text:
There was much shouting ("Shame, shame, shame!" "No bill, no break!" and "No fly, no buy!") Some of the Republicans shouted too, particularly Uncle Louie "Batcrap Crazy" Gohmert, who came completely unglued, but it was certainly no surprise. At one point, I remarked that it seemed more as if we were watching a session of Parliament in England, instead of the House of Representatives in the U.S.
Speaking of England, I think they just shot themselves in the foot with the majority voting for "Brexit." Guess the U.S. isn't the only country with a bunch of people who vote, having absolutely no idea what the hell they are voting for (or against). Apparently, after the vote, lots of the Brits were googling "UK," because they were not aware of the fact that they are (at least for the time being) a part of it! Oy! Some folks now want a re-vote. I can't say I would be against that; Brexit is going to be an absolute mess if it goes through. (The mess has already started.)
Trump went to Scotland, where he once again made an utter fool of himself, congratulating them for voting to leave the UK. Um, hey, Donald Dumbf**k, they voted over a year ago, and they voted to stay! The Scots, though, had a grand old time dumping on Trump via Twitter. One of my faves: "Scotland voted to stay & plan referendum, you tiny fingered, Cheeto-faced, ferret wearing shitgibbon." Gotta hand it to the Scots: they sure know how to dish out the insults!
Looking at this week's Sunday talks lineups, I'm really not sure what the topics will be, though I'm sure there are some hit-back dishing out coming from the Trump camp, since one of his advisors will be on "Meet the Press." Doesn't matter though. Trump and his hand puppets know how to hand out school-yard taunts; they ain't got nothin' on the Scots!
ABC's "This Week" – Labor Secretary Tom Perez; Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
NBC's "Meet the Press" – Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va.; Paul Manafort, adviser to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
CBS' "Face the Nation" – Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.
CNN's "State of the Union" – Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders; Sen. Bob Corker, Tenn.
Donald Trump's name lends itself to all sorts of mashed-up words, but we find it doesn't really work with the big story of the week. British voters decided to take the so-called "Brexit" (or "British exit") from the European Union. But what . . . → Read More: Friday Talking Points [397] — Taking The Trump Exit]]>
Donald Trump's name lends itself to all sorts of mashed-up words, but we find it doesn't really work with the big story of the week. British voters decided to take the so-called "Brexit" (or "British exit") from the European Union. But what should we call the increasing stream of Republicans flowing away from Trump's campaign? Truxit? Trexit? See, it just doesn't work all that well.
But whatever you call it, the number of GOP stalwarts now taking the Trump exit continues to increase. It's kind of astounding that so many in the party are fleeing their own presidential nominee, since this (to put it mildly) isn't normal. Normally, the party rallies around their candidate right about now, but these are not (again, to put it mildly) normal times.
Just in the past week alone, we had well-respected Republican foreign policy wonk Brent Scowcroft actually endorse Hillary Clinton for president. That's pretty stunning. Then there were a list of 50 Republican business leaders who also publicly announced they were supporting the other party's candidate. George Will is now pleading with Republican donors to not give Trump a thin dime. Senator Mark Kirk, who is in fear of losing his seat in Illinois, is proudly running away from both Trump and his own party (his recent ad boasts Kirk "bucked his party to say Donald Trump is not fit to be commander-in-chief"). Go on, tell us how you really feel, Senator Kirk!
One Republican was a bit more eloquent about his disgust towards Trump. Lionel Sosa, described as: "One of the few Hispanic political operatives able to help Republican candidates win large percentages of Latino voters," will be leaving the Republican Party if it nominates Trump. He explains why he's made this decision:
I'll have to bid [the Republican Party] farewell, hoping that one day soon, it comes to its senses. Here's my thinking. This madness could be temporary because our nominee is not really a Republican. Not a real conservative. He's just a shark, a self-promoter out to see how far his out-of-control ego can take him.
Instead of "Tear down this wall," the party promotes a new and bigger wall. A thousand points of light has been replaced by a thousand points of anger. In place of compassionate conservatism, our nominee promotes callousness, extremism and racism. And instead of a unifier, the party now cheers the ultimate "us against them" proponent. Divisiveness incarnate.
Wow. And that's all coming from Republicans, mind you. The Trump campaign had another bad week all around, beginning with Trump firing his campaign manager. The news that the campaign is essentially broke also hit hard. Trump ended the last filing period with less money in the bank than many House candidates. Hillary is outspending him in battleground states by over a $20-million-to-zero margin.
From all reports, Trump just doesn't like to do fundraising. Fundraising is a part of politics that most politicians hate, because it involves picking up the phone and calling wealthy people to ask them to send you a bunch of money. It's tawdry — there's no getting around it. Trump, so far, seems not to have called anybody on the GOP's "big donors" list. This, in addition to the "we're flat broke" campaign finance report, means GOP donors are now less inclined to make donations, even if Trump calls them up and personally asks. "Why throw away money on a losing cause?" the fatcats wonder. Making it even harder in the future for Trump to raise funds. It's a vicious cycle, and it couldn't be happening to a more deserving guy, really.
Trump tried to get back on offense this week, by giving a speech outlining all the ways he's going to be attacking Hillary Clinton over the course of the campaign. Unfortunately for Trump, most of it was laughably inaccurate and some of it descended to the level of flat-out conspiracy theory. Especially amusing was his claim that Clinton "was asleep" when the tragedy in Benghazi happened (she wasn't — it was three o'clock in the afternoon when the call came in, not three in the morning).
Clinton also gave a speech which attacked Trump right back. She got off one amusing line during it (about how all Trump's books "seem to end at Chapter 11"), but she still needs some work on her delivery. But beyond oratory style, Clinton's biggest danger this year is going to be running a too-conventional campaign strategy against Trump, who is making up his own rules as he goes along. One thing Clinton should do to practice facing hostility would be to give a press conference (since it's now been over 200 days since she last did so). If you can't even face reporters' questions, after all, how are you going to ever face Trump on a stage?
Three names have popped up on the shortlist for Hillary's veep choice: Senator Tim Kaine, HUD Secretary Julián Castro, and Senator Elizabeth Warren. Warren will actually be appearing on the stump with Hillary in Ohio on Monday, which could serve as an audition of sorts. Reports are that Clinton and Warren don't exactly have a close relationship, though, and there was a very disturbing story in Politico recently — which was disturbing on a number of levels:
Big Wall Street donors have a message for Hillary Clinton: Keep Elizabeth Warren off the ticket or risk losing millions of dollars in contributions.
In a dozen interviews, major Democratic donors in the financial services industry said they saw little chance that Clinton would pick the liberal firebrand as her vice presidential nominee. These donors despise Warren's attacks on the financial industry. But they also think her selection would be damaging to the economy. And they warned that if Clinton surprises them and taps Warren, big donations from the industry could vanish.
"If Clinton picked Warren, her whole base on Wall Street would leave her," said one top Democratic donor who has helped raise millions for Clinton. "They would literally just say, 'We have no qualms with you moving left, we understand all the things you've had to do because of Bernie Sanders, but if you are going there with Warren, we just can't trust you, you've killed it.'"
Personally, we think that is a dandy reason to pick Warren. Pissing off Wall Street would be a good thing, in our book at least. Forgive my language, but it actually comes from one of these donors, explaining why they wouldn't speak on the record: "There is no upside to my talking to you on the record. Either I piss off the Clinton campaign or I piss off Warren, or both."
Like we said, the whole article was a pretty cynical look at how politics works these days. Speaking of denouncing such a rigged system, Bernie Sanders made crystal clear what he wants now, in an op-ed he wrote for the Washington Post. Here are his opening and closing paragraphs:
As we head toward the Democratic National Convention, I often hear the question, "What does Bernie want?" Wrong question. The right question is what the 12 million Americans who voted for a political revolution want.
And the answer is: They want real change in this country, they want it now and they are prepared to take on the political cowardice and powerful special interests which have prevented that change from happening.
. . .
What do we want? We want to end the rapid movement that we are currently experiencing toward oligarchic control of our economic and political life. As Lincoln put it at Gettysburg, we want a government of the people, by the people and for the people. That is what we want, and that is what we will continue fighting for.
Bernie now says he'll vote for Hillary Clinton, so he's edging closer to trying to unify the Democrats for the general election campaign.
In other news, Marco Rubio has decided that he will, after all, run for re-election. The Washington Post summed this up in a single headline: "Marco Rubio Is Running For Senate Again. So That He Can Run For President Again." Florida voters, beware!
It was a busy week for the Supreme Court, with rulings that watered down the Fourth Amendment, reaffirmed affirmative action in college admissions, and punted (with a 4-4 tie) on Obama's immigration plans. This last one was a political loss for Obama, as he likely won't be in office when the issue is fully resolved.
In marijuana news, there is a bipartisan bill moving in Congress to essentially remove all the restrictions on medical marijuana research. The astonishing part is that it was written by both strong supporters of ending the War On Weed as well as the staunchest drug warriors in the House. Maybe with those co-sponsors it has a chance of passing, who knows?
Data is now in from Colorado, showing that legalizing recreational marijuana use among adults had almost no impact on underage marijuana use. None! If anything, teen use went down because of legalization. Add that to the enormous heap of wrong predictions (and outright lies) the public has been told about marijuana, for approximately the last century.
In related news (heh), Led Zeppelin won a court challenge to the originality of "Stairway To Heaven."
All kidding aside, we'll end where we began, with Donald Trump. There's one Republican candidate for office (for a House seat from Tennessee) who obviously isn't taking the Trump exit. In fact, he's actually gone beyond Trump in racism (something that's not all that easy to do). He put up a proud sign with his own charming take on Trump's signature slogan: "Make America White Again." Hey, since it seems to be the year to discard all the dog whistles in favor of just saying what you feel, why not? The sign later came down, but it's obvious we're in for a whole different style of politics on the Republican side, possibly for a long time to come.
