Plenty of false equivalency cartoons this week. Here are the best
Pick your plagiarism:
Can’t you see it? The evidence is right in front of you:
Supreme cleaning service will keep Trump on the ballot:
Changing minds will be difficult:
What could happen in November:
The Elephant has a bad dream:
The Daily Escape:
Oak Creek, Sedona AZ – November 2023 photo by Jim Lupton
Over single malt and martinis, our Thanksgiving guests talked about what a confusing time we’re living in. Americans are angry and anxious, and the polls continue to show problems for Biden across the board, despite that overall, the economy is fine.
Inflation has slowed significantly. Wages are increasing. Unemployment is near a half-century low. Job satisfaction is up. Yet Americans don’t necessarily see it that way From the NYT:
“In the recent New York Times/Siena College poll of voters in six swing states, eight in 10 said the economy was fair or poor. Just 2% said it was excellent. Majorities of every group of Americans — across gender, race, age, education, geography, income and party — had an unfavorable view.
To make the disconnect even more confusing, people are not acting the way they do when they believe the economy is bad. They are spending, vacationing and job-switching the way they do when they believe it’s good.”
Continuing with the confusion, the new WSJ/NORC survey of the American dream—the proposition that anyone who works hard can get ahead regardless of their background, has moved out of reach for many Americans. Only 36% of voters in the survey (conducted between Oct. 19-23 with a margin of error of ± 4%) says that the American dream still holds true: (emphasis by Wrongo)
“The American dream seemed most remote to young adults and women in the survey…..46% of men but only 28% of women said the ideal of advancement for hard work still holds true, as did 48% of voters aged 65 or older but only about 28% of those under age 50 agreed.”
And people think the dream is growing more remote. When last year’s WSJ poll asked whether people who work hard were likely to get ahead, 68% said yes—nearly twice as many as in this year’s poll (36%). More from the NYT:
“Economic difficulties are greater for those without a college degree, who are the majority of Americans. They earn less, receive fewer benefits from employers and have more physically demanding jobs.”
Voters without a college degree are Trump’s strongest cohort.
Adding to the cloudy forecast, the Economist/YouGov weekly tracking poll of registered voters says most people are happy with their jobs:
But the same Economist/YouGov poll gives a different impression when you ask about the American economy more broadly:
What’s going on here? These data suggest something tragic – either the American people have no idea what is happening in the country, or what they do know is deeply wrong.
A final nail in this conundrum. Ed Kilgore in NY Magazine says that the youth vote is swinging against Biden:
“Until recently, Democrats’ biggest concern about the 2024 youth vote was that millennial and Gen-Z voters …might not turn out in great enough numbers to reelect Joe Biden. Young voters were…the largest and most rapidly growing segment of the Democratic base in the last election. But now public-opinion surveys are beginning to unveil a far more terrifying possibility: Trump could carry the youth vote next year.”
The latest national NBC News poll finds President Joe Biden trailing Trump among young voters ages 18 to 34 — with Trump getting support from 46% of these young voters and Biden getting 42%, while:
“CNN’s recent national poll had Trump ahead of Biden by 1 point among voters ages 18 to 34.
Quinnipiac University had Biden ahead by 9 points in that subgroup.
The national Fox News poll had Biden up 7 points among that age group.”
Hard to know what to believe from those surveys. More from Kilgore:
“According to Pew’s validated voters analysis (which is a lot more precise than exit polls), Biden won under-30 voters by a 59% to 35% margin in 2020. Biden actually won the next age cohort, voters 30 to 49 years old, by a 55% to 43% margin.”
So, what’s wrong? It’s important to note that yesterday’s younger voters aren’t today’s. From Nate Silver:
“Fully a third of voters in the age 18-29 bracket in the 2020 election (everyone aged 26 or older) will have aged out of it by 2024, as will two-thirds of the age 18-to-29 voters from the 2016 election and all of them from 2012.”
Silver says, So if you’re thinking “did all those young voters who backed Obama in 2012 really just turn on Biden?” Those voters have aged into the 30-to-41 age bracket.
