California Free Press

Off the Top of My Head

Republicans Should Split into Two Parties

by John Lawrence

It's obvious there is a severe split in the Republican party between those loyal to Trump and those who are loyal to the Constitution. Honorable and principled Republicans like Liz Cheney, Adam Kinzinger, John Kasich and many others have nothing in common with the obsequious, conspiracy minded, demonizing, besmirching Trumpies. Trump and his followers should be relegated to the dustbin of history while real Republicans who believe in small government - that government governs best which governs least - low taxes, the free enterprise system and that the United States is a shining city on the hill should be the future of the Republican party. Splitting off and forming another party would show the country that Republican principles, such as those exemplified by Nelson Rockefeller, Dwight Eisenhauer and Ronald Reagan, are still relevant. My father, who was a Republican, would not recognize the Republican party of Donald Trump.

A split in the Republican party might not lead to huge electoral successes at first, but it would lead to the erosion of the Trump wing which is a good thing. Eventually as the new breed of Republicans gets their new Republican party organized and established, they would also start winning elections because they would be standing for something real and relevant not something wholly concocted and based on lies and untruths. They would not be tainted by the likes of some of the more nefarious members of the Republican party like Nixon, Trump and dare I say, George W Bush who used the conservative Supreme Court to get himself elected and then lied us into a war in Iraq. The new branch of the Republican party would hopefully not be a party of white nationalists espousing anti immigrant sentiments. The new branch of the Republican party hopefully would work with Democrats in the interests of the people of the United States instead of assuming a mission of making Democrats fail in order to get themselves elected. A new branch of the Republican party would put the interests of the people above their own sectarian interests.

There are many, both American citizens and people around the world, who look up to the United States that used to be, the United States that helped Europe win World War II, and then offered the Marshall plan even to the losers of that war which helped rebuild Europe. The United States that overcame the Great Depression by means of a compassionate government that worked in the interests of the people. The United States that passed the Civil Rights Act. But today with the advent of Trump and people like him, people that put their own interests first and the interest of American citizens other than themselves last, people around the world are experiencing a sense of exasperation, vexation and chagrin with the United States. It doesn't represent a shining city on a hill any more. Sure people still want to come here to get away from the hell holes that the countries they were born in represent. The United States still affords a high degree of average prosperity for most, but not all, of its citizens. In order for the Republican party to live up to its principles, honorable Republicans should split from those who endorse Trump and his Big Lie.

Off the Top of My Head

Bush V Gore Set Precedent for Trump v Biden

by John Lawrence

Remember when George W Bush took over the Presidency because the Supreme Court sided with him in his lawsuit to get the vote counting stopped? If it had continued Gore would have won the Presidency in 2000. If Gore had become the rightful President, there probably would not have been the disastrous and illegal Iraq wars. As is evident now Saudi Arabia was more to blame for 9/11 than Iraq or Afghanistan, but Bush wanted to be a war time President. The US government, during the George W Bush administration, kept documents secret that would have implicated Saudi Arabia as the sponsor of the 9/11 attack that killed 3000 Americans. Families of the 9/11 victims have had to retrieve documents from the British government that implicate Saudi Arabia whom they now blame for 9/11 and are suing for compensation.

In 2000 conservative justices on the Supreme Court voted to stop the counting of votes in Florida overruling the Florida Supreme Court. Wikipedia reported:

"Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 (2000), was a decision of the United States Supreme Court on December 12, 2000, that settled a recount dispute in Florida's 2000 presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore. On December 8, the Florida Supreme Court had ordered a statewide recount of all undervotes, over 61,000 ballots that the vote tabulation machines had missed. The Bush campaign immediately asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay the decision and halt the recount. Justice Antonin Scalia, convinced that all the manual recounts being performed in Florida's counties were illegitimate, urged his colleagues to grant the stay immediately. On December 9, the five conservative justices on the Court granted the stay for Bush, with Scalia citing "irreparable harm" that could befall Bush, as the recounts would cast "a needless and unjustified cloud" over Bush's legitimacy. In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens wrote that "counting every legally cast vote cannot constitute irreparable harm.""

Media organizations later analyzed the ballots and found that, under specified criteria, the originally pursued recount of undervotes of several large counties would have confirmed a Bush victory, whereas a statewide recount would have revealed a Gore victory. So Gore actually won the 2000 election. There would have been no illegal invasion of Iraq, and the US would have been well on the road to combating climate change because that was Gore's primary issue. How history might have been changed, if only ... So Trump probably figured, among his other plans to overturn the Biden victory in 2020, that the Supreme Court would probably be on his side in overturning the election since he had appointed 3 conservative justices to the Supreme Court, and the Court had essentially overturned the 2000 election in favor of George W Bush. However, Trump never got to the point of approaching the Supreme Court as Bush had done because Pence went ahead after the insurrection and presided over the vote count which assured that Biden had won the election. If the insurrectionists had sufficiently interrupted the proceedings on January 6, Trump's lawyers might then have petitioned the Supreme Court to rule in favor of Trump especially since the Court was overwhelmingly conservative, three of the Justices having been appointed by Trump himself. We'll never know, but what is clear is that Trump attempted a coup on January 6. It just didn't come off quite as he had planned.

Off the Top of My Head

If Huge Numbers of People Believe Something, Does It Make It True?

by John Lawrence

Huge numbers of people believe Trump won the election. By all objective measures, it's a false belief. Huge numbers also believe some particular religious doctrine. Does that make it true? When it comes to religion though, there are no objective measures. Did God actually give Moses two stone tablets containing the Ten Commandments at the top of Mount Sinai or was it Mount Horeb as it says elsewhere in the Bible. Or was it Mount Serbal or Mount Catherine where Christians built a monastery in the belief that one of these mountains is where Moses received the stone tablets. Biblical scholars cannot even agree exactly which mountain corresponds to Mount Sinai. Or, is it possible that Moses had the stone masonry skills to have carved the stone tablets himself and then just told the story that he had received them from God? After all if people believed the tablets were created just by Moses and not by God, they would have given the Ten Commandments a lot less consideration as something they should be concerned about.

The January 6 Committee is attempting to prove that Trump knew he had lost the election, but misled his followers to believe in what others have called his Big Lie. Is there a willingness on the part of "followers" to believe anything their "leader" tells them? We'll never know the factual truth about Moses and the stone tablets, but we actually have factual data about the truth or falsehood of Trump's contention that the election was stolen from him. As Bennie Thompson, chair of the January 6 committee said, "Numbers don't lie." It doesn't matter what millions of Trump supporters believe because beliefs have to be measured with respect to objective facts whenever they're available, and in this case they are. With respect to religion we are free to believe whatever we want since there are no objective facts available no matter how hard anyone wants to believe that their beliefs are in fact the true facts.

So why do people believe stuff that isn't true? Why did all those people believe that the Emperor's new clothes were in fact a most wonderful set of threads? It took a little boy to point out that the Emperor was in fact naked. People will tend to believe whatever a person in power tells them because they don't want to be punished either directly or by other believers who could make them social outcasts for not believing what all of the rest of them believe. You don't want to say the Emperor is a fake if the Emperor could throw you in prison or worse. People didn't contradict the Roman Caesars when they told them they were actually gods. A lot of the wars have been between groups with contrary religious beliefs. After the Protestant Reformation, there followed the Thirty Years war in Europe between Catholics and Protestants. The war in Yugoslavia was among three religious groups: Eastern Orthodox Christians, Roman Catholics and Muslims. They were all ethnically the same southern Slavs, the only difference among them which resulted in them killing each other was in their professed religious beliefs. Croats were largely Roman Catholic, Serbs were mostly Eastern Orthodox and Bosnia is majority Islamic. Different religious beliefs have resulted historically in human beings killing each other.

Trump's Big Lie resulted in his true believer followers almost fomenting a successful coup on January 6. It also helped Trump and other Republicans raise huge amounts of campaign cash from his followers based on their belief that the election was stolen from their "leader." Tolerance among people with different religious beliefs is a necessary component if earthlings ever hope to attain Peace on Earth, Good Will Among Men (and Women). Democracy is based on an accurate counting of votes. It's all about the numbers. It's not about beliefs. It's not about believing what some leader tells you to believe. Objectivity and science establish what is undisputedly true. Fortunately, democracy has a way to establish what is objectively true. Religion doesn't.

Off the Top of My Head

Problems of American Democracy - Part 5 - Elections Are Popularity Contests

by John Lawrence

The most competent, knowledgeable and experienced candidates are not elected. The most popular are, and in many cases these people don't know anything about governing or legislating. Especially today in America's celebrity culture, media celebrities with tons of name recognition get themselves elected while people who would govern wisely are rejected. Case in point: experienced and talented Hilary Clinton lost the 2016 election to media celebrity Donald Trump. Now Trump goes around endorsing the ljkes of Dr. Oz. Why? Because Dr. Oz is a household name having been on television for a long time. This feature of democracy could mean the end of democracy as more and more incompetent celebrities who know nothing about governing are elected. In fact the candidates who pander the most to the voters are more likely to get themselves elected than the ones who tell it like it is. The question must be asked, "Is this the best way to run a country?"

I don't think so. What you want ideally is the best and the brightest, the most knowledgable and the most experienced running the country. At the very least there should be a requirement that all Presidential candidates must have served at least one term in Congress. But that's not what the Founding Fathers ordained. Any nincompoop can run for President of the United States and become the most powerful man or woman in the world. Kishore Mahbubani writes in his book, "Has China Won?": The Chinese Communist Party is not run by doddering old apparatchiks. Instead, it has become a meritocratic governance system, which chooses only the best and brightest to be promoted to the highest levels." I am not endorsing the Chinese system. Yet by removing selection of people for the highest offices from the general public, the system does not fall victim to elections by the lowest common denominators. In China the people elect officials at the city or county level, and those officials elect officials at the next highest level and so on. So the highest officials are elected by that governing body at the immediately lower level.

