TRUMP the stupid CHUMP

from The Washington Post....

Get ready for the Trumpiest Show On Earth

By PAUL WALDMAN | 1:07PM - Thursday, July 14, 2016

The Republican National Convention venue in Cleveland, Ohio. — Photograph: Angelo Merendino/Getty Images.

IT'S being reported that Donald Trump has chosen Indiana governor Mike Pence as his running mate, and assuming the story holds up, this will be the single most boring thing Trump has done during the course of this campaign. Fortunately, the Republican convention starts next week, and Pence's appearance is unlikely to alter an event that stands to be positively historic in its chaotic splendor.

The standard complaint about contemporary political conventions is that it's just a big show for the TV cameras. Unlike in the old days, when backroom deal-making would actually determine the party's nominee, today everything is planned and scripted, little more than an elaborate display of bunting, balloons, and talking points.

Well get ready, because the Republican convention that starts on Monday is going to be the Trumpiest Show On Earth. We're now learning about the speakers, about the themes of each night, about the platform to which this party is pledging its allegiance, and about the chaos likely to ensue outside the hall. Equal parts entertaining and horrifying, the GOP gathering will probably get some of the highest TV ratings in history as Americans tune in to witness the political equivalent of a 747 crashing into a freight train full of toxic waste as it plunges off a cliff right onto a carnival freak show. It should be quite a sight.

Let's start with the speakers. While there's a long list of Republican politicians who suddenly found urgent appointments that required them to be as far from Cleveland as possible, the organizers managed to put together a fabulous lineup of electrifying orators. Aaron Blake breaks down the speakers list, but here are a few highlights:

No fewer than four Trump children, including Tiffany Trump, daughter of Marla Maples and the Zeppo of the Trump brood.

NFL washout Tim Tebow, world #484-ranked golfer Natalie Gulbis, and Ultimate Fighting Championship chief Dana White.

Tech lottery winner Peter Thiel, famous for trying to sue news organizations out of business and create offshore havens where billionaire libertarians could live outside the reach of taxes and laws.

The rabbi who converted Ivanka Trump to Judaism.

Rudy Giuliani, there to explain why black kids are a bunch of criminals who need the educational benefits that only a fusillade of bullets from police officers' guns can provide; a sheriff known for his criticism of Black Lives Matter is also on the bill.

Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, whom you might have heard of because she announced an investigation of Trump University, then four days later solicited and received an (apparently illegal) $25,000 contribution from Trump's family foundation, then promptly dropped the investigation.

A man whose son was killed by an undocumented immigrant.

A guy who owns a casino.

The guy who runs Trump's winery.

Antonio Sabato, Jr., I guess because why the hell not.

This is, to say the least, not exactly the lineup you'd put together if you were really trying to appeal to the broad electorate. It's also notable for who's missing. It wasn't long ago that the party touted its rising minority stars, a generation of charismatic young politicians of color who could change the image of the party as a bunch of angry old white guys. Officeholders like Nikki Haley, Susana Martinez, Brian Sandoval, Tim Scott, and Mia Love (and even this kid from Florida named Marco) could show American a different face of the GOP. Four years ago, all of them addressed the Republican convention that nominated Mitt Romney. But this year, not one of them is on the schedule.

And what about the themes of the convention? If you had asked a diehard liberal what Republicans would showcase, he'd have probably responded sarcastically, “I'll bet they'll do a whole night on Benghazi, then show a video attacking Bill Clinton for his affairs.”

Well guess what: the first night of the convention will revolve around Benghazi, and at some point there will be some kind of “presentation” about Bill Clinton's sexual indiscretions.

The party will be ratifying a platform that has become not just more conservative than ever before, but in an almost comical way. Among other things, it endorses a wall across our entire southern border, declares pornography a “public health crisis,” changes its previous references to “illegal immigrants” to now say “illegal aliens,” and reiterates the party's opposition to gay people being allowed to marry or adopt children, transgender people being able to use the right bathrooms, women serving in combat, any restrictions on AR-15s or large-capacity magazines, and the Soviet plot to contaminate our precious bodily fluids (okay, I'm kidding about the last one).

Meanwhile, outside the convention hall, a group called Bikers for Trump is coming en masse to start cracking skulls if they see any nogoodniks stirring up trouble. “We're anticipating a victory dance, but it sounds like there's a lot of agitators and a lot of troublemakers coming to town,” the group's leader told CNN. “You can definitely count on the Bikers for Trump standing with the police department in the event they need it.”

I'm sure the cops are glad to hear it, because if there's one thing that will keep everything calm and civil, it’s a bunch of gun-toting Trump-supporting bikers ready to throw down.

And there will be guns, because Ohio's laws allow you to carry them pretty much anywhere. People coming to the area around the convention will be barred from carrying things like canned goods, drones, and tennis balls; most fittingly, you'll be arrested if you're carrying a water pistol, but carrying an actual pistol is just fine.

If you're worried about missing out by not being there in person, you might console yourself with the fact that there's a reasonable chance that a powerful alien empire will decide to vaporize the entire Cleveland area with a death ray in order to forestall the threat this lunacy poses to the galaxy. While we hope no one actually gets killed, it's a good bet that this is going to be the most fascinating and ghastly convention in modern times. In other words, it will be a perfect reflection of the man the Republican Party has chosen to nominate.

• Paul Waldman is a contributor to The Plum Line blog, and a senior writer at The American Prospect.

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