Saturday Soother – The Wrongologist

Implications Of Brian Thompson’s Assassination

The Daily Escape:

Bear Trap Gap, NC – November 2024 photo by Mandy Gallimore

“If you want things to stay as they are, things will have to change”– Il Gattopardo

If you’re on social media, a concerning number of people seem to openly support gunning down a “corporate rich guy” in broad daylight. Brian Thompson, the CEO of United Healthcare was murdered in what appears to be a targeted killing. And the comments about it on the internet underscore there is kind of a depravity circulating in too many Americans.

This, after two attempts to assassinate Trump during the campaign. Which stirred up similar, although more muted reaction on social media.

The killer left anti-insurance messages on the shell casings of the bullets that killed Thompson, using the words: “deny,” “defend” and “depose”. Those words are references to the ways insurance companies avoid paying for care.

An excellent summary by Bob Lefsetz:

“And we thought the revolution would arrive as a result of the red/blue divide. When in truth, it’s all about income inequality. Please don’t criticize me for having sympathy for those screwed by the insurance companies. If I were in charge, there’d be no guns at all, or a law akin to that in Australia. But one would posit that the shooter is pissed because the insurance company didn’t pay.

But that’s what insurance companies do, not pay. That’s their business model. Even assuming you can see the doctor of your choice, which is rare.”

Yes, not pay whenever possible is what insurance companies do.

To be clear, this is why advanced societies have tended to create broad publicly funded social safety net programs. It’s not because their bleeding heart politicians love giving away money. It’s because making sure people have humane standards of living keeps them from becoming desperate and doing stuff like this. During the Great Depression, capitalists agreed—grudgingly—to the New Deal because they were afraid otherwise the country would “go Communist”.

We have no clarity on the actual motive behind the killing, but all signs point to it being linked to dissatisfaction with our health insurance system. And we need to remember that Brian Thompson was a human being with a family. So calling his death justified is despicable.

It’s the health insurance payment system and healthcare pricing for goods and services that is despicable.

From STAT:

“The public’s dissatisfaction has never been higher. Recent polling data show the health care system is as unpopular now as it was before the Affordable Care Act went into effect 15 years ago — a time when insurers could decline to cover people if they had any number of pre-existing health conditions and nearly 49 million people lacked insurance. A survey from Gallup released Friday reveals that “Americans’ positive rating of the quality of health care in the U.S. is now at its lowest point” since 2001.”

“Roughly 25 million Americans remain uninsured. Tens of millions of others have health insurance but can’t afford their deductibles, coinsurance, or copays due to the high prices of tests, surgeries, and prescription drugs….These barriers aren’t just a nuisance — they can have real effects on patients’ health.”

The KFF foundation reports that 100 million Americans have medical debt, and its highly doubtful that they can afford to pay it down. Even people with platinum forms of coverage face long waits coordinating the complex and uncoordinated delivery of their health care, as Wrongo knows firsthand.

After getting care, patients are inundated with medical bills they don’t understand — perplexed why their insurer isn’t advocating on their behalf, and fearful that hospitals and other providers will send them to collections or sue them.

It’s all part of a health care system that is projected to spend $5 trillion this year, eating further into workers’ wages. Those who feel most aggrieved often are the sickest. Most people are generally satisfied with their health insurance. However, people who have more health conditions and therefore need to get care more frequently don’t like their coverage nearly as much as healthier people, according to polling from KFF.

So, the more they know you, the more they dislike you. People are feeling a sense of helplessness in trying to address this mammoth commercial insurance industry that’s putting restraints on people’s ability to get care. When you feel that sense of helplessness is when you end up having situations like this. People don’t really know what else to do.

The murder of the CEO and the public’s reaction reveals that:

Americans are blindingly angry, and not just with the healthcare system.
Due process is no longer trusted. Have enough money and you’re likely to buy your way out of a bad situation. The FTC says Twitter must comply with the consent decree and Elon Musk just doesn’t do it. The government is no match for the rich. Money can insulate you from so much.
Vigilante justice has become a solution in some places because of the lack of due process.

We’re entering a period that is very similar to the Gilded Age of the 1880s and the 1930s.

Our social contract is in free fall. And the Trump administration’s proposed cabinet officers will make it worse.

What will happen in a country with 400 million guns and 320 million people? Things may go downhill quickly. Never forget, most change is fomented by individuals. A fruit vendor in Tunisia ignited the Arab Spring.

Is this the start of change in America? One person gunning down an insurance company executive?

Wrongo doesn’t condone the shooting. At this point we have no motive. But what we do know makes you think about our broken health care system and the overcompensation of the people who run it. They’re getting rich on our illnesses. They take our money and then, don’t pay.

