The best explanation for the hidebound, milquetoast response of senior Democrats to creeping fascism – in fact, it’s starting to look like sprinting fascism – is they’re rich and profit from the way things are currently run, so it’s an I’m Alright Jack situation all the way down.
But it’s also the fact they are addicted to fairness and playing by the rules, so much so they are willing to sacrifice justice and their own voters. the Peanuts cartoon remains illustrative: the rules of the game are one person holds the football while the other person kicks it. You take turns. This seems like a fair rule and you want to play by the rules. But every time it is your turn to kick, the person holding the football pulls it away. What to do? First you protest and try to reason with them. But they continue to pull the football away. Do you continue to try to kick the football, or after about the third time, do you get up, walk back, and wallop the person who has repeatedly pulled the ball away, then take the football yourself?
A simple, straightforward solution to a simple, straightforward problem, one every child out in the schoolyard understands: you play by the rules. If you consistently break the rules, you get a beatdown. Simple. Yet it seems beyond the grasp of the Democrats who hold the highest offices in the country.
Of course, the New York Times would not report it as “Dems, often thwarted by GOP practices, reclaim football” but would report it as “Horrors, the Dems have forcibly taken the football! Let’s interview the people who kept pulling the ball away to see how they feel.” But by this point that kind of coverage is baked in, and good messaging by Dems could combat it. Hell, the media might even start to respect them, who knows?
I'd say abolishing the filibuster is some pretty hardball tactics, and fool that I am, I really think we're close. Mandela Barnes and John Fetterman in the Senate, and we might get it done (Yeah, I know, Dianne Feinstein or some other hidebound Dem will suddenly discover their love for the filibuster and it's Zeno's Paradox, perpetually one vote away, but let me have my dreams.)
Can’t discount venality and greed among the DNC (run in part to bring in money for preferred consultants instead of supporting politicians worth electing) and its preferred politicians.
Excellent stuff, Roy. I’m grateful for your analysis and clarity on things like this, because sometimes when I read comments at blogs I like and trust, from people who seem to be intelligent, informed, and staunchly Democrat, some of the comments make me feel like I’m losing my mind. There’s always a handful of them (sometimes more, sometimes less, depending where you go) whose main concern is cheering for the clueless Dem leadership and viciously attacking anyone who suggests maybe, just maybe they should adapt to the situation at hand, not pine for the days when Tip’n’Ronnie had drinks together.
It’s insane. But when your policies for the last 40 years haven’t really worked and your world is crumbling, it’s safest to pull out the lovingly well-worn list of grievances dating back to 1972 and start punching hippies, The Squad, “The Kids Today,” etc. Surely that will get those reasonable suburban republicans to reclaim their party, so everyone in DC can all go out for drinks together as they once did!
I think I'll leave at believing that the answer to what to do about the GOP shit pulling, so to speak, is essentially by submission to them and believing they're redeemable notwithstanding a couple of decades of proof to the contrary, well, as the Rude pUndit would put it, fuck that shit. It's a well documented failure so sure, let's double down on the complicity with and enabling of the GOP that brought us to this point with worse to come -- only how much worse is debatable.
As for poor Chait: Well, as a rule I equate being a pundit with being a bullshit artiste which is to say dishonest, a liar, in the name of getting that fame and fortune. The exceptions as far as I'm concerned are few and Chait isn't one of them.
Points to Roy for referencing the DLC; they're right up there behind the GOP for fucking over the nation. (Reminder: Before he was a beloved POTUS, Slick Willy Clinton led the DLC.)
Wait, aren't you the one who's always saying the Dems need to run a "50 State Strategy"? Are they supposed to win in all 50 states, or are you willing to accept a couple of losses?
Blame the Dems when they don't run a candidate, blame the Dems when they do run a candidate but the candidate loses, blame the Dems when they do run a candidate and the candidate does win, but you don't like the candidate. I think that covers all the bases, doesn't it?
I'm so old I remember when progressives were telling Hilary Clinton she had to nominate Perez for VP or they wouldn't vote for her. The DLC shut down in 2011 though.
I don't know if they even have it in them, but people opposed to the GOP have to get a lot meaner and a lot more cynical about this stuff if they want to be effective.
So why are Democrats? A good stand-alone question. I'll be one to my dying day, but I totally despair of the changes which need to happen in this benighted country arising in its current form.
I'm basically ignoring the hearings. They'll convince no one, change no minds, have no effect, make nothing better. It's a fundraising stunt at this point, from what I can tell.
That said, of course Chait think republicans will listen to democrats. He always paid a great deal of attention to advice from the GOP.
New poll out shows something like 15% of Republicans saying they'd vote for Biden over Trump if the two were matched up again in 2024. That makes Trump unelectable, I think. If the hearings have contributed to that, then good for them.
But anyway, BLM protesters don't take to the streets because they think racists will smack themselves on the forehead and say "Gosh, I was wrong all along!", they speak out because the truth must be told, no matter who wants to hear it. More and more, I'm appreciative of people who still go through the motions like truth and fact still matter - who knows, maybe they do?
Fair. I've been reporting ToS violations to twitter all night, and my inbox is buried under an avalanche of "Yeah, so, it turns out we're cool with telling people to kill themselves because they're queer, or hoping all mentally ill children get abused, or suggesting monkeypox is AIDS, or asserting that immigrants should all be shot."
It makes me a little weary of trying to hold people accountable.
I'm agog at the blinkardness and unwillingness to change of the Democratic Party (putatively progressive innit) — but if you think about it: this kind of nostalgia for the bipartisan fuzzy feelings and obsessing about decorum and partnership in the Democratic establishment is just as white supremacist & regressive in its own way. They long for a status quo that favors white monied comfort & they are confused when the other side, just as white & monied, will not reach back to them. This status quo was made possible by maintaining structures that cause inequality & injustice — and have the added bonus of casting the Dems as the heroes who swoop in with a means-tested bandaid to cover over all the injuries our systems creates.
And the means-testing is entirely due to the influence of the GOP, ever willing to reinforce the class warfare of nudging the (ever smaller) middle class and pointing out all the "free stuff" the poors get.
