I actually, physically groaned when I saw the Billboard cover line: “Make America Blake Again.” It’s a takeoff of Donald Trump’s slogan “Make America Great Again.” Is that just a stupid magazine editor making a dumb wording choice, or does the cover line reflect Blake interview? Yeah… it reflects Blake’s interview. Blake skirts around the issue of who he will vote for in November, but he’s a soldier in the War Against Political Correctness (a favorite Trump cause) and he’s also a member of the False Equivalencies Club. So, yeah, probably a Trump voter. You can read the full Billboard piece here. This is the political section:
“In country music, we’re so politically correct and so afraid to possibly upset someone,” he says.
Recently a tea party website announced, “Blake Shelton Sides With Trump on Issues of Political Correctness,” dubiously trying to claim him for the right wing. Does the singer support Donald Trump?
“I’m not going to have the political conversation with you about Trump, or about Hillary Clinton, but I will tell you this: Whether you love him or hate him, he says what he thinks, and he has proven that you don’t always have to be so afraid. A lot of people are pulling for him, no matter how much Hollywood fights it. I see people who don’t like him go and beat up people that do like him. You tell me, who’s crazy here?” Shelton, who says he will vote in November, adds, “I probably wish there was another option, but there’s not.”
After this interview went wide yesterday, many sites ran stories about Blake’s seeming admiration for Donald Trump’s ability to “say what he thinks.” Not to mention Trump’s ability to make it possible for white men to NOT be afraid when they’re saying something un-PC, as in saying something racist, sexist, derogatory towards people with disabilities, derogatory towards people who believe in democracy and more. I’m frankly more disgusted with Blake’s “woe is the white guy who has to watch what he says” act than his slippery false equivalency that both Trump and Clinton are equally awful somehow. Anyway, people noticed and Blake decided to correct the record on Twitter. Some assorted comments from Blake’s Twitter (I’m not embedding because he might tweet-and-delete):
Hey before this gets going like it always does… I haven’t enforced ANYBODY for president. And I not going to. I don’t do that sh-t.
My comment about “wish there was another option but there’s not” is across the board…period. Now go dig up another story.
When y’all what the news about this stuff watch ALL the channels.. Read ALL the articles. Make YOUR mind up. And then vote.
It’s crazy that in this moment in time… With everything going on in the world that spinning my words is so important to the media.
[From Blake Shelton’s Twitter]
How dare Billboard accurately quote Blake Shelton when he’s speaking to them during an on-the-record interview for the cover? How dare other media outlets run those quotes in context and draw an inference that Blake Shelton seems like a Donald Trump apologist? I mean, come on!
Photos courtesy of Billboard.
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