#congress poll debacle

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

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Supreme Outrage!

April 26, 2024

ROBERT B. HUBBELL

The Supreme Court heard oral argument on Thursday regarding Trump's presidential immunity defense. For clarity, that defense asserts that the president is above the law and beyond the reach of US criminal statutes that otherwise apply to every American. To the shock of everyone—and no one—the reactionary majority expressed sympathy for Trump's defense. The hearing itself was a supreme outrage. While the reactionary majority may not adopt the most extreme version of Trump’s defense, they need not do so to grant Trump a victory. Indeed, they have already granted Trump most of what he asked for: a lengthy delay.

Before I review the debacle that masqueraded as a Supreme Court hearing, let’s skip to the most important part: We have a remedy; we need only be bold enough to claim it. The current court is illegitimate; we must effectively replace it by enlarging the Court to overwhelm the reactionary majority.

Is such a plan reasonable? Constitutional? Wise? Achievable? Yes! Mitch McConnell created an Orwellian rule to deny Democratic presidents the right to appoint Supreme Court justices—and then waived the novel rule as soon as it would apply to an appointment by a Republican. Three justices (at least) lack legitimacy: Gorsuch and Barrett, whose appointments were tainted by the McConnell rule, and Clarence Thomas, who should recuse himself from every case relating to Trump. In short, one-third of the Court that heard Trump's arguments on Thursday had no business presiding over Trump's immunity claim.

Expanding the Court requires only a majority vote in both chambers of Congress and the signature of the president. Those conditions are within our grasp in November 2024. When I first raised this prospect in 2018, it was met with shock and horror by readers, who protested that expanding the Court would undermine its legitimacy. Such objections seem quaint in light of the damage wrought by the Court in six short years.

As Ian Millhiser of Vox wrote today,

One takeaway from today's debacle of a Supreme Court argument is Democrats need to start seriously considering packing the Supreme Court. A Court that would allow Donald Trump to get away with trying to steal a presidential election cannot be trusted.

We have a long list of issues that should drive us to the polls in historic numbers in November. Add to that list that we are burdened with a lawless Supreme Court that cannot be trusted with our democracy or Constitution.

As noted above, the reactionary majority granted Trump a victory before the hearing began by refusing Jack Smith’s request to skip the intermediate step of an appeal to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals. The Court enhanced that victory for Trump by refusing to hear the matter on an expedited schedule. And now it appears that the Court will issue a fractured opinion on the last day possible (June 30) that will order the trial court to engage in pointless pre-trial fact-finding about the difference between “private” and “official” acts.

But most critically, the reactionary majority gave Trump a victory by dignifying ludicrous arguments that should have been rebuked and condemned the moment Trump's counsel gave them voice. In failing to reject those arguments out of hand, the reactionary majority bestowed upon them the veneer of legitimacy and respectability they do not deserve.

For example, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor asked Trump's lawyer,

If the president decides that his rival is a corrupt person and he orders the military to assassinate him, is that within his official acts to which he has immunity? Trump's lawyer responded, “That could well be an official act [and therefore immune from prosecution]”

How did we arrive at this point? How is it possible that counsel for a former president could say with a straight face that a president can order the assassination of a political rival with impunity? How could the justices sit silently and ponder counsel’s answer instead of rising in horror and ordering the attorney out of the courtroom? They are feckless. They have abandoned the Constitution in its hour of need by failing to communicate the horror and repulsion such arguments deserve.

The reactionary majority also gave Trump a victory by refusing to acknowledge the constitutional urgency of the attempted coup and insurrection. Rather than focusing on the facts alleged in the indictment against Trump, the reactionary majority crafted ever more fanciful hypotheticals that had no bearing on the case at hand. As expressed by Professor Laurence Tribe,

Today’s SCOTUS argument was more like a hearing in Congress to design an immunity law for future presidents, with Justice Kavanaugh saying “We’re not taking about the present case” and Justice Gorsuch saying “We’re writing rules for the ages” and Justice Alito joining in.

Only Justice Jackson reminded her colleagues that deciding this case was the Court’s task and that it might not be cool to use it as a vehicle for “answering in advance all these abstract questions”!

By engaging in fantasy rather than focusing on the facts at hand, it is inevitable that the Court will send the case back to the trial court for pre-trial fact finding—an outcome that will ensure the case will be delayed until after the election. The Court will thus deny all Americans the opportunity to cast their vote with the benefit of a jury verdict on Trump's guilt or innocence.

Justice Alito reached the pinnacle of bad faith by arguing that not granting immunity to Trump would increase the likelihood that a future president would try to stay in power. Huh? Every president before Trump relinquished power voluntarily without benefit of presidential immunity. If Trump is told he has absolute immunity and wins a second term, what motivation would he have to leave office—ever?

Alito also summited the peak of hypocrisy. In Dobbs, he wrote that there is no constitutional right to an abortion, reasoning as follows:

Constitutional analysis must begin with “the language of the instrument . . .  The Constitution makes no express reference to a right to obtain an abortion . . . .

But the Constitution make no reference to “presidential immunity.” As counsel for Jack Smith argued,

There is no immunity that is in the Constitution, unless this Court creates it today.

Do not expect blatant hypocrisy to slow Alito’s headlong embrace of presidential immunity that appears nowhere in the Constitution. Alito knows no shame in service of his reactionary agenda.

For additional discussion of the oral argument and potential outcome, see

Ian Millhiser in Vox, The Supreme Court is likely to place Donald Trump above the law in its immunity case (excellent legal summary), and

Chris Geidner at Law Dork, SCOTUS approach to Trump's immunity claim likely to delay D.C. case further (substack.com) (deep dive into argument by counsel and questions by justices).

Millhiser predicts an outcome along the following lines:

At least five of the Court’s Republicans seemed eager to, at the very least, permit Trump to delay his federal criminal trial for attempting to steal the 2020 election until after this November’s election. And the one GOP appointee who seemed to hedge the most, Chief Justice John Roberts, also seemed to think that Trump enjoys at least some immunity from criminal prosecution.

As summarized by Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo, The Court is Corrupt. Say It With Me. Per Marshall,

The Roberts Court is a corrupt institution which operates in concert with and on behalf of the Republican Party . . . That’s the challenge in front of us. . . . But things become more clear-cut once we take the plunge and accept that fact.

The courts are not going to save us. The reverse is true. A significant portion of the federal judiciary has been corrupted and undermined by judges loyal to a reactionary religious and partisan agenda above all else. They view the Constitution and statutes as convenient “talking points” when they advance their agenda and disposable trifles when they do not.

Our remedy is at the ballot box. We must give Joe Biden control of Congress and a mandate to reform the federal judiciary—starting with the Supreme Court. We can achieve that goal if we are disciplined and tenacious. Put aside all disagreements and reservations to ensure Democrats win control of the executive and legislative branches in 2024. Then we can begin the long, slow work of repairing the damage inflicted in a few short years by the reactionary majority empaneled by Trump, McConnell, and The Federalist Society.

[Robert B. Hubbell Newsletter]

[mightyflamethrower]

e should dispense with the tired narrative that four conscientious state and federal prosecutors—independently and without contact with the Biden White House or the radical Democrats in Congress—all came to the same disinterested conclusions that Donald Trump should be indicted for various crimes and put on trial during the campaign season of 2024.

The prosecutors began accelerating their indictments only once Trump started to lead incumbent Joe Biden by sizable margins in head-to-head polls. Moreover, had Trump not run for the presidency, or had he been of the same party as most of the four prosecutors, he would have never been indicted by any of them.

Yet now they are in a doom loop of discovering that the more they seek to rush to judgment before the election and gag Trump from speaking publicly about these star-chamber proceedings, the more he rises in the polls.

In truth, each succeeding cycle of corrupt leftwing lawfare that ends in failure—the Russian collusion hoax, the weaponized first impeachment, trying ex-president Trump in the Senate as a private citizen, the laptop disinformation set-up, the Alfa bank ping caper, the pathetic attempt to erase Trump from state ballots, and the unfolding Fani Willis moral debacle—does not return things to zero.

Rather, they serve as force multipliers for each other. Each overreach geometrically increases the dangers to democracy, ever more turns the public off, and ironically cascades sympathy and poll numbers for the very target of their paranoias.

Some of the prosecutors have colluded with White House lawyers and congressional liaisons. Some had run for office, offering campaign promises to get Trump convicted for something or other.

Now, after years of delays and deadends, all four are rushing to synchronize their trial dates to ensure that the front-running Trump is on the docket daily and not out on the 2024 campaign trail.

Do we recall when leftist legal eagles claimed that of all the iffy Trump indictments, Georgia prosecutor Fani Willis had the best case against Trump?

The phone call, we were told, was proof of “election interference.” It was Willis who got the first Trump “mug shot.” It was Willis, we were assured, who got Trump with the goods on tape, begging election officials to “find” the requisite missing votes that would prove his victory (note that he did not say “invent” the votes but to look for a supposedly existing trove of them).

And now Willis’s signature case is in shambles.

We learn, allegedly, that 1) Willis hired her stealth boyfriend Nathan Wade as a special counsel, the day before he filed for divorce (whose records were then mysteriously sealed by the court); 2) that Wade so far has received over $650,000 as special counsel, reportedly including a miraculous ability to charge for 24 hours of continuous legal service in a single day; 3) that Willis and Wade allegedly have used her greenlighted windfall to him to go on a number of pricey junkets and cruises; 4) that to try an ex-president and the leading candidate in the 2024 presidential election, Willis picked Wade who had never tried a single felony case and was previously a “personal injury/accident” lawyer; 5) that the supposedly apolitical Willis had consulted with the January 6 partisan congressional special committee, while Wade had met for marathon meetings with the Biden White House legal counsel (and apparently billed Georgia taxpayers for receiving such federal tutorials).

The legal community’s initial dismissal of this sordid prosecutor’s office is reminiscent of the immediate efforts to downplay Claudine Gay’s plagiarism. But the charade will eventually end the same way, in this case with the resignation and likely indictment of the prosecutor, along with her boyfriend, who concocted quite a scheme at the expense of the taxpayers. Both have made a mockery of their indictment of an ex-president and, if the allegations are true, will be disbarred and prosecuted.

The other three indictments are even weaker. Alvin Bragg claims that Donald Trump’s efforts a near decade ago to enact nondisclosure agreements and payments to remain silent about embarrassing behavior constituted “campaign finance violations.”

If so, what then defines campaign violations when Ms. Clinton brazenly destroyed nearly 30,000 subpoenaed campaign-era emails, ordered subpoenaed communication devices smashed, illegally hired a foreign national to find dirt on a campaign rival, and used three paywalls to hide her hush payments to British subject Steele to concoct a smear dossier—with help from Russian sources—to destroy her 2016 rival?

Letitia James, apparently for the first time in New York history, believes a bank was somehow wronged when its seasoned auditors viewed Trump’s assets, approved a loan to him, profited from his timely payments of interest and principles, and lodged no complaints against Trump or his company.

James apparently believes that Donald Trump is the first and most egregious real estate baron in New York history who inflated the value of his holdings. Her indictments thus supposedly have nothing to do with a left-wing political activist who ran for attorney general on promises to get Trump.

As far as Jack Smith, he supposedly was to be focused on Trump’s removal of classified presidential files to an insecure location at his Mar-a-Lago home and Trump’s “insurrectionary” actions on January 6. But he seems way beyond that now and is trying to put a gag order on the presidential frontrunner and to ensure Trump is in court during the 2024 campaign—challenging the very administration that appointed Smith in the first place.

In truth, Trump was the first ex-president in history to be indicted for a dispute with archivists over the status and security of removed classified files. Such disagreements were historically adjudicated bureaucratically rather than criminally, and certainly not with performance-art FBI swat raids into an ex-presidential residence.

Moreover, true insurrectionists do not instruct protestors to assemble peacefully and patriotically. Insurrectionists themselves do not try to overthrow governments while unarmed and accompanied by bare-chested buffoons with cow horns and slow-moving septuagenarians draped in American flags. And during an “insurrection,” unarmed “rebels” are usually not invited into the government quarters by supposed government doormen, among them perhaps 150-200 FBI informants. They are usually not shot and killed for the crime of entering a broken window while unarmed. And governments need not lie about the violence of insurrectionaries if they are truly insurrectionists.

Jack Smith’s problem—aside from his similar previous effort as special counsel to bankrupt and destroy the life and career of former Virginia governor Bob McDonald, a conviction overturned 9-0 by the Supreme Court—is that his indictments are so asymmetrical as to be surreal.

If the Department of Justice really wishes to prosecute insurrection, then it should concentrate on 120 days of arson, looting, killing, and violent protests that destroyed $2 billion in property, led to over 35 deaths, injured 1,500 law enforcement officers, and saw a federal courthouse, a police precinct, and a historic church torched by protestors, months of violent chaos planned and orchestrated by Antifa and Black Lives Matter, and enabled by leftwing inert mayors and governors.

The future Vice President of the United States, Kamala Harris, sought to organize bail for violent rioters. She boasted on television that the protests would not stop, should not stop, and would continue beyond the 2020 elections. Could she have at least suggested to the rioters to protest “peacefully and patriotically?” And just last week, President Biden praised that months-long violent summer of looting, violence, arson, and destruction, calling it “the historic movement for justice in the summer of 2020.”

Or Smith could investigate the well-orchestrated and increasingly violent pro-Hamas rallies. These are “insurrections” that have stormed the California legislature, occupied the Capitol rotunda, defaced and defiled iconic federal monuments and cemeteries, shut down key bridges and freeways, attacked law enforcement, and led to violence and assaults.

If Trump is guilty of removing files that he had the statutory right as president to formally declassify, then what was senator and subsequent Vice President Joe Biden guilty of when he stealthily and unlawfully removed hundreds of files, kept the removals secret (until his administration went after Trump for the same offense), and sloppily stored them in his insecure garage?

At each juncture of these extra-legal efforts, past precedents, former customs, and accepted traditions are being destroyed by the Left, whose endless miscarriages of justice are the real threats to constitutional government. And the more impotent these serial and unending gambits become, the more strident and desperate they appear.

[commonsensecommentary]

America’s “Great Revulsion” Of 2022

It is the time of the year for election forecasts. 

So far, as is the case with most prognosticators, my record is somewhat mixed.  However, I will, nonetheless, foolishly go where wise men fear to tread and offer up my best guesses for the upcoming 2022 midterm elections.

