Ukraine and Hunter Biden dominated cartoons this week. Here we go.
The GOPâs answer:
Tables get turned on âcontextâ as GOP equivocates:
Twin tunnels:
The other border crisis:
Theyâve got the wrong guy:
GOP is decorating a sparse tree:
The Daily Escape:
Drone view of the Bentonite Hills, UT – November 2023 photo by Hilary Bralove
Today, Veterans Day, (thereâs no apostrophe before or after the âsâ) honors those who served, while Memorial Day honors those who died in military service.
Wrongo served in the US Army during the Vietnam era, although not in-country. Wrongoâs dad served in the Army in France and Germany in WWII. Wrongo didnât get to meet his dad until dad came home from France after the war. Wrongoâs Grandfather served in the Navy in WWI, captaining a small boat on the east coast of the US. It is not clear exactly how he earned the nickname âCaptain Sandbarâ; that story is lost to history.
With few peaceful exceptions, wars are always going strong somewhere in the world. In the many centuries of European history up to 1945, an army crossed the Rhine on average once every 30 years. War was an important occupation for all of the major nations of Europe. But, in the 78 years since WWII, theyâve not only decided to not make war on each other, Europe has become a federation that has brought peace to the continent.
At least until Russia invaded Ukraine.
But itâs Saturday, our usual day to relax and try to escape the polycrisis weâre experiencing at home and abroad. This week, Democrats had a pretty good Election Day. And while some are concerned that Joe Manchinâs retirement will cost the Dems a Senate seat, Wrongo thinks weâll just have to win elsewhere.
Heâs also reasonably certain that last Tuesdayâs results show polling isnât capturing how Americans really feel about the economy. From Simon Rosenberg: (brackets by Wrongo)
â….[hereâs] a reminder of this data from YouGov/Economist and the Conference Board Iâve been sharing of late that shows far more contentedness than is conventional wisdom:
Overall, how satisfied or dissatisfied are you with the way things are going in your life today? Satisfied 64%, Dissatisfied 35%
How happy would you say you are with your current job? Great deal/somewhat 80%, A little/not at all 19%.
Do you think your family income will increase or decrease in 2024? Increase 45%, stay the same 41%, decrease 15%.
Do you consider yourself paid fairly or underpaid in your job? Paid fairly 56%, Underpaid 38%.
Hereâs a chart that makes it clear that job satisfaction is higher than itâs been in 35 years!
This gives a very different sense of where people are at compared to the NYT/Siena polling on a related question: âThinking about the nation’s economy, how would you rate economic conditions today?â The answers were Excellent: 2%; Good:18%; Only Fair: 29%; Poor: 49%; and Didnât know: 2%.
How do you square the idea that 62.3% of people surveyed said that theyâre satisfied with their job with 49% of the people in the NYT poll saying that economic conditions are poor? Nobody whoâs happy at work thinks the economy is poor.
Think about where we are: Over the next year Dems are going to spend $1 billion+ to tell swing state voters what Biden has accomplished on their behalf, while reminding them how historically awful Trump and the entire Republican party have become.
That gives Wrongo hope for 2024.
And if you are still craving bad news, Republicans are almost certain to shut down the government next week. The new House Speaker, Mike Johnson (R-LA), sent Congress home a day early for a long(ish) weekend, apparently because Johnson is giving a speech in Paris?
âThe New Republic reported Friday that Johnson â who still has yet to present a plan to fund the government before the November 18 deadline â gaveled the House of Representatives out of session on Thursday so he can make it to the Worldwide Freedom Initiative’s (WFI) upcoming conference in Paris, France, where he’s due to speak Friday night.â
Johnson is expected to roll out his plan to fund the government by today as Republicans aim to vote Tuesday on some sort of plan. Chances arenât great for a clean extension of the current deal.
âThe Republican partyâs single biggest legislative initiative of the last three yearsâone championed by a Republican president and a majority of congressional Republicansâhas been an attempt to overturn a free and fair election.â
The Republicans canât get their shit together, so 8 days from now, Americaâs soldiers, air traffic controllers, food safety inspectors, IRS agents, border patrol and more will all go without pay. Some will be furloughed. Every government function will be effected.
