;)
October 17, 2022
Afternoon Update:
Marie: I seldom do polls, but since the latest semi-reliable polls are finding pretty much the same thing, here's one: ~~~
~~~ Shane Goldmacher of the New York Times: "Republicans enter the final weeks of the contest for control of Congress with a narrow but distinctive advantage as the economy and inflation have surged as the dominant concerns, giving the party momentum to take back power from Democrats in next month's midterm elections, a New York Times/Siena College poll has found. The poll shows that 49 percent of likely voters said they planned to vote for a Republican to represent them in Congress on Nov. 8, compared with 45 percent who planned to vote for a Democrat. The result represents an improvement for Republicans since September, when Democrats held a one-point edge among likely voters in the last Times/Siena poll. (The October poll's unrounded margin is closer to three points, not the four points that the rounded figures imply.)"
Alan Feuer & Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: "The Justice Department said on Monday that Stephen K. Bannon ... should spend six months in jail and pay a fine of $200,000 after a jury found him guilty this summer of willfully disobeying a subpoena from the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack. Mr. Bannon pursued a bad-faith strategy of defiance and contempt' from the moment he received the subpoena last year seeking records and testimony about his knowledge of Mr. Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election, culminating in the violent assault on the Capitol, prosecutors said in a sentencing memo to Judge Carl J. Nichols, who is overseeing the case. The prosecutors noted that Mr. Bannon, who is set to be sentenced by Judge Nichols on Friday, deserved a penalty harsher than the minimum term of one month in jail because he had blatantly brushed off the committee's demands and then attacked it in a series of brazen public statements." An AP story is here.
The Big Grifter's Gotta Grift. David Fahrenthold & Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: "The Trump Organization charged the Secret Service up to $1,185 per night for hotel rooms used by agents protecting ... Donald J. Trump and his family, according to documents released on Monday by the House Oversight Committee.... The committee released Secret Service records showing more than $1.4 million in payments by the department to Trump properties since Mr. Trump took office in 2017. The committee said that the accounting was incomplete, however, because it did not include payments to Mr. Trump's foreign properties -- where agents accompanied his family repeatedly -- and because the records stopped in September 2021. The records the panel managed to obtain provided new details about an arrangement in which Mr. Trump and his family effectively turned the Secret Service into a captive customer of their business -- by visiting their properties hundreds of times, and then charging the government rates far above its usual spending limits.... Mr. Trump's son Eric -- who ran the family business while his father was in office -- provided a misleading account of what his company was charging. In 2019, Eric Trump said the Trump Organization charged the government only 'like $50' for hotel rooms during presidential visits. APolitico story is here. ~~~
~~~ Marie: I don't call "like $50" misleading; I call it a "honking big lie" when the rate is more "like $1,200," or 24 times as much as the figure he cited.
Jenny Gross & Tiffany Hsu of the New York Times: "Kanye West has agreed in principle to buy Parler, the social media service that has attracted fans of ... Donald J. Trump, the service's parent company, Parlement Technologies, said in a news release on Monday.... The announcement came a little over a week after Twitter and Instagram restricted [West's] accounts in response to antisemitic remarks that he posted." An NPR story is here.
The Philadelphia Inquirer may have endorsed John Fetterman (D) for U.S. Senate, but wait! Why not vote for this guy? ~~~
~~~ Pennsylvania Senate Race. Meidas Touch: "In a newly resurfaced clip from The Jimmy Kimmel Show discovered by PatriotTakes, Republican Senate Candidate Dr. [Mehmet] Oz [R] talks about his love of drinking urine. Jordy Meiselas reports." ~~~
Vimal Patel of the New York Times: Arthur Cofield, an inmate in a Butts County, Georgia, state prison, ran a massive con from the prison in which he stole $11 million by stealing the identity of an elderly billionaire. "Mr. Cofield, 31, was charged with several federal counts, including conspiracy to commit bank fraud, aggravated identity theft, money laundering and conspiracy to commit money laundering, according to court documents. He has pleaded not guilty." MB: If Cofield is looking for a new job, he has just the right resumé to join Trump's Liars Social, which reportedly has been shedding executives.