Ain’t that America.

Women Hold The Key To The Future

The Daily Escape:

If you’re looking for some hope going into the weekend, The Bulwark’s Dan McGraw has an incisive piece about how important the gender gap is for the 2024 election. He thinks as in 2022, there’s a strong case that women could give Harris a significant turnout advantage:

“More women than men have voted in every presidential election going back to 1964 and the current gap between them (between 5 million and 10 million votes per election) has been stable since 2004.”

Here’s a chart demonstrating the difference:

Trump has not historically done well with women voters. In 2016, Trump was -15 with women. He gained ground in 2020, losing women by -11. These losses were partially offset by his poorer margins with men: He was +11 in 2016 and +2 in 2020.

So that’s his baseline. Here’s one big question about 2024: Will the difference in turnout between women and men be higher, lower, or the same as it was in 2016 and 2020?

From McGraw:

“If I had to bet, I’d guess that the delta increases. Why? Because the vote gap has been fairly stable going back to 2004 and Trump has intentionally antagonized women this cycle. Negative polarity is currently the greatest motivating force in our politics… I do not expect increases in men’s turnout to keep pace with increases in women’s turnout.”

In 2016 Trump only got 39% of the women’s vote. It is not inconceivable that he could go lower. Indeed, for the last few days it’s looked like he’s trying to go lower. Starting in October, Trump thought it’d be a good idea to present himself as a “protector” who would save women from fear and unhappiness. As October ends, he said the following which probably won’t do his campaign any favors. From NBC News : (emphasis by Wrongo)

“Former President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he would “protect” women “whether the women like it or not,” a comment the Harris campaign immediately pounced on. Trump said at his rally in Green Bay, Wisconsin, that his “people” previously told him they did not think he should say that he wanted to “protect the women of our country,” comments he has previously made on the campaign trail.”

That’s some creepy paternalism right there.

This election looks very close, making either outcome relatively high-probability. It’s possible that everything will be too close to call and we’ll end the week with six different states at Florida’s 2000 contested level:

And there are signs in the polling that Harris has more support among women than Trump has among men this cycle. A recent ABC News/Ipsos poll has Trump winning men by 51-45%, (+6) while Harris is at 56-42% (+14) with women (all likely voters).

And the Harris margin is being repeated in swing states:

“A CNN poll released showed similar trends. It had Harris +8 with women and running even with men in Michigan. It had her running +19 with women with Trump +12 with men in Wisconsin. In Pennsylvania a Quinnipiac University poll of the commonwealth released the same day showed men backing Trump by 57-37%, while women backed Harris 55-39%.”

Off topic, but Trump seems to also be having issues with Seniors (+65) in PA. According to a Fox News poll of Pennsylvania, Trump is running 5 percentage points behind Harris among voters ages 65 and over, down from the previous month, when he and Harris were tied with Seniors. It’s a major shift from 2020, when Trump carried 53 percent of the senior vote in Pennsylvania and lost the state.

This could be big since the senior vote is particularly important in five of the seven battleground states — Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan, Wisconsin, and North Carolina. According to US Census data, these states have more residents over the age of 65 than the national average. According to modeling data across the Blue Wall states, Democratic voters over the age of 65 are running 10 to 20% ahead of their Republican counterparts with respect to registered turnout.

The conclusion? Nothing is definitive:

If women are more likely to vote than men, and if women are more supportive of Harris than men are of Trump—especially in key swing states—then Harris should win.
It’s possible that Harris will underperform, Trump will overperform, and he’ll get a solid, clean Electoral College win.
But it is also possible that Harris blows the doors off with women voters. That she both (1) increases that 10-million-vote advantage in women’s turnout and (2) explodes the gender gap. If that happens, she wins comfortably. Maybe even comfortably enough that we know it by late Tuesday night.

One way this could go is that Harris picks up a handful of points with white women, the single largest demographic group in the election. She could also boost the overall turnout of black and Hispanic women.

Try to get into a relaxing head space for the weekend. This may be Wrongo’s last column before Tuesday, so the battle is on hold until we see results.

Give any spare change to your local Congressional candidate. That’s where the hope is. It’s not quite a heat wave in Connecticut, but sitting outdoors and watching the leaves fall while listening to the Telemann’s “Concerto for 4 Violins No.2 in D Major” performed live by Hoing Kim in 2023 will tie the hopium for Harris together with the beautiful weather:

The Crypto Bro Vote

The Daily Escape:

When Trump pivoted to being pro-crypto, everyone thought it was just another scam to make a few extra shekels in advance of election. From The Atlantic:

“…more than 1 million people tuned in for the launch of World Liberty Financial, a new crypto project promoted by Trump and his family. The former president has been posting about it on social media for several weeks.”