Theyâre harming our economy and for what reason? Theyâre going to shut down the government because they mistakenly think it will be good for them politically.
But itâs time for our Saturday Soother, where we forget about Mike Johnson, Joe Manchin and the Israeli/Hamas war. Instead letâs find an oasis of calm for a few hours. Here on the fields of Wrong, we are still waiting for the oak trees to give up their leaves. Although they are always last to fall, this year itâs doubtful that we will be able to schedule our final fall clean-up before Thanksgiving. Thatâs weeks later than usual.
Now grab a comfy chair by a big window and watch and listen to J. Offenbachâs âBarcarolleâ, from his âTales of Hoffmanâ. A barcarolle was originally a Venetian gondolierâs song typified by gently rocking rhythms in 6/8 or 12/8 time.
Offenbachâs is the most famous example. Here it is performed by the Attika plucked string orchestra which includes eight mandolins:
Bob Dylanâs song “I’ve Made Up My Mind to Give Myself to You” from his 2020 album “Rough and Rowdy Ways” uses Offenbachâs âBarcarolle” as a riff.
The Daily Escape:
Tulips, Boston Common, Boston MA – May 2023 photo by Ken Grille Photography
The DOJ has released the Durham Report. Former Connecticut US Attorney John Durham was tagged by Trumpâs Attorney General Barr with proving there was a deep-state plot against Trump. From the NYT:
âMr. Durhamâs 306-page report appeared to show little substantial new information about the FBIâs handling of the Russia investigation, known as Crossfire Hurricane, and it failed to produce the kinds of blockbuster revelations impugning the bureau that former President… Trump….had once suggested that Mr. Durham would find.â
So, after four years, and $6.5 million of our money, Durham found nothing? Apparently the best he could come up with was a Right wing personal opinion. Meanwhile Conservatives are furious with Durham for not finding Hillary Clinton guilty of…something. The Right-leaning Washington Times said:
âSpecial counsel John Durhamâs failure to indict any Obama-era FBI officials involved in the Trump-Russia collusion investigation has left conservative activists and Trump allies questioning why he didnât pursue prosecutions that they said were handed to him on a silver platter….Mr. Durham brought three prosecutions during his sprawling, four-year probe that concluded Monday, but he netted only one conviction: a low-level FBI lawyer who admitted to doctoring evidence.â
More:
âNone of the three indictments involved high-profile FBI figures who greenlighted an investigation into Donald Trumpâs 2016 presidential campaign based on unverified intelligence and ignored evidence that countered the collusion narrative, according to Mr. Durhamâs 300-page report released Monday.â
Thereâs a lot of crying on the Right. The broken down ex-football coach who became a Senator, Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) said the Durham report shows that: (emphasis by Wrongo)
â…a whole list of people lied…If people donât go to jail for this, the American people should just stand up and say, âListen, enoughâs enough, letâs donât have elections anymore.â
Yikes! The Atlanticâs Tom Nichols observed:
âA US Senator says people should rise up and do away with elections unless the State punishes law enforcement officers for doing their job. A word I rarely use, but: This is pretty fascist stuff.â
So this is the Trump legacy in America. A Special Counsel appointed by Trumpâs AG to disprove there was a connection between the Trump campaign and Russia doesnât disprove it. He didnât recommend filing any new charges against people he investigated in his final report. Despite criticizing the FBI, he didnât recommend revamping the investigative procedures they use in politically sensitive investigations.
OTOH, the FBIâs investigation that Durham was supposed to debunk, wasnât about investigating Trump but was about Russiaâs support for his campaign. It was meant to find a conspiracy against Trump that didnât exist. Thatâs the stock in trade of Trumpism. See the whole Republican investigation witch hunt list: Whitewater, Benghazi, Voter Fraud Commission, Hunter Bidenâs Laptop.
Itâs all political theater. The GOP outrage act has been running for longer than most Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals.
Unlike the Mueller investigation, Durham mostly came up empty on the cases he brought to trial. The absolute best he can say is “Maybe the FBI shouldn’t have looked into Trump-Russia because the feds played it fast and loose“.