The single issue likely to drive this election is apparent every time we walk into a grocery store, fill a prescription, or gas up our cars: galloping, relentless, corrosive price inflation.  Now stealing our wages at a rate not seen for 40 years, the escalating cost of simply surviving is driving Americans ever deeper into debt and prompting many to make horrid decisions between paying for food, medicine, or heat with the coming of this winter.  Financial stress and insecurity is striking deep into many households, and no relief seems to be in sight.  The mealymouthed responses of Joe Biden and his band of blithering economic advisors to this economic crisis have inspired little confidence and engendered much anger.

The concerns that Americans have about crime and public safety are also having a huge impact on voters.  Continuing Democratic policies that defund and denigrate the police, release those arrested for supposedly minor crimes without charges, and eliminate a bail system that has historically helped to keep those charged with violent crimes locked up until their trials have forced many frightened Americans to buy guns—and now Democrats want to take away that remaining protection too.  

Convincing Americans that their Party has no interest in catching and convicting criminals is a rather bizarre way for Democrats to try to win the 2022 election cycle.

Of course, the Democrats' most cherished hope is that abortion politics will prove decisive, but the post-Dobbs fervor of only a few months ago seems to have faded.  Worse still for Democrats, both Black and Hispanic voters are clearly not the monolithic bloc of dependably Blue ballots they are often presumed to be, and the functional limits of relentless identity politics, which were recently revealed by the racial and ethnic train wreck now transpiring in the raucous Los Angeles City Council, might become even more apparent when the final vote totals are tallied on November 8th.

The polls now show that a number of Democrats involved in races for the Senate, House, and Governorships are dealing with slipping support, and frantically waving the talisman of Donald Trump and shouting about right wing extremism apparently have lost their magical ability to move moderate voters into the Democratic column.

The escalating cost of living is a huge crisis.  Crime is a big issue.  Attempting to forgive students loans in order to buy some votes at taxpayer expense seems not to have resonated with most voters as the Bidenistas hoped it would, and the fatiguing and futile attempts of Democrats to milk the pandemic panic for every penny are turning off Americans, who are beginning to suspect that their lives were turned upside down in order to both justify massive Blue State bailouts and jack up the stock prices of Big Pharma so that members of Congress could cash in.

Moreover, the continuing scandal of nearly non-existent border security, resulting in millions of illegal immigrants entering our country, is hard to miss despite every effort by Democrats to ignore or downplay this problem.  Furthermore, watching Joe Biden humiliate himself and our nation by begging Saudi Arabia and Venezuela for the oil he refuses to allow American companies to pump domestically is a public proclamation of both his idiocy and weakness.  We also cannot ignore foreign policy missteps that have, according to Joe Biden himself, raised the terrifying specter of a nuclear exchange on the battlefields of Ukraine.  And who can forget the debacle of our precipitous and halfwitted withdrawal from Afghanistan, which was a case study in inept leadership by our brain dead Commander-in-Chief?

Nothing is now going right for America, but I suppose we can be thankful that the so-called Inflation Reduction Act that was signed in August, which was never intended to bring down inflation in the first place, has ensured that the IRS can hire tens of thousands of new agents so that our income taxes can be more easily audited.  Another dose of hundreds of billions of dollars of federal borrowing to fund its many other provisions will help to force interest rates higher for the foreseeable future, keep lots of D.C. lobbyists employed, and ensure that less money will be available for the true emergencies facing America and Americans.  Hooray.

Unsurprisingly, President Biden and his hapless sidekick, a Vice President who seems only slightly less clueless than her flailing boss, are both distinctly unpopular.  Their ranting dislike for at least half of the American population—those who, incidentally, do most of the work, spill most of the blood, and fly most of the flags in our nation—is both abundantly apparent and supremely distasteful.  It certainly drives national Democrats crazy to have to pretend any concern whatsoever for those Americans who don't reside in Brooklyn or Berkeley, and their Party's disdain and condescension for so many decent and law abiding citizens has driven away a lot of swing voters who find the closet Marxists, gender benders, and Gaia worshippers now driving the Democrat's political and social agenda to be just a bit cuckoo—and scary.

We also cannot ignore another obvious and telling sign that Americans have lost faith in the Democrats running our country into a ditch: Nobody wants to enlist in Joe Biden's Woke military.  When our warriors decide they no longer want to fight for America, it's time to do some serious soul searching about the current direction of our nation.

I am going to go out on a limb, although I really don't think I'm wrong here, and predict that Democrats are due for a pretty significant electoral thumping in just a few weeks.  Given that the last few election cycles have amply demonstrated the electoral polls routinely undercount Republican voters, the fact that the predictive models are showing wholesale Democratic weakness in many previously safe contests would seem to indicate that the reality is a Republican Wave that could easily turn into a Red Tsunami.

The frustrations Americans are now feeling remind me, to be perfectly honest, of the disgust directed at the Democrats in 2016.  Just as in that election, I suspect many will not be voting for Republicans because they are enamored with a specific candidate or their platform; they will, instead, be voting against Democrats.  The 2022 elections will, I believe, go down in history as "The Great Revulsion" directed against Democrats, their policies, and the incredible incompetence featured in the Oval Office and beyond.

Donald Trump was lifted into the Oval Office by the anger many voters felt toward Hillary Clinton and the Democrats.  I believe we are seeing a similar dynamic today.  Joe Biden is the poster child for every aimless, ineffective, expensive, intrusive, and extremist policy now being championed by the ultra-liberal left wing of his party.  

Whether we are talking about forcing biological boys into the girls' locker rooms of our nation's schools, turning every issue facing our country into a racial conflict, or insisting that abortion right up to the point of a live natural birth is not flirting with infanticide, Democrats have firmly and fanatically planted themselves on the wrong side of most of the voters in this nation, many of whom are moderates who are fed up with ideological warfare and overt censorship masquerading as sensible governance.

It seems impossible to believe there will not be a terrible price to be paid at the ballot box for betraying our nation and its citizens in so many ways, and we will learn just how thorough this repudiation will be in only a few short weeks.

This will not be a Revolution: we’re simply revolted by where our country is being dragged without our consent by crazies.

[neutralgray]

A Synthesized History: An Amateur Comparison of the Perspectives between the "Patriot's," the "People's," & The "True" History of the United States - Part 17

Full Essay Guide link: XX

(Patriot - Chapter 20 | People - Chapter 20-22 | True - Chapter 32-34)

The Conservative Renaissance

American opinions on their own government were at an all-time low. The national embarrassment of the Vietnam War coupled with Nixon's political scandals generated waves of cynicism that could be measured in American sentiment. The Harris Poll (an analytics company that has tracked opinions among Americans since 1963) demonstrated that between 1966 and 1975, confidence in the president and Congress dropped from 42% to 13%, confidence in the military from 62% to 29%, and confidence in business from 55% to 19%. The Survey Research Center of the University of Michigan posed this question: "is the government run by a few big interests looking out for themselves." In 1964 the response to that question was met with only 26% saying "yes." In 1972, 53% of poll-takers felt that was the case. When it came time to elect another national leader, voter turnout dropped significantly, from 63% to 53%. The message was clear: people did not trust the government.

James Earl Carter Jr (Jimmy Carter) was elected the next president of the United States. Carter was a democrat and was likely voted in less on his own merits, and instead simply because he wasn't a Republican like Nixon. When he entered office, the United States was suffering from overspending in Vietnam and embargoes from middle eastern nations due the United States' continued support of Israel (a middle eastern Jewish state that was founded after WWII with support from many prominent members of the United Nations).

Carter demonstrated a pessimistic mistrust of the government he was elected to run, but used his presidential powers to enact the policies he felt were best. On his second day in office, he pardoned all draft dodgers of the Vietnam War, likely in an attempt to have the nation move on from the debacle. One of his biggest political motives was tackling energy usage, wanting to move away from fossil fuel dependency and embrace alternative forms of energy. Some of his policies and their political implications were inconsistent, though. Initially, Carter attempted to help the economy with stimulus spending, but when that did not achieve any short-term measurable results, he shifted to cuts and tighter budgets. This was reminiscent of FDR, who often probed at the economy with experimental and inconsistent policies.

Big industries were beginning to leave the United States behind. Regulations from OSHA, the EPA, and the Consumer Products Safety Commission restricted what companies could do. In response, companies spent more on legal teams and lobbyists, while passing the new regulatory expenses onto the consumer rather than take a cut to their bottom dollar. Cheaper labor and fewer regulations across the ocean were naturally exploited by these companies, often returning much more significant profits over their investments. Between 1950 and 1965, $8.1 billion dollars were invested in American-owned European factories for a profit margin of $5.5 billion dollars. Compare that metric to the investments and profits made in Latin America and Africa. In Latin American countries, a $3.8 billion investment netted $11.2 billion in profits, and in Africa a $5.2 billion investment netted $14.2 billion in profit. These American companies, and the country by extension, came to rely on these poorer countries for assets such as diamonds, coffee, platinum, mercury, cobalt, rubber, manganese, chrome, and aluminum. As manufacturing jobs continued to leave the country, the average salary of company CEO's rose while working class wages decreased. Japanese and European manufacturers were also gaining stronger international footholds in the world market, indicating an economic shift in the power of the United States. As companies were leaving the U.S., more of the country's wealth became tied to international affairs.

By 1960, only 8 U.S. banks had foreign branches, holding assets worth $3.5 billion. By the mid-1970's, over 120+ banks had foreign branches with assets up to $155 billion. The Arabian-American Oil Corporation (ARAMCO) was a major source of profit, with the United States owning 75% of the company's stock. In 1973 ARAMCO made a profit of $1.00 per barrel. By 1974 it had increased to $4.50 a barrel. This control of oil was so important to American profit interests that Carter based his foreign policy doctrine on it. The Carter Doctrine was the foreign policy to use military force to oppose any threat to middle eastern oil in the Persian Gulf, particularly if it was to rebuff Soviet threats.

Outside of oil interests, however, Carter did achieve some human rights based foreign policy decisions. Under his presidency, the SALT II treaty was negotiated with the Soviets. This was an extension of the original Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT 1), which froze the number of strategic missile launchers to existing levels and provided stipulations requiring the dismantling of some ICBM and SLBM launchers. The SALT II treaty limited new missile programs, forced both sides to limit the amount of new strategic missile types were in research/development, and limited the development of fixed ICBM launchers. Carter also helped negotiate the Camp David Accords, which established a framework for peace in an ongoing Arab-Israeli conflict while also promising them American financial aid and military airfields for Israel. Carter's administration also put national pressure on some South African countries, which were engaged in significant racial oppression. This pressure did not inherently change the systems of power in those countries but it did put an international spotlight on human rights violations.

Carter also had many failings in his international endeavors. Despite campaign promises to stop selling weapons to repressive foreign regimes, most sales continued. By 1975, the U.S had exported $9.1 billion dollars in arms to foreign bodies. Worse than a broken promise, however, was the continued active engagement of the CIA in disrupting and destabilizing foreign countries. The CIA funded Islamic rebels in hopes of overturning the Afghani government. When Soviets put troops in Afghanistan it prompted Carter's administration to embargo grain to Russia and called for a boycott of the 1980 Olympic games, which was taking place in Moscow, Russia. The CIA also supported the dictatorial regime in Iran. According to Sjursen, CIA support and influence was in response to Iran planning to nationalize their oil.

In 1979, the Iranian Islamic Revolution occurred, which overthrew the U.S. supported governing body of Iran. The ousted leader, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi (often called "The Shah"), fled and was offered asylum by the United States. This action infuriated Iranian revolutionaries, who then responded by storming the U.S. embassy in Tehran and taking over 50 American hostages. They demanded the return of the Shah, so that he may face their brand of justice. A rescue (Operation Eagle Claw) was attempted, but ultimately failed when a U.S. helicopter crashed into another aircraft, which contained jet fuel. The fireball explosion killed 8 servicemen. This complete disaster coupled with failed negotiations for over a year undermined Carter's presidential image. When it came to time vote again, Carter became one of the few one-term presidents of the United States.

Negotiations continued and the hostages were finally released on the inauguration day of the next president: Ronald Reagan. Reagan was once an actor before shifting to a political career that was characterized by anti-communist stances. Reagan appealed to Southern voters with his emphasis on states' rights, cementing the Republican transformation of the South that Nixon started. He was also endorsed and supported by groups such as the Moral Majority, a right-wing Christian group that helped mobilize conservative Christians as an active political force.

As with any president, Reagan naturally had people opposed to his being elected but a vast majority of Americans seemed in support of him. With an acting career behind him, Reagan already had some charismatic sway with his voter base, and his down-to-earth style of speaking coupled with his generally optimistic demeanor made him appealing to many. After surviving an assassination attempt on March 30th, 1981, and returning to work as quickly as possible, Reagan's popularity exploded. If the man was liked before, he was beloved after.

Ronald Reagan's presidential era was largely characterized by his de-regulation policies and his ideas on economics. He believed in the concept of "supply side economics." Supply-side economics is the theory that economy growth can be achieved through reduced taxation, fewer regulations, and free trade. Reagan applied his economic theory through his policies, which had 3 main points:

Increased military spending

Lower overall income tax, especially on wealthier tax brackets

Deregulation of financial systems and other facets of bureaucracy

The term "Reaganomics" caught on as a way of describing Reagan's economic policies.

Under Reagan's America, top tax income brackets reduced from a 70% tax to a 28% tax. The idea was that with more money in the hands of the rich, the more that money could be invested directly back into the economy. The reduced federal regulations would also encourage the creation and growth of new and expanding businesses.

Ronald Reagan did not just permit businesses to exponentially grow. He also slashed budgets from any government agency deemed unessential. Research on renewable and alternate energy was cut by 90%. Agencies were taken over by Reagan appointees who seemed actively hostile to the organizations they were put in control of. Thorne Auchter, new head of OSHA, ran multiple Florida businesses which had been fined multiple times for failing to adhere to OSHA standards. Lee Thomas, Reagan's EPA administrator, believed the organization was "too aggressive" on companies.

The immediate effects of Reagan's economic policies did reduce inflation, easing the minds of Americans when buying necessities. Long-term effects were also taking root, however. The salaries of CEOs continued to increase (sometimes quadrupling between 1980-88) while low-class wages were on a steady decrease. Executives with powerful lobbyists showed their appreciation for these economic policies by financially supporting the Reagan administration and the federal government-- an option simply not available to the "little guy."