With that $300 child tax credit, I seriously thought the Dems had hold of a real third-rail program, one that could never be repealed once enacted, because EVERYBODY got it. I didn't figure on Joe Manchin. What a fool I am.
Wait, does Roy's like mean he's pleased by your history of pointed response and the thrust thereof, or just that he's happy you said nothing?
Or would your unsaid post be something along the lines of "Well if this vote means I don't get anymore invites to Black Lung Joe's yacht, then maybe I need to reconsider..."? 'Cause I'm totally on board that sentiment if you know what I mean...
"Look, we're OK with a little insurrection and the occasional hanging of elected officials, but reading a letter from Coretta Scott King that impugns the motives and conduct of our colleague from Alabama is going TOO FAR."
See, now you're just trolling me for a limerick based on "impugn"...which, I gotta say, is intriguing, but it's barely sunrise here and the coffee has not kicked in.
Democrats - Democratic politicians - are afraid that if they emulate the fierceness of Republicans in trying to counter Republicans, they will precipitate the collapse of the house of cards governmental system we have under the Constitution. They reveal this in their talk about bipartisanship (which isn’t in the Constitution), their reluctance to denounce the Senate and the Electoral College (which are), their search for ways to talk about the Fascist Party which calling it what it is. I cringe when I hear them and the media refer to Trump and his supporters in and out of government as “crazy” or “deluded.” No, he and they are lyars and criminals. Their voters are criminals by proxy. Why of all the January 6th Committee members is it only Liz Cheney who explicitly calls Trump criminal? Maybe she knows her bridges are burned and there is no Republican Party to return to, so she can speak the truth. Meanwhile, does Merrick Garland care at all that he may become history’s scapegoat, the man who destroyed the rule of law (such as it is)? Hell, he doesn’t have to wait for the Committee, Mueller laid out the evidence for indicting an exPresident for the crimes he committed during the 2016 election. The fear that action will cause America to implode is guaranteeing that the fascists will succeed in blowing it up.
And you see no problems arising when the house of cards collapses? I can agree that the #1 priority of the Democratic Party and its elected representatives is to prepare for that collapse (because it is coming), and if they are not then they deserve whatever reeducation camp President DeSantis sends them to, but I'm not yet convinced nothing is being done because its not on TV or Twitter.
They’ve had over thirty years to start responding since, you know, the treat has been clear and growing for other thirty years so there should have been visible signs of action for quite awhile, assuming the DNC cared.
When I was attending a small Catholic high school, its library included a complete set of Allen Drury novels, set in the Advise and Consent metaverse. I read them all, and my memory is they got progressively more violent and whacko as they went on, ending with a Ted Kennedy stand-in winning the presidency, being led by the Russians into a war room and shown an overwhelming force ready to attack, and Teddy collapsing into a weeping puddle on the floor and immediately agreeing to an unconditional surrender. The novel ended with the Red Army marching down Pennsylvania Avenue while the heros raise a glass of scotch to the new Resistance. I guess that's where a love of principled bipartisanship leads you.
Though I would like to see from those decrying the feckless Democrats some examples of what Democratic politicians are supposed to be doing that isn't happening now. Bear in mind that about a third of eligible voters think politics is a tv reality show that has no effect on their lives. Will Democrats yelling harder change that?
Every once in a while, MSNBC will share a clip of a state legislator that went viral, calling the republicans out for their racism and hate-mongering in plain language that anyone can understand. These things go viral because there are lots of Democrats hungry for that sort of thing who aren't seeing it said at the national level.
What legislators do is legislate. To do that requires a majority in the House and 60 votes in the Senate, or a simple majority willing to vote to eliminate the filibuster. Stop me if you've heard this already.
And the point is? There’s been a dearth of substantive legislation.
Of course, that’s due is big part to Manchinema. But given the way things are, candidates should be laying out real proposals and commitments and risk losing Manchinema — let them bolt the GOP. You know, maybe an opposition party should fight, specially after a couple of decades of doing as little as possible.
Bernie's calling on the Dems to pass all sorts of popular legislation through the House, then make as much noise as possible when it fails in the Senate. I'm all for that, why not? But it doesn't change the fact that the legislation doesn't pass.
But I'm wondering: Suppose Warnock or Ossoff hadn't won, and the Dems had only 49 Senators. Would you still treat the claim that "We don't got the votes" as a lame excuse for inaction? Or would you be willing to concede that they really, truly don't have the votes?
If we're talking about old movies that have warped the brains of old liberals as much as West Wing warped the brains of younger libs, I'd like to suggest 12 Angry Men. The racists bully and shout, but Henry Fonda meets it all with calm reasonableness and a commitment to the facts and evidence, and prevails in the end. Just how it works in real life.
Good example. Yeah, we all know how most people just love to admit they were wrong due to poor judgement or one of their own character flaws. And they adore admitting they were duped and then fleeced by a conman. Certainly, they would never dig in their heels and defend their own wrong opinions/actions even more strenuously. Nah, that never happens.
Fonda's character is always performing for an audience. He knows he can't win over Lee J. Cobb or Ed Begley Sr., but he imagines the more reasonable jurors on the fence might look at him and at the screaming bigot and decide to align with Mr. Reasonable. Democratic politicians imagine the same thing, somewhere there's an audience of Reasonable People awarding them points for their good behavior, for every time they stand on principle to the disadvantage of their own party, every time they pick a Republican instead of a Democrat for the position of Special Prosecutor or Secretary of Defense. Surely, there must be someone, somewhere, who's keeping score like that, right?
I look to George Lakoff's 'Don't Think Of An Elephant' and a quote (allegedly) by Vladimir Mayakovsky: 'The left must learn to use the tools of the right'... but those you cite won't shift their expressed position because, as said elsewhere, the milquetoast line reflects their economic comfort and the security baked into their niche (sic) readership where 'fairness' is the message we are all supposed to regurgitate as we sink into the mire.
I'd be thrilled if the Democrats could learn the tools of the left, actually. This country has a long and proud history of social movements that have changed us for the better, seems like we might be able to learn something from that?
