-minute. And speaking of Alec Baldwin, like, do you know if he’s coming back?

JOST: We truly didn’t – someone said to us the other day, oh, you’re coming back as head writers. And we truly – no one ever told us (laughter). So we do not know. We try to just – we, like, try to figure out what we’re doing on our own and then we wait and see. But, you know…

CHE: It’s kind of like being on, like, a playoff team. Like, sometimes you might get 40 minutes. Sometimes you get 10 minutes. You know, sometimes you start, and certain combinations work. So you never really know. It’s more so about, how do we execute the best show? So it’s a weird place of – it’s always in the moment.

GROSS: So what…

CHE: So it’s kind of hard to answer that, you know?

JOST: There’s times you don’t learn about, like – you don’t learn about a new credit or something you’re getting until someone in your family sees it in the scroll at the end of the show.

CHE: Right.

JOST: And you’re like, oh, I guess that kicked in this week or, you know…

GROSS: Did that happen to you?

JOST: You know, you just…

CHE: Well, I didn’t know I had – I didn’t know I was a writer on the show until, like, three weeks after I was a writer on the show.

JOST: What do you mean?

CHE: Well, I remember Seth was like, you know you’re hired for this evening.

JOST: (Laughter).

CHE: And I had no idea. I thought I was still – because I came…

JOST: Oh, that’s right.

CHE: …In on a guest contract, so that was, like, week to week. And I was working there for about two weeks. Like, I was already there, and they were like, you know you’re hired, right? Like, you work here.

JOST: (Laughter).

CHE: Seth, who was head writer at the time – I had no clue. No one told me. And this was in the middle of a production week.

JOST: It’s not always a great communication place.

CHE: No, yeah.

JOST: But – and part of that is – I mean, it’s really just the velocity of the show sometimes. There’s so many moving pieces that not everyone is told everything all the time. And the reality is we would basically be doing a similar job regardless of what our title was.

CHE: Right.

JOST: Like, we were – when we were added as head writers with Kent and Bryan, or when Chris and Sarah had been head writers, too – like, you’re doing effectively the same job. You’re in most of the same meetings because we’ve been there for a while, and you’re – you would do the same hard work. And you would do the same – you would care in the same way about the show, regardless of what your title is.

GROSS: My guests are Colin Jost and Michael Che, anchors of “Saturday Night Live’s” “Weekend Update.” They’re also head writers on the show. They’re hosting the Emmys Monday night. Here’s a clip of Che on “Update” from last season’s finale.

(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, “SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE”)

CHE: A report has found that 86 percent of people arrested in New York for marijuana possession are black or Latino. Well, duh. We’re the only ones they search. That’s like saying the only people that have STDs are the people that take tests for STDs. We’re not the only ones that carry drugs. If cops searched white dudes in cargo shorts as much as they search black dudes in hoodies, prison would look like a Dave Matthews concert.

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: You know, people are always talking about needing diversity in Hollywood. You know where we really need diversity? Jail.

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: Forget about #OscarsSoWhite. How about prisons is too black…

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: …Colin?

(LAUGHTER)

GROSS: We’ll hear a clip from Colin Jost on “Update” after a break. And we’ll talk more with Colin Jost and Michael Che. I’m Terry Gross, and this is FRESH AIR.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. I’m Terry Gross. Let’s get back to my interview with Colin Jost and Michael Che, the anchors of “Saturday Night Live’s” “Weekend Update.” They’re preparing for the new season, which starts September 29. They’re also preparing to host the Emmys Monday night. They’re nominated, along with “SNL’s” other writers, for best writing for a variety series. Last January, they became head writers of SNL. Jost had held that position before but gave it up after becoming an “Update” anchor. We just heard an excerpt of Che on “Update.” Here’s Jost from last February after President Trump’s first State of the Union address and Trump’s tweets about it.

(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, “SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE”)

JOST: President Trump also tweeted that he had the highest ratings ever for a State of the Union address, which – get this – wasn’t true.

(LAUGHTER)

JOST: And this time, even Fox News fact-checked on him. You know you’re running your mouth too much when even your hype man is like, yo, that ain’t exactly accurate, though.

(LAUGHTER)

JOST: So sorry.

CHE: That was good.

JOST: Oh, thank you. Then in a new interview, President Trump stated that he is not a feminist. Was he getting accused of that a lot?

(LAUGHTER)

GROSS: Michael Che, one of the things that you’ve said that’s controversial is, you were talking about Louis C.K. doing a set, you know, kind of testing out new material, showing up as a surprise to the audience. And there were a lot of complaints. Like, the public isn’t ready to see Louis C.K. yet. And you tweeted that, you know, he should be able – it wasn’t tweeted. It was on your Instagram.

You said a lot of what I read says that C.K. shouldn’t get to be a famous comedian anymore because to them he’s still winning, isn’t that strange? Meaning, he can be shamed, humiliated, lose millions of dollars, lose all of his projects, lose the respect of a lot of his fans and peers and whatever else that comes with what he did. But since he can still do a comedy set for free at a 200-seat club a year later, it means he got off easy. That’s how coveted fame is.