This one is obvious. The Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week this week was Representative John Lewis, veteran of the Civil Rights battles, who staged a sit-in on the floor of the House of Representatives which lasted over 25 hours, in an effort to force a vote on gun control legislation that 85-to-90 percent of Americans want to see happen.
We already wrote this past week about what a brilliant piece of political theater this was. In fact, in the very first blog post I ever wrote, I called on Democrats (who, in 2006, were also in the minority in Congress) to start playing some offense instead of just moping about not being in charge:
Realistically, since Democrats don't control either house of Congress, they can't schedule floor votes on their issues (or even get them out of committee). But that doesn't mean they can't use the media to effectively start a national debate on their own "hot button" issues.
. . .
There's no shortage of good hot button issues to pick from that poll at 60%, 70% or even higher with the general public — in both blue states and red.
. . .
Democrats need to take back Congress, but the only way they'll do it is to give people a good solid reason to vote for them, not just against the other guys. Something Americans would be for without caring which party thought it up. Something a devout churchgoer in the Deep South could support as enthusiastically as a tree-hugger in San Francisco. Republicans can scream and rant about being anti-this or anti-that until they're blue in the face, but the average swing voter is going to think: "Wow, that's a good idea. That would make my life easier. I'm voting for that."
This is precisely what the House Democrats just did. Following the Senate's lead (after Chris Murphy's filibuster), they focused on only two gun control bills: universal background checks, and banning suspected terrorists from buying guns. Both poll astronomically high with the public at large.
Democrats are now vowing to vigorously make their case out on the campaign trail. This is a great idea. Put as much pressure on Republicans as humanly possible on both issues. The campaign ads would almost write themselves ("Congressman Smith wants terrorists to be able to buy guns!").
For leading this effort in the House, and for showing the country what Democrats look like when they're on offense, John Lewis is easily our Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week. He took an old civil disobedience idea and masterfully used it to radically change the debate on a very important issue. A hearty "Well done!" to Congressman Lewis and all the other Democrats who stood (or "sat") by him.
[Congratulate Representative John Lewis on his House contact page, to let him know you appreciate his efforts.]
Sadly, this one is also pretty easy this week. Representative Chaka Fattah was convicted of financial racketeering charges this week. You can read the whole sordid story for the details, if you'd like.
The icing on the cake, though, was Fattah's announcement (after he had been found guilty as sin) that he would be stepping down from his seat… in October — the day before he will be sentenced. Because, you know, another three months of salary isn't too much to ask, right?
Republicans began moving quickly to force Fattah out, so he quickly decided that it'd be better for everyone if he just stepped down immediately. But even attempting to cash a few more paychecks after a racketeering conviction was a pretty nakedly greedy move, so both for his many crimes and his attempt to cash in until the last possible day, Chaka Fattah is unquestionably our Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week.
[Since he is no longer a member of the House, his contact page will no longer be available. Maybe you could write to him when he starts his prison term, if you'd like to let him know what you think of his actions.]
Volume 397 (6/24/16)
Before we begin this week's talking points, we have some old business to take care of. A few weeks back, in FTP [374], we ran the final round of our "best playground taunt to call Donald Trump" contest. We had four finalists, but in the end we're going with the simplest and most elegant of the choices. We felt it was the most versatile, the most cutting, and the most dismissive label of all the suggestions we received.
The runner-up slogan is funnier, we do admit: "Crazy Uncle Donald." It universally brings to mind that relative you only see at Thanksgiving and Christmas who revels in being politically incorrect. However, we see this one as better for surrogates and attack dogs to use against Trump, because it is a little too blunt for a presidential candidate (one not named Trump, at any rate) to use. The word "crazy" is just a wee bit too much, at least to us.
Which is why we decided on "Poor Donald" instead. This is even more appropriate now that the Trump campaign appears to be in financial trouble. It fits in with Trump's refusal to release his tax returns — probably because he wants to hide how little he's actually worth. Literal meaning works just fine in saying "Poor Donald," but it also brings to mind nothing short of pity. It evokes the flavor of "Richie Rich, the poor little rich boy." Poor Donald — we should all hold a pity party for him.
We feel that this is calculated to get under Trump's orange skin in multiple ways, which was the whole point of the contest in the first place. So we congratulate Balthasar, a commenter at my blogsite, who came up with the winning entry. Woo hoo! You have earned respect (but, unfortunately, no actual prize), and we will begin using "Poor Donald" as many times as we can in the coming months.
OK, that's enough old business, let's get on with this week's talking points. As always, use responsibly.
92 percent
These first two come from a CNN poll with some eyebrow-raising statistics.
"Democrats in Congress held a sit-in this week to draw the public's attention to how bought-and-paid-for all the Republicans are on commonsense gun control laws. The N.R.A. calls the tune, and the Republicans dance. They refuse to even bring up a bill expanding background checks, even though an astounding ninety-two percent of the public agrees with the idea. Over nine out of ten Americans want Congress to act — and we bet that includes a whole bunch of constituents who are paying attention now and who will be paying attention this November in the voting booth."
85 percent
These first two are (if you'll forgive the analogy) a double-barrelled shot Democrats should be verbally firing.
"In the same poll, almost as many Americans support banning people on federal watchlists from buying guns — an astounding 85 percent of the public agrees with the idea. What's even more startling is that the support among Republican voters is actually higher than the average. A whopping ninety percent of Republicans want to see people on the No-Fly List or other terrorist watchlists banned from buying guns. Once again, in case you missed it, ninety percent of Republicans want to see Congress act. The N.R.A. doesn't want Congress to act. It's pretty easy to see that Republicans are completely ignoring the will of the people — their own partisan voters, even — in favor of kowtowing to a big campaign donor."
Getting out in front, for once
As mentioned earlier, it certainly is nice to see Democrats playing offense, for once.
"Count me among those who are pleased that Democratic politicians are making a stand (by sitting down) and for once going on offense on a political issue with sky-high public support. They should continue protesting Republican inaction right up to the election, in fact. Republicans have always been eager to explain why certain laws needed to pass for national security, always helpfully pointing out: 'If you're not a terrorist, this won't apply to you, so don't worry!' But when the subject of allowing suspected terrorists to legally buy high-powered military weapons, then Republicans balk. The public is not on their side, and Democrats are the ones showing leadership this time around. We can't force Paul Ryan to hold a vote in the House, but maybe if we make this a centerpiece of the election, we'll be able to get a vote under Speaker Pelosi next year. The time for moments of silence is over. The time for action is here. And you can bet your bottom dollar Democrats will be pointing this out from now to Election Day."
Ryan's other failure this week
Paul Ryan has had a pretty miserable week. So point it out!
"Paul Ryan rolled out the long-awaited official Republican replacement of the dreaded Obamacare this week. Initially, Ryan promised he'd roll out actual legislation to accomplish this, but then he found out this was too hard to do, for a simple reason: the numbers just don't add up. When you propose a bill, it has to be 'scored' to see what the outcome will be in dollars and other statistics (like number of people insured). But all the Republican ideas — each and every one of them — will actually cost more money than Obamacare, and have a worse outcome. So Ryan instead decided to just put out a 'white paper,' which is Washington-speak for 'some vague ideas with no actual details or numbers.' Republicans have had six years to offer up their magical replacement plan for Obamacare, and they still cannot do it because the numbers just don't add up."
Speaking of political stunts…
But there's an even better way to drive this point home.
"Paul Ryan complained that the Democrats were doing nothing more than (as he put it) putting on a 'political stunt' with their sit-in. If you're wondering why he's so cranky on the subject, it's because the Democratic effort completely buried his own political stunt this week. Ryan rolled out his replacement for Obamacare, straight from the Land of Make-Believe, which has no details and no numbers. When he took over leadership of the House, he promised he'd pass actual legislation — an actual bill to replace Obamacare. He could not do so because, as always, the Republican numbers just don't add up. So rather than provide real numbers, Ryan decided a political stunt would do the job just fine. Too bad for him that he chose a week to pull this stunt when Democrats showed how much better they are at political theater. Ryan was upset because their stunt blew his away in the media world, plain and simple."
Taking the Trump exit
Although admittedly not as catchy as "Brexit," we think this phrase nicely balances "jumping on the Trump train." When you want to get off it, it's not a train, it's a highway — and many are already heading for the exit lane.
"At this point, you have to wonder how many Republicans are going to eventually decide to take the Trump exit. Brent Scowcroft and 50 Republican business leaders did so this week, declaring their support for Hillary Clinton rather than supporting their own party's nominee. Latino Republicans are heading for the exit, too. Conservative columnist George Will is begging Republican donors not to donate to his party's presidential nominee. Has America ever had a presidential election where so many respected voices from one party have denounced their own nominee? At this rate, I'd have to warn Republicans to head for the Trump exit ramp as soon as possible, because as time goes by a real traffic jam may develop."
Only one year?
And finally, we had to end on a happy note.
"Can you believe it's only been a single year since the Supreme Court upheld marriage equality all across America? Thinking back to the time before the court ruled on the matter once and for all is like remembering some much more distant era in history. In only a year, gay marriage has been almost completely normalized. The political fight is over. Opponents have moved on to other (and smaller) political battlefields, and even Republican candidates for office now regularly refuse to even talk about gay marriage. That's a big change from when they confidently used it as a wedge issue in every election they could. Such a big change has happened so swiftly that it now feels like gay marriage was legalized a lot longer ago than a single year, in fact. This is the ultimate victory, folks — the other side has completely given up the fight. Soon it will become hard to remember a time when marriage equality wasn't the law of the land for all."
