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Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026

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I have a general political theory on the current Democratic Party that no matter what gift Trump gives them they will find a way to mess it up.

ICE has had a lot of bad vibes lately. Enter the Bad Bunny Super Bowl show. I had never heard of him before Trumps rants on the Bad Bunny being in the Super Bowl. I don’t know if he was picked by the wokes or simply the NFL trying to find away to grow the game outside the US.

I think a general view of the center-left is to be nice to immigrants (empathy) even if they are closer to economic migrants than asylum/desperate. This feels like a cooking the frog too fast type moment where the message seems to be we will replace your culture and you will like it moment. The Super Bowl to me is perhaps the American Holiday most linked to Americana and they did the event completely in Spanish. The performance was trashy with some sort of sugar plantation theme (which were never in America and most of Spanish-Speaking Americans are not sugar plantation culture).

My hope is that this has gone too far and even my liberal mother will have an issue with explicit replacement.

sugar plantation sex

I was also starting to consider Americans thoughts on what is generally referred to as LATAM which is basically anything south of the Rio Grande. Most Americans probably group them into one group even though they are distinct economically and in their ethnic makeup. I don’t think the other south of the border types would be happy with their presentation when we could have found other groups with positive cultural traits if the goal was marketing to LATAM. Maybe I am missing a group but when I think of south of the border I think there are a few broad groups.

  1. Bad Bunnies Caribbean plantation culture. Cubans though seem to have classier elements.
  2. Mostly Mexico and some other Central America. A combination of conquistadors and Amerindian mostly Aztec
  3. Brazil and the Portuguese culture.
  4. Southern Cone. Least “Latino” and as much Italian as Spanish.

If the NFL goal is to grow the game I don’t see how highlighting sugar cane field sex would be viewed as a good way to reach out. Groups from these regions only have significant presence in Miami and Puerto Rico within US territories. From what I can tell southern cone twitter hates the performance.

After viewing the performance I will rate it worse than my fears. Politically I will rate it as good for my side in the category of the wokes always find a way to ruin electoral chances for the Democrats.

Edit: Empire which America is should never degrade itself especially on the big stages. It’s actually one reason the stupid amount of money we spent on the new Fed I can understand. When Milei comes to Washington (any Leader) and signs some currency swap the building he meets with Bessent or Powell needs to loudly say Empire. In Dunk and Egg show the bad Targaryen gets it right the dragon never dies even in a puppet show. The Super Bowl is one of those stages for the US.

It was defiantly anti assimilation and pro replacement. It is really hard to ignore the Straussian read here.

An economic union with people who at best are indifferent is one I’m not interested in especially when we don’t need the immigrants. I like America. I like Americana. I unapologetically like things like Walt Disney World, cheeseburgers, and the Fourth of July. I love our reverence for our founding fathers and considered the founding documents incredibly thought provoking re political economy (eg Federalist and Anti Federalist Papers should be read by every high school class). I always feel something when I walk through the Mall. If I’m asked to give it up, the question is why. I’m far from convinced peculiarly we are enriched by LATAM immigration and I am very convinced whatever pecuniary benefits are not worth the cost of giving up the culture I grew up with.

You just saw a show where an American citizen sang about stuff like getting drunk with his cousin for the Fourth of July, and pointed at the camera and told people stuff like you can achieve anything you dream of, believe in yourself and keep working for it. He even celebrated the family unit and marriage, having a couple get married during his show! You just didn’t realize that’s what was going on.

This just seems like purposeful misreading of my comments. Yes Bad Bunny is technically an American citizen. But he isn’t American culturally. He sings in Spanish. He views America almost like a militant LATAM.

It isn’t my America (of course Bad Bunny thinks America is everything in the new world and Americans are being narcissistic to label themselves as the only Americans). It isn’t the America I grew up in.

And I’m supposed to be happy if he replaces my America with his vision because he says people can achieve their dreams?

He's an American citizen because the US Army claimed his homeland and the American security state crushed the groups in the 60s trying to make it "not America" He's obviously not an Anglo American but Puerto Rico has been part of America longer than most modern countries have existed.