After the response you got to that – you know, a lot of negative responses to that – how do you feel about what you said?

CHE: I think it was extremely ill-timed. I mean, the thing about when you write anything, you kind of surrender the context and you kind of surrender the way it will be presented to people and how people will – the tone it will take, you know?

So I think if you – you could cleverly make that to seem like a terrible thing. And you can make it seem like what it was, which was just me saying I just think it’s interesting what the power of fame and what the power of stage, how it’s perceived, you know? I just think it’s extremely interesting. And that was like something that was kind of selfishly a thing that came to my head immediately when I read those stories.

GROSS: What do you mean selfishly? Meaning, because you’re famous?

CHE: Well, it’s selfishly because I work in this business. And you realize that you’re extremely lucky to. And people are very, very – it’s a privilege. You know, it really is a privilege to be able to work. It’s a privilege to be able to do this and have a job that you really, really care about and that people love and respect. And they will take it away from you, you know? Whether you like it, they will take it away from you. And they remind you, like, hey, you know we will take this away from you.

And I think that’s kind – that was what I was talking about. I wasn’t really even talking about Louis necessarily. I was using him as an example because it was something that reminded me of, wow, this is kind of a special thing that we get to do. And he could go through whatever he went through, which seems scary as hell, deserved. And people will still say, well, you get to – you still get to do this thing. And that bothers me.

GROSS: I think…

CHE: Them saying that. Not me, obviously.

GROSS: Yeah, I think what’s bothering a lot of women is that if he – he doesn’t seem to have done anything as of yet to change. He said he’s going spend a lot of time just, like, listening and thinking.

CHE: Yeah.

GROSS: And if there’s evidence that he’s changed, he hasn’t presented it yet. And I think that was what was bothering a lot of people.

CHE: Yeah. No.

GROSS: Like, he’s back on stage. But, like, what’s different? What’s changed?

CHE: None. You know what? And I’ll – it is so crazy because I was just talking about this with somebody. But that’s kind of – I don’t agree. I don’t disagree with any of that. Like, I truly think him going on stage and not addressing anything was insane, you know? And I don’t fault that he – I don’t fault the attempt of making it right. I do fault the execution of not making it right, if that makes sense. You know, like I think – I think everybody has the right to defend themselves. Everybody has the right to take the opportunity to clarify or apologize or make any bad situation right. But when you don’t do it, you can’t – it’s indefensible. You know, like what can you say? And I think that he missed a big opportunity to make that right.

GROSS: So is this – Michael Che, is this one of the reasons why you’re not on Twitter anymore? What we were talking about was Instagram. But still, is this – is this…

CHE: I don’t like Twitter because it’s – yeah, it’s – no one’s as angry as they say they are. No one’s as happy as they say they are.

JOST: (Laughter).

CHE: It’s just kind of this land of hyperbole that I don’t – I have a platform. Like, I have – we go on TV. And we’re lucky enough to be able to tweet to a camera and speak. So it’s not for me. I just don’t like – I don’t like the way it makes people feel. I don’t like the way it makes people gang up on other people.

Justly or not, it’s just uncomfortable. It’s – I don’t like it at all. It’s just a cesspool of everybody just yelling at each other. And the anger and – anger and, like – and I don’t know what the opposite of anger is, but I’ve never experienced it.

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: Anger. Anger and the opposite.

JOST: Peace. Joy. I don’t know.

CHE: Anger and extreme joy are the only voices that get heard on Twitter, you know?

GROSS: One thing I have to say is that if you’re following terrific journalists on Twitter, you get the news really quickly. You get links to great articles really quick.

JOST: Yeah.

GROSS: Like, that’s a terrific function that Twitter serves.

JOST: Well, it also used to be – it also used to have a great function because you’d follow comedians or your friends who are really funny. And every time you go on, you’d see like a great joke. You know, and it was…

CHE: Everybody is just so scared to death on there, man.

JOST: Yeah.

CHE: It’s a – I don’t know, Terry. We got to – we have to talk about this more.

GROSS: (Laughter).

CHE: I’m going to get you off Twitter.

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: It’s just – it doesn’t make sense.

JOST: Yeah.

CHE: It really doesn’t.

GROSS: I don’t tweet. I just read good journalists. And…

CHE: And you know why?

JOST: It’s lost that…

CHE: And why don’t you tweet?

JOST: Yeah.

CHE: And why don’t you tweet? Because you know that if you say one thing just in the heat of…

GROSS: You know why I don’t tweet?

CHE: Yes, please.

GROSS: There are several reasons. One is I would be writing a tweet and then I’d be thinking, let me think, let me sleep on that – and then edit it in the morning.

CHE: Yes. Right.

GROSS: And that’s not the spirit of Twitter. And I don’t have the time. I spend so much time working on the show.

CHE: Right.

GROSS: Tweeting would just be another assignment. It would just be more work. So I like reading journalists. I like reading comics. But I don’t want to tweet.

CHE: You’re one – and I totally agree with you. It’s like you have to think of it as if – this has to be able to stand up when I don’t have control of it anymore. This statement – it’s in black and white.

JOST: It’s a full press release.

