Good day all. For the last 6+ years, the Republican Party has been undergoing a shift. Al the old Neocons, Establishment and Country Club Republicans have been more or less sidelined. (And they aren’t happy about it) However, once in a while, an idiot in GOP clothes pops up and does really stupid things.
One of these people is Texas State Representative Dade Phelan. Up until recently, this boob was the speaker of the Texas House of Representatives. I’m not that informed on Texas politics, but I think that Phelan was finally booted from the speakership after the last election. (He made a complete ass of himself it seems) Apparently, he also has a very thin skin and contempt for the 1st Amendment. He is now pushing a bill to make Memes illegal. Here are the details from the Blaze:
Texas state Rep. Dade Phelan (R), the at-times incomprehensible former state House speaker who led the unsuccessful impeachment effort against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, is pushing a bill that would criminalize the publication, distribution, or broadcast of certain political memes or altered media.
Phelan’s bill would require “political advertising that includes an image, audio recording, or video recording of an officeholder’s or candidate’s appearance, speech or conduct that did not occur in reality,” including media manipulated with generative artificial intelligence, to include a disclosure accounting for the meme’s creative deviations from reality.
As I mentioned above, I’m not that much of a follower of Texas state politics. However, from what I’ve read in the past, this clown Phelan is an arrogant, elitist jerk. He was also leading the charge, if I recall correctly, to remove Ken Paxton as the Attorney General of Texas. It appears, as near as I can tell, that Paxton wasn’t one of “Them” and wasn’t shy about going after actual political criminals.
He was impeached in the Texas House, controlled by Phelan at the time, and forced to step aside until his trial in the Senate. He was acquitted and returned to work. The 2024 election had a number of Paxton’s “Enemies” primaried out of offices and Phelan failed to retain his speakership. Now I will happily be corrected by people with more information on all this then I have. Comments below!
Critics have suggested that Phelan’s House Bill 366 is unconstitutional, stressing that it would run afoul of the First Amendment.
I seem to recall that this stunt was tried in one of the blue states and was quickly crushed by the courts. I know that there is someone who was railroaded into prison by the Garland DoJ for posting memes. (Hopefully, that will be overturned and frankly that judge should be removed for incompetence)
Under the proposed law, the Texas Ethics Commission would determine what form that disclosure takes, including “the font, size, and color of the disclosure.”
Failure to include a disclosure could land Texans in jail with a Class A misdemeanor charge.
And I think that’s a great way to get Texas police officers killed. Of course, getting this through the Texas House and then through the Senate is unlikely, not to mention that Governor Abbott will veto it if it should actually end up on his desk. Apparently, the idea for this bill was some actions by Phelan that led to some of his “Fans” to meme him unmercifully.
When presiding over a 14-hour state House session in 2023, Phelan appeared to slur his words and have difficulty identifying a colleague. This prompted Paxton and others to allege that he was “in an obviously intoxicated state,” and to call for his resignation. Phelan dodged questions about the allegations. In the years since, criticism of Phelan has in some cases incorporated mockery of the incident.
I don’t know if this clown was drunk or not and frankly, not my problem. I don’t live in Texas and don’t have a dog in that hunt. However, it looks like someone decided to have some fun at Phelan’s expense.
Texas Scorecard suggested that the “Drunk Dade” call-ins to Michael Berry’s talk radio show — consisting of an impression of a supposedly inebriated Phelan — might, for instance, qualify as verboten speech under House Bill 366.
I should see if those are available online. They sound like they might be amusing.
Berry noted on Monday, “DrunkDade tryin to bolster my outlaw cred,” suggesting that the parodies make Phelan “so mad he’s tryin to make it illegal.”
Phelan’s inspiration to push the bill might instead be the so-called deepfake political advertisement that targeted him ahead of the Republican primary runoff election last year.
Last year was a major assault on the GOP(E) in Texas, both at the state level and the federal level. Brandon Herrera, aka the AK Guy, ran against a RINO congressman and came within 400 votes of defeating him. Herrera spent something like $1 MILLION DOLLARS!!! on his run. The RINO, with help from the Washington Uniparty, spent about $12 million dollars.
At the state level, I understand that seven or more RINO’s in the House and Senate lost their primaries. Phelan was a near miss apparently. I’m guessing it was a full on battle royal and that the memes were flying fast and furious.
The Texas Tribune reported that the offending political mailer, which was paid for by the Club for Growth Action PAC, featured two photoshops: one that swapped House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) out of a photograph and instead depicted Phelan hugging Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.); and another falsely depicting Phelan giving a speech at a Texas House Democratic Caucus news conference.
The mailer stated, “Texas Republicans deserve better than Democrat puppet Dade Phelan!”
Ok, that is a bit over the top but it’s nothing compared to what President Trump went through thanks to Felonia von Pantsuit and her fake Russia file. Compared to what used to be said in the early days of this country, that picture is nothing.
Under the proposed legislation, such doctored images would require disclosures “indicating that the image, audio recording, or video recording did not occur in reality.”
Yeah, I don’t think so. I haven’t seen the image in question of course, but I have seen any number that were made regarding President Trump, and of late, Vice President Vance. Some were really negative, but others were flat out funny. I’ve made a few myself. What Phelan and others like him fail to understand, besides how free speech works, especially political speech, is that trying to ban something never works.
From the description of the image, photo shopping Phelan to look like he was hugging San Fran Nan Pelosi was designed to reinforce a political point in the ad. I suspect that, although it never actually happened, his hugging Pelosi, it did hit a little to close to home, and that he was pushing more of the Progressive Liberal Democrat’s agenda then he should have. (Which, these days, should be none at all)
This bill is going to fail, but it should be used against Phelan and anyone who supports it. (Dollars to donuts, all the Democrats will be fully on board with it since they’re the usual targets of the memesters) It’s a complete waste of time discussing it. What should happen is that it should be used against Phelan from this point forward. Everything I’ve heard about this bozo is that he would fit right in with the Deep State Uniparty in Washington. Perhaps the GOP in Texas can boot him out. Well, that’s your problem Texas. You deal with it.
Thatisall
(3 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
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