When it came to foreign affairs, Reagan's doctrine was that the United States would support anti-communist insurgencies. Reagan had no interest in maintaining the decades old NATO policy of "boxing in" the Soviet Union. He wanted to strip the USSR's grasp on world affairs and forcibly reduce their territory. Military spending, which had steadily been increasing since WWII, blew up under Reagan. His administration aided in overthrowing the government in Grenada, funding death squads in Nicaragua, and backing a right-wing government in El Salvador. This practice of openly aiding insurgent forces would lead to Reagan's greatest political controversy: The Iran-Contra Affair.

In the country of Nicaragua, a political revolution had occurred which overturned the standing government. The country's revolution was at the hands of the USSR supported Sandinista National Liberation Front, which was named after Augusto César Sandino, the leader of the Nicaraguan resistance to U.S. occupation during the 1930's. Ronald Reagan funded a counter-force known as the Contras. The Contras were largely made up of the country's previous national guard, now organized and aided by the CIA. Congress moved against the president in this matter, making it illegal to support the Contras, citing the group's cocaine trade funds. In response, Reagan and his team would utilize "3rd party support," so to speak. The United States sold weapons to Iran (enemy of their political ally, Iraq) with Israel serving as a broker. The official reason for this exchange was for the negotiated release of American hostages in Lebanon, but the profits of the sale went to fund the Contras. Arabian money, arms transport through Guatemala, and a collaborative Israel served as the perfect workaround to the Congress ban.

When this scandal leaked to the press and the public at large, the Reagan administration came under fire. Reagan, Vice President George H.W. Bush, and collaborative Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North came under fire. In legal proceedings that followed, Oliver North took most of the blame. The president and vice president seemed to sit behind a wall of plausible deniability, though testimonial evidence from involved staff generally state the Commander-in-chief knew and collaborated in the scheme.

Another unpopular move from Reagan was vetoing a bill passed through Congress which called to impose heavy sanctions on South African countries utilizing an imposed racial segregation system described as "apartheid." Apartheid governments had laws that imposed differing rights and restrictions based solely on race, and prevented race mixing. Congress overrode the president's veto, but the veto itself damaged Reagan's reputation in the black community. According to a 1983 poll, only 17% of black Americans felt the economy was improving compared to 43% of white Americans. Many black Americans already felt unseen by the 80's administration, but that presidential veto cemented the sentiment.

Another controversy of Reagan's legacy was his slow response to the AIDS epidemic. Auto-Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) spread across the nation, but as it was a largely sexually transmitted disease, it carried a stigma of moral/cultural shame. AIDS also largely ravaged the gay community, which was not held in high regard by conservative religious groups like the Moral Majority. Despite thousands of deaths, Reagan made no obvious moves to respond to the epidemic or even acknowledge it. The president did not publicly acknowledge the crisis until 1985 (following the AIDS-related death of famous actor Rock Hudson) and would not deliver a formal address on it until 1987. The epidemic shook the foundations of the prominent gay community that emerged in the 70's, with almost everyone in that community knowing at least one person affected by the virus.

One of Reagan's biggest successes was the progress made in the Cold War. Mikhail Gorbachev became the leading commander of the USSR in 1985. Gorbachev was more willing to negotiate with the United States than any other leader seemingly was before. Thanks to ongoing discussions between the two world leaders, Cold War tensions were eased and nuclear stockpiles were reduced. The one point Reagan would not compromise on abandoning was his infamous Strategic Defense Initiative, nicknamed the "Star Wars Program." The SDI was a research and development project intended to create a defense system against potential nuclear missile attacks. The program was often criticized for its "science fiction" premise, but the president's commitment to the program coupled with his aggressive anti-Soviet policies likely kept the USSR afraid of U.S. capability and (potentially) more willing to negotiate than the USSR might have otherwise been.

Following Reagan's presidency, George H. W. Bush was elected to the office. During his election campaign, he showed a willingness to play "dirty," with many of his ad campaigns being targeted take-downs of his political rivals. Once in office, Bush was largely accepted as the natural choice since he was the vice president of the previously adored Reagan. He also carried over Reagan's appeal to Evangelicals by selecting senator J. Danforth Quayle (a fundamentalist Christian) as his vice president. Potentially appealing to that right-wing voter base, Bush also shifted opinions on issues he was initially a moderate on, such as abortion and new equal rights amendments for women. Due to these factors, Bush's presidency has sometimes been quipped as "Reagan's 3rd term."

During Bush's only presidential term, the United States engaged in two major military conflicts. The first was an invasion of the small country of Panama to depose the de facto ruler, General Manuel Noriega, who was wanted for drug trafficking and racketeering. The Panama forces were quickly overwhelmed, with the invasion being a decisive American victory. Despite the victory, little changed overall in the international drug trade.

The second military conflict was the invasion of Iraq following their invasion of the neighboring country of Kuwait. Iraq, led by Saddam Hussein, was previously a U.S. ally but the invasion of Kuwait threatened the oil reserves, ergo it threatened national interests. The "official" reason was to liberate Kuwait from Iraqi control, but the U.S. did not generally get directly involved in middle eastern conflicts like this.

Propaganda used for this conflict painted Hussein as another "Hitler," emphasizing the imperative to stop him. Despite this propaganda tactic, when the troops were deployed their objective was limited to only removing the Iraqi army from Kuwait. More war propaganda was the supposed use of "smart bombs," which was purported to limit civilian casualties with their more strategic explosive use. The invasion lasted approximately 6 weeks, with the Iraqi forces being completely crushed and most modern infrastructure being destroyed. Hussein was not removed from power, even though the U.S. victory demonstrated that they could accomplish that objective had they pushed further. Hussein continued to oppress his own countrymen, killing Shiites and Kurds in genocidal sweeps. Some war hawks believed that Bush hadn't done enough to "finish the job."

These military engagements had two primary outcomes:

The Panama and Iraq conflicts being such overwhelming victories helped remove the cultural "shame" left over from the failure of the Vietnam War.

The Iraq conflict helped justify the continuance of the United States' massive military budget even after their Cold War enemy, the USSR, collapsed in 1991.

The first point is highlighted by a direct quote from H.W. Bush about the War in the Gulf as it was coming to a close: "The specter of Vietnam has been buried forever in the desert sands of the Arabian peninsula." Reporters in Iraq were also subject to censorship restrictions that reporters in Vietnam did not contend with. The administration likely learned from the public response to Vietnam and wanted to avoid massive public outcries. Their efforts were a success. Newspapers and news media that once decried the Vietnam War now sang praises on the effectiveness, swiftness, and strength displayed by the mighty U.S. military over Panama and later Iraq.

To the second point: the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics dissolved in 1991, following democratic policy changes enacted by Gorbachev, a weakened military force, and decades of economic stagnation. In the decades following WWII, the Soviet Union was almost always the reason the U.S. was "justified" in growing their empire, stockpiling their nuclear arms, and expanding their military might. With the USSR just gone, that justification was no longer there. The military budget was reduced for a time, but it never returned to anything closely comparable to the pre-Soviet era, and the U.S. still continued to spend more on their military than most other 1st world countries combined. The solution was to continue suppressing instances of independent nationalism that threatened to upset the economic and political power balance of the current world, just like the war with Hussein's forces.

In the middle of Bush's only presidential term, the economy went through a recession that led to 7.9% unemployment. The recession was likely the fallout of Reagan and Bush's high-deficit, low tax, high military expense economy model. Massive companies like AT&T and General Motors laid off thousands of employees. Manufacturing jobs continued to dry up in the states as industries looked for cheaper exploitable labor. Japanese companies were also buying up American businesses, taking larger chunks of the world's shared economic web from the United States.

In order to combat the recession, Bush increased domestic spending with a stimulus package plan and he rescinded his campaign promise of "no new taxes." He also supported the Cap and Trade Compromise, which was a proposed policy to "cap" carbon emissions with a hard limit every year while the limit was reduced over time. Companies would receive permits for their allowed pollution cap, but could sell their permits to other companies. Bush also passed the Clean Air Act of 1990, which aimed at reducing acid rain and toxic pollutants. These acts alienated Bush from his more radical conservative peers.

The era of Carter, Reagan, and H. W. Bush pushed the United States to a more far right political landscape than it had possibly ever been. Deregulation and tax cuts on the rich started with the democrats but continued strong under Reagan and Bush's Republican political campaign. Despite the 1970's being a predominantly liberal cultural period, the time that followed it grew increasingly politically conservative.

On a cultural level, the 70's hippie became the 80's "yuppie," a slang term for a young and fashionable middle-class person with a well paid job. Consumerism was encouraged by Reagan's administration, with a plethora of goods and novelties being available through the 1980's. This mass consumerism fed into the economy and is also likely why the 1980's continues to endure as such a standout decade in pop culture. Despite this consumerism, this era also led to massive national debt increases, larger overall income inequality between upper and lower-class citizens, and a significant amount of proxy wars.

This period was also an era of attempted information control. Following the embarrassment of Vietnam, the buzzwords "national security" got thrown around a lot to justify the censorship and withholding of any findings that came about from government investigations into its many bureaucratic systems. One publicly known finding was discovered by the Church Committee, which was an organized investigative Senate group, which uncovered that that CIA dispatched operatives in academic settings for the express purpose of propaganda and population manipulation.

Other cultural changes from the 1970's to the 80's included decisions by the Supreme Court and new international dialogues. In the 70's, the death penalty was declared unconstitutional but it was restored in the following decade. Aspects of the landmark Roe v Wade case on abortion rights were weakened, and federally funded clinics were prevented from informing patients of abortion options. During international summits, new important topics of conversation included global warming and environmental protection. The United States generally always picked their economic engine over any environmental concern, but these discussions happening at all meant these problems were being identified on global scale.

Despite the potential of nuclear power as a solution to Carter's feared energy crisis and as a means to move away from fossil fuels, disasters such as the nuclear meltdown in Russia's Chernobyl power plant coupled with general fear over nuclear arms meant that the public was wary of nuclear power as a solution. Protestors opposed the use of nuclear energy and the issue became yet another partisan party schism.

The spirit of protest continued throughout the 1980's. In response to federal cutbacks on public services such as fire emergency, education, and policing, many middle-class "average" citizens who had never protested before now protested government action. Anti-war protests happened across the country in response to Reagan and Bush's proxy wars, but these conflicts were so quick that any potential grassroots movements were snuffed out before they ever got too far. Black Americans also protested against Reagan's presidency, outraged that in response to mass black unemployment Reagan's only response was to build more jails and be "hard" on crime-- crime that was likely directly influenced by the community's unemployment crisis.

Native American communities continued to advocate for themselves. As the era rolled into the early 1990's, Native Americans began to protest the celebration of Columbus Day, a federal holiday, in which the supposed "discoverer" of North America was honored. Natives pointed out the absurdity of discovering a land which was already occupied by other people, and that the treatment Columbus issued to the Natives was morally unacceptable to celebrate. This cause expanded on other Native American advocacy points such as their efforts to educate Americans on their true cultures, customs, and history. Some groups fought against this Native American cause, citing that the story of "western civilization" was the story of man's growth of higher ideas, with the United States being the supposed pinnacle of that "higher" Western philosophy. Most would not dare argue that the violence committed on early North American Natives was not abhorrent, but that it was inconsequential to the symbolic celebration of what Columbus Day represented.

Access to birth control medication made it easier for women to find and maintain work. Access to this medication also reduced the worry of unwanted pregnancy from sex, allowing couples to more freely engage in physical intimacy. Despite birth control giving women more bodily autonomy and women continuing to enter the job market, the expected cultural gender norms arguably did not shift much. Women with full-time jobs and careers were implicitly expected to continue being the "homemaker" in the standard nuclear family, even with their new demands making that much more difficult.

Televangelism was another practice that took off during this era. Televangelists were Christian ministers who derived their ministry from television broadcasting. This practice appealed to evangelical fundamentalist Christians, whom had become a prominent political force under the Reagan presidency and the organization of groups such as the Moral Majority. Televangelism also likely contributed to the infamous "Satanic Panic" of the 80's, which was a period of moral upset wherein many unsubstantiated claims of satanic ritual abuse were reported by fearful Americans who were likely just scared of the changing world and a perceived moral decay.

As "old school" manufacturing jobs like steel and auto industries continued to leave the United States, a new industry began to thrive-- "Silicon Valley." Silicon Valley refers to a region in Northern California where "high-tech" industries began to take off, but also generally refers to the emergent computer technology industry. Computer manufacturing and software development grew with major companies such as Microsoft and Apple leading the helm. While the technology was not accessible to the average consumer yet, it was quickly heading in that direction.

These events all unfolded during a conservative renaissance, in which liberal culture was tempered by conservative politics. In order to regain their foothold, Democrats would rebrand into the "New Democrat" to defeat this Republican upsurge. The "new" democrat would sometimes show more open sympathy to cultural issues but demonstrated greater fiscal conservatism and a "tough on crime" stance that made them nearly identical to the Republican party they were trying to usurp. Democrats wanted to appeal to this perceived prominent conservative voter base, and in doing so the parties really began to look like ever-so-slightly different but largely identical conglomerates of people whose biggest differences were simply the party label.

Final Thoughts:

I took less away from Schweikart and Allen's writings this time compared to usual, and the few points I felt were relevant were typically stated as a "good" in their text whereas my inherent beliefs could not mesh well with their version of what certain events meant for the country. That said, I did not find the writing on Reagan to be as insufferable as I feared it would be. The authors clearly admired him, but they do well presenting baseline facts when they are not asserting their economic opinions as those "facts." Far be it from me to pretend I likely haven't done the same in these essays, however. I did find it a little curious, that Schweikart and Allen quickly brush over the Iran-Contra affair, as if it wasn't Reagan's most notorious and controversial scandal.

Sjursen's A True History was definitely the most useful in building the descriptive narrative of this time period, coupled with facts and additional information from A People's History and A Patriot's History.