Alternatively--hear me out--the idea of providing Republicans with an offramp could serve a useful purpose, in spite of the old Advise and Consent rhetoric (but sustained by it), a little more Yes, Minister: pushing the breakup of the GOP into Trumpy and non-Trumpy factions that can't work together.
The non-Trumpies have been a joke for the last 5-6 years, because there are obviously so few of them, and they're almost all keyboard commandos like Kristol and French. This is because a big plurality of Republican office holders have been allowed to stay ambiguous on the Trump subject. The proper goal of Druryism should be to force them to choose between civilization and savagery and break them up.
I think it's entirely within our reach to make Trump toxic enough to just enough Republicans that he can't win the general election in 2024. Making him toxic enough to just enough Republicans that he can't win the Republican primaries is a heavier lift, but the main thing is ensuring he can't be President again.
I'd really like Democrats to be forcing GOP congressional candidates to talk about it this fall. Don't let them pussyfoot, don't let them say "I didn't like the tweets" or "some of his policies were good", make them say where they stand on subverting the constitutional election promise AND all the GOP reps who voted not to certify. After the hearings are over.
One thing at a time, this Trumpian innovation of denying you lost an election and then attempting to overturn the results needs to die with Trump. So far, I haven't seen any Republicans take it up, but that's just losses in the primaries, we'll see if anyone tries it in the general election.
Should read "One FASCIST at a time" which, when I read it, suddenly reminds me of the one stupid thing about the Mercury* dime – that fasces. It is perpetually amusing to me that the fascist symbol** illustrates a concept that is literally incapable of function. You ever try swinging an ax that had a big bunch of sticks tied around the handle so you couldn't actually hold it? Well, neither did I, but that's only because even as a little kid I could see it was unworkable...
*God on the coins? WTF?
**and I know, the use of it on that dime was premature to the fascist ascendancy, but it still makes me laugh/shiver to see it on our greatestnationinhistory coinage.
That's because we haven't done the work yet. They obviously hate each other, Charles Koch and the construction contractor who votes for Louie Gohmert. You need to force Koch to say in public what he thinks about abortion, you need to force the Gohmert voter to say what he thinks about billionaire tax cheats. Republicans and Russians are willing to do the work of dividing Democrats and we passively let them do it, or even participate, encouraging the belief that the difference between the Sanders economic plan and the Biden economic plan (Bernard Sanders, Budget Committee Chairman) is more significant and problematic than the difference between an obsessed libertarian and an obsessed theocrat.
Everybody wants to complain about how we should play dirty like the Republicans but nobody wants to talk about what it is they actually do. That's what they do, maintain unity in their own ranks and foment discord across the aisle.
Mitch McConnell pretends to care about abortion so he can get the deregulated shipping industry, or whatever it is he wants. And they all concern troll "moderate" Democrats to divide our party further, with a lot of success (nobody ever wants to talk about the relationship between Joe Manchin and Jim Justice, but if Manchin is a Republican tool, there's a reason for it).
I don't have to praise Liz Cheney in public, thank gods. but if Bennie Thompson finds it expedient to praise her I'm not going to second-guess him. He's creating a space in which Republicans are breaking up because some of them feel they have to say the Constitution comes first and others won't.
Everybody says why don't we push our program through through sheer forcefulness, like LBJ. having their balls in his pocket. Would they look at the record? The civil rights legislation of the 1960s wasn't LBJ frightening Stennis and Eastland into voting for it--he couldn't even persuade my beloved Robert Byrd. It was majority whip Hubert Humphrey passing out pork to Republican senators from Dirksen on down.
Republicans seem so fucked up nowadays that that wouldn't be possible. No doubt. But Biden's picnic, distasteful as it may be, does help to divide the Republicans in the first place between those who are afraid of Biden's cooties and those who aren't. A division that doesn't get mentioned enough is that between the officials in Washington and the voters in Armpit, TX.
I hope you understand I'm not talking about recruiting Republican votes for legislation, in general (can be OK if it happens, but I'm not expecting it). I'm talking about making voters unsure what Republicans stand for. The story of 2016 is in part how voters in Michigan/Wisconsin/Pennsylvania were persuaded that Democrats had nothing to offer them, and quite a few decided not to vote; Democrats' job now (informed by the personal stories of 1/6 volunteers explaining how Trump lied to them) is in part to persuade them that Republicans have nothing.. Just make them say they're against it, or suffer the consequences.
I like this, a lot of the comments here are of the "Democrats in Disarray" variety, but the divisions and hatreds within the Republican party are enormous. Let's remember that Democratic voters, no matter how much they may dislike their leadership, never attempted to hang their own Vice President, nor has a Democratic President ever campaigned against an incumbent Democratic Governor, as Trump did with Brian Kemp.
I see your schism as parallel tracks. The Trump faction is all about pandering to voters, the other faction is about serving special interests -- like the difference between making the widget and marketing the widget. The worst the GOP's done the past couple of years has come from SCOTUS even if no more than as enablers. And much of that preceded Trump.
To the extent Trump's popularity is on the wane, I don't expect it to have any significant electoral effects. Now, if there was a party dedicated to making clear to voters how everything bad with this country is due primarily to what Republicans have done and are doing and that said party would commit to corrective actions -- something like, I dunno, a Contract With America -- that would be something. But that's not going to happen and the time to do so probably has passed. (I refer of course to the top of the party; the base on the local level is something else entirely.)
"Everybody wants to complain about how we should play dirty like the Republicans but nobody wants to talk about what it is they actually do. That's what they do, maintain unity in their own ranks and foment discord across the aisle."
I partly agree and am partly confused. In any case, we also have the problem messaging-wise because the mainstream is so supportive of the GOP and so dismissive (for one thing) of the Democrats.
Anyway, tl;dr:
I'm unclear why you think the schism in the GOP matters and what support you have that it I other than a few factoids.
Also, I have, like, an allergy to excessive, unrealistic hope. In this case, I'm hopeful that the base keeps fighting but hope that the DNC will act appropriately, please, they've been failing for over thirty years (and please, I'm uninterested in the exceptions to the rule; the record's clear).