But since he doesnât mention any individuals who should be recommended for charges or suggest any operational improvements, it’s clear it was Durham who was wasting everyone’s time, not the FBI. In the reportâs executive summary, Durham says:
â…this report does not recommend any wholesale changes in the guidelines and policies that the Department and the FBI now have in place to ensure proper conduct and accountability in how counterintelligence activities are carried out,â
Durham concludes with the premise that he started with: That the FBI should not have opened the Trump-Russia investigation:
âWe conclude that the Department and the FBI failed to uphold their important mission of strict fidelity to the law in connection with certain events and activities described in this report…â
Durhamâs job was to investigate the investigators (and also the investigation): To lend credibility to the idea that the Trump-Russia investigation was the product of a political witch hunt against Trump. He winds up accusing the FBI of âconfirmation biasâ in its legitimate probe of Trump/Russia links.
Thatâs rich since Durham never made any secret of his own bias in trying to discredit the Bureau with conjecture and few facts. Heâs failed.
Durham found nothing but tries hard to make it sound like he did.
America is in a literal death spiral. The more mass shootings take place, the more innocent people die. And then more of Americaâs Republican politicians tell us that only more guns will solve the problem.
Republicans say that school shootings would be minimized if we would just hire a security guard to cover the door of every school. But with school budgets under pressure, where will the money come from to hire them? And how would the GOPâs plan for out-gunning the next mass shooter turn out?
We need to see mass shooting as a form of domestic terrorism. Weâve moved from having ten Constitutional Amendments that most of us cared deeply about to a place where the Right only really cares about the Second Amendment. Maybe we shouldnât be all that surprised that there are so many Americans who care more about guns than they care about people.
For a certain group, that seems to be what America is all about. If they cared about freedom, nothing would be more of a priority than defending every personâs right to go about their daily lives without the threat of violence. If we really cared about the sanctity of human life, we would prioritize people over guns. On to cartoons.
The unholy trio who prioritize guns over people:
The GOPâs platform is turning into a cliff:
When your anti-human policy list is this long, you must be a Republican:
It isnât a game:
Clarence is tracking mud into the Court:
Rep. Jim Jordan plans to investigate AG Bragg in NYC:
The Daily Escape:
Walker River, NV â February 2023 photo by TheOsideBish
According to the GOP, your organization has to toe the line or else you could be banished or investigated. CNBC is reporting that House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) are set to banish the US Chamber of Commerce from Capitol Hill for endorsing Democrats in some 2020 and 2022 House races.
CNBC quotes Mark Bednar, a spokesman for McCarthy:
“The priorities of the US Chamber of Commerce have not aligned with the priorities of House Republicans or the interests of their own members, and they should not expect a meeting with Speaker McCarthy as long as that’s the case…”
CNBC says Scalise also won’t meet with them either, quoting his spokeswoman Lauren Fine: (brackets by Wrongo)
“[the Chamber headquarters in] Washington has radically shifted away from the pro-business philosophy of most local Chambers across America….unless the Chamber gets back to their traditional pro-business roots, they should not expect to have any engagement with Majority Leader Scalise’s office.”
This all started in 2020, when the Chamber endorsed 23 House Democrats in swing districts, a sharp break from the past practice of endorsing a nearly exclusive slate of Republicans, with one or two Democrats thrown on the list for a patina of bipartisan perception. And Republicans failed to regain the majority. The Chamber then reportedly endorsed 23 House Republican candidates and just four Democrats during the 2022 election. But that hasnât made them âpureâ enough for Kevin McCarthy, despite the Chamber providing $3 million to Mehmet Oz in his losing effort for a Senate seat in Pennsylvania.
Wrongo met often with the US Chamber of Commerce during his days at the big bank. They are far from being anti-GOP. On Monday, Tim Doyle, a spokesman for the Chamber, told CNBC:
âThe Chamberâs priorities include lower taxes, reduced spending, fighting over regulation and numerous other issues, and we are aligned with House Republicans on many of the issues that are important to American businesses of all sizes,â
That sounds to Wrongo like itâs aligned with the Republicans. Doyle did go on to say:
âWe do disagree with those who believe the Chamber should become a single-party partisan organization….â
The Intercept is reporting that the new House Republican majority wants to investigate the Chamber over its commitment to ESG regulations. ESG stands for environmental, social, and governance, key criteria that can impact company market valuations and its behavior. But ESG has become a red line for Conservatives, who argue that companies that follow it are failing to live up to their fiduciary duty to maximize profits for investors.