It seems that what you want at the national level are officials who represent the best and the brightest not those who have become media celebrities or prominent athletes. You also don't want millionaires and billionaires in a position to buy elections. Money corrupts politics and makes it certain that government will be by the elite and for the elite. Just because a politician has a lot of money or worse yet has people with a lot of money running his campaign does not mean that that politician is in a position to govern effectively. American democracy is entering a phase in which only media celebrities are going to be able to collect enough votes to get themselves elected. They become the ultimate "influencers." Government by the most popular is antithetical to government by the best and brightest. When these "influencers" also are total panderers you have government by those who can most effectively dupe the voting public.

Off the Top of My Head

Is Democracy Doomed by the Constitution Itself?

by John Lawrence

According to the Constitution, state legislatures have complete control over their state's electors so, even if the popular vote is for a Democrat, a Republican controlled state legislature can choose electors dedicated to the Republican candidate for President. The electoral college was established by Article II, Section 1, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution and modified by the 12^th and 23^rd Amendments. Article II, Section 1, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution states:

"Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector."

The 12th amendment is irrelevant to our discussion as it has mainly to do with how electors should deliberate and the number of which are chosen by each state. The 23rd amendment gives citizens living in DC the right to vote. The Constitution makes clear that state legislatures have complete control over the selection of electors, and, therefore, that state's control of its votes for President regardless of the popular vote in that state. In fact the following is true:

"Currently, all states select electors through a popular vote (although how that vote works can differ), but that was not always the case throughout American history. In many states, the state legislature selected electors, a practice which was common until the mid-1800s."

Many "battleground states", those where the popular vote is close, have Republican controlled legislatures. When the same party holds both legislative chambers and the governorship, that party has state control. Republicans have state control in the battleground states of Arizona, Georgia, Florida and Ohio as well as 19 other states mostly in the south and midwest. State legislatures that are Democrat controlled are mostly on the west coast and northeast. In the next Presidential election red states that have state control of their legislatures and governorships could change the rules about how they choose electors and decide that they will choose Republican electors regardless of the popular vote. Of course they would be sued and the suit would wind up in the Supreme Court which is majority controlled by Republicans and conservatuves. One of the tenets of conservatism is a strict interpretation of the Constitution. They are called "strict constructionists." There is absolutely no doubt that a strict interpretation of the Constitution gives state legislatures complete control over the selection of electors. If rules need to be changed in those states to allow for the selection of electors not to be made by popular vote, that can easily be accomplished in states in which both the Houses of the legislature and the governorship are in Republican hands such as in the battleground state mentioned above.

So while the US Congress has been concerned over the years with voting rights such as the 15th and 19th amendments to the Constitution which gave voting rights to African Americans and women, respectively, and the Voting Rights act of 1965 which prohibits racial discrimination in voting, the real test for nondiscriminatory election of the President of the U.S. will come up in the 2024 election in which many red states will avail themselves of their rights as states to select electors. In the final analysis expanding voting rights legislation such as the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and the Freedom to Vote Act are irrelevant to the outcome of the election. The John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act would make illegal voting rules that discriminate on the basis of race, language, or ethnicity and empower voters’ to challenge discriminatory laws. The Freedom to Vote Act (S. 2747) is currently in the Senate and would solidify comprehensive voter protections, including a minimum of 15 days for early voting, mail-in ballots, and making Election Day a national holiday. It would require eliminating the filibuster to get these laws passed in the Senate.

If states pursue what is their right according to the Constitution to change electoral law to allow them to choose electors not in accordance with popular vote, it will precipitate a Constitutional crisis in 2024. If Trump runs and is elected due to these changes at the state level, the Supreme Court will uphold the election results and Trump will be elected despite the popular vote. This is the scenario that Trump clumsily tried but failed to succeed with in 2020. Next time it could succeed and be perfectly legal. All this goes to show that the U.S. Constitution is fundamentally flawed. Minimal changes that would bring it into the modern world would be elimination of the electoral college so that Presidents are elected by popular vote, the elimination of the filibuster so that the Senate operated as a democratic institution and elimination of the Second Amendment so that every nut case doesn't have the right to own firearms.

Off the Top of My Head

Problems of American Democracy - Part 1

by John Lawrence

When my father was a high school teacher in Highland Park, NJ, he taught a course - Problems in American Democracy. So I'm hopefully carrying on a family tradition by trying to elucidate these problems which, to put it mildly, are probably much different today than they were in 1941! The big problem today is that so many people are detached from reality in terms of being in touch with what the real problems are. One of the real problems is climate change, how to get from here to net zero carbon emissions before planet earth becomes uninhabitable. Another real problem is homelessness and affordability of housing. Another real problem is the 80 million refugees in the world. Another real problem is for Americans to be concerned about world problems and not just confine their attention to what goes on inside the borders of the US.  Another real problem is physical and social infrastructure which will be addressed by Biden's Build Back Better bills. But the biggest problem of all, as I see it, is that elections every 2 years make continuity of direction for the US impossible especially when the 2 parties have become diametrically opposed. So today we have the reality that the American government could possibly swing back and forth between Trumpism and what we might call Bidenism. Back and forth between ignorance and enlightenment. To boot the American people are no longer tuned in to authoritative news sources. Too many are only tuned into social media which is greatly responsible for cultivating the divide between two American tribes - the no nothings and the do somethings.

People in the Trump camp could care less about voting for or against their own economic interests. You would think a lot of them would benefit from the initiatives that the Democrats have put forward. But either they are ignorant of them or are willing to vote against their interests just because of the tribe they belong to or out of spite. They are completely irrational. Rationality is not even on the table. Their hate and their spite rules everything as far as they are concerned. They are willing to go down numerous rabbit holes and believe all kinds of conspiracy theories because critical thinking or a concern about human welfare, their own and others, has no place in their consciousness. Their concern and understanding remains at the level of symbols like the American flag. A deeper understanding or analysis of situations is beyond them. What's more this misinformed and ignorant part of the population is significant in number and can easily be responsible for electing ignorant and conspiracy theory infused lawmakers who will do whatever is necessary to pander to their constituents. Thus America as a nation could swerve back and forth between ignorance and rationality as exemplified by Trump's withdrawal from Obama's climate initiatives like the Paris accords and Biden's reinstating them.

Contrast the instability of American democracy with the Chinese system of government in which stability is of utmost importance. They don't want anyone rocking the boat including tennis stars. While this heavy handedness does curtail some of the aspects of western notions of freedom, it preserves the priorities of the long term interests of China itself which has been going in what most experts concede is a very positive direction. According to the World Bank: "Since China began to open up and reform its economy in 1978, GDP growth has averaged almost 10 percent a year, and more than 800 million people have been lifted out of poverty. There have also been significant improvements in access to health, education, and other services over the same period." China has had the goal of eliminating poverty altogether and claims as of 2021 to have done so. According to a Chinese source which admittedly may be biased: "Through continuous efforts, the final 98.99 million impoverished rural residents in China had all been lifted out of poverty, and all 832 impoverished counties and 128,000 villages had been removed from the poverty list by the end of 2020. The strategy of targeted poverty alleviation is China's strongest "weapon" in its final battle against poverty, and a major innovation in the theory and practice of poverty reduction. China's success in poverty alleviation has proven that the problem of poverty, in essence, is how the people should be treated: the people-centered philosophy is the fundamental driving force behind this cause." Independent confirmation of these claims is unclear. The World Bank which is an unbiased source essentially agrees with the Chinese government at to its elimination of poverty: "In 1990 there were more than 750 million people in China living below the international poverty line - about two-thirds of the population. By 2012, that had fallen to fewer than 90 million, and by 2016 - the most recent year for which World Bank figures are available - it had fallen to 7.2 million people (0.5% of the population). So clearly, even in 2016 China was well on the way to reaching its target. This suggests that overall, 745 million fewer people were living in extreme poverty in China than there were 30 years ago. World Bank figures do not take us to the present day, but the trend is certainly in line with the Chinese government's announcement."

So what weapons does the US have in its arsenal for the alleviation of poverty and homelessness? Not many. Biden's Build Back Better plan will help, but the US in recent years has been more interested in funding weapons systems built by the military-industrial complex, weapons that destroy rather than weapons that build. It's only "progressives" that even care about solving the problems of poverty and homelessness in America or in doing something about climate change or about the refugee problem in the world and not just at our southern border. I note that not one Republican voted for Biden's Build Back Better bill in the House. Instead Republican leader Kevin McCarthy went on an 8 hour diatribe in a futile attempt to prevent the bill's passage.

Off the Top of My Head

If Trump Didn't Commit Treason, What is Treason?

by John Lawrence

It's clear Trump tried to overthrow the results of the 2020 election and fomented a coup to keep himself in power. I'd like to know why that isn't treason and why Trump is not in jail. It would have to be done by Democrats because now the government IS Democrats. Republicans don't even participate except to try to roadblock everything Democrats try to do. So Democrats would have to put Trump in prison, and I think they are afraid to do so. Wishy washiness is their name. First Trump's famous call to Raffensberger, Secretary of State of Georgia, in which he implored him to "find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have". Then his attempt to corrupt the Department of Justice in order to get it to declare the election was corrupt, then his attempt to get Pence to not certify Biden's victory and on and on. There is so much documented proof that Trump did all of these things and more not to mention fomenting a coup on January 6. I repeat why isn't he in jail and being tried on charges of treason?

Trump is not only not in jail, he's contemplating another run for President in 2024. The US cannot withstand another run for President by Trump. The scenarios for future coups will make January 6 look like a dry run. Republican states have already changed laws making it more likely that state legislatures can take over elections and select their own slate of electors if they don't like the outcome of the voting process. Trump and his cronies have already cast doubt on the validity of elections. Poll workers have already received death threats as has anyone else connected with the democratic process or anyone who stood in the way of Trump's attempted coup. The January 6 committee will dig up enough dirt to put Trump in jail, but I doubt if they will go all the way and get that done. Democrats are too afraid of the reaction of Trump's supporters if they put him in jail. They're afraid it will look like a partisan effort. Well, it will be because there is no Republican support for chastising Trump in any way whatsoever. But that shouldn't stop Democrats and maybe Liz Cheney from doing the right thing.

