May 23, 2024 | What A Day Newsletter

What A Day: Beach don't kill my flag

FILE - Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito pauses after swearing in Mark Esper as Secretary of Defense during a ceremony with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, July 23, 2019. A second flag of a type carried by rioters during the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was displayed outside a house owned by Alito according to a report published May 22, 2024, by The New York Times. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)

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NO FUN IN THE MAGA SUN

Top right-wingers seem downright peeved they can’t shred democratic norms without getting an earful from their neighbors, or, y’know, law enforcement. Can’t MAGA just have fun?

Poor Sam Alito. The conservative Supreme Court Justice is getting so much guff for flying anti-democratic “Stop the Steal” flags, he hardly knows what to say. The first time, like any strong family-values conservative, he blamed his wife. (Adding, for good measure, that she did it because a neighbor called her “the c-word,” which we presume is a detail she appreciated seeing in print.) But after a second flag tied to the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection was ID’d fluttering over his beach house, he simply didn’t respond to questions about it from the New York Times. Now, top Democrats are demanding he recuse himself from election cases and face an investigation. Can’t the man just come home from a hard day’s work, raise an authoritarian banner, and enjoy a peaceful weekend at the beach like a normal guy?

Rudy Giuliani is likewise miffed at agents who served him with criminal indictment papers at his birthday party last Friday, right after his guests finished singing “Happy Birthday.” One officer, Rudy complained, failed to exhibit good style. “He handed me a folded-up, crumpling piece of paper,” Giuliani groused. “It wasn’t, like, done stylishly.” Never mind the man stands accused of attempting to undermine two-and-a-half centuries of American democracy! Indict him with style, or not at all!

MAGA nutjob Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) is likewise up in arms that he can’t have a cordial visit with former Trump advisor Peter Navarro, who’s jailed for spurning the congressional Jan. 6 committee. The nerve! What is this… prison!? Even the people who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6 took selfies and celebrated as they broke into a federal building. Republicans went from calling them tourists to hostages after hundreds have been jailed for their part in the attack.

They get it from the top, of course. Disgraced former President Trump may be facing 88 felonies for trashing democracy and allegedly hiding state secrets in his bathroom. But lately he can’t seem to stop complaining about how cold it is in the courtroom as he napped through his hush-money trial.

If you want to shred democratic norms, it’s a lot to expect your neighbors, the press, pro-democracy politicians and, y’know, the cops, to be chill about that. Pick one, guys: your anti-democracy flags, or your weekends.

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