Wayne County Madness

 

Last night, two minor-ranking Republicans tried to cancel the votes of an entire state.

Wayne County, which includes the City of Detroit, MI, was to have its votes certified by a bipartisan, four-person panel, comprised of two Republicans and two Democrats.

Despite zero evidence of voting irregularities, the two Republicans, Monica Palmer and William Hartmann, voted not to certify, deadlocking the vote at 2 - 2.

The outcry was instantaneous. On the Trumpian side, the delusionists seized this moment as some sort of confirmation of their moon-bat conspiracy theories regarding vote fraud. On the reality side, residents of Detroit were outraged that their entire voice in democracy could somehow be potentially wiped out by two, lone idiots.

Now, the likelihood that this vote would have actually negated Detroit's voice was slim, at best. Had the deadlock held, it would have gone to other legislative channels, and the certification would have taken place that way, unless Republicans found a way to thwart that process too. But the fact that the first step towards such an outcome was even taken is breathtaking!

Fortunately, those two repented. The board reconvened, the vote was taken, and the vote for Wayne County was certified by a vote of 4 - 0. Sanity prevailed.

But what a goddamned jolt!

For some time now, I've been railing against the Right Wing Media Cult. And there is little doubt that this cult, which is just as divorced from reality as creationism, flat-earthers, holocaust deniers and those who believe the moon landing was faked, has saturated nearly the entire Republican establishment.

So much so that two individuals felt their opinion should outweigh that of an entire city.

If you don't believe that this was the result of cult-driven delusion, I invite you to examine these pictures, taken from the Facebook page of William Hartmann, one of the two Republicans to initially vote against certification. These images are from 2010, and they come courtesy of Del Quentin Wilber, who took the liberty of looking them up and posting them to Twitter. His post was later echoed by The Bulwark. You can read Del's original post here. You can also find William Hartmann's Facebook page here.

Remember: The following shit came from a guy who actually managed to get himself onto a vote certification board for an entire city!

On his Facebook page, Hartmann has posted THIS high-class stuff:

Yeah. THIS guy. The guy who posted stuff like THIS. HE was one of four people in charge!

This is what we're up against. Stupidity THIS flagrant.

I'd say something like "God help us," except the Right Wing Media Cult has taken over Christianity, too.

Eric

*