" have, like, an allergy to excessive, unrealistic hope"
Yeah, this, right here, is what I don't get.
OK, there are people who have too much faith in the Democrats, and that means they go out and vote for the Democrats instead of staying home and not voting at all, and that's bad because...
Or maybe it's that unrealistic hope for the Democrats that prevents people from engaging in more radical and effective action? If so, what's the more radical and effective action the Dems are keeping people from. Too much faith in the Dems is holding back the Green Party or the General Strike?
Or maybe you're thinking of those comfortable upper-middle-class liberals who worship Nancy Pelosi? Sorry, those folks were never going to a fucking thing beyond voting and donating (and thanks for the donations, BTW!). If you succeeded in disillusioning them about the Democrats (something which is, frankly, impossible) they'd just drop politics altogether and put the time into gardening and homemade kombucha.
And finally there are the young folk, engaging in effective action with no help from the Democrats, things like union organizing and mutual aid and our newly forming Underground Abortion Railroad. But these youngs are smart, and can already distinguish between a Dem worth supporting like AOC and the ones who are useless. Also smart enough to know even the useless ones are worth the half hour it takes to vote for them, given the alternative.
It just seems like an odd fixation, with all the other problems in the world, to concentrate on stamping out any signs of excessive hope.
My bad. By excessive I should be clear that I meant excessive *misdirected* hope as I have already made clear ad nauseum.
I get hope that one’s abuser may stop abusing but hope that the abuser would turn themselves in, get treatment, somehow proactively resolve their problem without some external pressure, no, that’s too much for me.
Hope from a documented source of enabling the problem for over thirty years is by definition not smart but rather adds to the problem. Hope resulting in trust and doing nothing more in no way contributes to a solution. Hoping that the DNC will act properly when facing an existential threat to the nation is how we got here.
Yes, "Hoping that the DNC will act properly" is wrong, I get that. Now tell me about all the harm it causes, the bad things people actually DO because they have misplaced hope in the DNC. Do they mistakenly vote for Democrats? No, wait, we need them to do that, actually, because the Republicans are worse.
I used to hear all this stuff from my former compatriots in the Green Party, but they at least had a program, stop voting for the Dems and vote for the Greens instead.
That plan is so crazy it just might work. Ha, no, it won't. Both the Quiet Part Quiet and the Quiet Part Out Loud wings of the party want the same things (I.e. blood sacrifice and tax cuts for the rich).
The only way to deal with the GOP is to utterly destroy it, and everyone in it, and salt the earth where it stood. Alas, we don't have a Democratic Party up to the task. R.I.P. America.
Don't mean to come across as all Democrat-apologist, but there's a reason that Donald Trump is no longer President, why Mitch McConnell is the Senate Minority Leader instead of the Senate Majority Leader, and why Kevin McCarthy is the House Minority Leader instead of Speaker. And it has to do with a party that ran in enough elections and won enough elections to make these things happen.
I'm also seeing, frankly, in the current doom-and-gloom, erasure: Black and Brown people, LGBTQ, many others. It's like what's happening and going to happen to them doesn't matter. They--we--are being erased (notice what's happening to Vice President Harris for example).
That's true. But, as Roy said, they still don't realize (or do, but won't admit it out loud) what an existential threat the GOP is, and one bad midterm election brings back McConnell and makes McCarthy (or someone else more acceptable to the real leader of the party) Speaker. Then one bad presidential election gives us either Trump again or someone like DeSantis. My optimism is not very high right now.
It's always puzzled me, but every Democratic candidate for office campaigns against his or her specific Republican opponent, but never against Republicans generally. And with Republicans it's not like that at all. Sure, they'll attack a Democratic candidate for being soft on crime or being a big-spending budget-buster, but it always fits into a larger claim that ALL Democrats are like that, so what do you expect, this guy's no exception, right? And the Republican attack is always more effective because of that.
And Joe Biden, god love him, is just not made for these times: >>Mr. Biden made no mention of any of those developments. At a time of mounting political division, the president threw a picnic for members of Congress and their families, inviting every Republican and Democrat in the House and Senate. He used it to renew his plea for a more personalized, civilized political discourse, reviving a tradition interrupted in recent years and seeking to recapture some of what the first lady, Jill Biden, called the “magic” of the White House grounds to bring people together across the aisle.<< https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/12/us/politics/biden-congressional-picnic.html
The best explanation for the hidebound, milquetoast response of senior Democrats to creeping fascism – in fact, it’s starting to look like sprinting fascism – is they’re rich and profit from the way things are currently run, so it’s an I’m Alright Jack situation all the way down.
But it’s also the fact they are addicted to fairness and playing by the rules, so much so they are willing to sacrifice justice and their own voters. the Peanuts cartoon remains illustrative: the rules of the game are one person holds the football while the other person kicks it. You take turns. This seems like a fair rule and you want to play by the rules. But every time it is your turn to kick, the person holding the football pulls it away. What to do? First you protest and try to reason with them. But they continue to pull the football away. Do you continue to try to kick the football, or after about the third time, do you get up, walk back, and wallop the person who has repeatedly pulled the ball away, then take the football yourself?
A simple, straightforward solution to a simple, straightforward problem, one every child out in the schoolyard understands: you play by the rules. If you consistently break the rules, you get a beatdown. Simple. Yet it seems beyond the grasp of the Democrats who hold the highest offices in the country.
Of course, the New York Times would not report it as “Dems, often thwarted by GOP practices, reclaim football” but would report it as “Horrors, the Dems have forcibly taken the football! Let’s interview the people who kept pulling the ball away to see how they feel.” But by this point that kind of coverage is baked in, and good messaging by Dems could combat it. Hell, the media might even start to respect them, who knows?
I'd say abolishing the filibuster is some pretty hardball tactics, and fool that I am, I really think we're close. Mandela Barnes and John Fetterman in the Senate, and we might get it done (Yeah, I know, Dianne Feinstein or some other hidebound Dem will suddenly discover their love for the filibuster and it's Zeno's Paradox, perpetually one vote away, but let me have my dreams.)
Can’t discount venality and greed among the DNC (run in part to bring in money for preferred consultants instead of supporting politicians worth electing) and its preferred politicians.
