Part I: “Nice Shooting, Wedge!”

With the leavings of NYC, Chicago and Baltimore still to trickle in non-iconic superstar Joe Biden is set to win the presidency with 306 electoral votes and ~8M popular votes for, likely, a little shy of a 5% margin.

The massive turnout and the down ballot thumb in the eye delivered to Democrats have clarified a lot of questions a-brew since Obama’s 2012 victory and frustrating second term.

#1 “The Sanders Revolution” Was an Illusion, but The Trump “Revolution” Was Real:

Remember how we all laughed at Mittens for his demand to “unskew” the polls? Well, Mittens was right in theory but not in practice. There WAS a voluminous “missing” white vote throughout the USA. Mittens failed to get it out. Trump succeeded in 2016 and built on it in 2020. This success was the result of a swirl of racism and, moreover, a larger “wagging middle finger” at various, distant elites that Trump’s puerile narcissism so ably tweaked. Bernie Sanders also claimed that his “revolution” would turn out a bevy of low propensity voters by promising them the fruits of socialism spiked with the commeuppence of ‘billyonahrs’ and ‘millyonahrs’ (other than himself, bien sur). Bernie had the money and organization to garner this revolution in the 2020 priamry without the interference of Clinton loyalists. Instead he did worse without the anti-Clinton vote. Swedenizing the USA with a side of anti-wealthy Jacobeanism failed. Trump’s bullshit worked. So it goes.

#2 Both Bases are Real

In 2008 Obama’s community organizer skills begat a stellar ground game that expanded the Democratic base without the need to cater to “the middle”. Yeah? Well, both Trump and Biden blew straight through Obama’s 2008 landslideish vote total (69.5M). Sure, population has grown but no candidate came close to the 69.5M mark in 2012 or 2016. With Obama off the ballot Dems got BTFO’d in 2010 and 2014. Sans Trump R’s got walloped in 2018. In 2020 both bases doubled down and, while the Democratic one turns out to be larger, it needed to be much bigger than the 08 Obama version to match the maximized Trump base. Any slippage either way makes for a blow out for the other side.

#3 It’s All About the Wedge Issues

Recall the angst from the professional left that the Democratic Convention did not showcase AOC and instead highlighted many bland midwestern Republicans. Well guess who got wedged out of the Republican coalition to win the election for Biden. Guess who didn’t follow through for down ballot Ds? With the Republican’s structural advantage in the Electoral College, and with both bases being about equal at their maximum, Dems will need to find ways to wedge off part of the Republican coalition. Trump succeeded at this on the margins with some latinos and younger black men; but that was dwarfed by Biden’s gains in the suburbs.

In this case, the wedge was just from light “never trumpers” that could not abide the mans ugliness, but apparently had not much trouble with standard Republicans. The fact that no big policy ideas other than the imbecilic “defund the police” slogan and AOC’s annoying media presence were able to fill the void made the wedging more negative (anti-Trump) than positive (pro-Anything). With Trump’s masterful ability to exhaust the oxygen in the room, perhaps it never could be about healthcare as the ’18 mid-terms were.

No, to wedge off pieces of the Republican base, Democrats will have to be more creative and idealistic. Sandersism isn’t going to work, but a successful wedge issue is in plain sight if Democrats have the guts to seize it.

Isn’t it Non-Iconic? Don’t Ya’ Think?

The most astute analysis of America today that I have heard came from a tangential high school acquaintance. This woman is autistic and has become a supporter of Greta Thunberg, the young Scandinavian climate activist. Upon sharing her enthusiasm for Ms. Thunberg, she was surprised to see that many people she spoke with disliked Ms. Thunberg.

Her conclusion: For better or worse ANYONE that becomes an iconic figure in this epoch will end up being both loved and hated. So what may be needed is someone that is not an icon, someone that will inspire neither intense passion or dense disdain.

Biden was, seemingly, the first choice of few in the Primary and barely registered in his two previous attempts. He was an astute VP Pick for Obama in providing both the experience and the doubling down on what time has proven to be the weakest element of the 08 and 12 Obama Coalition: northern white’s without college degrees. Still, it seems that few truly adore Biden; he doesn’t have a signature policy idea like Andrew Yang or a unique ideological spunk like Bernie Sanders. His “baseball card” stats of ethnicity, religion and all the rest are not those deemed unusual or unique. Yet, somehow, over pertinear five decades as a workhorse politico including three national campaigns, it is still really hard to hate or even dislike Joe Biden.

Non-dislikeability. That is Joe’s super power. In age filled with “small time Napoleons” trying to navigate their own platforms to become icons or perhaps the next Keith Raniere, it is a rare superpower indeed. Not that one that anyone wants, but, methinks, the one America needs.

America. Doom? Dessert Country.

It’s Harkonens versus Atreidies to rule America in 2020. In November we will learn: Is Joe Biden Duke Leto Atriedies? Or is Joe Biden Paul Muad’Dib?

Either way, I’ll be drinking the Water of Life on Election Day/Week.

Bern Means Business!

Let it be told that Bernie Sanders lost the Democratic Primary not on Super Tuesday, but shortly after his victory in Nevada. For it was at that time that The Bern committed two needless, imbecilic own goals.

First, Sanders hectored both AIPAC and Israel’s PM Netanyahu, calling both the conference and the PM “racist”. Usually, “racist” is an epitaph reserved for, well, actual racists, like David Duke. This was no doubt a delight to to the cadre of Islamic supremacist anti-Semites such as Linda Sarsour and Reps. Omar & Tlaib that the Bern Out has surrounded himself with, who know a good dhimmi when they encounter one. For the the preponderence of American Jews, and one suspects “swing” suburban women, calling a conference that all of Bernos fellow candidates attended (save The Liz) one way or another, is absurd and obnoxious, even if many may not like Bibi himself.

El Bern followed that up by cheerleading Castro’s Cuban literacy program in a 60 Minutes interview. True, he made an obligatory ho hum denouncement of the whole authoritarian thing, but that clearly was not where his joy was. For many Cubans, that small matter of the dictatorship aspect of Castro’s Cuba makes celebrating its literacy akin to enjoying the punctuality of Mousslini’s train service.

Having stuck his thumb in the eye of broad swaths of Jews, Cubans and other latinos, Berning Man not just lowered his chances of winning Florida in the General, he took Florida off the map. One suspects, this was the “oh shit” moment that finally coalesced the Moderates around Uncle Joe.

Berns burn out was avoidable.

With AIPAC, Bernie could have sent in a milquetoast taped address and gone on with his “proud to be Jewish” (as a “good Jew” of course, not an uppity Zionist one) subterfuge or just said nothing and skipped it. The Castro bit was a more complicated gotcha, but Bernt could have said that the positive of literacy programs he mentioned in the 80s in no way excuses the horrors of dictatorship.

Instead, Bernmetheus doubled down on rhetoric that did nothing to expand his base while pre-emptively losing a bell weather swing state.

Why would a professional politician make such a blunder?

During this crucial stretch, the New York Times produced a fascinating overview of “The Dirt Bag” left, Ur-Bernie Bros that have a popular, pugnacious “teabagger for the left” (Thus Dirt Bag), podcast and road show hosted by a fivesome called the “Chapo Trap House”.

“During the three-hour show, there is little vision laid out for what they want, beyond a Sanders presidency. There is a vision for what they want destroyed and how good it will feel to do that. The idea of actually taking power is terrifying, and they say so.

“’What’s scary is the idea that this could end,’” Mr. Biederman said. “What’s scary is we’re not just tossing catharsis into the void, that this is something real. We are there.’”

Of course winning is horrifying! The Chapos make a combined 168K per month just from their podcast. Assuming that is their only revenue stream (which seems unlikely) then they are raking in north of 2M per year. Split five ways, that’s 400K apiece. Unless MC Hammer is managing their finances, almost assuredly the Chapos are all ‘mill-yon-aaahrs’, as is Bernito himself.

That is the ultimate tasty irony of Bernie Sanders and his most stout Sandernistas: They Are Businessmen! Like any good Capitalists that have built a strong brand, they are ferocious in defense of that brand. The Bernie Brand is one of uncompromising purity as a perch to heckle impure moderates and rage against systematic establishments and lambaste a “billionaire class” (that apparently includes almost every black person in the deep south) to be “Anti” to, while promising grande and even laudable ideas that have no chance of becoming law. Ah, but that’s where the true sizzle of Brand Bernie pops off of the steak: You see, the grand strategems will all come to pass once the the revolution arrives in the form of million upon millions upon millions of new, mostly younger, voters. The Bernvoluton, like all revolutions, shall be pure!!!!

As an electoral strategy, The Youth Vote is dubious. Young people passionate about politics is a wondrous thing. They fill rallies, knock on doors, persuade peers, contribute beer money, and invigorate by their presence. They just don’t vote. In 2008 Barak Obama, a once in a generation political talent running at the perfect moment, increased the youth vote by about 10% comparable to 2004, or ~2.3 million votes. That’s a lot, but Democrats actually won back the gerrymandered House in 2018 by winning moderate suburban women. Bernie is an effective and inspirational leader. He truly does have a powerful brand. But Bernie Sanders, you’re no BHO.

Still, the revolution that never arrives is the perfect Ghost in the Machine for Brand Bernie. It allows all of the outrageous promises, it makes it unnecessary to be diplomatic towards AIPAC (Abu Mazen is apparently the only billionaire Bernie likes) or forcibly denounce Castro or do any of the frustrating (and grossly impure work) of actually succeeding and getting anything accomplished. And then, when the revolution does not arrive all that is needed is to warm over some Gramsci theorizing about how elite bourgeoise institutions thwarted the revolution by controlling mass culture, and then go back to sneering at liberals, heckling moderates, fulminating against Israel, snarking the impure, being bitter about rigged establishments, and all of the other simplistic drivel that stands in the place of actually doing the grim work of moving the ball forward on issues you purport to be passionate about.

Indeed, a 40 state loss in The General would be the best outcome possible for the Bernie Brand. Just think of the power structures to blame, the legions of petit bourgeoises that were fooled and can be mocked, and oh the glorious dreams of what could have been if only.

For the USA of course, untethered President Great Pumpkin and a Republican House, Senate and Supreme Court would be a nightmare. But Businessman Bernie and his Capitalist Bros will be laughing all the way to the Credit Union.

The American Century.

About 100 years ago, the United States began to take center stage in world affairs. Europe had destroyed itself and was gearing up to do it again. This was the end of the first era of globalization that had the British Empire at its heart. You can draw a lot of parallels, but there are, of course, many differences. For one, the British Empire decayed largely from external pressure.

The most remarkable feature of American politics at present isn’t so much the polarization, but the intellectual bankruptcy of the bases of both political parties. The Republican base has turned into a cult of personality; the Democratic base has turned into a cult of orthodoxy.

Things that used to be the trademarks of the conservative movement such as free trade and small government are close to meaningless in the current Republican party, and subject to change on the whim of the President. Even the post-war Hawkishness (including the anti-Soviet flavor) of the Republican party is lost.

Likewise, liberalism has no meaning anymore. Concepts like due process are discarded if they conflict with the prevailing orthodoxy. While the liberal left at one time distinguished itself on the basis of its deference to science, like all orthodoxies, inconvenient truths cannot survive the its inquisitions. Meanwhile, what science is part of the the orthodoxy is used to demand maximal outcomes in accordance with the orthodoxy instead of a solution.

The result is that each side gets very narrow results according to its immediate priorities, but only in the short term. Nothing long-term gets accomplished.

A vicious cycle of identity conflict has also arisen. Many whites are acting like a minority. Diagnosing the blame is irrelevant. This is going to get worse.

So, the American century looks set to end with the proverbial whimper with a farcical government of incompetence being manipulated by the lilliputian Russians while the Chinese advance.

The military believes it will lose in a conflict with China, according to its wargaming. We have failed to strengthen our alliances in the Pacific, and will ultimately lose our influence there, whether you want to call it “hegemony” or underwriting globalization. Will we fight for it?

