One mistake Harris made was laughing at Trump when he made those comments. The proper response would be extreme disgust and anger.

I don’t credit the MSM for much, but they did push back forcefully at the debate on this one. Unfortunately that got buried. The debate should have ended the Trump campaign, but all the enablers rushed in to save him.

Trump repeated it in his debate with Harris, and the media just let it slide.

His base then said that ABC was giving the answers to Kamala and helping her.🤦‍♀️

Kinda reminds me of King Rat in reverse.

Hawkins' dog?

See James Clavell

Willie Horton? youtu.be/Io9KMSSEZ0Y

It’s so disgusting. It’s authentic physical nausea to think about it. It’s too much.

And it wasn't some off-mic comment flying under the MSM radar. "Eating the dogs/cats" was widely heard, within a few weeks of the election. And still America bought it (or at least chose to ignore it).

Ida know. Jesse Helms's "hands" commercial in the 1990 Senate race against Harvey Gantt, Charlotte's first Black mayor, was pretty damned bad as well.

When I think they can’t be more degenerate…

Wellfare Queens and Willie Horton are quaint compared to our current situation.

#ReleaseEpsteinTrumpFiles

Its all awful. The rumours 47 spread about former President Obama still burn in my memory. It normalized racism in a click bait, more views kind of way. Facebook & fox news made tons of money off that fake news.

Trump's normalization of racism is the key to his supporters' hearts. He reassured them they are the real victims of social progress, that expressing their racist sentiments, loud and proud, was more than A-OK, it also made them patriots. He won their adulation, their fealty and their votes.

Many of us who grew up in CA when Chinese restaurants started to rival Italian restaurants in the 1970s remember well that the lie that Chinese restaurants were using cat meat in their food was spread so as to shutdown their success. Stupidly Dems laughed at Trump instead of calling BS.

I will add that Harris of all people should have seen that racist attack for what it was because she grew up in CA where I did in the same timeframe and should have known better. She should have called BS. Instead she cluelessly “moved on” not understanding the power of the accusations.

Umm I live in Ohio and WE WERENT LAUGHING.

You were not. But Harris unfortunately did during the nationally televised debate. She didn’t even challenge it. Dems need to get real and call BS on this stuff. Again, I was growing up in the Bay Area when she was. I remember that trope being used back then to alienate Chinese Americans.

The story itself was bad enough, but the broad agreement everyone had that the story was fake but we had to treat it like it wasn't was the part that had me feeling like I belonged in a rubber room. If we all know the story is fake, why do we have to keep pretending its real?

And they paid basically no price for it. Our Liberal Media is not equipped to meet the moment.

Same. A very close second is BLOATUS continuously referring to every person of color as “low IQ”. Tim Scott must be so proud.

Did you see what Texas R’s just supported? They slashed black and Latino votes to 1/5 and 1/3 of a white person’s vote with their gerrymandering. Disgusting!

As a person of latin american heritage the “all mexicans are rapists” crap was pretty horrific.

🤬🤬worst president ever

That was my son and I breaking point with the in laws. We couldn't believe they actually believed it. My son hasn't talked to them since and they won't apologize because they don't see anything wrong with it. It isn't their fault the media put a video out that they believed 😭😭

I don't know what was worse, that they invoked that so easily (knowing they were lying) or that people (not everyone, but more than I'm comfortable with) ate it up.

An honest question to the Trump supporters you may know; “Is this what you wanted?” youtu.be/hPwDLib0YYA?...

Propagated by an elected official _representing the very town_ said conspiracy theory was raining hell on!

It worked, obviously, that's why I scoff at dem messaging bellyaching. The people are dumb af.

I’ll never forgive them for this.

I will never - ever - forget Lee Atwater and the Willie Horton ads. And that's who I thought of when Cuomo ran his racist Mamdani ads. #NeverCuomo

The Haitians they were smearing are my "neighbors". I live on the outskirts of Springfield, OH. It is infuriating and insulting to all of us.

And the bald-faced lying: when are journalists gonna ask the “show me the evidence” follow up to everything the right says?

