Good Grief

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Tuesday, September 13, 2016
[Content Note: Bigotry; white nationalism.]

This is a real thing that happened in the world: Republican vice-presidential nominee Mike Pence, during an interview with CNN's Teddy Ruxpin Wolf Blitzer refused to say that David Duke, former grand wizard of the KKK and Trump supporter, is "deplorable."

Blitzer: All right, let's get into this whole issue that Hillary Clinton raised the other night when she spoke about the "basket of deplorables." She said that half, in her initial statement—she said this, she said: "To be grossly generalistic, you can put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables, right? Racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic—you name it." Afterwards, very quickly, within a day, she issued a statement saying she regretted saying "half." It wasn't half. I spoke to her press secretary today; I said, well, what percentage; he wouldn't give me a percentage. But she said there are supporters—and you know this—there are some supporters of Donald Trump and Mike Pence who—like David Duke, for example, and some other white nationalists—who would fit into that category of deplorables, right?

Pence: Well, as I told you the last time I was on, I'm not really sure why the media keeps dropping David Duke's name. Donald Trump has denounced David Duke repeatedly. We don't want his support, and we don't want the support of people who think like him.

Blitzer: So you call him a deplorable? You would call him that.

Pence: No. I don't—I'm not in the name-calling business, Wolf. You know me better than that. What Hillary Clinton did Friday night was shocking. I mean, the millions of people who support Donald Trump around this country are not a basket of anything. They are Americans. And they deserve the respect of the Democrat nominee for President of the United States. For her to rattle off this litany of perjoratives was just really shocking. And anyone with that low an opinion of the American people should never hold the highest office in this land.
Oh, save your sanctimonious outrage, Pence. That "litany of perjoratives" is a perfect description of the platform you've tried to legislate in Indiana, so lift yourself from the fainting couch and have a seat on the Bullshit Ottoman.


This is not an exaggeration. Mike Pence is awful for women; a disaster for LGBTQ people; terrible for refugees and immigrants. His entire tenure as Indiana's governor has been an exercise in punitive governance, absolutely horrific in every way for marginalized Hoosiers.


This guy is a cruel joke. Only Mike Pence could sit there feigning a case of the vapors about Hillary Clinton calling bigots "deplorable" like he's got the moral high ground after he won't even concede that David Duke is "deplorable."

If David Duke isn't deplorable, then who the fuck is?

Oh right. Hillary Clinton.

UPDATE: From a press conference earlier today, here is a cool video of Mike Pence, Paul Ryan, and the GOP leadership having a jolly old laugh with the media in response to a question about Ryan's reservations about his party's nominee.

As I noted at Shareblue: "It is yet another moment of clarity about the role of the press, who did not act as pursuers of truth but as wanna-be pals of the politicians they're meant to hold to account. This, as they say, is why we can't have nice things."
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