Every cartoonist tried to pile on the “Biden’s too old” story this week. Some were ok, most were obvious and mean-spirited, including many depicting the First Lady as the power behind the throne, manipulating a doddering Biden.
Yesterday, Wrongo said that since the election will be determined by turnout of a very few votes in a very few states. He likes this question from Robert Kuttner: Do the Democrats have the energy to turn out enough voters for down ballot races? Will those voters also vote for the top of the ticket?:
“Think of it as reverse coattails. One impressive feat, especially since Trump’s election in 2016, has been a massive effort to increase the size and turnout of potential Democratic voters. Most of this has been done outside the institutional Democratic Party, though in a few states such as Wisconsin the party has been a major force.”
Better turnout on the Democratic side, especially among “low-propensity” groups, such as young people and voters of color, far more than trying to win over swing voters, was key to helping Biden win in 2020. It also allowed Democrats to do better than expected in the midterm elections of 2018 and 2022. It can work again.
On to cartoons. The last convention that Chicago hosted wasn’t a win for the Dems:
Sunset, North Fork Reservoir from Mt. Mitchell, NC – July 2024 photo by Mandy Gallimore. Mt. Mitchell is the highest mountain in the Eastern US.
More thoughts about Biden’s press conference: While Wrongo thinks that Biden’s claim to the nomination has been strengthened, that hasn’t quieted the naysayers in the Democratic Party, and many in the press remain focused on his gaffe about Harris. Still, Wrongo is going to assume that Biden will remain at the top of the ticket. The question becomes how to shift the discourse to describing the consequences of a second Trump administration? Wrongo might say:
“Do you want a country run by an old felon who has bankrupted every business he’s owned and filled his administration with phony religious zealots at every level who are only loyal to him? Or do you want an older competent leader with years of government experience surrounded by good people with the best interest of the country?
Do you want chaos and turmoil or competence and compassion? If you’re still undecided think about the consequences of your decision for your children and grandchildren. It’s your choice.”
“With just days to go before the start of the Republican National Convention…Biden and former President…Trump continue to be closely matched among registered voters in both a head-to-head matchup and a multicandidate field….Biden’s support remains relatively unchanged from last month despite the view of many Americans that he lacks the mental fitness to serve as president.
The poll also found that Kamala Harris, Gavin Newsom, and Gretchen Whitmer do not improve the Democrats’ chances against Trump. Harris receives support from 50% of registered voters to 49% for Trump. Newsom garners 50% to 48% for Trump. Whitmer receives 49% of the vote to 49% for Trump.
Here’s the top line results:
There are only 2% undecided, which means winning the election is dependent on turnout.
The poll also says that Biden outperforms Trump on which candidate has the character to be president. By more than two to one, Americans are more concerned about a president who lies than they are about someone who is too old to serve:
“Americans are overwhelmingly more concerned about a president who plays fast and loose with the facts than someone who is too old to serve. Nearly seven in ten Americans (68%) think it is more concerning if a president does not tell the truth. Nearly one in three (32%) think it is more concerning if someone is too old to serve. Democrats (85%), independents (66%), and a slim majority of Republicans (51%) agree that dishonesty is of greater concern over advanced age.”
More from the cross-tabs:
“Nearly two in three Americans (64%), including 38% of Democrats and 35% of Biden supporters, do not think Biden has the mental fitness to serve as president. 68% of independents say the same. Americans divide (50% mentally fit to 49% mentally unfit) about Trump’s mental acuity.”
At the press conference, Biden questioned the reliability of the polls and they really don’t seem very believable to Wrongo. They all show it’s a close race, but we should be very skeptical that we’re getting a real look at the state of the race.
Those Democrats who want Biden out — either because they think he can’t win, or because of his decline in mental acuity, or both — have a very weak political argument. As of this writing, Biden stays. With the WaPo having the race tied and NPR having Biden slightly ahead, why would the man give up the nomination because a handful of House members, a Senator of two (publicly) and a bunch of cranky donors want him to quit?
For the sake of argument, say it remains Biden v. Trump. There’s a practical political argument to be made to vote for Biden, even if you think that he won’t be able to serve four years. There will be an experienced Democratic VP able to take over and an administration led by thousands of Democratic appointees to continue to carry the load.
Contrast that with the possibility that Trump won’t serve a full term if elected, an event that is also quite likely. Think about whoever is his possible successor, along with an administration filled according to the Project 2025 blueprint can do to America. That seems to be a crash and burn scenario.
Congressman Jim Himes (D-CT) thinks that Biden should step aside. In speaking with MSNBC’s Alex Wagner, she asked what he saw in Biden’s post-NATO press conference that led him to call for Biden to step aside, Himes responded this way: (emphasis by Wrongo)
“…Alex, it’s really not about tonight. And one of the, really, kind of sick aspects of this moment is that we are watching every speech, every rally, every debate, and saying, how did he do today? And that’s just not the way to think about the presidency of the US.”
In other words, the price of Biden running, as Wrongo said, is to be on tender hooks until Election Day waiting for another ugly shoe to drop. If Democrats decide to keep Biden as their nominee — or, more accurately, if they are not able to pressure him off the ballot — that is what they have to look forward to for the next four months.