“Trump wasn’t always this pro-crypto. He once referred to bitcoin as a scam….This summer, he appeared at a bitcoin conference and declared that the United States ‘will be the crypto capital of the planet’”

But his embrace may be more calculated than that. You shouldn’t be surprised to learn that crypto companies are bankrolling Republican campaigns this election. The New Yorker has a detailed story about how Silicon Valley’s crypto boys went all in on Sen. Adam Schiff in part by crushing Rep. Katie Porter’s attempt to become the Democratic nominee for the California Senate race:

“…Katie Porter was…futzing around on her computer when she learned that she was the target of a vast techno-political conspiracy….Now she was in a highly competitive race to replace the California senator Dianne Feinstein, who had died a few months earlier. The primary was in three weeks.

A text from a campaign staffer popped up on Porter’s screen. The staffer had just learned that a group named Fairshake was buying airtime in order to mount a last-minute blitz to oppose her candidacy. Indeed, the group was planning to spend roughly ten million dollars.”

“Porter…had raised thirty million dollars to bankroll her entire campaign, and that had taken years. The idea that some unknown group would swoop in and spend a fortune attacking her…seemed ludicrous: “I was, like, ‘What the heck is Fairshake?’ ”

Fairshake is a super PAC funded primarily by three tech firms involved in the cryptocurrency industry. The pro-crypto PAC has raised more than $200 million for 2024’s election cycles, per OpenSecrets, with tens of millions of dollars flooding in from crypto giants Coinbase and Ripple, as well as the Menlo Park CA venture firm Andreessen Horowitz.

Fairshake’s thinking was: If Porter lost and other politicians saw how much money the industry had available to spend on elections, they’d be more likely to become pro-crypto. The stakes, for the big donors, are existential — regulatory acceptance would boost the value of their companies’ assets and the use of their services.

The PAC dumped about $10 million into the race, a third of the $30 million Porter had for her campaign. She hadn’t ever heard of the group, but its attack ads called her “a fake,” a “liar” and a “bully.” Fairshake selected Porter from a list of high-profile options, hoping to make an example. She lost and will be out of Congress when it convenes in January.

An unnamed political operative told the New Yorker:

“Porter was a perfect choice because she let crypto declare, ‘If you are even slightly critical of us, we won’t just kill you…we’ll end your career.’ From a political perspective, it was a masterpiece.”

Fairshake’s scare campaign appears to have worked. The House of Representatives passed a pro-crypto bill, with bipartisan support, in May. Candidates with Fairshake’s support won their primaries in 85% of the cases.

This has made its way into the presidential campaign: Trump backs crypto and Harris has signaled her support for it as well.

Trump may be on to something, since this could be a bigger factor in the election than we realize. The New Yorker quotes Coinbase as saying that fifty-two million Americans own cryptocurrencies. Those polls indicated that 60% of crypto owners were millennials or Gen Z-ers, and 41% were people of color, key demographics for each Party.

Coinbase also launched an advocacy organization, Stand with Crypto, which is advertised to Coinbase’s millions of US customers every time they log in, and which urges cryptocurrency owners to contact their lawmakers.

Sherrod Brown (D-OH) is running for reelection, where Fairshake has directed forty million dollars to ads in support of his opponent.

In total, Fairshake and affiliated PACs have already spent more than a hundred million dollars on political races in 2024, including $43 million on Senate races in Ohio and West Virginia, and $7 million on four congressional races in North Carolina, Colorado, Alaska, and Iowa.

The big question is whether the bro vote is overhyped? Will these crypto bros turn out to vote?

Trump’s best chance at success in November requires minimizing his losses among women and suburbanites while building a coalition that includes a historic number of male and working-class voters in his corner. As a result, we’re seeing both campaigns and their allies attempt to reach men in unprecedented and unconventional ways online. (A reminder: Young men historically vote at lower rates than young women.)

For Trump, it seems this targeted outreach to the tech bros segment of the electorate is essential. If he can’t win record numbers of men, it’s unlikely he can win the White House.

For the Harris campaign, the male-focused outreach efforts are happening in addition to major campaigns and organizing programs designed to reach more dependable parts of their coalition who turn out more dependably.

In a way, this is proof that American governance and legislation have become so perverted by money that it is nearly impossible for people other than billionaires to further their agendas. It’s particularly dangerous given that the US economy has bestowed lavish riches on a tiny group of disaffected, unaccountable technologists.

Today’s startup founders and venture capitalists are, like the nouveaux riches of previous eras, using their wealth for selfish aims. In doing so, they have revealed themselves to be as ruthless as the robber barons and industrial tyrants of a century ago—not coincidentally, the last time that income inequality was as extreme as it is today.