Excellent stuff, Roy. I’m grateful for your analysis and clarity on things like this, because sometimes when I read comments at blogs I like and trust, from people who seem to be intelligent, informed, and staunchly Democrat, some of the comments make me feel like I’m losing my mind. There’s always a handful of them (sometimes more, sometimes less, depending where you go) whose main concern is cheering for the clueless Dem leadership and viciously attacking anyone who suggests maybe, just maybe they should adapt to the situation at hand, not pine for the days when Tip’n’Ronnie had drinks together.
It’s insane. But when your policies for the last 40 years haven’t really worked and your world is crumbling, it’s safest to pull out the lovingly well-worn list of grievances dating back to 1972 and start punching hippies, The Squad, “The Kids Today,” etc. Surely that will get those reasonable suburban republicans to reclaim their party, so everyone in DC can all go out for drinks together as they once did!
I mean, this post is spot-on, and some of the defensive circle-the-wagons responses seem absolutely delusional: https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2022/07/bipartisantastic
"inviting Republicans over for a picnic is central to his strategy" lol
11-dimensional picnic chess! It’s absolutely perfect! Now shut up and clap harder!
"Wait, that's not potato salad..."
"Well, it did sit out on the WH lawn in the sun for a few hours, Senator, but by your votes you've proved you have the stomach for it..."
I think I'll leave at believing that the answer to what to do about the GOP shit pulling, so to speak, is essentially by submission to them and believing they're redeemable notwithstanding a couple of decades of proof to the contrary, well, as the Rude pUndit would put it, fuck that shit. It's a well documented failure so sure, let's double down on the complicity with and enabling of the GOP that brought us to this point with worse to come -- only how much worse is debatable.
As for poor Chait: Well, as a rule I equate being a pundit with being a bullshit artiste which is to say dishonest, a liar, in the name of getting that fame and fortune. The exceptions as far as I'm concerned are few and Chait isn't one of them.
Points to Roy for referencing the DLC; they're right up there behind the GOP for fucking over the nation. (Reminder: Before he was a beloved POTUS, Slick Willy Clinton led the DLC.)
Did I hear rumors of Tom Perez being considered for DLC chair? Centrist insider ball of charisma that he is? Just kill me now.
Vaguely recollect that.
Meanwhile, the man who thought he could beat Lindsey Graham is the chair, and a very low profile one at that.
No, that's the DNC, an organizations that actually exists.
My apologies for using the incorrect acronym.
And yet, even now there’s no substantive difference…
I overlooked that typo, of course it wasDNC. Who I was referring to was Harrison.
"who thought he could beat Lindsey Graham"
Good for him.
You lost me there. Harrison, too, lost.
Wait, aren't you the one who's always saying the Dems need to run a "50 State Strategy"? Are they supposed to win in all 50 states, or are you willing to accept a couple of losses?
Blame the Dems when they don't run a candidate, blame the Dems when they do run a candidate but the candidate loses, blame the Dems when they do run a candidate and the candidate does win, but you don't like the candidate. I think that covers all the bases, doesn't it?
Still confused.
I'm so old I remember when progressives were telling Hilary Clinton she had to nominate Perez for VP or they wouldn't vote for her. The DLC shut down in 2011 though.
I don’t remember any progressives liking Tom Perez, but that’s just me.
He had a "committed following on the left" and was particularly endorsed by Elizabeth Warren https://www.politico.com/story/2016/03/tom-perez-veep-cabinet-220704
When you bring that up, i vaguely remember him being the better of two (possibly more) choices—but I could be remembering that wrong.
By 2011 the DLC was fully mooted.
I don't know if they even have it in them, but people opposed to the GOP have to get a lot meaner and a lot more cynical about this stuff if they want to be effective.
So why are Democrats? A good stand-alone question. I'll be one to my dying day, but I totally despair of the changes which need to happen in this benighted country arising in its current form.
Bravo, Roy.
I'm basically ignoring the hearings. They'll convince no one, change no minds, have no effect, make nothing better. It's a fundraising stunt at this point, from what I can tell.
That said, of course Chait think republicans will listen to democrats. He always paid a great deal of attention to advice from the GOP.
"Show Trials"
Well, sure, but show is all they got. It's not like anyone gets anything more than a hair-mussing as a result.
New poll out shows something like 15% of Republicans saying they'd vote for Biden over Trump if the two were matched up again in 2024. That makes Trump unelectable, I think. If the hearings have contributed to that, then good for them.
But anyway, BLM protesters don't take to the streets because they think racists will smack themselves on the forehead and say "Gosh, I was wrong all along!", they speak out because the truth must be told, no matter who wants to hear it. More and more, I'm appreciative of people who still go through the motions like truth and fact still matter - who knows, maybe they do?
Fair. I've been reporting ToS violations to twitter all night, and my inbox is buried under an avalanche of "Yeah, so, it turns out we're cool with telling people to kill themselves because they're queer, or hoping all mentally ill children get abused, or suggesting monkeypox is AIDS, or asserting that immigrants should all be shot."
It makes me a little weary of trying to hold people accountable.
Bummer that Musk isn’t buying it and making a heaven forfree speech.
SCOTUS.
The electoral college.
GOP voter subverting, gerrymandering, etc.
A media always willing to do theirs to put the GOP in the best light.
Add the possibility of a GOP Congress.
Mark Lungo, this is for you:
You (like I) are sick of my rants and want to know what I actually prescribe.
Pretty much this: https://jaredyatessexton.substack.com/p/we-are-not-alone-we-are-not-powerless?r=hdnf&utm_medium=ios
Thank you for sharing that beautiful article.
I'm back in the like shadow on twitter, so I'm holding onto this to retweet for when I can also like it. But it was good.
Great piece, nails just about everything.
Goddammit, thanks for costing me another $70.
Thanks. I agree 100% with him.
