More from @gregolear

Greg Olear

@gregolear

Mar 2

🧵on #Project2025

I. The “Cowboy Catholic”

Like many leaders of the reactionary right—Mike Johnson, Mike Davis, Stephen Miller, and so on—the current head of the Heritage Foundation has a dull, forgettable name: Kevin Roberts.

[THREAD]

2/ Roberts has a winsome smile, a PhD in U.S. history, a background in academia, & a well-earned reputation as a nice guy. Who could have imagined that this bright, friendly Gen Xer would be leading a Christian conservative counter-reformation—a crusade to end American democracy?

3/ In 2013, Roberts, who is Catholic, became the second president of Wyoming Catholic College, a strict, almost monastic institution est. in 2007 that provides “a rigorous immersion in...the spiritual heritage of the Catholic Church”—and that will throw you out if you hook up.

Read 28 tweets

Greg Olear

@gregolear

Feb 6

If action is character, as F. Scott Fitzgerald proposed, then it is instructive to look at the life of Tucker Swanson McNear Carlson in reverse, Benjamin Button style. . .

[THREAD]

1/ It is the night before Veteran’s Day, 2021. On his primetime Fox News program, Tucker Carlson argues that the U.S. should back Russia, and not Ukraine, in the escalating conflict between the two countries. “Why would we take Ukraine’s side and not Russia’s side?”

2/ He insists that choosing Putin’s dictatorship over Zelensky’s democracy is a no-brainer because of “energy reserves.” This is either breathtaking ignorance of the region’s history or straight-up Kremlin propaganda. Or, I suppose, both.

Read 53 tweets

Greg Olear

@gregolear

Jan 24

Should the media try to present Elise Stefanik (R-Machiavelli) as a moderate, throwback, Paul Ryan Republican and not the ruthless, power-mad opportunist in league with Dear Leader Donald that she is, please consider her career trajectory:

[THREAD]

1/
Carpetbags her way to a House seat

Sidles up to Nunes (her doppelgänger) and to Jim Jordan (which makes that hateful troll look tall)

Comes out against impeachment

2/
Usurps Liz Cheney in the GOP House leadership structure

Supports conspiracy theories about the 2020 election being stolen

Joins Ken Paxton’s treasonous lawsuit attempting to overturn the election results

Read 9 tweets

Greg Olear

@gregolear

Jul 5, 2023

Last week, Leonard Leo’s Supreme Court handed down a bevy of wretched decisions that are now the law of the land. These decisions have two things in common: All of them will cause more harm than good. And all of them are wins for Leonard Leo.

[THREAD]

2/ As many legal scholars have pointed out, the internal logic of the Leonard Leo Court is functionally nonexistent. Nothing holds. There is no rhyme or reason to these decisions.

3/ The Leonard Leo judges will dredge up some anti-witchcraft statute from medieval England, while ignoring the last 50 years of settled law in the here and now; “Starry Decisis” may as well be Sam Alito’s drag name.

Read 20 tweets

Greg Olear

@gregolear

Jun 21, 2023

#WPJWJT?

(Whose Private Jet Would Jesus Take?)

Alito's corrupt behavior is matched only by his sneering arrogance.

propublica.org/article/samuel…

@propublica

This @propublica article is something. Among the choice quotes:

"On June 9, Arkley’s group [which included Alito] chartered a boat, the Happy Hooker IV, to tour Yakutat Bay."

@propublica

@propublica Leonard Leo, a Knight of Malta-level gaslighter, called the ProPublica piece “bait for reeling in more dark money from woke billionaires who want to damage this Supreme Court..." (b/c there are SO MANY woke billionaires)

Read 5 tweets