CHE: It’s a press release.

JOST: Anything that used to be authentic.

CHE: You’re just doing mini press releases on something that you thought about for 30 seconds. But the crazy part is it lulls you into thinking, oh, this is just an interaction. This is a casual conversation. And then next thing you know, you’re held to that forever. Like, if you said this one thing, that means that’s what you believe. Ten years from now, if you want to run for president, but wait a minute – you believe this thing because you said it in 2009.

JOST: Right (laughter).

CHE: And people don’t want to hear anything else. There’s no – it’s insane that people base articles on this. They base what jobs you should be able to have based on something you said flippantly in a conversation getting the news as it was happening.

JOST: Having a…

CHE: It’s just an insane responsibility.

JOST: Having Twitter on your phone is like being with a journalist that hates you 24 hours a day.

GROSS: (Laughter).

CHE: Yeah, seriously.

JOST: Anything you say will – on that can be spun. I mean, truly that’s what you have to think of it as.

CHE: Yeah. It’s like walking around with the district attorney, and everything you say is just going to the district attorney.

JOST: (Laughter).

CHE: And you’re like, why am I doing this?

GROSS: I see you both have very strong feelings about this. Let me reintroduce you. If you’re just joining us, my guests are Colin Jost and Michael Che, anchors of “Weekend Update,” head writers of “Saturday Night Live.” And they’re now preparing to host the Emmys Monday. We’ll be right back. This is FRESH AIR.

(SOUNDBITE OF THE INTERNET SONG, “STAY THE NIGHT”)

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. And if you’re just joining us, my guests are Michael Che and Colin Jost, the anchors of “Weekend Update.” They’re also head writers of “Saturday Night Live.” And Monday they’ll be hosting the Emmys.

So it was very controversial when “Saturday Night Live” had Donald Trump – candidate Trump guest hosting the show. And you were doing Update back then. And we talked about that a little bit the last time you were on. But…

JOST: Right, right.

GROSS: And there were protests and everything that you were having him on. Would you have President Trump on the show?

CHE: I mean, to me, I don’t mind anybody being on the show because I think something good can come out of anything in comedy, you know? But I wouldn’t go for it. I don’t know what the win is. Like, I don’t think people find him funny.

GROSS: What was it like to work with him before he became president?

CHE: It was like working with any unfunny, insecure dude, you know, just like a – you know?

JOST: No.

CHE: That’s another thing. Like, when you see him as a human and then he’s in this kind of larger-than-life chair, it kind of – I don’t know.

GROSS: Michael, you said that when Trump was on the show during his candidacy, that he seemed insecure. What made him seem that way?

CHE: Well, most people are insecure when they come on our show just because it’s a scary thing to do. You know, it’s very hard to be on live TV. It’s very hard to be around so much – a very talented cast that’s used to it, and you kind of got to keep up with them. And the speed of the show is very intimidating. And I think it humanizes a lot of people. It humanizes most people that host the show, so – and also, you always think you’re funny until you’re in front of an audience, you know, especially an audience that’s not necessarily your audience.

GROSS: But did he do particularly things that made him seem insecure?

CHE: There’s always a code of we know how hard the job is, so, you know, it’s almost doctor-patient privilege…

JOST: (Laughter).

CHE: …When you host the show.

GROSS: Sure.

JOST: It’s HIPAA.

CHE: Yeah. It’s kind of that where we don’t kind of, you know, spill everybody’s tea, as the kids say.

GROSS: So I want to ask you about the Mother’s Day show when each cast member’s mother comes out and talks about their child, who’s the cast member, except for Michael Che’s mother. So on Update, Melissa McCarthy, playing your stepmother…

CHE: (Laughter).

GROSS: …Comes out wearing this, like…

JOST: (Laughter).

GROSS: …Pink T-shirt that says, like, world’s proudest stepmother on it – or stepmom. And so I hope it’s not putting you too much on the spot to ask. How come your mother wasn’t there?

CHE: My mother doesn’t really like cameras. She doesn’t even like still photos. So it was kind of hard to get her to sign up for live TV. And it’s – to me, it’s mind-boggling with anybody. Just – I know how nerve-wracking it is for us as professionals to be up there on home base. But for someone that’s not even a professional comedian to be like, sure, I’ll do that for Mother’s Day and try to land a joke, it’s kind of cool to see. And it was a lot of great moments. But my mother just doesn’t like, really, like, TV and cameras. But turns out Melissa McCarthy is a much better comedian than my mother…

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: …Is what I’m trying to say. Who knew?

GROSS: Would you describe the sketch – because it’s too visual to just, like, play the audio.

CHE: Melissa McCarthy comes out as my mother on Update. And she’s very, very, very motherly. She’s wiping crust off my face. And she’s a little bit smothering. And she’s extremely supportive. And it’s a little annoying. But also it’s my mom, so it’s very – it’s pretty close to my actual relationship with my mother probably.

GROSS: Seriously?

JOST: If I could brag about Michael’s acting in it, I thought he was especially good playing opposite Melissa. And I thought it was – he played it in a…

CHE: Well…

JOST: …Very real way that you would want to try to keep on the positive side of it while also being annoyed by it.