Chris Weigant blogs at:
Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant
Full archives of FTP columns: FridayTalkingPoints.com
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Even a cursory look shows that tension has increased as trust has diminished–not over emails, but over people who would make emails a long term issue of leadership, without identifying a single digital missive as a violation of state secrets–nothing close to the Wikileaks leaks of thousands of documents, embarrassing governments around the world, widely applauded by many progressives; nothing like Trailblazer, the NSA program that swept up micro-private communications from citizens who had broken no laws and were under no suspicion of unlawful activities; nothing like the data drop by Edward Snowden, now living in Russia, a contract employee for a private firm that clearly had no firewalls or procedures for digital security despite its big, out-sourced contracts; nothing like the Panama papers, 11.5 million documents of financial fraud and deception that represent a greater threat to US security and stability that anything identified in Hillary's emails!
Yet those Milt Romney termed the "47 percent" appear consumed with the lack of a "there" when it comes to Hillary's emails, seeing the absence as a more ominous threat than what actually exists in well known breaches that are rapidly being forgotten. It seems the country needs bigger scandals, even imaginary ones; greater dangers, larger fears, and our cultural machinery slogs these out by high capacity demand without reference to the facts. Our biggest non-profit industry (and a major profit center!) is fantasy fulfillment. Our single collective desire is to make our nightmares come true!
What are your darkest dreams? For the first time in American politics, they are real. They are possible. Right or left, black or white, rich and poor, victims and oppressors, men/women, gay/straight, immigrants and native born have found their rights impelled by the mob and the powerful.
So here are a few of the things that scare me. When Bangladesh, one of the first countries to have a cyber threat committed against its central bank that actually resulted in the loss of cash, tried frantically to contact the New York Federal Reserve, the repository of its funds, through emails and messages, because it was the weekend, no one at the Fed was available. In a global cyber system of finance, the Federal Reserve has no 24 hour hotline. The attempted billion dollar hack which resulted in $81 million disappearing into Filipino casinos, was committed after hours Thursday, the start of Bangladesh's weekend, but once discovered, its officials were not able to reach the New York Fed until Monday.
This is reckless disregard; it is the equivalent of putting a Master Lock (bullet proof!) on Fort Knox or the New York Fed's gold room on the weekend and calling off all security, assuming the lock will provide sufficient security for the wealth on the other side. This is stupidity! Apparently, in all of its threat scenarios, planning assets, security reviews, no one at the Fed ever thought about or planned for a cyber crime on the Fed's days off, during holidays and weekends. Except for the missing money, the criminals left no trace. And the global sentries of the international money system are left pointing fingers at each other.
A second abiding foundation of Digging Deeper is the idea of proportion, that dialogue should involve careful comparisons of cause and response; that time and space and content are important along with size and impact. Democracy can only create balance if its differences and called for solutions to incidents and issues, if problems and systemic failures are viewed through a prism of proportion. Proportion provides perspective. It ensures all sides are able to make their best case on issues that effect them. It should ensure weaker positions are eliminated, rather than being repeated.
In my nightmare, we have become a country without proportion. We amplify the same faults, thinking they will improve if we make them bigger. Trump's "Wall" is a perfect example: it replicates the failure of barriers by saying they just need to be bigger/taller/deeper/longer/more expensive. It is a symbolic idol of his nativism. It would be a shrine to hate and fear.
Every society is a mix of legal and illegal activities, human activity runs the whole continuum. Is it proportional? How can it be improved? Trump who used Jamaicans with special work visas in his resort properties would turn back Latin America workers without documents, putting the focus on documents rather than productivity and contributions socially and economically.
So in Texas, a Mexican student who graduated valedictorian was booed and criticized on social media when she announced she was here without papers. She was seen as having taken advantage of the system (a Texas public high school!) despite what she had achieved and was clearly capable of contributing! Proportion is required to approach a middle ground, to weigh facts and priorities, short and long term. Take her away, deny her the chance to study, place her else where, and what have we lost? Has the country been injured by her success?
Proportion fails often in the one place it is supposed to work. Witness the sexual assault case involving an unconscious female found semi-nude, her underwear removed, her skirt around her shoulders, her breast exposed whose journey through America's insanity was chronicled in her incredible insightful, sensitive letter about her inner journey after the attack and trial. She prepared the letter for the sentencing phrase of her perpetrator's trial. (View an enacted reading by Congressional women here. Read the letter here.)
Found guilty on three counts, the judge set a sentence which will imprison the convicted perpetrator for only three months in a county jail, a penalty his father thought was still too high for "twenty minutes of action."
It is a national irony and outrage that our justice system has many and massive failures, criminal and civil. Cleveland police fire 167 shots in a high speed chase of an unarmed couple and an officer leaps on the car hood to fire 49 rounds through the car's front windshield–and is found not guilty by a judge. In Ferguson, Missouri, a town passed, civil statue allowed police to arrest persons (principally, young black men) for "manner of walking" without an objective standard or any relationship to community peace and safety. Its enactment and enforcement was purely as a money maker, a revenue producer for the town's coffers.
Lastly, to show how proportion has changed, no community was profiled and no one in the crowded was interviewed or arrested after this act took place.
America must not forget the terror of its own violence. Or lose sight of how it was proportioned, if it is to be a voice and pillar of peace.]]>
Trump continues on his mission to destroy the Republican party. At least, that seems to be his mission. A number of companies have now said they will not lend any support to the Republican convention. Among them are Apple, Coca-Cola, HP, Wells Fargo, UPS, Motorola, JPMorgan Chase, Ford, and Walgreens. Keep going, 'pubs. By the time the convention rolls around, you'll be lucky if Fred and Martha's Grocery and Gas 'em Up will sponsor you.
After the horror that happened at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, and based on this Sunday's talk show line up, it appears the conversation, at least for now, is focusing more on the issues of guns and less on the issue of The Candidate Who Would Not Come In From The Cold, and The Candidate Hell Bent on Humiliating The US In The Eyes Of The World. Attorney General Loretta Lynch will be on all four of the main Sunday Shows. And of course, America's Number One Serial Killer, Wayne LaPierre, will stick his head out of his hidey hole too, but he only gets one appearance to Lynch's four. Good!
So, here you go. Enjoy — or not.
ABC's "This Week" – Attorney General Loretta Lynch; Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas; Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn.; Chris Cox, chief lobbyist for the National Rifle Association.
NBC's "Meet the Press" – Lynch; House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis.
CBS' "Face the Nation" – Lynch; Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump; Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president and CEO of the NRA; Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.
CNN's "State of the Union" – Lynch; Paul Manafort, Trump adviser; Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis.
Before we begin, we should mention that this week's talking points section consists of a few extended excerpts from President Obama's recent speech on fighting the Islamic State. What he had to say was important, and it counters several insidious talking points that . . . → Read More: Friday Talking Points [396] — No Magic Phrases]]>
Before we begin, we should mention that this week's talking points section consists of a few extended excerpts from President Obama's recent speech on fighting the Islamic State. What he had to say was important, and it counters several insidious talking points that have been used against him in the past, so we felt it was worth taking over this week's talking points. Just to warn everyone up front.
Because these excerpts are longish, we're going to once again have to punt on announcing the winners of our "what playground taunt should we call Donald Trump?" contest once again. Our apologies, and we swear we'll get to it next week (granted, that's what we said last week, but this time we really mean it).
We're also going to have to review the week's news in lighting fashion for an intro, because this column's already approaching Brobdingnagian lengths. Well, maybe not, but it sure is fun to run "Brobdingnagian" through the old spell-checker, and we have to find our amusements where we will in this job. Ahem. Enough meandering, let's just get on with it, shall we?
Of course, the tragic news from Orlando dominated the week's media, as once again someone with easy access to military-style weaponry takes dozens of lives. According to Donald Trump and John McCain, this is all Barack Obama's fault (of course). Personally, we think if you want to go back and point fingers, you'd have to include George W. Bush's inability to get an agreement with the Iraqi government to keep American troops there (Obama was merely following Bush's signed agreement, something McCain and all other Republicans seem to always conveniently forget), and we would even trace the real blame back to L. Paul Bremer's infamous first order of his stewardship of Iraq, which disbanded the Iraqi army and led directly to all the Sunni insurgencies since. Put plainly, if de-Ba'athifying the army had never happened, then the Islamic State would never have happened. Which John McCain (at the very least) should well know.
Newt Gingrich had another one of his patented horribly bad ideas, but we already explained why earlier in the week, so we'll just note it and move on. Thankfully, nobody else has picked up on the idea of resurrecting HUAAC.
The C.I.A. released some chilling documents detailing the torture it performed on prisoners (which included such phrases as "hung by the arms from the ceiling for almost a month" as well as one prisoner's statement: "Doctors told me that I nearly died four times"). To its credit, the Washington Post ran an article about the new documents using a headline which included the clear and unequivocal phrase "C.I.A. Torture."
Speaking of the Post, Donald Trump has now banned them from covering his rallies. In normal times, this would be shocking, but it's pretty much par for the Trump course, these days.
Some Republicans are still dreaming about dethroning Trump at their convention. Aren't they adorable, when they're asleep and dreaming such lovely dreams? Awww….
Speaking of adorable, Little Marco Rubio has now apparently decided that he does want to stay in the Senate, after all. Since he was so vocal about how he'd never do such a thing (tweet from last month: "I have only said like 10000 times I will be a private citizen in January"), it won't be very hard for Democrats to put together a few ads to remind voters of Rubio's disdain for his current job.