Finally, just tell me what treason is if it is not all the things Trump did to overthrow a democratically elected government in the US. No wonder the rest of the world doesn't trust us.

Off the Top of My Head

Snake in the Grass Kyrsten Sinema Sells Out to Corporate Lobbyists

by John Lawrence

Corporations, especially the pharmaceutical, can thank Kyrsten Sinema for selling out to them. The least objectionable parts of Biden's Build Back Better plan are the ones Sinema vetoed. Biden's plan would have been much better if corporate lobbyists hadn't gotten to her. But not to worry. She's set for life with probable promises of corporate board positions paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for a few hours "work." With Democrats like her, we don't need Republicans. She's a Republican wolf in Democratic sheep's clothing. But never fear. Biden's Build Back Better Bill will eventually pass within the next couple of weeks, and it's still truly transformational. Too bad that every Democratic Senator had effectively a veto over any provision of it. Joe Mancin was at least up front with the public about his concerns, some of which were at least plausible. Sinema sprung her demands on Biden at the seeming last minute forcing him to renegotiate the whole deal and delaying the whole process. While pundits quibble over Biden's ratings, I don't think he's too concerned about that. He knows he has a BIG DEAL or a BIG FUCKING DEAL as he once whispered to Obama. He'll go down in history as a transformational President.

So what do the Republicans have to offer? Election denialism and insurrection denialism. It wouldn't be so bad except for the fact that they could spring back to life in two or maybe four years. Too bad for the rest of the world's confidence in America. Although the US decries Soviet and Chinese authoritarianism in which one leader can remain in power for a number of years, while the whole US relationship with the rest of the world could change every four, what about Angela Merkel, who remained in power for 16 years, in a putative democracy. Longevity of intent is not a function necessarily of type of government. The US is back? Biden would like to convince others it's so. But Trump has a different perspective which is that Biden's version of the US is back until he, Trump, takes over again in 2024. The US could veer wildly back and forth without any continuity whatsoever. While Democrats are doing their best to help families and bring the US into the modern world, Republicans offer warmed over conspiracy theories aided and abetted by social media. The US needs to get serious about denying Trump a chance of ever running again. In fact he should be in jail for attempting to overthrow a legitimately elected US government which is treason. Yes, the T word applies to him. The S word, sedition, as well. Yet as of now he can run again and possibly win in 2024.

I think that, after the twin Build Back Better bills finally pass, Democrats will turn their attention to voting rights. Will Sinema and Mancin go along with holding the filibuster in abeyance to get voting rights passed? That's the big question. If not, Democrats are sunk in 2022 and 2024. And so is the US as a world leader. The US will become a backwater and a latter day banana republic with an outsize military, corporate lobbyists run amuck and a fast fading US dollar as the world's reserve currency. Runaway global warming will be a given if Trump is elected again in 2024. The US will become a billionaire's paradise with unrestricted limits in economic inequality and a burgeoning homeless population that neither Republicans or Democrats seem to be able to do anything about. Rents will soar out of sight as more people live in their vehicles and on the streets without adequate sanitation. The rest of the developed world will leave the US in its dust, but they alone will not be able to solve the problem of climate change which will eventually make parts, if not all, of the earth uninhabitable. So there is a lot riding on a Federal voting rights bill overriding the Republican state efforts to gerrymander and restrict access to the ballot in order to favor the electability of Republicans.

How Trump Might Save the Democrats

by Robert Reich

Monday, October 11, 2021

[Please consider subscribing to my substack, at robertreich.substack.com, from which the following is drawn]

The unofficial kickoff of the former guy’s presidential campaign was a rally Saturday night in Des Moines. Unfortunately for the GOP, Trump’s speech focused on his Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen rather than on Joe Biden, whose approval ratings keep sliding because of the Delta variant’s continuing impact as well as fumbles at the border and in exiting Afghanistan.

All indications are that Trump is going to cast the midterm elections as a referendum on himself rather than on Biden. That’s hardly surprising, given Trump’s sociopathic ego. He cast his entire presidency as a referendum on himself. 

What’s surprising is how quickly the rest of the Republican Party is falling prey to this. We’ve already observed it at the state level: Trump’s Big Lie has moved 18 Republican-dominated states to enact 33 laws suppressing the votes of likely Democratic voters, on the false pretext of eliminating “voter fraud” that doesn’t exist. Several of these state laws will also let Republican legislatures ignore future electoral results they dislike. Under the same pretext, Republican states have undertaken bogus “audits” of the 2020 election.

But for a brief time it seemed as if senior Republicans in Washington would try to move the party away from Trump. They now appear to have given up. Several who in January criticized him for provoking the Capitol insurrection are now defending him and minimizing the attempted coup – including, notably, Senator Chuck Grassley, who showed up at Saturday’s Des Moines rally, and former vice president Michael Pence, who is now minimizing and excusing the riot.

For Trump to make the midterm elections into a referendum on himself and his Big Lie is useful for the Democrats. It takes the focus off Biden, reminds Americans how vile the former president is, and forces Republicans to try to defend him. If you watched Fox News Sunday, you might have seen Chris Wallace repeatedly ask House Minority Whip Steve Scalise whether he thought the 2020 election was stolen, and Scalise repeatedly squirm to avoid answering the question.

Scalise also refused to say whether he would vote to hold in contempt of Congress Trump advisers, such as Steve Bannon, who are resisting subpoenas issued by the January 6 Committee. Bannon is invoking executive privilege, at Trump’s request — an absurd position because by the 2020 election Bannon hadn’t worked in the White House for years. 

January 6 Committee Chair Bennie Thompson and Vice Chair Liz Cheney say they “will not allow any witness to defy a lawful subpoena or attempt to run out the clock, and we will swiftly consider advancing a criminal contempt of Congress referral.”

This means even more of an ongoing focus on Trump and his attempted coup. Before Congress can refer a criminal contempt to the Justice Department for prosecution, the full House has to vote on it. So you can expect a near party-line vote, which will put Republicans further on record as supporting Trump and, by implication, others who instigated the insurrection. 

The criminal contempt of Congress statute, enacted in 1857 and only slightly modified since, provides that any person who willfully fails to comply with a properly issued committee subpoena for testimony or documents is punishable by a substantial fine and imprisonment for up to one year. Once the House votes in favor of criminal contempt, the Speaker is required to report it to the Department of Justice, which then determines whether to prosecute. (Unfortunately, Attorney General Merrick Garland so far has not distinguished himself for holding Trump or his cronies accountable for anything.)

House Republicans could soon find themselves in an even more awkward position as the January 6 Committee investigates the roles several of them played in the insurrection. Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin has asked the committee to investigate the help Rep. Scott Perry gave Trump in pressuring the Justice Department to overturn the election, as well as Rep. Jim Jordan’s contacts with the White House before and during the insurrection. (You may remember that in the 2016 presidential election, Jordan, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, dug into allegations of impropriety at the FBI and Justice Department, and defended the power of the subpoena to compel testimony from executive-branch officials.)

The January 6 Committee also issued a subpoena last week to Ali Alexander, the leader of the pro-Trump “Stop the Steal” organization, who has claimed he worked on the pre-insurrection rally with several GOP lawmakers, including Reps. Paul Gosar, Mo Brooks, and Andy Biggs.

Trump’s speech in Iowa Saturday night suggests we’re already in the gravitational field of the 2024 midterms. But in making that speech mostly about himself, Trump may have given Democrats more leeway to do what Americans – including most Trump supporters – need them to do.

Off the Top of My Head

US Is Not a Democracy. It's a Republic if We Can Keep It.

by John Lawrence

Benjamin Franklin said, “It's a republic, if you can keep it.” when asked if we had a monarchy or a republic. We almost didn't keep it when Trump tried to turn it into a monarchy with him as the first monarch. However, the US is not a democracy. A democracy would be a nation governed by a majority of the people. There are a lot of reasons why this is not the case. #1 States' rights: The Federal government is not a national government. It's not a central government with power over the whole nation. Because of states' rights, the US federal government is a weak form of government that shares powers with the states which can veto an administration's agenda if they feel so inclined. States can overrule the central government. A country with a strong central government can set its agenda at the national level and then pursue it without any obstructions from various states or regions or provinces. All things being equal, a nation with a strong central government will surge ahead of one with a weak central government in a competitive enironment.

#2 Representative instead of direct democracy. A representative democracy does not necessarily govern in the same way a direct democracy would. Representatives are subject to lobbying which distorts their votes and makes them represent their donors more than their constituents. Opinion polls show that a majority of Americans want gun control, affordable health care and addressing the issue of climate change among other things. Yet the US government does little if anything regarding these issues because vested interests are funding politicians to vote "No" on these issues.  #3 Gerrymandering or political party control of district boundaries. When a political party controls district boundaries they can draw the districts in such a way as to favor the electability of their party's candidate. They can also practically guarantee that their party's candidate will be elected in perpetuity.

#4 The Electoral College. The electoral college makes it possible for a Presidential candidate to win the popular vote and lose the electoral college vote and hence the Presidency. Again it's minority rule not majority rule.

#5 The winner-take-all two party system eliminates representation for minorities. The way the US districting system is set up, it is impossible for third party candidates to win. They can be spoilers though taking votes away from the party that they're closest to ideologically. A parliamentary system is more amenable to multiple parties being represented.

#6 A Constitution set in stone whose barriers to change are seemingly infinite. The Constitution can be amended but not change except for amendments. The amending process requires a two thirds vote, not a majority vote, and hence is undemocratic. Other countries have procedures whereby the whole Constitution could be changed or updated or rewritten.

