Brittney Griner Is A Black Lesbian, So OF COURSE She Hates America...and Freedom
Jesus, could Tucker Carlson possibly be a bigger asshole?
“[T]he Biden administration chose Brittney Griner over Paul Whelan” - so sayeth Tucker Carlson
Jesus, is there nothing the Right-wing (lack of) intelligentsia won’t try to gin up into a controversy? Even where none exists? And they know it? People like Tucker Carlson are working 24/7/365 to find something they can use to embarrass Joe Biden. I’m amazed they haven’t blown an ACL.
Take Brittney Griner’s release. It was never about a choice between Griner and Paul Whelan except insofar as the State Department wanted to negotiate a deal to get both in exchange for Viktor Bout. When it became clear the Russians weren’t going to accede to releasing Whelan, it became a case of taking the deal they could get- Griner’s release- or nothing.
That wasn’t what the State Department or the White House wanted, but it was what they could get. So they swallowed their pride, accepted the deal the Russians would give them, and agreed to bring Brittney Griner home. That doesn’t mean they’re giving up on securing Whelan’s release, only that they accepted it couldn’t be done alongside Griner.
If you listened to the (lack of) intelligentsia, the Biden Administration left Paul Whelan to rot because he supported Donald Trump. Oh, and because he’s not a Black lesbian. As far as anyone can tell, though, Trump did do much of anything to secure Whelan’s release.
Let's get a couple few things clear:
If you are anything but happy about Brittney Griner being released from Russian custody, you are a sicko, a psychopath, and/or just a racist bigot who's offended a Black lesbian sportsballer is getting "special treatment" by not being forced to live out the next decade in a Russian labor camp. (Not saying you can't have other thoughts on the subject. But one of them should be, "Regardless, hooray!")
Nextly, we are pretty sure 99.9 percent of the MAGA trash claiming to have Very Serious Opinions about this did not know who the hell Paul Whelan was before yesterday morning, and they sure as hell didn't know who Viktor Bout was. These idiots whining about an arms dealer being sent back to Polonium Island didn't seem too bothered by Russian criminals when they were rubbing their Russian junk up against Donald Trump's campaign and presidency.
Yeah, most of the clowns making the most noise now almost certainly didn’t know the names of the players involved, but they certainly have a VERY SERIOUS AND IMPORTANT OPINION THAT MUST BE PAID ATTENTION TO now, eh?
They certainly loved them some Russians when Donald Trump was looting the national treasury and making off with all manner of top-secret documents, didn’t they?
One more thing: It's abundantly clear that — just as President Joe Biden explained yesterday — nobody got "skipped in line" here. Russia is the one that's arresting Americans on bullshit charges and using them as bargaining chips. Russia is accusing Paul Whelan of being a spy, therefore wants a spy for a[n accused] spy.
The two cases- Paul Whelan and Brittney Griner- were never intertwined. The particulars of their cases have nothing in common save for the fact that they’re both Americans. Whelan was arrested on trumped-up espionage charges and Griner on drug possession charges. The idea of their cases being intertwined existed only in the American media.
When Cherelle Griner spoke yesterday, she promised to keep fighting for Paul Whelan's release. David Whelan, Paul Whelan's brother, said in a statement yesterday that while the family is distraught his brother hasn't been released yet, he wanted to make one thing very clear:
"It is so important to me that it is clear that we do not begrudge Ms. Griner her freedom," David Whelan said. "As I have often remarked, Brittney's and Paul's cases were never really intertwined. It has always been a strong possibility that one might be freed without the other."
Sadly, Whelan’s family was far more gracious than most of the denizens of Bullshit Mountain (apologies to John Stewart), who felt it necessary to weigh in on the two cases. After all, they have a VERY SERIOUS AND IMPORTANT OPINION THAT MUST BE PAID ATTENTION TO, don’tchaknow?
Yes, indeed. Joe Biden left Paul Whelan behind to rot in a Russian prison because he’s not Black, a Democrat, and a lesbian. Let that be a lesson to Whelan’s family, eh?
All of these things should be more than enough reasons for MAGA trash shut its trap about subjects it knows nothing about. Especially the part where David Whelan explains that he knows that "Brittney's and Paul's cases were never intertwined."
Spoiler alert. MAGA trash did not shut its trap.
It was hard to get excited about all the garden variety MAGA trash throughout the day yesterday, though. Donald Trump Jr. desperately seeking his father's approval on Twitter by repeating his talking points? BFD. Matt Walsh being Matt Walsh? Sorry, did he take a break from endangering children's hospitals to comment on this?
Quite frankly, we knew Tucker Carlson, grand wizard of the vile fascist white scumbags, would outdo them all. He did not disappoint.
Tucker is pretty sure Joe Biden wants to force Paul Whelan to stay in Russia because he is white and not a lesbian.
Once again, the Right-wing (not so) intelligentsia has felt it necessary to wade in where they couldn’t possibly add anything of value.
Then again, when has that ever stopped talking heads like Tucker Carlson, who’s to reasoned, rational debate what Cristiano Ronaldo is to teamwork?
But let’s get back to why Mango Mussolini couldn’t secure Paul Whelan’s release. If he’s as close to Vladimir Putin as he says he is, you’d think he would’ve been able to do some horse trading with him, right? After all, wasn’t it one of Trump’s selling points when he was running for President that he was a master negotiator and deal-maker?