CHE: You know, I’m not even going to let anybody give me credit for that. It’s Melissa McCarthy flying, so you just sit. It’s like everything’s better with bacon. Everybody’s funnier with Melissa McCarthy…

JOST: (Laughter).

CHE: …Doing the heavy lifting, so I’m just sitting there watching most of the time.

GROSS: So I think it’s interesting how comedy is changing in the sense that, like, there were so many comics for so many years – and maybe there still is at comedy clubs – telling, like, sexist jokes about sex and about women. And I think – I hope that it’s more difficult to do that now.

CHE: Well, I think it’s hard to – being in comedy is kind of hard ’cause, like, I’m exposed to so much comedy. And most of the country and most of the world knows maybe five to ten stand-up comedians, so – and they base all of stand-up – of the thousands of stand-up, they base everything based on, you know, who’s popular at the time. And it’s usually only five or 10 guys that are extremely popular and crossover mainstream.

But as somebody that works in comedy, I think for years – and even studying comedy as a kid, like, there’s always going to be jokes that was funny 20 years ago that won’t be acceptable years later. I mean, as a black person, you know, there’s stuff that doesn’t fly – you know what I mean? – that would have. There used to be comedians that came out in blackface that was white, you know? Like, that’s completely not acceptable anymore.

And I think that’s always going to be the case. More people – especially now that media is so much bigger and more people have voices, they can say, look; even with the Louis situation – like, yeah, Louis can go out there. But also, people have the right to come out and say, you know what? We don’t want to see and we don’t want to support anybody that supports him. And that’s your right, too. And I think that’s you know, that’s something – as a performer, you have to deal with people can reject you. Just the way you can comment on everybody, they can comment on you. And that’s the way it is, you know? You kind of got to take what you get from that.

GROSS: So…

JOST: And there’s two things – there’s two elements to anything like that is – one is, how does it fly among your peers? You know, if someone’s a comedian and they’re doing jokes like that now, it’s not even your peers – your peers would probably just be like, why? (Scoffing) Like, what? That doesn’t seem, like, well, I mean, they might not even say that to you. They might just not really want to hang out with you or really think that that was a great – whatever, you know. That’s part of it. And the other is just audience.

GROSS: So I think I need to let you go and get back to preparing for the Emmys. Just a question – are you nervous?

CHE: No.

GROSS: (Laughter).

JOST: I was going to say yes.

CHE: No. It’s not – you can’t be nervous. It’s just – it’s comedy. It’s, like, literally comedy. Even if it’s bad, that’s pretty funny too.

JOST: (Laughter).

CHE: Worst-case scenario – it’s terrible, and it’s funny that it’s so bad. So it’s – you know, it’s nothing to be afraid of. Nobody – like, this isn’t a real – this isn’t a real job, you know?

JOST: That’s a good – I didn’t really think about…

CHE: If I was a fireman, I’d be…

JOST: (Laughter).

CHE: …I mean, firemen should be afraid.

JOST: I’d be very nervous.

CHE: Brain surgeons – but, like, for comedy, we’re literally going out there, and we’re just going to tell some jokes. And people are going to like them or not. But it’s nothing to be afraid of.

GROSS: Colin, you have…

JOST: Well, thank you. This is actually a good…

GROSS: …Fireman in your family.

JOST: I do.

GROSS: Do you see it that way, too – that, like, fire is something to be afraid of? Comedy isn’t worth getting really…

JOST: Well…

GROSS: …Worried about because it’s just comedy?

JOST: …Certainly, fire is a lot – (laughter) – a lot scarier. Yeah, as the first, basically, non-hero in my family…

GROSS: (Laughter).

JOST: …It’s – I don’t – no, I get nervous because I’m more nervous leading up to it than I am…

GROSS: Because you have higher standards than Michael Che has.

JOST: Exactly.

(LAUGHTER)

CHE: I don’t have high standards at all, man. This is back-of-the-classroom humor. I’m throwing spitballs at everybody. I could care less, you know? What’s there to be afraid of?

JOST: I get nervous more when I’m not – when it’s not in front of me. When I’m thinking about it in advance, that’s more nerve wracking than when you’re actually out on stage and you’re feeling. Then you know what it’s like to be on stage, and then that feels a lot more liberating. It’s more the lead up to it where – I don’t know – having not actually gone through it before, where that’s more nerve wracking for me. But I would still take it over fires.

GROSS: Good luck to both of you. Thank you so much for coming back on our show. I really enjoyed it. And…

JOST: Thank you for having us.

GROSS: Yeah, my pleasure. Good luck on Monday.

Colin Jost and Michael Che are the anchors of “SNL’s” “Weekend Update” and are head writers on the show. Monday night, they’ll host the Emmys, which will be broadcast on NBC. After we take a short break, David Bianculli will review the new Hulu drama series “The First,” starring Sean Penn. This is FRESH AIR.

