The Vulgar One

Melania & Donald in happier(?) times

A couple minutes ago a news alert from Reuters popped up on my phone with the announcement that Melania Trump has has decided to accept her misogynist husband's apology even though she found his videotaped comments "unacceptable and offensive."

For good measure the former Slovenian model added that her husband "has the heart and mind of a leader." 

Now I seriously doubt she wrote that, nor am I sure of what kind of behavior or comments pass as leadership qualities in Slovenia, but here in this country crass vulgarity that demeans women is generally not what Americans regard as reflective of the attributes of the leader of the free world.

Especially not when over 50% of the population is female, and the orange-haired candidate in question already has a lengthy track record of misogynist statements and accusations of rape.

At this moment Melania Trump may or may not be regretting the decision to stand up in front of millions of people at the Republican national convention in Cleveland and attest to her husband's character; but she has to be feeling humiliated in the eyes of the world.

Maybe she knew he was a vulgar borderline rapist all along, but if she didn't, then like millions of other people around the globe; she sure does now after the release of a 2005 video of Trump talking to Access Hollywood host Billy Bush on a bus just before making an appearance on the soap opera 'Days Of Our Lives'.

By the way, did you know that Billy Bush (born William Hale Bush) is a privileged, private school-educated scion of THE Bush family? His father Jonathan is the brother of George HW Bush, the 41st president.

Given the open contempt the Bush family has for Trump, doesn't take a genius to figure out  how the Washington Post got a hold of the now-infamous video tape of Trump.

Utah Rep Jason Chaffetz dumps Trump

While a number of high-profile Republican politicians who'd pledged their support for Trump months ago have quickly moved to publicly distance themselves from The Donald's toxic brand, it's way to late for that kind of symbolic public rebuke

Smug GOP Rep Jason Chaffetz, whose spent the bulk of the last three years keeping hearings on the exhausted specter of the Benghazi attacks on the U.S. Embassy alive in order to tarnish Hillary Clinton's reputation, told Utah's Fox 13 news, "I'm out."

The feisty self-righteous Republican from Utah joins embattled Freshman New Hampshire Senator New Hampshire Senator Kelly Ayotte in turning their backs on Trump's presidential bid.

Locked in a tight race in New Hampshire to save her Senate seat, Ayotte's last-minute attempt to save her political ass comes just days after she called Trump a "role model" during a Senate debate with her opponent, NH Governor Maggie Hassan.

But again, it's too late for that.

Ayotte  knew she was up for reelection this fall, and despite that she's tried to have her political cake and eat it to by wish-washingly stating that she would support Trump, but not endorse him; which strikes me as a half-ass attempt to be able to capitalize on a Trump presidential victory, but protect her political self respect in the event of a Clinton landslide by being able to say she never endorsed him.

GOP VP candidate Mike Pence

Unfortunately you have to stand for something and pick a side, Ayotte did neither (especially after laughingly trying to assert that she "misspoke" after getting called out for calling Trump a "role model") and she may pay for that with her Senate seat.

Finally there's Republican vice-presidential candidate Mike Pence.

Who so far seems to have escaped accounting for his support of discriminatory anti-LGBTQ laws and draconian anti-abortion laws.

Pence embarrassed himself in the recent vice-presidential debate with Democrat Tim Kaine by pretending not to know anything about the slew of lies his running mate has uttered in the past two years.

Yesterday, in the wake of the release of Trump video, the even-tempered right-wing Indiana Governor had enough and promptly canceled a scheduled campaign appearance in Wisconsin before releasing a statement saying that he too was "offended" by his own running mate's comments and would "pray" for him.

Like the majority of the Republican establishment, Pence has to be privately fuming that he and the GOP have hitched their wagon to the vulgar star that is Trump.

Republicans can express all the righteous indignation they want to, they have only themselves to blame for the mess their party finds itself in.

They knew a monster was loose back in March during the Super Tuesday primaries, and they watched it smash through a wall and wander off into the woods.

There's nothing they can do about their monster at this point, after all they created it in their own lab with their subservience to the Tea Party and tacit approval and tolerance of bigotry, homophobia, misogyny and xenophobia.

Now the monster has taken over the party of Lincoln and 'Family Values' and replaced it with something nasty and vulgar.

Can you recall a time when both a vice-presidential candidate and the presidential candidate's wife both publicly acknowledging being offended by something the candidate said?

Can't wait to see what Giuliani and Christie have to say about that on the Sunday morning new talk shows tomorrow - how do you defend the indefensible?