Apparently, Republicans in the House are also questioning the Chamberâs own conduct, including reportedly allowing former Chamber CEO Thomas Donohue to use the organizationâs corporate jet for personal trips.
Look, the Chamber can be pretty terrible. Theyâre planning to sue the Securities and Exchange Commission if it goes forward with a climate change-related disclosure rule. But forcing them to only give money to Republicans is a new low, even for these nihilists.
Separately, Floridaâs Governor DeSantis is set to take over Disney’s special Reedy Creek tax district in order to force the company to cough up $1 billion. Wrongo reported on DeSantisâ fight with Disney in April 2022 here and here. Targeting Disney became a thing after the company spoke out about Floridaâs âdonât say gayâ law.
Back in April, DeSantis pushed lawmakers to dissolve the Reedy Creek Improvement District, which for 55 years effectively gave Disney control of the land around its Florida properties. Republicans complied, and the district was scheduled to sunset on June 1, 2023.
But on Monday, Republican lawmakers unveiled a bill to turn over control of Disneyâs special taxing district to a five-member board to be chosen by DeSantis. The proposal also comes with a rebrand; Reedy Creek would become the âCentral Florida Tourism Oversight District.â
This gives DeSantis a new form of control over Disney, the stateâs largest employer. And the opportunity for extorting collecting an additional $1 billion from a company that is on the DeSantis enemies list (which will ultimately be paid by the parkâs patrons) is totally on brand for DeSantis.
Anyone else getting really tired of Republicans telling us we canât say certain words, we canât read certain books, we canât teach certain things, we canât talk about certain history, or we canât donate to a few Democrats?
Whatâs Conservative about any of that?
The Daily Escape:
Zion NP in snow – January 2023 photo by Rich Vintage Photography
What is it about the Chinese balloon story? Why did the media and politicians go totally nuts about it? Hereâs what  Damon Linker thinks:
âDegraded American public lifeâ. This is another example of Wrongoâs column yesterday about how weâre all living in our virtual vertical communities. The Republican political vertical immediately locked in, like a cat watching a laser pointer, to this mostly low-risk intrusion into US airspace by China. From Forbes:
âTalking heads on cable TV are up in arms about the Chinese spy balloon that was floating across the continental US, before it was shot down Saturday afternoon. Conservative commentators have insisted President Joe Biden shouldâve ordered the balloon be shot down earlier and that a foreign balloon flying over US territory never wouldâve happened under President Donald Trump. But it did happen under Trump…â
It happened under Trump at least three times.
The Pentagon says it was definitely a surveillance balloon and that China had the ability to maneuver it using external propellers. OK, if youâve ever sailed a boat even in a moderate breeze, paddled a canoe across a windy lake, or bicycled on a windy day, you know maneuvering in high winds is very difficult. So how will a balloon generate enough power to overcome the prevailing winds at 60,000â? And the balloon doesnât have an aerodynamic shape. So bottom line, you arenât controlling the path of a balloon in any sizable wind.
A balloon actually sucks for spying. A quick look at earth.nullschool.net shows that the current winds at the specified latitude are running between 50-100 mph. No balloon with a propeller can plow through that. Itâs likely that the propellers arenât for propulsion, but for changing the direction that the antenna is pointing, so that it can phone home.
Itâs possible that as the Pentagon says, the deceased balloon was gathering data on our defenses, but all nations do that all the time. So whereâs our politiciansâ and the mediaâs common sense? Their hysterical reaction is totally on brand, but as always, very depressing.
We have to hope the politicians and generals who control Americaâs nukes have better minds than our GOP politicians.
Letâs deal with the question about why Biden didnât shoot it down over land. One issue was that the debris field when the balloon remains hit the ocean was seven miles long. One advantage of knocking it down where they did is that the ocean is only about 50â deep off the Carolina coast. Imagine a seven-mile debris field spread across any American state: It would be a fantastic opportunity for souvenir hunting.
