Category: Divided Government

Why Ukraine?

The Daily Escape:

St. Ann’s Church and Shrine, Polonia, Buffalo NY, abandoned in 2012  – March 2024 photo by Abandoned and beyond Buffalo. It was recently purchased by a group of Muslims aiming to transform it into a refuge.

From Timothy Snyder:

“…It has been 459 days since the US Congress passed legislation to support Ukraine. Russia, supported by arms from Iran and North Korea, is now slowly advancing…and sending scores of missiles and drones at cities throughout Ukraine.  Russia has…destroyed one major Ukrainian hydroelectrical facility, and…is targeting two others.  The aim is to bring down the Ukrainian electricity grid.

The US Congress is once again in recess.  Although sizable majorities of Americans and their elected representatives want to support Ukraine, legislation has been blocked by the Putinist wing of the House of Representatives.”

This means that the House won’t address funding for Kyiv until mid-April at the earliest. It would be difficult to state the problem more succinctly or better than Snyder does. Where have the Biden administration and the US House been for the past 460+ days?

Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE) was on “Meet the Press” yesterday. Bacon favors some support for Ukraine and highlighted his partnership with Reps. Jared Golden, (D-ME), Brian Fitzpatrick, (R-PA), and Ed Case, (D-HI) on a Ukraine aid bill:

“We put a bill together that focuses on military aid — a $66 billion bill that provides military aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan….If we do this bill, and I think we will, there’s enough support in the House to get this done. And — and I want to make sure that we have support in the Senate…”

It’s possible that Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) could face a vote to oust him if he moves to pass Ukraine aid in the House. Before the House left for its two-week vacation Marjorie Taylor-Greene, (R-GA), submitted a motion to vacate, which could lead to a House vote to oust Johnson. Since Greene did not file the motion as privileged, the vote can happen at an indefinite point in the future. Shortly after Greene filed the motion, she said: (parenthesis by Wrongo)

“He (Johnson) should not bring funding for Ukraine to the floor…”

The US has been in a stalemate on resupplying weapons to Ukraine for six months. Zelenskyy told CBS News that Ukraine’s forces had managed to hold off Russian advances through the worst of the winter months:

“We have stabilized the situation. It is better than it used to be two or three months ago when we had a big deficit of artillery ammunition, different kinds of weapons….We totally didn’t see the big, huge counteroffensive from Russia… They didn’t have success.”

CBS said that Zelenskyy acknowledged that the invading Russian troops and their seemingly endless supply of missiles and shells is having a negative effect, that they’re not going to be able to defend against another major Russian offensive expected in the coming months. That, he said, was expected around the end of May or in June.

More: (parenthesis and emphasis by Wrongo)

“He (Zelenskyy) said what’s needed most are American Patriot missile defense systems, and more artillery…he said the nature of the funding dedicated by the American government to help Ukraine must be put into perspective.”

He then made the point that the vast majority of the funds committed to Ukraine go to defense contractors in the US:

“Let’s be honest, the money, which is allocated by the Congress, by the administration, in the majority of cases….at least more than 75% — stays in the US. This ammunition is coming to us, but the production is taking place there, and the money stays in the US…”

What’s happened to Americans? Two years ago every town in the US was sponsoring Ukrainian families. Zelenskyy spoke to the US Congress and received standing ovations. Their war of necessity with Russia dominated the evening news.

Now, we get crickets instead of news about Ukraine. It seems that we’ve become a culture where we admire, support and follow “winners only” like BeyoncĂ© and Taylor. We like winners. Their stories are simple to follow, and their detractors are easy to get angry about.

Ukraine looked like a winner in the fall of 2023, so America was all in, but that died in the standoff in the spring of 2024. America no longer has the willingness or ability to think through complex problems like Ukraine vs. Russia, a problem that may take several more years to solve. So we kick Ukraine to the side of the road and instead talk about Princess Kate and her cancer diagnosis or about Dodgers pitcher Shohei Ohtani, his awesome huge contract and his possible connection to gambling.

You know, the easy stuff that doesn’t make your hair hurt.

We need to keep Ukraine in the forefront of our thinking. We need to realize that Russia sees the eastern NATO countries on their border like potato chips. And you can’t expect Russia to eat just one.