Lizzie Johnson of the Washington Post on "how dogs being bred for research at Envigo became the target of the largest animal welfare seizure in the Humane Society's history.... After years of alarm from animal rights advocates and state legislators, after U.S. Department of Agriculture inspectors found maggot-infested kibble, 300 dead puppies and injured beagles being euthanized, after an undercover investigation by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, and after a lawsuit filed against Envigo by the Justice Department, the Indianapolis-based company had reached a settlement with the federal government. It agreed to shut down the Virginia breeding operation -- admitting no wrongdoing and receiving no punishment or fines -- rather than make what the CEO of its parent company called 'the required investments to improve the facility.' In July, U.S. District Court Judge Norman K. Moon approved the surrender of Envigo's beagles to the Humane Society of the United States.... What followed was two months of beagle mania, as people across the country showered the Humane Society with $2.2 million in donations and clamored to adopt the dogs. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle took in a beagle. So did the governor of New Jersey and the chief meteorologist at a Virginia news station." ~~~
~~~ Marie: The settlement should have included locking that CEO in a cage, cutting off his tail & feeding him maggot-infested kibble.
Ukraine, et al. Nahal Toosi & Matt Berg of Politico: "The United States intends to further crack down on Iran for helping Russia in the war on Ukraine, a U.S. official said Monday following reports that Tehran plans to send Moscow missiles to use on the battlefield. The penalties -- likely to include economic sanctions and possibly some export controls -- would also target third parties that help Tehran and Moscow.... The Washington Post reported over the weekend that Iran -- in addition to continuing to sell Russia drones, some of which are used kamikaze style to crash into targets -- plans to send Moscow surface-to-surface missiles."
U.K. NEVER MIND! Mark Landler & Stephen Castle of the New York Times: "Britain's new chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt, said on Monday that he would reverse virtually all the government's planned tax cuts, sweeping away Prime Minister Liz Truss's free-market economic plan in a desperate bid to steady the financial markets and stabilize her government. Mr. Hunt also announced that the government would end its massive state intervention to cap energy prices next April, replacing it with a still-undefined program that he said would promote energy efficiency, but that could increase uncertainty for households facing rising gas and electricity bills. Ms. Truss's Conservative government had planned to announce the tax and spending details of its fiscal plan on Oct. 31, but with the markets still gyrating, Mr. Hunt rushed forward the schedule. His announcement constituted one of the most dramatic reversals in modern British political history."
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Colleen Long & Zeke Miller of the AP: "Two years ago, candidate Joe Biden loudly denounced ... Donald Trump for immigration policies that inflicted 'cruelty and exclusion at every turn,' including toward those fleeing the 'brutal' government of socialist Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela. Now, with increasing numbers of Venezuelans arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border as the Nov. 8 election nears, Biden has turned to an unlikely source for a solution: his predecessor's playbook. Biden last week invoked a Trump-era rule known as Title 42 -- which Biden's own Justice Department is fighting in court -- to deny Venezuelans fleeing their crisis-torn country the chance to request asylum at the border. The rule, first invoked by Trump in 2020, uses emergency public health authority to allow the United States to keep migrants from seeking asylum at the border, based on the need to help prevent the spread of COVID-19." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Robert Barnes & Ann Marimow of the Washington Post: "Over eight oral arguments, [Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson] dominated the questioning and commentary, speaking twice as much as her next most loquacious colleague. It is likely a record for a new justice.... Her contributions ranged from the sweeping -- a rejection of an originalist interpretation of a colorblind Constitution that provoked swoons from the liberal legal community -- to the kind of mundane minutiae upon which even Supreme Court decisions turn." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Rosalind Helderman of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump attacked American Jews in a post on his Truth Social platform on Sunday, saying Jews in the United States must 'get their act together' and show more appreciation for the state of Israel 'before it is too late.' American Jews have long been accused of holding secret loyalty to Israel rather than the United States, and Trump's post leaned on that antisemitic trope, suggesting that by virtue of their religion, American Jews should show more appreciation to Israel. Trump also complained in the post that 'no president' had done more for Israel than he had but that Christian evangelicals are 'far more appreciative of this than the people of the Jewish faith, especially those living in the U.S.'... Trump's latest diatribe about Jews came as Republican candidates have made overt appeals to racial animus and resentments in the closing weeks of the midterm election campaign." An NBC News report is here.