Due to my long standing leftist tendencies, I am not fond of Reagan as a president and do hold his extensive de-regulation policies as a significant factor in current economic crises. That said, I think reading about this period in history helped me contextualize why he was so popular at the time of his election. From the opening paragraph, it's established that the shadows cast from the Vietnam failure and Nixon's Watergate scandal completely broke the average American's trust in the government. Then comes Reagan who addresses the people in his inaugural speech with these famous words: "government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem." Many American people felt heard. They saw an optimist who believed in the capacity for the United States to achieve great things if it was simply given the freedom to do so. Whatever the long-term legacy of his decisions, it's easy to see why Reagan was beloved at a time where Americans had never been so openly cynical of the government.

This was admittedly not my favorite era to write about, but the point of these essays is largely to help me learn the complete history of my country, be informed, and have a reference point I can revisit if I need to brush up on any particular era of American history. This era was extremely important in getting a more complete picture of the shadows still being cast on today's modern political landscape.

My true final thought on this period of time coincides with some of my thoughts reflected in the previous essay. Those thoughts are merely the continued observation of frightening parallels between this time period and the period we live in right now. Just like the 70's, we live in an age where socially progressive causes have become a staple of cultural shifts and political talking points. Just like the 80's, the response to this cultural shift has been met with outright political hostility and political conservatism in favor of enforcing "traditional" morals.

Talk about being doomed to repeat history if you don't learn from it the first time.

[newstfionline]

Thursday, December 29, 2022

Southwest’s Debacle, Which Stranded Thousands, to Be Felt for Days (NYT) After a winter storm pummeled many parts of the country, most airlines quickly bounced back from delays and cancellations. But not Southwest Airlines, which days later is still struggling from what executives and analysts describe as its biggest operational meltdown in its five-decade history. The bad weather, coming a few days before Christmas, hit the airline harder than the rest of the industry because of inadequate computer systems that made it hard for the airline to get crews to waiting planes and put passengers on alternative flights, and a flight model that allowed problems at one airport to cascade to others. “This is the worst round of cancellations for any single airline I can recall in a career of more than 20 years as an industry analyst,” Henry Harteveldt, who covers airlines for Atmosphere Research Group, said. Thousands of travelers were stranded at airports, and many said Southwest had done little or nothing to get them to their destinations. Southwest canceled more than 2,900 flights on Monday; scrapped about 2,500 each day for the next two days, more than 60 percent of its schedule; and said it could take days to fully restore normal operations.

Military police enforce driving ban in snow-stricken Buffalo (AP) State and military police were sent Tuesday to keep people off Buffalo’s snow-choked roads, and officials kept counting fatalities three days after western New York’s deadliest storm in at least two generations. Even as suburban roads and most major highways in the area reopened, Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz warned that police would be stationed at entrances to Buffalo and at major intersections because some drivers were flouting a ban on driving within New York’s second-most populous city. More than 30 people are reported to have died in the region, officials said, including seven storm-related deaths announced Tuesday by Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown’s office. The toll surpasses that of the historic Blizzard of 1977, blamed for killing as many as 29 people in an area known for harsh winter weather.

Title 42 Remains in Place (1440) The Supreme Court yesterday ruled 5-4 the Biden administration must keep in place pandemic-era border controls while it considers a separate legal challenge to the order. Anticipation over the possible lifting of the policy, known as Title 42, has led to a surge of migrants arriving at the US-Mexico border in recent weeks. The directive, implemented in March 2020 as an emergency health order, allows the quick expulsion of migrants without the opportunity for them to claim asylum, as typically required by law. The Biden administration has sought to rescind the order, while a coalition of Republican states has sought to keep the policy in place amid a historic flow of migrants over the past year.

In El Salvador, a tough anti-gang crackdown proves popular (AP) Nine months into a state of emergency declared by President Nayib Bukele to fight street gangs, El Salvador has seen more than 1,000 documented human rights abuses and about 90 deaths of prisoners in custody. And Bukele’s popularity ratings have soared. For decades, El Salvador’s main street gangs, Barrio 18 and the MS-13, have extorted money from nearly everyone and taken violent revenge against those who don’t pay. The gangs, which have been estimated to count some 70,000 members, have long controlled swaths of territory and extorted and killed with impunity. Bukele, who was elected in 2019, began sealing off certain sectors of Salvadoran cities earlier this year, surrounding them with police and soldiers who check anyone entering or leaving. Bukele requested that Congress grant him the extraordinary powers after gangs were blamed for 62 killings in just one day, March 26. Bukele, who is seeking re-election in 2024, has reveled in recent polls that suggest approval ratings of near 90% for both himself and his gang crackdown. “I don’t care what the international organizations say,” Bukele said earlier this year of criticism of his measures. “They can come and take the gang members. If they want them we will give them all of them.”

In Record Numbers, an Unexpected Migrant Group Is Fleeing to the U.S. (NYT) Twice a week at a gas station on the western edge of Nicaragua’s capital, local residents gather, carrying the telltale signs of people on the move: loaded backpacks, clothes and toiletries stuffed in plastic bags and heavy jackets in preparation for a chilly journey far from the stifling heat. Nurses, doctors, students, children, farmers and many other Nicaraguans say teary goodbyes as they await private charter buses for the first leg of an 1,800-mile journey. Final destination: the United States. For generations, Nicaragua, the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere after Haiti, saw only a trickle of its people migrate northward. But soaring inflation, declining wages and the erosion of democracy under an increasingly authoritarian government have drastically shifted the calculus. Now, for the first time in Nicaragua’s history, the small nation of 6.5 million is a major contributor to the mass of people trekking to the U.S. southern border, having been displaced by violence, repression and poverty. More than 180,000 Nicaraguans crossed into the United States this year through the end of November—about 60 times as many as those who entered during the same period two years earlier, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data.

France’s winter advice: Brace for power outages—but no panic, please (Washington Post) If France’s power grid were to near its limits in the coming weeks, officials say, the warning signs wouldn’t be subtle. Millions of people would receive phone alerts. On government sites, power consumption charts would switch to red. The final option would be one that until now has seemed unthinkable: rolling regional power outages to avoid the scale of blackouts last seen in 1978, when much of the country came to a standstill for hours. French officials have suggested that such scenarios are more likely this winter than at any time in nearly half a century. Or maybe not. The government has switched for months between reassurances and unsettling news, trying to prompt just the right amount of public concern to encourage residents to lower their power consumption. But after a whirlwind of contradictory announcements—and despite a plea from President Emmanuel Macron that “we must not give in to panic!”—the needle has now swung decisively into the direction of public frenzy.

‘Nothing left to destroy:’ Russia is fighting for land already in ruins (Washington Post) Tamara Klimashenko stood in what was once her cherished flower garden and pulled out her phone to show photos of the peonies, petunias and chamomiles that once covered this patch of dirt now littered with shrapnel. Lyman was the site of fierce fighting in May, when Russian forces seized the city, and in the summer. The Russians occupied Lyman until Oct. 1, when they fled a fast-advancing Ukrainian counteroffensive. But even amid the wreckage of their home—with the walls blown out and wood planks hanging from the ceiling—the Klimashenkos said they feared an even worse fate: another Russian invasion, potentially their third in eight years, as President Vladimir Putin’s self-assigned “main goal” of “liberating all of Donbas” yet again puts their city in the Kremlin’s crosshairs. “They’re going to bring more destruction,” said Anatoly, 62. “And already there is nothing left to destroy.” Putin’s insistence that the war will continue until his objectives are met means that the fight for Lyman—or what’s left of it—isn’t over. The Russian president has doubled down on his illegal annexation claims in recent days, insisting that people like the Klimashenkos and their neighbors are now Russian citizens, who must be liberated from the Ukrainians who liberated them from the Russians in September.

Captured Russian tanks and equipment are coveted trophies—and a headache (Washington Post) When Ukrainian forces came across the abandoned Russian fighting vehicle on the battlefield, they knew they had found a rare prize. The BMP-3, armed with a 100mm main gun and a 30mm autocannon, was one of the few of its kind that the Ukrainian military had seized from the Russians since the start of the invasion. But about a month ago, after weeks of being operated by Ukrainian soldiers, its engine and fueling system began to fail. Ever since, the Russian fighting vehicle has been out of commission, stuck at a repair site in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region. Ukrainian forces have seized hundreds of what they call “trophies”—Russian tanks, armored personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles—since the start of the war. They’ve become valuable assets for Kyiv. The brigade working at this repair site jokingly referred to them as “lend-lease” tanks, referring to the World War II program under which the United States supplied Britain, the Soviet Union and other Allied nations with humanitarian aid and military equipment. But many of these tanks and other vehicles are stuck in hangars like the one at this repair site as brigades struggle to find the parts needed to repair them.

China to resume issuing passports, visas as virus curbs ease (AP) China says it will resume issuing passports for tourism in another big step away from anti-virus controls that isolated the country for almost three years, setting up a potential flood of Chinese going abroad for next month’s Lunar New Year holiday. The announcement Tuesday adds to abrupt changes that are rolling back some of the world’s strictest anti-virus controls as President Xi Jinping’s government tries to reverse an economic slump. Rules that confined millions of people to their homes kept China’s infection rate low but fueled public frustration and crushed economic growth. The latest decision could send free-spending Chinese tourists to revenue-starved destinations in Asia and Europe for Lunar New Year, which begins Jan. 22 and usually is the country’s busiest travel season.

On the Front Lines of China’s Covid Crisis (NYT) Slumped in wheelchairs and lying on gurneys, the sickened patients crowd every nook and cranny of the emergency department at the hospital in northern China. They cram into the narrow spaces between elevator doors. They surround an idle walk-through metal detector. And they line the walls of a corridor ringing with the sounds of coughing. China’s hospitals were already overcrowded, underfunded and inadequately staffed in the best of times. But now with Covid spreading freely for the first time in China, the medical system is being pushed to its limits. The scenes of desperation and misery at the Tianjin Medical University General Hospital, captured on one of several videos examined by The New York Times, reflects the growing crisis. Even as Covid cases rise, health workers on the front lines are also battling rampant infections within their own ranks. So many have tested positive for the virus in some hospitals that the remaining few say they are forced to do the job of five or more co-workers.

Philippine rain, flooding cause at least 25 deaths, damage (AP) The death toll from heavy rains and floods that devastated parts of the Philippines over the Christmas weekend has risen to 25, with 26 others still missing, the national disaster response agency said Wednesday. Nearly 400,000 people were affected, with over 81,000 still in shelters and nine others injured, the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council said. Sixteen of the 25 deaths were reported in Northern Mindanao region in the south, while 12 of the 26 missing are from the eastern Bicol region, the council added.

[harpianews]

Congress chiefs of 5 states resign over poll debacle following Sonia direction

Congress chiefs of 5 states resign over poll debacle following Sonia direction

The Congress chiefs in five states – Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur – have resigned after party president Sonia Gandhi Tuesday asked them to do so in the wake of the party’s disastrous performance in the recent assembly elections in those states. Gandhi’s move was meant to “facilitate reorganization of Pradesh Congress Committees (PCCs)” in these states, according to the All…

[digimakacademy]

हार पर कांग्रेस में नहीं थम रही रार, सिब्बल के बाद अब चिदंबरम ने की समीक्षा की मांग, कहा- ऐसा लगता है कि जमीनी स्तर पर पार्टी कहीं है ही नहीं हाइलाइट्स: बिहार विधानसभा चुनाव और कुछ राज्यों में हुए उपचुनावों में कांग्रेस के खराब प्रदर्शन पर पार्टी में उठ रहे सवाल

[news4me]

Go For Surgical Action to Revive Congress, Says Veerappa Moily After Delhi Poll Debacle

Go For Surgical Action to Revive Congress, Says Veerappa Moily After Delhi Poll Debacle

[ad_1]

Veerappa Moily said the Congress is concerned and worried about the humiliating defeat in Delhi, adding, ‘it’s a lesson which we have to learn’. PTI

Updated:February 12, 2020, 4:22 PM IST

Congress leader Veerappa Moily. (Twitter/@moilyv) Bengaluru: Expressing concern over the Congress debacle in the Delhi Assembly elections, senior party leader M Veerappa Moily said…

[nilnews4]

Congress has to struggle a lot, says Priyanka Gandhi after party poll debacle in Delhi A day after the Congress' poll debacle in Delhi assembly elections, party general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Wednesday said that her party will have to struggle a lot, and it will do so.

[disillusioned41]

Last week, House Democrats attempted to call President Donald Trump’s bluff and increase the COVID relief bill’s survival checks to $2,000. House Republicans blocked the initial maneuver, and may today prevent the legislation from passing. If it does pass, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell could kill the bill.

The spectacle of Congress continuing to stall $2,000 survival checks during an economic emergency spotlights Donald Trump’s erratic behavior, Democrats’ persistent austerity ideology and the dysfunctionality of a government waiting until the last minute to hammer out 5,000-page emergency legislation in a matter of hours.

Most important, the antics of House Republicans and McConnell illustrate how — despite all of America’s paens to democracy — lawmakers ostensibly elected to represent us will routinely stomp on their own constituents.

Of course, constituents are barely part of the media narrative anymore. Indeed, if you read national news, you will almost never see a mention of whom exactly these Republicans are supposed to be representing.

For example, you will not see any mention of the fact that, according to research from AFL-CIO political director Michael Podhorzer, the majority of lawmakers in the House Republican Conference come from districts in the bottom two income quintiles — meaning their constituents would particularly benefit from the $2,000 checks.

Similarly, you will see McConnell depicted only as an all-powerful Republican leader — an omniscient spectre haunting the halls of power, effectively disassociated from time, place and constituency. In this mythology, he is a phantom menace who controls everything but somehow represents nobody. You will not see much mention of the fact that McConnell actually does represent a real, live place — one that illustrates how this standoff is fundamentally a crisis of democratic accountability.

Kentucky’s Senator May Deny Emergency Aid To His Own Constituents

McConnell’s role in this debacle cannot be overstated: Had he already signed onto the plan to increase the direct payments in the COVID deal, it would probably be a done deal — but so far he has been reticent, as millions of Americans are struggling to survive.

Among those millions struggling to survive are hundreds of thousands of people in McConnell’s own state of Kentucky — which is one of the poorest in the country. As such, it would particularly benefit from the $2,000 survival checks.

As McConnell plays coy in Washington, his state is becoming a Dickensian nightmare. More than 700,000 Kentuckians live below the federal poverty line.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, things have become downright dystopian: Louisville’s ABC affiliate recently reported that “an estimated 42 percent of Kentucky children (live) in renter households (that) were behind on rent and/or did not get enough to eat, and 20 percent of adults with children in the household reported the children weren’t eating enough because they couldn’t afford enough food.”