A fanatic in Britain killed a member of Parliament while shouting an extreme right-wing slogan, and now it seems he was inspired by American neo-Nazi groups. This immediately brought a promise from Republicans to root out such domestic support of international terrorism… oh, wait, that didn't actually happen, did it?
And finally, a nice comparison of two states, and the results of their experiments — on the left and right — as to how budgeting and tax policy really works in the real world (as opposed to "in conservative economists' fantasies"). In California, taxes were raised on millionaires. In Kansas, taxes were raised on the poor and slashed for the wealthy. How'd all that work out?
California's economy grew by 4.1 percent in 2015, according to new numbers from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, tying it with Oregon for the fastest state growth of the year. That was up from 3.1 percent growth for the Golden State in 2014, which was near the top of the national pack.
The Kansas economy, on the other hand, grew 0.2 percent in 2015. That's down from 1.2 percent in 2014, and below neighboring states such as Nebraska (2.1 percent) and Missouri (1.2 percent). Kansas ended the year with two consecutive quarters of negative growth — a shrinking economy. By a common definition of the term, the state entered 2016 in recession.
The article also points out Kansas is on the brink of a big credit downgrade "indicating there is a chance the state cannot pay its bills." Proof positive that trickle-down does not work (and indeed has never worked), and that raising taxes on the ultra-wealthy does not kill the economy one tiny little bit.
OK, that's enough of a wrap-up, let's move right along to the awards portion of our show.
We have two winners for this week's Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week award, both for impressive feats of political theater.
The first goes to Representative Gwen Moore from Wisconsin. Because of Republican attempts to force welfare recipients to undergo drug testing (to prove their worthiness), Moore successfully flipped this debate on its head with her own proposal: welfare drug testing for rich people. From the story:
Moore's bill would require a drug test for any tax filer who claims itemized deductions worth more than $150,000. So a wealthy guy who wants to write off massive amounts of mortgage interest would have to prove he's not on drugs.
If taxpayers with more than $150,000 in deductions didn't want to submit to a drug test, they could just use the standard deduction instead — meaning they'd pay a whole bunch more in taxes. This would only affect families which had roughly three times the average American family's income in deductions alone, so it wouldn't affect many folks out there. And if the sacred principle is that government helping people out financially requires drug testing, then why not?
Moore explained further what led her to make the proposal:
Moore told The Guardian her most direct inspiration for the proposal, which is unlikely to become law, came from House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), who unveiled his poverty policy agenda last week at a drug and alcohol treatment center in southeast Washington.
"When he stood in front of a drug treatment center and rolled out his anti-poverty initiative, pushing this narrative that poor people are drug addicts, that was the last straw," Moore said.
We've always been a big believer that the way to point out Republican hypocrisy is in the most scathingly ironic method possible, because that's really the only way to get anyone talking about the inherent contradictions in conservative ideology. If drug testing is going to be required for government benefits, why wouldn't we test those who are receiving the highest dollar amounts of such benefits? Brilliant!
While our first MIDOTW salutes a bill that is likely never going to become law, we also have to salute a senator who pushed as hard as he could to move towards actually passing meaningful legislation. Democrat Chris Murphy of Connecticut led the ninth-longest filibuster in American history this week, to force the Republican-led Senate to allow votes on two gun control bills from Democrats. Newtown is in Connecticut, making this a very personal subject for Murphy.
Murphy lasted until two in the morning, or almost 15 straight hours. In the end, he won — he got Mitch McConnell to agree to bring up the Democratic bills, possibly as early as Monday. That is pretty downright impressive, seeing as how filibusters rarely actually achieve their goals.
Now, this doesn't mean that either bill is going to pass. The first would ban people on the official watchlist of suspected terrorists from buying guns. Given the existence of such watchlists, it seems a reasonable thing to do — why should someone who is not allowed on a plane be allowed to buy a semi-automatic weapon? We have our doubts about the constitutionality of such lists in the first place (discussed earlier in the week) ourselves, but if we're going to have such a list it certainly isn't all that big a step to refusing them permission to buy weaponry.
The second would require background checks for all gun purchases, even those taking place online or at gun shows. This concept is overwhelmingly supported by the American public, but the National Rifle Association has so far been successful at blocking the idea.
As I said, even though Murphy secured a vote for these two measures, neither is likely to pass, making his filibuster an act of political theater. But again, we love a good bit of political theater, especially when it is even partially effective in moving the public debate at large.
Republicans have a crafty way to avoid paying a political price on the first measure — they've got their own proposal which seems to ban suspected terrorists from buying guns, but it is in fact so weak that nobody would likely ever be denied as a result (current stats show that people on these watchlists are already successful at buying guns nine times out of ten, it bears mentioning). This way, Republicans can counter Democratic political ads about "voting to allow suspected terrorists to buy guns," by saying in response: "I voted for the Republican version, which protected innocent Americans' Second Amendment rights." As we said, crafty.
But perhaps the tide is very slowly turning. During and immediately after the filibuster, there was actually some talk across the aisle of creating a bipartisan bill on the watchlist problem. These talks quickly broke down, and did not result in any meaningful compromise. But they took place — which is more than has happened in the past. So maybe there's hope, although likely not before an intervening election.
Gun control may not be as toxic politically as it was in the past for Democrats, with every passing massacre Americans are forced to witness. This week — whether legislatively successful or not — Senator Chris Murphy moved that debate forward in a big way. By (literally) standing his ground for 15 hours, he at least forced a Senate vote on two gun control measures that never would have seen the light of day otherwise. That is incredibly impressive, which is why he also is a winner this week of the coveted MIDOTW award.
[Congratulate Representative Gwen Moore on her House contact page, and Senator Chris Murphy on his Senate contact page, to let them know you appreciate their efforts.]
Sadly, we have to hand this week's Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week to Senator Bernie Sanders.
On Tuesday, the final primary (Washington D.C.) of the 2016 season happened. Bernie lost it, by an overwhelming margin. He met that day with Hillary Clinton, which was reminiscent of her face-to-face meeting with Barack Obama a few days after the final 2008 primary. But Clinton emerged from that meeting eight years ago and started working on her concession speech, which she gave four days after the primary season closed. This was her famous "18 million cracks in the glass ceiling" speech, in case anyone's forgotten.
Bernie, on the other hand, met with Clinton for 90 minutes and then gave an online speech of his own two days later. He hit all the high points of his agenda during this speech, but fell short in one big respect:
Bernie Sanders profusely thanked his supporters. He said he looked forward to working with Hillary Clinton to advance key issues. And he urged like-minded followers to run for state and local offices so they can continue the "political revolution" he began.
In short, during his 23-minute speech live-streamed across the country, Sanders sounded very much like a candidate prepared to drop out of the Democratic presidential race. But the senator from Vermont pulled up short Thursday night, neither conceding the party's nomination nor endorsing Clinton in the general election.
"The major political task that together we face in the next five months is to make certain that Donald Trump is defeated and defeated badly," Sanders said of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. "And I personally intend to begin my role in that process in a very short period of time."
But "defeating Trump cannot be our only goal," Sanders cautioned, speaking from his home town of Burlington, Vt.
We find this disappointing.
Bernie is trying to walk a tightrope here, between not being called a "sellout" by his supporters, and not looking like a spoiler to everyone else. He's stopped talking about winning over the superdelegates and wresting the nomination from Clinton at the convention. He knows this isn't going to happen. He is trying to exert as much influence as he can over the party platform and the future of the party as a whole, and we do understand that.
But the choice has now become a binary one. Either vote for Clinton in November, or run the risk Donald Trump will actually be president. Those are the only two choices left. Voting third party or writing in Bernie's name may make some of his followers feel better, but depending on how close that voter's state is, it could run the risk of President Trump. There's no other way to see it now.
This year, especially, we have seen some awfully artful language from Republicans on the subject of the precise definition of the word "endorsement." They've had to dance over these metaphoric hot coals already. So there are examples for Bernie to follow to offer even a half-hearted endorsement of Clinton: "I cannot let Donald Trump become president and thus even though I do not fully endorse her agenda I will be voting for Secretary Clinton in November."
That's all Bernie needed to say in his video speech. But, for once, Bernie is the one resorting to lawyerly hair-splitting language: "I personally intend to begin my role in that process in a very short period of time." What the heck is that supposed to mean? Bernie's role — whether he likes it or not — in the process of the Democratic nomination is now to fight for inclusion of his ideas in the platform, but also to support the only viable candidate who can defeat Trump in the fall.
Bernie already got an extra week. It was crystal clear after the California and New Jersey primaries that Hillary Clinton had won the Democratic nomination by every measure. D.C. voted a week later, which gave Bernie some time to adjust to this reality. Then he met one-on-one with Clinton for a long discussion. The fact that he still can't bring himself to offer even a half-hearted endorsement of Clinton now, though, is disappointing. The choice for Bernie now is: work to get Hillary Clinton elected, or run the risk of President Trump. So far, he has not made up his mind, which — even though we agreed with almost everything Bernie had to say in his video speech — is disappointing. So much as it pains us to say it, Bernie was our MDDOTW award-winner this week.
[Contact Senator Bernie Sanders on his Senate contact page, to let him know what you think of his actions.]
Volume 396 (6/17/16)
We started today intending to point out one important thing Obama said this week, but when we read the full transcript, we decided to just do away with the talking points altogether to focus on a few excerpts from the speech. If this disappoints you and you still crave some anti-Trump talking points, you could always check out what his fellow Republicans have been saying — just in the past week, mind you — about Trump's reaction to the Orlando shooting. Some of them are as snarky as anything we could dream up, so that should satisfy anyone looking for our usual fare here.
