We interrupt the booming economy and Iranian uprising for some urgent Bannon gossip

We interrupt the booming economy and Iranian uprising for some urgent Bannon gossip
CPAC 2017. (Image: Screen grab of NewsHunter29 video, YouTube)

Is anyone else at the point where you know it won’t pay to pursue the mainstream media’s Distracter of the Day any further, and you’re just not going to?

Maybe, if the MSM reported that there actually was a nuclear weapon launched from Commie Jackwagonistan, it would be worth a quick fact check.

But short of that, there seems to be less and less reason to give my precious time to some theme being flogged about (combine two or more):

Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?

(1)  Insanity

(2)  Offensive comments

(3)  OMG Trump

(4)  OMG Trump voters

(5)  Racism

(6)  Islamophobia

(7)  Republicans

(8)  Haters

(9)  Fake news

(10) Men

(11) White men

(12) White privilege

(13) White box trucks

(14) Cis-anything

(15) Fascism

(16) How everything is like Hitler

(17) How everything is like Nazis

(18) How everybody hates us now

(19) How nobody likes us anymore

(20) Russia

(21) Russia Russia Russia

(22) OMG whatever I mean seriously AAAARRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

You pick which ones you think go with the exciting new theme that Steve Bannon said awful things about Trump, and Trump said awful things back.

Look, I don’t know why Bannon seems to be burning bridges with Trump.  I don’t know if Bannon is burning bridges, for that matter.  (Some diehard defenders are saying he’s being taken out of context, at least going by their tweets.  Which is all I have to go on; you have to haunt Twitter right now to have some idea what’s really happening in Iran.)

Maybe Trump indeed perceives Bannon as burning bridges, and has responded accordingly, in his own special way.

For the record, whatever is going on with Bannon, the reality of political concerns and beliefs among the people he’s been a nominal leader for over the last year hasn’t gone away.  I do think, however, that the December Trump just had went a substantial way toward reconciling many of those folks to Trump.

I also assume there’s a misrepresentation factor, to a greater or lesser extent, with the MSM’s depiction of “what Bannon is doing.”  That assumption will be 100% valid nine times out of ten, and still valid but less than 200-proof the tenth time, whether you check out any specific instance or not.  So there’s that.  I’m not jumping on any bandwagons either way.

Also for the record, I assume this isn’t “the Republicans, conservatives, Trumpistas, or a pack of zoo animals in red hats tearing themselves apart.”  That’s the shallowest possible analysis.  The social, political, and geopolitical developments in our world are fundamental – in Dmitry Medvedev’s word, tectonic – and can’t be reduced to personalities or in-crowd ankle-kicking.

In fact, I think most people intuitively know that.  The reality that we’re in a time we can’t back out of (i.e., and “get back to normal,” whatever that means to a given person) is getting harder to pretend against.  That’s frightening and disorienting for a lot of people, and joking aside, we ought to feel for them and be gentle with them.

But baiting them with gossip into Two-Minute Hate sessions isn’t the way to do that.  So I, for one, am rejecting this whole Bannon-Trump Theme of the Day out of hand, and posting on it solely for click-bait (while my colleague Howard Portnoy is on assignment).

Good click-bait being nothing without a questionnaire, here’s one for you.  Choose one:

(A) I tend to side with Trump on this.

(B) I tend to side with Bannon on this.

(C) I four-fourths don’t give a half-full 8-ounce jar of crusty navel lint about Steve Bannon.

(D) I don’t take my thinking cues from the mainstream media.  At all.

J.E. Dyer

J.E. Dyer

J.E. Dyer is a retired Naval Intelligence officer who lives in Southern California, blogging as The Optimistic Conservative for domestic tranquility and world peace. Her articles have appeared at Hot Air, Commentary’s Contentions, Patheos, The Daily Caller, The Jewish Press, and The Weekly Standard.

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