I'm agog at the blinkardness and unwillingness to change of the Democratic Party (putatively progressive innit) — but if you think about it: this kind of nostalgia for the bipartisan fuzzy feelings and obsessing about decorum and partnership in the Democratic establishment is just as white supremacist & regressive in its own way. They long for a status quo that favors white monied comfort & they are confused when the other side, just as white & monied, will not reach back to them. This status quo was made possible by maintaining structures that cause inequality & injustice — and have the added bonus of casting the Dems as the heroes who swoop in with a means-tested bandaid to cover over all the injuries our systems creates.
And the means-testing is entirely due to the influence of the GOP, ever willing to reinforce the class warfare of nudging the (ever smaller) middle class and pointing out all the "free stuff" the poors get.
With that $300 child tax credit, I seriously thought the Dems had hold of a real third-rail program, one that could never be repealed once enacted, because EVERYBODY got it. I didn't figure on Joe Manchin. What a fool I am.
Maybe including a sunset provision was foreshadowing of the Dem’s commitment there.
"just as white supremacist & regressive in its own way" -- oh, indeed. That's why a key part of it is always finding a minority to shit on. https://edroso.substack.com/p/a-second-conversation-with-james
You know my response so I’m saying nothing.
Wait, does Roy's like mean he's pleased by your history of pointed response and the thrust thereof, or just that he's happy you said nothing?
Or would your unsaid post be something along the lines of "Well if this vote means I don't get anymore invites to Black Lung Joe's yacht, then maybe I need to reconsider..."? 'Cause I'm totally on board that sentiment if you know what I mean...
Little did anyone know know just how much the Senate would be willing to tolerate.
"Look, we're OK with a little insurrection and the occasional hanging of elected officials, but reading a letter from Coretta Scott King that impugns the motives and conduct of our colleague from Alabama is going TOO FAR."
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/sen-elizabeth-warren-barred-speaking-impugning-sen-jeff-sessions-n718166
See, now you're just trolling me for a limerick based on "impugn"...which, I gotta say, is intriguing, but it's barely sunrise here and the coffee has not kicked in.
Democrats - Democratic politicians - are afraid that if they emulate the fierceness of Republicans in trying to counter Republicans, they will precipitate the collapse of the house of cards governmental system we have under the Constitution. They reveal this in their talk about bipartisanship (which isn’t in the Constitution), their reluctance to denounce the Senate and the Electoral College (which are), their search for ways to talk about the Fascist Party which calling it what it is. I cringe when I hear them and the media refer to Trump and his supporters in and out of government as “crazy” or “deluded.” No, he and they are lyars and criminals. Their voters are criminals by proxy. Why of all the January 6th Committee members is it only Liz Cheney who explicitly calls Trump criminal? Maybe she knows her bridges are burned and there is no Republican Party to return to, so she can speak the truth. Meanwhile, does Merrick Garland care at all that he may become history’s scapegoat, the man who destroyed the rule of law (such as it is)? Hell, he doesn’t have to wait for the Committee, Mueller laid out the evidence for indicting an exPresident for the crimes he committed during the 2016 election. The fear that action will cause America to implode is guaranteeing that the fascists will succeed in blowing it up.
And you see no problems arising when the house of cards collapses? I can agree that the #1 priority of the Democratic Party and its elected representatives is to prepare for that collapse (because it is coming), and if they are not then they deserve whatever reeducation camp President DeSantis sends them to, but I'm not yet convinced nothing is being done because its not on TV or Twitter.
They’ve had over thirty years to start responding since, you know, the treat has been clear and growing for other thirty years so there should have been visible signs of action for quite awhile, assuming the DNC cared.
Treat and threat both clear...
"And you see no problems arising when the house of cards collapses?" To the contrary, the prospect fills me with despair.
When I was attending a small Catholic high school, its library included a complete set of Allen Drury novels, set in the Advise and Consent metaverse. I read them all, and my memory is they got progressively more violent and whacko as they went on, ending with a Ted Kennedy stand-in winning the presidency, being led by the Russians into a war room and shown an overwhelming force ready to attack, and Teddy collapsing into a weeping puddle on the floor and immediately agreeing to an unconditional surrender. The novel ended with the Red Army marching down Pennsylvania Avenue while the heros raise a glass of scotch to the new Resistance. I guess that's where a love of principled bipartisanship leads you.
Though I would like to see from those decrying the feckless Democrats some examples of what Democratic politicians are supposed to be doing that isn't happening now. Bear in mind that about a third of eligible voters think politics is a tv reality show that has no effect on their lives. Will Democrats yelling harder change that?
Every once in a while, MSNBC will share a clip of a state legislator that went viral, calling the republicans out for their racism and hate-mongering in plain language that anyone can understand. These things go viral because there are lots of Democrats hungry for that sort of thing who aren't seeing it said at the national level.
How about committing to actually doing stuff? How about explaining how the GOP has been tearing down the nation?
What legislators do is legislate. To do that requires a majority in the House and 60 votes in the Senate, or a simple majority willing to vote to eliminate the filibuster. Stop me if you've heard this already.
And the point is? There’s been a dearth of substantive legislation.
Of course, that’s due is big part to Manchinema. But given the way things are, candidates should be laying out real proposals and commitments and risk losing Manchinema — let them bolt the GOP. You know, maybe an opposition party should fight, specially after a couple of decades of doing as little as possible.
Bernie's calling on the Dems to pass all sorts of popular legislation through the House, then make as much noise as possible when it fails in the Senate. I'm all for that, why not? But it doesn't change the fact that the legislation doesn't pass.
But I'm wondering: Suppose Warnock or Ossoff hadn't won, and the Dems had only 49 Senators. Would you still treat the claim that "We don't got the votes" as a lame excuse for inaction? Or would you be willing to concede that they really, truly don't have the votes?
If we're talking about old movies that have warped the brains of old liberals as much as West Wing warped the brains of younger libs, I'd like to suggest 12 Angry Men. The racists bully and shout, but Henry Fonda meets it all with calm reasonableness and a commitment to the facts and evidence, and prevails in the end. Just how it works in real life.
Good example. Yeah, we all know how most people just love to admit they were wrong due to poor judgement or one of their own character flaws. And they adore admitting they were duped and then fleeced by a conman. Certainly, they would never dig in their heels and defend their own wrong opinions/actions even more strenuously. Nah, that never happens.
