Disgusted yet, Vic?    

     This morning I saw the most hateful political ad of the 2016 Republican race thus far: a twenty-eight second black and white anti-transgender scare piece aimed at Donald Trump's recent remark that North Carolina shouldn't have passed its intolerant public restroom law which ignores transgender identification with one sex or the other.
     North Carolina has lost business opportunities due to this disgusting and bigoted legislative action.  Trump, being a businessman, remarked on this consequence in connection with his statement highlighted by Cruz for President, which paid for the ad: "People go, they use the bathroom that they feel is appropriate--"
     I cut Trump's words off after "appropriate" because the ad snips his overall idea.  It's been wondered about in the news media if Trump's view on transgender use of public restrooms, one of his few expressed humane beliefs, will harm him among Republican voters.  I doubt it, but hardcore shits who get in a tither about where people go to the bathroom, may find themselves in sympathy with Ted Cruz's intolerance, such as this person, Patriot, G. Cole, who tweeted, "first man I see go in a girls bathroom, that man will be using the bathroom through a straw in a hospital for a month."
     I assume Patriot, G. Cole is a doctor who can determine for how long patients will stay in the hospital after suffering serious groin injuries, including those he inflicts.  Apparently, Patriot, G. Cole, a Cruz supporter, also spends some of his time keeping an eye on the doors of "girls" bathrooms, and also doesn't realize that women use them, too.
     From the diaper-changing table, some of the ad was photographed in a women's restroom.  Presumably, a woman took the pictures.  The image with the diaper-changing table (implying "baby") is accompanied by the caption, "SHOULD A GROWN MAN" (capital letters are used throughout), and followed by "PRETENDING TO BE A WOMAN".  This second image shows three stalls, the middle occupied, flanked by two empties.  The person in the middle is probably a woman due to the way the calves taper to the ankles.  She wears sandals and is sitting down.  The stall to her right has nothing going on, but the one to her left (get it?) has a strip of toilet paper on the floor, as if the person who used it, supposedly a transgender or, in Cruz's worldview, "pretend woman," is not only an abomination but also a slob.
     "BE ALLOWED TO USE THE WOMEN'S RESTROOM?" the question concludes, on an image of what looks like a rest area or park building where the women and girls go to relieve themselves.  The word "women" appears on the restroom door and also on the the little fence partially blocking our view of the building.  By this point, anyone with a half a brain (I mean that literally) should be thinking, "Hell no, Ted!"
     This is only six seconds into the ad.
     "THE SAME RESTROOM USED BY YOUR DAUGHTER?  YOUR WIFE?"  This image shows the back of a woman holding a plastic bag in her left hand and her little blonde daughter's hand in her right.  They would be in danger from a transgender violent sex criminal who lurks in women's restrooms, but how many of those are there?
     We then see and hear Trump saying the above-mentioned sound bite, accompanied by a still portrait of Trump with the caption, "DONALD TRUMP THINKS SO."  Following this, is the caption, "IT'S NOT APPROPRIATE, IT'S NOT SAFE".  Here, we look down a line of nine white bathroom stalls (contrasting with the three dark-painted stalls in the earlier image) and a black and white pattern of wall tile at the far end of the room, indicating this is a black and white (good versus evil) issue.
     Another restroom follows, with darkly painted stalls, a multi-colored tile pattern, and mirrors facing the stalls, indicating, I guess, the vanity and selfishness of those indulging their inner gender.
     "IT'S PC NONSENSE THAT'S DESTROYING AMERICA" the caption reads over this horrifying clean-looking bathroom.  Yes, "nonsense" is destroying America, not intolerance, racism, economic inequality, abuse of the security apparatus, or militarism; or, for that matter, authority figures like Ted Cruz.
     Over a shot of Trump smiling and looking almost bashful, the next caption reads, "DONALD TRUMP WON'T TAKE ON THE PC POLICE."  Judging from Trump's nauseatingly frequent attacks against political correctness since last summer, I'd say he's attacked PC far more than Cruz has.  The last caption adds, "HE'S ONE OF THEM."  Assuming there really is a PC Police force.
     Here we see a cute flip.  Trump, enemy of political correctness, is actually, according to Cruz, a champion of political correctness.  Take your opponent's strength and convert it into a weakness.  Accuse the opponent of doing exactly what he isn't doing.  Trump, contrary to popular notions on the news during the past day or two, didn't exactly give a ringing endorsement to transgender rights.  He pointed out that North Carolina was getting "punished" for passing a law bad for business.  Being from New York, Trump, unlike Cruz, has encountered far more of the LGBT community.  He also demonstrated, even in the ad's clipped sound bite meant to make him seem PC, his willingness to let people use bathrooms if they need to go.  This is not a high bar in an ethics contest.  If a transgender needs to use your bathroom are you going to say, "No"?  What kind of asshole would do that?  Ted Cruz, perhaps?  Patriot, G. Cole?
     The ad will work with many Cruz supporters and some who are undecided, but I just get the impression that Senator Cruz is obsessed with women's restrooms.  This, world, is what the most important political process in my country this year has come to.  Expect worse.
     An additional comment:
     Prince, who collapsed and died in an elevator at his home in Minnesota after a long struggle with the flu, is all over the news today, and also was last night.  Every piece I've seen about him has been laudatory, but last night on Fox News, Megyn Kelly shared the screen on her show with silent images of Prince performing, along with Fox "expert analyst" Mark Fuhrman, ex-cop and controversial figure in the O.J. Simpson murder trial.  Kelly and Fuhrman talked about Prince's death, Fuhrman offering his experience-based knowledge of cops dealing with dead people.  He talked about how Prince may have died, saying, during the brief excerpt I endured before turning the channel in disgust, that "they [the cops] might be looking for a syringe..."
     In other words, he was saying a bunch of shit on Fox News while images of the great musician and songwriter played in the screen's lower right corner, Fuhrman in his own box above him, white over black.  Fuck you, Mark Fuhrman, and fuck you, Megyn Kelly for trying to turn Prince into someone supposedly worthy of having a slime like Fuhrman speculate about, without even knowing what cops on the scene know.
   
                                                                               Vic Neptune