According to census data, roughly 13 percent of adults in Kentucky are now suffering from food scarcity, meaning they either sometimes or often do not have enough food to eat. That number has increased nearly 40 percent since the start of the pandemic.

The median household income in Kentucky is about $52,000, and roughly two thirds of all Kentucky households make less than $75,000 a year. That means the current proposal to boost $600 checks to $2,000 for families making $75,000 or less would provide additional emergency aid to most people in the Republican Senate leader’s own state.

In light of these figures, you would think a lawmaker from a destitute state would be the single biggest champion of such an initiative.

Instead, McConnell may end up following House Republicans and use his power to block the checks. In that event, we would be watching Kentucky’s U.S. senator directly denying aid to most people in his own disproportionately poor state during an economic emergency and a deadly pandemic. This wouldn’t be a case of McConnell ignoring or punishing specific constituencies who didn’t vote for him — exit polls show he won reelection with a majority of voters making $50,000 or less.

And let’s remember: McConnell’s reluctance to quickly enact $2,000 survival checks is not the first time we’ve seen him pit himself against his own state during the pandemic — he has also led the fight to block direct aid to states, even though Kentucky faces one of the most acute budget and pension crises in the country.

A Feature, Not A Bug

Taken together, this entire situation confirms a trio of recent studies underscoring that we live in a bizarro version of democracy in which representatives are routinely using their public offices to ignore constituents’ wishes — and at times to directly harm the people who elect them.

This dynamic is a feature, not a bug. The founders created institutions like the Senate and lifetime Supreme Court appointments to try to insulate policymaking from the rabble, and to protect what Alexander Hamilton called the “permanent will” of the elite. They allowed for a lame-duck period in which a president gets to govern without any accountability at all. And such institutional limits on American democracy have been compounded by gerrymandered congressional districts and a campaign finance system that effectively insulates incumbents from any public accountability.

Those limits on democracy were supposed to encourage meritorious policy, but in this budget standoff, we see the opposite: Republicans have been able to behave so recklessly precisely because these limits on democracy mean they don’t have to care about their own constituents.

McConnell was just reelected to a Senate job where he won’t face voters for another six years, when the pain and suffering he inflicted will be a distant memory. House Republicans are safe in gerrymandered districts, many of which will likely remain that way because Democrats failed to win state legislatures ahead of redistricting. And Trump is a lame duck, who isn’t angling for reelection.  

In each situation, the power players involved know they are safely insulated from democratic accountability, allowing them to care only about a donor class that is far more interested in $200 billion worth of tax cuts for the wealthy than in $2,000 checks for starving people.

To know that a lack of democratic accountability is at the heart of this manufactured crisis, just compare Trump’s posture before the election.

Facing the potential wrath of voters back then, Trump was pushing a $1.8 trillion rescue package — not because he was a more moral person a few months ago, but because he was trying to win reelection and thus trying to depict himself as responsive to the public will. Once the election was over, he didn’t have to care anymore — he could use his lame duck moment to stage a childish conniption fit that did real damage to real human beings.

The same dynamic is also at play with McConnell. Arguably the only reason he even allowed a meager $900 billion stimulus bill with $600 survival checks to pass through the upper chamber was because he was worried about democratic consequences — more specifically, he was worried that blocking a bill would result in Georgians voting out their GOP senators, which would toss McConnell out of his job running the Senate.

He can now play games with the $2,000 check initiative knowing he won’t be voted out of a job by Kentuckians — but if he does capitulate, it will only be because he fears losing the two Georgia runoff elections.

In other words, it will only be because he fears some modicum of democratic accountability.

A Cautionary Tale About Democratic Accountability

Moving forward, there is a larger lesson here.

In elite circles, there is this idea that America’s problems are a product of politicians being too beholden to their constituents’ whims, which supposedly creates gridlock as elected officials aim to placate their parties’ voters. This mythology — which is a modern day version of the founders’ fear of too much democracy — has been weaponized to promote ideas like super committees, presidential commissions, fast track authorities and strict budget rules, all designed to insulate decisionmaking from public pressure.

The idea is that government officials will only be able to make tough, painful decisions necessary for meritorious policy if they are further protected from public accountability and consequences.

But this latest grotesquerie of House Republicans and McConnell threatening to deny $2,000 checks to their own constituents disproves the entire theory. It shows that a lack of democratic accountability is the problem.

[reading-writing-revolution]

Heather Cox Richardson:

July 23, 2020 (Thursday)

Today’s biggest breaking news came at the president’s briefing this evening. Allegedly about the coronavirus, the briefing began with Trump announcing he was cancelling the Republican National Convention, which was scheduled to be held in Jacksonville, Florida from August 24-27.

Just last month, on June 11, Trump moved the hoopla part of the convention from Charlotte, North Carolina, where Governor Roy Cooper refused to promise he could have a fully filled arena for his acceptance speech. Because the Republican National Committee was under contract with Charlotte, it maintained it would hold some business meetings in the city, but it cut from the convention in either place a meeting to create a 2020 platform. Trump decided to run on the 2016 platform, underscoring that, for him, the election is about the man in charge, not policies.

Trump said “the timing is not right” to hold the convention, referring to coronavirus, which is spiking in Florida. Today the state reported 173 deaths, the largest single day loss in the state so far. Florida has had a staggering 10,000 new infections almost every day for the last two weeks. As numbers spike there and elsewhere, primarily in the South and West, experts worry that we are approaching a point at which it will be impossible to stop the spread of Covid-19. We have had more than 4 million infections and more than 140,000 deaths, including 3,000 since Tuesday. We are on track to lose more than 200,000 Americans to coronavirus before November 1. Yesterday, more than 150 public health experts wrote an open letter to Trump, Congress, and the state governors begging them to “shut it down now, and start over.”

Nonetheless, Trump continues to demand that schools reopen, saying today that if they don’t, money should go from the public schools to parents to send their children elsewhere. This would divert money from public to private schools, a plan Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos advocates. Advisors noted that Trump was paying close attention to leading Republicans backing out of the convention, and was worried attendance would be thin. Cancelling because of the pandemic let him stake out a leadership position on an issue where polling shows Americans think he has failed.

Trump also said that he spoke to Russian President Vladimir Putin today, but did not discuss intelligence reports that say Putin has been paying Taliban-linked fighters in Afghanistan to kill U.S. and allied troops.

The RNC’s inability to pull off either a platform or a convention this year does not look good. One convention official told CNN the Jacksonville event was "a multimillion dollar debacle” and that the money it cost could have gone to fighting coronavirus.

The Republicans looked incompetent today in another way as they failed to reach an agreement on a new coronavirus package. They rejected the Democrats’ bill, passed two months ago, but have apparently been unable since then to come up with any deal within their own conference (they have not included any Democrats in the negotiations). They were supposed to roll out their bill today, but are now hoping to have something ready to show Democrats by Monday. Unemployment benefits for 30 million Americans, expanded by an early coronavirus bill, expire next week, so the Republicans are under pressure. But Senators up for reelection want a generous bill, while others hate the idea of spending money on social welfare programs.

Today the administration took some legal hits. A federal judge ruled that the government had sent Trump’s former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen back to prison from home confinement to stop him from publishing a tell-all book in September; and the inspector general of the Justice Department, Michael Horowitz, announced he will investigate the federal use of force in Washington, D.C. and Portland, Oregon. At the request of congressional Democrats from Oregon, he will examine the orders the federal officers received, their use of chemical agents (tear gas), and reports that they were improperly detaining protesters.

Both the Cohen case and the federal deployment were overseen by Attorney General William Barr, who is apparently using the Justice Department to advance the president’s political interests. Barr is set to testify before the House Judiciary Committee on July 28 about his attempts both to reduce the sentencing guidelines for Trump’s friend Roger Stone and to dismiss the case against Trump adviser Michael Flynn. He will likely also be asked about his firing of the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Geoffrey Berman, as well as others. It is worth noting that Barr won confirmation in his position thanks to Republican Senators, who have not opposed his actions.

They have, though, voted to pass the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act, including a provision in it to rename military bases that currently carry the names of Confederate generals. The bill authorizes almost $737 billion (yes, that’s a “B”) in military spending for the year. It passed by a veto-proof majority, which gives Trump an excuse not to try to kill the bill, but it is nonetheless a blow over one of his signature fights.

Trump lost another fight today, as Major League Baseball reopened with the Washington Nationals playing the New York Yankees on their home field. Before the game, every player and every coach in the playing area held up a black banner that stretched along the first base and third base lines, then took a knee on the grass in silence, in honor of Black Lives Matter. Then Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is the trusted face of coronavirus advice and thus has angered the not-so-trusted president, threw out the first pitch. (It was so far off base that one wit noted on Twitter: “He clearly doesn’t want anyone to catch anything.”)

And the sexism of today’s Republican Party also took a hit today, as Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) rose to a point of personal privilege in the House and replied to the actions of Representative Ted Yoho (R-FL), who stopped her on the steps of the Capitol Monday to call her “disgusting,” “crazy,” “out of [her] mind,” and “dangerous,” for linking poverty and crime. She told him he was rude, and went inside to cast a vote. When she came back out, she said, "There were reporters in the front of the Capitol, and in front of reporters Rep. Yoho called me, and I quote, a 'f*****g bitch.’”

Ocasio-Cortez called out Yoho’s verbal abuse and his non-apology (he apologized for the “abrupt manner of the conversation,” but said he could not apologize for his “passion”). She indicted the sexism inherent in not only Congress but in society in general. "This issue is not about one incident,” she said. “It is cultural. It is a culture… of accepting of violence and violent language against women and an entire structure of power that supports that." Silence on the issue, she said, “is a form of acceptance.” It was a powerful speech, putting the issue of sexism on the table in Congress along with the issue of racism.

While the Republicans bet on the idea of a full-fledged convention this year and lost, the Democratic National Committee decided back in June to make their convention both virtual and appropriate to the pandemic. It will be centered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from August 17-20, and will have live broadcasts from other cities, and a robust social media platform as well, while keeping participants safely distanced.

“Leadership means being able to adapt to any situation,” said DNC Chair Tom Perez.

[feelingbluepolitics]

Highest recommendation.

Republicons certainly don't favor the explosively revealing process of investigation and articles of impeachment when they've been enabling and covering for him, shockingly, all long, even with respect to Russia's 2016 attacks against us.

But keep in mind they are battling with trump too. He blindsided them with the Ukraine call and then released the confessional transcript, leaving them no feasible ground.

Now trump's play is to try to ignore all Congressional powers including subpoenas. It has not escaped their comprehension that trump is moving wholly against Congress including any role leftover for the Senate, too.

And trump betrayed allies to their deaths, and handed over American-won battlegrounds and American outpost bases to Russia. Russia is gloating via video from where American troops had to urgently evacuate mere hours before.

Graham is well-positioned, given all the kissing up he's been doing, to butt heads with trump on all of these issues. He criticizes trump most harshly on the military debacle so that he is simultaneously standing for his extremely pro-military state. McConnell cannot do this, with his home state approval in the low 30's. But Graham's got room right now, with mid-70's approval and bumper fundraising hauls.

With that as context for The Hill article:

"Speaking in the Oval Office earlier Wednesday, [t]rump insisted that the conflict playing out in Syria 'has nothing to do with us,' and he downplayed the value of the Kurdish alliance, telling reporters that the Kurds are 'no angels.'

"The remarks drew a rebuke from Graham, who raised concerns that [t]rump's shift in strategy could be worse than former President Obama's decision to leave Iraq.

"'I worry we will not have allies in the future against radical Islam, ISIS will reemerge, & Iran’s rise in Syria will become a nightmare for Israel,' Graham tweeted. 'I fear this is a complete and utter national security disaster in the making and I hope [t]rump will adjust his thinking.'"

"The senator dug in upon hearing of [t]rump's criticism, tweeting that he will 'NEVER be quiet' on matters of national security.

[Well. Hardly ever. Unless it's a national threat that favors Republicons.]

..."'The worst thing any Commander in Chief can do is to give land back to the enemy that was taken through blood and sacrifice,' Graham tweeted. 'I fear those are the consequences of the actions being taken right now.'" 

See? Graham is going where he cannot simply walk back from. And it fits his original confirmation bias, that trump will destroy them.

[foreverlogical]

Maybe it was the way they leapt to their feet to applaud as one, like Stalinist apparatchiks—all those Republican senators and members of congress Donald Trump now owns—as the U.S. president offered up one obvious misrepresentation after another in his State of the Union address on Tuesday. Or maybe it was that his adoring defenders did the same at the rambling 63-minute victory speech Trump delivered at the White House on Thursday, following what he called “total acquittal” by the U.S. Senate.

But as a tumultuous week in Washington neared its end, it was unsettlingly clear that Trump had not learned any lessons from his impeachment ordeal—as his few Republican critics once hopefully suggested—except that he remains surrounded in his mind by political enemies, whom he called on Thursday “horrible,” “sick,” and “very evil.” And what of the charges against him, that he had abused his power as president to further his personal political interests, which even Sen. Mitt Romney thought were serious enough that the Utah Republican bravely became the lone U.S. senator in history to vote to remove a president of his own party? 

“It’s all bullshit,” Trump told a national television audience.

Worse for the president’s Democratic adversaries, the odds may have turned in Trump’s favor as the 2020 election campaign got formally underway this week. Even as the U.S. Senate gave Trump virtual carte blanche to do as he pleases by acquitting him of impeachment charges on Wednesday, he hit his highest approval rating ever—49 percent according to a new Gallup poll. Meanwhile, the Democrats proved embarrassingly incompetent in Iowa, with a vote tally rife with delays and errors and the candidate long perceived as their most electable standard-bearer, former Vice President Joe Biden, fading fast.

As Trump said in the East Room, trying out a line that has already become a popular Republican 2020 refrain, “The Democrats can’t count some simple votes, yet they want to take over your health care.”

Indeed, the Democratic debacle in the Iowa caucuses seemed symbolic of a broader disarray in the party, which can’t settle on a clear favorite with only nine months to go before Election Day. With results mostly counted after four days of confusion, the outcome there was evenly divided between the old and the new, between ultra-progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, 78, and the Indiana moderate Pete Buttigieg, 38, who appeared locked in a virtual tie for the lead, with Biden well behind. But both had meager pluralities of about a quarter of the vote. Pollsters and pundits predicted further trouble for Biden, the former front-runner, in next Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary, which could mean serious problems for him even in states he was expected to win handily down the line, like South Carolina.