And he still won goddamit. I hate this reality

I think making fun of a disabled reporter should have been the end of him. What do i know?

Alas, now the top rank of the Federal government has gone full white supremacist, with an infestation of a ridiculous gang of fascist clowns. That was not on my bingo card for the 21st century by any means.

Funny you mention that, I was just saying to my wife that MAGA people are just George Wallace voters who are 50 years late and don’t know who George Wallace is. Really hard to tell them apart.

At least he’s got no real voter base outside the frothiest maga losers. Just a total juiceless edgelord foisted into his seat by his oligarch handlers. More likely to taste the guillotine than finish a term as president

Welfare queens driving Cadillacs still gets me more. But that is more about my age and other things.

Don’t forget eating lobster! They even tried to get Michelle Obama with a faked receipt at a hotel eating lobsters.

This is part of the lexicon of race-neutral language contrived by Reagan and his team. It allowed whites to express their bigoted sentiments and enact laws which were specifically harmful to Blacks without ever once mentioning race. See also: 'Tough on crime'.

💯💯💯💯💯

... like lester maddox on cavett, 'it was an adze handle'

What makes it worse is so many believed it regardless of no evidence. We need to put money in education and shut down the "news" agencies that do not report actual news.

Absolutely. There is no way to sugarcoat that.

hmmmm, that "slavery wasn't so bad" thing is kinda right up there. jesus christ. every fucking day there's another awful thing. but maybe it's bringing us all closer together

When he shouted it out at the debate I really thought that was the end of this. I was stupid enough to think anything mattered.

That was a "viral moment" before the Internet. Even then, if people talked about what you said, however ridiculous, would be a win.

I stopped thinking voters can reason when then VP George Bush Sr, when asked how he didn't know about the Iran-Contra scandal, snarled 'how would you like your career to be judged by one day?' I thought, he's comparing being VP to a TV anchor? He's cooked. But ppl said 'Hey, he's tough!" He won.

Same! I foolishly thought “Holy hell! That’s it! He’ll finally get crucified by the press.” Silly, naive me.

I remember turning to my wife and saying it's over for him. No one can take him seriously now. I keep replaying that.

And people fell for it.

the fucking part where he went on TV and the reporter asked him about it and he openly said, "Well, if I have to make up stories to get the media to hate Haitians then that's what I'll do"

You are correct! My pirate arrgh is so bad, I scare the wild life away… It’s just too much!!!

White supremacy has always been a huge problem in this country. Now the #Repubikkkans have taken it to a whole new level.

Karoline Leavitt: "In accordance with the Pedo-dent's stated wish that he makes it into Heaven, he has decided to wear a new hairstyle to get him closer to his goal."

Jesse Helms was pretty out there. Not sure who died first.

It's just another version of the blood libel.

I was aghast at the bullshit.

JD is a POS on the daily

ICE is the worst thing I’ve ever seen. Right up there with the Viet Nam War and the Kent State massacre.

And lynchings!

Possibly worse than both. It's open season on anyone Dear Leader says is an enemy of the state. It's dictatorship.

As I know you know, there's no "good" kind of race baiting. Just saying it for the white guys in the back.

OH wait! We left them on X, didn't we?

What makes me angry is that they thought people would believe that about Haitians. It’s unbelievable levels of bigoted worldview.

Willie Horton exists as a standout midpoint between Wallace and the cat-eating

It was absolutely disgusting.

And that mfer repeated it in a debate like it was true & I know lots of people who believed it! Idiots. Men.

Republican; new race of incestuous cannibals. REPUBLICANS EAT EACH OTHER!

I truly believed Trump’s outburst about this in the debate would be the end of him 🥲

#metoo

It was totally race baiting. Unfortunately, none of the mainstream media thought it was important to describe it that way. That would have been too partisan.

Wallace generously; it was scarcely distinguishable in character or purpose from blood libel.

The absolute idiotic racism is out loud and proud. I call my congress members, and I protest, but I feel like it's a drop in the bucket. I think we need a national general strike - that lasts at least two weeks.

It was ridiculous.