America has two “far enemies” (as opposed to “near enemies”). Our far enemies are Russia and China. Rather than allow them time to become near enemies, we need to deal with them where they are today. This means arming Ukraine with the best air defense systems we have and with longer range missiles that can strike at Russia’s oil, shipping and manufacturing facilities.

Its long past time for the US Congress’ wakeup call! Your dithering may cost Europe and America far more than you think.

To help you wake up, watch and listen to the late Kirsty MacColl perform her hit “Walking Down Madison”, from her 1991 album Electric Landlady. The backup group includes Johnny Marr (The Smiths) on guitar and rapping by Aniff Akinola. Wrongo has loved this song since he first heard it 33 years ago. The idea that you’re never far from having reality whack you in the face has always appealed

Sample Lyrics:

From an uptown apartment
To a knife on the A train
It’s not that far
From the sharks in the penthouse
To the rats in the basement
It’s not that far
To the bag lady frozen asleep on the church steps
It’s not that far

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Cartoons Of The Week

Welcome to a week that included TikTok, March Madness and St. Patrick’s Day!

The House overwhelmingly passed legislation to ban TikTok:

But will it ever become law?

Trump said the quiet part out loud:

Insulin remains under threat:

Yes, Big pharma is suing the Biden administration for making insulin affordable. They say his actions are “unconstitutional“. It’s important to remember that they didn’t invent insulin and it is cheap to make.

The GOP’s double standard on documents:

The mystery surrounding Princess Kate isn’t going away:

Boeing is so badly broken it’s hard to see how it recovers:

March madness has many meanings:

Wrongo’s favorite St. Paddie’s Day cartoon:

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Cartoons Of The Week

There were many quality cartoons about how Biden exceeded expectations during his State of the Union speech. Despite all of her notoriety, there were surprisingly few about Sen. Katie Britt’s rebuttal performance. On to cartoons.

Our true choice:

Different messages:

Biden drinks a new concoction:

Katie’s being seen, but not quite as the GOP expected:

Women’s History Month had a big kick off by the elephant:

Supremes move deliberately:

California won’t elect this guy:

Wrongo’s evergreen Oscars joke:

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Thoughts On Biden’s Performance And On Gasoline Consumption

The Daily Escape:

Saguaros and poppies, Catalina SP, Tucson, AZ – March 2024 photo by Paul J Van Helden

You’ve all heard and read about Biden’s State of the Union (SOTA) speech last Thursday. But maybe you’re unaware of the White House strategy for the speech. This was the first SOTA in history to be streamed live on Instagram, in addition to a primary stream on YouTube. Playbook reported that the 9 pm and10 pm hours were the best periods of grassroots fundraising for Biden since the President’s campaign launch.

The White House Office of Digital Strategy also held several events to brief and engage digital creators and media brands around the SOTA. There was a creator watch party in the White House State Dining Room during the speech. Given the declining reach of legacy media, these creator engagement strategies are important.

Trump had planned to comment on Biden’s speech in real time on his Truth Social platform but it went down for the first part of the SOTA. It took over an hour to read what he had to say. When the site came back, we learned that Trump had pretty much just been ranting about Biden’s coughing and warning people not to shake his hand because it had germs.

As an aside, Trump has been a germophobe forever. A casual friend knew him quite well in the 1980’s. Then Trump was a young real estate entrepreneur wanting to get into a fancy Westchester, NY country club. My friend’s husband was also in the real estate business, and Trump’s father Fred prevailed on him to get the Donald into their club. That led to multiple weekends where Trump would take a limo to Westchester to play golf with my friend’s husband and several buddies, all of whom were club members.

It turned out that Trump was a good golfer, so the men were ok with playing with him, except for the obvious cheating on the course. But after each round, the group would adjourn to one of the members’ homes for a potluck, and there Trump’s germophobe flag would fly. He wouldn’t shake hands, and he washed his hands often. He clearly preferred going through the buffet line first, to the extent that if he couldn’t he wouldn’t eat.

Apparently, Trump has done a lot to overcome his germ fears but it all came back when Biden didn’t wash his hands before leaving the podium.

A little on Biden’s strategy: Biden isn’t banking on turning out 100% of Democratic voters. He’s not necessarily counting on low-propensity voters who normally have very little interest in politics. His goal is for Trump to continue to be himself, while Biden, in addition to getting high Democratic turnout, will peel off about 10% of self-identified Republican voters (up from 8% in 2020) and then win Independents. Wrongo has stated previously that he’s certain that Trump will not get near the same number of votes he got in 2020.