So why did nothing happen that would’ve resulted in the release of Whelan? Could it have been that Trump didn’t see the benefit in trying to secure his release, so he never thought it necessary to put in the effort to convince the Russians to let him go?
In such a transactional Presidency, even if Trump thought about Paul Whelan, which doesn’t seem likely, it would’ve been in terms of “What’s in it for me?”
TUCKER CARLSON: So at this point, we can assume the obvious, the Biden administration chose Brittney Griner over Paul Whelan.
See above.
The basketball player over the Marine facing 16 years. There was only room for one in the lifeboat, and the Marine got left behind.
Paul Whelan's release was never on the table here, see above.
Well, why'd they make that choice? Well, you should know that Whelan is a Trump voter and he made the mistake of saying so on social media. He's paying the price for that now.
Donald Trump didn't do fuckall to free Paul Whelan when he was president. Russia arrested Whelan while Trump was president. If Donald Trump ever even brought it up to his boyfriend Vlad ... LOL just kidding of course he didn't.
And then there’s the undeniable fact, at least according to Tucker Carlson, that Brittney Griner hates America (and freedom).
How could she not? After all, she’s Black, a Democrat, and a lesbian. That’s a trifecta of America-hating certainties! Any White Conservative Christian heterosexual knows that!
Carlson: Brittney Griner is not. She has very different politics. Brittney Griner despises the United States, she's been very vocal about that.
Yeah, about that. Griner has spoken out in favor of protests during the playing of the Star-Spangled Banner, but that hardly equates to “despising the United States.” Fox News even admitted as much in perhaps one of the most juvenile op-eds you may ever read.
(Here’s a hint to save you time and brain cells. The piece was entitled “Brittney Griner is coming home. Will she stand for the anthem now that she's back in the USA? All of America rejoices that Brittney Griner has been released from Russia. Will our national anthem have a different meaning for her now?” And yes, it reads as if a jingoistic 7th-grader wrote it.)
Carlson: She hates the country so much she doesn't want to hear its anthem.
That observation is so ridiculously ignorant it barely warrants acknowledgment, much less a comment.
By this time, most lucid observers are probably thinking, “How can anyone with a prime-time television show be so f*****g stupid?” And I’d have to admit I have no answer for you. America is one of the few places in the world you can make a seven-figure income for being an unrepentant asshole. Not IN SPITE of being an asshole, FOR being one. That’s Tucker Carlson.
Nice work if you can get it, eh?
Carlson: That's the kind of position that gets you rewarded by Joe Biden. Hate America? Perfect. We'll free the guy who sold weapons to drug cartels to get you out early. So, there's that.
Here’s the thing about negotiating, Tucker. Sometimes you must make deals you find personally distasteful to achieve the desired end. Trading Viktor Bout was not what the Biden Administration WANTED to do; it was what they HAD to do to bring Britteny Griner home. And for armchair quarterbacks like you to decide that Joe Biden DID IT WRONG is as offensive as it is profoundly ignorant, something you do exceedingly well.
At this point, Tucker played a clip of White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre explaining that the choice here was between bringing Brittney Griner home and bringing no one, and explaining that the Biden administration will never stop trying to get Paul Whelan released.
Then Jean-Pierre said Brittney Griner is a Black lesbian, said it was personal for her, and that Griner is an inspiration to LGBTQ Americans and women of color. That's what set Tucker off.
And what’s wrong with that? America is full of White Conservative Christian heterosexual males celebrating one thing or another. How often does a marginalized group like Black lesbians have something to rejoice over?
That takes nothing away from White Conservative Christian heterosexual males. And it certainly poses no threat to them.
Tucker lied directly to his dumbfuck viewers and said Jean-Pierre had said, "And by the way so am I." Jean-Pierre did not say that in the clip Tucker played. She only said "On a personal note." Regardless, any normal human being would understand that Jean-Pierre was simply saying it meant something to her as a Black lesbian, a member of two groups that have been historically oppressed and discriminated against by the Tucker Carlsons of American history.
Tucker asked his dumbfuck viewers what would have happened if Sean Spicer had said he was thrilled when straight white men got out of prison. That would have been an overtly white supremacist statement, obviously, but one of fascist white nationalist Christians' favorite tricks is to negate the lived experiences of all people who aren't white heterosexual Christian conservative men, mouthfucking that Martin Luther King Jr. quote about "content of character" and swearing that any acknowledgment of membership of a historically oppressed group is "irrelevant."
Of course, the tell was that while Tucker was swearing it shouldn't matter, swearing Brittney Griner being a Black lesbian was "irrelevant," you could see him sneering and seething and making the sideways "laughing until I'm crying" emoji in his mind.
The question reasonable people should be asking is why the release of an American unjustly held captive in Russia for nine months needs to be politicized.
(Spoiler alert: It doesn’t.)
The release of Brittney Griner is a cause for celebration. Period. End of story. There are no political points to be made and no political advantages to be mined from this story. Even Paul Whelan’s family, which was far more gracious than Tucker Carlson and the rest of the Right-wing (lack of) intelligentsia, made it clear that their brother’s case had no connection with Brittney Griner. So if they can be gracious, why can’t Tucker Carlson and the rest of the ghouls on the Far-Right?
Why must these merchants of manufactured outrage shit upon everything good and decent?
Brittney Griner is home, reunited with her wife and family. Shouldn’t that be enough?
Phucker Tiresome has got to be one of the most tediously infantile mouths-that-never-shut on TV.