(SOUNDBITE OF JAMES HUNTER SONG, “I’LL WALK AWAY”) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

Source: http://www.wfae.org/post/michael-che-and-colin-jost-snl-hosting-emmys-and-hating-twitter

[patriotsnet]

Why Are Republicans Scared Of Trump

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/why-are-republicans-scared-of-trump/

Why Are Republicans Scared Of Trump

Donald Trump Hasn’t Cowed Republicans He’s Freed Them To Pursue Their Long

Why Are Republicans Still So Afraid Of Trump? | The 11th Hour | MSNBC

Donald Trump getting the “O-K” from Joseph McCarthy and Mitch McConnell

On the eve of the impeachment vote in the House of Representatives , things are looking mighty bleak for anyone who hoped Republicans might turn over a new leaf. For the last several months, there has been plaintive hope that GOP lawmakers might be moved by the overwhelming evidence that Donald Trump is guilty of running an extortion scheme against Ukraine’s leaders to help him win re-election in 2020.

Right now, it looks like there’s no chance of any Republican defections in the House away from the GOP line that Trump did nothing wrong. The one Republican, Rep. Justin Amash of Michigan, who admitted out loud that Trump deserved to be impeached, was duly ejected from the party. In the Senate, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has been openly bragging that he intends to rig the Senate trial in Trump’s favor. Even supposedly Trump-skeptical Republican senators, such as Utah’s Mitt Romney or Maine’s Susan Collins, have been avoiding questions about whether the Senate should call witnesses for the trial.

“But this presidents actions are possible only with the craven acquiescence of congressional Republicans,” they write. “They have done no less than abdicate their Article I responsibilities.”

No, Republicans clearly feel empowered by Trump. He frees them to reveal their darkest desire which is to end democracy as we know it, and to cut any corners or break any laws necessary to get the job done.

Why Republicans Are Afraid To Challenge Trump

Juan Williams

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Republicans Now Bragging About Being Trump Big Lie Pushers

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In taking a shot at CNNs Jake Tapper, Republicans are openly boasting that theyre responsible for spreading democracy-defying conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election. 

The CNN anchor recently took a stand against inviting election deniers on his programs, saying last week that lawmakers who support former President Donald Trumps Big Liereferring to the false claim that the election was stolenare not welcome on his weekday and weekend shows. Its not a policy but a philosophy, Tapper said, noting he hasnt booked such Republicans since the election. Pro-Trump Republicans have since come forward with emails from CNN bookers requesting their presence on Tappers shows. Rep. Elise Stefanik of New Yorkwhom the GOP last month voted to replace Liz Cheney as the partys conference chairtweeted screenshots, telling Tapper to read and weep:

Twitter content

Responding to these apparent gotcha attempts, Tapper said he cant account for every email from my excellent bookers whose job it is to present me with as many options as possible. He also pointed to the absurdity of Republicans rushing to prove they are, in fact, election deniers. Kind of stunning to see her proudly identify as a conspiracy theorist, he said of Stefanik.

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Republicans Still Scared To Death Of Trump

Trump went on yet another unhinged rant this weekend during a speech to donors in Florida, attacking Mitch McConnell as a “stone cold loser” for refusing to go along with his attempt to steal the election, but you won’t find any profiles in courage in the GOP willing to stand up to him.

Case in point, on this weekend’s Fox News Sunday, South Dakota Republican Sen. John Thune was asked about Trump calling him “weak and inneffective RINO” earlier in the year and saying he might back a primary challenger to Thune. Thune responded telling host Chris Wallace that “I’ve been through wars in South Dakota, political wars, with my own party when I ran the first time, with the Democrats in a couple of hotly contested Senate races, so being afraid of a fight or somebody coming after me is not something that’s going to influence that decision,” but Thune refused to admonish Trump for his rhetoric, and refused to stand up for McConnell when asked about him as well.

Which is pretty much the equivalent of “I support Trump, but I really don’t like the tweeting” that we heard from so many of them over the last five or six years.

As the Fox article discussed, Trump called Thune “Mitch’s boy” when urging Gov. Kristi Noem to challenge Thune in 2022, but no amount of insults are apparently ever breaking point for these jellyfish.

The Actual Reason Why Republicans And Their Media Are Discouraging People From Getting Vaccinated

Dr. Jonathan Reiner, a CNN Medical Analyst, said last week, “A surprising amount of death will occur soon…” But why, when the deadly Delta variant is sweeping the world, are Republicans and their media warning people not to get vaccinated?

Dr. Anthony Fauci told Jake Tapper on CNN last Sunday, “I don’t have a really good reason why this is happening.”

But even if he can’t think of a reason why Republicans would trash talk vaccination and people would believe them, it’s definitely there.

Which is why it’s important to ask a couple of simple questions that all point to the actual reason why Republicans and their media are discouraging people from getting vaccinated:

1. Why did Trump get vaccinated in secret after Joe Biden won the election and his January 6th coup attempt failed?

2. Why are Fox “News” personalities discouraging people from getting vaccinated while refusing to say if they and the people they work with have been protected by vaccination?

3. Why was one of the biggest applause lines at CPAC: “They were hoping the government was hoping that they could sort of sucker 90% of the population into getting vaccinated and it isn’t happening!”

4. Why are Republican legislators in states around the country pushing laws that would “ban” private businesses from asking to see proof of vaccination status ?

