Maybe because “political correctness” has too many syllables and “reverse discrimination” was too obviously ridiculous, the new term the conservative movement (with a big media assist from libertarian-ish millionaire influencers like Glenn Greenwald and Joe Rogan) have settled on is “woke.” It’s a four-letter word that conservatives and libertarians everywhere can wrap themselves in to insulate themselves from reconciling their bigoted ideas about the LGBTQ community and their terrorizing of children, their racism against non-white folks, and their misogyny against their own mothers and daughters. It is easy to spell and it is super easy to pronounce—I mean “say.” It can also be utilized to undermine any and all opposition to their policy-deficient agenda.
On Friday, Republican Rep. Jim Banks announced his plans to run in 2024 for governor of Indiana. The Republican representative from the Hoosier State is first out of the gate in a race that many believe will be filled with other conservatives. But Banks has his whole policy-absent catchall ready to go: He’s promising to form an “anti-woke caucus” in Congress just in time for him to run for election. What will this newly formed redundant Republican exercise do? Anti-woke stuff, you silly billy! At least, finding microphones into which to say anti-woke stuff.
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Along with a video announcing his candidacy for governor, Banks also published an op-ed in the fascist think tank Claremont Institute’s online magazine AmericanMind, where he mostly used the word “woke” or “wokeness” and announced his plans to fight the formless “tyranny” of government and its “most toxic part”: wokeness. If there are any delusions that Trump and his Republican brand of authoritarianism will weaken, it isn’t going to be during this congressional session.
Banks is a classic modern Republican with votes against impeaching Donald Trump, the HEROES Act, and asking that the 2020 election results be overturned by the Supreme Court. He’s been able to stay slightly under the radar with all of the national air being sucked into the soulless abysses that are Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, and Matt Gaetz. But Banks has been itching to prove how absolutely terrifying he would be as a leader in the conservative movement.
HIs campaign video highlights his service as a veteran and his reportedly working-class upbringing. It also highlights how Banks has fought against China for “for stealing our jobs and for giving us COVID.” Real global thinking here. Over the weekend, Banks went on Fox News to explain: “Most Republicans are now awakened to this fact that wokeness is weakness, it’s a cancer that is eating America from the inside-out.” He goes on to talk about “girls sports,” and you know where that’s headed.
We are “awakened” to how “wokeness is weakness.” The general tenor is that while the Republican Party tries to figure out how best to continue cutting the Social Security program, Medicare, Medicaid, and all other social safety net programs, they will continue fighting a pretend culture war with the only objective being to take civil rights from Americans.
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