Marc Fisher of the Washington Post: "In a flurry of elections, some of the world's major democracies have been leaning toward or outright embracing far-right authoritarian leaders, who have echoed one another by promising to crack down on loose morals, open borders and power-hungry elites.... In the United States..., Donald Trump has presumptively rejected future election results, and a majority of Republican candidates on the ballot this fall for major state and federal elective offices have joined him in repudiating the outcome of the 2020 presidential election -- an epidemic of election denialism in the United States that historians and political scientists define as a core element in any country's drift toward authoritarian rule. Thirty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of Soviet communism heralded a new era of democratic governance and a huge expansion of global trade, that democratic wave has been replaced in many countries by a tide of authoritarianism."
November Elections
Arizona Governor. Zach Schonfeld of the Hill: "Arizona Republican gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake sparred with CNN's Dana Bash over unfounded claims of mass election fraud in 2020 during an interview on Sunday. 'You called the 2020 election corrupt, stolen, rotten and rigged, and there was no evidence of any of that presented in a court of law or anywhere else that any of those things are true. So why do you keep saying that?' Bash asked Lake on CNN's 'State of the Union.'... A series of investigations into Arizona's 2020 elections failed to find evidence of substantial fraud that would have overturned President Biden's victory in the state. Lake went on to portray the media as covering only 'one side' of the issue, while Bash repeatedly contested Lake's claims of electoral fraud.... During a subsequent interview on 'State of the Union' with Lake's opponent, Katie Hobbs, the Arizona Democrat lambasted Lake's position. 'This is disqualifying,' Hobbs said. 'This is a basic core of our democracy, and she has nothing else to run on.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~
~~~ Mary Astor of the New York Times: "Kari Lake, the Republican candidate for governor of Arizona, refused on Sunday to commit to accepting the results of her election, using much of the same language that ... Donald J. Trump did when he was a candidate." CNN's report is here.
Georgia Senate. Maya King of the New York Times: "Herschel Walker was not onstage on Sunday night for Georgia's second U.S. Senate debate. But he was one of its main topics anyway. Senator Raphael Warnock, the incumbent and a Democrat, excoriated his Republican opponent, Mr. Walker, who chose not to attend the debate, arguing tha Mr. Walker's history of domestic violence, lies about his past and refusal to participate in the forum made him unqualified for office. Throughout the hourlong matchup in Atlanta, Mr. Warnock stepped out of character, opting for direct attack lines over the thinly veiled criticisms he has leveled at Mr. Walker for most of the campaign. He answered panelists' questions with a mix of policy points and full-throated rebukes of Mr. Walker's claims about his personal life, business prowess and academic record. He described Mr. Walker's 'well-documented history of violence' in reference to reports about Mr. Walker's domestic violence against his ex-wife, Cindy Grossman, calling them 'disturbing.'"