#7 Lack of continuity: Elections every 2 years can change the direction of government or the government's agenda or lack thereof. #8 Gridlock: An administration's agenda can't go forward due to the filibuster. In short, while other countries are surging ahead, America has the political equivalent of constipation. Gridlock is the outcome of a divided country controlled by the minority.

Fareed Zakaria wrote in an article in the Washington Post, The decay of American democracy is real:

"One aspect of the United States’ power remains substantially diminished: its role as a beacon of democracy. Among countries surveyed, 57 percent of people said the United States is no longer the model for democracy it used to be. Young people worldwide are even more skeptical about America’s democratic institutions.

"In one fundamental way, things look worse now than in prior periods of crisis. After Watergate, many were surprised that the world looked up to the United States for facing and fixing its democratic failures. It was a sign of the country’s capacity to course-correct. But imagine if after that scandal, the Republican Party, instead of condemning Nixon, had embraced him slavishly, insisted that he did absolutely nothing wrong, settled into denial and obstructionism and proposed new laws to endorse Nixon’s most egregious conduct? Imagine if the only people purged by the party had been those who criticized Nixon?

"The decay of American democracy is real. It’s not a messaging or image problem. Until we can repair that, I’m not sure we can truly say America is back."

 

Off the Top of My Head

If Two Democratic Senators Were Not Elected in Georgia Run-offs, There Would Be No COVID Relief Package Under Biden

by John Lawrence, March13, 2021

It was crucial that the two Georgia Democratic Senators were elected. Not one Republican voted for Biden's $1.9 trillion bill. If there were one less Democrat in the Senate, nothing like it would ever have been passed. Republicans are the Party of No. Not one Republican Senator will ever vote Yes on any legislation put forward by a Democrat so that Georgia election was crucial. That's why Republican legislatures not only in Georgia but around the country are scrambling to put restrictive Jim Crow voting regulations in place on the belief that Republican operative Paul Weyrich was right. He said, "So many of our Christians have what I call the goo-goo syndrome: good government. They want everybody to vote. I don't want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of people, they never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down."

So now economist Larry Summers is worried about inflation due to the fact that trillions have been added to the deficit. So far, lawmakers have enacted six major bills, costing about $5.3 trillion, to help manage the pandemic and mitigate the economic burden on families and businesses. Even those economists know that the Federal government doesn't need taxes  in order to spend money. The Federal Reserve can create it with a few keystrokes on a computer just the way they did to bail out Wall Street banks during the Great Financial Recession (GFR) of 2008. Of course the public wasn't suppose to know about this "secret" bailout by the Fed. Authorities wanted you to believe that the $700 billion bill passed by Congress provided the bailout. In reality it was much more. Rolling Stone reported: "Washington Post “Fact-checker” columnist Glenn Kessler disputes the numerous studies showing the real bailout outlay was through the Fed, which the Sanders campaign had said was anywhere from $7.7 trillion (the number Bloomberg used in its coverage of secret Fed lending) to $29 trillion (the number the Levy Institute at Bard College calculated, including guarantees and other forms of aid).

So how is it that  Larry Summers was not so worried about inflation due to the Fed's trillions of dollars created and given to Wall Street? The answer is that that money was given to rich people which has caused no inflation because rich people are not going to spend money in ways that drive up the Consumer Price Index (CPI). They are mainly going to invest their money in ways that aren't included in the CPI. They are going to purchase assets like stocks and real estate. Consequence: no inflation at least as measured by the CPI. Instead the Wall Street bailout during the GFR as well as the $2 trillion tax breaks of the Trump administration produced asset inflation. It's the reason that home prices and rents are becoming increasingly unaffordable. But Summers is worried about inflation as measured by the CPI which is what happens when poor and middle class people get a trillion dollar bailout. They will spend that money at least partly on consumer goods that are included in the CPI and potentially drive up prices. However, much of the bailout money will go to pay off debts like past due rent and mortgage payments. This is not inflationary. So the real moral of the story is that, according to economists like Summers, bailing out rich people is good, bailing out poor people is bad.

So two lessons are to be learned here. 1) The Fed doesn't need taxes to create money and spend it into the economy whether that money is to bail out banks or to bail out the poor and middles class. 2) Democrats need to enact at the Federal level voting laws which encourage as many people to vote as possible and roll back Republican enacted restrictions on voting at the state level. In order to do the latter, Democrats will have to eliminate the filibuster at least for particular types of legislation. The only reason Biden's $1.9 trillion relief bill passed is that it was done by a process known as "budget reconciliation" which only requires a majority vote in the Senate. A national voting rights bill cannot be passed by that process and is subject to the filibuster which requires 60 votes. The Party of No wouldn't hesitate to use the filibuster to doom any voting rights legislation at the Federal level which means essentially that Jim Crow voting rights would again be put in place to discourage black people from voting. And don't worry about your children and grandchildren having to pay off the national debt. The Federal Reserve doesn't need their money.

Off the Top of My Head

Democrats Should Get Rid of the Filibuster No Matter What They Have to Promise Joe Manchin

by John Lawrence, March3, 2021

They have nothing to lose by ending the filibuster and much to gain. Democrats are the party of getting stuff done, stuff that the country and the world needs. On the other hand Republicans are the party of No. With the filibuster in effect they will say no to everything. There is much that needs to get done that will go undone if the filibuster remains in effect. Democrats have nothing to lose, but they need the votes of every Democrat in the Senate including Joe Manchin who has said he's against ending the filibuster. What would Republican do if they were in power without the filibuster? Not much more than they have already done with the filibuster - give tax breaks to the rich which they can do with the budget reconciliation process which effectively nullifies the filibuster for budget related legislation. So Democrats don't have much to fear if Republicans regain control without the filibuster. But the Biden administration needs to do much more than budget related stuff. For example, a national voting rights act which clarifies on a national level voting procedures. Right now each state is rolling back voting procedures in an attempt to massively suppress poor and black and brown voters.

Also the Senate parliamentarian has ruled that the $15 an hour minimum wage increase cannot be part of the $1.9 trillion COVID relief act. She could be overruled by the President of the Senate, Kamala Harris, but this close to the beginning of his administration Biden doesn't want to do anything that radical. However, he has a deadline and that is 2022 when, if history is any guide, Republicans could regain control of one or both Houses of Congress. If that is the case, Biden will be neutered until his term is up in 2024 and will probably not be reelected after Republicans get done harping on him for 2 years that he has got nothing done (thanks to them). Unlike China which has continuity over 5 to 10 years in its policies, the US is in a situation now where it could likely swerve back and forth from left to right every 4 years. That does not lead to much admiration and respect from the other countries of the world which are already doubting how much they should trust and emulate America.

Trump undid as much as he could of what Obama had done by executive order, and now Biden has undid everything that Trump did also by executive order. Trump may have been an anomaly so that from now on good, consistent and stable leadership will prevail. But there is not much reason to believe in this happy scenario. Trump voters seem to be as hostile to the vision of Democrats as Democrats are hostile to the vision of Trump supporters. The two parties are at loggerheads. Will we swerve from belief in the necessity of doing something about global warming to denying global warming exists every four years? Will we go from extolling the benefits of fossil fuels to trying to get rid of fossil fuels every four years. Will we go from concern about the environment to allowing corporations to despoil the environment with impunity every four years? Will we go from tax breaks for the rich to government programs to support the poor every four years?

I'm thinking that, once Biden realizes that Republicans will not support his agenda on anything, he may support removal of the filibuster in 2022 before the next election so that he can force through all the legislation on his list that can't be passed by budget reconciliation. He'll have to buy off Joe Manchin somehow. His vaunted style of "working across the aisle" has been shown to be ineffectual even in his own eyes. That's the painful lesson he learned during the Obama administration when Republicans stalled and slow walked Obama for eight years, and, while they were doing it, they were at the same time putting Obama down for not getting anything done when they were not outright demonizing him. They will attempt the same thing with Biden, but I think Biden has learned his lesson. He will keep up the facade of wanting to work with Republicans, but he won't compromise in any significant way just to be a nice guy and get their support. The Republicans will not cooperate on anything unless they can diminish it and water it down. Obama thought he had to do just that. Biden has lost his naivete.

Off the Top of My Head

Congressional Republicans That Supported Insurrection Should Be Censured

by John Lawrence, January 10, 2021

Although it takes a two thirds majority to expel someone from the House or Senate, it only takes a majority to censure. Therefore, Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley and Kevin McCarthy at the very least should be censured. They will lose their committee chairs and be publicly shamed because the politician must stand before his peers to listen to the censure resolution. Meanwhile, Trump should be impeached in the House, but there should be no trial in the Senate because that would be a media circus of which Trump would be the star, and this would steal Joe Biden's thunder just as he assumes the office of President of the United States. The page needs to be turned and Trump should be blacklisted from every form of media exposure. Twitter, Facebook and others have already banned him for life which is the best thing that could have happened. Right wing app Parler has been deplatformed. Rudy Giuliani and Don Junior need to be prosecuted for inciting to riot for the words they spoke at Trump's Save America rally that preceded the insurrection. "Trial by combat"? Indeed. Long story short, Trump should be denied any media exposure whatsoever. The focus should be on Joe Biden's Presidency and the reckonings of those that have committed prosecutorial crimes needs to be done offstage, so to speak.

We need a breath of fresh air come January 20 while in the background those who have committed crimes connected with the insurrection need to be brought to justice. Every one of the rioters need to serve jail time or be fined - even those who crossed the barriers but did not go inside the Capitol. Those who went inside the Capitol need to be dealt more severe penalties. None of these rioters should be left off the hook. The myth that these assholes are Patriots needs to be dispelled. The only ones who are innocent in my opinion are those who didn't cross the line that the barriers represented. I'm sure that over time they all will be penalized in one form or other because there is so much video and social media evidence including their own bragging on social media. The FBI has their work cut out for them. In the meantime security needs to be ramped up at state Capitals all across the country, and gun laws need to be augmented and strengthened. Probably the only thing that saved the Capitol from an armed insurrection was the fact that so many of them flew to Trump's event and weren't allowed to bring guns on the plane. You can't have people with machine guns threatening state Capitals or office holders of a party they disagree with. We've seen too much of that already. Security around Joe Biden and Kamala Harris needs to be extremely tight. We don't want what happened to Abraham Lincoln happening to either of them.