In the west, Europe already understands that we are waning. Iran is challenging us in the Middle East.

There is no problem that a new President can fix, not that we will see a new one in 2021. That is not probable. Even if we did, the storm of scandal and obstruction that would follow would prevent any meaningful change. The United States will be more unequal in 2025 regardless of who is President. It will have done nothing meaningful about the environment in 2025, regardless of who is President. The dollar will be a less widely used currency in 2025, regardless of who is President. Adults will be deeper in student loan debt in 2025, regardless of who is President. Less people will have affordable medical care. And so on.

Will the Right Welcome the Kremlin Coup?

America has lost the Cold War in the post-game interviews.

The President is an asset of the Russian government.

It’s already known that Trump financed his businesses with Russian money. The pee tape and other dadaist absurdities are also likely real. Those two things are enough to undermine his finances and, maybe, his reputation. But at a more base level, it doesn’t matter what Russia has on Trump. Why should Trump not act as a Russian Agent when it has brought him fortune and power?

The hacking of the 2016 election was not the equivalent of Pearl Harbor or 9/11. No Americans wanted the Pacific fleet destroyed or the twin towers felled. Forty some odd million Americans did want Trump to be President. At the base College Football level, they don’t care that his win was dirty. Are the Dallas Stars really sweating their skate in the crease Stanley Cup? Of course not! While the 2016 election is revolting it is also bloodless. It hasn’t changed workaday life in an obvious, direct and negative manner. Mueller is not quite the equivalent of an exasperated Sabres blogger — but Hillary Clinton won’t get the Stanley Cup either.

Team Putin and the Russian jinns have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. The pertinent question is whether they are satisfied with one victory, or do they want to take a chance to win the war? Trump is likely most useful as a Russian Asset today. Despite his relative unpopularity, he commands a Republican apparatus that maintains all federal elected power. From the GRU’s perspective, the Asset’s strength could slip easily. Fatso Trump could die or become medically incapacitated. Democrats could win one House in November and weaken his hand, and have subpoena power. Mueller could find a ‘smoking gun’ . Trump’s tax returns could leak, perhaps revealing his financial ties to Russian oligarchs. The economy could take a natural downturn. His inherent gonzo douche baggery may undermine Trump unexpectedly.

The Asset could get more powerful if Republicans hold on in the mid-terms and Trump wins re-election (which he probably will). Still, the Russian Asset is a ‘sure thing’ today and will likely remain so through November or possibly next January.

From a game theory perspective applied to the GRU and Putin, is now the time to go for a maximalist gain? Namely, is now the time for a real 9/11 or Peal Harbor — an unquestionably ugly event,  but one that produces a reaction that strengthens Moscow’s hand? Japan awoke a sleeping giant. Al Qaeda won 9/11 and its aftermath in many ways, until a real President came along and contained and decapitated al Qaeda (if not ISIS).

How could Russia win during this window that it’s Asset is at maximal usefulness? My theory: a cyberattack creates a nationwide electrical blackout in mid-October. In the chaos, scores of plants or terror cells start mass casualty shooting sprees. They are neutralized. Some turn out to be Islamic terrorists, others neo-Nazis or white nationalists, a few are eco terrorists or the most radical elements of the anti-semitic BDS Left. The DC Security establishment immediately identifies Russia as behind the electrical grid hack and as coordinators of the shooting sprees. Trump notes the randomness of the shooters and insists that it is not clear who initiated the cyber attack. Meanwhile, with the electricity out for 96 hours the basic elements of food, water and shelter become more strained. Trump uses it as an excuse to declare limited martial law to have the military keep order and maintain supplies, More intelligence officials testify that Russia initiated the attack. Many citizens are convinced that Trump colluded with Putin on the attack as a “Reichstag Fire”, or was asleep at the wheel and let it happen. Millions take to the streets to demand Trump’s resignation or ouster, leading to counter protesters certain that the black out was a “deep state” false flag, demanding that Trump maintain power. Sporadic violence breaks out between the two groups, leading to more calls for calm via military law. With the USA in chaos Russia begins making incursions to Eastern European countries like Montenegro or Slovenia. America stiffs NATO, leaving its European allies to contend with an emboldened Russia. Electricity is restored, but then is ‘hacked off again. Other cyber attacks lead to more infrastructure failures. Trump cancels the mid-term elections leading to more protests, more counter protests, more violence and more chaos which begats more military order that the mushy middle supports if only to obtain their bread ration. Meanwhile, scape goating and blame over the cause of the black out intensifies leading to more chaos and violence. Authoritarian order keeping becomes the norm. NATO is left weakened, Russia gains territory and their compromised Asset, Donald Trump, is now firmly entrenched ruling over a divided and weakened former super power in North America.

Far fetched? Paranoid? Ridiculous? Yes. But Donald Frikkin’ Trump, a compromised Russian Asset, is President.  He is likely most useful to his Russian masters right now. The Director of National Intelligence is stating that the ‘lights are blinking red’ warning of another cyber attack.

Something is coming. Something is coming that will not be good. Something is coming that America is not ready for.

MOAB Morons

This isn’t complicated. Trump throws some missiles at Syria and gets press kudos. Trump does the same trick in Afghanistan and takes advantage of free advertising associated with the kitcshy MOAB moniker. Everyone, including his stalwart critics, clickbaits about it; thereby continuing the pathetic symbiotic relationship between Trump and our worthless media. Yes, I mean you, clickbait-in-fury purportedly liberal Mother Jones!

Nothing practical is accomplished. The non-articulation of any strategy makes it obvious that MOABing is not part of a broader ME strategy because none exists. Meaningless.

Another day of our lives crests and oozes away.

Thoughts on Intersectionality

Originally a critical studies concept that was used to talk about the “intersection” of questions of race and gender in the United States, the term has become an organizing principle of today’s left.

It’s a pretty broadly accepted concept, but it has its critics. Marxists think it doesn’t focus enough on class. Natch. Or that it’s not complex enough, or it’s American-centric. Outside of the “critical studies” world, it’s easy enough to imagine that the idea is impossible to accept by political conservatives.

My problem with it is a bit different. It has absolutely no empirical basis. There is no formula for figuring out who is more oppressed. Is it a black transwoman muslim? Or a poor gay Amerindian? How do we measure “oppression.” We can’t. The reason for that is that “oppression” is not one thing, pace Marxists.

For some, oppression is unfair scrutiny by police. For others it is identity-based difficulty in acquiring a job. There is no one oppression. It is not created by capitalism (prove me wrong). It is not created by colonialism. Not alone. All of the different kinds of oppression are just that: different. Some are, quite frankly, trivial and others are crimes against humanity.

I do agree that the catalog of “intersections” seems to depend on an American-centric choice, but if you look closer, it’s who is part of the American left. And herein lies the problem:

The politics of intersectionality define it, it and its theory of identity do not define a politics. If you are part of a group opposed to U.S. policy on any level, you are almost surely “oppressed” in some metaphysically compatible way with African Americans or gays.

This is reductive. It’s Manichean. It is just not correct.

Race-based slavery is the Original Sin of the United States and we aren’t done reckoning with it. Gender equality, on the other hand, was largely pioneered here. Religious freedom and gay rights also emanate from the United States rather than being founded on their negation.

Intersectionalism is so readily contradicted by its—ahem—intersection with religious identity that it’s hard to believe it’s taken seriously at all, given that most religions have teachings that are the source of some of the oppressions that the other groups feel.

When these problems become too plain to ignore, they resort to Colonialism. In other words, inside every Muslim is a LGBT ally trying to get out, but they are held back by their legacy of colonial oppression.

No.

You can’t have diversity that way, by seeing a teleological end point of different groups’ views of identity.

But nobody does more to dissolve this “theory” into absurdity than the Jews. Jews are white, antisemitism is a second-class problem, and Israelis are colonialists.

That’s right. The world’s longest still-existing oppressed group, who have been chased from land to land for literally millennia and who number maybe 15 million–maybe 2% of the entire planet–are part of the oppressor class because they live in the tiny sliver of land called Israel and are rich in the United States.

Jews aren’t a race, so why are they “white”? Jews aren’t all rich unless you’re a Victorian-age antisemite. Jews are only a “majority” capable of oppressing anyone in that tiny piece of land called Israel, which, just happens to be the most liberal country in the area.

Yet unless you’re one of the “Good Jews” willing to despise your co-religionists who feel the need to live in that place (which gets treated worse than North Korea by the international community) you aren’t Intersectional.®

This is simple: Israel is not part of the global left and hasn’t been since the early 50s. Therefore, it’s not Intersectional.® That is the only logical explanation. And that is why Intersectionality is really just a groupthink orthodoxy for the far left.

Quit Trying To Make Legal Arguments Against Trump

Oh boy. Fred Kaplan says Trump’s appointing Bannon to the NSC may be illegal. His legal analysis hinges on a few vague terms and barely justifies the headline. But a broader point:

It is problematic to tell the President who can give him advice in the first place. Maybe Bannon can’t have a “seat” but what difference does this make? None.

You will not solve the problems of the Trump administration with resort to legal arguments and appeals to the courts, especially once his hand-picked justice gets on the Supreme Court.

If people cared about this stuff, he wouldn’t be there in the first place. And if you block him from doing things people support on technicalities, it’s unlikely to be helpful electorally.

Unless we are talking coup, the only remedy for Trump is at the ballot box and that will unfortunately take more than clever legal arguments.

The Unfortunate Uncoolness of Anti-Trumpisms

Admit it.

He’s the worst President-elect in history already, but just because something shows defiance to him doesn’t mean it’s cool or smart or catchy. And we’re going to have to do a lot better to do much good.

The best anti-Trumpisms are the caricatures of him that are only barely exaggerations, like Alec Baldwin on SNL. But so much of what we see online and elsewhere is just … lame.

For example: “pussy grabs back?” And look, I’m not even getting into the fact that the Berniecrats are taking over the Democratic party. They think Bernie would have won, but they are basically saying that moving the party to the left is the way to… capture the white voters who cost the Dems the election?

The problem with that is that what they think Bernie says is different than what he actually says. He says, “focus on wealth inequality” and talks in policy specifics. What they hear is “send everyone to transgender reeducation camp and protest in the streets shutting down the freeway.”

No, unfortunately, Democrats don’t want to—or aren’t ready—to hear what will win them elections again. And it ain’t moving to the left.

It’s this very bitter pill: some white people now behave as a minority even though they aren’t. Call them what you want. They behave this way. To win them over, you need to speak to their issues the same way you do with any minority group or interest.

It might be possible to win without them in a re-run Presidential election, but if you ever hope to get Congress back or even approach parity in governorships and statehouses, this is just what you have to do.

Ready? OK. You won’t like it. I don’t like it. But this is just how shit is.

• It’s the economy, stupid. Which means:

• Stop demanding all social change to occur overnight.

• Apply the same kind of results-based, empirical governance to guns that you want done on issues like the climate. This means you probably need to give up on “assault rifles.” Cheap handguns are the top two dozens most confiscated guns and guns used in crimes. “Assault rifles” look scary but are basically impossible to conceal and are expensive and are used in less than 10% of crimes. Handguns, on the other hand, are used in more than 85% of crimes!  Anyway, gun control will be largely a waste of time as long as the  Trumpish Supreme Court-in-waiting stays alive. School shootings should be a time to focus on why we need universal healthcare that includes mental health coverage. This issue has killed Democrats in enough elections that this should be obvious by now.

• Apply the same kind of results-based, empirical governance to the crime issue that you want done on issues like the climate. This means you probably need to give up on “mass incarceration” as a buzzword because you can’t guarantee that it isn’t one of many different reasons that crime is (or was!) at historical lows. Promoting racial equality in sentencing and encouraging state-run prisons to replace private ones is fine, but fundamentally different than emptying the prisons. This has killed Democrats in enough elections in the past that the thought of making it a viable attack again should horrify you.