Ohio Senate. Cleveland Plain Dealer Editors Endorse Democrat Tim Ryan for U.S. Senate: "There is not much question as to what the state would get from either of the two candidates -- Ryan, as a congressman, having voted with Democrats virtually all of the time and [Republican J.D.] Vance having signed on to Donald Trump's Big Lie and extremist approach to politics after being highly critical of the former president during the 2016 campaign and afterward.... During his [20] years in Congress, Ryan has shown himself to be an able collaborator who is willing to work across the aisle, an important quality in a deeply divided Senate.... The pragmatic grasp he showed in discussing the need to stand firm against the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the potential threat of China doing the same with Taiwan add up to a strong argument for Ryan to replace [Rob] Portman [R] in the Senate.... Who can forget [Vance's] initial reaction to the Russian invasion: 'I don't really care what happens to Ukraine one way or another.' Unfortunately, Vance elected not to appear before our editorial board to explain his indefensible embrace of Trump's Big Lie or clarify where he stands on Ukraine, abortion restrictions, domestic violence against women or other matters." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Pennsylvania Senate. Julia Mueller of the Hill: "The Philadelphia Inquirer on Sunday endorsed Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman (D) in the state's Senate race after declining to endorse him in his party's primary earlier this year. 'There is no reason Fetterman cannot serve effectively after his stroke,' the editorial board wrote, noting that the Democrat struggles with slightly delayed auditory processing after suffering a stroke shortly before the primary but contending that the lag of a 'couple of moments ... should not significantly impair him' from serving as a senator. The editors added that 'Fetterman knows what his values are and is capable of communicating them. The same cannot be said for his opponent, Mehmet Oz, a man wholly unprepared to be Pennsylvania's U.S. senator.' Republican nominee Mehmet Oz, a former cardiothoracic surgeon-turned-television personality, has mocked his opponent's stroke and painted Fetterman as unfit." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Way Beyond the Beltway
Ukraine, et al.
The New York Times' live updates of developments Monday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "Russia launched another attack on Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, using explosive Iranian drones to hit the city early Monday, one week after it unleashed a deadly missile barrage on the capital and other cities across the country that killed at least 19 people." ~~~
~~~ The Washington Post's live briefings for Monday are here: "Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky condemned Russia's attack on the capital city with kamikaze drones, insisting Moscow 'terrorizes the civilian population' as a residential building was hit.... The E.U. Foreign Affairs Council is scheduled to meet Monday and discuss 'Russian aggression against Ukraine.'... Ukraine has sent about 8 million tons of food to countries since it resumed shipping in July, Zelensky said."
Charlotte Higgins & Artem Mazhulin of the Guardian: "Russian soldiers have shot dead a Ukrainian musician in his home after he refused to take part in a concert in occupied Kherson, according to the culture ministry in Kyiv. Conductor Yuriy Kerpatenko declined to take part in a concert 'intended by the occupiers to demonstrate the so-called "improvement of peaceful life" in Kherson', the ministry said in a statement on its Facebook page.... Kerpatenko, who was also the principal conductor of Kherson's Mykola Kulish Music and Drama Theatre, had been posting defiant messages on his Facebook page until May. The Kherson regional prosecutor's office in Ukraine has launched a formal investigation 'on the basis of violations of the laws and customs of war, combined with intentional murder'.... Condemnation by Ukrainian and international artists was swift." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
News Ledes
New York Times: "The police in a small Oklahoma city found four bodies in a river on Friday, three days after they said four men, all described as friends, had been reported missing. The discovery of the bodies deepened the mystery surrounding the missing men in Okmulgee, a city of about 11,000 people about 40 miles south of Tulsa. The police said the bodies were males but were awaiting a medical examiner's confirmation of their identities. The Okmulgee Police Department said a passer-by had noticed something suspicious in the Deep Fork River on Friday, leading investigators to find what appeared to be human remains protruding from the water." ~~~
~~~ Update: New York Times: "The mysterious disappearance of four friends in Oklahoma took a grim turn on Monday after the police confirmed that their remains had been found in a river after they had been fatally shot and then dismembered. Joe Prentice, the police chief in Okmulgee..., said at a news conference on Monday that the remains had been identified as those of Mark Chastain, 32; Billy Chastain, 30; Mike Sparks, 32; and Alex Stevens, 29, all of Okmulgee. The chief said the Chastains were brothers. Chief Prentice said that investigators believed the men had planned to 'commit some type of criminal act' after they left Billy Chastain's home on Okmulgee's west side around 8 p.m. on Oct. 9. All four were reportedly riding bicycles, the police said. Their plan to engage in criminal activity was based on information from a witness who had been invited to join the men to 'hit a lick big enough for all of them,' the chief said, quoting the witness. 'That is common terminology for engaging in some type of criminal behavior...,' he added." ~~~
~~~ Marie: I once lived in Okmulgee County. It is that kind of place, a place where your friends & neighbors just might dismember you.
