Yesterday, VA11 Democrats held a candidates forum, and overwhelmingly it was a thoughtful, fact-and-reality-based, sane and sensible conversation on numerous important issues facing our country right now. In stark contrast, check out the VA11 *Republican* candidates forum held on June 22 (candidates: Mike Van Meter, Lucas Rand, Karina Lipsman, Sam Wong and Stewart Whitson) – see below for video and a few “highlights” (in air quotes, because…yikes, this whole thing was a doozy!). And this September 9, make sure you vote for the *Democratic* nominee in the special election to replace the late, great Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-VA11). Because…seriously, can you imagine any of these Republican being anything but a MASSIVE downgrade from Rep. Connolly???
- On Iran, one VA11 Republican candidate (Stewart Whitson) literally said “I trust President Trump, and so I trust that President Trump has intel that’s driving his decisions; I trust everything he’s done.” That alone should be disqualifying, no matter what you think about the Iran issue specifically. Total cultist if he actually trusts “everything [Trump’s] done.” Also, Whitson falsely claims that Trump “pushed diplomacy first,” when in fact Trump pulling us out of the JCPOA resulted in the path to Iran getting this far with their nuclear program in the first place.
- Asked whether there might be ANY areas of disagreement with President Trump, the candidates answered as follows: Stewart Whitson said “I cannot think of a single thing I disagree with with the president” (he also claimed the Biden administration “waged war on our country and our children” – WTF???); Karina Lipsman said she agreed with having a “smaller government,” just not the “way that it was done” by Musk/DOGE; Lucas Rand said “the theatrics that surrounded the DOGE efforts were completely uncalled for” but he does understand WHY Trump did it “as fast as we did”; Mike Van Meter said “I support and love Donald Trump and I know you do too” – also called him “transformational”; Sam Wong said “Trump inspires so many people…he’s such a hard worker…so that is the inspiration I see,” also said “I do support the DOGE.”
- On Trump’s disastrous Big UGLY Bill, the candidates were pretty much all on board, with basically all of them echoing some version of “number one, pass the one big beautiful bill.” Which, again, is not “beautiful” in any way, but is quite possibly THE ugliest, most destructive and damaging piece of legislation to EVER come before the US Congress for its consideration. This bill should, in and of itself, be automatically disqualifying for any candidate supporting it.
- Significantly, things that were NOT talked about at this forum included some of the most important, crucial issues facing our country, such as: the climate crisis, the future of our democracy and the rule of law, the massive corruption going on in the Trump administration, how to make our country BETTER – whether on healthcare, housing, education (Karina Lipsman was enthusiastic, though, about Trump getting rid of the US Dept. of Education and pushing the “Crucial Communism Teaching Act”), growing our economy, you name it…
So anyway, compare and contrast the VA11 Democratic forum – substantive, full of serious/fact-and-reality-based discussion of the issues that matter the most – and the VA11 Republican forum – basically a cult of personality centered on Donald Trump, who apparently is a perfect human being who can never do any wrong, and not appearing to care in the least bit about doing things to actually make our country a better place to live in. Finally, this is something to keep in mind the next time you see the “mainstream media” do its usual false-equivalence/”both sides” b.s. and “sanewashing” of Republicans…
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