In the race to the bottom of the Republican sewer, Nikki Haley is throwing elbows to stay relevant. She will not take second place to anyone in showering hate on her fellow citizens — especially if they happen to be transgender. She made that clear in an interview on Fox News Sunday. When host Mike Emanuel asked her if she was considering a presidential run in 2024, she replied,
"If there's a place for me, I look at the craziness in the world. I look at what's happening with this woke culture in our schools and wanting our kids to decide their gender. I look at the fact that we've got men playing women's sports. I look at the fact that we've got our military focused on gender pronouns classes."
"What I will tell you is we need to snap out of it. This is absolute craziness. We've got enemies trying to come after us and America has been naive, it's been weak and it's been asleep at the wheel."
[You can see the complete interview in the video below]
What has happened to this benighted woman? People do not choose their gender. They have a gender. Most of the time it is cisgender. Sometimes it is transgender. And sometimes, it is fluid, non-binary, or something else. And as for the insane claim that schools want our kids to “decide their gender”, can Haley produce evidence for that? Or has she adopted the Joe McCarthy strategy of claiming that she has proof for something that is complete fiction?
That is not the end of it. Haley cannot resist a cheap shot. Despite her claim, no men are competing in women’s sports. Yes, some women presented as male in their early years. But they were always female. I understand that some may consider a woman who grew up with testosterone to have an unfair advantage. It does challenge sports authorities to come up with the best solution.
But how many people are in this demographic? I know of one, the swimmer Lia Thomas. And while there must be others, it is hardly significant enough to make the issue your number one presidential campaign focus. Stick with taxes, regulations, the environment, foreign policy, et al. — the consequential things.
And talking about focus does Haley actually believe that the US military is doing nothing but “gender pronouns classes”. As a corporate manager, HR required me to take a seminar on recognizing and avoiding sexual abuse, unwanted touching, and unconscious sexual coercion. It took an hour and was hardly an imposition. It was thought-provoking. And I suspect that the military’s pronoun sensitivity training is no more onerous.
And as for America being naive, weak, and asleep at the wheel, where was she when the CIA killed Al Qaeda boss, Ayman al-Zawahiri, with a precision drone strike in the heart of Kabul? Has she not noticed that Russia is bleeding to death fighting an American and NATO-supplied Ukrainian force? Did it escape her attention that the Democrats passed the ‘CHIPS and Science Act’, supporting American computer chip and technology manufacturers? “The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act," the first significant gun control law in a decade. And the Senate has just sent a massively consequential climate/health/tax bill, the Inflation Reduction Act over to the House.
Meanwhile, what are the Republicans doing? Their sole policy initiatives are to ban teaching CRT in schools — which no one is teaching it in the first place — and police classrooms to ensure that there is no deviation from heterosexual orthodoxy.
The only legislative achievement of the last administration was an enormous cash giveaway to corporations and individuals already sitting on piles of money.
This weekend was not the first time Haley has shown that she is no longer the competent technocrat she was as Governor of South Carolina. Like so many other Republicans, her decline began when she embraced Trump after initially expressing doubts. Before the South Carolina presidential policy in 2016, she did not know if she would support a Republican candidate, but if she did it would not be Trump, saying he represents
"Everything a governor doesn't want in a president."
"I want someone who is going to hold Republicans accountable, and I want someone who is going to make a difference, not just for our party but for every person they represent in the country."
However, as soon as Trump got the nod, she changed her tune and tightly embraced what she had previously scorned. In 2017, he rewarded her obedience with an Ambassadorship to the UN.
She broke with Trump again when she slammed him for inciting the 1/6 insurrectionists and his election-denial rhetoric. In return, Trump turned down her request for a pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago. She supported incumbent Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) against Trump-backed challenger Katie Arington. Although, she backed the Trump candidates in other races.
It is symptomatic of her desire to be in Trump’s good graces while establishing her independence. A needle-threading exercise other 2024 Republican hopefuls are also performing.
But regardless of where she stands with Trump, she has forgotten her demand that a President represents every person in America. Instead, she has whole-heartedly embraced the base-pleasing bigotry of attacking the trans community. She has no care for whom she hurts as long as her hate propels her presidential ambitions. And as such, she is a model Republican. Her conversion to Christianity in 1997 will help as well.