Wow. Ezekiel is not pulling punches. See the recent posts here and here. The posts paint the modern Republican Party as Satanists doing the Devil’s work. Deliberate evil.
Look, I half agree. No, I don’t think Republicans are literally Satanists. I don’t think they worship Old Scratch. First, because they’re too self-centered to worship anyone outside their party. And second, they’re just not morally centered enough to worship any one thing that deeply. But you want to bet they could stage a hell of a dark mass?
But yes, the work of the Republican party has become deliberate evil divorced from consequence. That’s the horrible part. They are routinely hurting people in exchange for campaign donations, and they get away with it. Every. Single. Fucking. Time.
I just saw this one. Did you know that the State Department Inspector General just vindicated the six Voice of America (VOA) whistleblowers wrongly targeted by the Trump administration? Trump installed Michael Pack, a fantastically scandal-ridden sycophant, as head of the VOA. Pack fired the network chiefs, top editors, and prominent journalists and replaced them with unqualified hacks. Mr. Pack even pulled the career employees’ security clearances, making them effectively unemployable in the federal government.
They were completely innocent. The State Department Inspector General just issued their findings, cleared them all.
The employees — senior executive service executives of the U.S. Agency for Global Media — had been among those deemed not sufficiently loyal by Michael Pack, Mr. Trump’s controversial choice to head the agency that manages VOA and four other international networks. Mr. Pack, a conservative filmmaker who was recommended for the job by alt-right propagandist Stephen K. Bannon, took office in June 2020 and immediately began dismantling and remaking the agency. An institution long respected worldwide as a source of independent news for foreign audiences was fast on its way to becoming just another vehicle for shilling Mr. Trump.
Washington Post, July 13, 2021, Opinion: The Voice of America whistleblowers have been vindicated.
Mr. Pack’s actions also put foreign VOA reporters in harm’s way.
The reports also detail how staff pushed back against Trump-appointed management after Pack refused to sign off on J-1 visas needed by foreign journalists working for VOA. That includes a China-based reporter who had recently had his life threatened and whose visa had already been approved by the State Department.
The Hill, July 8, 2021, Trump appointee erred in firing Voice of America whistleblowers: watchdog.
Keeping them safe should have been pro forma, but not for little Marky. He just refused to sign their Visas. He’s the image of Republican deliberate evil.
In just his six months in office, Mr. Pack was the subject of more than 30 whistleblower complaints, thumbed his nose at congressional oversight and was found both by a federal judge and the Office of Special Counsel to have acted improperly or illegally.
Washington Post, July 13, 2021, Opinion: The Voice of America whistleblowers have been vindicated.
Pack, a longtime conservative filmmaker, spent $2 million in government funds to investigate journalists employed through USAGM.
In the final weeks of the Trump administration, the District of Columbia’s attorney general accused Pack of funneling more than $4 million to his documentary company through a nonprofit he also runs.
The Hill, July 8, 2021, Trump appointee erred in firing Voice of America whistleblowers: watchdog.
And what’s happened to Michael Pack since then? I expect he’s living fat and happy. No skin off his nose. He’s a wealthy, connected White Republican, after all. Just like all those other criminals. All the Trump people were horrible; each one is the Republican Party writ small: petty, ignorant, and vicious. It’s who they are.
Will they do it again? When Republicans hold office in the future, will they break laws and harm innocent people for their personal advantage? Because they’ll be back in power at some point.
Yes, of course. Republicans will do the same vile, nasty stuff in the same way, just harder and worse. Why change what worked so well the last time?
I disagree that the GOP serves the… well, the Dark Lord. But are their actions deliberate evil?
Well, yeah. Everyone can see that.