More Data That Supports A Harris Win

The Daily Escape:

Wrongologist readers know that Wrongo thinks the presidential election isn’t quite as close or scary for Democrats as the polls would have you believe. They show Harris with a narrow lead, with some showing the battleground states as tied. Well, most polls aren’t truly reliable these days. And the pollsters, who make arbitrary weightings after the questions are asked, seem to travel in packs. They’re terrified of underestimating Trump support (as they have in the past). So maybe this time they have a thumb on the scales just like they did in 2022.

Wrongo has been saying that it’s possible to make a vibes-and-momentum argument that Harris has sprinted ahead of Trump who seems to be shrinking right before the public’s eyes whenever he speaks. By any normal standard, Trump has lost it mentally and emotionally. His speeches at rallies consist of rambling, often apocalyptic, hate-filled rhetoric and lies.

In order to get attention he’s saying crazier and crazier things, but it’s hard to see that any of that is winning over more voters. His efforts seem to be to directed at keeping his most fervent supporters energized while extracting as many dollars as he can from their wallets.

Harris on the other hand has effectively undermined the image of Trump as some sort of inevitable strongman. Instead has cast him as a failed rich-kid with no plan beyond turning Americans against each other.

There are some interesting survey data points that are encouraging for Harris: A new survey suggests that pollsters may be underestimating Harris’s support with young people. The large Harvard IOP youth poll suggests there is now a serious youth surge towards Harris.

She is up 61%-30% with likely 18-29 year-old voters. In 2020 Biden won 18-29 year-olds by just 24 points.

The Harvard IOP youth poll is a very large sample poll of a narrow slice of the electorate, and thus far, more reliable than 70-person sub-samples of groups in national polls. We’re also seeing surges in young people registering to vote.

And this Harris margin hasn’t been getting captured in most polling so far.

Compare the Harvard poll to this week’s Quinnipiac poll, that had Trump up a point. Quinnipiac’s 18-34 year old vote was Harris 48, Trump 45. But if Harvard’s poll is closer to correct, that number probably should be more like Harris +25 to +27. Adjusting for the youth surge in the Harvard poll to the Quinnipiac poll would put Harris up by a lot, not behind.

Another point is that many young people register as unaffiliated, not as Democrats. So analysts may not be seeing a youth surge towards Harris.

Howard University just completed a large sample poll of black voters in the battleground states. It showed that likely Black American voters in battleground states show strong support for Harris over Trump. Harris leads Trump, 82% to 12% among this population. The same voters report having supported President Biden over Trump 81% to 9% in the 2020 election. Support for Harris was even higher among voters who say they are “almost certain” to vote 85% to 10%.

The Howard poll has a ±3.1 margin of error, and 96% of the sample indicate they are likely to vote in the 2024 presidential election.

Finally, some readers wanted Wrongo to keep them updated on Thomas Miller’s model that forecasts the Electoral College vote based on investor closing prices in the PredictIt market for the Party that will win the 2024 presidential election. For September 26, the closing prices indicated that Harris wins the Electoral College 312- 226.

Remember that political polls are snapshots of the recent past and have limited predictive power.

Prediction markets, OTOH, are forward-looking. Investors anticipate what will happen on election day and place their bets accordingly. Just as the stock market is a leading indicator of what is expected to happen with the economy, a political prediction market is a leading indicator of what will happen with an election.

Time for a Saturday Soother. Just forget about the election for a few moments while you watch and listen to Luigi Boccherini’s (1743-1805) “String Quintet in E major” (1st Movement) performed in 2015 at the Chester Music Festival and played by the Ensemble Diva:

Boccherini was a virtuoso cellist who is credited with modifying Hayden’s model of the string quartet by bringing the cello to prominence.

Cartoons Of The Week – August 4, 2024

On Friday, Kamala Harris secured enough votes in the DNC’s “virtual roll call” of delegates to secure the Democratic nomination for President. She’s was only a candidate for ten days in July, but she raised $310 million, the largest single fundraising month for any presidential candidate ever. Importantly, two million donors gave for the first time to the presidential race.

And Harris dominated the news cycle for two weeks, something that hasn’t happened for Democrats in a long time. That is, until Trump played the race card against Harris at the National Association of Black Journalists in Chicago, saying in his tone-deaf way that she turned “Black”. That will haunt him throughout the election cycle.

But Harris returned to a prominent place in the news cycle with the prisoner exchange with Russia. That deal was brought together by multiple countries over two years. The WSJ has a detailed story.