Next up, the Biden campaign is rolling out a $30 million ad buy and many more campaign travel stops.

What to say about the rebuttal speech? Sen. Katie Britt (R-AL) spoke from her kitchen table. By the end of the evening, there seemed to be less talk about her vice presidential chances than about who might play her on Saturday Night Live’s cold open.

Let’s turn our attention to gasoline consumption in the US. Wolf Richter reports that for 2023, gasoline consumption was where it had been 20 years ago, even though miles driven set a new record. This was largely due to more efficient internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles and the shift to electric vehicles (EVs). Wolf provided two handy charts:

Gasoline consumption in the US in terms of product supplied to gas stations rose by 1.5% in 2023, to 376 million gallons per day. But that was still down by 3.9% from 2019. It’s finally back where it was in 2003, (20 years ago).

For clarity, gas consumption is determined by miles driven, and the growing efficiency of gasoline-powered vehicles, including hybrids, along with the transition to EVs (the #2 bestselling model in the US in 2023 was a Tesla).

The second chart above, “per-capita gasoline consumption” makes what’s going on clearer. The US population has grown over the past 20 years, but while gasoline consumption has been flat, per-capita gasoline consumption has plunged by 15% from 2003 and by 21% from 1978.

Further, average fuel economy has increased by 42% over the past 20 years, along with average horsepower, because of technical innovations that make today’s ICE vehicles more powerful and more economical than ever before. From Wolf:

“Since 1975, fuel economy for highway driving doubled from 14.6 mpg to nearly 30 mpg in 2023!”

More: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“With less demand for gasoline domestically, the US has become a significant exporter of gasoline….Exports of gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel accounted for about 21% of the record 10.1 million barrels per day of crude oil and petroleum products that the US exported in 2023.”

Where will gas consumption go from here? Biden says we should be at zero emissions by 2050. How will we replace the tax receipts from federal and state gas taxes?

Enough. Let’s punt on the election and on the debate over EV cars. It’s time for our Saturday Soother, when we take a break from the assault on our consciousness by media and social media, and instead, focus on calming ourselves before launching into another week of disinformation.

Here at the Mansion of Wrong, we’re planning for projects on the Fields of Wrong, preparing for a meeting with our yard guys. We’ve finally convinced them that because of global warming, yard work must begin in early March rather than in early April.

To help you get centered on this Oscars weekend, grab a seat by a big window, then watch and listen to famed conductor Michael Tilson Thomas lead the USA’s National Youth Orchestra in a 2018 performance of Aaron Copland’s “Hoe-Down” from his ballet “Rodeo” in Beijing:

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Two More Reasons For Cynicism

The Daily Escape:

Bee in a Fishhook Cactus bloom, Anza Borrego SP, CA – February 2024 photo by Paulette Donnellon

“I worry that no matter how cynical I get, it’s never enough…” – Lily Tomlin

There are abundant reasons for cynicism today. First, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY)  will step down as Senate minority leader, three years ahead of his retirement from the Senate. McConnell said the recent death of his wife’s sister reminded him of his mortality, which encouraged him to step down and take a seat in the back. But for an 82 year-old man who is in iffy health, McConnell may not want to keep sweeping up after the growing number of rogue elephants in the Senate any more.

Wrongo is glad he’s finally going because he’s an awful human being. However, after the Republicans in the Senate replace him, Wrongo is certain to miss the good old days when McConnell was in charge, because whoever follows him will be much worse.

A short look back on Mitch’s tenure: He made it his mission to ensure that nothing would get done under Obama, even if it meant the country went into a default. McConnell denied Obama the chance to fill a Supreme Court seat, holding it open for Trump. If it wasn’t for Mitch’s partisan warfare, Trump wouldn’t have appointed three right wingers to the current Supreme Court; Roe v. Wade would still be the law of the land.

McConnell fundamentally changed the way the Senate works. Now we all know that if something passes the Senate it needs 60 votes. Mitch McConnell made votes for Cloture (the procedure by which debate is ended and an immediate vote is taken on the matter under discussion) a huge thing. Under McConnell’s leadership, cloture votes went from a handful each term to hundreds.