One very depressing moment for me was when my wife and I brought this up to her parents as an example of clearly deranged shit that no one could support and her dad said "well they probably do eat cats!" It's sad watching older relatives get sucked into right wing conspiratorial thinking.

Honestly folks, people like that rely on everyone else to be civil. You have to own them, sorry if it hurts. Should have said “you probably eat the cats, you friggin codger, don’t forget to floss” or “Stfu geezer” but that’s how my family is 😂

Hmm, sounds exactly like my in-laws, and that was my breaking point

My parents will just say “well it could be happening!” Which to them is apparently the same as it actually happening no matter how unlikely it is. It’s maddening.

Same here. Years of Fox have made it so my parents will believe anything about Ds, no matter how crazy, as long as it “sounds right.” No proof necessary.

its not even conspiratorial bc theres no thought that goes into it, its just reflexive racism from folks who clearly do not believe that the haitians could possibly be human, not in spite of their pitiful state, but precisely because of it

It already existed. They just swapped out Haitian for Chinese. Everything they do is based on some old racist trope.

Painting people as the “other” is already vile- this went further aiming to have them seen as inhuman. Only monsters are this evil. Every one of them deserves to be removed and charged at a minimum.

This is the character of the people we are dealing with. Shameful.

Remember Reagan’s welfare queens? Republicans are just plain mean without reason or cause.

I'm not often in the business of knowing where folks go where they die but I can say with certainty that JD Vance is going to hell

They should have lost based on that alone - really evil

And it worked.

Fascism requires a complicit media, and we've had one since at least 2015.

Especially after the Republican mayor, the Republican governor, and the police chief of Springfield held press conferences saying that the stories were completely false.

Willie Horton. Welfare Queens. Trans athletes. LGBTQ communities. POC. White people keep doing this crap, or looking the other way when it happens. And some of them STILL have the unmitigated gall to fix their mouths to say we make everything about race.

Caging human beings based on skin color ranks right up there.

Well, we all know the old saying... "Once you go cat, you never go back!"

I think the Willie Horton smear is a good historical analogue.

I went to college in that town. Beyond awful!

I like cats. I just can’t eat a whole one by myself.

Waltz did a shit job calling him on that in their debate

And yet, it didn’t crater the campaign.

And the “mastermind” behind that crap is poised to take power (with his billionaire enablers) when Trump bites the dust. And to fire up the jaded MAGA base he’ll come up with more of this crap.

it's a prime example of how trolling achieves reach in the modern info space. everyone heard about haitians eating pets in ohio. a majority of the population don't realize that trump fully attempted a coup.

And the Washington Post just couldn’t bring themselves to endorse one candidate over the other….

And it worked.

The only George Wallace who is allowed space in my head is the beloved comedian, @mrgeorgewallace.bsky.social !

Oh God….Wallace is from my days. Just a horrible person. I was in college when he was shot. I said great! I’m so going to hell.

I was just plain appalled...absolutely ridiculous. And yeah, having to go back to wallace to get this.

Good old George Wallace. I celebrated when that old racist cracker dropped dead. He represented who the GOP have always been as far as im concerned. I hated him even as a kid. It might be because my parents hated him and it had me pay attention to his racism.

Which is so rich given that white Americans ate slaves.

Don’t forget the racism on which Pelosi relied to secure her reelection the one time she ever faced a challenge from the left.

Who would have thought the Willie Horton of our times would be cat and dog eating Haitians? It reeks of desperation and yet it still worked for the cultists.

That's minor in comparison to so many other things said and done by this sTumpy the 🤡 republican administration imo. sTump is, was a known race baiting filth fuck stain useless coward even before Obama was elected.

It really is unbelievable, just how stupid people actually are. My reaction as I watched him say that in the debate was one of disbelief. It made him look like the delusional imbecile that he is. I actually laughed when he said it,..... before I realized how many idiots actually believed it.

I seldom find myself awed by the willing gullibility of American racists, but that entire episode was a revelation. And, Springfield and its county voted heavily for Donald even as the town's workforce, and economy, is now bracing for a drop.