Fonda's character is always performing for an audience. He knows he can't win over Lee J. Cobb or Ed Begley Sr., but he imagines the more reasonable jurors on the fence might look at him and at the screaming bigot and decide to align with Mr. Reasonable. Democratic politicians imagine the same thing, somewhere there's an audience of Reasonable People awarding them points for their good behavior, for every time they stand on principle to the disadvantage of their own party, every time they pick a Republican instead of a Democrat for the position of Special Prosecutor or Secretary of Defense. Surely, there must be someone, somewhere, who's keeping score like that, right?
I look to George Lakoff's 'Don't Think Of An Elephant' and a quote (allegedly) by Vladimir Mayakovsky: 'The left must learn to use the tools of the right'... but those you cite won't shift their expressed position because, as said elsewhere, the milquetoast line reflects their economic comfort and the security baked into their niche (sic) readership where 'fairness' is the message we are all supposed to regurgitate as we sink into the mire.
I'd be thrilled if the Democrats could learn the tools of the left, actually. This country has a long and proud history of social movements that have changed us for the better, seems like we might be able to learn something from that?
Learn something? Harrumph, I say!
Why, that's downright UNAMERICAN
Funnily enough I was just reading Galbraith's "Culture of Contentment." I think he'd see it your way.
Alternatively--hear me out--the idea of providing Republicans with an offramp could serve a useful purpose, in spite of the old Advise and Consent rhetoric (but sustained by it), a little more Yes, Minister: pushing the breakup of the GOP into Trumpy and non-Trumpy factions that can't work together.
The non-Trumpies have been a joke for the last 5-6 years, because there are obviously so few of them, and they're almost all keyboard commandos like Kristol and French. This is because a big plurality of Republican office holders have been allowed to stay ambiguous on the Trump subject. The proper goal of Druryism should be to force them to choose between civilization and savagery and break them up.
I think it's entirely within our reach to make Trump toxic enough to just enough Republicans that he can't win the general election in 2024. Making him toxic enough to just enough Republicans that he can't win the Republican primaries is a heavier lift, but the main thing is ensuring he can't be President again.
I'd really like Democrats to be forcing GOP congressional candidates to talk about it this fall. Don't let them pussyfoot, don't let them say "I didn't like the tweets" or "some of his policies were good", make them say where they stand on subverting the constitutional election promise AND all the GOP reps who voted not to certify. After the hearings are over.
"Will you commit right now to accepting the decision of the voters, even if they don't choose you?"
But it not Trump then you get the fascist in Florida or the one in Texas, both much more competent than Trump.
One thing at a time, this Trumpian innovation of denying you lost an election and then attempting to overturn the results needs to die with Trump. So far, I haven't seen any Republicans take it up, but that's just losses in the primaries, we'll see if anyone tries it in the general election.
Should read "One FASCIST at a time" which, when I read it, suddenly reminds me of the one stupid thing about the Mercury* dime – that fasces. It is perpetually amusing to me that the fascist symbol** illustrates a concept that is literally incapable of function. You ever try swinging an ax that had a big bunch of sticks tied around the handle so you couldn't actually hold it? Well, neither did I, but that's only because even as a little kid I could see it was unworkable...
*God on the coins? WTF?
**and I know, the use of it on that dime was premature to the fascist ascendancy, but it still makes me laugh/shiver to see it on our greatestnationinhistory coinage.
No sign yet that the two factions can’t work together so…
That's because we haven't done the work yet. They obviously hate each other, Charles Koch and the construction contractor who votes for Louie Gohmert. You need to force Koch to say in public what he thinks about abortion, you need to force the Gohmert voter to say what he thinks about billionaire tax cheats. Republicans and Russians are willing to do the work of dividing Democrats and we passively let them do it, or even participate, encouraging the belief that the difference between the Sanders economic plan and the Biden economic plan (Bernard Sanders, Budget Committee Chairman) is more significant and problematic than the difference between an obsessed libertarian and an obsessed theocrat.
Everybody wants to complain about how we should play dirty like the Republicans but nobody wants to talk about what it is they actually do. That's what they do, maintain unity in their own ranks and foment discord across the aisle.
Mitch McConnell pretends to care about abortion so he can get the deregulated shipping industry, or whatever it is he wants. And they all concern troll "moderate" Democrats to divide our party further, with a lot of success (nobody ever wants to talk about the relationship between Joe Manchin and Jim Justice, but if Manchin is a Republican tool, there's a reason for it).
I don't have to praise Liz Cheney in public, thank gods. but if Bennie Thompson finds it expedient to praise her I'm not going to second-guess him. He's creating a space in which Republicans are breaking up because some of them feel they have to say the Constitution comes first and others won't.
Everybody says why don't we push our program through through sheer forcefulness, like LBJ. having their balls in his pocket. Would they look at the record? The civil rights legislation of the 1960s wasn't LBJ frightening Stennis and Eastland into voting for it--he couldn't even persuade my beloved Robert Byrd. It was majority whip Hubert Humphrey passing out pork to Republican senators from Dirksen on down.
Republicans seem so fucked up nowadays that that wouldn't be possible. No doubt. But Biden's picnic, distasteful as it may be, does help to divide the Republicans in the first place between those who are afraid of Biden's cooties and those who aren't. A division that doesn't get mentioned enough is that between the officials in Washington and the voters in Armpit, TX.
I hope you understand I'm not talking about recruiting Republican votes for legislation, in general (can be OK if it happens, but I'm not expecting it). I'm talking about making voters unsure what Republicans stand for. The story of 2016 is in part how voters in Michigan/Wisconsin/Pennsylvania were persuaded that Democrats had nothing to offer them, and quite a few decided not to vote; Democrats' job now (informed by the personal stories of 1/6 volunteers explaining how Trump lied to them) is in part to persuade them that Republicans have nothing.. Just make them say they're against it, or suffer the consequences.
I like this, a lot of the comments here are of the "Democrats in Disarray" variety, but the divisions and hatreds within the Republican party are enormous. Let's remember that Democratic voters, no matter how much they may dislike their leadership, never attempted to hang their own Vice President, nor has a Democratic President ever campaigned against an incumbent Democratic Governor, as Trump did with Brian Kemp.