• Apply the same kind of harassment-free, warm-fuzzy mentality you expect everyone to show toward the groups you like to religious people, police, and white people. Yes, I know. Racism=prejudice+power. Tell it to your dorm-mates. The white virtual minority either doesn’t or won’t understand that. Stop trying.

• Stop making excuses for terrorists. Enough with muh colonialism. You’re trying to explain how to stop it. What is heard is why we should feel bad when they try to kill us.

• Stop making excuses for hostile foreign nations.

• Stop means testing any government program. Things that are only for poors (welfare/Medicaid) are hated; things that are for everyone are loved (Social Security/Medicare)

Do these things and you have a decent chance of being put in a place where you could work the kind of radical economic reforms we need to the problem of wealth inequality. Expanding Social Security to 55+s and making Medicare available to everyone would go a long way. All those people retiring at 55 would create a flood of jobs. No more pretending Republican answers to healthcare work.

Now, what would happen if we could get to a place where we had a strong, more equal economy? All the social problems would be much more easy to handle. Not simple, but simpler.

Oh, yes. This would also have the added benefit of completely weakening the Trump coalition since reachable voters are the ones you can reverse wedge on some of these issues that aren’t the doctrinaire conservatives.

 

“Hamilton” versus PUTIN-Trump-(pence)

“Hamilton” is the crowning American cultural creation of the 2010s, thus far.* The School House Rock + 90s Rap + Showtunes mashup leaves about a dozen songs stuck in the head and posits new discoveries upon multiple listens. Reimagining the Founding Fathers as Hip Hop Dandies contemporarizes their philosophy, writing, and arguments. The Hamilton Mix Tape lacks the emotional throughfare of the cast album, but its meshing of hip hop and powder wigs is stronger. “I picked up the pen like Hamilton” Nas intones in ‘Wrote My Way Out”. “We’re America’s ghost writers” K’naan shouts in “Immigrants (We Get the Job Done)”.

One iconic Broadway show and one increasingly tasty album does not, a definitive quantitative analysis of cultural or attitudes. Still, it does indicate at least some championing of the ideals and big personas of the founders (in spite of their ugly and hypocritical record on slavery) amongst the broader hip hop community, along with a celebration of the immigrant working hard, thinking harder, making it and becoming American.

Meanwhile, in “Real America”™, following, at best, the seediest election in American history (yes worse than 2000) the Right is suddenly largely embracing the mutual hand jobs exchanged between Team Trump and the Potato Jefe Putin. Strong circumstantial evidence that we have literally elected a Manchurian President and lost the Cold War in the postgame interviews is met with a smile and a shrug. I mean, hHey, he’s our Manchurian President, amiright?

Urban, hip hop America embraces the Founders and the ethos of the Immigrant Striver. Reactionary, conservative America embraces Bolshevism and KGB rat fucking and is just fine, thanks, with playing footsie with overjoyed like, actual, Nazis.

It’s enough of a switcheroo to boggle the mind. That is, until one applies my oldest hypothesis: In America Everything Always Comes Back to Race. Then it makes perfect sense. The machinery the founders, however imperfectly built, is applying itself to a multi-ethnic plural society. Putin and Nazis preserve white christian nationalism without any fussy dog whistles. Oh yeah… Duh!

 

* The best movie of the 2010s is “Melancholia,” even more so now. Rogue One even stole its ending!

New Rule

You can’t invoke “threats to democracy” or “undermining democracy” in criticizing investigations into Russian threats to our democracy and when this serves the interests of the man who lost by 3 million votes in an undemocratic system.

It does delegitimize our system but our system is not directly democratic. So, for those so concerned about democracy, they ought to worry about the electoral college first.

 

Did the FBI Assist Kremlin Sponsored Coup?

Never written a more tinfoil line in my life. But, there’s this and this. So am I crazy or is this real?

Did the FBI obtain a warrant using false information from Trump aides to get e-mail issue live again which objectively tanked Clinton in the polls 10 days before the election—and was it part of a Russian plot? Intelligent people are saying so. I’m hearing this. Sad!

After all, the CIA says the Russians wanted to help Trump and no one can explain the second warrant they got on the e-mails.

Sounds like treason to me.

Palestine is a failed state

Generally, a state is that entity that has a monopoly on legal violence within its borders. A failed state has lost this ability, along with other features of a collective action body to provide services to the public.

The International community in the post-WWII world has focused on “self-determination” and the basic preservation of state boundaries. After the war, under pressure from the United States and the Soviet Union, the world rapidly decolonized and many new states came into existence. It was either presumed or ignored whether these states actually had the features of states in many cases, especially in Africa.

The case of Africa is interesting because especially in the case of the former British colonies, independence was conditioned on universal suffrage and states that resisted the occurring even over a rapid amount of time were made into international pariahs—though arguably not for that alone. Yet almost without exception, the new states that were given the vote became kleptocratic dictatorships almost immediately.

The situation is mostly similar throughout the Middle East with the exceptions of the Gulf emirates and Saudi Arabia that were given independence not on a western parliamentary model, but on traditional leadership structures. It is no mistake that these states are stable and Syria, Iraq, Egypt, and virtually all of Sub-Saharan Africa are not. Better understandings of how liberal democracies emerge show that it is rare that they emerge from illiberal democracies and common that they emerge from more centralized but stable states. The frequent slaughter, genocide, and famine in these areas seriously undercuts the policies undertaken in decolonization. At the very least, the assumption that these people want to “live free or die”—in this case, having one and only one fair election is “living free.”

The Oslo Accords provided space and time to see if some of these mistakes could be avoided in Palestine. They were not. In the first open elections (Doe-eyedly insisted upon by the second Bush administration) resulted in the last elections in over 10 years, the loss of control of Gaza from the recognized Palestinian authority and the failure of either the Hamas government in Gaza or the PA government in the West Bank to provide routine services—which in the international sphere is always blamed on Israel. But this really shouldn’t matter because a sovereign state should, at least in those parts that are unoccupied, be able to do this even with hostile neighbors. Cuba did it.

Of course the situation of white settlers and colonists cannot be in good faith compared to Jews in their ancestral homeland.

Despite this, the international community persists, just as it did after World War II, in either a case of malevolent neglect or being blinded by Kumbaya optimism some toxic mix of both in pushing the two-state agenda. At the very least, consideration of giving Gaza a separate independence should be considered. It also seems more likely that a confederation of the West Bank and Jordan is more likely to be a viable state and ironing out the ramifications of that easier than of a separate Palestine or a single-state solution with Israel.

In reality, the fate of the “settlers” left in an Arab state will likely be the fate of Jews left in every other Arab state. They will be cleansed out of it at best and slaughtered at worst.

A one-state solution in all of Mandatory Palestine would almost certainly result in the same one-man-one-vote but only once result seen elsewhere in the hemisphere under such circumstances. Since this enables the great powers and the UN to wash their hands of the situation it is often chosen.

 

 

It’s always our fault

A professor on NPR this morning, I believe from Davis, said things like “soul searching” and that complaining about racism was “intellectual comfort food”  when the reality was more complex.

A WSJ reporter on the program pointed out that if trade and economic anxiety were really the issues then why, in a place like Ohio, are free traders Portman and Kasich popular?

This election is not my fault. It’s not the fault of some inchoate coastal elite to “understand” “real Americans” or “working class whites.” If they are mad about being made fun of then how do they expect the minority groups they’re mad at to feel? Why is it always our fault.

Let me be clear: the problems of the white working class will not be made better by undoing trade deals and undoing the remnants of the safety net. They will be made worse. This is the path they chose. And if we’re in their living rooms, recording their conversations, it was done to stick it in the eye of their betters.

It’s classic “cutting off your nose to spite your face” behavior and I find attempts to understand or empathize with this comical.

How about these folks get a dose of empathy for the “urban” and “coastal” human beings they hate so much they are willing to suicide bomb them politically? Why isn’t it their job to understand us?

The Democrats do not need a major revolution in their policies or electoral strategies as strange as that sounds. They won the popular vote. They would win the House if it weren’t gerrymandered. As bad and as consequential as this loss was, it was still very close and not a landslide rejection. Those are two different things. 1984 was a landslide but since it was an incumbent’s reelection there weren’t the same consequences.

Becoming the party of the campus left isn’t going to help here either, no matter how much the BernieBros say so. Agreeing with Trump on trade isn’t going to make these “real Americans” ask you for your preferred pronouns anytime soon. If the Keith Ellison chairmanship of the DNC is any indicator, 2020 will be more like 1984.

Recognizing that these people are reactionary and dislike equality for minorities, however, is different than constantly saying “you are racist” at every turn. Knowing how things are doesn’t mean we have to say it 24/7.

 

Right-Wing Jewish Traitors

Any leader of a communal Jewish organization that is apologizing for Steve Bannon is just as much of a self-hating Court Jew trying to save his own skin by currying favor with power as any lefty pro-BDS Jewish sellout.

The fast-twitch antisemitism muscle fibers these folks have developed with respect to criticism of Israel seems to have atrophied with respect to the oldest most basic version of antisemitism.

I’m making no defense of the antisemitism that pervades the global left. It has descended into Jew hatred. But that the very people who have been correctly pointing this out for so many years can’t see the original model when it’s right in their faces is absolutely shocking.

The irony is that the importance of Israel as a safe harbor for Jews wouldn’t be such an issue if it wasn’t for this older type of Jew hatred rearing its head in every generation.

Anyone who stands up for this man, who has done more to bring the Old Hatred back to life in this country than anyone, is just a latter day Elisha ben Abuyah.

The Inevitable Post-Mortem

These are almost as useless as predictions are.

Hillary wasn’t “cool.” The winner of the presidential election since 1980 has always been “cooler.” I wish I had something deeper to add than that. I really don’t. Democrats need to stop believing the customer is always wrong. People don’t want a wonky technocratic President. They want a reflection of their aspirations and fears. Democrats need to stop nominating the A students and get someone charismatic that will listen to the A students. Apparently, no real qualifications are necessary, so there’s no need to limit yourself to the world of politicians.

I’m not saying this with the least touch of snark. I am serious. Kamala Harris has some Obama magic, but someone else’s magic isn’t “cool.” If Peyton Manning was or could be a Democrat, I’d get him going right now.

So, let’s talk about all the stuff:

Hillary wasn’t cool, but I don’t think she made any unforced errors. Some of them were forced. She was so unsubstantively criticized whatever she was for really didn’t matter. Her campaign trying to expand the map was reminiscent of the Maginot Line when her rear was exposed and she couldn’t turn the guns around.

The worst right now are the Sanders people who think he would have done better. Dig into the data. He would have been fighting over the same voters as Trump with less enthusiasm among what was Hillary’s base. Anyway, he wasn’t the candidate.

The worst thing is not knowing what is going to happen. Are the Rs going to repeal everything? or is Trump going to leave some safety net things untouched?

This blog was launched to try to lay out ways to get Democrats to react to Bush. Almost none of the lessons were learned that needed to be learned. Democrats went off on their usual mix of technocracy and identity politics which have only ever gone along for the ride on other issues. “It’s the economy, stupid” remains paramount.

But Democrats can be their own worst enemies, not realizing that they are unilaterally disarming and following rules the other team isn’t playing by anymore. Dems haven’t been rewarded and Rs haven’t been punished by procedural maximalism. They need to just go for it.

The urge to take the party to the Bernie left will probably be irresistible and probably give us 8 years of Trump. Too bad. You can have balls and fight for center-left positions too.

I can’t over-emphasize the identity issue. “Racist” might be true of someone but it won’t persuade them. All of the bullshit campus PC nonsense demanded a Sistah Souljah moment of some kind—wish it would have come from Obama.

Going at cops as cops instead of making it positive is a problem. Movements like Occupy Wall Street start that are supposedly about the 99% but then get coopted by Palestinian issues, police issues, and all the other shit from The Nation and Amy Goodman.