This November is not about dueling personalities, middle-of-the-road policy differences, or as some see it, an 81-year-old man being the lesser of two evils compared with a 78-year-old man. It’s a referendum on our democracy, and a choice between a trustworthy public servant who can be counted on to uphold American values and a felon who wants to push the country into authoritarianism.
Enough! It’s time to take a break from Biden’s political shortcomings. It’s now Trump’s turn to release his detailed medical records. To release his tax returns. To hold an hour-long foreign policy press conference.
Hey, let’s relax, it’s still the summer, and you can spare a few moments to forget about the election and stressing about whoever Trump plans to appoint as his VP next week. It’s time for our Saturday Soother. Here at the Mansion of Wrong, we’re enjoying temperate weather, unlike most of the US. Rain is promised and occasional showers, but this week, the days have been warm and dry.
To help you leave the political world behind for a few minutes, grab a chair in an air-conditioned room and watch and listen to “The Barcarolle” from Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann. Here, soprano Fatma Said and mezzo-soprano Marianne Crebassa duet to great effect. They are joined by the Philharmonic Orchestra of Monte Carlo, conducted by Sascha Goetzel:
This is probably what heaven sounds like on a Saturday evening.
We’re still in the doom loop regarding whether Biden should step down as the Democrats candidate for president in November. A large proportion of pundits and Hollywood types are demanding that the Democrats take the easy way out, and thus, go on to lose this fall.
Except that Biden held a press conference on Thursday that, like the first presidential debate, was designed to quell the chorus calling for him to step aside. Or it was designed to offer red meat to the supposed journalists who asked the questions? The media has been treating Biden like a treasonous convicted felon that should be dropped like a hot rock, and treating the actual treasonous convicted felon like he’s an acceptable candidate.
The press conference turned out to be respectful, and largely concentrated on foreign policy. Biden showed great command of the subject matter, and with the exception of his usual verbal tics, gave long and well-reasoned answers. Some of the most hostile press members didn’t get to ask questions, but most of the areas of concern regarding his health, mental acuity and his commitment to staying in the race were covered in at least some depth.
What’s next? Wrongo has no idea if Biden is going to stay in the race, or what he will do if the chorus of calls for him to step aside continue to grow over the next week.
Wrongo has a huge concern should Biden decide to keep running. Usually presidential debates don’t matter, but in this election cycle, the two debates are more like health and wellness check-in events for both candidates, and that’s Wrongo’s biggest worry should Biden stay in the race: The election will ride entirely on how he performs in the second debate that is scheduled for September 10. By then, the convention will be over and all of the other possible options to head the ticket that are available today will be in the rear view mirror.
The decision about Biden is whether he’s electable. The way we talk about that is: Does he give the Democratic Party the best chance to win in November? We know that there are no guarantees: Biden could stay in and win. Biden could stand down and the new nominee could lose. Nothing is “safe.” The problem for the Democrats is that as of today, given the electoral map, the options of Biden either on or off the ticket both have less than a 50% chance of success. The Party probably feels it has to choose the least-dangerous pathway, and humans are rarely good at doing that. We’ve evolved to believe that if one option is risky, then the other option is likely to be less risky.
Has Wrongo seen enough? Maybe Biden can’t win this one for us. Maybe we have to win it for ourselves.
In a better world, Biden wouldn’t be the candidate in 2024. In that world, Hillary Clinton would just be finishing her second term. There would be a liberal majority on the Supreme Court, and Trump would just be a footnote to the history of presidential politics. But that’s not the reality we’re in. So Dems must decide whether Biden is the best option we’ve got. Regardless of who emerges when the smoke clears:
If we all agree to back the candidate, they will win.
If we all can’t agree to back the candidate, they will lose.
This was the big lesson that came out of the French election. They sluffed off candidates and parties in order to present a united front to the electorate that would prevent their right wing from taking over.
It’s important to remember that in America, the number of voters on the side of democracy easily outnumbers those on the authoritarian side. America’s challenge with beating Trump is how to unite the voters, not divide them. And division comes from the sort of narrative being sown by the media and the pundits. That guy’s “unelectable,” so don’t vote for him.
Despite the press conference, Biden still has yet to prove that he can be a vigorous, effective presence. He has done a number of events, and while all of them have been better than the debate, none of them until this one, has risen to the level “very good.”
This time around may be different. It is true that no incumbent president has lost re-election during a time of economic expansion and low unemployment. It is also true that no 80-year-old has ever been elected president. And that no felon has ever been elected president.
We are presently on course to make history with at least one of these improbabilities.
There are other firsts in this election: Never before has an aspiring president said out loud that he wanted to be “a dictator.” Never before has a sitting president attempted a coup. Never before has the general election featured two men who have served as president. Never before has the general election matchup been settled so early. Never before has a presidential general election debate taken place in June.
A lot of never-before things are happening all around us, right now.
Another historical precedent is that Trump has never won the popular vote. We should not assume that just because it hasn’t happened before, it can’t happen.
Dems need to choose to support Biden or overthrow him, and the sooner the better.