President Obama actually gave two short speeches this week which merited attention. The first is the one we're focusing on, where he addressed the press corps right after a previously-scheduled meeting on the Islamic State situation. But later in the week, Obama spoke again after meeting with the victims' families down in Florida, where he further expressed his frustration at the lack of political will on gun control and the fact that he has had to be "mourner-in-chief" far too many times. This speech was also well worth reading, but we're concentrating on the earlier one instead.
Obama began by accurately portraying the state of the fight against the Islamic State (which he calls "ISIL") — something usually missing in media reports on the fighting. The past year has truly been a turning point in the fight, at least against the "Caliphate" they've proclaimed for themselves on the ground in Iraq and Syria. In Iraq, the Islamic State has lost roughly half the ground it used to hold, and has lost all its battles. Anbar province is almost completely clear of the Islamic State, as Iraqi forces have retaken city after city. The only area left to clear is a border crossing and a few surrounding towns. That's a major accomplishment, seeing as how a little over a year ago the Islamic State was essentially on the doorstep of Baghdad and held almost the entire province. Mosul — the biggest battle of the war, most likely — remains to be cleared in the north, but Iraq has so far seen steady progress without a single reversal of fortune.
Syria hasn't been as much of a success story, but even there some incremental progress is being made by the various groups fighting the Islamic State (while also fighting each other, which certainly doesn't help). Here is Obama's overview of all the recent progress, from the official transcript:
At the outset, I want to reiterate our objective in this fight. Our mission is to destroy ISIL. Since I last updated the American people on our campaign two months ago, we've seen that this continues to be a difficult fight — but we are making significant progress. Over the past two months, I've authorized a series of steps to ratchet up our fight against ISIL: additional U.S. personnel, including Special Forces, in Syria to assist local forces battling ISIL there; additional advisors to work more closely with Iraqi security forces, and additional assets, including attack helicopters; and additional support for local forces in northern Iraq. Our aircraft continue to launch from the USS Harry Truman, now in the Mediterranean. Our B-52 bombers are hitting ISIL with precision strikes. Targets are being identified and hit even more quickly — so far, 13,000 airstrikes. This campaign at this stage is firing on all cylinders.
And as a result, ISIL is under more pressure than ever before. ISIL continues to lose key leaders. This includes Salman Abd Shahib, a senior military leader in Mosul; Abu Sa'ad al-Sudani, who plotted external attacks; Shakir Wahayb, ISIL's military leader in Iraq's Anbar province; and Maher al-Bilawi, the top ISIL commander in Fallujah. So far, we've taken out more than 120 top ISIL leaders and commanders. And our message is clear: If you target America and our allies, you will not be safe. You will never be safe.
ISIL continues to lose ground in Iraq. In the past two months, local forces in Iraq, with coalition support, have liberated the western town of Rutbah and have also pushed up the Euphrates River Valley, liberating the strategic town of Hit and breaking the ISIL siege of Haditha. Iraqi forces have surrounded Fallujah and begun to move into the city. Meanwhile, in the north, Iraqi forces continue to push up the Tigris River Valley, making gains around Makhmour, and now preparing to tighten the noose around ISIL in Mosul. All told, ISIL has now lost nearly half of the populated territory that it once controlled in Iraq — and it will lose more.
ISIL continues to lose ground in Syria as well. Assisted by our Special Operations Forces, a coalition of local forces is now pressuring the key town of Manbij, which means the noose is tightening around ISIL in Raqqa as well. In short, our coalition continues to be on offense. ISIL is on defense. And it's now been a full year since ISIL has been able to mount a major successful offensive operation in either Syria or Iraq.
All of these points are almost never brought up during the coverage of the presidential race (or in any other context) in the mainstream media. The fight is slow, but the good guys have been winning for a while now. You'd think that would be news.
Obama then spoke of how the Islamic State's finances have also been targeted, and made a plea for obstructionist Republicans to put America's national security over their petty partisanship in the Senate:
In continuing to push on this front, I want to mention that it is critical for our friends in the Senate to confirm Adam Szubin, my nominee for Under Secretary of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence. Adam has served in Democratic and Republican administrations. Everyone agrees he's eminently qualified. He has been working on these kinds of issues for years. It's now been more than a year since I nominated him — more than 420 days — and he still has not been given a full vote. There is no good reason for it. It is inexcusable. So it's time for the Senate to do its job, put our national security first, and have a vote on Adam Szubin that can lead our financial fight against ISIL and help keep our country safe.
Hint to Democrats looking for attack ads against sitting Republican senators: here's a dandy issue for an ad! Political inactivity has consequences, for us all. Obama seems almost eager to get into the fray of the campaign himself these days, and his approval rating just keeps going up, so we're looking forward to hearing more of this sort of thing in the weeks ahead.
But the real reason we decided to highlight this speech so heavily was when Obama started talking about a favorite bugaboo of Republicans everywhere, most recently regurgitated by Donald Trump: the "magic phrase" Obama refuses to use. Last year I wrote about this bizarre GOP concept:
There's an ongoing debate about the phrase "Islamic terrorism" (or "radical Islam" or similar phrasings), where conservatives insist that if politicians (specifically President Obama) would merely use the correct phrase to describe things, it will somehow bestow magical benefits. "Did you hear President Obama today?" the jihadists would incredulously say to each other, "He actually used the term 'radical Islamists' to describe us! We must have won the battle of ideas, so there's just no point in fighting on anymore. Here's my AK-47, I'm going back to my home village to grow olives." Although ridiculous, this is precisely what some Republicans seem to believe.
Finally, this week, Obama addressed this argument head-on and destroyed it once and for all. He absolutely knocked it out of the park. We thought it was a shame that when Obama's remarks were reported on television news, they were always cut to a single short soundbite or two. Because Obama eloquently buried this ridiculousness forever, and he deserves credit for the breathtaking way he did so. So here is what Obama had to say, in full, to finish this week's talking points section.
And let me make a final point. For a while now, the main contribution of some of my friends on the other side of the aisle have made in the fight against ISIL is to criticize this administration and me for not using the phrase "radical Islam." That's the key, they tell us — we can't beat ISIL unless we call them "radical Islamists." What exactly would using this label accomplish? What exactly would it change? Would it make ISIL less committed to trying to kill Americans? Would it bring in more allies? Is there a military strategy that is served by this? The answer is none of the above. Calling a threat by a different name does not make it go away. This is a political distraction. Since before I was president, I've been clear about how extremist groups have perverted Islam to justify terrorism. As president, I have repeatedly called on our Muslim friends and allies at home and around the world to work with us to reject this twisted interpretation of one of the world's great religions.
There has not been a moment in my seven-and-a-half years as president where we have not been able to pursue a strategy because we didn't use the label "radical Islam." Not once has an advisor of mine said: "Man, if we really use that phrase, we're going to turn this whole thing around." Not once. So if someone seriously thinks that we don't know who we're fighting, if there's anyone out there who thinks we're confused about who our enemies are, that would come as a surprise to the thousands of terrorists who we've taken off the battlefield.
If the implication is that those of us up here and the thousands of people around the country and around the world who are working to defeat ISIL aren't taking the fight seriously, that would come as a surprise to those who have spent these last seven-and-a-half years dismantling al Qaeda in the FATA [the tribal areas of Pakistan], for example — including the men and women in uniform who put their lives at risk and the Special Forces that I ordered to get bin Laden and are now on the ground in Iraq and in Syria. They know full well who the enemy is. So do the intelligence and law enforcement officers who spend countless hours disrupting plots and protecting all Americans, including politicians who tweet and appear on cable news shows. They know who the nature of the enemy is.
So there's no magic to the phrase "radical Islam." It's a political talking point; it's not a strategy. And the reason I am careful about how I describe this threat has nothing to do with political correctness and everything to do with actually defeating extremism. Groups like ISIL and al Qaeda want to make this war a war between Islam and America, or between Islam and the West. They want to claim that they are the true leaders of over a billion Muslims around the world who reject their crazy notions. They want us to validate them by implying that they speak for those billion-plus people; that they speak for Islam. That's their propaganda. That's how they recruit. And if we fall into the trap of painting all Muslims with a broad brush and imply that we are at war with an entire religion — then we're doing the terrorists' work for them.
Now, up until this point, this argument about labels has mostly just been partisan rhetoric. And, sadly, we've all become accustomed to that kind of partisanship, even when it involves the fight against these extremist groups. And that kind of yapping has not prevented folks across government from doing their jobs, from sacrificing and working really hard to protect the American people.
But we are now seeing how dangerous this kind of mindset and this kind of thinking can be. We're starting to see where this kind of rhetoric and loose talk and sloppiness about who exactly we're fighting, where this can lead us. We now have proposals from the presumptive Republican nominee for President of the United States to bar all Muslims from emigrating to America. We hear language that singles out immigrants and suggests that entire religious communities are complicit in violence. Where does this stop? The Orlando killer, one of the San Bernardino killers, the Fort Hood killer — they were all U.S. citizens.
Are we going to start treating all Muslim-Americans differently? Are we going to start subjecting them to special surveillance? Are we going to start discriminating against them because of their faith? We've heard these suggestions during the course of this campaign. Do Republican officials actually agree with this? Because that's not the America we want. It doesn't reflect our democratic ideals. It won't make us more safe; it will make us less safe — fueling ISIL's notion that the West hates Muslims, making young Muslims in this country and around the world feel like no matter what they do, they're going to be under suspicion and under attack. It makes Muslim-Americans feel like their government is betraying them. It betrays the very values America stands for.
We've gone through moments in our history before when we acted out of fear — and we came to regret it. We've seen our government mistreat our fellow citizens. And it has been a shameful part of our history.
