It doesn't exactly work for the broader narrative of Republican superiority and "Crazy Nancy's" hold on the "evil" Democratic Party if anyone acknowledges that a crazed lunatic apparently attacked an elderly man and wanted to maim and kidnap the Speaker of the House.
We're still in a land where "truth" isn't one thing, but many things to many different people. And where the "mainstream media" is part of an "elite cabal" with the "evil," Devil-worshipping Democrats — something that accused Pelosi attacker David DePape himself seems to have espoused. That's how even mainstream Republicans are now trying to distance themselves and deny their own culpability in the actual narrative — an unhinged person, spurred on by conspiracy theories being blared on the internet, went to Nancy Pelosi's house in search of some kind of violent confrontation — by embracing rumor an innuendo. And we now have fucking Elon Musk at the helm of Twitter, trying to tell Hillary Clinton she should be paying more attention to a conspiracy-happy fringe publication.
Musk tweeted, and then deleted, a suggestion in response to Clinton that there might be some kernel of truth to a report that Paul Pelosi was entertaining a male guest at 2 a.m. Friday — drawing on several bits of misinformation, including a detail debunked by police that DePape was in his underwear when police arrived.
San Francisco police made clear that, according to the initial investigation, DePape was no "friend" to the Pelosis and that Paul Pelosi had no idea who this man was who broke into his home. Video from Friday showed the smashed glass door where DePape apparently made entry to the home — he wasn't let in.
VIDEO: Over the home of Speaker Nancy Pelosi - shows a shattered window - where the suspect who broke into the home and attacked Paul Pelosi may have gotten in.
— Ryan Yamamoto (@RyanKPIX) October 28, 2022
Story here: https://t.co/cc78vzvAkQ@KPIXtv #kpix #NancyPelosi pic.twitter.com/Y7nfbwoEnq
SFPD Chief Bill Scott said in a CNN interview that there is zero evidence that Pelosi knew DePape. "It really is sad that... these baseless, fact-less theories are being floated out there," Scott added. "And they're damaging — they're damaging to the people involved, they're damaging to this investigation."
None of that is enough, and as the New York Times reports, some mainstream Republicans are happy to run with the early rumor rather than the facts as they're emerging. In one example, a former Republican primary candidate for New Jersey’s 4th Congressional District, tweeted "New day, new narrative," today, implying that emerging details were some kind of lie whipped up by Democrats to cover up the baseless story that was promulgated by Musk, via the disreputable Santa Monica Observer.
We now know that DePape was carrying hammers because he wanted to "break her kneecaps," and he allegedly told police in an interview that he wanted to see Pelosi "wheeled" into Congress and made an example of, as the "leader of the pack" of liars.
But those on the right for whom this could present something scary and politically inconvenient, if say there was too much sympathy for Pelosi, are basically holding their ears shut and telling others to do the same. Pushing for conservatives to form their own theories about the attack on Paul Pelosi, Fox News contributor David Webb said on a Sunday show, "Look for what’s missing and what doesn’t add up."
As Angelo Carusone, the president and chief executive of the progressive nonprofit Media Matters for America, puts it to the Times, there's no room for sympathy for anyone named Pelosi in this storyline — because to show sympathy would be anathema to the vilification campaign they've been on for years and years.
"They’re very unlikely to give them any solace or support even in the most clear-cut circumstances, because in some way it cuts against the broader narrative that they’re supervillains and therefore deserve it," Carusone tells the Times.
Right, so, us versus them. And within three days you have people like Marjorie Taylor Greene suggesting that now Musk and the Santa Monica Observer are being silenced in tweeting about "Paul Pelosi's friend."
The same mainstream media democrat activists that sold conspiracy theories for years about President Trump and Russia are now blaming @elonmusk for “internet misinformation” about Paul Pelosi’s friend attacking him with a hammer.
— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@RepMTG) October 31, 2022
The media is source of misinformation.
Trumper Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake made an offhand joke at a Scottsdale campaign event — to which there was uproarious laughter, as CNN reports — about how Nancy Pelosi's "got protection when she’s in D.C. — [but] apparently, her house doesn’t have a lot of protection."
It's just more evidence that politicians on the other side of the aisle aren't seen as real people by Republicans — they and their spouses are just actors in a play or on a show who need to be taken out. It's similar to the way those morons marched around the Capitol looking for "Nancy" on January 6th, behaving like they were on some reality show, thanks to our former reality-show president.
The coarseness and insanity goes on. Marjorie Taylor Greene hasn't pulled down her tweet despite an FBI affidavit that contradicts it. Her truth doesn't have to be your truth.
Please, someone tell Georgia's 14th District to stop fucking voting for that awful woman, and the same goes for everywhere else in the country where people seem to think politics are a game and none of this is real.
Top image: Police tape is seen in front of the home of U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) on October 28, 2022 in San Francisco, California. Paul Pelosi, the husband of U.S. Speaker of the house Nancy Pelosi, was violently attacked in their home by an intruder. One arrest has been made. Speaker Pelosi was not at home at the time of the attack. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)