Ledgewater, Cashiers, NC – July 2024 photo by Mark Krancer
Wrongo and Ms. Right have spent a great few days enjoying the company of kids and spouses. While the subject of the 2024 election was on everyone’s mind, it only occasionally broke through into whatever we were discussing at the time.
All the while, the chorus of media and pundits calling for Biden to step aside has continued. Back on June 30, Wrongo said this:
“The NYT has an editorial saying that Biden should stand down for the good of the country. Even though the idea has been rejected by Biden, that thought is alive and will play out over the next few weeks. And for better or for worse, it will largely gain or lose traction based on poll results…”
Over the July Fourth weekend, more Congress members and the Massachusetts governor called on Biden to cede the nomination. There also were reports that Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) was organizing a group of Democratic senators to urge Biden to step aside.
What comes next? Biden will stay, or decide to yield to the pressure and go. And Biden or not, the media is going to harp on the shortcomings of whoever it is, no matter what. Here’s the Democrat’s dilemma:
In some sense, we are like online voters on a TV reality show. So far, the response by the leaders of the Democratic Party has been pathetic. They’re cowering in their offices and texting us for more money. This is the state of play in July 2024: We’re presented with a yes/no option for the presidential candidate, and are told to: a) send money and b) vote hard in November. In truth we have only limited agency when it comes to deciding on Biden or another candidate as the Democratic nominee.
Starting today, pressure will continue to mount, since Congress returns and the pols will get confronted by reporters asking what their positions are on Biden.
Paradoxically, Biden has narrowed Trump’s lead in key swing states, according to a new survey by Bloomberg/Morning Consult, published on Saturday: (emphasis by Wrongo)
“…Trump led…Biden by only 2 percentage points, 47% to 45%, in the critical states needed to win the November election. That’s the smallest gap since the poll began last October. Biden now leads Trump in Michigan and Wisconsin. He’s within the poll’s statistical margin of error in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and North Carolina, and is farthest behind in…Pennsylvania.”
The poll also showed Biden narrowed the gap with independent voters, with Trump and Biden being tied at 40%. In a previous poll, Trump had led Biden by 44% to 36%. Here’s a visual from the survey:
This poll is the first comprehensive survey of the states most likely to decide the outcome in the Electoral College since Biden’s debate disaster on June 27. They surveyed 4,902 registered voters in seven swing states: 781 registered voters in Arizona, 790 in Georgia, 694 in Michigan, 452 in Nevada, 696 in North Carolina, 794 in Pennsylvania and 695 in Wisconsin. The surveys were conducted online from July 1 to July 5. The statistical margin of error is plus/minus 3 percentage points in Georgia and Pennsylvania; 4 percentage points in Arizona, Michigan, North Carolina, and Wisconsin, and 5 percentage points in Nevada.
The poll showed that Trump also has hurdles to overcome: Some 62% of voters said he’s dangerous, an increase from 59% in February. That comes after the NY jury found him guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records.
And what happens if Biden steps aside?
The only viable replacement for Biden at this point is VP Kamala Harris. Wrongo’s informal surveys over the past year showed very little support for her, although there is zero reason to think that Democrats would vote against her in a two-way race vs. Trump.
And replacing Biden with Harris would remove the concerns about Biden’s age and mental sharpness. Maybe there would be new concerns, but we’d know for a fact that the age/capacity concerns held by many moderate/swing voters and many in the Democratic party would disappear.
Thinking about Harris:
Recent polls suggest Harris might do better than Biden against Trump, although it could still be a tight contest. A CNN poll released on July 2 found voters favor Trump over Biden by 49% to 43%. Harris also trailed Trump, 47% to 45%, but within the margin of error. It also found independents back Harris 43%-40% over Trump, and moderate voters of both parties prefer her 51%-39%.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll also taken after the debate found Harris and Trump were nearly tied, with 42% supporting her and 43% backing him. The Reuters/Ipsos polls typically have a margin of error of about 3.5 percentage points.
For Democrats, the answer to the dilemma is deciding about risk management. It’s clear that all polling suggests that Biden will face a very tough uphill battle to beat Trump in November. It’s unclear whether Harris would do better. So Dems are dealing with the devil you know vs the devil you don’t.
And many Dems are genuinely concerned that they can’t win with the devil they know, and so want to take a risk with the devil they don’t really know.
There are plenty of ways to think about this. Sports fans know that no one looks down on the great athlete who loses to Father Time. They only look down on an athlete who hangs on too long. Dems are no longer fighting just a story about Biden being “old”. It’s become about Biden losing control, and Americans don’t like that kind of story at all.
A Harris-lead ticket could change the conversation, adding stories about women, young people, people of color, and critically, how Americans have had to adjust in the face of change and disruption. Many voters could rally to that story. The Party faithful could build coalitions around it.
With the exception of Biden himself, Harris has served in elected office – as a district attorney, state attorney general, senator and vice-president – longer than any Democrat elected to the White House in Wrongo’s lifetime, except for LBJ. And as a former prosecutor, she can make the case against Trump, a convicted felon.