This is a country founded on basic freedoms, including freedom of religion. We don't have religious tests here. Our Founders, our Constitution, our Bill of Rights are clear about that. And if we ever abandon those values, we would not only make it a lot easier to radicalize people here and around the world, but we would have betrayed the very things we are trying to protect — the pluralism and the openness, our rule of law, our civil liberties — the very things that make this country great; the very things that make us exceptional. And then the terrorists would have won. And we cannot let that happen. I will not let that happen.
Chris Weigant blogs at:
Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant
Full archives of FTP columns: FridayTalkingPoints.com
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Mouse: To say I'm disappointed would be an understatement. What do we have to do get Sanders to admit defeat?
Grumpy: Far from quitting his losing campaign for President tonight I expect . . . → Read More: Go Back to the Senate Bernie. You are Needed There.]]>
Mouse: To say I'm disappointed would be an understatement. What do we have to do get Sanders to admit defeat?
Grumpy: Far from quitting his losing campaign for President tonight I expect Sanders to shift the focus from Hillary to the DNC. I expect to hear a virtual declaration of war against the platform committee, specifically Barney Frank and Dannel Malloy. His favorite target, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, will also get star billing in his diatribe. While I am not Schulz's biggest fan I find myself liking her more and more each time her name is mentioned by Sanders.
Mouse: Me too. I refuse to fall down and worship every nugget of so-called wisdom that falls from Sanders' mouth, and there is nothing wrong with DWS.
Grumpy: Here is how CNN sums it up:
Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign is winding down — but his fight with the Democratic National Committee is just getting started.
The Vermont senator has called for the ousting of leadership from the convention committee level up to the top — publicly insisting that DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz be replaced. And his campaign wants two well-known Democrats removed from key posts at the national convention in Philadelphia next month.
"I do believe that we have to replace the current Democratic National Committee leadership," Sanders told reporters in Washington Tuesday as the last Democratic primary voters went to the polls. "We need a person at the leadership of the DNC who is vigorously supporting and out working to bring people into the political process."
Mouse: Losers don't set the agenda. Go away, Sanders.
Grumpy: But don't take CNN's word for it, here is what Sanders' spokesman Michael Briggs told Reuters:
"Tomorrow night, no, he's not ending it," Briggs said of the campaign. "We're working our way through that, how to go forward on that front. This message to supporters is going to be a lot broader than that."
Briggs added:
"We see the convention as a serious opportunity for a serious discussion about a lot of these issues. We hope the Democratic Party establishment can figure out a way to open its arms and welcome into the party fold the people who have been excited by Bernie's campaign," Briggs said.
I have heard the voices of the people Briggs is talking about. I have read their vile hate on the internet. As a "big D" Democrat my entire adult life I say these people do not belong in the Democratic party anymore than the Dixiecrats did. Those that reviled Clinton with worn out disproven conspiracy theories do not belong in the Democratic party. Those that jeered at adults and children while simply trying to go to a Clinton rally do not belong in the Democratic party.
Mouse: Independents are upset their attempt at taking over the Democratic party with their little revolution didn't work. If they want to run a candidate for President, they should start with lower offices and work their way up. Sanders was never a Democrat and I hope this is the last time our party allows someone like him to run with a D after his name.
Grumpy: The primaries are over, Sanders lost. It was not as close as he and his supporters like to pretend. It was not nearly as close as the contest in 2008 between Obama and Clinton. Yet now comes Sanders, an Independent until he needed the Democratic party to give his political aspirations plausibility and which the aforementioned Debbie Wasserman Schultz allowed. It is time for the DNC leadership from President Obama on down to state and local party chairs to speak with one voice to Sanders and tell him to get back to his full time job in the Senate. There are real problems that need fixing and his vote there is needed there far more than his squawking about the rules of a party he only just joined.]]>
In fact, the applause he receives is a meter for terrorist success! It measures the divergence of fear over thought. It represents the abandonment of America's founding principles. It abrogates the defense of freedom and replaces it with tyranny. The foundation of Trump's response is not freedom but fear that inflames hate.
Fear is easily produced; the first fight against terrorism is a fight against our own inner fears, fear of the unknown threat, the horror of terror, its absolute violence, its mindless destruction, its national pall of grief. The hard work in the fight against terrorism–to be applauded!–is finding strength within our grief. Casting out our fear and refusing to blame each other for the evil of others–and getting the others right. The others are not members of a group, but holders of a mind set. A mind set of destruction and devastation that extracts a high toll that Trump would further extend.
Orlando in its grief and devastation is our shining example. In Orlando, a city commissioner has pointed out hate against the gay community or the Muslim community debases our values. That terror makes small acts of love important. In Orlando, Muslims have joined with the gay community, without denial or judgment; religious leaders of all faith have ministered to a community broken, in need of healing, showing us loss need not become uncontrollable rage, an imploded hole that sucks the rest of us into a vortex of hate and suspicion where we surrender–by our applause.
Be careful what you clap for! Temptation is easy. Hate is not a shield. Fear will not go away without inner strength. Actions that say otherwise will fail, after the applause fades.]]>
I urge you to start inside out. Put your beliefs aside and for a moment feel the grief; the pall that hovers over the explosion that took place in Orlando. Don't think about scripture, the 2nd amendment, or gay sex; take away all the barriers that prevent you from seeing the dead as the living–before labels and names, they were people. On Saturday night, they were dancing and drinking; a universal celebration.
Now think: were you called to judge? Do you dance? Know joy? Start inside with joy. Think how good it feels. Think how good the dead felt, the joy they knew moments before they died. We all share that joy. It crosses every barrier, transcends every rule, is asked for in the prayers of every faith, and comes in manifold ways.
Today, contribute your joy. Not for your predictions, not for how you believe that divine grace has spoken in stern warning–leave aside joy for your unassailable absolutes. Find common joy: with the lives of those now dead. Extend a hand for the grace of common joy. Bigger than our beliefs is the call for peace.]]>
Speaking of The Donald, I heard a clip of a speech he gave the other day, wherein he said that Hillary will prevent people from worshiping as they want, AND (this is really cookoo) that she will make it legal for women to have an abortion right up until their due date. Um, right. :eyeroll:
Hillary is now considered the presumptive nominee. I'm very happy about that, but it appears that some folks, who preferred the other Dem candidate, ain't so very happy. Saw something on Facebook yesterday about how "millions" of votes have not yet been counted. Well, those votes were mailed in and/or provisional. They are starting to count them, and guess what? Hillary is still ahead. Well, the other guy's fans say, I just know she cheated because Hillary!
You know, I used to look forward to election season, but after this one, I think I am losing that feeling. Hopefully it won't get too much worse, if it does, I might have to put myself in a coma just after I mail my ballot in, kin future elections.
Anyway, here are the Sunday talk show lineups. (Beware, as always, of lies, damned lies, and a distinct lack of solid statistics.)
ABC's "This Week" – Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders; Paul Manafort, adviser to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump; House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis.; U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara of New York.
NBC's "Meet the Press" – Sanders; Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz.
CBS' "Face the Nation" – Sanders, Ryan, Flake; Corey Lewandowski, Trump's campaign manager.
CNN's "State of the Union" – Sanders; John Podesta, campaign chairman for Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.]]>
Whither the fabled "Party of Lincoln"? That was the question on the minds of many Republicans this week, at least based on how often they used the phrase. Now, we're used to scathing attacks on character being hurled in the . . . → Read More: Friday Talking Points [395] — GOP's "What Would Lincoln Do?" Moment]]>
Whither the fabled "Party of Lincoln"? That was the question on the minds of many Republicans this week, at least based on how often they used the phrase. Now, we're used to scathing attacks on character being hurled in the frenzy of a presidential campaign. Indeed, it's woven into the fabric of American politics. It's just that in normal years, these attacks are flung across the aisle, at the other party's nominee. It is extraordinary that all of the vicious attacks we're going to feature in our talking points section this week came from Republicans, all aimed squarely at their own party's presidential nominee. Seriously, when in the past have you ever heard the term "unendorse" used? We haven't checked, but we believe it just got coined and added to the political lexicon. It hasn't existed before because the concept hasn't ever existed before (again, in our own memory, at the very least). But we're going to get to all this in great detail later, so let's just move along for now.
Oh, one technical side-note, before we begin: for those of you anxiously awaiting the results of our "what to call Donald Trump?" contest (which ran last week), compiling the list of anti-Trump statements today took so much time that we're going to have to judge the contest next week. Our apologies for the delay.
In non-presidential news, Paul Ryan definitely fell flat on his face this week. Actually, he fell flat on his face in presidential news as well (in answering press questions after his event), but this week was supposed to be the glorious time when Ryan began unveiling his much-touted Republican agenda — those things his House would be passing as soon as possible. Ryan deluded himself into thinking he could come up with a legislative agenda acceptable to his House caucus, when he first took the job of leading them. He was going to pass a whole bunch of bills to prove to the country what a wonderful forward-thinking agenda Republicans were capable of. Months of work went into this effort, but in the end Ryan had to severely trim back his own expectations. None of this stuff would be written into actual bills, he explained (while backing down from his grandiose earlier promises), because that was just too hard to do, given all the Tea Party radicals he had to keep happy. Instead, he'd just be listing some vague suggestions, in some white papers nobody would ever read. This week was to mark the first one of these, on solving poverty (by spending less money on the poor, of course). Here is how Dana Milbank of the Washington Post snarkily began his coverage of the event:
Seven white men and a white woman, Republican members of Congress all, boarded vehicles on Capitol Hill on Tuesday morning for a voyage deep into Anacostia, a largely black and poor section of Washington.
Their mission: to reassure nonwhite voters frightened by Donald Trump, their party's presumptive presidential nominee.
Their odds of success: exceedingly low.