It’s interesting that on the very Sunday Biden announced that he was withdrawing his candidacy for President and endorsing Harris, the negotiations on the prisoner swap were coming to a head. We won’t know exactly how involved Biden was for several years, but we do know that Kamala Harris also played a part. She made the final pitch to Germany’s Olaf Schultz to release his prisoner, a Russian hitman Vadim Krasikov, who was jailed in Germany, and without whom, the deal would have fallen apart. She also briefed the Slovenian officials regarding the deal at the Munich Security Conference.

Overall, prisoners from the US, Germany, Slovenia, Norway, and Poland were sent to Russia. The deal’s done, and Trump is grumpy. This is a huge improvement over where we were before Biden pulled out of the race. On to cartoons.

There’s good news and bad news for the Russians heading home:

The “Weirdo” charge seems to be sticking:

Orange is the new weird:

Painting a happy face on the Trump train is about all that’s possible:

Their words show the disconnect from the rest of us:

MAGA has been reduced to a fairy tale:

Finally, an interesting piece of music played on an instrument that is rarely heard. Take a few minutes to watch and listen to Brandon Acker performing the early 17th-century piece “Canario” by G.G. Kapsberger (1580-1651). The instrument is called the Theorbo, a type of lute:

Biden’s Passing Of The Torch

The Daily Escape:

Mountain goats, Hidden Lake Overlook, Glacier NP, MT – July 2024 photo by Jennifer Pardee Caruso

Today Wrongo wants all of us to think about Biden’s address from the Oval Office last Wednesday. He focused on the challenges facing the country, in particular if Trump were to succeed him. He also said that he was passing the torch to a new generation: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“I believe my record as president, my leadership in the world, my vision for America’s future, all merited a second term. But nothing, nothing, can come in the way of saving our democracy. That includes personal ambition. So, I’ve decided the best way forward is to pass the torch to a new generation. That’s the best way to unite our nation. You know, there is a time and a place for long years of experience in public life. But there’s also a time and a place for new voices, fresh voices, yes, younger voices. And that time and place is now.”

There’s the echo of JFK’s 1961 inaugural speech when Biden talks about passing the torch: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“Let the word go forth from this time and place to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans–born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage–and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world.”

A big idea and a smaller one leap out of the Biden speech. As Heather Cox Richardson wrote about the big idea:

“….Biden followed the example of the nation’s first president, George Washington, who declined to run for a third term to demonstrate that the United States of America would not have a king, and of its second president, John Adams, who handed the power of the presidency over to his rival Thomas Jefferson and thus established the nation’s tradition of the peaceful transition of power. Like them, Biden gave up the pursuit of power for himself in order to demonstrate the importance of democracy.”

If you want to know what kind of person someone truly is, watch them do The One Thing In The World They Do Not Want To Do. The most difficult thing, the thing that takes every fiber of their will to accomplish. It’s the ultimate character test, one which Trump could never pass. More from Biden:

“I revere this office, but I love my country more….”

He thus showed us that he had the most crucial qualification for the office of president.

JV Last observed a small thing about Biden’s speech that in reality is a big thing: the watch that he wore on Wednesday night. Wrongo didn’t know that Biden is a watch guy. From JV Last:

“For the watch guy, your watch means something. You’re not throwing on a timepiece. You’re choosing a companion, a wingman, a talisman. Last night, Biden wore a Rolex Datejust 41 with a smooth bezel and blue sunburst dial. It’s the most classic and low-key watch imaginable. Elegant, yet wholly unobtrusive. More important, though, is the watch’s provenance. Biden’s Datejust was a gift from his wife. He wore it first on January 20, 2021, at his inauguration.”

“It is a lock that Biden chose his Datejust…because he understood he was bookending his presidency. Bookending his professional life….In such a moment, a watch guy would want the watch that means the most to him because it was given to him by the most important person in his world.”

Kinda makes you want to tear up a little bit. You can get a more detailed look at Biden’s watches here.

Since this is our Saturday Soother, where we try to let go of the possibility that Trump will dump Vance for Nikki Haley, let’s close with some music that’s appropriate to Biden’s speech. You may remember when in 2015, the cast of Hamilton performed at the White House. At that time, Christopher Jackson (who played George Washington) sang “One Last Time” along with Lin Manuel Miranda. That night, the audience included Joe Biden. Here’s the video of that performance:

It’s impossible to watch this with all we know now, without wondering what Biden was thinking when he watched George Washington’s farewell from Hamilton.

Let’s leave the final words to JV Last:

“The first Baby Boomer president decided that the presidency was all about him….Bill Clinton was a successful president. But along the way he disgraced the office and clung to power with…self-importance that progressed from unseemly, to destructive, to pathological.