You could go pretty far left on the economy and get away with it if you didn’t bring that with you. Just sayin’

After the Wreckage

Admit it.

It was humiliating.

Seeing  the lions of the last thirty years that had kept the barbarians at the gate for so long, calmly doing their respectable and necessary duty to let the barbarian into the parlor. Bill. Hillary. Barack. Michelle. Winners and losers of several big battles and combatants in the bitterest of stalemates. They won more than they lost over the years,  even with the catastrophic Bush Junta sandwiched in between. They saved the economy and the country and “Detroit” twice. They gradually increased access to health care and came about as close as possible to a trend towards universal coverage. They raised taxes, modestly, on the wealthiest, reregulated Wall Street (modestly), and set a realistic path towards contending with Climate Change. Through laws and their own example they helped lead America at large to seemingly become more respectful and tolerant — even if they were late to the game on gay marriage and LGBTQ advocacy in general. Marijuana is slowly being decriminalized. All of that and so much more.

In seven weeks, all these years of battles and steady progress, a lifetime’s work, almost all of it will be gone in about 72 hours.

This blog was started as a response to the last wreckage of the Democratic Party that stood feebly by as the post-9/11 Bush Junta bamboozled America into war. Leafing through some of the old posts, I’m impressed how often this blog was correct, ahead of it’s time, and how often versions of the ideas expressed here came to actual fruition. In it’s own small way, this blog was part of the incremental progress attained since its birth in 2003.

Most of that will likely soon be gone too.

The Republicans will have to own it now, and the white nationalism at the heart of Trumpism would seemingly not jive with the starvation policies of Ryanism. No one really cares about Gay Marriage anymore, and even abortion politics are just playing to one small, vocal segment of the old Republican coalition. What everyone has always wanted, and what would help poorer exurban areas, is deficit spending to stimulate the economy. Will Rs give this to Trump now that they own the outcomes and cannot just blame? IOKIYAR.

Best case: massive infrastructure, defense and other spending boosts the economy and only around the edges changes are made to the existing social safety net.

Worst case. Oh my is the worst case ever bad. But that will have to wait for another time.

This is a bad surreal trip, and we are at the start of the beginning.

 

HRC and the “Vision Thing”

Back in the 2008 Democratic Primary I wrote that, unlike Obama, HRC was unable to stitch her worthy policy proposals into something more than the sum of their parts. That is, HRC lacked what Bush I referred to as “the vision thing”. That is her biggest weakness as a politician. It’s hurting her now. Yes, the Comey e-mail letter is a nothingburger about a nothingburger. Yes, it’s smarmy and stupid on his part. Yes, it sucks. Yes, it’s unfair. But, having failed to make her candidacy about one or two big things like an infrastructure project(s), addressing global warming, or anything else HRC cannot pivot from the distraction of Comey’s e-mail interference and say, what’s important is focusing on my plan to do X, oh, AND my opponent is a bozo potemkin candidate Human-Butterscotch-Dairy-Queen-Dip-Cone-With-A-Klan-Hat that you wouldn’t trust to babysit your nine-year old daughter. HRC only has the negative case to make against Mr. T and not the corresponding positive case to make for herself.

I’m not sure if Team Clinton could have added substance to the hydrogenated oil and Russian argot wheat gruel of this gruesome campaign. The venal Media’s need to chase its own tail over every ludicrous Mr. T controversy and Mean Girl spat took all the O2 out of the room. To their credit, this flummoxed the Conservatron Also Rans and Team Clinton won on this terrain and was coasting to victory before Comey’s partisan thumb-on-the-scaling. Of course, the agonizing thing is that HRC does have intelligent plans to address most every issue facing America, but it’s too late to focus on those now.

In an election where both candidates are disliked the last bit of character besmirching, lame as it may be, will be stuck to HRC.

Previously, I had HRC’s superior ground game and a general election repeat of the fact that most late deciders went against Mr. T in the Republican primaries as creating a rout for HRC. My final prediction now: HRC wins the Obama 2012 States + NC but minus Iowa and Ohio. Clinton under-performs Obama throughout the Northeast and Midwest but still wins Pennsylvania, Michigan, Minnesota and the rest relatively easily. White educated Republicans provide the margin of victory, barely, in NC and FLA despite lower black turnout than 2012. HRC wins Nevada surprisingly easily. Arizona will be under 5 for Mr. T and Texas will be under 8. Almost. Next time. Utah is a random wild card.

Key Senate Races:

ILL – Duckworth

Wisc – Feingold

NH – Hasan (barely)

Penn – McGinty

NV – Masto (Surprisingly easily)

IND – Bayh

MO – Kander (Squeaker, running as disestablismentarian versus Bond)

NC – Burr

FLA – Marco Polo

Burr and Marco Polo will owe their Senate seats to Comey. The Comey-over also keeps Dem gains in the House to a minimum, maybe 5 seats but hopefully including the worthless Issa in CA.

 

Margin Prediction

I think my results prediction from August is pretty damn good. If I had it to do over again, I would put Indiana in the Dems column for senate and be more likely to give them 51 votes. I might have to think harder about Arizona.

I’m going to call the final margin at 50-40. McMullin, Johnson, and Stein will add up to about 10. It’s a blowout by contemporary standards but the two party vote will keep it from doing much more in the electoral college than I originally thought. Maybe Arizona, maybe NE-2.

Jerry Fallwell

At this point what is the counterargument that “evangelicals” are nothing more than a white nationalist group? When I first read that the group emerged as a reaction to segregation and pretended it was in reaction to Roe v. Wade, I thought it was a bit much. Sometimes movements outgrow their original intent. But with Fallwell saying he would vote for Trump even if he liked rape, there’s no other answer. Family values are meaningless unless they advance white nationalism.

The Mormons are shaming the so-called Christians. At least they are standing on their values.

The One Real Major Flaw With Hillary

I haven’t heard anyone mention this since the 2000s.

It’s not that she’s corrupt. She’s not. It’s not that she’s too hawkish or too conservative or too liberal or too establishment or too radical. It’s not that she doesn’t fellate the media with access. In fact, none of the criticisms that have been leveled at her this year made any sense to me and apparently, very few of them had any real traction in comparison with Trump’s flaws.

What bothers me most about Hillary is that her husband was president. Does that make me sexist? It bothers me because it’s quasi-dynastic. I am not saying she doesn’t deserve it on her own merit. On the contrary, there’s an argument that in a more female-equal society, it would have been Hillary elected in 1992. Fine. But it wasn’t.

I didn’t like that at all about George W. Bush and largely opposed Jeb Bush for that reason first of all. W got away with being a right-wing President because most people believed his presidency would be a repeat of his father’s—but oh boy.

On the other hand, Bill Clinton was a fine president who was a flawed husband. I believe Hillary will be a great president even if there is a quasi-dynastic edge to her election. But while we cannot risk another below par president, much less another W-scale disaster, let alone the whirlwind of Trump, it is nonetheless troubling that a Bush or a Clinton will have been in office for so much of the recent decades. I don’t think it’s an optimal position.

Might it be a way to have a “third term” of a popular president? Sure. George Wallace did this in Alabama and the Kirchners did it in Argentina. But it just seems a bit strange. Maybe the idea got going with RFK as a way to press rewind on the JFK assassination and Teddy for the same reasons. Maybe people want to press rewind to the 90s more than they admit. (I fully admit it.)

Obama was a gifted politician and the Iraq war issue was real, but some of me often wonders if this concern, maybe in the form of boredom, had more to do with it in 2008. Obama was also a reasonable policy equivalent and Sanders was not.

I would have been very torn between Hillary and Joe Biden.

 

Mr. T’s “Reynolds” Access Hollywood Video

[Full Company]

The Access Hollywood Video

[Clinton/Kaine/Obama]

Have you seen thish?

[Clinton]

Creepy Orange Hitler does unwanted gropes of vag hair

And he said it all right there

[Obama]

Highlights!

[Orange Hitler]

The charge against me is connection with one

Alt-Right for the purpose of improper fascism and anti-semetism

My real crime is frequent sexual assault

As a star grabbing pussies

Without her knowing consent

[Kaine/Obama]

Damn!

[Orange Hitler]

I had frequent sexual harassments

Most of them at my own penthouse

[Kaine]

At his own penthouse!

[Obama]

At his own penthouse!

[Deep Voice]

Day-um!

[Orange Hitler]

I did this in front of my children

My typical visit as Ivanka’s father

[Kaine/Obama]

No….

[Company]

Booo!

[Clinton]

He’s neveh gon’ be president now!

[Kaine/Obama]

Neveh gon’ be president now!

[Clinton]

He’s neveh gon’ be president now!

[Kaine/Obama]

Neveh gon’ be president now!

[Clinton]

That’s one less thing to worry about!

[Clinton/Kaine/Obama}

That’s one less thing to worry about!

======================================================

All “Hamilton” parodies aside… can you, for just one second, imagine the reaction if Obama had ever been caught on tape saying anything remotely like this?

HRC Takes One For The Team

This has been the theme of her political life. In 1975, she moved to Arkansas to marry Bill. After Bill’s first term as governor when he lost reelection, she remade her image to help him win. He did. When Bill’s presidential campaign got off to a rocky start due to Gennifer Flowers, she stood by him. When her health care bill failed, she stood down and became a more traditional first lady.

When Bill had an affair with an intern, she stood by him and eventually reconciled instead of divorcing and beginning her own political career.

I would argue that the Iraq vote was a vote the party needed too, but maybe that’s a bridge too far. (Remember: the leadership wanted this issue over with so they could run the 2002 election on the basis of economics.)

When Obama came out of nowhere and won the nomination from her, she teamed up and became one of his strongest political allies even with less policy control over the role of Secretary of State than was normal.

No one could be more opposite than Trump, who denies losses, cannot accept blame, refuses to admit mistakes, and has never stayed loyal to a wife.

If Trump wants to bring up Bill’s affairs, Hillary should respond with this line. She is a team player. She puts those who need her ahead of herself and she always has. Trump never has.

A Post-Debate Rant

Trump is a clown. There is no other way to put it. He constantly involves himself in idiocy, knows nothing. And (I never thought I’d write this) at least George W. Bush seemed to know he needed people to tell him what to do. Not only does Trump appear to hire shitehouse advisors, he doesn’t listen to them. I guarantee none of his advisors said, “yeah, fuck preparing for the debate.”

But this post-debate minitraversy about Miss Puerto Rico? He called her Miss Piggy and that’s “fat shaming?”

This is one of these college/liberal only memes that just sounds retarded to the rest of the country. Not only that, but she was a model or a beauty queen. No one else asks for it, but if you’re one of those things, you are doing your thing based on your looks. You were not forced to be in a beauty pageant.

Now, calling Rosie O’Donnell a pig—and she’s not attractive—is one thing. But Rosie is not in the business of being attractive. She’s a comedian and a talking head. Other misogynist attacks Trump has leveled against women are equally as irrelevant to what they were doing. Unless it was Megyn Kelly’s job to be pregnant, her being on her period is irrelevant, for example.

But when these bizarre new social rules are held against people—we can’t just beauty queens by their looks—it only fosters the believe that P.C. is out of control. (Spoiler alert: it is!)

Now, as for “fat shaming”: look, judging people by things other than their character is not what leaders of that echelon should do. But it is what most people do. Most people do make fun of people in not nice ways and when you aren’t careful about how you attack leaders for doing it, you’re attacking followers.

And you can count me as one of those people who doesn’t think fat is good. I expect no one to share my likes and dislikes, but I also expect no one to try and talk me out of my likes and dislikes. So, no, I will probably never find a 300 pound woman attractive. I also refuse to believe that a few “critical studies” professors are smarter than the “medical establishment” and can “prove” that being morbidly obese is actually healthy. Or that people who actually eat less calories than they consume don’t lose weight. Or that genetics are any barrier to weight loss.