Many party establishment figures believe that neither Sanders, whose extremely liberal views turn off many mainstream voters, nor Buttigieg, who polls suggest faces an uphill climb in the general election because he is an unexperienced newcomer and married to another man, can defeat Trump in November. The other leading candidate in Iowa, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, is also seen as too progressive in her views to win over many moderates and independents.

“We’re gonna win a lot of seats,” an ebullient Trump announced on Thursday.

So, many pundits are beginning to wonder what four more years of an even more untrammeled Trump might look like. This week gave some hints. He will go after his political enemies with relish and utter abandon. And he will blame them for every misdirection while claiming credit for every positive development. Even his State of the Union was shamelessly solipsistic, as if the United States had never enjoyed a single good moment before he appeared on the scene, and Trump alone had brought the nation back from the brink, the sole author of what he called the “great American comeback” (though economists say the U.S. economy is in the middle of a boom initiated by former President Barack Obama).

“It is very scary to contemplate Trump unbound,” Trump biographer Michael D’Antonio told Foreign Policy. “Trump in a second term could weaponize the Department of Justice against his critics and opponents. … He might also look for ways to defy the Constitution, perhaps by refusing to leave office because of some ‘emergency.’”

Another Trump biographer, Gwenda Blair, suggested the president is now living out the philosophy he recorded in his first book, The Art of the Deal, in 1987. “It’s ‘whatever you can get away with, do it,’” she said. “That was the first full version of ‘brag about it, don’t just do it.’ Leap past ordinary constraints, ethics, morality. And those who are hung up on those things are losers. He’s never deviated from that plan. And people love that.”  

Above all, Trump during his career has “harnessed a sense of grievance,” Blair added. She said that if Bernie Sanders, who like Trump has spent a career feeling aggrieved over being ignored by the mainstream, becomes the Democratic nominee, the 2020 race will be largely about the politics of grievance. And an electorate that may never be able to reconcile its various grievances.

That possibility in turn raises the question of whether, facing possibly four more years of what already seem to be insuperable political divisions—even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi lost her famous cool, ripping up Trump’s speech on national TV—Americans will be able to “keep” their republic after all, a question raised by several Democratic House managers during impeachment, invoking Benjamin Franklin’s famous remark. (Asked by a bystander outside Independence Hall what government the Continental Congress had just created, Franklin allegedly replied: “A republic, if you can keep it.”)

What’s going to happen to America’s nearly 244-year-old grand experiment? Can the world’s lone superpower long endure when it is being torn apart internally? Pick your historical paradigm. The fall of Rome. The eclipse of the British Imperium. Twilight of the Gods. Or maybe just more decadence, division, and drift, a further erosion of institutions Americans once thought sacrosanct, and a world that throws up its hands in disgust.

READ MORE

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this Washington Post story:

As Democrats running for president pivot to New Hampshire after the debacle in Iowa, they have already spent much of this week in the Granite State trading grabs over which one of them can best tackle another, big crisis — climate change.

The elbow-throwing was subtle at times, more pointed at others. What it shows is that Democratic candidates are heeding calls from the party base in New Hampshire to do something — anything — about what many of them see is an existential threat.

Climate change and the environment ranked as the most important issue among likely Democratic voters in the Feb. 11 primary, with 19 percent naming it in a CNN-University of New Hampshire poll conducted last month. That slightly ahead of health care (16 percent) and well ahead of beating President Trump and other Republicans (11 percent).

Sensing that concern, several presidential candidates trekked from Iowa, where the state party is still trying to figure out just who won the caucus there, to New Hampshire to speak at a youth climate town hall in Concord on Wednesday.

There, the two moderates who beat expectations in Iowa — former South Bend, Ind. mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) — vowed to undo President Trump’s many rollbacks of environmental regulations.

But in veiled digs at their competitors to the left, each also emphasized what they see as the practicality of their plans.

“The difference between a plan and a pipe dream is that a plan is something you can actually get done,” Klobuchar said, without naming any rival by name, after noting her promise to rejoin the 2015 Paris climate accord was doable because it does not need to pass Congress.

[bountyofbeads]

Bernie Sanders Wins Nevada Caucuses, Strengthening His Primary Lead https://nyti.ms/2HJdnAW

This is not just a presidential election, it is a referendum of Corporations vs. People. I vote for the People. Sanders is the opposite side of the same coin(Trump). MY GREATEST FEAR IS THE RE-ELECTION OF DONALD TRUMP.

Also if there's going to be a REVOLUTION, we MUST FLIP the SENATE otherwise nothing CHANGES.

#VoteBlueNoMatterWho

Bernie Sanders Wins Nevada Caucuses, Strengthening His Primary Lead

His triumph will provide a burst of momentum that may make it difficult for the still-fractured moderate wing of the Democratic Party to slow his march to the nomination.

By Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns | Published Feb. 22, 2020 Updated Feb. 23, 2020, 1:34 a.m. ET | New York Times | Posted Feb 23, 2020 |

LAS VEGAS — Senator Bernie Sanders claimed a major victory in the Nevada caucuses on Saturday that demonstrated his broad appeal in the first racially diverse state in the presidential primary race and established him as the clear front-runner for the Democratic nomination.

In a significant show of force, Mr. Sanders, a liberal from Vermont, had a lead that was more than double his nearest rivals with 50 percent of the precincts reporting, and The Associated Press named him the winner on Saturday evening.

His triumph in Nevada, after strong performances in Iowa and New Hampshire, will propel him into next Saturday’s primary in South Carolina, and the Super Tuesday contests immediately thereafter, with a burst of momentum that may make it difficult for the still-fractured moderate wing of the party to slow his march.

Mr. Sanders, speaking to jubilant supporters in San Antonio, trumpeted what early results suggested would be a landslide victory.

“We have just put together a multigenerational, multiracial coalition, which is not only going to win in Nevada it’s going to sweep the country,” he said, predicting another victory in Texas next month.

[ NEWS ANALYSIS: How Bernie Sanders dominated in Nevada. SEE BELOW]

While Mr. Sanders boasted that “no campaign has a grass-roots movement like we do,” and was bathed in “Bernie, Bernie!” chants, he otherwise ignored his Democratic opponents.

Mr. Sanders’s success, and the continued uncertainty over who his strongest would-be rival is, makes it less clear than ever how centrist forces in the party can organize themselves for a potentially monthslong nomination fight. The moderate wing is still grappling with an unusually crowded field for this late in the race, the lack of an obvious single alternative to Mr. Sanders and no sign that any of those vying for that role will soon drop out to hasten a coalescence.

As results were being counted on Saturday night, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., former Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, the billionaire investor Tom Steyer and Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota were all competing for what would clearly be a distant second-place finish.

With the full order of finish still in doubt, Mr. Buttigieg used his caucus-night speech to deliver a stern warning about the implications of nominating Mr. Sanders, urging Democrats not to “rush” into anointing him as their candidate. In his most pointed critique to date, Mr. Buttigieg said Mr. Sanders’s agenda lacked broad support and asserted that the senator did not give “a damn” about the swing-state Democrats in Congress who are scared of running with him on the same ticket.

“Senator Sanders believes in an inflexible, ideological revolution that leaves out most Democrats, not to mention most Americans,” Mr. Buttigieg said, adding that Mr. Sanders wanted to “reorder the economy in ways most Democrats, not to mention most Americans, don’t support.”

Mr. Biden appeared at a Las Vegas union hall while most votes were still uncounted to claim a comeback and vowed victory in South Carolina. “Y’all did it for me,” he told supporters, trying out a new line aimed at his rivals. “I ain’t a socialist, I ain’t a plutocrat, I’m a Democrat.”

Mr. Biden’s campaign asserted that he would finish in second place here, a claim challenged by Mr. Buttigieg’s aides.

The apparent scale of Mr. Sanders’s victory margin presented an immediate challenge to the rest of the candidates, many of whom had been counting on a drawn-out nomination fight to give them time to catch up. But time is plainly running short, and few of Mr. Sanders’s rivals have a clear path to closing his advantage. Among them, only Mr. Biden has a realistic chance of winning South Carolina next week, the sole remaining contest before Super Tuesday on March 3.

That may leave the other Nevada runners-up scrambling to accumulate delegates but with few opportunities to win whole states. Several candidates who were counting on a wave of national momentum coming out of the early states showed no sign of achieving that: Ms. Klobuchar, who claimed a third-place finish in New Hampshire as a major breakthrough, appeared to be near the back of the pack in Nevada. Mr. Buttigieg, who nearly deadlocked Mr. Sanders in Iowa and New Hampshire, did not come close to him on Saturday.

Should Mr. Biden prevail in South Carolina — an outcome that is no longer seen as a near-certainty — there could be enormous pressure on the other moderates in the race to stand down and give him a clean shot at Mr. Sanders.

Ms. Warren, meanwhile, did not appear to have received a significant bump in Nevada after a debate on Wednesday that was widely seen as her strongest of the campaign. The impact of her dramatic confrontation with the billionaire candidate Michael R. Bloomberg may have been muted here, because so many early votes were cast before it. She now faces the ungainly challenge of seeking to capitalize on the energy of that debate without having triumphed, or even fared especially well, in the contest immediately following it.

At a large rally in Seattle on Saturday, Ms. Warren declared there were “a lot of states to go, and right now I can feel the momentum.” Declining to follow other Democrats in taking aim at Mr. Sanders, she continued deriding Mr. Bloomberg and his self-funded candidacy.

The fragmentation of the vote among the other candidates, not only in Nevada but in the coming primaries, is likely to strengthen Mr. Sanders. After the split decision in Iowa, where he shared the lead with Mr. Buttigieg, and a modest victory in New Hampshire, he appeared to prove his ability to win convincingly in a more diverse state, an outcome that often eluded him in his 2016 bid for the Democratic nomination.

With its mix of Hispanic, African-American and Asian-American voters, Nevada offered Mr. Sanders a rejoinder to critics who claim he cannot broaden his appeal beyond his base of white liberals.

Mr. Sanders’s steady progress in the primary contest has come amid widespread grumbling and occasional howls of alarm from the Democratic establishment, which views Mr. Sanders — a 78-year-old democratic socialist who has never joined the party — and his movement with a combination of fear and distrust. The anxiety deepened this weekend in the aftermath of reports that government intelligence officials believe the Russian government is aiding his candidacy, and after Mr. Sanders acknowledged that he was briefed on the Russians’ apparent intervention a month ago.

Yet his coalition in Nevada — where 35 percent of the voters were not white, according to entrance polls — bodes well for his prospects in the 15 states and territories that will vote on the most important day of the race in just over a week. The Super Tuesday contests include large, diverse states such as California, Colorado and Texas, and the delegate lode is so hefty that if Mr. Sanders performs well, it will be difficult for one of his rivals to catch up given the unflagging dedication of his supporters.

Making that task more difficult is that the more moderate candidates continue to split votes and, more important, they all seem determined to forge ahead either by using their own fortunes or by raising enough money from donations to proceed. That was evident on Saturday, as candidates like Ms. Warren, Mr. Buttigieg and Ms. Klobuchar, as well as Mr. Sanders, traveled to rallies in states that will cast ballots soon.

Further complicating matters for those hoping to stop Mr. Sanders is the diminished standing of Mr. Bloomberg, the candidate some moderates hope can defeat Mr. Sanders. Mr. Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York, is reeling after a poor debate performance here, and some who were counting on him to become the moderate standard-bearer have been left to wonder whether he has what it takes.

Mr. Bloomberg’s campaign manager, Kevin Sheekey, warned in a statement on Saturday that “the Nevada results reinforce the reality that this fragmented field is putting Bernie Sanders on pace to amass an insurmountable delegate lead.” He added that nominating Mr. Sanders would be a “fatal error.”

Even as many of the candidates left the state on Saturday, Nevada retained the political spotlight as the caucuses appeared to run relatively smoothly after the debacle in Iowa this month.

Democrats in this state made drastic changes to their own caucus procedures after Iowa, scrapping the software they had been planning to use and intensively training thousands of people to pre-empt problems. There were scattered reports of volunteer shortfalls at some precincts, though not on a scale that seemed to alter the contest in any appreciable way, and some precincts had problems getting through on the telephone hotline to report caucus results, prompting the state party to add phone lines.

More revealing than the caucus process was who voted — and the coalition that Mr. Sanders built in a state that derailed his then-promising candidacy four years ago.

He performed well across a range of voters, winning men and women, union members and nonunion workers, and those who attended college and those who did not, according to entrance polls of caucusgoers.

Mr. Sanders not only won among self-described liberal voters, but also made inroads with moderates for the first time. Among self-described moderate or conservative caucusgoers, Mr. Sanders was the top vote-getter, albeit narrowly: He captured 25 percent of such voters, while Mr. Biden won 23 percent, according to entrance polls.

That was in part because many black and Hispanic voters described themselves as moderates, and because Mr. Sanders outpaced the field with Hispanics, taking 53 percent, and was second only to Mr. Biden among African-Americans. Mr. Biden captured 36 percent of black voters, while Mr. Sanders won 27 percent, the entrance polls showed.

Mr. Sanders made less progress with older voters, whom he has repeatedly struggled with, but claimed new evidence that his calls for “a political revolution” were motivating new voters. He won an extraordinary 66 percent of voters under 30, and dominated among the broader universe of voters who said they were attending their first caucuses, a demographic that made up just over half of the electorate.

Mr. Sanders’s performance will echo beyond Nevada and surely focus the minds of his rivals.

Asked before the results were announced how he would slow Mr. Sanders’s march should the Vermont senator triumph here, Mr. Biden, stopping at a caucus site in North Las Vegas, said: “I beat him by going to — just moving on. People want to know who’s the most likely to beat Donald Trump.”

Mr. Biden emphasized the importance of keeping the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives and taking back seats in the Republican-controlled Senate, and noted that he had raised “over a million bucks” since the debate on Wednesday.

Ms. Warren has raised considerably more than that since her standout performance, and on Saturday her campaign said it had taken in $21 million so far this month — a huge sum by any standard, and one likely to allow her to compete seriously at least through Super Tuesday. Her campaign manager, Roger Lau, said on Saturday that he believed the debate would ultimately “have more impact on the structure of the race than the Nevada result.”