Finally, think about a Harris/Shapiro ticket: PA’s governor Josh Shapiro has consistently logged high approval ratings. This is the crucial swing state that the Democrats have to win to keep Trump out of the White House. A January Quinnipiac University poll showed Shapiro had a 59% job approval rating, including 36% of Republicans who said they approved of his job performance, compared to Biden’s 40% overall approval rating in the state.
Time to wake up, America! We’re in that crucial period between Trump’s first coup attempt and his second. The Democrats’ dilemma must be solved ASAP. To help you wake up, watch and listen to Coldplay perform their big hit “Fix You” live on June 29, 2024 at Glastonbury 2024.
You will note Michael J. Fox joining the band onstage, playing guitar from a wheelchair. If you watch at 3:01, he does a kick that launches the crescendo in the song. European audiences are the best.
This video captures different people, different nationalities, different beliefs, collectively enjoying and engaging joyfully. No hate, no violence, just pure emotion.
Sample Lyrics:
When you try your best but you don’t succeed
When you get what you want but not what you need
When you feel so tired but you can’t sleep
Stuck in reverse
When the tears come streaming down your face
When you lose something you can’t replace
When you love someone but it goes to waste
Could it be worse?
Lights will guide you home
And ignite your bones
And I will try to fix you
What is it with the NYT? The Wrong family has subscribed to both the online and print versions for many decades. Wrongo remembers how badly the NYT treated Hillary Clinton about her emails in 2016. And their recent editorial board missive saying that Biden should retire for the good of the country made him again question precisely what they’re trying to accomplish in this election cycle.
“Study: Hillary Clinton’s emails got as much front-page coverage in 6 days as policy did in 69”
Vox helpfully provided a look at those six days:
The article authors Watts and Rothschild compiled data for all front-page and online articles published by The Times between September 1, 2016, and Election Day on November 8. Watts said of Clinton’s emails:
“It’s just a tremendous amount of…front-page real estate devoted to this scandal….The monolithic story that’s constantly renewing itself seems to be disproportionately damaging compared to this kaleidoscope.”
We all know what happened to the Clinton presidential campaign on November 8.
Fast forward to the NYT’s coverage of the Biden debate and its aftermath:
In some ways this is worse than with Hillary, because much of the NYT coverage was editorial hammering on Biden’s disastrous debate performance. You can probably expect the same thing going forward. Former Assistant AG for New York State and MSNBC commentator Tristan Snell nailed it:
Well, they didn’t say absolutely nothing, just close to it. Here’s the NYT’s front page on the day Trump was convicted:
Three stories. That’s it. NYT’s Editorial Board did publish an op-ed: Donald Trump, Felon in which the NYT made no call for Trump to step down as the GOP candidate. Here’s the final paragraph of that op-ed:
“In the end, the jury heard the evidence, deliberated for more than nine hours and came to a decision, which is how the system is designed to work. In the same way, elections allow voters to consider the choices before them with full information, then freely cast their ballots. Mr. Trump tried to sabotage elections and the criminal justice system — both of which are fundamental to American democracy — when he thought they might not produce the outcome he wanted. So far, they have proved resilient enough to withstand his attacks. The jurors have delivered their verdict, as the voters will in November. If the Republic is to survive, all of us — including Mr. Trump — should abide by both, regardless of the outcome.”
“To serve his country, Donald Trump should leave the race”
“Biden had a horrible night Thursday. But the debate about the debate is misplaced. The only person who should withdraw from the race is Trump.”
David Pecker, former owner of “The Enquirer” told us the plan. Plant the seed, a front page staring you in the face at every grocery store in America. The only thing that’s important is the cover.
Turns out that’s not much different than the NYT these days.
Wrongo isn’t some kind of mad skills media critic, and he continues to read the NYT. But when are we going to see the wall-to-wall editorials and Op-eds calling for the coup-leading, convicted felon, still-in-legal-trouble man with vivid dreams of political revenge and a fleeting grasp on reality being called to step aside? Are Republicans some sort of unaccountable, unstoppable force that few in the media can never criticize?
Wouldn’t it be fantastic if the next time a reporter brings up getting out of the race with Biden himself, Biden responded with:
“Either go write an Op-Ed making the case for my Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment, or shut the f—k up about it.”
Biden’s performance hurts his chances, no question. But dropping out now would assure defeat for the Democrats. There’s no Johnny Unbeatable in sight. Quitting the race now would fracture the Democratic Party. It would also reinforce the GOP lie that Biden and the administration accomplished nothing and was never legitimate.
Ironically, the late, unlamented Donald Rumsfeld can be misquoted to say:
“You fight an election with the candidate you’ve got, not a candidate you wish you had”.
It’s time to wake up America, we have to do more, and worry less. Stop reading the papers (specifically the NYT), and help elect Democratic Senators and Congresspersons. Let’s help them run strongly in all districts in November. Maybe they can help push Biden across the finish line.