It’s that whole reality-based, pro-science thing I have that is increasingly at odds with the overgrown children who think the whole world is kindergarten and no hurt feelings are allowed.

History Repeating: Boycotting the “Settlements” Only

If I was back in academia again, I might want to research two recurring themes in Jewish life in diaspora: the theme of the Court Jew whose close relationship with power provides security and the assimilator who thinks that blending in alone will provide safety. The problem with the former is that if the power is unpopular or deposed for any reason, populist anger is directed at those who benefitted regardless of their religion and often spreads even to the assimilators.

This almost never works out to anyone’s benefit, but it’s a knot that’s almost impossible to untangle for a small and hated minority. The only solutions to this dilemma that seem to function at all are Zionism and Western Liberalism though both are never completely secure protections.

So I can’t help but wonder what the point of this letter signed by many respected Jewish academics is. Is it to try to be a “good Jew”? I’m sure any query at the signatories is answered with “not in my name” and “moral responsibility” and so forth and so on.

But there’s just one problem. It’s wrong not only on a basic factual level, it’s actually counterproductive in a utilitarian way towards resolving the situation.

First, it’s wrong because it’s based on falsehoods. The 1967 lines may be a starting point for final status negotiations, but they only reflect the status quo of 1967. Prior to that, there were Jewish “settlements” in places like Gush Etsion that were destroyed and whose inhabitants were murdered. It’s an arbitrary point and notwithstanding a number of UN resolutions with no legal effect whose real purpose was to foster peace discussions, answering the question of whose territory is it leads to absurdity if the answer isn’t Israel. It could be the UK’s, since they were the Mandatory Power, but they left and the only state declared within the mandate prior to 1967 was Israel. It could be Jordan’s, but then you’re validating their war of conquest—which wasn’t even defensive in nature. If it’s “Palestine” then it’s a disputed claim with Israel and there’s no legal reason why the lines are those of 1967 and not whatever the two negotiate. The last remotely sensible answer would be Turkey, which is the successor state to the Ottoman Empire. Under that logic, however, neither Israel nor Palestine exist.

Leaving the question of sovereignty aside and just reverting to the question of title, most of the physical land in the West Bank belonged to the state or to large land barons, many Turkish, many Syrian, very few “Palestinians.”

To the extent settlements from Israel conflict with prior land use rights, there should be redress available in the legal system and those injured due compensation or a return of those rights. But that’s very different than saying every square inch inhabited by an Israeli is an illegal settlement. Israeli settlements are largely built on empty land that was infeasible to build towns on before modern infrastructure and engineering were developed.

I’ve traveled quite a bit in the “West Bank” and see these places with my own eyes.

Second, this will hurt, rather than harm, peace. If Palestinians (correctly) perceive that Israel is a divisive issue among Jews and that persistent repetition of falsehoods and drummed out outrage incited by these “new facts” can convince even Jewish Americans that they are correct, then there’s little incentive for them to stop it. The reaction on the Israeli side is and has been to feel even more bunkered and isolated with American support on the wane. These are utilitarian calculations, of course, but that’s all that’s left after the moral absolutes of the truth are left behind in the first place.

The worst idiocies of the left are in attempts to repeat the procedures of their victories. Not every disadvantaged group are “just like” American blacks or South African blacks. Every disadvantaged group deserves its own organic solutions to its own unique problems.

The logic of the civil rights movement in the US has now been expanded to include anything that people might make a comment on that hurt’s your feelings. The way you are born, like race, or traditions you keep, like religion, are nothing special in this milieu. Anything you choose to do now, no matter how absurd, self-indulgent, or self-destructive must now not only be benignly ignored, but praised and encouraged.

This is creating a generation of psychologically disabled Americans who cannot understand conflict and who cannot pierce the emotional trappings of conflict. And this is, of course, leading to a change in attitudes towards tough conflicts like Israel.

But in the end, the only solution involves security for self-determination for both peoples in some form. But you won’t get there encouraging Palestinian obstruction and Israeli defensiveness based on garbage lies.

Politics Isn’t The Culture War

Why is presidential politics so messed up? One thing I’ve started to think a lot about is that some people see it as a part of the culture war instead of choosing over policies.

If we were simply picking someone to run the government, an awful lot of what we talk about wouldn’t come up. Character issues might be there in extreme cases, but I doubt it would be as front and center.

It’s what the candidate stands for. Polls seem to show that a lot more people think Hillary is qualified to be president, but a huge portion of that group will not vote for her anyway. Why? Trump is a wildcard and a hothead. He has no experience.

But he stands for a no apologies version of pressing pause on the culture wars and perhaps even reversing them.

To liberals, that last sentence means that he wants to do damage to civil rights. You’re right. But what’s important to understand is why would someone do that?

Why would a man like Dennis Prager support Trump when he’s spent his entire career being a moral scold? I don’t agree with Prager about much. I don’t think someone saying the word ‘fuck’ is a mortal sin.

It’s the culture of irresponsibility. It’s the culture of “fat activists” who claim medical science is biased against them and people who want to do whatever they want and you have to like it. It’s the culture of safe spaces and “inter sectionalism” and “microagressions” and all of the other vapid garbage people do to avoid hearing dissent.

Not put up with it. Like it. It’s the make your problem my problem, but don’t make my problem your problem culture. Since we don’t have an alternative remedy to this that comes from a group careful with civil rights, the package deal from the right is all there is.

It’s easy to analogize this to austerity policies like welfare. Some people do want to not work. And I don’t think their lives should be luxurious, but it only makes problems if they aren’t fed and sheltered. Abortion too can be portrayed as lazy irresponsibility.

Until there is a Democratic candidate that loses her/his patience with this babyish mentality, people who have lost their patience will only be drawn to the right and the baggage that its solutions bring.

 

Kapernick

I’m going to please no one in expressing what I think about this.

We should be taking police violence seriously. I think most police do. And certainly, the man can express himself how he wants. But let’s look at the context.

Kapernick was an overhyped quarterback who was on the cusp on winning something under very talented coach Jim Harbaugh, but he was never able to round out his game. He had trouble getting plays off in time. I don’t think he ever mastered a real NFL offense. As a result, he was benched for a guy who would be the third stringer on a lot of teams.

Now suddenly he is woke?

Without getting into all of the silly questions about his level of “privilege” and his complicated racial identity, let’s give him the benefit of the doubt and say all of this is just part of some soul searching he’s been doing. He still fucked up.

Why? By choosing to exercise his speech in the way he did he guaranteed that all he would do is give each side in this particular culture war fuel for their fires. Linking patriotism to police violence and the like has always been a strange choice to me. Why aren’t the victims symbolized by the flag? They were Americans. Why are the people you’re protesting symbolized by the flag? They were bad Americans. This I don’t understand. The only linkage here is that in the tribes of the American culture wars, one side has claimed the flag and the other has not.

So now one side can say, “See?!?!!111? These people HATE America!!!”

In the current lexicon on the left, I can be accused of all kinds of neologisms for this opinion: whitesplaining, tone policing, and so on. But in reality, I just don’t like it when a laudable goal is pursued with bad strategy. Again, he’s free to do what he wants, but if the goal here is really to change the debate, he did it wrong. The people that need persuading here, for one thing, are largely white. Most minorities already get it.

If you want to make change you have to be hyper-aware of the reactions and consequences not just to your statement or action, but to your persona, your circumstances and understand how it will look even if those aren’t genuine reflections of how you feel.

I would also add that the last thing we need in this country is more divisiveness. It’s to the point now where bad policies will be pursued just in order to “slap down” actions like this regardless of whether it’s going to be good or bad for policing.

We all need to start giving each other a break.

The Cancer That Is Killing The GOP

Imagine this alternative history.

It’s mid-December, 2000. Al Gore has just conceded the election and asked his supporters not to contest the slates of electors in Congress. An aide walks into his room and tells him that it’s Governor Bush on the line. He picks up the phone and says, “Congratulations, Mr. President-elect.”  Bush is flattered by the title. He says, “Listen, Mr. Vice President, I’m worried about the legitimacy not just of my presidency, but of the government in general after this. Is there a possibility of you joining my government?” Gore thanks the President elect, but declines. His advisors, of course, had mentioned the possibility of brokering a solution where Congress picks him for Vice President and Bush for President as a resolution to the crisis, but it’s mostly over now. Gore, however, does offer to be a sounding board for anything the new president needs, totally confidentially. Bush says, “OK, then, first one: I want to have a meeting with President Clinton and I want his advice on a unity agenda for our country. It wouldn’t hurt if you were in on it too.”

Gore is stunned but promises to set it up.

The Vice President and President meet with the President and Vice President elect early in January, after the new Congress is sworn in. “I need to govern from the center. It’s the only way to make my presidency legitimate and heal the republic at this point, and I need your help.” Clinton and Gore talk with Cheney and Bush for a few hours. One of the sticking points is whether the mid-term elections would an appropriate point to change course if the results favor the Republicans. Clinton is hesitant on this issue. Bush finally agrees to govern as a unity president for his entire first term.

Bush is concerned that he ran on a tax cut and feels like he has to deliver. In the end, he agrees to promote the Greenspan plan that includes deficit-based triggers and to a sunset after 4 years. Bush promises to name a Democrat as Attorney General and as Treasury Secretary. He agrees to announce all of this in a joint press conference with President Clinton.

Now even if I haven’t already set the table here for avoiding 9/11 by placing someone other than Ashcroft in as attorney general, someone who would seriously heed Richard Clarke’s warnings about al-qaeda, imagine Bush takes the same approach on 9/11.

“Gentlemen, Bush says, we are going to catch Osama bin Laden immediately and we are not going to rest until we’ve disrupted his terror network. This means we have to set aside our concerns about Saddam for now.”

In this scenario, Bush’s approval ratings never fall below 60%, Bin Laden is captured in late 2001 before entering Pakistan, the economy comes to a much softer landing with less worries about future deficits and no savings glut looking for quick bucks in the real estate market.

Bush is re-elected by a landslide in 2004 and decides that his ticket into the history books is continuing his strategy of moderation and reconciliation between the parties. Enough Democrats and Republicans buy into this to produce some decent legislation, including education reform that doesn’t imagine total proficiency for all students by 2014, and Bush vetoes bankruptcy reform.

In his second term, he delivers further on his massive tax cut proposal, but it is much more progressive than his original version. He shocks everyone by pushing for a carbon market reminding people that it’s similar to the system used by his father to tackle ozone depletion. Bush leaves office with very high approval ratings having accomplished much and led the country through 9/11 and ending the war on terror after 1 year and only having endured one moderate recession. He did not ever get around to reforming health care, even though he admired another market-based solution that a Massachusetts governor had tried.

Why didn’t this happen? It didn’t happen because whatever impulse Bush may have had to write himself into the history books wasn’t stronger than the partisan impulses that surrounded him. Many conservatives felt that this was their chance to reverse serious mistakes and actively enact legislation they otherwise could never dream of, and, of course to settle some foreign grievances as well.

It’s the same reason they couldn’t accept the reasons they lost in 2012. They won’t moderate because they are still successful enough at the state level and, for now, in Congress. And because they are beholden to ideological funders who demand extremism.

This isn’t to say that Democrats aren’t beholden to interest groups, but the Democratic coalition is varied enough to let you form different constellations of them and still succeed. You cannot be a Republican that is willing to raise taxes, however.

A 20-year old demographic shift has taken away their majority and a disastrous nomination may cost them control of Washington. But will they moderate?

I doubt it. A small faction may. We’ll see.

 

Both Extremes in America Are Intellectually Bankrupt But The Mushy Middle Still Needs Leadership

The American left has never been as left or as strong as the left in other countries. Today, it has become dominated by white grievance just as much as the right. On identity issues, it is white self-grievance; on other issues, it’s a laundry list of more social spending that benefits the already-middle class. Almost all of it is deeply infused with the politics of complaint and monday-morning quarterbacking. It’s very obvious, for example, that leftist critics of Obama would not be involved in any manner with the Syrian conflict, but they don’t explain why this would be effective in any credible manner.

