Dittoheads Bring Their Private Hell to the Public

To some degree we make our own heaven or hell here on earth. I think being fearful and angry about made-up bogeymen is a form of hell. I get a taste of that hell when forcing myself to watch Fox news or listen to right wing hate radio, or listen to Papa Don, playing the role of an abusive father figure who accidentally became president - on national television and the twit machine. If you are into that sort of thing fine, live in your own private hell, it's a free country. The problem we are seeing is when your private hell starts to leak out into the real world and endanger other people's lives.

I could have made this timeline-of-shame much more detailed but this condensed version makes the point -

February 4, 2020 - Rush Limbaugh awarded "Presidential Medal of Freedom".

March 13, 2020 -  Rush Limbaugh tells his followers,"We're shutting our country down because of the cold virus."

March 27, 2020 - Rush Limbaugh tells his followers, "Health experts are part of the deep state and should not be trusted."

March 28, 2020 - CDC reports 103,319 cases of Covid-19 and 1668 deaths in the U.S. As of this evening the Washington Post is reporting over 2000 deaths in the U.S. and the CDC website has not been updated.

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Rush Limbaugh may not be accurate but he is popular and profitable. He's the most listened to radio personality in the United States. Forbes reports that he was paid 84.5 million dollars in 2018. Hannity on the other hand was paid a paltry 36 million dollars in 2018, although the article does mention that since Sean plays co-president in the reality TV show Papa Don goes to Washington, he would be negotiating for a higher salary in 2019 (or words to that effect).

We'll find out whether the propaganda, the right-wing mediasphere promotes, is able to pacify the base going forward. The billionaires who have bought politicians, judges, think tanks and media companies to do their bidding have successfully fooled enough citizens for decades to keep the pitchforks in the shed. We'll see how that goes as we feel the full force of this pandemic and enter an economic depression.

If the base ever figures out that the "richest" country in the world lags behind every other economically developed nation in health care, income equality, child care, childhood poverty, housing, education and fair elections - not because of all the pretend boogeymen that Fox News scares gram and grandpa with but primarily because of the greed of the ultra-wealthy...well we couldn't have that.

If nothing else I hope that people learn, and don't forget, the damage caused by the  incompetence and dishonesty of Donald J. Trump and his bootlickers, in the GOP and the media - come November.