It's what convinced me that JD Vance wasn't even a smidgen better that Trump.

In contrast with Pence, who was bad but easily a smidgen better than Trump.

Vance may even be worse. Trump is a selfish bully but Vance is evil for evil's sake.

Trump, he's raping the women; he's raping the children; and Vance is helping him get away with it!

Note that the Dems were, like, "Harris won the debate!" when of course the only thing anyone talked about for the next two weeks was "they're eating the dogs". The more ridiculous the claim, the more air time it gets, the more widely openly racist ideas get discussed. Diabolical.

That is a very good point

I'm not sure Wallace ever reached this level honestly

"Segregation now, segregation tomorrow and segregation forever!" Governor George Wallace, January 14, 1963 There are plenty of additional quotes available at your fingertips. www.emersonkent.com/speeches/seg...

I know who George Wallace is.

Think about what my comment is as being from the perspective of someone who knows more about Wallace than you do actually saying this and what it implies about Vance.

I no longer believe in God but I desperately want to believe in hell because these people deserve eternal torment for the evil they create

My sentiment as well: another atheist hoping there’s a hell for the ashats of the world.

Some of us go back to Pettit Bridge

Crazy is the new normal!? Racism is back as a fear mongering political tool! These people are leveraging ignorance, differences, stupidity and crazy to ruin our nation.

This applies to all immigrants - but Haitians really really deserve better from the United States in particular. Just so deeply upsetting on so many levels.

It's culturist, too, a false allegation about voodoo. We might say voodoo is un-Christian, but so is false witness.

Mee-YOW!

I spent most of Reagan's presidency with my jaw hanging open. Now, of course, I realize that he was just the cheap appetizer before a meal of total swill.

⏳️ and thats just magas softer side, pace yourself

JD Vance permanently disqualified himself with that bullshit. His justification that, despite the lies, it fit the narrative, exposed his intellectual, moral and ethical dishonesty.

I was disheartened that donald used dehumanizing language that even Wallace did not, and got rewarded with 77 million votes

100%

The raged hate is much different from the 50's onward.... & these MAGA folks aren't good at self regulation.

The longer I live the more I’m convinced is that it a lot of it is lead exposure for so many decades most of their lives if not all of their lives. Into the 90s, and even in drinking water in some places now.

Since, these MAGA folks have changed how Science is being utilized....this theory might be valid, but the Science ,to provide the proof is now limited...sadly.

One awful thing about it is news coverage didn't always make it clear these folks were here legally. In part bc of that, other legal immigrants or naturalized citizens didn't universally see it as a blaring warning that Trump/Vance weren't going to go after "just" the "criminal illegals." 1/2

The press coverage made clear they didn't think the legal status of non-citizens was wholly valid so long as Republicans disagreed with it. The same habit of deciding a scandal was only real if Republicans & Democrats agreed it was slowly somehow infected reporting on policy & law.

Trump thinks all brown/black people are criminals in waiting, or at least not possible of being real Americans who are contributors to society, and would lie about their circumstances & character to remove or jail all he can. The Haitians "did it the right way." They're still out. 2/2

I remember seeing Wallace on TV often, and while he ranted about generic criminals/"law and order", and falsely claimed Black people were in favor of segregation, I don't think he went out of his way to slander an entire group as badly, as maliciously, or as frequently as Trump and Vance have done.

It is horrible.

Just incredible that the moderators of those debates have no interest in (or ability to?) challenge candidates on outright lies.

And at his debate with Harris, Trump’s defense was to essentially say he was too old and stupid to remember where he first heard the lie, and that he’d stick with the lie anyway.

IIRC none of the 'moderators' challenged his defense.

This was also an indictment of how the Harris campaign was run. They muzzled Walz because he was effectively meme-ing Republicans & they wanted the "Nikki Haley anti-Trump" demographic. The debate was the tell. Walz was clearly coached to be deferential and respectful towards Vance. 1/3

What he SHOULD have done was come out early & shame Vance w/ a Joseph Welch-esque "At long last, have you no decency?" attack. Go directly after him for knowingly amplifying far right racist lies. 2/3

"Your lies encouraged terroristic threats on that community. You KNEW they were lies. You should apologize to the Haitian-American community, the city of Springfield, the state of Ohio, & the country." The road was clear to relentlessly attack Vance for his moral debasement. But it wasn't taken. 3/3

Almost the worst thing about the present times is how the 'left' pulls its punches. In the US, in the UK, almost everywhere except Spain.

