The Second Time As Farce

The case of Jussie Smollett and his putative attack at the hands of two gay Nigerian brothers in whiteface and MAGA hats has turned into a comical data point that illustrates yet again that we're seeing the 2020 moral panic roll itself back. Although the initial alleged attack took place in January 2019, a full year before the arrival of COVID, it was clearly an early attempt to stoke the same passions that would express themselves in 2020's BLM riots: allegations that Trump and his supporters were racists, and violent white racism was systemic in American attitudes. lurking always just beneath the surface.

It's starting to look like Kyle Rittenhouse's successful testimony on his own behalf will be the exception that proves the rule: for the defendant to take the stand is normally a very bad idea. But the Rittenhouse case itself is another indication that the 2020 hysteria is subsiding -- a jury was able to sort out the idea that Rittenhouse, a mixed-race naive 17-year-old member of the lower bourgeoisie, had been attacked by multiple white members of the Lumpenproletariat and used his firearm to defend himself from them, which turned the conventional 2020 narrative on its head.

The Smollett case simmered throughout 2019-20, with the state's attorney initially dropping disorderly conduct charges on clear political grounds, with charges restored a year later following public outcry. The case finally came to trial on November 29, with the bizarre circumstances of Smollett's romance with Abel Osundario and the development and rehearsal of the phony MAGA attack. So far, Smollett's testimony has reached the point where we learn his reason for not turning his phone over to police was a text from Don Lemon:

Smollett testified that he’d been in contact with Don Lemon during the early part of the Chicago Police Department’s investigation into the phony attack on him. He testified that one of the reasons he didn’t want to turn over his phone to the police during the investigation was because Don Lemon texted him that the Chicago Police didn’t believe his account of what happened. Lemon has already said that he was in constant contact with Smollett early on in the case and that the story was “personal” to him.

This couldn't be worse for CNN, a leading media enabler of the 2020 panic, which only days ago was forced to fire Chris Cuomo for violations of journalistic ethics. Now Cuomo's colleague Don Lemon has been drawn into the Smollett farce in a way that could compromise him ethically as well -- leaving aside that Lemon is already in legal trouble for putting his hand down his pants, rubbing his private parts, and then shoving his fingers into a man's face.

(I'm not sure how this compares to, say, Chris Cuomo's pinching a former supervisor's buttocks in front of her husband at a party, one of the offenses for which Cuomo was apparently terminated on Saturday.)

The bottom line is that Smollett, a coddled and privileged member of the elite, has become a national laughingstock for a transparent attempt to portray himself as a victim of racial prejudice a la George Floyd, and he's now in the process of dragging Don Lemon, a key moral entrepreneur of the 2020 panic, into the travesty with him -- not to mention Lemon's employer, CNN.

Also in this morning's news is further indication that the public standing of another beneficiary of the 2020 panic, Vice President Harris, is disintegrating.

A staffer for Kamala Harris was mocked after attempting to defend the vice president on social media, seemingly in response to a scathing story by the Washington Post over the weekend which detailed the California Democrat bullying staffers with "soul-destroying criticism."

The day after the report, the VP's Deputy Director for Operations David Gins tweeted a photo of himself staring at a computer screen in an office. "Absolutely love my job. Just thought some of you should know," he wrote.

Elsewhere, after widespread ridicule of the tweet on social medias, it was reported,

SOURCE: VP Kamala Harris' staff were "encouraged to show genuine support publicly and that support would be remembered" the source goes on to say "unfortunately the Gins tweet worked against that mission"

Harris rose to the vice presidency as a result of the 2020 moral panic -- indeed, her presence on the ticket was meant to be part of a promised "great reset" of national priorities in the wake of the hysteria. The emerging problem is that events are challenging the notion that a vice president doesn't need to have serious qualifications for the job -- as the moral panic of 2020 subsides, we're beginning to see the inklings of a constitutional crisis as the morning after sets in.

Even Dan Quayle, even Spiro Agnew, are starting to look good.