Back in 1945, before WWII ended, Japan sent thousands of bomb-carrying paper balloons via the jet stream towards North America. Only a small percentage of the balloons reached land. But six people, five of them children, were killed by one balloon that landed in Oregon.
Thereâs a (possibly apocryphal) story about a US Navy ship firing on a suspected Japanese balloon until they finally realized that they were shooting at Venus.
Bottom line, Biden and the US military showed professionalism and caution in tracking and attacking the balloon. The US military was able to jam the balloonâs instruments as it crossed America, while collecting information about Chinese intelligence gathering capabilities. They shot it down when and where the risk to civilian casualties and property damage was deminimis. From Robert Hubbell:
âBut the âspy balloonâ did allow the Chinese military to glean one significant piece of intelligence about Americaâthat Republicans are clowns who cannot be trusted to run the US military again.â
One Republican said Biden should be impeached. Several wanted to “SHOOT IT DOWN NOW”. Consider this tweet from Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC):
Does anyone believe the balloon threatened the lives of millions of American families? Or that Biden and Harris should resign? Wilson forgets to say that resignation would make House Speaker Republican Kevin McCarthy president. Itâs just awesome how serious the Republican Party has become.
All of the hostile one-upmanship aimed at China over the balloon served to show that there is no downside to an American politician taking a hawkish stance towards China.
China remains a crucial trading and economic partner and competitor, but both Republicans and many Democrats are happy to take a battering ram to our relationship with China. And the media decided to work the Chinese balloon story rather than spend time talking about Fridayâs blockbuster jobs report, or how unemployment reached a 50-year low.
That news wasnât important or exciting enough when there was a Chinese balloon on the horizon.
Americaâs relationship with China has always been fraught. If youâre as old as Wrongo, you remember 1971âs Ping-Pong diplomacy, one of the first official contacts between the countries since before the Cold War.
You may ask, whatâs happened since then? Well, the balls have gotten bigger.
On the fifteenth ballot of the new year, the House finally selected Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), as its new Speaker. What ended the impasse? In addition to the list of âconcessionsâ that we know about, what other promises did McCarthy make to Freedom Caucus?
When selecting a new Speaker, the House operates more like a parliamentary system than America is used to or expects. When the Party in power has a slim majority, and if there is contention within that Party, coalitions must be built, promises are made, and concessions are extracted.
It seems that McCarthy relinquished all the power and authority of the office in order to win the title of Speaker. But a weak Speaker leading a fractured caucus is actually dangerous. The Republican House can frustrate Bidenâs legislative agenda. It can conduct endless oversight hearings and investigations. It can restrict government spending.
When you look at the demands of the 20 anti-McCarthy holdouts and consider what he conceded to them, the next two years will be fractious. Over the past four days, they made demands in four areas. First, they object to funding Ukraine. They also object to the size of the omnibus spending bill that passed at the end of the last Congress. Third, they donât want the US debt ceiling extended. Lastly, they want to hold investigations. Many investigations.
Since the bill funding Ukraine and the omnibus spending bill passed with bi-partisan support in both Houses, any action they try to take on those two are likely to fail. But they have the right to investigate anything and everything, so we need to be prepared for that.
The debt ceiling is a problem. There will be bi-partisan support in both Houses for increasing it, but McCarthy will control whether a clean debt ceiling increase ever gets to the House floor for a vote. There will be a bi-partisan group of House members to support that bill, but if McCarthy goes to Democrats for the needed votes to pass a debt ceiling increase, the anti-McCarthy faction will attempt to remove him from the Speaker position.
Itâs very possible that McCarthy will be successfully deposed if Democrats arenât inclined to save him. It was this kind of behavior that convinced John Boehner to retire.
McCarthy almost certainly made concessions about Ukraine and the debt ceiling and government spending in order to win the job. He will either break these promises, or heâll lead the country to financial ruin. Or the moderates in the House GOP will try to kick him out. The Republicans have a majority but itâs not a functional one. On to cartoons.
