# Stupid Republican idea of the day **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 26, 2009, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897 "2009-03-26T18:48:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1461
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29202 "2016-05-19T20:36:01Z")
> [@Mollie\_Magill](#): > > Not necessarily - The first half of the twentieth was pretty good, too. Not beginning with Harding, it wasn’t. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29203 "2016-05-19T20:37:08Z")
We’re proud to discriminate. [Amid shouts of ‘shame,’ House GOP defeats gay rights measure](http://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2016-05-19/amid-shouts-of-shame-house-gop-defeats-gay-rights-measure) > [@](#): > > Democrats shouted “Shame! Shame!,” but seven Republicans switched their votes under pressure from House leaders Thursday and defeated a measure to protect gay rights. Loving the Constitution is easy. Following it is _hard_. Of course, they’ve had lots of practice with the Bible. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29204 "2016-05-19T21:08:47Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Not beginning with Harding, it wasn’t. Yeah, but Hoover: he was a tad ignorant and ill-informed, but he was not a derprecable asshole like those of the last forty-odd years. I mean, these guys even make Noxin look decent. If that is not scary, I must not know what is. ---
**Author:** ![Yask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/eb9ed0/32.png) [@Yask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yask)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29205 "2016-05-19T22:14:46Z")
> [@Gorsnak](#): > > Well that’s just plumb crazy. ISWYDT In terms of setting the standard for ignorance in office, why has no one brought up Iran Contra? The small potatoes issues that have been brought up (he didn’t check in on how the web rollout was going? Really?) absolutely pale in comparison to what that jellybean-addled icon of the Right claimed to be ignorant of. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29206 "2016-05-19T22:32:12Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > We’re proud to discriminate. > [Amid shouts of ‘shame,’ House GOP defeats gay rights measure](http://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2016-05-19/amid-shouts-of-shame-house-gop-defeats-gay-rights-measure) The real gem here came from Speaker Paul Ryan. Even though the amendment to a defense-spending bill was to cut off federal tax dollars to federal contractors who discriminate against LGBT workers, he knee-jerked: [QUOTE=Rep. Paul Ryan (R)] “The states should do this. The federal government shouldn’t stick its nose in this business.” [/QUOTE] 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29207 "2016-05-19T23:56:40Z")
Pat McCrory’s [latest attempt to dodge the bathroom-bill shitstorm](http://time.com/4341150/north-carolina-transgender-bathrooms-governor-pat-mccrory): > [@](#): > > North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory, under fire for signing into law a bill that forces transgender residents to use the bathroom that corresponds to their sex at birth, is blaming Congress for not updating the nation’s civil rights laws… It’s not _me_; it’s all those _other_ Republicans! ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29208 "2016-05-20T00:18:43Z")
How confusing. It’s like he’s wanting the Federal government to MAKE North Carolina stop discriminating, because they can’t help themselves. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29209 "2016-05-20T00:29:09Z")
He saw that documentary about how the FBI crushed the Klan. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29210 "2016-05-20T03:01:54Z")
> [@Bridget\_Burke](#): > > Yeah, and Teddy Roosevelt was OK. > > Even I remember when Republicans were old guys with too much money–not nutcases. Teddy was \*kind \*of a nutcase, though ;). ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29211 "2016-05-20T03:36:30Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > Teddy was \*kind \*of a nutcase, though ;). Yes, but he was the _good_ kind of nuts – kind of how like Batman is arguably just as crazy as the Joker, but channels it in a less destructive direction. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29212 "2016-05-20T03:37:08Z")
Totally nuts, but his daughter was The Fun Crowd. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29213 "2016-05-20T03:52:29Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > Totally nuts, but his daughter was The Fun Crowd. Oh, yeah. Alice was a hoot. “How can they tell?” Wasn’t she also the one who said that her father had to be the bride at every wedding and the corpse at every funeral? ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29214 "2016-05-20T04:11:02Z")
