... The Democratic Party gave up its participation in this [Iowa caucus] goat-roping. There was much weeping and rending of garments over this, mostly from people who believe that a quadrennial trip to the cornfields is just too fcking adorable. But a barely organized gathering of god-bothering white hayshakers has as much to do with the modern Democratic Party as it does with Luxembourg’s Chamber of Deputies. [snip]A most unrepresentative state -- caucusing, overwhelmingly rural, white, and god-bothering -- Iowa is best left to
The Democrats, who don’t have a real nomination fight anyway, sensibly decided to kick off with four straight primaries in New Hampshire, South Carolina, Nevada, and Michigan. New Hampshire helps them maintain the quaint, and the other three are states vital to the general election. They even got the Nevada Democrats to abandon the caucus process for a primary. There is no Democratic caucus event until March 12, and that one is in the Northern Marianas Islands. Iowa is buried in the chaos of Super Tuesday on March 5, and it’s a mail-in vote. Which is pretty much where it belongs.
Iowa never had a firm grip on its pride of place. It jumped ahead of New Hampshire in 1972, but nobody thought much of the Iowa caucuses until 1976, when a win there gave the longshot candidacy of Jimmy Carter its first real boost. Still, most of the kickoff attention remained focused on New Hampshire’s primary, which established its reputation at least as far back as 1960. But the facts on the ground were changing in Iowa. The rise of activist conservative religion changed the landscape first of the Iowa Republican Party, and then of the politics of the entire state. The first inkling of what was to come came in 1988, when crackpot preacher Pat Robertson took a strong second behind Robert Dole in the GOP caucuses. As Iowa slid faster and faster toward its personal Lord and Savior, it became less and less relevant to the Democratic Party until its banjaxed 2020 process finally exhausted the party’s patience. So the Democrats left the state to Jesus—and, to the weather...
... For years, White conservative evangelicals have played a crucial role in determining who wins the Republican caucuses that kick off the nominating process. And this year, they are showing strong support for Trump, according to interviews with Republican voters, strategists and Christian leaders across the state. The decision in some ways reflects a shift from the kind of late-breaking underdog candidates they have embraced in the past, who had deeper roots in Christian churches, and Trump’s enduring dominance across much of the GOP spectrum.
In several ways, Trump is an unlikely hero for those who identify as deeply religious Christians given his history of committing adultery, promoting falsehoods, and uttering vulgar comments and insults about women and people who cross him. But many have overlooked these indiscretions and questionable morals.
“The support has gone from begrudging to enthusiastic. Many evangelicals now see Trump as their champion and defender — perhaps even savior,” said Barry Hankins, a history professor at Baylor University who is an expert in evangelicalism. “Unwittingly, in my view, many evangelicals are welcoming authoritarianism and courting blasphemy.” [snip]
Standing outside a commit-to-caucus rally in Clinton, Iowa, recently, Paul Figie, a pastor and a Trump caucus captain, said Trump is “ordained by God.” He pointed to how he has seen Trump as being mistreated by the justice system and Democrats, equating the former president to a martyr. He dismissed the viability of other candidates, saying he was convinced that a higher power would put Trump back in office.
“Trump is the guy to be in there, and amen,” he said...
"Screw you and amen, you clueless, Bible-banging hypocrite," we said. They cloak their fascist politics of aggrievement in a veneer of religiosity. There's no better example of a waste of time than dealing with these damaged slugs.
Sophia Danner-Okotie’s has ambitious plans for her Nigerian-inspired clothing line but a sense of dread has punctured her optimism as she watches a legal battle being waged against a small venture capital firm that has provided funding instrumental to her boutique brand’s growth.
The case against the Fearless Fund alleges that one of its grant programs discriminates against non-Black women and asks the courts to imagine a similar program designed only for white applicants. It is among a growing list of lawsuits against corporate diversity and inclusion programs that are making their way through the courts this year.
Most have been filed by conservative activists encouraged by the Supreme Court’s June ruling ending affirmative action in college admissions and are now seeking to set a similar precedent in the working world.
The battle has been a roller coaster of setbacks and victories for both sides, but some companies are already retooling their diversity programs in the face of legal challenges, and the growing expectation that the conservative-dominated Supreme Court will eventually take up the issue.
One conservative activist, Christopher Rufo, claimed another victory this month with the resignation of Harvard’s first Black woman president, Claudine Gay, after allegations of plagiarism and a furor over her congressional testimony about antisemitism.
Rufo, who has cast Gay’s appointment to the job as the culmination of diversity and inclusion efforts that have sidelined conservative voices in higher education, vowed on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, not to “stop until we have abolished DEI ideology from every institution in America.”
Dozens of prominent companies have already been targeted, as well as a wide array of diversity initiatives, including fellowships, hiring goals, anti-bias training and contract programs for minority or women-owned businesses.
Some challenges have focused on policies adopted after the 2020 protests over George Floyd’s killing by police as companies pledged more efforts to redress racial inequalities in the workplace. But others have targeted decades-old diversity programs that anti-affirmative action advocates have long tried to dismantle...
The white nationalist scumbag Rufo and fellow racists like Stephen Miller are driving forces behind these legal intimidation tactics -- which, sadly, seem to be working. We're expecting that eventually the same Republican Supreme Court that declared that racism was over in the United States in Shelby and the Students for Fair Admissions cases should be favorably disposed to the Rufo/ Miller arguments.