He set a standard that other politicians would soon follow—the ne plus ultra being Donald Trump, whose desire to cling to power progressed from pathological, to criminal, to treasonous.

The lesson the Baby Boomer presidents taught us is that you must never give up. You should brazen it out. You can weather the storm. Any collateral damage caused by your refusal to yield power is just the price of doing business. Power, once grasped, should never be willingly surrendered.”

For what it’s worth, Biden, like Wrongo, is a member of the Silent Generation. He’s not a Boomer. Biden has returned America to a better path. He reminded us that there is honor in letting go. That the true patriot yearns to see his country move beyond him.

Saturday Soother + Cartoons Of The Week, July 21, 2024

The Daily Escape:

View from the Rancho Nicasio roadhouse, Marin County, CA – July 2024 photo by Dave Alvin

Did Wrongo miss anything? From here, it seems worth noting that the attempted assassination of Trump has landed like a rock in a pond; it made a big splash and then sank to the bottom. Even the press seem to be realizing “wait, nobody cares? For real?” It’s largely in the rear view mirror, if Trump could leave it there.

The shooter has given the press and Republicans nothing to chew on (no manifesto, nothing on social media, no obvious radical affiliations, nothing more than a party registration and an old donation). Perhaps we’ve become so normalized to the lone shooter in America that we’re at the point where we say, “oh yeah, some dude just took a shot at Trump.” And people say: “OK, makes sense“, like saying “stranger things have happened“.

And JD Vance as the GOP VP candidate also makes sense, because Republicans always buy into bad stereotypes about poor White people. Vance capitalized on the fact that White people, especially suburban, rich ones who buy books, are mostly out of touch with the realities of rural, poor White folks and are disdainful towards them. He sold White America a story of helplessness/failure to “bootstrap” that spoke directly to their stereotypes.

His book asserts that because one person made it out of “broken” Appalachia, everyone should be able to do the same. Its primary argument is that poor people suffer because they don’t know any better. From NY Mag:

“Vance says he is fighting a class war on behalf of workers, but his record suggests otherwise. When he does intervene in matters of class, it’s often on the side of the elites. He showed up to a UAW picket line in Ohio, but opposes the PRO Act, which would shore up collective bargaining rights for millions of workers….”

And what have Vance and the GOP actually done for rural folk? They cut off their healthcare. They eliminate government services, and refuse to pay for their educations. They now want to force them to have babies against their will. What else will Vance’s “help” do for them if he’s elected?

And did Trump’s acceptance speech help him? It doesn’t help when you have the longest recorded acceptance speech by a major Party nominee in our history. His chat wound up being more than 12,000 words and clocked in at an interminable 92 minutes. It broke the record for longest acceptance speech in history by 18 minutes. But that shouldn’t have been a complete surprise since the second and third longest acceptance speeches in history are Trump’s from 2016 and 2020.

The WaPo reported that toward the end of his speech a woman sitting with the Illinois delegation was heard saying, “Wrap it up, Don!” The only real surprise is that he gave a MAGA rally speech at a moment that should have been tailored to a bigger and less unhinged target audience.

From Jonathan Alter, who said Trump’s bad speech gave life to the Dems:

“Theodore Roosevelt was shot in Milwaukee, just a mile from where the GOP Convention took place. The assassin’s bullet went through Roosevelt’s eyeglass case and the text of a 50-page speech (TR was long-winded, too…) and lodged in his chest. Because he didn’t cough up blood, the former president finished his speech before receiving medical attention.

Roosevelt, too, was attempting a comeback four years after he left the presidency….He was the popular candidate of the Progressive “Bull Moose” Party, and many of his supporters believed his life had been spared by divine providence.

Here’s how the story ends: The shooting took place less than three weeks before the election. By the time Americans went to the polls, it was old news, and Roosevelt finished 14 points behind the winner, Woodrow Wilson.”

Finally, Kamala Harris. CNN has a piece today that says the Democrats are actually coming to a consensus that Kamala Harris has to be the nominee if Biden steps aside:

“No one quite knows what the process of picking a new nominee would be if Joe Biden did step aside – but many Democrats say that any process is likelier than ever to quickly end with Vice President Kamala Harris as the nominee.”

How and if that happens is still (weeks later) dependent upon Biden deciding to step aside. But as Tom Sullivan says:

“Admit it. You’d love to see the Democratic former district attorney debate the helmet-kissing, multiply convicted, sex-offending, Republican presidential candidate currently out on bail in three jurisdictions.”