I see your schism as parallel tracks. The Trump faction is all about pandering to voters, the other faction is about serving special interests -- like the difference between making the widget and marketing the widget. The worst the GOP's done the past couple of years has come from SCOTUS even if no more than as enablers. And much of that preceded Trump.
To the extent Trump's popularity is on the wane, I don't expect it to have any significant electoral effects. Now, if there was a party dedicated to making clear to voters how everything bad with this country is due primarily to what Republicans have done and are doing and that said party would commit to corrective actions -- something like, I dunno, a Contract With America -- that would be something. But that's not going to happen and the time to do so probably has passed. (I refer of course to the top of the party; the base on the local level is something else entirely.)
"Everybody wants to complain about how we should play dirty like the Republicans but nobody wants to talk about what it is they actually do. That's what they do, maintain unity in their own ranks and foment discord across the aisle."
I partly agree and am partly confused. In any case, we also have the problem messaging-wise because the mainstream is so supportive of the GOP and so dismissive (for one thing) of the Democrats.
Anyway, tl;dr:
I'm unclear why you think the schism in the GOP matters and what support you have that it I other than a few factoids.
Also, I have, like, an allergy to excessive, unrealistic hope. In this case, I'm hopeful that the base keeps fighting but hope that the DNC will act appropriately, please, they've been failing for over thirty years (and please, I'm uninterested in the exceptions to the rule; the record's clear).
" have, like, an allergy to excessive, unrealistic hope"
Yeah, this, right here, is what I don't get.
OK, there are people who have too much faith in the Democrats, and that means they go out and vote for the Democrats instead of staying home and not voting at all, and that's bad because...
Or maybe it's that unrealistic hope for the Democrats that prevents people from engaging in more radical and effective action? If so, what's the more radical and effective action the Dems are keeping people from. Too much faith in the Dems is holding back the Green Party or the General Strike?
Or maybe you're thinking of those comfortable upper-middle-class liberals who worship Nancy Pelosi? Sorry, those folks were never going to a fucking thing beyond voting and donating (and thanks for the donations, BTW!). If you succeeded in disillusioning them about the Democrats (something which is, frankly, impossible) they'd just drop politics altogether and put the time into gardening and homemade kombucha.
And finally there are the young folk, engaging in effective action with no help from the Democrats, things like union organizing and mutual aid and our newly forming Underground Abortion Railroad. But these youngs are smart, and can already distinguish between a Dem worth supporting like AOC and the ones who are useless. Also smart enough to know even the useless ones are worth the half hour it takes to vote for them, given the alternative.
It just seems like an odd fixation, with all the other problems in the world, to concentrate on stamping out any signs of excessive hope.
Wow.
My bad. By excessive I should be clear that I meant excessive *misdirected* hope as I have already made clear ad nauseum.
I get hope that one’s abuser may stop abusing but hope that the abuser would turn themselves in, get treatment, somehow proactively resolve their problem without some external pressure, no, that’s too much for me.
Hope from a documented source of enabling the problem for over thirty years is by definition not smart but rather adds to the problem. Hope resulting in trust and doing nothing more in no way contributes to a solution. Hoping that the DNC will act properly when facing an existential threat to the nation is how we got here.
JFC.
Yes, "Hoping that the DNC will act properly" is wrong, I get that. Now tell me about all the harm it causes, the bad things people actually DO because they have misplaced hope in the DNC. Do they mistakenly vote for Democrats? No, wait, we need them to do that, actually, because the Republicans are worse.
I used to hear all this stuff from my former compatriots in the Green Party, but they at least had a program, stop voting for the Dems and vote for the Greens instead.
That plan is so crazy it just might work. Ha, no, it won't. Both the Quiet Part Quiet and the Quiet Part Out Loud wings of the party want the same things (I.e. blood sacrifice and tax cuts for the rich).
The only way to deal with the GOP is to utterly destroy it, and everyone in it, and salt the earth where it stood. Alas, we don't have a Democratic Party up to the task. R.I.P. America.
Don't mean to come across as all Democrat-apologist, but there's a reason that Donald Trump is no longer President, why Mitch McConnell is the Senate Minority Leader instead of the Senate Majority Leader, and why Kevin McCarthy is the House Minority Leader instead of Speaker. And it has to do with a party that ran in enough elections and won enough elections to make these things happen.
Yeah this.
I'm also seeing, frankly, in the current doom-and-gloom, erasure: Black and Brown people, LGBTQ, many others. It's like what's happening and going to happen to them doesn't matter. They--we--are being erased (notice what's happening to Vice President Harris for example).
OMG you're right. Harris is being disappeared. It's like they've decided the future doesn't include her.
That's true. But, as Roy said, they still don't realize (or do, but won't admit it out loud) what an existential threat the GOP is, and one bad midterm election brings back McConnell and makes McCarthy (or someone else more acceptable to the real leader of the party) Speaker. Then one bad presidential election gives us either Trump again or someone like DeSantis. My optimism is not very high right now.
It's always puzzled me, but every Democratic candidate for office campaigns against his or her specific Republican opponent, but never against Republicans generally. And with Republicans it's not like that at all. Sure, they'll attack a Democratic candidate for being soft on crime or being a big-spending budget-buster, but it always fits into a larger claim that ALL Democrats are like that, so what do you expect, this guy's no exception, right? And the Republican attack is always more effective because of that.
And Joe Biden, god love him, is just not made for these times: >>Mr. Biden made no mention of any of those developments. At a time of mounting political division, the president threw a picnic for members of Congress and their families, inviting every Republican and Democrat in the House and Senate. He used it to renew his plea for a more personalized, civilized political discourse, reviving a tradition interrupted in recent years and seeking to recapture some of what the first lady, Jill Biden, called the “magic” of the White House grounds to bring people together across the aisle.<< https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/12/us/politics/biden-congressional-picnic.html
" White House officials said about a dozen Republican senators were in attendance, though reporters could not see all of them."
LOL.
Reporters, following the lede of the written-for-them article, defer the search & count function...