To help you wake up, listen to The Yardbirds tune “Please Don’t Tell Me ‘Bout The News” from their 2003 album “Birdland”. The Yardbirds were an English rock band, formed in 1963. The band started the careers of three of rock’s most famous guitarists: Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page:
Sample Lyrics:
You can read it in the morning
You can read it late at night
Well there’s been another warning
Or there’s been another fight
There’s a scandal going on
Some reporter stumbled on
About a leak in the press
And the world is in a mess
Won’t you spare me from this story
‘Cause I only get confused
Please don’t tell me about the news
Please don’t tell me about the news
It’s no surprise that all of the cartoonists arose from their slumbers to draw various scenes of
the Biden and Trump debate and its aftermath. In most cases they magnified Joe’s decrepitude or show streams flowing from Trump’s mouth. Few are genuinely funny.
But before cartoons, a few more words about the debate and where we are going. The NYT has an editorial saying that Biden should stand down for the good of the country. Even though the idea has been rejected by Biden, that thought is alive and will play out over the next few weeks. And for better or for worse, it will largely gain or lose traction based on poll results, by those same people who we’ve been saying for months that we shouldn’t trust their numbers.
That’s the dilemma facing Democrats. Interestingly, Biden’s poll numbers went into positive territory in a post-debate poll yesterday and he had his best fundraising day ever. The viewing numbers show that only about 30% of those likely to vote this fall watched or streamed the debate on Thursday night.
That historically small audience was likely comprised mostly of partisans on both sides, particularly given that CNN allowed Fox to run a simulcast of the debate on its network, giving Trump supporters a safe space to watch.
That so few undecided or persuadable voters checked into the debate could explain why a new 538/Ipsos poll taken entirely after the debate, found little movement from a previous poll of the very same people. Note: Biden leads today by 2.7 points, 46.2%-43.9%:
Why is it that Democrats collapse in terror when their guy gets a cold? Republicans rally around their guy when he’s found civilly liable for sexual assault; when he tries to overthrow the government and loses more than 60 lawsuits before doing so; and when he’s convicted of a felony based on his desire to conceal paying off a porn star that he had at least somewhat coerced sex with, while his wife was recovering from childbirth.
The pundits would have you believe that Democrats have to “acknowledge reality.” Instead, that says Democrats are cowards looking for a place to hide from the big, bad NYT. It doesn’t matter if the Dems replace Biden or not, the media is going to harp on the shortcomings of whoever it is, no matter what.
So circle the wagons and not the firing squad. The administrations of both of these two men have track records that are easily predictive of future performance. Make this a choice between one or the other of them rather than the media’s default position of it being a referendum on Biden. Discipline yourselves and focus on what is really at stake. This election isn’t a casting call for a reality TV show. It’s an election where the candidates represent fundamentally different visions of the American future. And those visions are the only thing that matters. On to cartoons.
Contrasting platforms 2024:
The only choice?
What happened to the Biden’s taking drugs narrative?
Monday will bring new horrors:
How it really works:
Few things are as difficult to swallow as Louisiana’s new policy:
Scrawling by a pavement Plato telling us what to do this fall:
Doll House, Bears Ears National Monument, UT – June 2024 photo by Robert Villegas
Over the weekend, Wrongo and Ms. Right along with friends of the blog Gloria R., Pat M. and David P. saw the play “Suffs” on Broadway, NYC.
The plot is that it’s 1913 and the women’s movement is trying to get women the right to vote. They are organized by the suffragists, not suffragettes (they call themselves “Suffs”). “Suffs” traces their heroic and occasionally dangerous campaign from 1913 through ratification of the 19th Amendment in 1920. There’s a schism in the movement between the conservative old-line establishment Suffs, and a youthful breakaway group who want to emulate a similar movement in England, led in the US by Alice Paul who briefly spent time in the UK.
Paul and her group confront then-president Woodrow Wilson, who, after jailing the Paul group and allowing them to nearly die in a hunger strike, eventually tumbles to supporting the Suffs’ cause.
So much has changed since the passing of the 19th Amendment over a century ago, and yet this musical reminds us that we sometimes need to look back, in order to march into the future.
It was a sold out crowd. The audience was enthusiastic, and predominantly women. “Suffs” is a fantastic show that should be seen by anyone who loves Broadway, loves musicals, and needs a breath of hope in this bleak world. Like “Hamilton“, it invites us to learn something about the history of America. It’s a good show and it’s good for the world. Wrongo was emotional, remembering his time as an activist in the Civil Rights movement.
The show sets the stage early with the song, “Find A Way”:
How will we do it when it’s never been done?
How will we find the way where there isn’t one?
“Suffs” also makes us think about where we are today in America, along with what we can do to make it better. My lunch with the Broadway friends underlined that Democrats think it’s a scary time. Dan Pfeiffer wrote about how “Democrats are in a full-blown freakout over Biden”. Wrongo was the only one at lunch who thought that Biden has an excellent chance of winning in November. To paraphrase a line in the New Yorker by Lore Segal:
“The current situation is like two Democrats who are fighting a duel. On the count of ten, they turn and each shoots themselves in the foot”.
More from Pfeiffer:
“People are right to worry. This race is closer than it should be and the stakes could not be higher. It’s shocking that, after everything, Donald Trump is welcome in public let alone on the doorstep of returning to the White House. However, the level of defeatism among so many Democrats is unwarranted.”