As the NY Intelligencer reports:

“Republicans are bracing for the fact that Harris will be a more effective campaigner than Biden and certainly a better debater. And they think that should Harris ultimately become the nominee, she will be awash in positive media coverage from outlets like the New York Times and the Washington Post, which Republicans believe have been on a crusade to replace Biden. The positive media coverage will likely result in a modest polling bump for Harris — but Republicans believe it will only be a temporary one.”

Trump’s proclivity for spouting racially coded and misogynist comments would be on full display daily if Harris became the nominee, further turning off college-educated voters and women.

On to cartoons. Another terrible display of hive thinking by America’s cartoonists, but here’s the best: Still the state of play for Democrats:

Judge Cannon is on the case:

Trump and Vance have something in common:

Tech billionaires rush to help the GOP:

On to the weekend! With the Republican convention behind us, we can get back to picking tomatoes from our backyard garden. Not only did the Trump fever break, but the weather has turned cooler here on the Fields of Wrong. So grab a chair outdoors in the shade.

Since we’re going to war for the soul of our democracy, watch and listen to Richard Wagner’s “Die Walkure – The Ride of the Valkyries” performed here in 2016 by Jaap Van Zweden and the Hong Kong Philharmonic.

The “Ride of the Valkyries “refers to the beginning of Act 3 of Die Walküre, the second of the four epic music dramas constituting Richard Wagner‘s Der Ring des Nibelungen.

But surely, music isn’t politics, it’s simply art! Wrongo is of an age that when he hears this played, he sees Huey gunships and Robert DuVall assaulting a Vietnamese village:

Biden For The Win?

The Daily Escape:

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.”

Wrongo was struck by data from this recent NPR Marist poll:

“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.”

About That Debate

The Daily Escape:

Rainstorm, Blue Ridge Mountains, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC – June 2024 photo by David R. Robinson

It’s a new day and we’re trying to pick up the pieces after what happened in last night’s debate between Trump and Biden. Here’s a recap by Rick Wilson, Lincoln Project co-founder:

“It’s late June, and Joe Biden went on stage with a felon who tore down America, told 500 sundry lies, bragged about ending Roe v. Wade, defended January 6th, denied having sex with a porn star, and promised to betray Ukraine. And Joe Biden had a bad, bad night.”

Biden stumbled over his words, and Trump’s barrage of lies went unchecked. On Twitter and on cable news, the political pundit class had a collective freakout. From political journalist John Nichols:

“CNN is illustrating how a ‘debate’ when the moderators reject the basic responsibility of fact-checking in real time, and refuse to challenge blatantly false statements, is not a debate. It’s…chaos where lies are given equal footing with the truth.”

When Wrongo heard that CNN wouldn’t be doing any real time fact-checking on Thursday afternoon, it was clear how the debate would go. Only now, the Democrats and Biden can’t tell people they didn’t see what they saw.

A lot of media people are SHOCKED at Biden’s performance. Dem consultants see that there is blood in the water and the sharks are circling. So many senior Dems are saying that Biden should step aside. The options are pretty simple:

Convince Biden to drop out of the race.
Stick with Biden and hope his debate performance doesn’t turn many voters away.

There are LOTS of Dems who want option #1. But it will be impossible to get Biden to drop out if he doesn’t want to do it. And there are NO signs that he wants to it.

Any plan to ease Biden out would likely require the involvement of Jill Biden and Barack Obama, along with assembling a pre-fab, pre-convention ticket acceptable to the Party’s delegates.

Otherwise, it would be a free-for-all. Even with Biden and Obama’s backing, that’s a huge undertaking with a 10 out of 10 degree of difficulty. It also entails massive risk with the convention delegates, the public, along with the challenges of spinning up a presidential campaign from a standing start. No Democrat on the sidelines today has the national organization in place to make a credible presidential run. They would have to take over the Biden campaign’s assets and move on from there.

Get a grip: One candidate on the stage lied from start to finish. And no one is suggesting that he drop out.

The media has been on the verge of burying Biden because of his age for months. That was never more true than on CNN on Thursday night, where their coifed pundit-moderators ignored the elephants in the room – that one of the two men standing at the podiums was a convicted felon, the leader of a coup attempt, an alleged thief of national security documents, who was earlier this year found liable in a civil court for rape, and has promised to usher in a vengeful authoritarian regime if he returns to office.

Instead, they launched the debate with their usual dead horse: the deficit and taxes. More from Wilson:

“History is replete with bad debate performances: Clinton’s first outing in 1992, George W. Bush’s Boston groaner (I was there, and it was awful), and Obama’s first showing against John McCain. Debates matter until they don’t, but they matter most to the chattering and online classes.”

All of those debaters won the presidency.

Biden is still overwhelmingly likely to run for reelection; he’s still is in a position to be re-elected. Biden, even diminished, is more right than wrong, that at this point he represents the Party’s best chance to keep Trump out of the Oval Office.