It’s too much to criticize the agenda of the far left as that of a fifth column but before anyone agrees with dismantling the American Empire, they must explain what will replace the incumbent world order, the pax americana, if you will. I don’t support empire for its own sake, but I’m skeptical everything suddenly fixes itself if we disengage from the world.

On the economic front, it is certainly the case that the American safety net is too weak. But is free college part of the safety net? So many problems stem from poverty and malnutrition, yet those issues have taken a backseat to restoring the middle class to the perks that only the upper middle class now have instead of lifting the bottom out of poverty.

The one exception to this has been the largely union-backed campaign to raise the minimum wage to $15. While this only helps people with jobs, it’s actually treating the problem.

Unlike many, I have no problem with things that sound like “class warfare.” I’m not squeamish about higher taxes on wealth and incomes, but where I differ is that I believe this should be done in the name of social welfare, not punishment. Punishing “Wall Street” simply to punish them might feel good, but it won’t bring us back to the post-war middle class unless the program is tuned to raise incomes. In general, punishing the corporate class is largely not all that different than criticisms of the government from both sides that aren’t constructive, are monday-morning quarterbacking, and in the case of the left are basically just critiques of capitalism in general.

The reason this is getting worse on the left is that it has turned into its own echo chamber in a way that it wasn’t 10 years ago. When Dolores Huerta and Paul Krugman are rejected because of their choice of candidate, it’s clear that any dissent isn’t tolerated. If you propose an idea that seems like a compromise to win an election, you’re selling out. When the election results bear that warning out, it was rigged, or it was the media—anything other than the fact that Americans aren’t who they are.

Americans are not all Ph.D.s in some liberal arts subject. They are not all sweater-wearing NPR listeners. Nor are they all NRA members who worship Ayn Rand. America is more complex than that.

I focused on the left because a I generally believe that capitalism requires a safety net—if that’s socialism, then I whatever; but I do not believe the government should own the means of production.

The right in this country is beyond saving. They too fail to realize that they will never win a majority for many of the ideas they won’t compromise on, like trickle down economics. Their conversion into white Christian nationalists is complete.

The problem is that the technocratic center, to the extent that it exists, is still far too partisan to be called a “center” and does not really exist in the Republican party. There are a few left here and there, but for the most part, the Republican of governance was purged.

This leaves the Democratic party divided between the governance wing and the activist wing and in our system those divisions leave it vulnerable to losing even when the ideas of the other side aren’t great.

It also means that the Democrats too will eventually feel the centrifugal force pulling them to the extreme and they will probably overreach with policy.

Two areas where this may occur, in my opinion, are crime and identity politics. Crime is low. If that changes, those to blame for it will suffer a huge political price. In the identity politics realm, the continuous insistence that campus notions of equality can translate to the population at large will stall out. “I was born this way” appeals to basic American fairness. Self-flagellation and expecting to do whatever you want without consequences do not.

The problem here is that new things happen and new challenges will occur. If the only two solutions on offer come one each from a rigid fantasy world where all ideas must conform to doctrine, eventually there will be no effective governance.

 

Do a UK Trade Deal Now.

Trade deals are unpopular. Lurking beneath the froth is a bunch of special pleading for industries that are worried about competition. The froth is mostly comprised of claims that pertain more to capitalism in general than to international trade. For example, what Paul Krugman calls the “sweatshop fallacy”: we hear a lot about how bad conditions are in “sweatshops” but little about how worse those workers are before the work.

This isn’t to say that there aren’t problems with capitalism. Of course there are and they require the presence of a meaningful social safety net. And of course there are problems with trade. Also, there is nothing wrong in politics with special pleading for industry. It just doesn’t need to be cloaked in the bleeding heart language of the sweatshop fallacy.

That particular problem doesn’t apply much to trade between developed countries. There, it pretty much does come down to protecting your special interests.

So, why not go all in for a free trade pact with the UK right now? or if not immediately, as soon as they invoke Article 50 of the EU treaty? It would give them leverage in their negotiations with the EU which would be a nice carrot, and the fact that they need to do something about their loss of status with the EU is also the stick.

I wouldn’t even mind seeing the UK join NAFTA.

Polemic Forecast

Hillary Clinton will win the presidency, but have a very short Honeymoon period to win voters over because she will be badly bruised by the election which, though she will win, will be given next to no credit for doing so. Trump being a bad candidate, Obama being popular, Bernie Sanders ultimately throwing his weigh behind her, and the economy will all be mentioned as “reasons” for her success with the notion that people support her agenda and don’t hate her as much as is advertised almost unmentioned.

In the end, the map will look very similar to the last two elections with only North Carolina moving into HRC’s column varying from 2012. However, though they will stay red in the end after third party voters come home, the races in Arizona and Georgia will confirm they are swing states going forward.

The Democrats will win a bare majority with 50 senate seats with holds in all states and pickups in Wisconsin, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and New Hampshire.

In the House, a modest pickup of 16 seats will leave the Democrats shy of a majority in the House by 9 votes.

With Congress on such a razor’s edge, she will have to decide between controversial appointments and consensus legislation like her proposed jobs bill.

With the likelihood that the TPP and Merrick Garland are approved in the lame duck session, some intra-party disputes will be quashed for her, but it will be increasingly difficult to hold the left flank of the Congressional party together with the demands of the 10 or so Republicans in each house she will have to work with to accomplish anything. The only thing that will be attempted will relate to the economy and jobs. Nothing of the liberal social agenda will be attempted including guns. The public option will not get a vote, though Obamacare will finally receive a technical fix bill.

Whether there even are 10 such senators and representatives remains to be seen. The GOP will tell itself that Clinton’s election, by less than the landslide many foretold, was both a rejection of Trumpism and only a tepid endorsement of Clinton and that she will be easy prey in 2020. There will be a strong urge to reinvoke the McConnell doctrine in an attempt to oust her in 2020. Amnesia will set in in the GOP, who still retain the House and filibuster veto points, and the scandal machine used against the last two Democratic presidents will continue. The anti-Trump Republicans will rejoin the fold and attempt to hold the party out as the conservative party despite its animating principle being white nationalism just as it was before Trump.

Any kind of disruption—another Supreme Court vacancy, a economic shock, a terrorist attack, a political scandal—will erase any likelihood of broad Clinton agenda in Congress. The best hope for that is a strong rebuke by voters in 2018 in a beefed up Democratic party at the state and Congressional district level to take advantage of voter disgust with gridlock in time to reverse some 2010’s gerrymandering in the 2020 census. Though it is likely that intraparty conflict in primaries in 2018 could do to the Democrats what it did in 2010 and prevent the degree of victory, (I am not a witch!)

In short, this election will do little to change the political equilibrium set out in the electoral college since 2000 and in Congress since 2010.

What will it take?

Trump’s going to get away with the stochastic terrorism of his “Second Amendment” comments—somehow a well-regulated militia has become code for a guerrilla army that will overthrow the government when they decide their “rights” have been hurt.

I have a very bad feeling about this.

Martin Luther King’s last speech contained this element:

“Well, I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop. And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life — longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. So I’m happy, tonight. I’m not worried about anything, I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”

The very next day, he was shot.

2016 isn’t as crazy as 1968 or even 1966, but there are muted parallels. There is heightened racial tension. There is a growing unease with the government at all levels. This is enough to make people who are already nuts go nuts.

I hope there are no further parallels, but I worry. And I worry what the consequences of further parallels would be for our country.

Prepare for the “comeback” stories.

The media is as predictable as it is stupid. Surely part of the Clinton lead in the polls right now is a convention bounce even if the race really has shifted. So when the polls drop down to “merely” 5%, watch for the Trump Comeback® narrative to spew forth, especially from MSNBC whose living embodiments of What Liberal Media will be sure to talk about it.

They will also equate Hillary’s statements about e-mails with Trump insulting a military family or threatening to use nuclear weapons. This is what the media does. No matter how shocking what one of the candidates does, they will normalize it.

Trump has done dozens of things that should have totally disqualified him. Many Republican leaders even agree with this and some of them have repudiated him, but old habits die hard and the media will continue to make it seem like a he said-she said.

The real story of this election—no matter the result—is going to be the cowardice of the media and Republicans who knew better. If he wins, it won’t be Democrats who didn’t try to stop him. Even most of the hard core Bernie crowd has come around and realize they don’t want to be liable for a Trump presidency. Some Republicans, whether or not it’s out of craven political calculation or genuine belief, like Mitt Romney, Ted Cruz, and the Bush family have withheld support from Trump.

The fact that we’re one WikiLeak or one fake Clinton scandal or one Muslim terrorist attack away from having this psychopath with his finger on the button is our fault—the voters’—but the people who enabled it primarily exist in the political and media real.

 

 

The Ghosts of 2004?

Pretty good so far, Dems. Pretty, pretty good. Yes, it’s annoying that it took so long to stoke the tender egos of the smattering or loud, nihilist Bernie Bozos. Still, The Bern himself was a mensch in the end and did the right thing. The most strident and obnoxious of his supporters were never going to come on board or even try to work within the Party apparatus. If you are constantly interrupting speakers then its always about yourself anyway, so bully for you and pointless mush Jill Stein Green Party taint licking.

Still, I’m having a bad recollection of 2004.

The 2004 Democratic Convention was remembered most, of course, for Barack Obama’s “no red states, no blue states” speech. Loop-the-loop rhetoric floating the ether like a golden eagle, no doubt. Hard to imagine BHO being president without it. Persuasive leadership at its finest.

Touche. The more immediately pertinent result of the ’04 Democratic Convention was the astonishing and complete lack of any manner of attack whatsoever on Generalissimo Bush. This astonishing strategic blunder was supposedly made by Dukakis Campaign genius (and otherwise eight time loser) Bob Shrum who thought it would look unpatriotic to attack the President in war time. Because, BS Iraq War II and the complete failure to corner bin Laden circa 2004 was like, totes, the same thing as Dewey running against FDR in 1944. (Argh! Face Palm!) Recall, that the Republicans had a sulphuric convention that basically said we were all gonna’ die if Kerry was elected. Sound familiar? It’s unknowable if the Dems’ wimpy convention was the difference between winning and losing in ’04. I still think that bin Laden’s election eve video drop was the ENG that put ’04 out of reach (bin Laden correctly surmised that having a real president would be trouble for him). Still, Kerry got no convention bounce in ’04 so at the very least the pusillanimous convention was a squandered opportunity.

The 2016 Democratic Convention hasn’t had a total absence of meanness towards Mr. T. The problem is that anyone that isn’t voting for Mr. T because he is a misogynyst Swine Lord, or made fun of a disabled guy, was mean to John McCain, or was Captain Birther already isn’t voting for Mr. T. It’s easy to pop those soft balls over the wall, it’ll get a good response in the hall, but it won’t make any difference. Elizabeth Warren wiffed too. Can you remember a single quip from her speech? I can’t, and I was sober the whole frikkin time I watched it.

Mr. T needs to be eviscerated on being a lousy businessman, on being a con man, and most importantly on not releasing his taxes that very likely show him as being deeply in debt to Russian Oligarchs. This ludicrous beta-carotened cartoon character could very likely be a Manchurian Candidate that will make the US lose the Cold War during the post-game interviews. From the victorious locker room! While we’re getting drunk on the champagne!

Enter, 12 years later, Barack Hussein Obama. Going negative is against his brand, but this time it is necessary. Obama is the one that has “taken” the America that Mr. T wants to get back. Mr. T folds the racial resentment in with broad economic concerns and general apocolyptic anxiety. I find it hard to imagine Mr. T being the GOP nominee if Dick Gephardt had been President for the last eight years.