McCarthyâs headaches are just beginning:
Heâs a weak GOP Speaker, not a Pope:
Itâs way past time for the GOP to hit the target:
Last week was deja vu of Jan 6 two years ago:
The Daily Escape:
Snow covered kayaks, Lake Sunapee, NH – January 2023 photo by Juergen Roth Photography
Yesterday was two years since the January 6 attack on the US Capitol. And now, some of the same people are holding the House of Representatives hostage like they tried to do in 2021. From the WaPo:
âAll but two of the 20 Republican House members who voted against Kevin McCarthy for speaker in Tuesdayâs third ballot round are election deniers who embraced former president Donald Trumpâs false claims that the 2020 election was rigged…..14 are returning members who voted against certification of the electoral college count on Jan. 6, 2021.â
Then thereâs North Carolina GOP Rep. Ralph Norman who urged Trump to declare âMarshall Law,â (sic) just days before the 2021 inauguration. Look at what Norman is saying now:
This should be your primary concern in the power play between the far right Republicans (McCarthy) and the farther right bat-shit Republicans, including Rep. Norman. As Paul Krugman says in the NYT:
â…even with a speaker in place, how likely is it that the people weâve been watching the past few days will agree to raise the debt ceiling, even if failing to do so creates a huge financial crisis?â
Friday saw the first major breakthrough in the deadlocked voting when on the 12th ballot, a group of previous Republican holdouts flipped their votes to support McCarthy, but it wasn’t enough for him to clinch the gavel. Then on the 13th ballot, McCarthy picked up another vote bringing his total to 214.
âHouse GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy is on the brink of clinching the speakership after a group of 15 previous Republican holdouts flipped their votes to support the California lawmaker on Friday, marking the first major breakthrough in negotiations this week.â
McCarthy fell only three votes short of the threshold needed since there were lawmaker absences. Thatâs 14 new votes for McCarthy, with a maximum of 218 needed to gain the speakership. This is the current state of play, with more ballots to come late on Friday night.
You should note that McCarthy got Ralph Normanâs vote on Friday, after Norman said on Thursday that he would only switch if McCarthy was willing to shut the government down. So, is that whatâs in store for us? As JVL says:
“The sad truth is that McCarthy may be about to become the weakest speaker in history. This fight over the speakerâs gavel is exactly what every important vote in the House over the next two years is going to look like: The speakerâs fight is the debt ceiling fight is the budget fight is the Ukraine aid fight.”
Think about the Republican Speakers of the House since Newt Gingrich 30 years ago. Gingrichâs Contract for America has morphed into MAGA fratricide in a decade. It’s been a bit like watching the British royals fracture because Megan and Harry wouldnât toe the line inside the family.
Recall that the Republicans do not have a lot of experience with House speakers. Before Newt, Joe Martin of MA served two terms (1947-1949; 1953-1955). And since Newt there have been two:
Boehner was a mediocrity, but he was a professional legislator. Ryan was speaker during much of Trumpâs first term. Heâs noted for rewriting the tax code, which helped contribute to our ballooning deficits. McCarthy is inferior to either of these previous GOP speakers, who in their own ways were clear failures.
The Republican Party harbors some very dangerous extremists in their ranks, and McCarthyâs pandering to them is a dangerous game, not only for Democrats, but for all Americans. They donât want policy; they only want airtime.
From Michelle Goldberg:
â…The movement these characters are part of…isnât simply ideological. Itâs also a set of defiant, paranoid, anti-system attitudes, and a version of politics that prioritizes showboating over legislating. Thatâs why McCarthy has found himself unable to negotiate with the holdouts.â
It’s looking like McCarthy will manage to eke out the speakership. More from Goldberg:
âIt is not possible, however, that heâll emerge, in any real sense, as a leader. His best-case scenario is that heâd be a fragile figurehead, a hostage…constantly in danger of defenestration.â
We all should know that these self-aggrandizing jokers won’t hesitate for a moment to crash the economy and/or shut down the government just so they can crow about it on Steve Bannon’s podcast.
If they will do this to their own Party, imagine what they will do to the rest of us.
Itâs time to take our first break of the New Year from the âAll Kevin, all the timeâ barrage and get to our Saturday Soother. Itâs cold and rainy in Connecticut, and so itâs indoor activities this weekend, like maybe taking down some ornaments. Or maybe napping.