We need to remember that today’s young voters share the national unhappiness with the performance of the economy, and many are particularly affected by high cost of living and higher interest rates that make buying a home or a car difficult. Some are angry at Biden for his inability (thanks to the Supreme Court) to cancel student-loan debts. And most notoriously, young voters don’t share Biden’s strong identification with Israel in its ongoing war with Hamas (a new NBC poll shows 70% of 18-to-34-year-old voters disapprove of Biden’s handling of the war).
And there’s this tidbit from the NYT:
“Younger people…had concerns specific to their phase of life. In the poll, 93% of them rated the economy unfavorably, more than any other age group.”
What exactly are kids in their 20’s supposed to be feeling at this stage of life? Unless you come from money, your 20’s are a financial struggle. Wrongo’s certainly were, and that’s decades ago when the economy was great. This isn’t to dismiss today’s very real economic uncertainties. Wrongo’s own grandchildren run the gamut of (relative) struggle financially.
The single most persuasive way to convince young people that Trump isn’t the right answer is to show them what he’ll do in his own words. Many of them are too young to know much about Trump. Some of today’s college freshmen were just 14 or 15 when he was in office.
It’s Monday, and it’s time to wake up America! People need to pay attention. Once again, it will come down to effective messaging for the Dems. They must help voters understand who will serve their interests and who will literally crush their interests.
To help you wake up watch and listen to William Devaughn’s “Be Thankful For What You’ve Got”. It sold nearly two million copies in 1974. It takes us back to a time when there was more optimism in America. If you lived or worked in NYC in the1970s, the video will also take you back to a difficult period in the city’s history. In its own way, it’s a great Thanksgiving song:
The Daily Escape:
Cows grazing in fields near the village of Castelluccio in central Italy. In October 2016, a significant earthquake struck the area, badly damaging the village and roads—but farming still takes place and fields of lentils and poppies bloom every year, carpeting the land – 2018 photo by Maurizio Sartoretto
Ninety-two million eligible American voters failed to vote in the 2016 presidential elections. In the 2014 midterms, 143 million eligible Americans failed to vote. It was the lowest voter participation in 72 years. Is it possible to change this sorry record? We can start by looking at voter registration. From Larry Sabato:
There are 31 states (plus the District of Columbia) with party registration; in the others, such as Virginia, voters register without reference to party. In 19 states and the District, there are more registered Democrats than Republicans. In 12 states, there are more registered Republicans than Democrats. In aggregate, 40% of all voters in party registration states are Democrats, 29% are Republicans, and 28% are independents.
Sabato says that overall, the current Democratic advantage over Republicans in the party registration states approaches 12 million voters. But, they don’t turn out to vote.
There are a number of major states that do not register voters by party, including those in the industrial Midwest: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin. Add to that, Texas, Georgia, and Washington. If they did register by party, Texas, Georgia, and Indiana would certainly add to the Republican total. Sabato’s team produced this map illustrating the breakdown of registered voters (RV) in the table below:
More from Sabato: (emphasis by Wrongo)
Still, Republican Donald Trump found a route to victory in 2016 that went through the party registration states. He scored a near sweep of those where there were more Republicans than Democrats, winning 11 of the 12, while also taking six of the 19 states where there were more Democrats than Republicans — a group that included the pivotal battleground states of Florida, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania.
But the message gets worse for Dems, and it’s all about voter turnout. In 2016, falling participation defined the election, as pivotal swing states such as Wisconsin and Ohio saw voter participation drop by approximately 3% and 4% respectively, compared with 2012.
The Center for American Progress says that during the 2016 primaries, only 28.5% of eligible voters cast votes for party candidates, while only 14.5% participated in the 2012 primaries. For local mayoral elections, participation fell below 20% in 15 of the country’s 30 most populous cities.
The latest data available that break down voter turnout for midterm elections by state is for 2014. And it makes a disheartening case for Democrats, particularly in those states with a Democratic voter registration plurality where Trump won. Here is the breakdown of voter turnout by state:
In 2014, there wasn’t a lot of Democratic sentiment in the highest turnout states. And in the six states where Dems have a registration advantage, but the state voted for Trump in 2016, this was their 2014 voter turnout:
STATE TURNOUT
PA 36.1%
WVA 31.2%
KY 44.2%
NC 40.8%
LA 43.9%
FL 42.8%
This shows their turnout was substantially higher than the national average. If these states repeat the same turnout this November, chances are that the House will stay in Republican hands. Now, the data are from 2014, and the country is more energized politically in 2018 than it was four years ago, so generalizing may not provide us with a correct answer.