At the same time Joe Biden and his Democratic allies in Congress have to get a humungus aid package passed and into the hands of the American people - all of them - so that there are tangible benefits for all to see and benefit from including Trump, hopefully former, supporters. The coronavirus must be brought under control. The ineffective US intelligence agencies have a budget of about $75 billion and yet they had no intelligence relating to what an average American could plainly size up: a Trump rally attracting tens of thousands on the same day that Congress certified the election results. I wrote previously how like James Bond's arch villains, Trump would show up January 6 for one last stand even when we all thought the election was finally, after repeated certifications at multiple levels, over. Bond's villains do not give up and neither did Trump after he had tried every other trick in the book to overturn the election. I'm sure he had plans for the inauguration on January 20 as well. That's why security at the inauguration needs to be extremely tight.

Social media by and large has finally done the right thing banning Trump and right wing wack jobs and conspiracy theorists. But it is obviously too late. They should have done this long ago. There are much needed reforms that need to be undertaken regarding social media. They have in fact aided and abetted the worst impulses of American society as their algorithms favored conspiracy theories and other fantastic falsehoods as they brought more eyeballs to the platforms than did the plain unvarnished truth. We have to reckon with a model in the media that is basically centered on entertainment including the news. Bringing eyeballs to the media - all media - is what advertising is all about. Advertisers won't pay and media corporations won't make any money from sober analysis because it's not entertaining enough and people demand to be entertained. Although Trump's lies are being finally called out all over the media, let us not forget that lies perpetrated via the media are nothing new. The Willie Horton ads promulgated for George H W Bush's 1988 Presidential campaign typify the lying that political candidates have always partaken of with Trump just being the latest purveyor.

"Horton, an African-American man, was a convicted murderer who raped a white woman and stabbed her partner while furloughed from prison under a Massachusetts program in place when Dukakis, the Democratic nominee, was governor. The TV ad is now considered one of the most racially divisive in modern political history because it played into white fear and African-American stereotypes. In it, an off-screen narrator tells the story of Horton’s crimes while pictures of Bush and Dukakis and a menacing mug shot of Horton flash across the screen. The narrator notes that Bush supports the death penalty for murderers."

Clearly, there should be thought given to bringing about truth in media and what can be done to insure that the American people aren't sold a pack of lies by politicians or in any other kind of advertising. American culture has also been brutalized and vulgarized because this has been shown by advertisers to attract the most eyeballs. Violence in media runs rampant. It's almost like you have to watch movies from Europe to see something which doesn't contain violence and usually gun violence of the most graphic sort which pervades US entertainment. This is the stuff that media corporations produce because they think it's the most lucrative. Politicians supported Trump's lies because they thought it was the best way to get elected or reelected. Other societies have not put up with this crap. Violence and lies, although they may be entertaining, need to be restrained if America is ever to attain some degree of collective mental health. I for one will send up a cheer for sober analysis.

Off the Top of My Head

Good-Bye Mitch McConnell: Democrats Win Control of Senate. Now They Need to Get Rid of Filibuster to Get Anything Done.

by John Lawrence, January 6, 2021

Nothing turned off GOP voters more than seeing their hero call for a $2000. payment to individuals while Mitch McConnell stood there on the Senate floor and said repeatedly, "Object. Object." Jon Offoss told his supporters that, if he were to be elected and Democrats controlled Congress, Biden had promised to implement the $2000 payments. That would be incentive enough for many Republican voters, especially the non-rich, to vote for a Democrat. Thank God, Democrats will control the Senate and the Roadblocker-in-Chief, will not get the chance to block all progressive Democratic legislation coming forward from the House in the next 4 years. Now there is one more potential roadblock that the Senate has the ability to do away with: the filibuster rule. Meanwhile, on the day Joe Biden is certified by the Congress, Trump, while completely neglecting the fact that yesterday the most people ever died from COVID, is holding another shit show and super spreader event in Washington so his supporters can get off on their collective anger that their hero wasn't reelected in a free and fair election. By the way I noticed in the excellent CNN film about Jimmy Carter (Rock and Roll President) that the Ku Klux Klan in white robes protested openly at one of his campaign events and one of them was carrying a sign, "America First." So that's where Trump got the idea for that slogan.

Even when Democrats gain control of the Senate, opposition party senators can filibuster the majority’s agenda. That means that any one Republican senator can filibuster any progressive piece of legislation that Joe Biden and House Democrats put forward including the Green New Deal, or more appropriately - the Biden New Deal, a public option for Obamacare which would allow anyone to choose Medicare, the elimination of part or all of student loan debt, $2000 COVID relief payments to most Americans and more, much more. The filibuster is not part of the Constitution; it is simply a rule of the Senate which can be changed by a majority vote. Eliminating the filibuster has been characterized as the so-called "nuclear option." Wikipedia notes:

"According to the Supreme Court's ruling in United States v. Ballin (1892), Senate rules can be changed by a simple majority vote. Nevertheless, under current Senate rules, a rule change could itself be filibustered, requiring two-thirds of senators who are present and voting to end debate. (This differs from the usual requirement for three-fifths of sworn senators.)

"Despite the two-thirds requirement described above being written into the Senate rules, any Senator may attempt to nullify a Senate rule, starting by making a point of order that the rule is unconstitutional or just that the meaning of the rule should not be followed. The presiding officer is generally expected to rule in favor of the rules of the Senate, but under rule XX, "every appeal therefrom shall be decided at once, and without debate" and therefore by a simple majority as there is no need for a vote on cloture.

"This happened in 2013, when Harry Reid of the Democratic Party raised a point of order that "the vote on cloture under rule XXII for all nominations other than for the Supreme Court of the United States is by majority vote". The presiding officer overruled the point of order, and Reid appealed the ruling. Mitch McConnell of the Republican Party raised a parliamentary inquiry on how many votes were required to appeal the chair's ruling in that instance. The presiding officer replied, "A majority of those Senators voting, a quorum being present, is required." Reid's appeal was sustained by a 52–48 vote, and the presiding officer then ruled that the Senate had established a precedent that cloture on nominations other than those for the Supreme Court requires only a simple majority. On April 6, 2017, that precedent was further changed by McConnell and the Republican majority, in a 52–48 vote, to include Supreme Court nominations."

Long story short. Democrats can eliminate the filibuster if they really want to. And they really need to do that because the Republican game plan will be to block all progressive legislation by means of the filibuster. Even without Mitch McConnell as chief roadblocker, Republicans will stymie Joe Biden and block all his initiatives. The result is that Biden's initiatives will go nowhere. It would be a total waste of Democratic power now that they have it. Republicans have shown no hesitancy to use their power to the full extent without any pretense of cooperating or compromising with Democrats. Now that Democrats have the power, they should use it starting with getting rid of the filibuster rule. Nobody knows more - from personal experience actually - than President Obama about how the filibuster rule can impede social progress. Republicans used it to effectively neuter Obama during his 8 year Presidency. Washington Post reported:

"Former President Barack Obama called on Thursday for eliminating the filibuster, joining a growing chorus of Democrats who portray the Senate’s signature procedural weapon as an obstacle to social progress that must be abolished if the party captures the Senate and White House.

"The appeal by Mr. Obama to do away with a tactic that Senate Republicans used to thwart him and the Democratic agenda for much of his eight years in office came during his eulogy in Atlanta for Representative John Lewis, the civil rights icon. The former president seized the moment to cast the filibuster as a vestige of a grim period in the United States when Southern lawmakers used it to impede voting rights and other advances for African-Americans."

“Once we pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, we should keep marching,” Mr. Obama said, referring to legislation Democrats are pushing on Capitol Hill in the face of opposition from Republicans. “And if all this takes eliminating the filibuster — another Jim Crow relic — in order to secure the God-given rights of every American, then that’s what we should do.”

So the writing is on the wall. Do we want this democracy to represent the interests of the majority of its people or only the upper 10%? Do we want to save the planet from global warming? If so the Republican call for "moderation" or "compromise" or "not being too radical" will not work. There is a limited time frame for us to act or the planet will soon - in our lifetimes and the lifetimes of our children - become uninhabitable for most people. We have failed to act on this in a timely manner. Now we must play catch up, and there is no time to waste. We have about 10 years to get global warming under control. Don't listen to people that say the Green New Deal is too radical. It's too radical only if we want to let the planet become virtually uninhabitable.

Off the Top of My Head

When Will Donald Trump Go Away?

by John Lawrence, December 16, 2020

There used to be a TV show - Search for Tomorrow. People wondered when everything would be resolved, the loose ends tied up and we would finally get to A Brighter Day, another soap opera. Well, we never found tomorrow or a brighter day, but simply the shows ended at the point that they were no longer profitable to their sponsors. In the same way the Trump road show/soap opera/reality show will end when it's no longer profitable. In the meantime it reminds me of a James Bond movie - Goldfinger. After Bond ruins Auric Goldfinger's evil empire and is relaxing on an airplane with a martini - shaken, not stirred, Goldfinger shows up on the plane with a gold plated revolver. There is always one final scene when you think everything has been resolved, but, think again, there is one last attempt by the villain to kill Bond. In this case the gun went off, blowing out a window, and due to the pressure differential,  Goldfinger who bears a striking resemblance to Donald Trump gets sucked out the window. Then the pilot, Pussy Galore, can make a safe landing and Bond can enjoy his martini ... and Pussy!