It was a slightly dressed up “black savages” argument. The guy is a huge POS.

How voters freaking bought into the fake story is beyond me. 😬

Except that — in the same way that DJT makes Ronald Reagan look like a Trotskyist — George Wallace now seems quaint compared to JDV, Santa Monica Goebbels, the whole sick crew.

I'm sure Buchanan, Rove, Atwater, et al won't appreciate being overlooked like that.

Yet he got elected. What does that say about the US?

The sick part is that it worked. I honestly thought it was game over for those guys. Shows you how little I know about those AmeriKKKans.

And it totally worked.

And now Trump supports slavery. That is my worst moment in American politics.

…and black and brown people still voted him. I will never understand that ultimate betrayal.

I spit my drink out my nose when he said that. At that moment, I thought she had it in the bag. Little did I understand just how deep racism runs in this country, even with personal experiences. That about broke me.

The cat eating fake story they admitted to being fake and still defended

And people believed it. Incredible.

And a study in this era of disinformation Invented out of wholecloth and broadcast by a cowardly VP who knew it was fake, enabled and supported by one of the most zealously lie-loving media ecosystems ever to exist

The glee they take in being performatively cruel and evil is so utterly disgusting

I don't know. I think they were telling us what's coming. That we're all going to be eating cats and dogs because there's a depression.

People saw him say this on live television, followed by the most "WTF?!" face ever by Kamala and still voted how they did. There has to be some deal with the Devil going on. We're not THAT stupid, are we? Please tell me we are not that stupid, I need to hear that. Please. Oh God...

Absolutely trying to make people mad and angry enough to be violent. SPLC has been calling this out for decades

Totally mind boggling that anyone who made those claims could possibly get elected. I’d like to think BS like that would be disqualifying in Canada. We have our own versions of racism here, but I don’t think that would pass the sniff test.

It was a straight up rehash of the anti-Asian racism of the 90s, where Chinese immigrants were accused of serving pets in restaurants. Nothing new under the sun for bigots.

Also, Springfield, Ohio is a nice town & I had the best pie of my life at a diner there.

That shit was unfortunately disgustingly widespread among black people here in St Louis. Really depressing.

Unfortunately Trump's base are low IQ racists. They respond to that type of grift.

Trump (being the idiot that he is) saying it at the debate was one thing, Vance spreading a lie he knew was fake was the darkest part of it for me

Uhmn,…not only did he viciously slander those poor people, but he proceeded to remove their TPS! That made them eligible for cruel instant deportation. He and his gang are the culmination of Wallace’s greatest wet-dream. The Confederacy is “guarding” Washington D.C. as we speak, isn’t it? MAGA!🤬

What’s so disturbing is that it worked

There are no consequences - no one is holding them accountable

It was fascist, racist, and disgusting propaganda at its worst. Lots of cracks were made, in the first administration of how I must miss eating cats, and dogs. Along with Kung Flu Kid I'm from a family of Russian Jews on my paternal side which escaped the Pogroms

During the American Civil War and settled into the Lutheran community.

AND SAID ON THE DEBATE STAGE AND 77 MILLION PEOPLE STILL SAID, "whats the harm of humoring him a little more?"

Trump is a lifelong bigot. From excluding black people from his apartment in the 70s, to blaming them for plane crashes in 2025, nothing has changed. Under Trump, Republicans have gone from dog whistling racism to putting it on blast 24/7.

The most galling thing BY FAR was that horrible shit actually worked and they weren't crushed in the election for doing it.