For what it’s worth, only five states had turnout over 50%: Alaska, Colorado, Maine, Michigan, Oregon and Wisconsin.
But can we fix turnout? The usual barriers we talk about fixing are:
But, a 2017 Pew study found that the most common reasons registered voters gave for not voting in the 2016 elections had little to do with barriers to turnout: they “Didn’t like candidates or campaign issues” (25%); followed by those “Not interested, felt vote wouldn’t make difference” (15%); “Too busy or conflicting schedule” (14)%; and “Illness or disability” (12%).
“Registration problems,” were only 4%; while “Transportation problems,” were 3%; and “Inconvenient hours or polling place,” just 2%.
Having charismatic candidates with messages that resonate is the easiest fix, but we are locked into a system in which career politicians work their way up the ladder, trying to be as bland as possible.
People have to become angry enough to force our current system to change.
The real question is: Why aren’t they already angry enough?
The Daily Escape:
Sigiriya, Sri Lanka – photo by jcourtial for dronestagram. Sigiriya is an ancient rock fortress. The site was the palace for King Kasyapa (477 – 495 BC). It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
We live in a seemingly endless loop of outrage. Nothing ever changes, because we waste energy on the “what-about?” arguments from both sides, each attempting to reframe the issue to their side’s advantage. These discussions yield nothing, and solutions are never agreed. This adds to a generalized feeling of powerlessness: The view that everything that is important is out of our hands, and insoluble.
So it is with school shootings, with protecting the DACA kids. And with whatever Russiagate is.
At least the Mueller investigation will run its course. We have to hope that the results will be made public. But if they are released, it will only lead to more debate and disagreement. Until then, we’ll continue to gleefully argue our respective Russiagate viewpoints in a fact-free vacuum.
We have experienced hysterical political times before, but they tended to be single issue events. Has there ever been a time when so many people in both political parties have been so single-mindedly determined to whip up anger?
When we’re looking at just a single issue, one side or the other often simply runs out of steam. Then the issue can be resolved both in Washington and in the mind of the public.
When we experience multiple issues simultaneously, the available energy is expended across the entire spectrum of problems. Thus, there isn’t enough energy to direct successfully at a single issue. So nothing is resolved.
This is where we are in February 2018, in a kind of nervous exhaustion: Too many issues and too few resolutions.
Can something, or someone unite us? Will a big event allow a majority to coalesce around a point of view, or a leader?
History shows that when we are in the grip of anxiety, it can be a relief if something we fear actually happens. Think about when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor. It was widely reported that the response of the public, including anti-war activists, was relief. There was a feeling that at last a course had been set, a key decision made. FDR united the disparate groups behind a war.
While the same situation doesn’t quite apply today, we crave some sort of decisions, perhaps some sort of decisive act. What would that be? It isn’t possible to see from where we are today.
As John Edwards said, there are two Americas. The one that sends their children to private schools, and the second one that sends their children to public schools. The second group has the kids who get shot by the gunmen. And politicians get away with platitudes about their thoughts and prayers.
Unfortunately, they then decide that fixing the problem is not worth their time.
We may have reached a breaking point. Shitty jobs, shitty pay, shitty hours, and little hope of advancement. No easy access to medical care, an uneven social safety net. Wrongo lived through the chaotic 1960’s. He endured Reagan’s show-no-mercy 1980’s. Those were bad times.
But, in a lot of ways, 2018 is worse. Today, there is an immense lack of mutual respect. And there is a ubiquitous atmosphere of a powerless people.
Wow, who said all that??
We desperately need a weekend where we can unplug from the media and focus on other things. In other words, we need a Saturday soother. Start by brewing up a big cuppa Stumptown Coffee’s Holler Mountain Blend, ($16/12oz.) The Stumptown people promise flavors of blackberry, citrus and toffee in a creamy, full body. Your mileage may vary.