Mr. T’s conventions was a sloppy hee-haw tail chasing contest, but having his Creepshow Spawn laud him while a bunch never-has-beens lambasted Hillary was enough to consolidate the Rs and at least keep HRC disliked among the persuadables who only tuned in at prime time.

The Democrats need to come out of Philadelphia with a compelling economic and security message against Mr. T that also counters his eshcatonological vision.

Time to put on the gloves and show up at the bell Obama! You too Biden!

 

 

Who will be to blame for President Trump?

First and foremost, the media. Just like in 2000. They simply cannot break this habit of acting like there are two sides to every story no matter what one side involves. In doing this, they normalize that behavior. Trump’s statements a year ago should have been disqualifying. I mocked people on Facebook after he proposed the Muslim ban asking them what was it about building a wall and deporting 11 million people that didn’t trigger them enough. Yet at the same time, they cannot resist painting Hillary Clinton in the most possible negative light even if none of it is justified. This is why millennials actually believe the 90s Republican lies about her.

Second, obstinate butthurt leftists, just like in 2000. They are literally willing to risk a Trump presidency so that things will finally “change.” Oh, they’ll change all right. These people will blame it on Hillary, just as they blamed it on Al Gore. Some of this will be fair, but it won’t justify their recklessness. Indeed, if they are so convinced she’s a bad candidate then they should be working harder for her. Thinking this will do anything but blacklist another generation of leftists from the mainstream of the Democratic party and set us back for a generation again is insanity. For people who see conspiracy in every action of ideologically impure, they sure seem to require their share of fainting couches every time it is confirmed someone is actually, you know, doing politics. Fuck these people.

The reason the left loves to destroy Democratic candidates (and they’ve tried repeatedly to do so especially in 2016, 2000, 1968, and 1948) is because they get more attention and more sympathy during conservative administrations. The sane among us will miss Obama and think fondly of the Clinton years. The hard left misses the bunker mentality of the Bush years when Michael Moore movies were popular.

It will remain to be seen whether Hillary herself will have made some avoidable mistakes. So far, her choices have been smart looking forward even if in hindsight some of them could have been smarter.

 

Where Were You in 2016?

On the eve of the Democratic National Convention Nate Silver gives Mr. T about a 42% chance of becoming president. Even if the Clinton E-Mail “Scandal” and the subsequent investigation is a Nothing Burger about a Nothing Burger; even if Comey’s unusual hectoring about “carelessness” was probably an attempt to shield his own Federal branch office from the vagaries of Congressional showboating by giving the Dems a straightforward “no charges” while also producing an attack ad for the Rs; and even if Mr. T has continued to be a Skat Muncher that steps on his own news cycles by retweeting anti-Jew imagery, or being an ass hat towards Mike Pence or whatever feeble outrage of the day he produces. Even with all the spun nothing and bluster, having the head of the FBI excoriate HRC is a punch that has changed the fight.

The good news is that HRC has fallen and Mr. T still is stuck in the low 40s. Pseudo-intellectual Hand Job Gary Johnson and Superfluous Gadfly Jill Stein continue to lop up a combined ~15%.  Still, the Republican Klanvention probably did shore up Mr. T’s support among wayward shards of the Republican coalition. The third-world antics of demanding that his opponents be jailed in defeat and the doomsday rhetoric put, for the moment, HRC in the broad category of “Other” that has so flummoxed too much of the electorate. To the degree that Mr. T’s denunciations, bullying, and Saturday Morning cartoon nonsense is racist, or Banana Republicesque (bring on Uday and Qusay — er… Eric and Don Jr.) or just dumb he manages to troll all of the media gate keepers and other “Franklins,” as Rick Perlstein put it, that have remained unknee capped from the Great Economic Collapse. For many, LOLing these Fuckers as they clutch their pearls is more cathartic than getting pissed off at racism or stupidity.

One forgets how brilliant the Bush Junta was at politics before their butterfingers response to Hurricane Katrina. There were financial shenanigans aplenty early in the Bush reign. Recall that the answer was a meaningless rejiggering of regulatory agencies and… cornering and then imprisoned Martha Stewart. Stewart was a Type A’s Type A, a notorious domestic dazzler whose dense details delighted and annoyed. And she was a Democrat! Of course, her financial chicanery was JV compared to the Big Boys. But who the hell were they anyway? Her head was put on a figurative pike and thus someone was “gotten” for the late 90s early 00 financial crisis.

Team Obama managed to birth Dodd-Frank, which has surely been more of a problem child for “Wall Street” than Martha Stewart stitching a poncho in jail. Still, overall Team Obama wasted too much political capital defending the bail out (even if the Bush junta technically got them through) and enlivening Tim Geithners micro penis. The bail out worked and unfroze the credit market, but it still feels like no one who should be punished has been punished. The Rich are still The Rich.

Still, we are playing for keeps here. It is not at all unreasonable to imagine a “King Slayer” scenario if Mr. T becomes president where the military has to step in to prevent him from nuking Toronto because PM Trudeau’s wife slighted his advances. Meanwhile, it appears very likely that the Russian Government is responsible for hacks into the DNC that showed — out of thousands of e-mails — some kids gloves dissing of the Sanders campaign. These have been released on the eve of the Democratic Convention to sew a hint of dissent and chaos all the better to get the incompetent stooge Mr. T in office.

Is this how the American Republic ends? Puerile purist liberals being toyed with by Vladimir Putin and not being able to stand that life is unfair (and that blacks never warmed to Bernie)? With Republican voter suppression? And, worst of all, with Democrats unable to be both rough enough to land meaningful punches on Mr. T while have a positive vision of the future.

It’s up to Hillary to create a positive vision for her candidacy that is more than the sum of its policy papers. Ultimately though, it is up to us to assure that no one is asking “where were you in 2016?” a generation from now.

Bring on the Democratic National Convention!

Trump’s Appeal?

It’s fine when preaching to the choir to dismiss the spirit driving the Trump phenomenon as racism. And while there are quite a few actual racists that stand out in their words, the millions of people behind it are not all literal white supremacists. Understanding what they’re upset about is key to talking to them instead of firing them up more.

Trump’s appeal does not lie in uncovering a latent belief in a huge minority of Americans that minorities are inferior. It is not racism in that sense. The ugly tone of the rhetoric is more like a Tourette’s tic with the racist language a taboo that feels good to violate.

But why is that a rewarding tic to scratch? Because from the perspective of these folks, it’s not a far left and politically irrelevant group of Berkeley liberals that are trying to impose their way of life on the, it’s one huge mass: the banks, the corporations, the government, and their tradition-destroying ways (you know, the revisionist defense of the Confederacy in a nutshell.) You cannot separate all of this if you want to understand these impressions. This isn’t to say these are correct, just to be crystal clear.

What liberals often fail to realize in the context of the culture wars (which they usually win) is that winning and “being right” don’t translate into permanent changes of outlook. Not many people honestly believe, for example, that things like gay marriage are going to be reversed, but that doesn’t mean everyone thinks it’s OK now and they were wrong then. They grudgingly accept (often in a self-martyring way) that this is the world now. This makes the next big change harder to accept. Progressives and conservatives are totally out of sync in how much change they are willing to accept. The problem comes when the progressives get out of sync with the majority (at least for them).

I don’t think that calling large numbers of people racists is persuasive even if it is true and especially even if it is only technically true. It’s also important to recognize that we have been screwed by the economy. Just because everyone isn’t sophisticated enough to figure out that the source of it is different or that the government isn’t really giving unfair advantages to undocumented aliens, blacks, and gays is a different issue.

So fine, when preaching to the choir you can wistfully marvel at the racist language coming out of so much of America. But to lead them, you need a plausible explanation that doesn’t involve shaming half the country for feeling like they’ve lost forward momentum in the last ten years.

What Brexit and California Reveal About Direct Democracy

Democracy means different things to different people, so it’s important to distinguish between representative and direct democracy. The former has been the basis of the two longest lasting existing systems of government on Earth, those of the US and the UK. Direct democracy has been increasingly seen as a solution to the corruption of elected officials in a representative democracy. But what does history show about the results it produces?

Here in California, we have three distinct forms of direct democracy all applicable at the state and local levels: referendum, where the people may agree to or reject a government proposal; initiative, where the people themselves may propose laws and constitutional amendments; and, recall, where the people may remove elected officials prior to the end of their term.

The record is bad. Perhaps the most justifiable of the three, recall, was used to remove a governor who happened to be in office when—you guessed it—a law enabled by initiative started to blow up. Worse, the infamous Prop 13 has strangled local government to the point where they are basically forced to make bad decisions to being in revenue. Terrible laws aimed at immigrants and gays have also been passed by initiative.

Why is this? In the Brexit context people cited numerous reasons for voting “out.” But much of the sour grapes were focused on it being a “protest” vote having nothing to do with the seemingly straightforward question of in or out. Unfortunately, Brexit was a very complex question and the fact that it was made so simply contributed to the confusion because the question of what “out” meant was left open.

And this is, in my view, the best critique of direct democracy as its implemented. We ask what amounts to an opinion question and leave the details out or don’t specifically ask people’s opinion about them. A politician concerned for his reelection would balk at voting for something even wildly popular among his constituents if the resulting implementation and consequences were disastrous. You’d think.

But the broader public failing to be able to distinguish between alternatives that don’t occur and necessary and sufficient causes has contributed to the mix of the demand for politicians to simply implement the popular opinion of the moment and ignore the consequences. This is what the Tea Party was about, perhaps best exemplified in the government shutdowns or the disaster of Brownback’s Kansas.

There is a tendency—a quite natural one, I think—to feel that direct democracy is the solution to an unresponsive elite. But it falls along the lines of thinking that shrinking government will increase freedom—only to find that corporations fill the void. In direct democracy, those that can out-organize, usually thanks to money, have an advantage that has nothing to do with the merit of their ideas and indeed usually trades on emotions like fear.

Recall is probably the most justified form of direct democracy in a representative democracy because it relates to the ability to pick our representatives, not do their jobs, though the chilling effect it has may produce the same result. But the other forms are simply producing bad results and need to be reduced.

Auxit?

They’re re-doing the election in Austria. While it’s just for the symbolic role of President, I suspect enough people will feel ashamed about the irregularities and perhaps the influence of Brexit to bring the far-right candidate into the office. Will this mean that Austrians are about to make an exit of their own?

We’ll see. This will be the first test of non-elite reaction to Brexit, even if it’s attenuated.

Brexit Denial

A number of articles out there citing the fact that the Brexit referendum wasn’t actually, technically legally binding are arguing that, therefore, it won’t actually happen. Most of this, I think is wishful thinking. The UK still has a tradition of more honorable politics than most places—though Jeremy Corbyn refusing to resign appears to be defying that.

But what I find the most odd thing is that commentators on both sides of the Atlantic are trying to batter the side that won with immigration->racism as the issue. Even David Cameron told the EU that that was the motivating factor of the referendum.

But that’s not entirely correct. Exit polls show that a significant portion of the electorate voted on the issue of sovereignty. And why not? The UK has the world’s oldest functioning constitution. It’s a legitimate issue. And something like 25% of Leave voters cited that as their reason. That’s more than enough to change the outcome if you remove them. So, it is a necessary, though not sufficient cause.

Because there is no single sufficient cause, you cannot logically isolate one thing as the cause of Brexit. The combination of factors—Britain’s independent streak, the EU’s blunders with austerity, the Euro crisis, and, indeed, the refugee crisis, and perhaps a series of other more minor issues like the Lisbon Treaty—all have to be assigned part of the blame alongside immigration.

So why give the immigration issue this much power? Why make it a self-fulfilling prophecy? Because the Remain folks want to be right and they want to bludgeon the winners more than they want to break the fall at this point, and that’s sad.

I can’t believe I’m about to type this, but, yes, Boris Johnson has it right. The UK should end up in a Norway-like agreement with free movement preserved. But asserting that the will of the people is entirely expressed in the immigration issue makes this result seem undemocratic.

Poorly played.

The Rout Is On, For Now.