The lawmakers must have perceived their mission to be risky, for they traveled with a veritable arsenal: a Capitol Police "mobile command center" truck, a canine unit, four or five squad cars and a half-dozen black police vans. Police closed the street to traffic, and security officials wearing plainclothes and earpieces kept a watchful eye in all directions as a white van disgorged the lawmakers at the residential addiction-treatment program they were visiting. House Speaker Paul D. Ryan zoomed up moments later in his two-Suburban motorcade.
The lawmakers, six of them in matching blue dress shirts, sat at a table in the shelter's basement, then invited the cameras in to capture a few seconds of their supportive nods and ingratiating smiles while African-American residents told their tales of recovery. Later, they reassembled outside, where the GOP officials gave a news conference while residents of the shelter, House of Help City of Hope, stood silently, human props in the background.
Ouch. Ryan should be happy he got even snarky coverage, though, because the story of the day became not his poverty white paper, but instead what he had to say about Donald Trump (which we'll get to, later).
Republicans running for office had better get used to what has happened over the past week or two, because it is going to be the "Groundhog Day" event of the entire campaign. The cycle will play out again and again, so the GOP better get used to it now: (1) Donald Trump says something incredibly bigoted, (2) Donald Trump then doubles down, refusing to apologize in any way, (3) every single Republican running for office anywhere is then asked: "So what do you think of what Trump just said?"
That's how it's going to go, so our guess is that Republicans will be thinking about that whole "Party of Lincoln" thing for months to come. "WWLD?" might just become the theme of the entire campaign, in fact.
Many inside-the-Beltway types (even a few Republicans) appear downright shocked that any racism might still exist out there in the hinterlands. Which is why we're ending this intro with the following news: Waco, Texas is finally getting around to desegregating a cemetery. Since it was created (back in 1875), there's been a fence down the middle of the graveyard, complete with separate entrances in the perimeter fence. Black people were buried on one side of the dividing line, white people on the other. And the fence still exists. A city councilman said in 2014: "That should have been taken out 75 years ago," but it took two more years for anything to be done about it. The city's been moving this slow for decades, apparently. From a story a newspaper ran in 1971, a cemetery association leader talked about how "the absurdity of the cemetery's segregating fence" had been discussed "for decades," and added the pithy quote: "I suppose they wanted that so the black ghosts wouldn't go over there and bother the white ghosts." But this absurdity continued for another 45 years and is only now being torn down. In this political season full of talk of building fences, it's good to see at least one racist fence come down, although you have to wonder what, exactly, took them so long?
The obvious choice for Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week this week would be Hillary Clinton, who clinched the party's nomination with impressive victories in four states this Tuesday, including winning California by double digits.
However, we gave her the award last week (kind of in anticipation), so we're going to just hand Hillary another Honorable Mention instead. Because we really feel that President Barack Obama deserves the MIDOTW award this week, instead.
Obama became relevant to the presidential race this week, as he endorsed Hillary Clinton and began laying out a campaign schedule to travel to the Midwest and other swing states in support of Clinton. Obama also acted as middleman this week, meeting personally with Bernie Sanders before he released his endorsement of Clinton. And then he followed it all up with a hilarious appearance last night on Jimmy Fallon's show.
Barack Obama's poll numbers have been inching steadily upwards since January. On the Real Clear Politics rolling daily average, his job approval is now over 49 percent. Obama has already broken through the 50 percent barrier in many individual polls, and he now seems poised to do so in the average, as well. This will be the first time he'll have managed this feat since the first two months of his second term, so it's no small accomplishment. His approval rating among Democrats is sky-high, and the New York Times points out an odd historic fact: Obama will be the first sitting (second-term) president to actively campaign for his own party's replacement since Ronald Reagan. Al Gore thought Bill Clinton was too toxic (there are many who blame his loss on his refusal to let Clinton campaign for him, in fact). George W. Bush was obviously too toxic — he hasn't even been to a Republican National Convention since 2004, in fact, because he's still too toxic for the party. This means that Obama giving rousing speeches for Hillary will be the first time a sitting president has done so in a very long time.
Obama is at his best on the hustings, in case anyone's forgotten. Even his fiercest detractors grudgingly admit "the man knows how to give a speech." Which means this is the start of Obama being in the news in the most positive way possible for months to come — which will likely push his approval rating even higher.
Obama won't just be campaigning for Hillary, he'll also be publicly making the case for his own presidential legacy. To see him broker a peace between Hillary and Bernie was just the kickoff to the general election season — a season where Obama will be fully engaged with the voters once again. When we look back at the 2016 election later, this will be seen as the week when Obama got off the bench and started to mix it up again in the world of presidential politics. Which makes him our choice for Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week. Personally, we're looking forward to hearing a few zingers from Obama out on Hillary's campaign trail. And we're definitely not alone in that.
[Congratulate President Barack Obama on his White House contact page, to let him know you appreciate his efforts.]
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is this week's Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week, for fiercely defending his attack on free political expression.
Cuomo has essentially created a blacklist of people and companies which his state will no longer do business with. Anyone who joins or advocates for the "BDS" movement gets put on the blacklist. Once again: a political stance taken means the state government blacklists you. That should horrify anyone who believes in constitutional government. Whether you agree with the movement or not, such heavy-handed tactics are flatly un-American.
For those unfamiliar with the term, BDS refers to "boycott, divestment, and sanctions" — political tactics that were used very successfully against the apartheid government of South Africa in the 1980s. Without endorsing the movement itself (plenty of other people are out there to explain the movement or try to convince you to join it, for those disappointed that we're not fully endorsing the movement), we have to point out that these are entirely peaceful measures being urged against the governmental policies of Israel towards the Palestinians. These are not some militant radicals trying to forcibly oust Israel's government. And protesting the policies of the current government of Israel doesn't automatically make you an anti-Semite (if it did, a large portion of Israel's own population would be guilty of the sin).
But to the foes of BDS, the movement is somehow a lot more sinister. The word most often used is "delegitimize" — that's what BDS is trying to do to the state of Israel itself. The second-most often word used is "anti-Semitic," but that one always gets tossed around in this debate. The pro-Israel people accuse the BDS movement of not being legitimate, and of trying to delegitimize Israel. Here's how Andrew Cuomo explained it in the Washington Post this week:
If you boycott Israel, New York will boycott you.
Indeed, a new front has opened in the fight against Israel's existence. Just as the U.S.-Israel relationship has developed a robust and burgeoning commercial dimension, the threats against Israel have acquired one. There are those who seek to weaken and undermine Israel through the politics of discrimination, hatred and fear.
New York will not tolerate this new brand of warfare. New York stands with Israel because we are Israel and Israel is us.
Um, no. Israel is not America's 51st state. It just isn't. We may "stand with" Israel" (or other such soaring platitudes) but to say that we are them and they are us is just flat-out wrong. And to call a peaceful movement a "new brand of warfare" is nothing short of propaganda.
Again — all of this seems obvious even if you don't agree or support the BDS movement. Why were the tactics fine to use against South Africa but somehow "the politics of discrimination, hatred and fear" when used against Israel? That makes no sense.
Cuomo is free — either as a private citizen or as leader of his state — to denounce the BDS movement until he is blue in the face. That's called free speech. He is free to argue against it, cajole people to denounce it, or any other action designed to fight against it short of abusing his governmental power.
But for a government itself to blacklist people and companies under its power — purely over their political beliefs — is nothing short of totalitarianism. Constitutionally, there are only two choices for any governmental agency to make: either allow all political speech, or none. There simply is no in-between where governments get to pick and choose which political beliefs they will reward. When the KKK wanted to join the "adopt a road" cleanup program in many states, the state could not specifically ban them for their beliefs. They had to either accept them into the program, put up the same sign as they do for everyone else ("this stretch of highway cleaned by…") or they could just end the adopt-a-road program altogether. Schools are faced with the same choice for organizations (many schools tried to ban gay-rights groups like PFLAG, and were told to either allow the group to form or ban all such groups altogether).
Governmental action and speech must be politically neutral. The power of government is so great that it cannot be abused to settle political scores. This is a basic tenet of America, in fact. But apparently it's one that Andrew Cuomo hasn't heard about. Oh, and also that thing about there only being 50 states, too. For his lack of understanding, we hereby award the Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week to Andrew Cuomo. Maybe he ought to read up on New York history, specifically how Tammany Hall held so much power through patronage — or the doling out of plum jobs to those who toed the political line. Such tactics belong on the ash-heap of history, not in new blacklists from the governor's office.
[Contact New York Governor Andrew Cuomo on his official contact page, to let him know what you think of his actions.]
Volume 395 (6/10/16)
If there's one thing Democrats are truly united about this election season, it is the unacceptability of Donald Trump to lead our nation. So it's pretty easy to put together talking points for Democrats to use to express their revulsion of Trump and all he stands for, because all Democrats largely agree on the subject.
This week, however, we're turning the talking points over to Republicans. Because the scathing things members of his own party are saying about him are even more instructive, since there is no question of them being mere partisan attacks. Now, it's a little puzzling why Trump's comments about a judge have lit this fire, since Trump hasn't been shy about expressing very similar sentiments from the day he announced his campaign ("they're rapists"). But for whatever reason, the Republican Party seems to have woken up to the fact that they're about to nominate a racist for president, and some of them are starting to speak out — very loudly, at times.
Good for them. Better late than never, and all of that. Squaring the circle of "I condemn Donald Trump's racism" and "I'm going to vote for him, and I urge everyone to do the same" has become increasingly difficult. Paul Ryan really set off this stampede (in answer to a question asked at his poverty dog-and-pony show), weakly arguing that Trump would be better than Hillary Clinton:
I disavow those comments. I regret those comments that he made. Claiming a person can't do their job because of their race is sort of like the textbook definition of a racist comment. I think that should be absolutely disavowed. It's absolutely unacceptable.