To help you get calmer about what a GOP majority in the House might do, grab a chair by a big window and watch and listen to âCapricho Arabeâ written in 1888 by Spanish guitarist Francisco TĂĄrrega. He was staying in Valencia, where Muslim, Castilian, and Christian cultures mixed, and you can hear all of those influences in this piece.
Here, British guitarist Alexandra Whittingham plays it in 2017 at the Church of St Pierre in Martignac, France:
The Daily Escape:
Juniper and snow, near Colorado Springs, CO – December 2022 photo by John Susan Hoffman
(Good luck to Sen. Ralph Warnock in today’s Georgia run-off election for a full term in the US Senate)
In the past two weeks, Trump has pledged solidarity with the January 6 rioters, dined with Holocaust-denying fans of Adolf Hitler, and called for the termination of the Constitution. On his failing Truth Social clone of Twitter, he yelled:
 â…the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitutionâ in order to âdeclare the RIGHTFUL WINNERâ from 2020 or âhave a NEW ELECTIONâ
As Mike Penceâs former chief of staff, Marc Short said on Meet the Press, Trumpâs attack on the Constitution was consistent with:
â…what he asked the vice president to do two years ago, when rioters were attacking the Capitol and he asked the vice president to overturn the election results.â
Letâs underline this: The likely Republican nominee for president in 2024 called for the âtermination of the Constitutionâ, not to “suspend” the Constitution as several pundits have mistakenly said. And very few in the GOP bothered to call him out on it. As Dennis Aftergut said in the Bulwark:
âTrump writing that we should cancel the Constitution ranks right up alongside John Tylerâs support of the Confederacy as among the most shameful acts by a former president in our nationâs history.â
Thereâs a method to Trumpâs madness. Letâs go back to what he said to Lesley Stahl prior to their â60 Minutesâ interview in 2018. From CNBC: (emphasis by Wrongo)
âStahl said she and her boss met with Trump at his office in Trump Tower in Manhattan…in advance of a recorded sit-down interview for â60 Minutesâ. At one point, he started to attack the press, Stahl said. There were no cameras in there. I said, âYou know, this is getting tired. Why are you doing it over and over?….And he said: âYou know why I do it? I do it to discredit you all and demean you all so that when you write negative stories about me no one will believe you.ââ
And to a degree that worked. Trump has now moved on to discrediting the Constitution and the judiciary. While some Trump-appointed judges have done a few helpful things for him, they canât deliver what Trump needs most: Immunity from prosecution.
He needs to be reelected in order to do that for himself.
Since 2021, the DOJ, the Georgia courts, and the New York courts have been grinding away at the January 6 insurrection, the theft and retention of national security documents at Mar-a-Lago, and the NY tax case. All have become more worrying for Trump.
Heâs lost more than once in the US Supreme Court, in the 11th Circuit, and in courts in Georgia and NY. Regardless of whether itâs rulings on motions related to executive privilege, challenges to warrants and subpoenas, or actual verdicts against the Oathkeepers for seditious conspiracy, the legal wagons appear to be circling in more closely around him.
Trump knows that. So heâs returning to what has worked for him before: Demonizing his enemies.
Instead of the media, this time heâs attempting to demonize our Constitutional order. If heâs successful at doing that before we see any indictments, verdicts, and sentences against his corporation, or himself, he thinks he can survive politically with his base. By going for the Constitution, heâs trying to discredit the judicial system so that the GOP wonât turn against him if/when heâs held accountable.
Targeting the Constitution has downsides â the authority of any judge Trump appears before flows from that Constitution, and unlike the media, judges are backed by the DOJ and the FBI.
Imagine if youâre the DOJâs Special Counsel Jack Smith, and the biggest target of your career just openly called for the termination of the Constitution. Youâre probably thinking that you have a decent shot at convicting Trump of trying to overthrow the Constitution back on Jan. 6.
Some GOP lawmakers who were asked on the Sunday political shows about Trumpâs rant said they disagreed. However, most wouldnât say theyâd oppose Trump if he becomes the GOPâs 2024 presidential nominee. Theyâre saying as little as possible because they believe a large percentage of the Republican base agrees with him.