______

Reid J. Epstein and Shane Goldmacher contributed reporting.

_____

"I believe the Democratic party elites are underestimating the discontent with the moderate, centrist status quo. I think a huge slice of the electorate wants radical change, just as they did four years ago." CHARLES, ARIZONA

"Why is it so difficult for people (particularly the media) to believe that some of us actually like, support, and believe in Bernie? Am I some extreme left wing liberal? No. I'm a middle class, single, 40-something educated female that happens to believe our country has enough imagination left in itself that we can invest in education, the environment, health care, and equality. Do I believe Bernie can accomplish everything he promises? No, but I'm okay with that. He is fostering a vision of hope, and if he even accomplishes one-tenth of that vision, we'll be far better off than the current path we're on. Unfortunately the alternative democratic candidates (the "safe bets") do no inspire the same level of hope in our future."MOMO, COLORADO

"Hundreds of million of US voters are fed up with the unfairness built in to our political system and our economy. They are tired of financial manipulation, health insurance profiteering, military waste, high cost of education, and low wages. These people know that talk of a really great economy is blather because they know their own financial situations and how many hours they have to work to squeak by. And they know how close to the edge they are because they see friends and neighbors falling into bankruptcy. The difference now is that they are getting organized through the Sanders campaign structure. They are talking to relatives, friends, and acquaintances. This face-to-face organizing has more power than TV ads, political talking heads, or social media."

CHARLIE COOP, BALTIMORE

" NY Times,,,you just don't get it. You don't understand what it mean to have a $30 prescription jump to $1,000 per month! You don't understand what it means to have the purchasing power of your pension decline by 33%. Its all good for you. But for the rest of us.....we are DROWNING!!!!!!!!!!!" ANN, DENVER CO

"Sanders is genuine, dedicated, and has amazing grass roots support; but I like my health insurance, my 401k balance, my job, low taxes, and I am just about 4,000 dollars away from paying for my own college and have saved considerable amounts for my children's education. No way am I going to give that up and pay for someone else's college too - so hello to four more years of Trump." RONAN IS COMING FOR YOU, LOS ANGELES

"If you listened to Sanders Nevada victory speech, he covered it all, what he is for. It's a sea change from where we are, but we have gone so far off the rails; we are so out of balance. Corporations and GOP hollowed out corrupt government have forgotten the people who buy their goods and pay taxes. It's become all about their profits and their power. Sanders comes along as the Un-Trump at this moment and the fear-mongering gets louder. Not once did Sanders mention socialism last night. Nor was that was he was talking about. The work is to rebalance this country for the people, not to eliminate capitalism. The work is to save the planet. "We are in this together" he said ( not us vs. them,"America first"). If Sanders becomes president and spends his first 100 days undoing Trump's destruction via executive orders and hiring and firing, that will be momentous. The rest will of course be a push. I'm with him." POTTER, MA

"Trump or Sanders. Trump or Sanders. One wants to take from the rich and give to the poor. The other wants to take from the poor and give to the rich. Do we have third party candidates yet. Are there any." VINCENT PAPA,

BOCA RATON FL

"As a two-time voter for President Obama, I will proudly vote for Democratic nominee Bernie Sanders in the November election. I will also vote for Warren if it is her. Otherwise I will vote Green. My one issue is non-profit, universal healthcare. God Bless Bernie."

OBSERVER, WASHINGTON DC

"It's becoming quite confusing trying to understand all these voices saying "Bernie can't win" when the election results are showing that not only can Bernie win, but he's killing it in the field -- across age, race, income bracket, gender. What in the world is motivating all these people to say "Bernie can't win?" The data shows otherwise: 54% of the democratic vote in Nevada means Bernie is heading towards the nomination. The only people who are going to lose big time here are the old stick in the mud party centrists, who are on the way out to irrelevance. We are watching in real time, over half a dozen election cycles, the Democratic Party being taken over by the progressives. It doesn't matter if Bernie is elected in 2020 or not. The progressive movement is here to stay. If not Bernie in 2020 as president, then likely Elizabeth Warren in 2024. I don't see how any facts on the ground can change this. I'm registering young, first time voters in Pennsylvania. They're all going Bernie. If everyone who said "Bernie can't win" will just register one young voter, we will crush Trump in the national." KIP LEITNER, PHILADELPHIA

"This is the story of NOT ME, US. By building a diverse coalition based around policies to help the working class and poor, Sanders has tapped a segment of voters long overlooked by the Democratic Party. As we get closer to Super Tuesday it looks more likely Sanders will come out on top. There is no situation where the moderate candidates can come out on top through their own merits. The Democratic Party is finally being realigned to the working class coalition that propelled FDR to the White House and ushered in a new era in America."

COMMENTER, NORTHEAST

"Why did he win? Because Bernie is the OG. I supported him early in 2016 but voted for Hillary in the VA primary because I thought the only way to beat the GOP was with a safe centrist. We all see how that worked out. Bernie 2020!"

NATHAN HANSFORD, BUCHANAN VA

"Bernie is like a former PM we had in Aus. He tried for years to become PM, his party was out of power for decades as our version of the GOP ruled and then something miraculous happened, the unthinkable, the NO WAY!! I don't believe it happened. He won and our very first social democrat won and we got universal healthcare, we got free college education, we got Family Law Courts, we got laws for our indigenous population, we got environmental laws, the list is very long of the things that happened and were changed. Over the decades since that win in 1972 the Aus version of GOP and the Aus version of the DNC have slowly eaten into some of these reforms but some of them like our Medicare and our Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme that is recognised around the world as one of the best(we subsidise the prescription drugs your doctor gives to you) remain and they are sacrosanct now, no government would ever tamper with them. So Americans...if Bernie wins the nomination don't be afraid but get out there and vote Blue and usher in a new era, a new broom and send Trump to the dustbin of history." LEE H, AUSTRALIA

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How Bernie Sanders Dominated in Nevada

A multiracial coalition brought the senator’s long-promised political revolution to vivid life, for perhaps the first time in the 2020 race.

By Jennifer Medina and Astead W. Herndon | Published Feb. 22, 2020 | New York Times | Posted Feb 23, 2020 |

LAS VEGAS — They showed up to Desert Pines High School in Tío Bernie T-shirts to caucus on Saturday morning, motivated by the idea of free college tuition, “Medicare for all” and the man making those promises: a 78-year-old white senator from Vermont. To dozens of mostly working-class Latinos, Bernie Sanders seemed like one of their own, a child of immigrants who understands what it means to be seen as a perpetual outsider.

For at least one day, in one state, the long-promised political revolution of Mr. Sanders came to vivid life, a multiracial coalition of immigrants, college students, Latina mothers, younger black voters, white liberals and even some moderates who embraced his idea of radical change and lifted him to victory in the Nevada caucuses on Saturday.

By harnessing such a broad cross-section of voters, Mr. Sanders offered a preview of the path that he hopes to take to the Democratic presidential nomination: uniting an array of voting blocs in racially diverse states in the West and the South and in economically strapped parts of the Midwest and the Southwest, all behind the message of social and economic justice that he has preached for years.

His advisers argue that he has a singular ability to energize voters who have felt secondary in the Democratic Party, like Latinos and younger people, and that Nevada proved as much — and could set the stage for strong performances in the Super Tuesday contests on March 3. The Sanders campaign is looking in particular to the delegate-rich states of California and Texas, whose diverse Democratic electorates include a high percentage of voters from immigrant backgrounds.

Mr. Sanders’s chances also depend in part on the field of moderate candidates remaining crowded and divided, which is not a guarantee, especially if voters seeking an alternative to the right of Mr. Sanders align behind one candidate. To earn enough delegates to be the Democratic nominee, Mr. Sanders will also have to win big in other large states, including California and Texas, where his coalition remains untested. And his brand of democratic socialism could prove to be a hard sell, including among Latinos elsewhere in the country.

Mr. Sanders delivered his victory speech Saturday evening not in Nevada, but in Texas, one of the diverse powerhouses on the Super Tuesday calendar.

“They think they are going to win this election by dividing our people up based on the color of their skin or where they were born or their religion or their sexual orientation,” he said in San Antonio, speaking of President Trump and his allies. “We are going to win because we are doing exactly the opposite, we’re bringing our people together.”

In the entrance polls on Saturday, Mr. Sanders led the field across many demographic groups: men and women, whites and Latinos, union and nonunion households, and across education levels.

The breadth of his appeal amounts to a warning shot at those in the moderate Democratic establishment he often rails against, many of whom have staked their hopes for a “Stop Sanders” effort on the idea that he has a political ceiling within the party and could not grow his base of supporters.

Instead, as the primary shifted to Nevada from the racially homogeneous electorates of Iowa and New Hampshire, it was Mr. Sanders who grew more formidable, while other candidates have struggled.

Strong showings in the first two states have not significantly helped former Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Senator Amy Klobuchar break through with nonwhite voters. Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. has called himself the one candidate who can build a diverse coalition, but he finished in second place in Nevada, the most diverse nominating contest so far.

Only Mr. Sanders, with his uncompromising message that working-class Americans affected by injustice can unite across ethnic identity, has shown traction in both predominantly white Iowa and New Hampshire and the more black and brown Nevada.

“He’s been saying the same thing for 40 years — I trust him,” said Cristhian Ramirez, a 31-year-old technology support specialist who began volunteering for the Sanders campaign in November. Mr. Ramirez brought several friends with him Saturday and scoffed at the idea that Mr. Sanders would face challenges in the general election. Like many supporters, Mr. Ramirez was first drawn to Mr. Sanders during the senator’s 2016 presidential bid. “Why should we vote for a moderate? We already tried that last time and we lost.”

The strong showing in the first-in-the-West caucus state seemed to be a payoff for Mr. Sanders’s unique political philosophy and his campaign team’s electoral strategy, which bet big on grass-roots outreach to Latinos and immigrant populations. It’s a model the campaign is looking to take across the country, working to reach people across racial and ethnic groups who have traditionally been less likely to vote.

“We’ve been saying for a while, candidates and the Democratic Party need to engage Latino communities sooner and substantively,” said Marisa Franco, the executive director of Mijente, a community organization that has backed Mr. Sanders. “If you do that, they respond accordingly.”

While ideologically liberal voters and young people powered Mr. Sanders toward popular vote victories in Iowa and New Hampshire, Nevada showed the candidate’s brand of authenticity could have cross-cultural appeal, even as the campaign sparred over “Medicare for all” with the culinary workers’ union, the state’s largest union and one of the most powerful organizations in Nevada Democratic politics.

Activists and leaders who have endorsed Mr. Sanders, particularly people who work with immigrant populations, argue that a focus on “Bernie Bros” — a caricature of his supporters as predominantly white and male — misses the scope of the campaign’s outreach to historically marginalized groups.

They praised Mr. Sanders for articulating a global frame of injustice that has led him to uncharted places among the Democratic field: He was the first to support a moratorium on deportations, has consistently spoken of the plight of the Palestinian people during debates, and has talked about his own family’s immigrant experience as a way to connect with voters, something he rarely did during his 2016 run.

No demographic is a monolith, of course, and Mr. Sanders’s support comes with fissures along fault lines of age and educational attainment. But, if Nevada is any measure, he is well positioned to galvanize a cross-section of Latino voters in a way that earlier candidates have done with black voters in the Democratic Party, amassing an advantage that could help create a path to the nomination.

“If you have focused intention and ongoing support for Latinos and other voters of color you can win,” said Sonja Diaz, the executive director of the Latino Policy & Politics Initiative at the University of California, Los Angeles. “They did not take the Latino vote for granted.”

When early voting began last week, the Sanders campaign sent a neon truck blasting local Spanish radio out onto the Las Vegas streets, urging people to show up at dozens of early caucus sites. They attracted hundreds of people to a soccer tournament, then offered rides to caucus sites to anyone who showed up.

After months of knocking on doors in largely Latino neighborhoods in Las Vegas, on Saturday morning, the Sanders campaign said it sent text messages and phone calls to every Latino registered as a Democrat or independent in the state.

For months, the Sanders campaign has boasted that it was the first to organize and advertise in largely Latino neighborhoods, not just in Las Vegas, but in Des Moines and east Los Angeles. Many people who showed up at the caucuses wearing Sanders buttons and stickers said his campaign was the only one they ever heard from. Latino political activists — including those backing other candidates — routinely applaud the Sanders campaign for doing the kind of expensive, labor intensive outreach they have been trying to convince other candidates to do for years.

Former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, who has virtually unlimited resources, is also investing in Latino outreach and competing aggressively in Super Tuesday states, which could cut into support for Mr. Sanders. He has already spent more than $10 million on Spanish-language advertising.

Mr. Sanders’s appeal seems particularly strong in the West, where his ability to harness not just Latinos, but also liberal black and Asian-American voters could portend a strong showing in California, which will award more delegates than the four early voting states combined.

The Sanders team has long said that California, where early voting is already underway, is a cornerstone of its campaign. It has invested roughly $6.5 million in advertising there so far, including more than $1 million for Spanish language advertising. A poll from the Public Policy Institute of California released last week showed Mr. Sanders with 30 percent of the vote, and Mr. Biden in second, trailing by nearly 20 percentage points.

The support for Mr. Sanders in Nevada was particularly notable given the intense fight with the Culinary Union, which represents 60,000 housekeepers, bartenders, cooks and others who work in casinos here. Leadership for the union, whose membership is more than 50 percent Latino, declined to back any one candidate, but spent the weeks leading up to the caucus criticizing Mr. Sanders’s “Medicare for all” plan, because it would effectively eliminate the union’s prized private health insurance.

But in interviews in recent days, many rank-and-file union members said they supported Mr. Sanders precisely because of his health care proposal, explaining that they wanted their friends and relatives to have the same kind of access to care that they have.

On Saturday, Mr. Sanders won at five of the seven caucus sites on the Strip, losing one to Mr. Biden and tying with him at another — a clear sign that the messages from union leadership had largely been ignored.

Ana Maria Archila, co-executive director of Center for Popular Democracy, a national collective of progressive groups, said she heard all day about people voting for the first time. She also said that she expected states like California and Texas could turn out even better.