Death is their electoral strategy.

Is there any other possible explanation?

So, what’s left?

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Top Republicans Are Running Scared And Relinquishing The Gop To The Monster They Helped Create

Like a bunch of lemmings, Republican lawmakers in Congress and across the country have clung to Donald Trump’s Big Lie that the only reason he lost the 2020 election was because it was riddled with fraud.

Of course, Trump never once proved a single instance of fraud in 60-plus trips to the courthouse, and he also helped ensure the massacre of at least half a million Americans due to the pandemic, so there’s that.

But instead of being willing to admit what’s plain as day to anyone with a brain and a pulse, GOP lawmakers tout Trump’s Big Lie in conservative media and then run from reporters representing every news outlet that has a shred of integrity left.

“In Washington, normally chatty senators scramble to skirt the question,” writes TheWashington Post.

Of course, there’s also the very public rift in the House GOP leadership between Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming who yet again on Monday reiterated the truth that Joe Biden was the rightful winner of the election.

“The 2020 presidential election was not stolen. Anyone who claims it was is spreading THE BIG LIE, turning their back on the rule of law, and poisoning our democratic system,” Cheney tweeted, in what amounts to GOP apostasy these days.

But the question is: Why? Why did McCarthy retreat from saying Trump “bears responsibility” for Jan. 6 to being a total Trump bootlicker? Why are chatty senators dodging reporters on Capitol Hill?

Republicans Fear Trump Will Lead To A Lost Generation Of Talent

The 45th president has brought new voices and voters to the party, but hes driven them out too. Insiders fear the repercussions.

06/01/2021 04:30 AM EDT

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As Donald Trump ponders another presidential bid, top Republicans have grown fearful about what theyre calling the partys lost generation.

In conversations with more than 20 lawmakers, ex-lawmakers, top advisers and aides, a common concern has emerged that a host of national and statewide Republicans are either leaving office or may not choose to pursue it for fear that they cant survive politically in the current GOP. The worry, these Republicans say, is that the party is embracing personality over policy, and that it is short sighted to align with Trump, who lost the general election and continues to alienate a large swath of the voting public with his grievances and false claims that the 2020 election was stolen.

Trump has driven sitting GOP lawmakers and political aspirants into early retirements ever since he burst onto the scene. But there was hope that things would change after his election loss. Instead, his influence on the GOP appears to be as solid as ever and the impact of those early shockwaves remain visible. When asked, for instance, if he feared the 45th president was causing a talent drain from the GOP ranks, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush perhaps inadvertently offered a personal demonstration of the case.

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Mcfeely: Why Are Republicans Afraid Of Everything

FARGO Republicans are afraid.

Afraid of Black people. Afraid of brown people. Afraid of red people. Afraid of yellow people. Afraid of women. Afraid of young people.

Afraid of young people voting. Afraid of people of color voting. Afraid of voting rights. Afraid of democracy.

Afraid of science. Afraid of medicine. Afraid of knowledge. Afraid of public education. Afraid of universities. Afraid of professors. Afraid of teachers.

Afraid of experts. Afraid of doctors. Afraid of Anthony Fauci. Afraid of masks. Afraid of vaccines. Afraid of vaccine passports. Afraid of vaccine chips. Afraid of things that don’t exist.

Afraid of history. Afraid of the truth. Afraid of those who tell the truth.

Afraid of books. Afraid of newspapers. Afraid of objectivity. Afraid of facts.

Afraid of wind towers. Afraid of solar power. Afraid of environmentalists. Afraid of the Green New Deal. Afraid of Greta Thunberg. Afraid of change.

Afraid of the media. Afraid of The New York Times. Afraid of The Washington Post. Afraid of MSNBC. Afraid of CNN.

Afraid of Twitter. Afraid of Facebook. Afraid of Google. Afraid of big tech. Afraid of the government. Afraid of the establishment.

Afraid of Democrats. Afraid of Black Lives Matter. Afraid of antifa. Afraid of Democratic Socialists.

Afraid of Bernie Sanders. Afraid of AOC. Afraid of Elizabeth Warren. Afraid of Nancy Pelosi. Afraid of Barack Obama. Afraid of Kamala Harris. Afraid of Joe Biden. Afraid of Mitt Romney. Afraid of Liz Cheney. Afraid of RINOs.

Opinion: Stop Saying Republicans Are Cowards Who Fear Trump The Truth Is Far Worse

âRepublicans Are Afraid Of Donald Trumpâ Despite Election Loss, Kasie Hunt Says | TODAY

Rep. Adam Kinzinger, Republican of Illinois, deserves great credit for demanding that his party fully repudiate Donald Trumps big lie about the 2020 election and acknowledge its role in inciting the Jan. 6 insurrection. But Kinzinger is getting one big thing wrong.

In a Sunday appearance on CBS, Kinzinger repeatedly said fellow Republicans are fundamentally driven by fear of Trump. They dont want to confront Trumps lies, Kinzinger lamented, adding that theyre scared to death of him.

As a broad description of our current moment, this is profoundly insufficient. It risks misleading people about the true nature of the threat posed by the GOPs ongoing radicalization.