McConnell will be remembered for his cowardly votes in two Trump impeachment trials. His failure to lead the Senate to a Trump conviction for the Jan. 6 insurrection may well have doomed our democracy. We remember him for his brazen/unprofessional treatment of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) (“…nevertheless, she persisted…”). If it hadn’t been for John McCain, Mitch would have dismantled the ACA, leaving millions of Americans without health insurance today.

His legacy will be his success in his decades-long work of damaging America:

Today’s second reason for cynicism is the Supreme Court’s decision to take up the question of whether Trump enjoys total Presidential immunity for his actions in the January 6th case. Their decision sent a shockwave through the nation, dismaying Democrats and any American who understands the implications of the delay. Thanks to a corrupt Supreme Court, the most important of Trump’s four (four!) criminal trials may not be finished before Americans cast their ballots in November.

From Rick Wilson:

“The Court handed…Trump two gifts last night: time and comfort….The gift of time was so deliberate that it can only serve as one more blow to the Supreme Court’s battered reputation. The Court…should move with dispatch in vital cases….If the immunity case isn’t of the most critical urgency and consequence, what is? Take it as given that the Supreme Court of 2024 is the most intensely political of our lifetimes….”

The Court’s surprise grant of review was a gut punch for many Democrats. They set the oral argument for April 22, 2024. It is doubtful that an opinion will be issued before June 2024. So, there is little chance that Trump will be on trial in the federal election interference or defense secrets cases before the November election.

There is no doubt that the Court was aware that they’ve delayed the Jan. 6 trial at least four months, past the point at which Trump will be the Republican Party’s nominee. That time frame is traditionally when the Department of Justice (DOJ) refuses to pursue cases against presidential candidates. Will Attorney General Garland have the cojones to let the case proceed, or will he tell Special Counsel Smith to pause it?

In some ways, this changes nothing. Wrongo has said that the courts were never going to derail Trump’s candidacy before November. We, the American people, remain in charge of our destiny, and thereby, Trump’s eventual accountability. Our remedy lies in defeating Trump in November. If that happens, Trump will be convicted. There is no cavalry coming. There is no miracle solution.

If we fail to do so, when Trump is again president, he will use the DOJ to end his federal criminal prosecutions.

It was clear that no conviction of Trump (including appeals) for Jan. 6 or the secret documents cases could possibly be final before the November election. A final verdict wouldn’t be achieved before the election, so obsessing over when any Trump trial begins is pointless.

Those who hoped the legal system would stop Trump are disappointed. As is anyone who hoped McConnell’s Senate would stop Trump in February 2021. As are those who hoped Garland’s DOJ would move (quickly) to hold him accountable in 2021 and 2022.

Once again the US Supreme Court has put its thumb on the scales of justice to preserve Republican political dominance. We all recall Bush vs. Gore where an earlier version of a Right-wing Supreme Court gave the 2000 presidential election to GW Bush. Back then, everyone said it was a “one-off” intervention in the democratic process. But here we are, 24 years later with another one-off.

To pull together these two stories, Mitch McConnell didn’t steal the Supreme Court for nothing,

Wrongo thinks that the many elite lawyer pundits are starting to realize that maybe, just maybe, a majority of the justices on the Supreme Court are robe-wearing political hacks doing whatever they can to perpetuate Republican Party policy.

There remains only one guardrail left to check the Conservative goal of restoring rich, white-Christian hegemony: Voters.

Make America Great Again, Trump for Prisoner!

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Cartoons Of The Week

The failure of the US Congress to provide aid to Ukraine in a timely manner is a massive rupture of the US’s standing both with NATO and with global democracies that implicitly count on the US to support them if shit ever hits the fan in their region. The bottom line is that the US is no longer a trusted ally or friend.

Jens Stoltenberg, a former Norwegian Prime Minister and now Secretary General of NATO reacted to the US failure to deliver by announcing he is giving Ukraine “permission” to use its soon to be delivered F-16s to launch attacks inside Russia:

“Stoltenberg believes that the death of Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny and the first Russian gains on the battlefield in months should help focus the attention of NATO and its allies on the urgent need to support Ukraine.”

According to Stoltenberg, it will be up to each ally to decide whether to deliver F-16s to Ukraine, and each have different policies. But he said at the same time, the war in Ukraine is a war of aggression and Ukraine has the right to self-defense, including striking legitimate Russian military targets outside Ukraine.

The criticism of this is that it could lead NATO into a European war that might well include nuclear weapons. Above all, NATO is a defensive, not an offensive, alliance. Finally, there are no provisions in the NATO Treaty authorizing offensive, outside-the-NATO boundary operations.

