When bloviators ask questions

Recently, John Oliver did a great critique of Tucker Carlson's racist message. I want to call attention to a tiny part of the segment. Often, one hears pleading questions from people who sound like they're seeking answers. Here are some examples from Tucker Carlson:  

"White nationalism. Let's be literal for a minute. What is that, exactly?"

"I don't even know what white nationalist means, and I'm not gonna go down that rabbit hole with you now."

"Why doesn't anyone ever define white supremacy? What is white supremacy? 

"Could somebody tell us in very clear language what a white supremacist is?"

The noticeable thing about these repeated questions (and what accounts for their endless repetition) is that the person asking the question really has no desire for an answer to his question. Otherwise, he'd never need to ask it again.

The way to handle these people is to call attention to that very fact. "You ask that question in a way that makes it apparent that you don't want an answer."

Motes and beams

 The right-wing types who get their information from, or even populate, Fox News, have a predilection and a well-developed ability to interpret the tiniest faults of their political enemies as great monstrosities. Call it making mountains out of molehills, but it's even worse than that.

Did someone send them a Happy Holidays or a Seasons Greetings card at Christmas? That is another salvo in the War on Christmas (and, indeed, on the persecuted Christians).

Did some Democratic politician show up in public without his or her American flag pin? A sure sign of loyalty to some other country or alien political or economic system.

Did Barack and Michelle Obama exchange a celebratory fist bump? No. It was a terrorist fist jab.

Did Barack Obama wear a tan suit? Well, I don't know what the hell that's evidence of. One never heard any complaints about Ronald Reagan's multifaceted wardrobe.

In any case, the reason I rehash all of this is that I wondered whether after four years of Trump's attacks on democracy, women, immigrants (both legal and illegal), and anybody who was disloyal even once; his incitements to political violence; his obvious ignorance, laziness, and incompetence at his job; his incessant lying... and whatever other components of the vomitus he left in the public square that I have not included, Democrats might have gained some immunity from Republican nitpicking.

Well, I didn't really wonder. I knew that this particular bit of right-wing behavior wouldn't change. One reason is that, for all their magnification of perceived imperfections in Democratic behavior, they could not detect in Donald Trump's behavior any flaw at all. Indeed, when I trotted out a dozen or so of Trump's most egregiously offensive statements, a right-wing acquaintance of mine said, basically, Oh, come on! Everybody in public life occasionally says things that put them in a bad light!

A bad light, indeed. I'm afraid that pointing out the orders of magnitude of the difference between Trump's sins and those of just about any other politician from either party is a losing game. Indeed, this magnification of microscopic faults seems to be the only weapon left for a party that has no positive ideas of its own.