A new series of polls show Hillary Clinton with a huge lead over Trump, including one showing her with 51%. Berniecrats are coming over faster to Hillary than 2008 Hillary supporters did to Obama despite Bernie’s continued presence in the race.

Trump is trying to #unskew the polls on Twitter by complaining about failure to weight by party ID, but ask President Kerry about that.

To consolidate these gains, Hillary needs to continue to present Trump’s lack of qualification, pick a solid running mate, and start talking about the economy. So far, her advisors haven’t failed to pick the right course.

US Danger in Brexit Lies In Liberal Reaction

Social media is full of Americans sighing that “fear won” in the Brexit vote. “They voted against their best interests.”

It’s true, but a vote is a vote. The same can be said of Trump voters (and to an extent Sanders voters). Fear about trade deals and immigration doesn’t disqualify you from a vote.

The British reaction from Remain folks (noticeably absent of claims of it being “rigged”) along the lines of “old people shouldn’t vote” betrays the totalitarianism lying beneath people who think they are “right.”

The problem with Brexit isn’t that it will destroy the world order the way an article in Vox claims; rather, that it’s likely a fraud, at least partially. To the extent it was driven by resentment of Intra-European immigration, the most likely outcome is that the UK, as part of the EFTA or EEZ will still have intra-European free movement of peoples. Of course not everyone voted on that issue alone, but maybe 3.8% did.

In other words, I’m skeptical much will change for a UK already not in the Eurozone or part of the Schengen agreement.

However, I must say I think that the EU is a failed institution and its imposition of austerity post 2008-crisis is what drove this at its core—along with the refugee crisis.

Anyway, the lesson is, you can be “right” but still lose elections. You could be “right” about refugees and the people who are “wrong” will still vote. Too much immigration is always going to spawn nativist resentment. Americans retain their complaint about Latinos, but Latinos have always been here and already have established communities that aren’t shocking the conscience the way Muslim immigrants are. Granting, of course, that most Muslims are closer to “model minorities” than it appears, fears are irrational and as long as they are there they will create votes.

Going forward, Hillary must be very careful to understand the difference between being “right” and winning or else UK out will pale in comparison to Trump in.

The Inverse Politics of Supreme Court Decisions

There are exceptions to the rule, but in the short term, it is usually the loser of a Supreme Court case that accrues political momentum. I guess this is because grievance motivates better.

Today there were two decisions. Affirmative action lives another day and immigration reform is held back.

The likely politics of this? Latino voters get the message loud and clear once again that a vote for Republicans is vote against them. To be honest, I’m not even sure how much this pushes the margins since Latinos who will vote will already likely vote against Trump, but it may help with turnout and/or downballot.

But Republicans will be allowed to continue their assault on affirmative action, which, while a bit stale and perhaps not as personal as the immigration reform issue is, still plays into the politics of white grievance.

To be clear, I’m not talking about what the good outcomes were or ought to be. I’m looking at everything through the lens of the Presidential election. Which, though perhaps a bit cynical, is relevant here since the winner will tip the balance on the Court itself.

 

Wow! Dems Just Did Politics!

I’ve been harshly critical of wimpy Dem politicos over the years. Especially, during the Fear Years, they were downright pathetic and spineless in their opposition to the Bush Junta.

Today, perhaps coincidentally, the House Gun Violence Sit-In knocks Mr. T’s big anti-Hillary speech off of the lead and all to put forward the proposition that it should be not so easy for terrorists to buy guns.

For once, pretty good Dems, pretty pretty, good.

Crime, cont.

It’s not a coincidence that the context of the Clinton Crime Bill is lost on younger folks. After all, they have enjoyed a massive drop off in crime since (coincidentally or not) the time of that bill. They don’t remember what the older generation remembers and apparently dismiss what they read in books about it as the construct of a racist system.

The problem is not addressing crime, I would contend, is more harmful to more minorities. You see, they are disproportionately the victims. This is why so many black leaders, for example, not only pushed for Clinton’s Crime Bill but for the higher sentences for crack versus powder cocaine which later came to be seen as racist. There is simply no denying that the crack epidemic was like setting bombs off in inner cities. The fact that more of the offenders were minorities was secondary to the problem.

The same could be said of guns. I imagine if there is a major crackdown on guns, that too will come to be seen as having a disparate racial impact even though we associate “gun people” with working class whites.

It would be helpful to look not only at who is impacted by penal measures but who is helped. In the end, is there any denying that the dramatic drop in crime that has revitalized so many cities served to benefit those city’s residents the most?

On lower crime, not so fast

One of the interesting debates in the Democratic primary that needs a thorough post-mortem is the issue of crime. It came up when somehow Sanders was able to attack Hillary Clinton for Bill Clinton’s crime bill—which she couldn’t vote for but Sanders did vote for—and has been a theme for a while. We hear about “mass incarceration” and “militarization of the police” among other things.

This debate has always struck me as a sure way to give the Republican Party a lifeboat when they should be thrown an anchor. While it’s true that crime has declined since 1993, no one is really sure why. This interview today talks more about culture and dismisses the abortion and lead theories. This means that letting lots of people out of jail, especially violent offenders, and worrying too much about “militarizing” the police should lead to a rise in crime rates. There are already some incipient evidence that crime rates are going up in response to taking our foot of the gas on crime.

It sure sounds to me like a classic case of “if ain’t broke don’t fix it.”

My Dark Horse VP Pick

I got three syllables for you… Joe Biden. He has all the necessary chops… can be Prez if “god forbid,” doesn’t distract from the top, can debate and campaign, knows how to get shit done on the Hill when needed, and hell he’s already done the job. Team Obama likes him. The Berners have never gotten into a hissy fit snit about him, although they’ll probably grouse no matter who Hillary picks.

There is nothing that could more make HRC’s effort to run for Obama’s third-term more definitive or obvious. Of course, he may not want the job or may want to retire. And there would be some argument that Hillary is not choosing her own person. But if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. For those of us that just want to vote for Obama again anyway this is the next best thing.

My VP Pick.

What do you want in a running mate?

Some of the things that have gone into the decision in the past include regional balance or ideological balance, but there have also been cases of doubling down on perceived strengths. Sometimes you want an attack dog. During the primaries, everyone always talks about the top two candidates teaming up, but that rarely happens (Kerry/Edwards is really the only recent example).

People need to feel that the running mate fills the most important role of a Vice President: ready to be President in a crisis. Everything else pales compared to this.

Only in desperation have candidates picked a history-making choice such as first woman. John McCain and Walter Mondale both faced uphill climbs and rolled this dice picking a woman to try and give some extra mojo to their campaigns. McCain’s pick may have cost him the presidency, though he still lost by a lot. It’s hard to tell if anything made a difference for Mondale.

But in both of those cases, the risk was run of taking the focus off the top of the ticket. Lloyd Bentsen polled stronger than Michael Dukakis after his debate performance against Dan Quayle. Ferraro was more interesting to follow than Mondale who was always going to be blown out.

Someone who understood these dynamics well was Barack Obama. He understood that his role in history as the first black president was a story. He tried not to make it the story, but no matter what he or his campaign did, that was always going to be a factor. A little revolution is usually enough for most people. Perhaps the best reason not to bring Hillary Clinton in as Obama’s running mate in 2008 was that it would have drained energy from the top of the ticket and done little to make people feel comfortable about relative inexperience, since, standing on her own two feet, Hillary only had four years more of Senate experience. Joe Biden, on the other hand, brought decades of experience.

And let’s be honest. A white man next to Obama actually right-sized his narrative instead of making it all about race or identity politics in a way that primary voters don’t want to acknowledge but that in an election where you need some nervous Republicans to cross over to get the result you want might be indicated.

So, even if I thought Julian Castro and Tom Perez were qualified to be president, and I don’t think they are, I would say first that the story needs to be about the history-making aspect of Hillary, not her running mate. Second, more cynically, I would say is there really anything that can be done to bolster Latino turnout this election that Donald Trump doesn’t already provide? Also, Perez and Castro speak terrible Spanish.

I also don’t believe in ideological balance. Any daylight between the candidates becomes a story, just as it would when they’re in office. Elizabeth Warren also has very thin chops to claim being ready for the nuclear codes. Remember, we’re going to try and emphasize the risks of putting a rookie like Trump in charge. A first-term senator doesn’t bolster this argument no matter what anyone says or how smart her policies are. This is also why I wouldn’t want Sherrod Brown. I don’t believe that regional balance is a factor anymore. Brown wouldn’t be a decisive factor in delivering Ohio.

Two who are qualified to be president are Xavier Becerra and Tim Kaine. Kaine has been a governor and speaks actual fluent Spanish. He’s a boring old white man. He’s qualified to be President. He won’t steal the spotlight. If you really think running mates can deliver states, Virginia is almost as good to have as Ohio. Becerra would take some of the spotlight off of Hillary because he’s not a national figure, isn’t a senator or governor and therefore might be seen as a pick based on his demographics.

So, by process of elimination of all of those rumored to be on the list, I would most strongly support Tim Kaine and very much be against Castro. Everyone else falls in the middle.

Sanders Missed His Point Of Maximum Leverage

Bernie Sanders is the first candidate since the major reformation of the primary system to persist even though he lost. And he’s doing it on the pretense of winning some concessions at the convention. The problem is that he doesn’t have the leverage to do this even though he did and that he doesn’t realize this just underscores why the problem was less with his far left ideas than with the man himself and his terrible strategic decisions.

Who is the most influential member of the Obama administration that ran against him in 2008? It would be tempting to say Hillary Clinton, who became his secretary of state. But that’s because you forgot that Joe Biden ran in 2008 as well. Joe Biden got the maximum result by dropping out early. This is the counterpoint to the Clinton/Obama scenario.

Sanders doesn’t need to stay in the race to be influential. He has influence. Simply staying in the race to win some on-paper concessions on the platform is a waste of his time and his supporter’s time. But outside of his speeches, the news reports hint at a darker reason. Sanders appears to be seeking personal revenge against Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Barney Frank, and Daniel Molloy, the Connecticut governor, as his top priority. His second priority? To change the primary rules that he thinks defeated him. All of these noble progressive policy planks seem to be a distant third in what he hopes to achieve.

This is yet another disgusting act by a man that has been given all kinds of plot armor by a horserace hungry press and an idealistic youth who is on a spin cycle between admiration for the fan based on his ideas and then ideas based on the man, having completely lost sight of where it all started. Only in such a vortex of personality could idealistic lefties excuse a flip-flop on Superdelegates, the data theft then blame the victim dance with the DNC, or the continual denigration of progressive heroes who didn’t support the “revolution” meme.

Another thing not on Sanders’s list? Gun control. Neither in his Thursday night speech nor in his reported lists of ransoms did he list gun control. Since he was apparently so butthurt by Clinton’s attacks on him for his record on guns that he broke his vow about negative campaigning, you’d think he’d try and do something especially in the wake of yet another horrible incident.

And that’s not even the icing on the cake. The icing on the cake is that this man, who has come to take literally the polite language included in the eulogies for his campaign, could have had an awful lot of these things if he was smart enough to identify the point of maximum leverage with any precision.

That moment came when Donald Trump became the presumptive Republican nominee unexpectedly quickly, received the backing of the party unexpectedly quickly, and narrowed his polling gap with Clinton quickly. In that moment, Sanders could have had his ransom. But by persisting with the result of being destroyed in California, he lost it. In that same stretch of time, Clinton has opened a 10-point lead over Trump, a lead wide enough to obviate the need for state-level polling.

Only the most paranoid Bernie cultists are following him down this march of lemmings. Hillary Clinton is going to win this election with or without them. If it’s without them, and with the help of moderates, the progressive agenda will be even more irrelevant to the incoming administration as she looks to be reelected with the same coalition.

Chances are this is what will happen. The victim/martyr/purity complex of this group will be better served by that result anyway. They are constitutionally incapable of being part of the people in charge anyway.