With House Republicans expected this week to oust Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming from leadership for vocally making the same case that Kinzinger is, the idea that Republicans are primarily driven by cowardice is everywhere.

Liz is a living reproach to all these cowards, one friend of Cheney told the New Yorker, a quote that drew tons of Twitter approval. Similarly, former GOP speechwriter Peggy Noonan ripped into Cheneys fellow Republicans as a House of Cowards who are jumpy and scared.

Meanwhile, now that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has endorsed Rep. Elise Stefanik to replace Cheney in the House GOP leadership, Democrats are pounding McCarthy for cowardice.

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How Long Can Trumps Gop Stranglehold Last

Liz Cheneys ouster from Republican leadership on Wednesday was a big win for the man she has refused to placate Donald Trump. I spoke with Washington correspondent Olivia Nuzzi about the considerable shadow the former president continues to cast over Republicans from his perch at Mar-a-Lago.

Ben: President Trump has in some ways been reduced to a background presence in the political landscape. Facebooks ban on him was upheld for now, hes off Twitter forever, and hes churning out statements on a junky-looking website that doesnt see a lot of traffic.

But in other ways, the Republican party is as dependent on validating Trumps view of the world as ever. Lindsey Graham says the GOP cant grow without him; party leaders are making pilgrimages to Mar-a-Lago to seek his wisdom, such as it is, and approval. And, of course, Liz Cheney was ousted from GOP leadership on Wednesday for banging on too loudly about the stolen-election conspiracy theory that rules the ex-presidents world and which a large majority of GOP voters believe.

In your view, does Trump have exactly the same kind of stranglehold over the party he did when he was president? Will the GOP just continue to stay in the thrall of a losing presidential candidate indefinitely?

Olivia: I feel like Im taking a multiple-choice test Im gonna have to go with B on this one.

Ben: I was taught that C was the most common correct answer. Not sure this holds true anymore.

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Indeed, a recent poll from the Democratic firm Democracy Corps, surveying voters in battleground states and districts, found that two-thirds of GOP voters there still strongly approve of Trump. These Trump loyalists are also among the most likely to say theyre very interested in the 2022 elections at this point. And in a CNN/SSRS poll from April, 70 percent of Republican respondents said Biden did not legitimately get enough votes to win the presidency. Faced with all this, any attempt to purge Trumpian influence from the party outright is doomed.

While the electoral incentives for the party overall are to unify and look forward before the 2022 midterms, the incentives for individual politicians can be different. Josh Mandel, a candidate in whats likely to be a fiercely contested US Senate GOP primary in Ohio, recently told a crowd that the election was stolen from Donald Trump. He added: My squishy establishment opponents in this race wont say those words. But I will.

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Donald Trump And The Politics Of Fear

Trumps candidacy relies on the power of fear. It could be the only way for him to win.

People are scared, Donald Trump said recently, and he was not wrong.

Fear is in the air, and fear is surging. Americans are more afraid today than they have been in a long time: Polls show majorities of Americans worried about being victims of terrorism and crime, numbers that have surged over the past year to highs not seen for more than a decade. Every week seems to bring a new large- or small-scale terrorist attack, at home or abroad. Mass shootings form a constant drumbeat. Protests have shut down large cities repeatedly, and some have turned violent. Overall crime rates may be down, but a sense of disorder is constant.

Fear pervades Americans livesand American politics. Trump is a master of fear, invoking it in concrete and abstract ways, summoning and validating it. More than most politicians, he grasps and channels the fear coursing through the electorate. And if Trump still stands a chance to win in November, fear could be the key.

Fear and anger are often cited in tandem as the sources of Trumps particular political appeal, so frequently paired that they become a refrain: fear and anger, anger and fear. But fear is not the same as anger; it is a unique political force. Its ebbs and flows through American political history have pulled on elections, reordering and destabilizing the electoral landscape.

Senior Republicans Should Recoil In Horror At Trump But Too Many Still Fear Him

The fate of the United States now rests on the stark choice the divided party faces: Trumps way or democracy

Surely this would be the moment. Surely the sight of a horde storming the US Capitol, smashing windows and breaking down doors, determined to use brute, mob strength to overturn a free and fair election, surely that would mark the red line. After five years dismissing those who warned that Donald Trump posed a clear and present danger to US democracy, branding them hysterics suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome, surely this moment when they saw the citadel of that democracy overrun by men clothed in the slogans of neo-Nazism , waving the Confederate flag of slavery, racism and treason and carrying zip ties, apparently to bind the wrists and ankles of any hostages would, at long last, make Republicans recoil from the man who had led them to this horror.

Hours into the attempted and planned insurrection, Trump again made plain the bonds that connect him to the men of havoc. We love you, he told them in a video message, gently suggesting they go home. Youre very special. None of that is a surprise. They were only there for him, summoned to Washington by Trumps big lie that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen through fraud that they had been robbed of their champion by a wicked conspiracy that took in everyone from the Chinese Communist party to his own vice-president.