The House Republicans have effectively turned the Ukraine war into a free-for-all. Without US arms assistance, there’s a substantial risk that this war could easily escalate, with the US having only a limited voice in both strategy and tactics. On to cartoons.

Republicans have reduced the US to hot air:

Putin’s now hoping for a Ukraine surrender:

Moon landing dredges up old theories:

Russia’s Congressional dupes fail to see the problem:

IVF ruling has consequences:

There’s a sucker born every minute in Trump world. The shoes are pre-order only; just another Don-con: :

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Cartoons Of The Week – February 11, 2024

(The Monday Wake Up Call will be published on Tuesday.)

Plenty of Super Bowl-adjacent cartoons this week but let’s start  by looking at two overlooked stories. First, the Nevada primary. It’s another case where the media decided there wasn’t anything worthwhile to cover. Except for Nevada’s own journalist, John Ralston:

Seems as if no one’s reporting that Biden got twice as many votes as Trump in the Nevada primary. Maybe they’re still covering Robert Hur’s feelings about Biden?

Second, you probably missed the Trump administration’s IG Report about the medical unit in Trump’s White House:

“The drugs dispensed included Fentanyl. Morphine, Ketamine, Hydrocodone, Provigil, Ambien, Diazepam, Versed, and Tramadol.”

Neither the pharmacy nor the WH’s clinical operations were credentialed by an outside agency. However, they saw an average of 6 to 20 of the patients seen each week who were not eligible to receive care from the pharmacy. There was little mainstream media coverage of this story. On to cartoons.

Everybody likes the commercials:

It’s hard to escape politics even at America’s biggest show:

Even the Super Bowl’s real narratives will get twisted:

The DOJ gave Biden a beating last week:

Everybody’s got memory problems:

 

Tucker Carlson interviews Putin:

 

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More Than The Border Bill Died This Week

The Daily Escape:

Trillium Lake, with Mt. Hood in background, OR – February 2024 photo by Mitch Schreiber Photography

In negotiations, there are four possible outcomes, two for “Yes” and two for “No”. The answers can come quickly or slowly. The fast “Yes” generally means that we offered more than we had to, while the fast “No” means there wasn’t enough in the deal for the other side to truly consider it. The worst outcome is the slow “No”. It burns tons of calories, and delays work on other important things. It is the most frustrating result for a negotiation, always raising the question of whether the other side was really negotiating in good faith.

Welcome to America’s politics in 2024 where if it wasn’t for bad faith, there would be no faith at all. Wrongo is speaking about the so-called border bill. Republicans had insisted that any allocation of funding for Ukraine be tied to an agreement about the border, saying that no money should go abroad until the US has addressed border security concerns here at home. They were also saying that the Democrats would need to agree to deal points that in the past, would have been very hard for the Dems to swallow.

But this past Sunday, Senate negotiators released the details of their hard-fought bipartisan border agreement which is harsher than we would have seen under any Democratic administration or Congressional majority in the last 40 years. The Dems agreed to the terms because it was the price House Republicans demanded in order to fund Ukraine. So naturally, House Republicans immediately declared it dead on arrival. This wasn’t a shock because they’ve been saying that for weeks despite not knowing precisely what was in the language of the bill.

The bad faith started with House Speaker Johnson (R-Bible) lying to the media by suggesting that he wasn’t consulted on the negotiations, a contention refuted by the principal GOP negotiator, Sen. James Lankford, (R-OK) who said that Johnson had declined his invitation to participate.

That led to an avalanche of slow “No’s” by Republicans in the Senate. The GOP’s default to “No” is for the moment, an election year strategy. They see border chaos as an important weapon against Biden in November. But the GOP often says “No” simply because it can’t figure out what else that divided caucus wants to do. They sometimes prefer foaming rage to solutions, or to victories.

As Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI) tweeted:

“I’ve never seen anything like it….They literally demanded specific policy, got it, and then killed it.”

You can’t engage in bad faith negotiations and expect that the other side will forget about it when the next issue comes along.

It’s unclear if this is a moment of Republican/Trumpian desperation or madness. But they came out against a serious, bipartisan bill targeted at what they said was required in order to tackle our border challenges. The Border Patrol Union, which endorsed Trump in 2020, has endorsed the Senate bill. The WSJ editorial page has endorsed the bill. Neither of these are Biden supporters.

