The Republicans and Diet Coke: A Tragic Love Story

When something so bad makes them feel so good.

Jill Francis
7 min readJul 27, 2022
Photo by Kenny Eliason on Unsplash

If you are as disgusted with 99% of the Republican Party in the US as I am, the January 6th hearings are our Super Bowl. I’ve been riveted to every move in the playbook, from the Cheney Chop to the Raskin Rattler, and have been cheering every point that lights up the scoreboard. Anyone equally obsessed is going to notice a few weird things along the way, like the fact that all of the women who testified live before the committee wore black, white, or some combination of the two. I’ve also noticed that Adam Kinzinger seems to be dealing with the stress of both the hearings and new parenthood by getting in the gym and is, at this point, testing the stretch properties of worsted wool in his now-undersized suit coats. However, the one detail that, in my uneducated opinion, reveals the true nature of the GOP is the ubiquitous presence of Diet Coke, a beverage that has been as much in decline in recent decades as the moral code of the entire political party.

By now, most of us are aware that Ex-President Cheeto is a Diet Coke fiend to the tune of twelve cans a day. We’ve all heard the story of the “Coke Button” that he had installed on his desk so that he could presumably stab a sweaty, ketchup-stinky digit at it when he needed a fix. No one even questioned the…

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Jill Francis

American immigrant in Italy with too many degrees in Psychology. I write about everything I’m afraid of. jillfranciswrites@gmail.com