Meadows texts reveal Marjorie Taylor Greene was concocting Jan. 6 lies even as coup was underway
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We now know that Senate Minority Bleater Mitch McConnell was “exhilarated” after Jan. 6 because he thought the events of the day had finally discredited Donald Trump. But apparently he taught his Sith soldiers the dark arts of deflection and projection a little too well, because Cheesus’ most devoted disciples have since spirited him from his political tomb, replaced the nougat in his arteries with spicy McNugget sauces, refitted his brain with bionic parasites, and trundled his creaking corpus back onto the world stage like he somehow hadn’t incited a coup against the legitimate government of the United States.
Of course, resurrecting a two-time popular-vote loser makes zero sense unless your party isn’t a party so much as a cult of personality. Enter Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who prefers an evil far more chaotic and redolent of curly fries than the quotidian, pro-plutocrat variety McConnell has traditionally offered.
Based on a tranche of text messages former Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows somehow let slip through his bony Skeletor fingers and into the hands of the House select committee investigating Jan. 6, we now know that some Republicans, including Greene, were concocting an egregious lie about the Capitol insurrection even as it was underway.
At 2:28 p.m., while the insurrection was in full swing, Greene texted Meadows to say: “Please tell the President to calm people,” adding that “This isn’t the way to solve anything.” She knew the rioters were people who would listen to Trump.
But then at 3:52 p.m., Greene texted Meadows again: “Mark we don’t think these attackers are our people. We think they are antifa. Dressed like Trump supporters.” Presto, the pro-Trump insurrection became a false flag operation!Greene wasn’t the only one. Just minutes earlier, Trump adviser Jason Miller had texted Meadows to suggest that Trump should tweet that “Bad apples, likely ANTIFA or other crazed leftists” had “infiltrated” the alleged “peaceful protest” by Trump supporters.
The “it was really antifa” hypothesis is absurd on its face, of course. Why would a left-wing group attack the Capitol to disrupt the certification of an election outcome they’d welcomed? And if you want to make Trump cultists look bad, you don’t need to launch a pretend insurrection. You could just put an M&M in a box with a hole big enough for an unclenched hand to go in but too small for a fist to come out, and then watch them walk around for three weeks with a box on their arm.
Of course, Greene wasn’t the only GOP guppy who quickly floated and/or hewed to the “antifa did it” conspiracy theory. Fox News’ biggest Trump apologists, including Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity, began sowing their bogus “it was antifa” seeds before the feces on the walls of the Capitol had fully dried. And Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, proving that even failed insurrections can’t be too young for him to exploit, claimed, without evidence, that “some of the people who breached the Capitol today were not Trump supporters. They were masquerading as Trump supporters and in fact, were members of the violent terrorist group antifa.”
Putting aside for the moment the absurdity of Joe Biden’s supposed antifa supporters trying to stop the transfer of power from a wannabe fascist to, well, Joe Biden, this raises another pressing question: How does one masquerade as a Trump supporter? Sure, anyone can wear a red hat and wave a goofy-ass flag, but can a mere civilian really perfect the languorous, thousand-mile Cheez-It stare they’ve all independently mastered?
But this is the right-wing spin machine in a nutshell. Their talking points don’t need to make sense. They simply need to be repeated ad nauseam, and before long, they’re taken as gospel. Though, in this case, it is remarkable that Greene and her pals were crafting dishonest talking points even as their workplace had essentially become a Mardi Gras parade with bear spray and baseball bats instead of beads.
But that’s what happens when people follow an idol who has absolutely no shame or allegiance to the truth. They tend to act in lockstep with Dear Leader’s dictates instead of following the simple evidence of their eyes and ears. And now MTG’s first fleeting stab at a bullshit rationalization for her own tribe’s inexcusable behavior has metastasized into a monster tumor that threatens the future viability of Western democracy itself.
Not a bad day’s work for a freshman representative who, at that point, had served just three days in Congress.
Of course, it’s also possible that the antifa lie was concocted before the insurrection—by some of the coup plotters themselves. According to court documents, Proud Boys Chairman Enrique Tarrio suggested his members involved in the coming unpleasantness might consider wearing black, which could be interpreted as a ploy to make it look like a false-flag antifa operation: “We will not be wearing our traditional Black and Yellow,” Tarrio wrote. “We will be incognito and we will be spread across downtown DC in smaller teams. And who knows … we might dress in all BLACK for the occasion.”
Either way, the majority of Republicans have now chosen the word of a clammy game show host over the future health of our 246-year-old republic. They should be drummed out of polite society for doing it, but sadly, this dreadful, anti-democratic beat goes on.
What will McConnell do now? I have a feeling he’s feeling less and less “exhilarated” as this country sinks deeper into the undemocratic morass he helped create.
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