The GOP is now committed to a policy that will keep our borders, which they say are in existential crisis, in chaos. They believe that chaos serves their 2024 political goals of winning the White House, while sweeping the Senate and the House. Wrongo is re-upping his quotes from Ezra Klein about American’s desire to vote for stability:

“Biden and his allies are framing this election as order against chaos. The party that gets things done against the party that will make America come undone.”

And this:

“
Democrats are right that voters are craving stability. But
Trump is leading in many polls because voters believe that he is the one who might offer it. What Trump is pitching
.is a push for order — ‘I am going to be the one who secures the border. I’m going to be the one that cracks down on crime. I’m going to be the one that tries to stabilize your prices.’”

So where do we go from here? It would be nice to think that if they really want stability, the American people will see through all this and realize how the Republican Party has grown so adept at holding hostages. Their MAGA wing represents a minority within a minority, yet our institutional rules permit them to veto decisions clearly favored by a majority of Americans.

But, with all the noise, it’s difficult to understand if voters can hear this even if they’re paying attention. Walking away from the border bill has enormous implications for the presidential election. With Biden’s economy going gangbusters (even Fox News admits that); with the inflation Republicans had expected to run on falling; with unemployment at historic lows and the stock market at historic highs; with the end of Roe trailing Trump like a dark cloud; he (and the GOP) have limited narratives left for waging his 2024 campaign, except fearmongering about border security.

Today’s chaos will become tomorrow’s over the imminent need to fund the government. Speaker Johnson has until March 1 and March 8 to get deals with the Senate and the President if we are to avoid another government shutdown. Right now, it’s difficult to see how any good faith negotiations will occur after what has happened this week with the border bill.

The government funding chaos isn’t on the voters’ radar just yet. So Democrats ought to go on offense about the border bill, describing what’s in it, where the GOP is lying about it, and how even when you meet Republicans more than halfway, they move the goal posts. The Dems need to make every Republican House and Senate member defend killing the border bill vote every day between here and the election, by making the immigration bill a central message of Biden’s reelection campaign.

As the Cato Institute reported last November:

“The Biden Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has removed a higher percentage of arrested border crossers in its first two years than the Trump DHS did over its last two years. Moreover, migrants were more likely to be released after a border arrest under President Trump than under President Biden. In absolute terms, the Biden DHS is removing 3.5 times as many people per month as the Trump DHS did.”

But those are facts, not feelings. Time to dust off this snippet of Stephen Sondheim’s song, “Send in the Clowns“:

Don’t you love farce?
My fault, I fear
I thought that you’d want what I want

Sorry, my dear

But where are the clowns?
Quick, send in the clowns
Don’t bother, they’re here

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What’s South Carolina’s Democratic Primary Telling Us?

The Daily Escape:

After the storm, Southern AZ – February 2024 photo by Leila Shehab

Welcome to the Monday Wake Up Call. Let‘s start with a quick review of the South Carolina Democratic primary: Biden won. He swept every county, garnering 96% of the vote overall and 95% or better in every county. At the watch party, people were headed out the doors less than an hour after polls closed. Here’s an MSNBC screen grab that says it all:

With the Biden vote so dominant and the race so noncompetitive, turnout was low, at 131,000. In 2020, with no competitive Republican primary and 12 Democrats on the ballot, 536,949 people voted. That means we didn’t learn very much about voter engagement for 2024.

And once again, the advance polling couldn’t be trusted. Here’s what Emerson College found on Jan. 5, 2024 just four weeks prior to the primary:

This meant that there were 23% undecided in early January. We all know that there are months to go before the general election this fall. It seems certain that Biden and the Democrats are currently testing the effectiveness of messages across the various voting cohorts in the US.

Democratic politicians and MSNBC pundits keep hammering on Trump’s threat to democracy. But how to tell the story about Biden’s first term in ways that normal people can understand? Is the implied threat of an authoritarian takeover by Trump enough to propel turnout in the fall? Or should the message focus on how much better off people are three years on from Trump?

The continued strength of the broader economy is finally starting to break through to people’s consciousness. But Biden and the Democrats still have to sell the Biden recovery and not flinch from fears that voters won’t buy it because they don’t feel it. Anat Shenker-Osorio famously said in an article in 2017 for The Hill, that Democrats shouldn’t just take the country’s temperature, they should change it.