How many times do the votes have to be counted and recounted? How many times do the votes have to be certified and recertified? How many lawsuits have to be thrown out of court that tried to overturn the election. They tried at the state level to get legislatures to appoint Trump electors instead of Biden electors based on the fact that the state legislatures had to appoint the electors, and legally they could overturn the will of the voters and just do it. Trump finally got his "standing" before the Supreme Court. Surely they would throw out the votes of the election and certify Trump as the winner. After all Trump appointed 3 of them. Those ungrateful Supreme Court Justices! They threw out not one but two Trump law suits to overturn the results of the election. At every stage Democrats were asking "now will they agree that Biden has won and Trump has lost." It never happened, and just like in Search for Tomorrow, tomorrow never came and there was never A Brighter Day, the day when everyone agreed that Trump had lost and Biden had won. Finally, all the states selected the Biden electors rather than Trump electors although hope was still held out that faithless electors would still vote for Trump when the electors cast their votes before the US Congress on January 6. But wait a minute. Congress has to agree to accept the electors' votes on January 6. What if they don't?

Just like in Goldfinger Trump could swoop down on Congress on January 6 while all the Republican legislators who remain loyal to Trump will object to the electors' votes. According to the New York Times there could be one final showdown just as Joe Biden is enjoying his martini - shaken, not stirred. Goldfinger, aka Trump, could show up at Congress and some members of Congress could just not accept the results of the election.

"The Electoral College’s certification on Monday of President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory left just one final venue for President Trump and his supporters to challenge the results of the 2020 election: a joint session of Congress in January.

"Every four years, the House and Senate come together to formally tabulate the electoral votes and raise any final concerns about the results. Normally, it is a perfunctory confirmation of the Electoral College vote. But this year, some of the president’s most strident supporters are threatening to transform it into a messy last stand by objecting to the results."

The Constitution gives Congress the final say in the election. Just as Goldfinger shows up at the last minute to take on Bond in hand to hand combat, Trump could show up in Congress, and, as the votes are tallied state by state, if even one Congressional member from each House objects to that state's electoral vote count, it could mean that Biden will not have won the election. If that occurred, the joint session would immediately pause so lawmakers could go back to their respective chambers to debate the objection for up to two hours. They would then vote on whether to toss out the electoral results of the state in question. Both chambers would have to agree to reject the votes. It could happen but it's unlikely. At the very least it could gum up the works. Two hours here two hours there,  50 states times two hours per state, pretty soon you've delayed the final certification of the election indefinitely, especially since Congress will adjourn for the holidays. When January 20 rolls around, there still might be no winner of the election to be sworn in. Please note that many Republican Congressmen have not agreed that Biden won the election.

The Times article continued:

"Mr. Trump’s allies, led by Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama, have their sights set on challenging five states — Arizona, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Georgia and Wisconsin — where they claim that widespread voting fraud occurred, despite the fact that all five states have certified that the results are valid and there is no evidence of any widespread impropriety.

"The key will be recruiting a Republican senator to join them, and so far none has publicly committed to doing so. Without a senator, their efforts will quickly fail and Mr. Biden could be formally declared president-elect in under an hour.

"If a senator did sign on to challenge the results, Republicans could force Congress into a final, messy debate over Mr. Trump’s refusal to concede defeat and his baseless claims of election fraud, which have been roundly rejected in court."

It's not over till it's over as Yogi Berra might have said. It's definitely "deja vu all over again." The final battle might still ensue. Just as Auric Goldfinger (Donald Trump) showed up to challenge James Bond one more time, when everyone in the viewing audience thought Bond had vanquished the evil empire for good, just as he was enjoying his well shaken martini, Auric Trump could show up and his henchmen could create such turmoil in the hoary halls of Congress that the American people will rue the day that the Founding Fathers didn't put something in the Constitution to prevent this mess. When will Donald Trump finally go away? The correct answer is when the money and the sponsorship deals run out. There will be No Brighter Tomorrow till then.

Off the Top of My Head

Why Do We Need All These People to Rubber Stamp Election Results?

by John Lawrence, December 23, 2020

If Dr Seuss were alive, he might write a book, "Oh, the Votes We Can See." Run the Star Belly Sneetches through the voting machine and they come out with certified votes on their bellies. Run the Sneetches without stars on their bellies through the voting machine and they uncertify the votes. This is nonsense. The US electoral system is nonsense. Why do we need a four member board in Michigan to certify a vote? Why do we need to send a board of electors whose whole purpose is just to rubber stamp the electoral votes that have already been decided? Layers of lawyers are going to sue Star Belly Sneetches to change their stars from Biden to Trump. Other layers of lawyers will sue to get the Sneetches without stars on their bellies to put a Biden on their belly. Meanwhile Joe Biden is Bidin' his time.This is all ridiculous. The United States of Ridiculousness that can't even modernize its election system from the time when electors at least had to ride their horses to Washington with election results.

I think the electors should have to ride horses to Washington, and once there they could be put up in the Trump hotel where they would be coddled and catered to in order to persuade them to cast their electoral vote for Trump. Biden could put up his electors at the Notel Motel where they would get a continental breakfast and a promise of a better job if they cast their vote for Biden. Star Belly Sneetches would pull up their horses outside the Trump hotel and Sneetches without stars could pull up their donkeys at the Notel. Star Belly Sneetches would dine on filet mignon and chant "USA USA" while Sneetches without stars would dine on bologna sandwiches and chant "Black Lives Matter." All the layers of lawyers for both sides would be invited either to the White House for a convocation or to Greene Memorial Stadium for a pep rally. The purpose of these rallies would be to get the electors either to cast their electoral vote for Trump or for Biden irregardless of whether they had a star on their bellies or not.

On the designated day the electors would gather at Union Station to cast their electoral votes except for a last minute challenge in court by the layers of lawyers who want a revote, a recount, a reaudit and a recertification. Hold the phone folks. We must ascertain whether or not there were enough eyeballs on the volunteers who counted the votes. They will be challenged in court because it is alleged that they don't know how to count. Their arithmetical skills must be recertified. One by one they must come before a judge and count from one to a hundred and then do it backwards. If they can't accomplish this simple test, they will be required to go back to the third grade and all votes counted by them will be declared to be tainted. Tainted votes must of necessity and by prudent jurisprudence be thrown out. Because of all these legal challenges this case will be taken to the state Court of Appeals, then to the state Supreme Court. Reaching no decision there the case will be taken to the Federal Court of Appeals and then to the Federal Supreme Court where the Justices will rubber stamp the outcome according to which candidate they are pledged to which is the candidate that appointed them.

When all is said and done the new US President will be sworn in 16 months after the election having denied his opponent's transition team the right to transition. However the layers of lawyers will go back to state court, then Federal court, then Supreme Court to assert their right to transition. I submit to you sir that every worthy gentleman should be able to transition if he feels a need to. The will of the Court turned out to be that the lawyers were directed to the transition room where they could transition to their heart's content in whatever manner they deemed appropriate. But wait a minute. Senator Mitch McConnell just received a letter from one of his constituents, little Johnny Harwood, 8 years old. "Dear Mr McConnell, Why couldn't all the votes be counted in one place and the winner decided then and there. One person, one vote. Just think of all the horse manure that could be alleviated if you simply did just that."

Off the Top of My Head

Will Trump Detach His Base From the Republican Party?

by John Lawrence, November 15, 2020

It is becoming clear that the base of the Republican party is more loyal to Trump than they are to the Republican party. The base has really become the Trump party and old guard Republicans like Mitch McConnell are getting nervous that they will not remain loyal to the Republican party. That's why Republicans are showing deference to Trump and his pique that the election was illegitimate. They know he lost the election, but they won't come out and say so. Trump's base even held a huge post election rally last Saturday showing their loyalty to Trump not necessarily the Republican party. This makes it more likely that Trump will take his base with him when he leaves office. Effectively, they would become the Trump party. Whether Trump creates his on media empire or associates himself with Fox news or some other media empire, it's clear that there is an audience he can count on.

The Republican party made a deal with the devil in the 1960s after the Democrats passed the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. Hitherto southern white supremacists and racists had been loyal to the Democratic party.They decided en masse that, if the Democrats were not going to continue to represent their racism and white supremacy, they would switch parties. Republicans then made a deal with the devil and accepted them with open arms because, while Republicans basically represent the interests of the rich, there are not enough of them to form a majority in a constitutional democracy. So far Trump has represented the interests of the old line Republicans by signing into law huge tax breaks for the rich and deregulating everything that could be regulated. His base hardly noticed except for the pittance of a tax break they got. They were more interested in Trump's conspiracy theories and ongoing campaign rallies where Trump sowed his racist and nativist sentiments and stoked their anger. Now it's clear that, if Trump so desired, he could detach his base that is the Republican base and take them with him forming a separate party devoted to Trump and his conspiracy theories. Trump and his henchmen in the alternative and social media world could create their separate entity and reality, which they've already to a large extent, created. So doing would continue the deep divides within the United States and further sow discord and division.

Aligning themselves with Mitch McConnell and a Republican controlled Senate, if the elections in Georgia don't result in two Democratic Senators, will hamper Joe Biden's attempts to enact any of his agenda in the same way that they blocked Obama's agenda for eight years. Then Trump and/or his family members could storm back in 2022 and 2024 to win back what they perceive they have unfairly lost in the 2020 election. They have labeled any middle of the road Democratic programs as far left or socialist and they will use the same tactics to demonize Joe and particularly Kamala as not representative of their racist and white supremacist values. Meanwhile, all the good work which Joe Biden's agenda represents will not get accomplished just like Obama's agenda was prevented from getting much of anything done except for a watered down version of Obamacare which they demonized ever since its enactment. Democrats, heretofore, have tried to cooperate with Republicans and be nice guys while Republicans have been playing hard ball using every bit of their power to promote their interests without any compromise whatsoever. They even went to the extent of denying Ruth Bader Ginsburg's dying wish that the next President replace her on the Supreme Court. This was after they swore up and down that the next President should replace a Supreme Court Justice a year before the end of the Obama Presidency thus denying Obama that privilege.

