Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said he isn’t buying all that Democratic “joy” on display at this past week’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago during a Sunday appearance with Jake Tapper on CNN’s State of the Union.
During their conversation, Tapper brought up the “disciplined” and “well-produced” DNC this week that, as the journalist put it, “conveyed patriotism and unity.” Graham didn’t see it that way.
“Well, I didn’t see what you saw,” Graham told Tapper with a laugh. “If you’re a Republican, you saw a hate fest. You saw a hate fest full of insults.”
“Americans are not joyful when they go to the gas station and fill up their car,” he continued. “They’re not joyful when they make their mortgage payment. They’re not joyful when they go to the grocery store. People are hurting, and this whole joy love fest doesn’t exist in the real world.”
To bolster his claim, Graham pointed to the gas prices, the state of the border, and inflation during Donald Trump’s presidency when “the world was not on fire.”
He’s either lying or what he said gives us a look into his shitty perspective of the world. Either way such a miserable and pathetic existence.
He and his party have certainly tried to rob everyone of it, sure.
So, what feeling is being sought after when republicans commit sexual assault?
Face eating leopard says they have to continue eating faces because there is nothing else to eat.
I think this is a great example of how a conservative mind views the world.
They are never happy or joyfull, its always a struggle and you fight for an idea despite you hating all of it. The idea that your life is not filled by misery is alien to them.
At this point being conservative is just akin to mental illness. Destructive, depressed, delusional to themselves and others. If ever there was a real social contaigion, it would be this state of being.
I feel the opposite as a Democrat. I support positivity, but I won’t smile while Palestinians are being murdered. That seems pretty tone deff. I’m happy Donald Trump is going down regardless. I’m voting Kamala. Please don’t forget to protest after we win.
I’m also worried about Armenia, Hong Kong, Myanmar, Syria, Iran, Taiwan, Tibet, Uyghurs, immegrants entering the US, UKRAINE. I am NOT smiling while people are dying and our nation is complacent.
I will tell you in advance: with that mindset, even if every issue you stated in the last paragraph is solved, you will still not be able to smile. People will still keep dying and suffering from injustice, just elsewhere or in different ways.
Try to celebrate every incremental step towards justice and use that energy towards the next step and so on.
Then I’ll continue to not smile. I refuse to pretend to be happy while people suffer. It’s natural to feel empathy. You guys can ignore it if you need to for your mental health, but as an American with the power to change things, I will continue to protest.
If you have the power to change things, why haven’t you done so?
Ever heard of “joy in suffering?”
Generally, the more you have, the more miserable you can be. It’s important to take time to appreciate the positive things in life even while grieving for those who don’t currently get to experience them. Joy and grief aren’t mutually exclusive feelings, and you don’t need to ignore/suppress the grief to experience the joy.
You’re terminally online and need to step away from the internet. Its not real.
I grew up in a pretty conservative household and we were literally raised that life is work and work is hell. By way of the transitive property, life = hell. It’s taken a long time through various degrees of depression and I’m still not fully grown out of it.
But yes, the entire culture and identity is about being miserable and persevering through it, even if that means making yourself and everyone around you more miserable to justify the perseverance.
Like the saying “nothing good comes free.” You could say the sunrise is free, but they’ll argue it’s not because you have to wake up early and waking up early is by necessity miserable so that the sunrise can be good. They’re brainwashed into thinking the only way a good thing happens is through suffering. Except the truly lost ones who only see life as suffering.
As an extension, if the conservative sees something free that people need, they will try to monopolize that free thing and then sell it. They call this innovation.
Everything in their world is transactional
So utterly grim that it perfectly explains the entire conservative movement.
“Life is bad. Anyone who isn’t miserable and angry like me is cheating and must be destroyed.”
Wow… yeah I grew up this way too. But I’m not sure I ever really put it all together the way you did just now. I’m gonna have to think on this.
Could also be that any time Lindsey Graham enters a room, all the people around him become miserable, so that’s why he thinks joy doesn’t exist
It’s hard to see any joy in the world when you’re a closeted hate-mongerer who can’t get laid for free.
Now who’s miserable in their lives and wants to make the rest of the country miserable too?
Heh heh heh
Resign and see how much joy suddenly appears
He’s not wrong. But he doesn’t mention his party is the reason for it.
Oh, he’s both wrong AND responsible. He’s pointing at results of policies and blaming people who set the policies that will improve the situation in the future for the results of the policies set by him and his cronies.
He’s trying to normalize a false equivalency.
It’s like blaming the current government for global warming and its effects, instead of just tasking them and empowering them to move the needle back in the right direction so it doesn’t get much worse than it already has.
He’s got the projection down though
This makes me so sad for him, but keep telling on yourself Lindsey. Also fuck you
I wonder when the last time he filled up his own car, or went to the grocery. So sick of the rich telling me about the struggles of the common folk.
Piss off…
Joy is not easy.
Happy can be had for the cost of a hobby, or of a friend buying another round, or jamming another game onto the screen.
But as J. D. Salinger said: “The fact is always obvious much too late, but the most singular difference between happiness and joy is that happiness is a solid and joy is a liquid.”
Happiness needs a vessel of a certain shape and size.
Joy can fill up anything finite.
Don’t mock Graham for this. He is expressing his sadness even if he doesn’t see it. Express sorrow for his lack of understanding of our time here.
Joy is fleeting, but it is there, and it is possible to feel it with some frequency. Does everyone feel it? Well, obviously not.
Lindsey would experience true joy if he finally came out of the closet and stopped licking Trump’s asshole constantly.
In SC, where Graham is from, gas prices are lower than they’ve been all year. Not sure what he’s talking about.
What a sad little creature.
People who are that deep in the closet usually do lack joy in their lives
Lady G needs a prostate massage, STAT! She’s lost the joy in her life!!!
My heavens!