[Trump’s Maryland delegate indicted on child porn charges](http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/md-trump-delegate-indicted-child-pornography-weapons-charges). And also illegal possession of a machine gun and the illegal transportation of explosives. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29215 "2016-05-20T04:14:58Z")
> [@Superdude](#): > > [Trump’s Maryland delegate indicted on child porn charges](http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/md-trump-delegate-indicted-child-pornography-weapons-charges). And also illegal possession of a machine gun and the illegal transportation of explosives. Another “best people” bites the dust. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29216 "2016-05-20T04:32:33Z")
> [@Superdude](#): > > [Trump’s Maryland delegate indicted on child porn charges](http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/md-trump-delegate-indicted-child-pornography-weapons-charges). And also illegal possession of a machine gun and the illegal transportation of explosives. Isn’t this Trump’s constituency? ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29217 "2016-05-20T04:59:29Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > \But he doesn’t talk the language of incompetence that Obama is so fluent in. In Donald Trump’s world, “I don’t know” subjects one to ridicule and makes people stop taking you seriously. The only exception is if “I don’t know” is followed directly by “I’ll find out”. \ > [@Donald Trump](#): > > “I don’t know anything about what you’re even talking about with white supremacy or white supremacists,” he said. “So I don’t know. I don’t know – did he endorse me, or what’s going on? Because I know nothing about David Duke; I know nothing about white supremacists.” From [here](http://www.cnn.com/2016/02/28/politics/donald-trump-white-supremacists/). ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29218 "2016-05-20T06:08:37Z")
> [@Steve\_MB](#): > > Pat McCrory’s [latest attempt to dodge the bathroom-bill shitstorm](http://time.com/4341150/north-carolina-transgender-bathrooms-governor-pat-mccrory) Somehow, “shitstorm” seems like just the right word in the right place here. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29219 "2016-05-20T06:10:12Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > Totally nuts, but his daughter was The Fun Crowd. On the other hand, his grandson was [an utter fuck-up](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kermit_Roosevelt%2C_Jr.#Role_in_Operation_Ajax) whose work could arguably be a major origin of more than six decades ME nastiness. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29220 "2016-05-20T06:43:15Z")
> [@Yask](#): > > In terms of setting the standard for ignorance in office, why has no one brought up Iran Contra? The small potatoes issues that have been brought up (he didn’t check in on how the web rollout was going? Really?) absolutely pale in comparison to what that jellybean-addled icon of the Right claimed to be ignorant of. Ronald Reagan was the true fifth Ulul Azmi, successor to Noah, Abraham and Moses; he inspired America and the World. Asking him to micromanage foreign policy would be like blaming your leaky faucet on Jesus Christ. B. Hussein Obama, OTOH, is an Islamist supporter with a Messiah complex. His claims of ignorance are _simultaneously_ the despicable prevarications of a clever and evil disciple of the Devil, _and_ proof that his miscegenated genes gave him a sub-Neanderthal IQ. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2016, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897/29221 "2016-05-20T07:21:25Z")
> [@Yask](#): > > In terms of setting the standard for ignorance in office, why has no one brought up Iran Contra? Pssst: post #29179. And on a lesser scale, but still way higher up on the ignorance-meter than any of the faux Obama “scandals”, how about [this one](https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1310&dat=19880414&id=trRVAAAAIBAJ&sjid=teEDAAAAIBAJ&pg=6930,3125210&hl=en) from 1988? > [@](#): > > **Reagan “was not aware” of Speakes’ fake quotes** > > President Reagan said Wednesday that he did not learn until recently that his former spokesman, Larry Speakes, had put words in his mouth on at least two occasions while briefing reporters on presidential meetings. […] > > Speakes says […] that he once attributed remarks made by Secretary of State George Shultz to the president and once collaborated with an aide in making up quotes which he then credited to Reagan. In fact, during Reagan’s presidency he was