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist

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John Kasich Says Republicans Are ‘afraid’ Of Trump

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Former Ohio Gov. John Kasich speaks with NPR’s Leila Fadel about the GOP’s unwillingness to stand up to President Trump, who still refuses to accept the results of the presidential election.

LEILA FADEL, HOST:

Last night, President Trump received another loss in court. A federal judge in Pennsylvania dismissed the campaign’s attempts to stop the certification of Pennsylvania’s votes. This is just the latest of more than two dozen failed challenges brought by the Trump campaign to overturn the election results. President Trump refuses to concede, and for the most part, his party has supported his efforts to pursue legal challenges based on false allegations of widespread voter fraud.

Very few high-profile Republicans have publicly acknowledged Joe Biden as the winner, but one of them is John Kasich. He’s the former governor of Ohio and a 2016 Republican presidential candidate, and he joins us now.

Governor Kasich, welcome.

JOHN KASICH: Thanks, Leila. Glad to be with you.

FADEL: So you endorsed President-elect Joe Biden. He won this election. What do you make of President Trump’s attempts to overturn the results?

KASICH: It’s just absurd. The whole thing is – it’s just – it’s ridiculous. I mean, he has clearly won this election. And it is just sort of amazing to me that Republicans just keep sitting on their hands. It makes no sense.

FADEL: That was the former Republican governor of Ohio, John Kasich.

Governor Kasich, thanks for speaking with us.

This Next Presidential Nomination Could Improve Things Or Make Them Even Worse

Is there a way out of this downward spiral? The optimistic case offered by Republicans who dislike the trends toward conspiracism in the party is pretty simple: They want to hang on and deal with Trump until 2024, and hope whoever wins the nomination will help steer the party in a healthy direction.

The Washington Examiners Byron York laid out this line of thinking in a recent column. There is a robust field of Republicans preparing to run. DeSantis, Pompeo, Pence, Haley, Cotton, Hawley, Noem, and several other possible candidates, York writes. Put them together and that is a strong group of contenders, all of whom will run on some theme of incorporating Trumps achievements into a new kind of Republican platform.

Theres variation among these Republicans about just how indulgent they were to Trumps stolen election claims Hawley was clearly the least responsible of that bunch. But most of the others indeed seem unlikely to push things anywhere near as far as Trump would if they end up losing the 2024 general election. And while they may have their faults, they seem unlikely to make conspiratorial thinking as central to their politics as Trump did.

The more unsavory tendencies in the Republican base surely wont vanish entirely if a more traditional Republican wins. But if the leader of the party stops throwing fuel on that fire, their influence would likely weaken.

Also Check: Are There Any Republicans Running For President Other Than Trump

What Are Republicans So Afraid Of

Instead of conspiracy-mongering about an election they did well in, they could try to win real majorities.

By Jamelle Bouie

Opinion Columnist

There was a time, in recent memory, when the Republican Party both believed it could win a national majority and actively worked to build one.

Take the last Republican president before Donald Trump, George W. Bush. His chief political adviser, Karl Rove, envisioned a durable Republican majority, if not a permanent one. And Bush would try to make this a reality.

To appeal to moderate suburban voters, Bush would make education a priority and promise a compassionate conservatism. To strengthen the partys hold on white evangelicals, Bush emphasized his Christianity and worked to polarize the country over abortion, same-sex marriage and other questions of sexual ethics and morality. Bush courted Black and Hispanic voters with the promise of homeownership and signed a giveaway to seniors in the form of the Medicare prescription drug benefit. He also made it a point to have a diverse cabinet, elevating figures like Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and Alberto Gonzales.

Whether shrewd or misguided, cynical or sincere or outright cruel and divisive these gambits were each part of an effort to expand the Republican coalition as far as it could go without abandoning Reaganite conservatism itself. It was the work of a self-assured political movement, confident that it could secure a position as the nations de facto governing party.

Why Dont Republicans Stand Up To Trump Heres The Answer

Why Are Republicans So Afraid Of Lev Parnas? | Velshi & Ruhle | MSNBC

Rep. Mark Sanford

If youre still flummoxed by the abject servility of congressional Republicans, by their refusal to confront Trump and stand up for American values, check out last nights primary election in South Carolina. The purging of Mark Sanford says it all.

Sanford is a long-serving conservative lawmaker who typically votes with his party, but on a few public occasions, he has actually dared to suggest that Trump is not the supreme very stable genius that the deluded Republican base deems Trump to be. The result: Sanford loses his job.

For the inexcusable sin of speaking his mind about factual reality, the Republican base voters in Sanfords House district threw him out last night, handing the GOP nomination to a far-right Trumper who repeatedly denounced Sanford as disloyal.

This is why rank-and-file Republican lawmakers refuse to speak out. Theyre afraid of their own constituents. Its Trumps party now, and the constituents in red districts virtually worship the guy. Forget about putting country over party, because its actually worse than that. Sanfords colleagues wont put country over career. Theyll vow that what just happened to Sanford will not happen to them.

As conservative commentator Erick Erickson said today, Mark Sanford losing in South Carolina is pretty much proof positive that the GOP is not really a conservative party that cares about limited government. It is now fully a cult of personality.

I stand by every word.

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