Trumpâs best (his only?) defense is retaking the presidency. That is why we shouldnât minimize his call to âterminate the Constitutionâ.
We need to keep pressure on Republican politicians to either disown Trump or embrace him. We should be asking Republican Senators and House Representatives:
âTrump took an oath to support and defend the Constitution, then he said we should abolish it. You also took that same oath. Does your oath require you to defend it against him?”
Mention the oath. In every question.
The Daily Escape:
Early snow, Rockford, MI – November 2022 photo by Jeane Blazic
Weâre going to cover two topics on this Monday. First, Bernard L. Fraga, associate professor of Political Science at Emory University, tweeted the demographics of the Georgia midterm election:
Black turnout was down by 4.5% vs 2018. Hispanic turnout was down 2.5%. Had the Black turnout percentage been at 2018 levels, Warnock probably would have won outright. The difference may have been caused in part by the new voting restrictions in Georgia. Wrongo talked last week about helping Georgians get photo IDs. People better wake up and help get more Black Georgians to the polls on December 6.
But todayâs main wake up call is about the Rightwing group, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). Wrongo has written about ALEC before, here, here, here and here. ALEC prepares model legislation that conforms to hard Right ideology. They then meet with state legislators all across America to push for adoption of ALEC-written laws at the state level. These are laws that would probably never become law at the federal level.
In the past, some Republican-led states have passed hundreds of pieces of ALECâs model legislation almost word for word, including on immigration, voter suppression, the environment, guns, and energy policy.
Now, ALEC is pushing states to adopt a new law shielding US businesses from âpolitical boycottsâ. If enacted, the proposed legislation, would prevent boycotts by investors, banks, and companies of any other US business. The guts of the Act is that a governmental entity may not enter into a contract with a company for goods or services unless the contract contains a written verification from the company that it:
This comes about amid rising consumer pressure on firms over who they support politically, or who they choose to do business with. Think about the decision by major retail stores to stop selling My Pillow products, or the decision by Adidas to cut Kanye Westâs shoe line loose after he made anti-Semitic statements.
From The Guardian:
âThe new model legislation requires every âgovernmental entityâ, which covers a wide array of bodies from state government to local police departments and public universities, to include a clause in contracts requiring businesses to pledge they âwill not engage in economic boycottsâ
For most of us, âfree marketsâ means that businesses are free to make buying and selling decisions based on the information thatâs relevant to their economic interests. But to enforce this Act, a state Attorney General can decide that the decision to, for example, divest the stock of an oil and gas company, is an ideological act.
What if itâs just not that good of a stock?
ALECâs doublethink maintains that for free markets to remain free, it is sometimes necessary to restrict the freedom to make certain decisions based on criteria that an Attorney General can define as âideological.â
Even if they are based on a sound economic rationale.
We knew all along that for the Right Wing, free doesnât really mean free. These people are authoritarians who want to harness the powers of government for their own ends. And theyâll do whateverâs convenient to achieve those ends.
The Republican establishment is very much alive. ALEC is the right wingâs corporate gangsters in suits. In this case, itâs billionaires aligned with corrupt Republican politicians. They have purchased state and federal legislators to do their bidding. And itâs been going on for a very long time.
Letâs see what the Supreme Court does when one of these cases gets in front of them.
Time to wake up America! The hard right in America is unbelievably well-funded. ALEC is just one of the many ways that they are undermining what true âfreedomâ means.
To help you wake up, listen to Little Feat, that is, the Lowell George-led version of Little Feat, (not the several incarnations of newer bands using that name that have been working since Lowell died in 1979).
Here Lowell George does âDixie Chickenâ, recorded at Londonâs Rainbow Theater on August 3 & 4, 1977. Itâs from the live album, âWaiting for Columbusâ. If you donât know this album, you should buy the 2002 Deluxe Edition CD. You will never be sorry. Donât buy the version on Amazon, it only has 20 songs; the actual deluxe CD has 27.
WFC was recorded in London and in Washington DC. There were 4 dates in London and 3 in DC. Here it is:
Thatâs Bill Payne on the piano solo. Little Feat combines jazz, honkytonk, swing, ragtime and Dixie into one great song. Enjoy!