frequently described as having a “disengaged” approach to administration (which the writer Calvin Trillin lampooned with a story about Reagan’s doing some exercises with his “disengagedbells” while waiting for a meal to be sent up by the “disengagedwaiter”). As [this article](http://www.salon.com/2015/12/27/behind_the_ronald_reagan_myth_no_one_had_ever_entered_the_white_house_so_grossly_ill_informed_2/) remarks: > [@](#): > > No one had ever entered the White House so grossly ill informed. At presidential news conferences, especially in his first year, Ronald Reagan embarrassed himself. On one occasion, asked why he advocated putting missiles in vulnerable places, he responded, his face registering bewilderment, “I don’t know but what maybe you haven’t gotten into the area that I’m going to turn over to the secretary of defense.” Frequently, he knew nothing about events that had been headlined in the morning newspaper. […] > > To be sure, his detractors sometimes exaggerated his ignorance. The publication of his radio addresses of the 1950s revealed a considerable command of facts, though in a narrow range. But nothing suggested profundity. […] > > In all fields of public affairs—from diplomacy to the economy—the president stunned Washington policymakers by how little basic information he commanded. His mind, said the well-disposed Peggy Noonan, was “barren terrain.” Speaking of one far-ranging discussion on the MX missile, the Indiana congressman Lee Hamilton, an authority on national defense, reported, “Reagan’s only contribution throughout the entire hour and a half was to interrupt somewhere at midpoint to tell us he’d watched a movie the night before, and he gave us the plot from War Games.” The president “cut ribbons and made speeches. He did these things beautifully,” Congressman Jim Wright of Texas acknowledged. “But he never knew frijoles from pralines about the substantive facts of issues.” […] > > No Democratic adversary would ever constitute as great a peril to the president’s political future, his advisers concluded, as Reagan did himself. Therefore, they protected him by severely restricting situations where he might blurt out a fantasy. His staff, one study reported, wrapped him “in excelsior,” while “keeping the press at shouting distance or beyond.” In his first year as president, he held only six news conferences—fewest ever in the modern era. Aides also prepared scores of cue cards, so that he would know how to greet visitors and respond to interviewers. His secretary of the treasury and later chief of staff said of the president: “Every moment of every public appearance was scheduled, every word scripted, every place where Reagan was expected to stand was chalked with toe marks.” Those manipulations, he added, seemed customary to Reagan, for “he had been learning his lines, composing his facial expressions, hitting his toe marks for half a century.” Each night, before turning in, he took comfort in a shooting schedule for the next day’s television- focused events that was laid out for him at his bedside, just as it had been in Hollywood. […] > > His team devised ingenious ways to get him to pay attention. Aware that he was obsessed with movies, his national security adviser had the CIA put together a film on world leaders the president was scheduled to encounter. His defense secretary stooped lower. He got Reagan to sign off on production of the MX missile by showing him a cartoon. Once again, the president made a joke of his lack of involvement: “It’s true that hard work never killed anybody, but why take a chance?” Cannon, who had observed him closely for years and with considerable admiration, took his lapses more seriously. “Seen either in military or economic terms,” he concluded, “the nation paid a high price for a president who skimped on preparation, avoided complexities and news conferences and depended far too heavily on anecdotes, charts, graphics and cartoons.” > > Subordinates also found Reagan to be an exasperatingly disengaged administrator. [_There’s that word again._] “Trying to forge policy,” said George Shultz, his longest- serving secretary of state, was “like walking through a swamp.” […] Numbers of observers contended that Reagan conducted himself not as a ruler but as a ceremonial monarch. […] As a consequence, a Republican senator went so far as to say: “With Ronald Reagan, no one is there. The sad fact is that we don’t have a president.” And the same people who ardently admire that guy try to smear _Obama_ as clueless or ignorant? It is to laugh. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897.md?page=1460) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-republican-idea-of-the-day/490897.md?page=1462)