Joe Biden could fall into the same trap of watering down his agenda just to please Republicans under the guise of cooperation. He supposedly wants to "work across the aisle." He thinks he can get Mitch McConnell to cooperate with him. My advice is to "speak softly and carry a big stick" in the immortal words of Teddy Roosevelt. He mustn't fall into the same trap that Obama - and for that matter Bill Clinton - fell into by playing nice with Republicans. Trump's base will continue to be more loyal to Trump than they will be to Mitch McConnell or the Republican party. Trump will be more concerned about staying out of jail and deferring his $431 million debt repayment so he will enlist his base along those lines. Trump knows that his personal concerns will diverge from legitimate Republican party concerns once he's out of office, and he will enlist his minions to give him their support. Prodigious and ongoing conspiracy theories will fuel the anger of Trump's base, and there will be demands for his reinstatement as the rightful President of the United States.

Off the Top of My Head

Trump's Purported Coup d'Etat

by John Lawrence, November 12, 2020

Trump's path to a second term goes through the Courts and the Republican state legislatures. It is up to the state legislatures to choose the electors who cast the state's electoral votes. So far they have always chosen those electors that are committed to cast their votes for the candidate that won the popular vote. But, as the song says: "It ain't necessarily so." It is conceivable that Trump could win the electoral votes in states in which Biden won the popular vote. Take Georgia for example. Here's how it would work. The Republican Secretary of State decides that there will be a hand recount of all 5 million votes cast in Georgia. That takes time. If the hand recount doesn't get done by November 20, Trump's lawyers could step in and ask the Supreme Court, which is controlled by conservative justices three of whom Trump appointed himself, to decide the election. This is not unprecedented. In 2000 George W Bush asked the Supreme Court to stop the recount process in Florida which they did costing Al Gore the election. If the recount had continued Gore, who won the popular vote not only in Florida but in the US generally, would have been elected. If something like this happens this year, this would give Georgia's 16 electoral votes to Trump instead of Biden.

However, Georgia's 16 electoral votes would not be enough to change the results of the election. Trump's lawyers would have to do the same process in a number of other states as well. In particular they would have to overturn the results in Pennsylvania with its 20 electoral votes. Pennsylvania, it is to be noted, also has a state legislature controlled by Republicans so it is not inconceivable. Currently Trump has 217 electoral votes including Alaska. He is winning in North Carolina with its 15 electoral votes so let's give him that. If he could use the courts and the state legislatures to flip Georgia and Pennsylvania, he would then have another 36 electoral votes for a total of 268, still not the 270 required to win the election. He needs another 2 electoral votes. Where could he find them? Let's see. Arizona's state legislature is controlled by Republicans. Let's assume Trump can do the same thing there. That would give him another 11 electoral votes bringing him to 279. Ipso facto Trump wins the election.

When the framers of the U.S. Constitution outlined the workings of the electoral college system, they didn’t specify how presidential electors should or must be chosen, leaving it up to the various state legislatures to each decide for themselves how to appoint their electors. However, the courts have decided that the states can't change the way they choose their electors after an election. This would throw the whole process into chaos. But chaos is precisely what we have now with Trump refusing to concede the election. Conservative talk show host Mark Levin has tweeted the following:

REMINDER TO THE REPUBLICAN STATE LEGISLATURES, YOU HAVE THE FINAL SAY OVER THE CHOOSING OF ELECTORS, NOT ANY BOARD OF ELECTIONS, SECRETARY OF STATE, GOVERNOR, OR EVEN COURT. YOU HAVE THE FINAL SAY -- ARTICLE II OF THE FED CONSTITUTION. SO, GET READY TO DO YOUR CONSTITUTIONAL DUTY

— Mark R. Levin (@marklevinshow) November 5, 2020

So if Trump and his allies can sow enough confusion into the process of determining certain states' election results, for example, calling for recount after recount, it's conceivable that Trump's lawyers will then ask the Supreme Court to intervene, and they might do the same thing they did in Bush v. Gore in 2000 and award the election to Trump. They might go even further and decide that, since the US Constitution does not specify that state legislatures must pick a slate of electors dedicated to the popular vote, they can decide for any candidate they please. This would effectively make Trump dictator because no one could ever trust election results again. Trump has a considerable base of support in the American electorate and could rely on the fact of this tremendous public support although half the nation at least wants Biden to be the next President, not Trump. After all Biden won the popular vote by over 5 million votes. But Hillary won the popular vote in 2016 and Al Gore won the popular vote in 2000. Having delegitimized the democratic process with his refusal to concede among other things, Trump hardly needs widespread skepticism about the electoral college to sow doubt about the voting process itself. Many people feel that the electoral college should be abolished and that the President should be elected by popular vote. This is only the latest blow to the American political system which is based on the wisdom of a few white men and their understanding of how things should be over 200 years ago. Yet the process can not be changed without three quarters of the states agreeing to a Constitutional amendment.

'Nightmare Coming to an End': Vanquishing Donald Trump, Joe Biden Wins US Presidential Election

Published on Saturday, November 07, 2020

by Common Dreams

"We, the voters, decided this!"

by Common Dreams staff

 

30 Comments

Beryl McCrainey Slevin from California and who voted using a mail in ballot stands in front of the mural of Joe Biden on November 7, 2020 as locals celebrate in anticipation of Biden being elected as the next US President in Ballina, Ireland. (Photo: Charles McQuillan/Getty Images)

After days of uncertainty amid concurrent global crises, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden was declared the winner of the closely-watched contest that denied President Donald Trump a second term Saturday morning, after votes tallied in the battleground state of Pennsylvania pushed Biden over the 270 electoral vote threshold.

According to NBC News: "The former vice president amassed 273 Electoral College votes after winning Pennsylvania’s 20 electors, according to NBC News, surpassing the 270 needed to win the White House and defeat President Donald Trump."

The Associated Press, which put both Arizona and Pennsylvania in Biden's column, also called the race:

The determination in Pennsylvania put Biden at 273 electoral votes to Trump's 214—a deficit the president has no way of overcoming even as five other states—Alaska, Georgia, Nevada, and North Carolina—continue to process their results. Adding Arizona's eleven electortal to Biden's column, put his electoral count to 284.

Shortly after the news broke, Biden said in a tweet addressed to the nation that he was "honored that you have chosen me to lead our great country."

"The work ahead of us will be hard," he added, "but I promise you this: I will be a President for all Americans—whether you voted for me or not. I will keep the faith that you have place in me."

Progressives immediately celebrated Biden's victory and expressed elation over Trump's pending departure.

"This nightmare is coming to an end. Despite every attempt to silence our voices and block our vote, the will of the people won," declared George Goehl, director of the grassroots advocacy group People's Action.

"We, the voters, decided this!" said Tamara Toles O'Laughlin, North America director for 350 Action, in a statement when the news broke. "By working together, our unapologetic movement for people and planet has been steadfast and patient as our votes were counted. People power stood up to Donald Trump's fascist vision for America and elected Joe Biden and Kamala Harris into the White House. The government we chose must be sworn in because this is the people's democracy."

The subject line in an email from the Sunrise Movement was expressive: "We fucking did it."

"Excuse my language," said the group's executive director Varshini Prakash, "but we fucking did it. It's official. We WON."

"We won. And this is a big win," said María Urbina, acting co-executive director and national political director of Indivisible. "A record number of voters turned out amidst a pandemic to express the will of the people, and to put a historic ticket in the White House by clear margins. Come January, we'll move forward together to swear in a President and Vice President who are serious about governing and will be expected to deliver on an agenda of dignity and justice for all."

"Together," Urbina added, "we can make good on the promise of an America that works for all of us, that prioritizes the most vulnerable, and that ensures we can all live with dignity. For now, we celebrate. This victory belongs to all of us."

Biden's victory comes in the midst of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and related economic crisis, a monthslong national reckoning over systemic racism, seemingly endless U.S. war, and the global climate emergency. There have been more than 9.7 million Covid-19 cases and nearly 236,000 deaths in the United States out of over 49 million infections and 1.24 million deaths worldwide.

On top of that is the broader crisis of Trump's presidency, which has featured rollbacks of environmental and public health protections at the behest of deep-pocketed polluters, a "pro-corporate, anti-worker agenda," efforts to degrade the rights of historically marginalized groups, inhumane immigration policies—including forcibly separating migrant children from their parents at the border—and constant lies.

Since Election Day, Trump has escalated his attacks on American democracy by falsely declaring victory early Wednesday, tweeting disinformation about the election, and delivering on Thursday evening what one reporter called "the most dishonest speech he has ever given." His campaign has also filed multiple lawsuits this week related to the race, validating pre-election warnings that he would try to steal the vote to retain power.

The president's actions sparked nationwide demonstrations demanding election officials "count every vote." Amid fears that Trump may refuse to concede, Biden campaign spokesperson Andrew Bates said in a statement on Friday that "the United States government is perfectly capable of escorting trespassers out of the White House."

Born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, in 1942, Biden studied history and political science at the University of Delaware then earned a law degree at Syracuse University. After practicing law as a public defender and at a firm, and entering local politics in Delaware's New Castle County, he was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1972.

Biden represented Delaware in the Senate for nearly four decades—with stints chairing the Foreign Relations and Judiciary committees—before serving as vice president for both terms of President Barack Obama's administration. After declining to run in 2016, Biden beat 27 primary competitors to secure the 2020 Democratic nomination.

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Biden's running mate, was among his primary competitors. Born in 1964, Harris hails from Oakland, California. After graduating from Howard University, she earned a law degree from the University of California, Hastings. She was district attorney of San Francisco and attorney general of California before being elected to the U.S. Senate in 2016. She will be the first woman, as well as the first Black and South Asian American, to serve as vice president.

Since Biden selected Harris in August, progressives have pledged to continue engaging with the pair and pushing them to embrace bold, popular policies including Medicare for All and a Green New Deal. As climate campaigners have pressured Biden and Harris to pursue more ambitious proposals, they have also emphasized that "Trump's climate policies are a raging dumpster fire." On Wednesday, the U.S. ditched the 2015 Paris climate agreement at Trump's direction; Biden has vowed to reenter the accord.