Pfeiffer includes an interesting chart that shows detail from the NYT/Siena poll after the Trump verdict. In summary, people who voted previously, back Biden while Trump leads with the folks who vote less often, pay less attention to the news, and engage less frequently with politics:
Pfeiffer concludes by saying: (brackets by Wrongo)
“It is a challenge [for Biden] to tell his story and focus voters on the dangers of Trump. The presence of third party candidates and the divisions within the Democratic Party over Gaza make matters worse.”
Can you imagine how freaked out Democrats would be if our nominee had just been convicted of 34 crimes, found liable for sexual assault, had his business found guilty of financial fraud, favored banning abortion, and was on the unpopular side of almost every issue? Dems might say to voters:
Voter: “How is the game going?”
Dem Party: “We forfeited.”
Voter: “What! Why?”
Dem Party: “We were down two points at the start of the 4th quarter.”
So the question is, like it was for the Suffs, can we find a way where there isn’t one?
The answer is we can, if we really try. Wrongo thinks we have to become activists, not Party members. We need to be “warriors for democracy” or “freedom fighters” in service of defeating Trump and all MAGA candidates in November. From Simon Rosenberg:
“The Choice, The Contrast, Joe Biden Is A Good President – I’ve been thinking a lot this weekend about something I wrote to you about the other day – the idea of establishing a clear contrast in the election. It’s something I’ve been referring to as “the choice.” Central to my theory of 2024 is that regardless of where polling is today once the Biden campaign was able to bring “the choice” to voters in the battlegrounds Biden would gain and we would win…”
The new CBS/YouGov poll from last week confirms that making the election a referendum on Trump would be supported by Biden voters. Opposing Trump as a main motivation for voting for Biden has moved up by 7 points in the past 3 months:
In the same poll, Biden leads Trump among independent voters by two percentage points — 50% to 48%. It’s well within the margin of error, but importantly, it amounts to a 17 point swing for Biden in June compared to March’s polling.
Another thing Rosenberg points out is that polls around the world have been overestimating support for conservative candidates. The underperformance by Republicans in polls we’ve seen in the US also showed up in the European elections this weekend. Here’s The Economist: (Brackets by Wrongo)
“Consider the numbers. Ms. Le Pen’s [France] result is down on 2014, the previous European election. So is the Austrian Freedom Party and, more drastically, the Danish People’s Party and the Party for Freedom in the Netherlands…. Alternative for Germany [AFD] also disappointed…on 10.8% it only modestly increased its support from 2014 and did less well than in the 2017 Bundestag election. The Lega [Italy] has made big gains, but it too seems to have done worse than was generally expected…”
The polls were off in India too, by a lot. Narendra Modi’s polls said his Right-wing party would sweep back into power, but they barely held on, and needed to share power in order to form a new government.
One of Wrongo’s lunch companions brought up David Sedaris’s quote in the New Yorker about the “Choice”:
“To put them in perspective, I think of being on an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and, eventually, parks it beside my seat. ‘Can I interest you in the chicken?’ she asks. ‘Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?’
To be undecided in this election is to pause for a moment and then ask how the chicken is cooked.”
Wrongo often talks about Biden needing better messaging. He should for example, say what Mitt Romney keeps saying:
“I don’t want my President to be someone who committed sexual assault…”
Or fraud. How can Trump be seen as a “winner” or a strong leader when he’s a rapist, a fraudster, a traitor, and a felon? We’re just beginning to see the negative impact of the guilty verdict. And “rapist, fraudster, traitor, felon” will take away from Trump’s preferred framing that he’s strong and Biden is weak. Biden is 81 and Trump turns 78 this week. This isn’t about age — it’s about their records.
But, we can’t sit on our hands. We have to become activists. Few of the Suffs women believed what they did as individuals would make a difference.
Few of the Vietnam activists believed they would bring about change.
And the activists of the Civil Rights movement knew how it was nearly impossible to win the vote, right up until the time they did win it.
Wisteria, Seattle Japanese Garden – May 2024 photo by Lisa Ketchum
(New columns may be light and variable for the rest of the week as Wrongo and Ms. Right visit family in New England)
Wrongo and Ms. Right spent Sunday celebrating the college graduation of a granddaughter-in-law. That led to some discussion about the current wave of campus demonstrations and how college students seem so lukewarm about Biden.
Wrongo asked if anyone was aware that Biden had delivered the commencement address at Morehouse College in Atlanta, GA earlier that day. Morehouse is one of the HBCU’s (Historically Black Colleges and Universities). None of them knew he was even speaking at a graduation. And given the uproar on campuses across the nation and what we’re hearing about how Black people are moving away from Biden, their thought was that it wasn’t going to be a good day for Biden.
Turned out that Biden had a pretty good day at Morehouse. From Simon Rosenberg:
“Yesterday, President Biden gave what I think is one of the most important speeches of his Presidency.”
“Of the many double standards employed by the media, Biden needing every speech to be some combination of Lincoln and Cicero while Trump’s public appearances are 90 minutes of word salad, non sequiturs, and dictatorial musings that get no push back, is among the worst.”
Wrongo is still looking for an explanation why every news event is somewhere between a “test” for Biden or a “danger” to his candidacy. You can watch Biden’s entire Morehouse speech here. It was a good speech and an important moment in Biden’s campaign for reelection.