Ezra Klein offered thoughts about American’s need to vote for stability:

“Biden and his allies are framing this election as order against chaos. The party that gets things done against the party that will make America come undone.”

More:

“…Democrats are right that voters are craving stability. But…Trump is leading in many polls because voters believe that he is the one who might offer it. What Trump is pitching….is a push for order — ‘I am going to be the one who secures the border. I’m going to be the one that cracks down on crime. I’m going to be the one that tries to stabilize your prices.’”

More:

“I’ve struggled with this portrayal of Trump as the candidate of stability. I doubt it can survive the gale-force winds of the actual campaign he will run, of the things people will hear and see from him when they tune in to the election.”

Finally:

“…Democrats are having trouble persuading voters of their central pitch: that they are the party of stability. It does not feel like a stable time. It is not Biden’s fault that the world is tumultuous. But that does not mean he will not be blamed for it.”

That’s where Wrongo parts ways with Ezra. He’s not certain that voters who yearn for stability will cast their lonely eyes on Trump. Think about how effective Nikki Haley’s message is that chaos follows wherever Trump goes. Trump’s base isn’t buying that, but that criticism was successful for Haley with Independents in New Hampshire, and will be effective with the “never Trumpers”.

As far as what will motivate 2024 voters to turn out? Wrongo is struggling with how to balance the need to defend America from the authoritarian Right and the kitchen table issues. Wrongo was in high school when the John Birchers were insisting that the threat of creeping communism required a militarist leader to keep America safe. That led to the Republicans nominating Barry Goldwater, at the time a member of the radical Right. The Birchers’ Republican heirs today have moved beyond Goldwater. They hunger for a fascist strong man.

Do average voters see this threat, or are they fretting so much about overpaying for their rent and groceries to care?

And the stability argument resonates with Wrongo. This Sunday brings the Super Bowl, which used to be the one television event that would still unite America. But a significant minority of Americans now think it’s a PsyOp to make Trump lose the election. Klein says in his article that:

“The clichĂ© used to be that Democrats fell in love and Republicans fell in line. The reality, in recent years, has been that Democrats fall in line and Republicans fall apart.”

Time to wake up America! The choice whenever voting starts in your precinct this fall is between chaos and stability. We must stay obsessed with turning out Independents and unaffiliated, along with the Republican “never Trumpers” whose collective votes will ultimately determine the 2024 election.

Biden has to lead the way, and he’s got to do more interviews even though it increases exposure to his age as an issue.

To help you wake up, watch and listen to Doreen Shaffer & the Skatalites tune, “You’re Wondering Now”. This was covered and popularized by the UK group The Specials in the 1980s. The Skatalites did this in 1968. But they were covering “You’re Wondering Now” by Andy and Joey, another Jamaican group who first performed it in 1963. Ska is a happy sounding form of music that featured a bass line on the off beat. In the early 1960s it was the dominant music genre in Jamaica and was also popular with the British mods. Shaffer’s voice is pure and wonderful:

Sample Lyrics:

You’re wondering now, what to do, now you know this is the end
You’re wondering how, you will pay, for the way you did behave

Curtain has fallen, now you’re on your own
I won’t return, forever you will wait

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Biden’s Dilemma

The Daily Escape:

Highlands, Nantahala National Forest, NC – January 2024 photo by Michele Schwartz

The drone strike on a US base in Jordan killed three American troops and wounded at least 34 more. The base is called Tower 22. The attack has had several effects: First, it makes very real the likelihood of a widening conflict in the Middle East (ME). Second it has caused another partisan fire storm in US politics. Biden vowed to respond to the assault, blaming Iran-backed militias for the first US military casualties in the many similar strikes in the region since the start of the Israel/Hamas war. Here’s a map showing where the attack happened:

Basically, this is a logistics location for US troops in Syria at the US military base at al-Tanf, just 12 miles north of Tower 22. Tanf has been the key support location in the US effort to control ISIS in Syria and to contain Iran’s military build-up in eastern Syria. From AP News:

“Since the war in Gaza began Oct. 7, Iranian-backed militias have struck American military installations in Iraq more than 60 times and in Syria more than 90 times, with a mix of drones, rockets, mortars and ballistic missiles. The attack Sunday was the first targeting American troops in Jordan during the Israel-Hamas war and the first to result in the loss of American lives.”

