Fear Itself (Open Thread)

Speaker Mike Johnson, who radiates hypocrisy and perversion like a Ben Franklin stove radiates heat, is lying on TV again:

Mike Johnson: “We’re so angry about it. I mean, I’m a very patient guy, but I’ve had it with these people. The theory we have right now — they have a hate America rally that’s scheduled for October 18 on the National Mall. It’s the pro-Hamas wing and antifa people … “

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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) October 10, 2025 at 8:28 AM

Near as I can tell, he’s lying for two reasons: 1) to shift blame for the shutdown on Dems by claiming they are the obstacle to reopening the government, whereas in reality, Johnson released his caucus for next week too, probably to avoid swearing in Adelita Grijalva (D-AZ), who will be the deciding 218th vote to release the Epstein files, and 2) to slander all Trump opponents as “pro-Hamas” and “antifa.”

Johnson references October 18, the date of the No Kings protests. More than 5 million people showed up at 2,100+ local No Kings protests in June. Indivisible says there are more than 2,200 rallies planned for October 18, and hopefully attendance will break the previous record.

I expect other Trump minions to join Johnson in slandering millions of patriotic Americans in advance of the protests. They hope to depress turnout and maybe, as a bonus, incite their frothing nut-bag supporters to commit acts of violence. Fuck that noise; I won’t be deterred, and I hope you won’t either.

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Speaking of fascist suppression of free speech, here’s an excerpt from an Orlando Sentinel article (gift link) about heavily armed agents employed by the State of Florida who showed up to intimidate a citizen for mildly (and accurately) criticizing a DeSantis/Trump lackey via postcard:

Two armed men wearing bulletproof vests with the word “police” stenciled on them showed up Wednesday at the Largo home of Cathy O’Gara while she was getting her 11-year-old granddaughter ready for school.

Dogs were barking. There was a loud knock at the door. She greeted the men, who didn’t identify themselves or the agency they were with. They asked if her husband, James O’Gara, lived there and if they could speak to him about a postcard he’d sent to Florida CFO Blaise Ingoglia with the brief message: “You lack values.”

It was a scary “big red flag moment” for the O’Garas, a retired couple who are politically active supporters of progressive candidates, vocal critics of President Trump’s immigration policies, and helped to organize a local No Kings anti-Trump demonstration in June.

“Anything is possible, if you can send a postcard and have this happen,” Cathy O’Gara said.

Huge red flag indeed. Also, O’Gara is 100% correct about Ingoglia, who is as vapid and simpering a sycophant as you’ll find outside of a Trump cabinet meeting. He was my statehouse rep and attracted criticism for his rabid partisanship even in this Trumpy-ass district.

Only now it seems he thinks criticism isn’t allowed. Commenter prostratedragon mentioned the incident in the morning thread here. I’ll reprint the address for Ingoglia’s office, in case anyone else would like to send him a postcard.

Blaise Ingoglia
Office of the Chief Financial Officer
Florida Department of Financial Services
200 East Gaines Street
Tallahassee, FL 32399-0301

I’ll include the return address on my postcard. I don’t think state agents would make it half way down my scary-ass swamp trail before deciding it’s not worth it to harass me for exercising my First Amendment right to call Ingoglia a corrupt fascist cockwomble.

The thing is, the fascists can’t shut us all up. To achieve the authoritarian state they desire, they’ll need our cooperation. We mustn’t give it to them.

Open thread!

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