Word on the street was that it was the brainchild of Jose D Vance's equally power hungry spouse, Usha. They took a crazy Facebook post by a crazy lady and ran with it (of course the lady found her cat alive and well shortly after posting about her neighbors eating her cat)

The Republican governor of Ohio called it out as a lie at the time, even though it was spread by the junior Senator (and VP nominee) from Ohio! That same governor has now authorized Ohio National Guard troops to deploy in Washington DC! J.D. Vance is not only a racist, he's a racketeer.

He didn’t call it a lie. He could never muster up that kind of integrity.

And yet we didn't punish anyone for it. The reporter who originally reported it is still getting paid, still living a normal, carefree life. WhT should have happened is they should have been dragged into the street and dealt with. We need to deal with all these fake journalists the same way.

And what’s worse is most people just…didn’t care.

I thought it was going to really hurt him, but to the extent it did the dip was transitory.

And yet, Americans fell for it.

I remember the 'Haitian people have AIDS' shit of the late 80s but yeah.

It was so transparently false!

And sadly...

What makes it worse was that the story was promulgated by a noted couch-fucker.

A lot of people turned into a goofy meme which just gave it more power to catch the ears of the people Trump was aiming for.

Agreed

We had the same shit in the UK years ago. "Immigrants are killing and eating the queen's swans!"

Remember when JD vance admitted that he made it all up but he'd do it again in a minute? Nice of the mainstream media to report on that www.npr.org/2024/09/15/n...

You are literally linking to a mainstream media organization's reporting

I linked to a news source for podcast guys who think the Capitol Steps are funny. Your average 55 year old machinist from Youngstown OH who rides a motorcycle watches CBS News if he isn't a 100% Fox guy. CBS/ABC/NBC were completely silent on that.

I saw it on MSNBC, does that count?

Maybe, but did they hammer on it for weeks like the media did on Hunter Biden and the Burisma shit that Lev Parnas has openly admitted was made up? CBS/NBC/ABC gave *weeks* of coverage to that shit.

Whataboutism and sprinting goalposts at the same time. It was on my local morning news. After being on both CBS and NBC and numerous other mainstream outlets. Attacking the media is page 1 in the fascist handbook. Ideally, get the other side to carry your water and do it for you.

it was never on CBS or NBC, fuck off with your false equivalency shit. It is very clear which horse the mainstream media in this country backed and gave preferential treatment.

no

ask yourself why the mainstream media spends weeks using falsified stories to smear a relative of a Democratic president in the run-up to an election but spends little or no time at all on the other guy's VP pick openly doing blood libel shit

I can tell by your username we have a lot in common

I don't K now why they would thinK that is a pro-social thing to do. K

He’s such an a$$hole.

That’s the important part: that he said lies were useful.

Fascists believe in "mythic truth" – an unchangeable fantasy that’s truer than reality. Logic and evidence don’t matter to them.

JD Vance is a writer. I am still waiting for the "literary community" to take him to task for using literature for evil.

He's a creation of Peter Thiel. His entire hillbilly persona was made up, he grew up in a suburb of Cincinnati.

Rascist lies, particularly.

"They're out there burning houses down, and peddling racist lies....." youtu.be/OLkPwxcIji0?...

following a fellow chumbawamba fan

This was great to listen to and thanks! I’m glad I’m not the only one calling them Nazis, bc they’ve got so many things in common with them=The Magas=Nazis! Same as my dad who was in the Nazi youth told me about! It’s unfolding every day here

🎯

If i have to make up stories to get the attention on the plight of the American people! Yup, I remember too, only word I’m not sure about is plight, lol 😂 But it’s a good thing that some of us do remember everything from these bastards!

That's the wildest part: they openly said it was made up and *people still believed it!*

This was my big takeaway as well. JD just said straight up that if he needs to tell heinous lies about legal residents of his state for political gain, he will do so without hesitation. Not even the decency to show remorse for the lie.

In fact they did that, as evidenced by your link to… NPR

NPR isn't mainstream media and they downplayed it. Go outside

OK thank you Mr Farts 420

NPR is media for 45 year old suburban moms to discuss the microagressions they face in their day to day lives and for guys who think Ira Glass's segments are a real life-changer. CBS/NBC/ABC were completely silent on JD Vance admitting what he was up to.