Biden did the best he could with an opponent who is unconstrained by the truth and moderators perfectly willing to allow Trump to lie. Unfortunately while Biden started weak, he finished stronger, while Trump started strong, he finished weak.

But Wrongo assumes that many people stopped watching after the first break.

So while some Democrats are in a panic about Joe Biden’s debate performance, we need to get a clue and check in with reality. It was probable that Biden was unwell and fatigued. Imagine how well you’d perform under the same conditions, regardless of your age.

Swallow your panic and get to work, doing whatever you can. Because for many Americans, this is personal. Your guy had a bad night. But the sun is out today. Move forward. Stop being afraid of your own shadow. We’re running against an insurrectionist and a felon. Biden is old. Stop being afraid of it.

We’re having our Saturday Soother on Friday this week, for the obvious reason that it’s necessary. On the Fields of Wrong, a very large tree fell across the long driveway of two of our neighbors. It says a lot that five or so of the men in the neighborhood worked together over two days to reopen the road. It did require borrowed and rented capital equipment: a scoop loader, a tractor and a wood chipper.

It’s going to be a cooler and drier Friday and Saturday in Connecticut. So let’s grab a seat in the shade and do our best not to think about the Supreme Court’s continuing efforts to end democracy as we used to know it. Try instead to take a few moments to gather ourselves for the slings and arrows of the week to come.

Start by listening to “Uncle John’s Band” by the Grateful Dead. It started appearing in their concerts in1969. The band recorded it for their 1970 album “Workingman’s Dead”. It was written by guitarist Jerry Garcia and lyricist Robert Hunter. The tune was played more than 330 times by the Dead and the lyrics seem to Wrongo to be valuable today:

Sample Lyrics:

Well, the first days are the hardest days
Don’t you worry anymore
‘Cause when life looks like Easy Street
There is danger at your door
Think this through with me
Let me know your mind
Woah, oh, what I want to know
Is are you kind?

Goddamn, well, I declare
Have you seen the like?
Their walls are built of cannonballs
Their motto is “don’t tread on me”

Come hear Uncle John’s band
Playing to the tide
Come with me, or go alone
He’s come to take his children home

Scattered Thoughts On Saturday

The Daily Escape:

Lupine, Crested Butte, CO – June 2024 photo by Lucian Manthey Photography

We just experienced Wrongo’s least favorite day of the year, the summer solstice. Now, the days grow shorter until December, and Wrongo will soon begin to mourn the loss of daylight. Adding to that, there’s the first presidential debate next Thursday, in which each candidate will try to make the election about which of the two of them is worse for the country.

We’re now entering the reality phase of the campaign. Over the next 10 weeks we will have 2 debates, the Trump sentencing, and the two presidential nominating conventions. Voters are beginning to check in now on how things are going. Wrongo expects that these unusually early presidential debates will draw large audiences that include a substantial swath of Americans who haven’t yet thought much about who to vote for in the upcoming election.

This is a group who can be significantly influenced by Biden’s performance.

Another thing for voters to note is that one donor, Timothy Mellon, heir to Andrew Mellon’s banking fortune, gave $50 million to the Trump campaign the day after Trump was found guilty of fraud in NY. Mellon had previously donated $25 million to super PACs for both RFK Jr. and Trump! That should prove to you that RFK Jr. is simply a stalking horse for the Trump campaign.

And think about what we had heard in the days after Trump was convicted: The media reported that Trump raised $52.8 million in the 24 hours after his guilty verdicts. But we now know that $50 million came from a single donor, meaning that Trump raised only $2.8 million from others in those early hours after the verdicts.

It’s hard to imagine that RFK Jr.’s candidacy would have be viable except for Mellon’s $25 million donation. In a sense, a single donor is keeping RFK Jr.’s campaign afloat. If anyone believed that RFK Jr. was a legitimate candidate, it is difficult to continue thinking that now after the revelation of Mellon’s funding.

Turning to the Supreme Court’s parsimonious trickle of decisions, on Friday, they upheld a gun control law intended to protect domestic violence victims. From Mark Sherman of the AP:

“The Supreme Court on Friday upheld a federal gun control law that is intended to protect victims of domestic violence…Justice Clarence Thomas, the author of the 2022 ruling, dissented….”

The Wrongologist

Geopolitics, Power and Political Economy

Category: Saturday Soother

More Data That Supports A Harris Win

Cartoons Of The Week – August 4, 2024

Biden’s Passing Of The Torch

Saturday Soother + Cartoons Of The Week, July 21, 2024

Biden For The Win?

Scattered Thoughts On Saturday