Now, get in your favorite chair and listen to some, or all of the musical score from the film “Dunkirk”. Both the score and the film are Oscar-nominated. The film’s director Christopher Nolan suggested to the musical director Hans Zimmer, that they use Elgar’s “Nimrod” from the 1898-99 “Enigma Variations” as part of the theme. They decided that the movie’s music should be about time, and how for the men on the beaches, time was running out. They picked the “Enigma Variations” because it’s part of English culture, less a national anthem than an emotional anthem for the nation. Along the way, consistent with using time, they slowed it down to 6 beats per minute. Listen to their version from the movie:
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
Today, we focus on this from the WaPo’s Marc Fisher who profiles the kind of people who support Donald Trump and finds they are mostly older white men and women:
The way Joe McCoy sees it, the last time America was great was when Ronald Reagan was president, when people played by the rules. No, it was in the ’70s, Holly Martin says, when you could depend on Americans to work hard. No, to find true American greatness, Steve Trivett contends, you need to go back to before the Vietnam War, ‘when you could still own a home and have a good job even if you didn’t have a college education.’
Fisher says this demographic resonates with the Donald’s campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again”. And even if they don’t agree on exactly why, they do accept Trump’s contention that the US has become “an economic wasteland” and that it is “committing cultural suicide.”
The premise behind “Make America Great Again” is that while the country is no longer great, it can be great again, and Trump is the can-do billionaire who can make that happen.
This can be difficult to watch, like a slowly-developing accident on the freeway. People seem so easily misled, and they say such unsophisticated things about immigration, about Putin and Syria, about our economy, about the threat from Muslims who live in America.
But do we have good Party establishment choices in the 2016 election? No, voters don’t have good, clear choices, despite the unprecedented number of candidates.
Republicans made their voters a bunch of promises over the past 10 years, some of which they had no hope of keeping, and others which they had no intention of actually delivering. It’s also clear that the Republican “Establishment” is frustrated with the Republican candidates, and their supporters who actually expected the Party to be more effective. That’s why so many Republican voters have no interest in Jeb Bush or Scott Walker, and it’s clear that the GOP Establishment misunderstands their own base.
So, Donald Trump appeals to many Republicans as someone who’s pretty effective at holding the media’s attention and driving the national conversation. Someone who looks to be a better bet to actually shake things up and make possible a few things that currently look impossible.
It might be a GOP Hail Mary pass, but what’s the alternative?
For Democrats, Hillary Clinton looks like the candidate who’s “turn” has finally come. She is a product of their “establishment” as much as Jeb Bush is of the GOP’s.
And is it really all that different that the progressive left looks to Bernie Sanders to create a “revolution” in the political climate, making a progressive America possible? Sanders may be more of a Hail Mary pass than Trump.
Since both parties suck and won’t work together, many on both sides are looking for an anti-establishment Messiah to lead them to the political Promised Land. What makes this risk seem worth it is that, while folks understand they’re inviting chaos, they feel our politics are already chaotic. So, people think “What’s the difference?”
And it’s hard to argue with them. American politics feels like a metaphor of Easter Island: Some of us spend our lives trying to get new trees to grow, while the majority are happy to keep chopping down the old ones as fast as they can.
Trump is saying if we vote for him, he’ll make it all better. And if you read Senator Sander’s stump speech, you’d know he is saying he can’t do it alone, that people have to get together and organize to effect change.
That is “a substantive difference” between these two “insurgents”.
That’s why Bernie Sanders’ use of the Democratic Socialist label is disorienting. It shakes people out of their normal process enough to wonder how he thinks he could possibly win. He can’t.
And the mainstream media and both party establishments say: “things really aren’t as bad as they’re made out to be.” They hope that in the end, most voters will agree with their sentiment, and vote for their establishment candidates.
But voters have spent decades lowering their expectations (in Wrongo’s case, except for a short-lived upswing in 2008). Screw that. People need to raise their expectations. Because lower expectations and the “what did you expect” attitude is essentially giving permission for poor results.
We need to expect MORE, demand more.
Because it’s better to have high expectations with the risk of disappointment, than it is to have low expectations that guarantee more of the same old stuff.