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It Lives
Rewatched the last installment of Ken Burns’ documentary on the US and the Holocaust last night. And as hard as it was to refrain from drawing through lines from that time to Trumpism and the bigotry it supports, I let it go. But then I read about Trump lecturing Jews about all they owe to him and how they better wise up and start sieg heiling him like his obedient white supremacist minions and thugs.
Then I thought about this: after the Nazi murder camps were uncovered, General Eisenhower invited congressional types and newspaper editors to come see for themselves the horrors of white supremacy run wild. He also ordered that army regulars, enlisted men and officers come see as well. When a soldier let out a little giggle, Eisenhower was pissed. “Still having trouble hating them?” he asked, pointing to piles of dead bodies, meaning the Nazis who decided that certain human beings had no right to exist.
But here’s the thing. It took less than twenty years before we were all palsy-walsy with Germans. Jews? They were still hated. And they still are. By people who tattoo themselves with swastikas and hold Hitler in high esteem. People Trump deems good and decent. But he doesn’t lecture or threaten them. Who does he threaten?
Jews.
So no, I’m not I’m making an argumentum ad hitlerum, just pointing out the fact the exact same seeds that grew into the Holocaust, are nurtured and replanted by Republicans and their Supreme Leader. There are plenty of other examples of Trump’s antisemitism. Does that mean “Holocaust”? No, not necessarily, but this shit starts somewhere. The Himalayas began with a little mound of dirt and rock pushed up by tectonic motion.
Trumpism relies on hatred and bigotry, antisemitism, racism and white supremacy just as surely as the the ideology that conjured up the Final Solution.
Trump thinks a lot about Nazis. He kept a copy of Hitler’s speeches. He thinks thugs who shout “Jews will not replace us!” are good people. But Jews? He only sees them as ungrateful losers who are not properly worshipping him and need to be straightened out as to whom they owe their loyalty.
“Despicable” is overtaken by shuddering fear at what the right wing in this country is playing with.
After WWII, plenty of Americans thought, well, we saved those Jews, we beat Hitler. Put all that stuff away now. Don’t have to think about it anymore. But some others began spreading lies that the Holocaust was a hoax. Some of those people have been influencing right wing politics in this country for years.
The Holocaust might be dusty history for some, but it shouldn’t be. It’s not for Jews.
And it’s not, at least the hatred that inspired it, for Aryan Nation thugs and neo-Nazis who sieg heil (literally) Trump. They see him as being on their side.
He’s more. He’s a leader for them. A savior. The fact that he’s a self obsessed incompetent doesn’t abate the fact that he’s a vicious racist at heart.
Don’t forget, Trump ordered Homeland Security to look into building a two thousand mile moat along the border, in addition to his Big Beautiful Wall, and fill it with snakes and alligators. He wanted the wall painted black to burn the skin off immigrants who tried to climb it, and to put sharp metal spikes on the top to tear them up. He suggested that border guards shoot immigrants in the legs so they couldn’t run away.
A mind this evil, this warped, that already ordered his own concentration camps….could ovens be that far off?
But millions love this asshole. Not in spite of his violent and racist mindset. Because of it.
One of the GIs who visited the death camps wrote a letter home to his dad saying that it wasn’t enough to beat the Nazis. We had to destroy the philosophy that allowed such horrors to exist.
That philosophy is alive and well in right wing America.
Fascism's success depends on widespread gullibility.
From the WAPO article above: “In a flurry of elections, some of the world’s major democracies have been leaning toward or outright embracing far-right authoritarian leaders, who have echoed one another by promising to crack down on loose morals, open borders and power-hungry elites."
