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Culture War Roundup for the week of August 26, 2024

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On the other hand, he's so out of the great white north that it seems Republicans won't come up with decent attacks before we get to November.

Stolen valor?

Vance and McCormick are running against their own achievements and their own intelligence and their own qualifications, which says something absolutely tragic about the Republican base electorate.

The people attacking Vance for his accomplishments are Democrats. Tim Walz literally said that Vance couldn't be a true country boy because he went to Yale. This is "stop hitting yourself" misdirection.

Show me the David McCormick tv spot where he mentions having a PhD in foreign relations, or running the world's largest hedge fund. If it exists, he doesn't play it during the news, jeopardy, or Phillies games in my town.

Literally an untreatable resume for a senator, and he's choosing to talk about high school wrestling.

Stolen valor

Oh God, I have to hear about it every day, how my dad can't believe how stupid it is to attack a 40 year old man for retiring from the military.

This is where I get confused about the accusations of one-sided astroturfing.

No one begrudges him retiring per se. It’s how he retired and what he said afterwards.

Tim Walz left service before his unit deployed to war, carefully timed so the official orders hadn't come through so "he didn't know". Fine, it happens. Then across a long political career he is introduced as having served in war, or makes references to carrying weapons of war, in times of war. How did everybody get the idea that Tim Walz served in war? Who told that lie to every introductory speaker for 20 years?

It might not matter to legacy media but there are people out there who care and are offended. It only makes sense to characterize Walz as a charming scandal-free puppy in a partisan media frame that ignores all such problems.