The timing of this attack could hardly be worse. What began in October as a war between Israel and Hamas has now morphed with involvement by militants from four other Arab states. In addition Iran, Israel and Jordan all bombed Syria this month. Iran also bombed Pakistan, and Pakistan retaliated.

All of this is tit-for-tat in which American airstrikes against militias in Iraq or Syria, alternate with more militia attacks on the US installations. This illustrates the ME mission creep since last October. Whatever the original mission was for US troops in Syria, Jordan, and Iraq is now being sidelined as protection of the troop presence itself becomes the main concern.

All of these tit-for-tats carry an extreme risk of escalation into a larger conflict.

Iran has a network of proxy militias to project power across the ME. It is trying to support them while simultaneously trying to remain outside of the conflict. While Iran has tacitly accepted Israel’s targeting of Hamas, it  has been loath to unleash Lebanon’s Hezbollah, fearing that Israel (or the US) will hit back at Iran directly. Iran would like to force Israel into a ceasefire in Gaza and force American troops out of the ME. So far, its proxies have achieved only an increased American presence.

If we assume that the Tower 22 hit was a deliberate hit, (the base has been there for several years), it’s certain that militias in the area knew where to hit it to achieve a maximum result. Expanding from that, the US has about a thousand bases scattered around the world that are used to influence local operations, etc. Up to now, the US has considered them as assets. But if they suddenly become targets, trying to defend them simultaneously will be as difficult as defending ships in the Red Sea: Impossible. On the other hand, they are excellent targets if the US wants to be provoked into attacking Iran.

If such attacks continue, the position of these bases is going to become untenable and will pose a massive political problem for Biden.

Biden has fallen into a trap. And worse, it is Israel that placed Biden in the trap by not even trying to find a way to de-escalate the war with Hamas and bring Israeli hostages home. Biden’s support for Israel and his gentle pressure on Netanyahu to stop killing Gazans hasn’t worked; it also helped Biden fall in the trap. Biden should stop letting Bibi lead him around by the nose.

Biden can retaliate directly inside Iran, which will likely escalate the tit-for-tat attacks. And if taken as far as certain Republican pols want to go, it will endanger the Straits of Hormuz and risk doubling oil prices.

Worse in some ways, direct retaliation inside Iran might lead Russia to announce Iran is under full protection of Russia’s nuclear umbrella. That would make the Russia-China-Iran axis a concrete and formidable enemy. That would be a terrible outcome, even though some American Neo-cons have been making noises about being able to “win” a nuclear war. Here are some Republican chicken hawk suggestions about Iran:

Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MI):

“We must respond to these repeated attacks by Iran and its proxies by striking directly against Iranian targets and its leadership. … It is time to act swiftly and decisively for the whole world to see.”

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK):

“The only answer to these attacks must be devastating military retaliation against Iran’s terrorist forces, both in Iran and across the Middle East.”

Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) wrote:

“Joe Biden has emboldened Iran and shown weakness on the global stage. We have to have a stronger Commander-in-Chief.”

Talk is always cheap, and most of this is political theater. Biden could also conduct limited retaliatory missions against the actual militias in Syria who US Intelligence says attacked Tower 22. Whatever he does, Biden will suffer inevitable attacks from Republicans at home. All this with less than eleven months to go before Election Day.

As of now it isn’t clear how Biden intends to respond. In the past, when Trump targeted Quds Force General Qassem Soleimani, and other Iranian interests, the US conducted these actions outside of Iranian territory. Iran’s denial of direct involvement in the attack complicates the situation and makes it less likely that Biden will attack inside of Iran.

Striking militia leaders outside of Iran will cause Republicans to question the effectiveness of Biden’s tactics. The US has employed this type of retaliation in the past, but it hasn’t significantly curbed Iran’s or its proxies’ aggressive actions.

We need to keep perspective on the Tower 22 deaths. Republicans should remember that 48,000 Americans are killed by Americans with American-made guns every year. Of course our three soldiers should be honored, and we should retaliate. But if the loss of American lives is the big deal the Republicans say it is, then their indignation should be directed here at home in addition to in Jordan.

Otherwise, it’s false indignation.

All of us should remember that we have failed in every mission in the ME. We only accomplish growing our list of enemies like the Taliban, Al Qaeda, ISIS, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, Iran, Syria and whoever comes next if we stick around.

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