Fair enough. But it is precisely the power hungry elites that foment the general unease, stir up the faux nationalism and then ride to power on the forces they have unleashed, promising to fix what they themselves deliberately broke.
A side note: Though I doubt they're designed into the authoritarian plot by political theoreticians, I'd add that at least two consequences of current, mostly unchecked global capitalism are creating the conditions for authoritarianism's rise:
Massive fossil fuel use climate-induced migration...and economic inequality within and across national. borders...
While I certainly never believed the "end of history" theory of political evolution, I did believe that where even marginally possible, totalitarianism would fail, that the vast majority of people would demand the right to think independently and express their thoughts.
I think I got over that misapprehension before the advent of Trumpism, but if I didn't, Trump's election made me realize how strikingly wrong I was. It turns out that about half the people in the world -- give or take -- are both lazy and cowardly. They want a "Daddy" (or, occasionally, a "Mommy") figure to tell them what to do, as long as what to do is somewhat in line with their own narrow world views. So in this country, these people are all mini-Margie-Greene types; they want someone to tell them they're the best and their white Christianist beliefs & "morals" are righteous. Nobody else -- not people of color, not non-Christians -- can measure up. These "others," these inferior people should shut up and not interfere with the Code of the White Christians, as prescribed by a small cadres of "leaders." Nobody else has to think; nobody has to take responsibility for shaping society's rules.
Paul Ryan eschewed food stamps & other social welfare programs (from which he benefited as a child) as the "hammock that lulls able-bodied people into lives of complacency and dependency." But the real hammock of complacency & dependency is the one Ryan exalts -- one in which everybody follows him & his stale Ayn Rand "philosophy." Half the human race doesn't use the brains they think their own version of god gave them. They're pathetic losers. And I don't have any sense they can be fixed.
I wonder if Donnie seeing Jared and Ivanka again on video during all the January 6th hearings contributed to putting his tiny mind on how American Jews have not been sufficiently loyal and appreciative of all he has supposedly done for them. He's also probably mad at not yet seeing his cut from the two billion dollar check the Saudis wrote to Jared, very ungrateful.
Claude Lanzmann's, "Shoah," (1985 - in the Criterion Collection) is the most revealing, shocking, and best demonstration that the psychology of Nazism never died at all. It lasts about 6 hours and one comes away shaken in one's faith in humanity. We are not better than that. I haven't seen Ken Burns' film yet, but I do see the connections Akhilleus makes.
Here is a little bit of hope that those new polls aren't quite as bad as they look at first glance. The poll's methodology got changed to favor Republicans.
"So Times/Siena has decided that voters are less likely to vote if their views of Joe Biden don't "align with their party." The problem with this is that it's obvious in nearly every poll conducted this year that Democratic midterm candidates are outpolling the president, whose job approval numbers are still weak. What the folks at Times/Siena are telling us is that they don't really believe that people who dislike Joe Biden but like Raphael Warnock or John Fetterman or Mark Kelly will actually show up in November. Republicans don't have this disconnect -- obviously, they all despise Biden, so the poll is weighted in favor of their votes. That's an automatic bump for Republicans.
In addition, Cohn says, Times/Siena now gives "even more weight to a respondent’s track record of voting than we did in the past." But what Democrats are telling us is that there's been a registration upswing since the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision that's been disproportionately Democratic and female. Now, maybe those new registrants won't actually show up to vote. Maybe they'll be outnumbered by GOP voters fired up about immigration, inflation, critical race theory, and (nonexistent) schoolkids who identify as animals and use litter boxes. But Democrats are insisting that they'll turn out new voters, with some emprical evidence to back them up (the surprisingly strong vote in Kansas for abortion rights) -- and the response from Times/Siena is to say that this is less likely than usual. Again, a GOP bump."