There is some truth to recent polling that shows Biden in difficulty with college students. Pew has a poll showing that younger Americans think Biden favors the Israelis too much (36%), while just 12% of young adults say he’s striking the right balance in the Israel-Hamas war:
These kinds of polls are why the media are concerned about Biden’s popularity, but 41% of those same students say that they’re “not sure” how Biden is doing. That’s five points more than the number who believe he’s doing the wrong thing. And for “all adults”, the favoring the Israelis too much is only at 22%, with the “Not Sure” holding at 40%, eighteen points more than those who dislike what Biden is doing.
Time to wake up, America! As Daniel Miller said after Biden’s speech:
“The media must do better. We all must do better. We cannot allow these lies that have poisoned the minds of the American public to continue unchallenged. We must challenge these lies and we must get the American people to see the truth.”
To help you wake up on a Tuesday morning, watch and listen to “Long Distance Call” from the new album “Sam’s Place”, the first Little Feat album in 12 years. The album title is for Sam Clayton, a Little Feat original who wanted to have Little Feat do an album of blues covers. “Long Distance Call ” was written by blues legend, Muddy Waters, and it has Clayton and Bonnie Raitt on vocals. It was recorded in Memphis TN at the old Sam Philips Studios and Sam and others in the band played on the same old piano that Jerry Lee Lewis played, decades ago:
Sample Lyric:
“I might buy you a brand new Cadillac, baby
If you only speak some good words about me…”
What’s the possibility that the media will find some good words to say about Biden?
Squirrel in a bird feeder, Northbridge, MA – 2024 photo by Paul G. Dailey
Wrongo had planned today to talk more about Ukraine, but the nation’s news had other ideas. We will cover two stories today. First, Supreme Court Justice Alito’s shocking display of gross partisanship at the exact time he was hearing a case regarding the same issue.
On Thursday, in an exclusive, the NYT reported that Alito’s home displayed an upside-down US flag during the days after the January 6 insurrection. In 2021 and since, flying the US flag upside down is a symbol calling for people to “Stop the Steal” of the 2020 election from Trump. In case you miss the significance, that upside down flag is a call to insurrection. And it was displayed by a Supreme Court justice. More from the NYT:
“At the time the Alito’s flew the flag in front of their house, the Court was deciding whether to hear a vote-counting challenge from Pennsylvania. The majority said no, but Alito, joined by Thomas, dissented. They wanted the Court to take the case, whose theme, was that the Pennsylvania election had been stolen”
The NYT reported that Alito emailed the following when asked for comment:
“I had no involvement whatsoever in the flying of the flag. It was briefly placed by Mrs. Alito in response to a neighbor’s use of objectionable and personally insulting language on yard signs.”
Who thinks that makes flying the flag upside down justifiable? Nobody. From Robert Hubbell:
“Alito’s response to the Times is a lie. He owns the flag. He owns the flagpole. He owns the property on which the flag was displayed. He permitted it to remain on display on his property. He, therefore, did have “involvement” in “flying the flag.” It does not matter that it was his wife who physically raised the “Stop the Steal” banner on the flagpole. Alito’s hair-splitting denial is misleading and incomplete—and therefore false.”
We have two Supreme Court justices (and their wives) openly siding with insurrectionists and deciding on cases that involve the insurrection and its leader, Donald Trump. The Court should be renamed “The Court of Supreme Ethical Violations”. Plainly, the Court has lost the ability to police itself.
And for the record, the upside-down flag was flying over the Alito’s’ home on Jan. 17, 2021. Why has it taken the NYTthree and a half years to publish such an important story? Wrongo’s faith in the NYT has taken another hit with their deferred reporting on the flag at Alito’s home.
The second report comes from Kyle Tharp at “For What It’s Worth” a newsletter about politics and social media. He reports that pro-Trump content now dominates on TikTok, a platform that Biden began using this year:
“Since November, according to two TikTok officials, there’s been twice as much pro-Trump content as pro-Biden content on the platform….1.29 million positive Trump videos or images, with 9.1 billion views, compared to 651,000 positive Biden posts, with 6.15 billion views…This may not be the most precise survey of the landscape, but that’s still a nearly 10 to 1 ratio of Trump likes to Biden likes, and 12 to 1 in views.” ”
Let’s remember that TikTok is primarily used by younger Americans who may make the difference in which candidate wins in November. Two other points:
“…there are 10.5 million TikTok users in Pennsylvania, 3.4 million in Nevada, 2.4 million in Arizona, 5.4 million in Georgia, and 3.7 million users in Michigan.”
The Biden campaign almost certainly knows those numbers. Tharp says that Democrats and liberal groups have six months to flood the zone with positive pro-Biden news clips or creative original content reaching core audiences on TikTok. They should start now.
That’s enough disturbing news for today, it’s time for our Saturday Soother, when we do our best to forget about Trump’s attempt to bribe Big Oil executives, or why Republicans think showing up at a Manhattan courtroom is good for their careers. Instead, let’s try to focus instead on the natural world around us as we prepare for another week of depressing political news.
