Tuesday, July 19, 2016

The Weaponization of Grief

John Cassidy, no friend to Republicans, writes in New Yorker about the first night of the Republican Convention in Cleveland. I called him "no friend" but he does a reasonable job of summarizing the proceedings, except for Melania's speech at the end (perhaps he left early?).

I particularly enjoyed a quote he picked up from MSNBC commentator Steve Schmidt who characterized the proceedings:
What we’re seeing tonight is the weaponization of grief.
That's brilliant phrase-making, and relatively accurate as well. On the other hand I resented the incompleteness of a comment by Avik Roy, who worked for Marco Rubio:
Summary of #RNCinCLE Day 1: Brown people are making America less safe.
And exactly what color did Roy think Mrs Mendoza's and Mr. Shaw's dead sons were, if not "brown"? Here Cassidy's bias shows.