But Ryan's still going to vote for the man he's disavowing as absolutely unacceptable: "Do I believe Hillary Clinton is the answer? No I do not."
The New York Post responded with a scathing cover ("I'm with racist"), but comedian D.L. Hughley probably summed it up best: "What [Ryan is] saying is that a racist is better than a liberal." Hughley later added: "I think you can't be a little bit pregnant or a little bit racist."
Michael B. Keegan also raises an interesting connect-the-dots point over at the Huffington Post about the whole fracas, with the beautifully self-explanatory title: "While Trump Makes Racist Attacks On Judge, GOP Holds a Supreme Court Seat for Him to Fill?"
Since it's been such an interesting week, instead of our usual Democratic talking points ripping into Republican positions we're going to present a list of Republican talking points — because they're doing such a great job ripping into their own party's nominee. Most of these people are still going to vote for and support Donald Trump, although a few are indeed already walking away from him. The first group of these comments all come from a Salon article which helpfully put them all in one place (and these are just the best ones, there are plenty of others listed):
Senator Ben Sasse [R-NE]:
Saying someone can't do a specific job because of his or her race is the literal definition of racism.
Senator Marco Rubio [R-FL]:
[Judge Curiel] is an American, born in the U.S., a judge who has earned that position. I don't think it reflects well in the Republican Party. I don't think it reflects well on us as a nation.
Ohio Governor John Kasich:
Attacking judges based on their race and/or religion is another tactic that divides our country. More importantly, it is flat-out wrong.
Newt Gingrich:
I don't know what Trump's reasoning was, and I don't care. His description of the judge in terms of his parentage is completely unacceptable.
Senator Rob Portman [R-OH]:
The fact that the judge has a Mexican-American heritage has nothing to do with how you should describe his judicial ability. The guy was born in Indiana. He's as American as I am.
Representative Jackie Walorski [R-IN]:
Questioning a judge's impartiality based on his ethnicity is not only inappropriate, it has no place in American society.
Senator Jeff Flake [R-AZ]:
His statements this week on the judge — that's a new level… Because it's not just… ill-informed or ignorant statements, but they suggest that when he's president, you know, after November, that… perhaps he ought to go after that judge. That's a whole new level. So that's — it's very disturbing.
Alberto Gonzales:
The call for a recusal of a judge based solely on ethnicity in my judgment is wrong and to do it publicly in my judgment demeans the judge and really does hurt the reputation of the judiciary, and I just think it was inappropriate the way that Donald Trump did it in this case.
Senator Mark Kirk [R-IL] faces a tough re-election battle this year in a blue state, and he's the first one to "unendorse" Trump. Kirk says he'll be writing in David Petraeus for president when he votes. From what he had to say:
I cannot and will not support my party's nominee for President… I have spent my life building bridges and tearing down barriers — not building walls. That's why I find Donald Trump's belief that an American-born judge of Mexican descent is incapable of fairly presiding over his case is not only dead wrong, it is un-American…. I think we should send a strong message that racism and bigotry are not going to be tolerated in the party of Lincoln.
From the same article, Senator Jeff Flake had more to say on why he hasn't supported Trump and still won't be:
Let's face it: meet the old Trump, just like the new Trump. We've got what we've got. That's not somebody who can win the White House. "We're going to build a wall and make Mexico pay for it" is not a serious proposal. [Voters] want serious proposals on how to deal with this war on terrorism. Saying that you're going to ban Muslims from entering the country is not a serious proposal.
Susan Collins [R-ME] is still on the fence, however:
[Trump's comments] make it very difficult for me. It makes the decision [to endorse him or not] a hard one.
So is Senator Bob Corker [R-TN], who is still holding out for the "presidential" Trump to emerge:
He's got this defining period that's over the next two or three weeks where he could pivot, can pivot, hopefully will pivot to a place where he becomes a true general election candidate.
Good luck with that line of wishful thinking, Senator Corker!
Senator Lindsey Graham [R-SC] urged other Republicans to unendorse their party's presidential nominee:
If anybody was looking for an off-ramp, this is probably it. [Trump's comments are] the most un-American thing from a politician since Joe McCarthy. [I urge] Republicans who have backed Mr. Trump to rescind their endorsements. There'll come a time when the love of country will trump hatred of Hillary.
From a different interview with Graham:
There are a lot of people who want to be loyal to the Republican Party, including me. There'll come a point in time where we're gonna have to understand that it's not just about the 2016 race, it's about the future of the party, and I would like to support our nominee: I just can't.
Wow — tell us how you really feel, Lindsey!
A state senator from Iowa, David Johnson, publicly announced he was going one step further, and exiting the Republican Party altogether.
I will not stand silent if the party of Lincoln and the end of slavery buckles under the racial bias of a bigot. [Trump's] campaign to reality TV and large crowds and divisive language and all the trappings of a good show for those who like that kind of approach, and that's what happened in the 1930s in Germany. I think that's all I need to say, but certainly the fascists took control of Germany under the same types of strategies. Mark me down as Never Trump.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell thinks he has the answer: Trump just needs to read prepared speeches from now on. Problem solved! No, really:
I object to a whole series of things that he's said — vehemently object to them. I think all of that needs to stop. Both the shots at people he defeated in the primary and these attacks on various ethnic groups in the country…. I think he'd have a much better chance of winning if he would quit making so many unfortunate public utterances and stick to the script.
The Washington Post helpfully explained what McConnell was trying to achieve, in the snarkiest of ways:
This is fascinating stuff on many levels. Note that McConnell "vehemently objects" to Trump's attacks on various ethnic groups, but will continue to support him provided he reads from a prepared script that no longer includes such attacks — in other words, provided Trump stops saying these things aloud.
That's really the root of the Republicans' problem with Trump, isn't it? "Don, you're not supposed to say this stuff in public," is really what it boils down to. Perhaps Trump himself needs a course from Republican Talking Points University — are there any openings left for the summer session of "Dog Whistling 101"?
But that's really too much to hope for, for some clear-eyed Republicans. GOP strategist Mike Murphy has a very realistic view of Trump's chances in November:
To win what Trump would have to do is change the perception women have of him. Because white men are only a third of the electorate. So you can win them by 40 percent and it's still not enough…. He would need to dramatically change the perception people have of him now. And since Trump can't change, I think his answer is less in political strategy and more in a team of shrinks to get him back into some sort of mentality where he understands he has to change. This would require Trump to entertain the possibility that his antics and depravity are alienating a lot of people, and it's not clear he's capable of doing that.
Gotta love that "team of shrinks" jab, Mike! Which brings us to our final Republican angst of the week, from Michael Gerson, who still clings to the notion that his party is somehow better than all those millions of Trump voters are proving it to be:
So what were senior Republicans thinking when they endorsed Trump? I don't want to underestimate the difficulties involved in opposing one's own presumptive nominee. There is tremendous political pressure to be loyal to the team. The arguments against doing anything that might help Hillary Clinton are strong. "This is about moving our agenda forward," said Ryan in justifying his Trump endorsement.
Republican leaders, in other words, thought they were in a normal political moment — a time for pragmatism, give-and-take, holding your nose and eventually getting past an unpleasant chore.
But it is not a normal political moment. It is one of those rare times — like the repudiation of Joe McCarthy, or consideration of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, or the Watergate crisis — when the spotlight of history stops on a single decision, and a whole political career is remembered in a single pose. The test here: Can you support, for pragmatic reasons, a presidential candidate who purposely and consistently appeals to racism?
When the choice came, only a handful of Republicans at the national level answered with a firm "no." A handful. It was not shocking to me that the plurality of an angry Republican primary electorate — grown distrustful of establishment leaders — might choose a populist who appeals to racial prejudice. It is shocking to me — and depressing and infuriating — that almost no elected Republicans of national standing would stand up to it.
By this standard, Sen. Ben Sasse is the moral leader of the GOP. But given the thinness of his company, many of us will never be able to think about the Republican Party in quite the same way again. It still carries many of the ideological convictions I share. Collectively, however, it has failed one of the most basic tests of public justice: Don't support racists — or candidates who appeal to racism — for public office. If this commitment is not a primary, non-negotiable element of Republican identity, then the party of Lincoln is dead.
Of course, some Democrats have been pointing out for decades now that Lincoln would be horrified at the modern Republican Party (say, from Nixon onwards…). But it's good to see that some Republicans are finally coming around to the same realization. Maybe there's hope, for some of them at least.
Chris Weigant blogs at:
Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant
Full archives of FTP columns: FridayTalkingPoints.com
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text:
Bowman 2 Mature Content
Clear Vision Mature Content
Zombie Train Mature Content
Bowman 2 Mature Content
Clear Vision Mature Content
Sniper Assassin Mature Content
Sierra 7 Mature Content
Trainyard Shootout Mature Content
Ricochet Kills 2 Mature Content
Storm Ops Mature Content
Palisade Guardian 2 Mature Content
Palisade Guardian Mature Content
Total AG Ratings: 3,654
i am on 38 level
this is a good game but having grenades would come in handy
Boring, forces keep firing at someone that isn't there, game won't continue
I am on level 29. now no other level is coming.
Really fun, easy to control, it has a nice learning curve and the difficulty increases at a nice rate! My only complaints are that you don't seem to use the other snipers apart from Lone Wolf most of the time and there's no way to save your progress.
Very cool game, makes you feel as if you were in the middle of the action :)
low frame speed , not enough weapons to fully sustain an all out onslaught which is given in the tenth stage . bazookas would be handy , no way to win .
nice game
i like this game
great game im on 11 its impossible

subset: commoncrawl