Last Thursday was an exciting day on the Fields of Wrong. It’s garbage pickup day, and a medium-size black bear wandered around the Mansion of Wrong looking for treats. Garbage cans are his preferred target, followed by birdfeeders. But our cans were still in the garage, so he left our place without a snack, although several of our neighbors had to clean up their garbage, which the bear had strewn far and wide.
The bluebirds are nesting in our birdboxes, and with all the rain, our fields are very green. We’re expecting good weather today, so grab a seat outside in the shade. Now, watch and listen to the Paganini Ensemble Vienna play Paganini’s “Quartets for Strings and Guitar Vol. 4 Nos. 11, 6 & 13”. These were recorded in Vienna in March, 2022. Paganini’s string quartets with guitar are among his finest chamber compositions:
Sunrise, Paines Creek, Brewster, Cape Cod, MA – May 2024 photo by Bob Amaral Photography
Wrongo has just started reading Erik Larson’s “The Demon of Unrest”, a history of how Fort Sumter in Charleston, SC fits into the overall story of the Civil War. It has a certain currency, since Wrongo and Ms. Right took a Charleston harbor tour in April that prominently featured Fort Sumter.
Usually, Wrongo would wait until he’s finished it to talk about a book, but today is an exception. In Larson’s note to readers (pg. XI) he starts by saying:
“I was well into my research on the saga of Fort Sumter and the advent of the American Civil War when the events of January 6, 2021, took place.”
That is the only time Larson refers to Jan. 6. The book mostly covers the five+ months from Lincoln’s election in November 1860 to the shelling of Fort Sumter in April 1861. We see that during those five months, amid the building talk of secession, a pro-slavery mob attempted to stop Congress from tallying the vote to elect Lincoln.
Knowing about that should hit very close to home for Americans today.
While there’s nothing explicitly in the book about Jan. 6, the Trump years (down to today) is a kind of spectral presence, not least when Larson describes the urgent concerns of public officials that the electoral count to certify Lincoln’s election would be disrupted, or that the certifications would be stolen or destroyed, and the Capitol attacked by angry Americans.
Sound familiar? The basic question today is similar to the question in 1861: “Can America stay together?” After the Civil War, we never thought that we would have to ask that question again. Today we can add a question about whether a presidential election loser should suffer consequences if they launched a coup attempt to retain presidential power.
It seems clear at this point that to bind the country together, we need to rediscover and commit to a new national narrative, a reaffirmation of America’s Cause.
All of this came to mind when Wrongo looked at a survey completed in April by the Nationhood Lab at Salve Regina University’s Pell Center for International Relations and Public Policy. The Nationhood Lab is working to develop a new narrative of America’s purpose that can be broadly shared.
They asked registered voters what in the nature of the US they most identified with by offering statement pairs about our national purpose, American identity, and the meaning of our past. In each case, one statement was keyed off the ideals in the Declaration of Independence (Civic Ideals) while the other was rooted in characteristics like ancestry, heritage, character, and values (Heritage and Traditions).
Each was presented in a manner that made them sound as attractive as possible. The participants were then asked to choose between civic ideals and our traditional heritage/character. Interestingly, the civic statements proved far more attractive regardless of gender, age, race, education or region, except for Republicans and those who voted for Trump in 2020:
Sixty-three percent of Americans preferred the statement that we are united “not by a shared religion or ancestry or history, but by our shared commitment to a set of American founding ideals: that we all have inherent and equal rights to live, to not be tyrannized, and to pursue happiness as we each understand it”
The alternative, that we are united “by shared history, traditions, and values and by our fortitude and character as Americans, a people who value hard work, individual responsibility, and national loyalty”, was embraced by only 33% of respondents.
Fifty-six percent of respondents said they agreed more with a statement that Americans “are duty-bound to defend one another’s inherent rights” over one that said we “are duty-bound to defend our culture, interests, and way of life” which was preferred by 36% of the survey participants.
Fifty-four percent preferred the statement “Freedom, justice, and equality are ideals each generation must fight for” and that “we must pledge ourselves to make our Union more perfect.” While the alternate statement, “Security, individual liberties, and respect for our founding values are the heritage each generation must fight for” was chosen by 40% of those surveyed.
Below is a chart with the full demographic results of the survey:
These results are in some ways, an antidote to the terrible polling Biden is experiencing. Nothing in the NYT poll should cause panic. While the NYT headline is that Trump leads in 5 states, that’s not actually what their own data says. Trump leads in 3 (AZ, GA, NV) and 3 are essentially tied.
But it’s very hard to believe that a significant share of people in the Nationhood Lab polls that share an overwhelming belief in civic ideals will turn around and vote for Trump in six months.
If you want additional support for the concept that current political polling can’t be relied on, consider the just-concluded Maryland Democratic Senate primary. David Trone, a businessman who put $62 million of his own money into his primary campaign lost to Angela Alsobrooks, Prince George’s County Executive. From Charlotte Clymer:
“There were ten polls on the Maryland US Senate Democratic Primary released this year. David Trone led in seven of them, most by double digits. Angela Alsobrooks led in three, never by more than five points. Alsobrooks just beat Trone by double digits.”
Political polling is massively overrated even if there is some marginal utility to it. If you really want results, you have to get out and vote.