At a recent event in Las Vegas geared toward Latino voters, Ms. Archila said she asked the audience to “close your eyes and imagine a country where we are not a target,” citing Mr. Sanders’s support for a moratorium on deportations.

“People started to cry,” she said. “We have never known what it feels like to be in this country and not be under threat.”

_____

Jennifer Medina reported from Las Vegas and Astead W. Herndon from Charleston, S.C. Nick Corasaniti contributed reporting from Minneapolis.

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5 Takeaways From the Nevada Caucuses (The Big One: Sanders Takes Control)

Mr. Sanders has now won the most votes in each of the first three states and has more momentum than all his rivals and more money than everyone besides two self-funding billionaires.

By Shane Goldmacher | Published Feb. 23, 2020 Updated 8:41 a.m. ET | New York Times | Posted February 23, 2020 |

LAS VEGAS — Senator Bernie Sanders won big on Saturday and is now the clear front-runner. Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. saved enough face to march on to his must-win in South Carolina a week from now. Pete Buttigieg finished in the top tier again and embraced the urgency of knocking down a rising Mr. Sanders, though it is not clear where he wins next. And Senator Elizabeth Warren is awash in cash after her debate dismantling of Michael R. Bloomberg  — $9 million in three days — but the performance did not nudge her up in the standings in Nevada.

Here are five takeaways of what Saturday’s results mean for the rest of the Democratic primary:

BERNIE SANDERS HAS TAKEN COMMAND OF THE RACE

Mr. Sanders did not just win Nevada. Entrance polls show that he dominated.

Those polls showed Mr. Sanders winning men and women; whites and Latinos; voters in all but the oldest age group (17-29, 30-44 and 45-64); those with college degrees and those without. He was carrying union households and nonunion households, self-identified liberal Democrats (by a wide margin) and moderate and conservative ones (narrowly).

“Welcome to the revolution,” said Waleed Shahid, a spokesman for Justice Democrats, a progressive group.

The Sanders victory was built upon three distinct and yet overlapping bases of support: young people (56 percent support among those 44 and under), very liberal voters (49 percent) and a majority of Hispanic voters. The latter was a new factor in Nevada after two heavily white opening states, Iowa and New Hampshire, and particularly important as the race expands to big and diverse states on Super Tuesday with large Latino populations, none more significant than California and Texas.

Mr. Sanders has now won the most votes in each of the first three states (Mr. Buttigieg appears to have edged him in delegates in the still-disputed Iowa results) and has more momentum than all his rivals and more money than everyone besides the two self-funding billionaires, Tom Steyer and Mr. Bloomberg.

It was no accident that Mr. Sanders spent much of the day before the Nevada caucuses in California and had two rallies in Texas on Saturday: He campaign is looking ahead to Super Tuesday March 3 as the day he breaks away from the rest of the Democratic field.

Speaking of which …

THE REST OF THE FIELD ISN’T SHRINKING

Not long after the first results began rolling in, a super PAC supporting Mr. Buttigieg announced it was buying TV ads on Super Tuesday states. Mr. Biden’s campaign manager declared that “the Biden comeback” had just begun. Senator Amy Klobuchar dropped from her New Hampshire showing yet claimed to have “exceeded expectations.” And Ms. Warren’s campaign manager said her performance at last week’s debate would prove more important than the actual election.

Translation: No one is about to quit this race.

And the longer all the alternative candidates remain, the longer Mr. Sanders can keep carrying states and consolidating his own coalition without a singular rival.

“The Nevada results reinforce the reality that this fragmented field is putting Bernie Sanders on pace to amass an insurmountable delegate lead,” said Kevin Sheekey, the campaign manager for Mr. Bloomberg.

Each has their own arguments for staying.

Mr. Biden, who carried black voters in Nevada, is the best positioned to beat Mr. Sanders in an upcoming state (South Carolina). Mr. Buttigieg has had the strongest showings overall besides Mr. Sanders. Ms. Warren, whose campaign announced a $21 million haul for February, argues she has the money and organization to compete. Mr. Bloomberg has his billions. Ms. Klobuchar’s path — which is taking her to Fargo, North Dakota, on Sunday — seems less clear and may be more about grabbing spare delegates than the nomination.

The collective impact is clear. A remarkable six candidates all had at least 12 percent of the vote among voters over 45 in Nevada, an almost impossibly even level of fracture.

JOE BIDEN’S BEST FINISH YET IS STILL SECOND PLACE

The Biden case for the nomination has been straightforward: He’s the guy to beat President Trump. Yet for the third time in three races, Mr. Biden did not win. He did improve from his bad fourth-place finish in Iowa and his disastrous fifth place in New Hampshire (as of late Saturday both Mr. Buttigieg and Mr. Biden were claiming second as Nevada sloooowly processed results).

But throughout February, Mr. Biden had said that his fortunes would be reversed now that more diverse states were voting. Except it was Mr. Sanders who soundly defeated Mr. Biden among Latino voters, according to entrance polls, while Mr. Biden’s lead among African Americans — his strongest base — continued to shrink to 12 percentage points.

“Y’all did it for me. Y’all did it,” Mr. Biden nonetheless told his supporter in Las Vegas.

He notably sharpened his contrast with Mr. Sanders and Mr. Bloomberg, who has vied to take over the moderate lane the former vice president occupied for virtually all of 2019.

“I ain’t a socialist. I ain’t a plutocrat. I’m a Democrat,” he said. “And proud of it!”

Mr. Biden could well still win in South Carolina where he has consistently led in the polls, and that could be a springboard to Super Tuesday. But his schedule has him locked down in the must-win state for much of the week as rivals cross the nation.

And don’t forget: Mr. Biden led in the Nevada polling averages for much of the last year.

Until he didn’t.

BUTTIGIEG WANTS TO BE THE ANTI-BERNIE

Of all the victory and concession speeches on Saturday, Mr. Buttigieg’s was the most revealing. He used the big platform not just to make the case for himself but to slash at Mr. Sanders, whom he accused of pushing an “inflexible, ideological revolution that leaves out most Democrats, not to mention most Americans.”

He talked about the urgency of beating Mr. Trump and the importance of nominating a Democrat who “actually gives a damn” about down-ballot races. Speaking on MSNBC, one of the campaign’s national chairs, Representative Anthony Brown, called Mr. Buttigieg the leader in the “non-revolutionary lane” of the primary, though the extent to which such a lane exists, it is more a tangled mess.

Going forward, the problem is that all of Mr. Buttigieg’s early successes in Iowa, New Hampshire and, to a lesser extent, Nevada has not yet lifted him nationally.

Among black voters, the Nevada entrance polls had him carrying a meager 2 percent. Advisers to his rivals and Democratic strategists who want to see Mr. Sanders stopped have been frustrated with Mr. Buttigieg’s campaign, arguing that while he has been relatively successful so far, he is now in a demographic cul-de-sac.

But Mr. Buttigieg has a compelling counterpoint, as he said pointedly in his speech: “Ours is the only campaign that has beaten Senator Sanders anywhere in the country this whole campaign cycle.”

AFTER SIZZLING DEBATE, Warren doesn’t GET NEVADA BUMP

If Wednesday’s debate performance was going to turn Ms. Warren’s political fortunes, it did not do so fast enough for the Nevada caucuses.

The results trickling in delivered another round of frustration for a candidate who fell below expectations in both Iowa and New Hampshire and had her campaign manager, Roger Lau, arguing on Saturday that the days-old debate would prove more significant than the actual election.

“We believe the Nevada debate will have more impact on the structure of the race,” Mr. Lau wrote on Twitter. He called the actual results a “lagging indicator” because so many votes — true — were cast before the debate.

The problem is that election results create their own new gravitational reality in politics and the race itself will be reset with the next debate on Tuesday. Then comes South Carolina, which was long seen as her weakest of the four early states. Then, suddenly, Super Tuesday, where Mr. Sanders seems to be making a play for Ms. Warren’s home state of Massachusetts.

Ms. Warren still has fans. Before one of the largest crowds of her campaign in Seattle on Saturday, she told supporters that she had raised $9 million in the last three days, a huge sum. That gives a financial cushion to a campaign that was so close to running out of money in January it took out a $3 million line of credit.

But on a day that Mr. Sanders won and was building momentum, Ms. Warren was still focused on her preferred target: Mr. Bloomberg, reliving some of the greatest hits from the debate.

And she added some new, off-brand material for a candidate who rose in the polls last year on the strength of her myriad plans and reputation as a wonkish fighter.

She cracked a height joke.

Mr. Bloomberg, she said, posed “a big threat, not a tall threat, but a big one.”

Her rivals had not even mentioned her in their assessments.

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[theculturedmarxist]

On Wednesday, the US Senate voted to acquit President Donald Trump on charges of abuse of power (52-48) and obstruction of Congress (53-47). The largely party-line vote concludes the impeachment process initiated by the Democrats last fall.

The result is a political debacle for the Democratic Party that has only strengthened Trump.

Trump has scheduled a national address today at noon. The purpose, as he stated on Twitter, will be to “discuss our Country’s VICTORY on the Impeachment Hoax.” On Wednesday afternoon, Trump retweeted an image of a Time magazine cover showing a series of signs: Trump 2024, Trump 2028, Trump 2032… Trump 4EVA. This is a repetition of his previous threats to remain in office beyond constitutionally mandated limits.

One day before the final vote, the outcome of which was not in doubt, the Democrats gave Trump a platform in Congress to deliver his State of the Union address. Trump used the opportunity to denounce his political opponents, rail against “socialism” and outline a raft of right-wing proposals.

Trump will utilize his acquittal to press forward with his antidemocratic and authoritarian measures. Jonathan Turley, writing in the Washington Post on Tuesday, pointed to the significance of the argument advanced by Alan Dershowitz in defending Trump during the Senate impeachment trial. Dershowitz’s claim that neither “abuse of power” nor “obstruction of Congress” is an impeachable offense became the central axis of Trump’s defense.

“The president’s defense was then tied inextricably to this extreme and chilling argument,” Turley wrote, a defense that has now been endorsed by the Senate.

Another comment in the Post, from David Von Drehle, cited a Gallup poll showing Trump’s approval ratings rising from 39 percent last fall to 49 percent by the end of the impeachment process—”the highest level of his presidency so far and at least three points higher than Barack Obama could claim in early February of his reelection year.”

Citing the same poll, the Wall Street Journal editorial board gloated that the Democrats may have “helped [Trump] win a second term by impeaching him.”

This outcome is the product of the methods employed in the Democrats’ campaign against Trump and the class interests involved. If there has been one constant element in the Democratic strategy, it has been to make sure that popular hatred of the Trump administration would be smothered and the Democrats’ opposition would be directed not to the left, but to the right.

Trump’s inauguration more than three years ago was followed immediately by protests against his attacks on immigrants, his racist policies against refugees, his appointment of fascists to top-level positions in his administration, his pro-corporate policies and tax cuts, his militarist threats, and his attacks on social programs. The day after his inauguration saw the biggest single day of protests across the country in US history, with more than a million people participating.

Popular opposition on each of these issues was suppressed and derailed as the Democrats focused their campaign against Trump exclusively on matters of foreign policy. In particular, they centered their opposition on the concerns within dominant factions of the military and intelligence establishment that Trump was not pursuing the fight against Russia with sufficient vigor.

Even before the election, the Democrats began concocting the narrative that Trump’s election campaign was the focal point of a massive conspiracy directed from the Kremlin and Russian President Vladimir Putin to “undermine our democracy” and “sow divisions” within the United States.

The anti-Russia campaign assumed hysterical dimensions, comparable only to the McCarthyite rants of the 1950s and the anti-Communist conspiracy-mongering of the John Birch Society. The Democrats turned unsubstantiated claims that Russia spent a few hundred thousand dollars on social media advertisements—a tiny fraction of the billions spent by corporations and the rich on the presidential campaigns—into lurid allegations of a “Russian plot” against America, in which Trump served as the puppet of Putin.

Throughout this process, the Democrats’ relation to Trump had a schizophrenic character. While they bitterly opposed the administration on foreign policy matters affecting the strategic interests of American imperialism, they were—and remain—eager to work with him on key elements of ruling-class policy on which they agree, particularly on social and economic policies to continue the enrichment of the financial oligarchy.

This began with President Barack Obama’s declaration immediately after Trump’s election that his “number-one priority” was to “facilitate a transition that ensures our president-elect is successful.” Obama coupled this with the declaration that the election was an “intramural scrimmage” between two sides “on one team.” The Democrats then collaborated with Trump in ensuring passage of his corporate tax cuts, his attacks on immigrants, his record military budgets and his aggressive actions against Venezuela, China and other countries.

Terrified of and opposed to any mass popular movement against Trump, the Democrats sought to pursue their conflict with the White House using the methods of a palace coup—behind-the-scenes maneuvers involving the intelligence agencies and disaffected factions within the state.

The Democrats have utilized the anti-Russia campaign to press their own demands for the suppression of free speech (in the name of combating “fake news”) and to legitimize their persecution of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange for exposing the crimes of American imperialism.

Following the failure of the investigation into Russian “meddling” led by former FBI director Robert Mueller, the Democrats launched the impeachment campaign to continue their operation. The supposed “quid pro quo” alleged against Trump—the basis of the abuse of power charge—involved temporarily holding up military aid to the Ukrainian government, which is involved in a military conflict with Russian-backed forces in eastern Ukraine.

The methods employed by Trump’s opponents within the state are determined by the social and political interests motivating them. The Democratic Party is a party of Wall Street and the military and intelligence agencies, aligned with privileged sections of the upper-middle class that pursue their interests through the politics of racial and gender identity.

The Democrats’ palace coup has ended in a debacle. Now it is the socialist movement against Trump that must be developed. It is one thing for Trump to prevail against his reactionary and cowardly opponents in the Democratic Party. It is quite another for him to take on the growth of the class struggle.

The Socialist Equality Party launched its presidential campaign to build a revolutionary socialist leadership in the working class. Over the past two years, mass struggles have erupted in the United States and internationally. This is the social power that can bring down the Trump administration, end imperialist war, stop the drive to dictatorship and fascism, and put an end to capitalist exploitation and inequality.

The movement of the working class must be guided by a conscious socialist, revolutionary and internationalist program and perspective. We call on all workers and young people to support the Socialist Equality Party in the 2020 election and make the decision to join the SEP and its sister parties in the International Committee of the Fourth International.