RAS,
I hope you’re right. Democrats have been traditionally difficult to pin down with sketchily worded polls. Unlike Rs, they don’t excommunicate party members who think for themselves, which makes tea leaf reading troublesome. Rs, who vote in tribal lock step, are an easy call so of course polls trend in their direction. What I’m hoping is that all those Dobbs related registrants don’t forget why they signed up. Democrats need to be reminding everyone of what confederates have stolen from them and what other rights they look to eviscerate this term.
Last week the NYT had a box offering you a chance to participate in their poll. I suppose it was the NYT/Sienna. I started to respond, but when it took me to a page where I would have to enter my Personal Identification Information (PII) and other data, I backed out. I figured the Times already has what it needs to know about me, from when I subscribed, and as a rule I limit what PII I give away. I know the personal data battle is long lost but I see no reason to help the body snatchers and scavengers.
Anyway, picking up on RAS' words (above), I also do not particpate in telephone surveys. I did a few years back, civic duty and all, until I realized that I was no longer a random call but a reliable answer. Talk about bad polling practice! This stuff is not like Nielsen.
I noticed that the bar chart age cohorts for the NYT/S poll all tip for democrats EXCEPT for the 45-64 cohort, and that the entire sample tilts R. Which means that the number of 45-64 cohort is large relative to the others, andf has lots of Rs in it. If significant (and it may not be -- I think polling has been busted by caller ID and cellphones), that means that people older then prime family formation age but younger than retirement age are stuck in voting for their grandpa's GOP and haven't yet figured out that the GOP doesn't actually deliver the goods on "good economy, strong defense, small government." It figures .... these are folks who have to focus on the basics of living and don't have the ability to study no politicks. And they carry the burdens of mid-mortgage, all taxes, child-rearing, and loan payoffs. So they rely on symbols and tribal practices (if you live in W Cleveland you vote R). They don't believe good gov can help them cope.
Pray for a good D GOTV.
Marie,
I’ve said many times before Simple Rules for Simpletons is the way to go on the right. The great appeal of religion, for many, is that it largely removes the necessity for thinking. “What would Jesus do?” and “What does the Bible say?” are get out of thinking cards for too many. And maybe that wouldn’t always be so unhelpful if they followed those beliefs, but just looking at who they put in office and what their political heroes do on a daily basis demonstrates the hypocrisy of such a system. But what it does is give them a handy cudgel to best in their perceived enemies.
Look at Ayn Rand, that defender of brave individualism was a lifelong moocher. Atlas didn’t shrug, he gave up, lied about it, and went on the dole. But imbeciles like Paul Ryan and Li’l Randy see her claptrap as rules (for other people) to live by.
Interesting that all of you replying are reading the polls-- I am such a pessimist that all day long I have muted the programs (and even watched a particularly white Hallmark fall movie) every time someone is excitedly reporting that the Democrats are totally doomed. You are all braver than I. Some days I stick my head up out of the burrow and it feels balmy out there, but most of the time reading our paper (which does NOT support the Big Lie, and says so, repeatedly-- for which there are always letters telling them they are biased in favor of evil liberals and sleepy Joe--) scares me to death. Mastriano, who must be reveling in his name on national lips, although he won't speak to or admit MSM reporters, is guarded by white christian nationalists from a church he favors. He also speaks, like the Crappy Cult Carrot himself, in coded words about his rival, who is Jewish. I don't think I am exaggerating to say that the danger in three weeks is palpable and real. Not just the election itself, but following it, regardless of the outcome.
They ARE Nazis. They ARE dangerous.
So…six months in the slammer for Steve Bannon. He should be happy. He can make a fortune on the grift when he gets out, playing the martyr card. But here’s my real question.
Will they let him wear three shirts in prison? And if so, will that be three different shades of orange?
Navarro should be next.
Congress has to pull the plug on these Trumpy assholes who defy subpoenas.
Will this sentence affect the thinking of the Fat Fascist? Probably not. He’s convinced that he is above it all. And although I’d rather see him tossed into the clink for his insurrection mongering or his absconding with stolen documents, I’d be okay with prison time for ignoring a subpoena, if it comes to that, just so long as the “con” in his title “con man” refers to convict as well as confidence.