While progressives—including former primary rivals Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)—have rallied behind Biden's bid to oust Trump, the future president has also faced extensive criticism for his political track record on numerous fronts, such as his support for the Iraq War, his primary role in the 1994 crime bill, and his refusal to back universal public healthcare or a ban on fracking for fossil fuels.

"The evident defeat of Donald Trump would not have been possible without the grassroots activism and hard work of countless progressives," Norman Solomon wrote in a column for Common Dreams early Friday. "Now, on vital issues—climate, healthcare, income inequality, militarism, the prison-industrial complex, corporate power, and so much more—it's time to engage with the battle that must happen inside the Democratic Party."

Some news outlets, such as Vox and Business Insider, declared Biden victorious on Friday morning, based on a determination from their election-calling partner, Decision Desk HQ, at 8:50 am ET that the former vice president had won Pennsylvania—hours before other election-calling operations or major news network announced a winner.

"The race is over, as far as our call is concerned, because of the vote totals coming out of Philadelphia this morning," Drew McCoy, the president of Decision Desk, told Vox senior politics correspondent Andrew Prokop. "It became pretty obvious that as the remaining votes across the state and in Philadelphia are counted, Biden's lead will continue to grow."

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Off the Top of My Head

The Urbanization of the Electorate Means That the US is Turning Left

by John Lawrence, November 6, 2020

Urbanization is happening not only in the US but all over the world. In the US the phenomenon is that the rural/urban split signifies also a liberal/conservative split. People in the rural hinterlands supported Donald Trump and people in the cities supported Joe Biden. As the country urbanizes, there are now more people living in cities than in rural areas. The voting maps in some states showed huge areas of red and only small areas of blue, and yet there were more people in the blue areas who voted Democratic than there were in the red areas who voted Republican.

This election was notable because of the huge turnout which was facilitated by the extensive use of mail in balloting. It's clear at this point that Biden will win the Presidency. What's not clear is how the crucial Senate races will pan out. If Republicans maintain control of the Senate, their leader Mitch McConnell will do to Biden what he did to Obama. He said after Obama was elected that his number one priority was to make Obama a one term President. He did this by blocking almost every progressive measure that the Democratic controlled House put forward. These measures never reached Obama's desk for his signature. In order for any progressive legislation to be enacted into law, it must be passed by both the House and the Senate. Mitch McConnell saw to it that no progressive legislation got passed the Senate. So a lot of the things that Obama would have liked to have done didn't stand a chance because of one man who in the last analysis is as powerful or more powerful than the President of the United States.

Right now two Senate races in Georgia are headed for run offs. If the Democrats win both races, it's possible that there would be a 50 - 50 tie in the Senate. In this case vice President Kamala Harris would cast the deciding vote in any legislation. This would be a good thing since it means that progressive legislation developed by the House could not be blocked by the Senate. The only caveat is that the filibuster rule would have to be eliminated because, if it were not, any Republican Senator could nix any legislation. It's not clear how this would play out with the Supreme Court whether or not they would play the role of declaring any progressive legislation unconstitutional. At any rate with Joe Biden as President we will be rejoining the Iran nuclear deal - the JCPOA. What is also clear is that we will be rejoining the Paris Accords on global warming. These are two crucial things that Joe Biden can do singlehandedly.

What is clear about this election is that there was a record turnout. The massive use of mail in ballots favored Democrats. Traditionally Republicans have won elections by suppressing the vote of the other side. Conservative political activist Paul Weyrich famously said: "So many of our Christians have what I call the goo-goo syndrome: good government. They want everybody to vote. I don't want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of people, they never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down." That quote says it all. Leaving Aside the fact that Weyrich was encouraging Christian voters to go along with him in suppressing the voting rights of some Americans - a not very Christian thing to do, Republicans have always used voter suppression as a tactic. This year, thanks to mail in voting, that Republican strategy was not so successful. Many essential workers who would probably vote Democratic have had to work rather than taking off a day to wait in long voter lines at the polls. This year they did not have to make that decision to lose a day's pay in order to vote. That's why the voter turn out was so high.

It is clear that a new era is dawning. What is not clear yet is whether or not Democrats will be able to go full steam ahead with Joe Biden's agenda to strengthen Obamacare by adding a public option, something Republicans blocked in the original legislation, launching a full on attack on global warming, augmenting social security for seniors, easing student loan debt for debtors, launching a massive infrastructure program, reducing economic inequality by taxing the rich and other progressive measures. This will depend on how much control Democrats wield in Congress.

Off the Top of My Head

Trump Campaign Rallies COVID Superspreader Events

by John Lawrence, November 2, 2020

A Stanford study concluded that Trump's campaign rallies ultimately resulted in more than 30,000 confirmed cases of Covid-19 and likely led to more than 700 deaths, though not necessarily among attendees. One benefit of the election no matter how it turns out is that Trump will not be holding any more superspreader events thus saving the American public from even more cases and deaths from COVID. Today I will be glued to the tube (except for my 11:15 AM reservation for a lane at the Y pool). This election like no other will set the course for human history on planet Earth. Will we have a humane society or will we have a super narcissistic egotist at the helm? Four more years of Donald Trump will doom the Earth to a fiery and a watery (depending on where you live) demise. The effort to mitigate global warming will be for nought and it will be full steam ahead for the superspreading of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere.

Bishop Gerald Green a 66 year old prominent evengelical pastor in Chesterfield, Virginia, exhorted his congregation on the fourth Sunday in March not to fear the virus. Like many ecumenical leaders, Glenn, a former police officer, didn't heed the advice of Virginia governor Ralph Northam and others who warned against gatherings of more than 10 people. "I firmly believe that God is larger than this dreaded virus," Glenn told his parishioners. "If I had to deliver my own eulogy, I'd say, 'God is greater than any challenge you and I face.' That would be my epitaph." Glenn died from COVID-19 three weeks later. His religious faith never appeared to waver, but neither did the deadly resolve of the virus.

I wonder if his preferred epitaph is emblazoned on his gravestone. It seems that Glenn's beliefs about God were somewhat invalid. After all God created viruses as well as every other living being or entity (is the virus a being?) on planet Earth. Perhaps we would be better served by a belief in God that acknowledged that we better take care of the planet or else suffer the fate of extinction as many other animals have. Perhaps God wants us to heed his warnings or else suffer the consequences. So far humans have exploited the planet for profit. We have not been good stewards. Money has been more important than saving the environment. Trump has exemplified this by putting lobbyists for the fossil fuel industry in charge of the Environmental Protection Agency. His message is hardly indecipherable: go ahead pollute all you want and maximize your profits. President Trump's first EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt, resigned effective July 6, 2018, amid a series of scandals. Deputy Administrator Andrew Wheeler, a former coal industry lobbyist, started serving as Acting Administrator on July 9, 2018. Wheeler was confirmed as EPA Administrator on February 28, 2019.

Before his short stint in the Federal government, Scott Pruitt was elected Attorney General of Oklahoma. In that role, he opposed abortion, same-sex marriage, the Affordable Care Act, and environmental regulations as a self-described "leading advocate against the EPA's activist agenda." In his campaigns for Oklahoma Attorney General, Pruitt received major corporate and employee campaign contributions from the fossil fuel industry, taking in at least $215,574 between 2010 and 2014 even though he ran unopposed in the latter year. As Oklahoma's Attorney General, Pruitt sued the Environmental Protection Agency at least 14 times regarding the agency's actions. In 2012, Pruitt was elected as chairman of the Republican Attorneys General Association and re-elected for a second term in February 2013.

How ironic that a pandemic which arguably came about due to environmental degradation was unleashed on a nation the President of which didn't give a damn about the environment, and then President Trump completely mismanaged the response to this pandemic. He doesn't deserve another 4 years as the most powerful man on the planet when he clearly has no regard for the planet. Anyway today's outcome will be known soon enough. The American citizens will decide which road they want to go down, the road of a narcissist who cares about nothing but himself or the road of a man dedicated to making the country and the world a better place.

I voted for Joe Biden. I hope you did too. I think God gave us a brain so that we could figure out the correct way to take care of planet Earth. If we could figure out how to use fossil fuels as an energy source, we are intelligent enough to know when we should stop using them. Instead of a nation led by a self serving President and his cult like followers, I pray we elect a President who is not only religious but compassionate and intelligent.

Off the Top of My Head

Trump's 'Cull the Herd' Philosophy wrt COVID

by John Lawrence, November 2, 220

Trump's philosophy is that people who succumb to COVID are 'suckers and losers' which is what he said about those who die in war. He himself exemplifies this survival of the fittest philosophy. Take him as an example. He got COVID and bounced back within a couple of days. He's out there doing four or five campaign rallies a day, quite remarkable for a 74 year old man. So he must have some superior constitution to overcome the virus and be bouncing back big time. His example is that people with superior constitutions will hardly be affected with COVID, and that the US should cull the herd of suckers and losers that are so affected. Especially since most of the suckers and losers that succumb to COVID are blacks Latinos and old people who were going to die anyway.

Hitler had a somewhat similar philosophy. In addition to Jews, he was culling the herd of mentally defectives, homosexuals and non-Aryans, in other words people he considered to be weaklings or inferiors. Trump has the same philosophy: why let the American economy go down the tubes in order to try and save the lives of suckers and losers especially since a preponderance of them are minorities ^i.e. non-Americans. Beyond that Trump and his followers are only interested in short term profits for themselves. They adhere to the Ayn Randist philosophy of extreme selfishness. Nobody counts for anything except themselves. It's the extreme opposite of the philosophy of caring which the Biden campaign represents. Trump and his cultlike following don't care about anyone but themselves.They don't want to diminish their own prospects in order to do anything (example: mask wearing) to help anyone else, especially those whom they consider inferior to themselves. Hitler would smile on this philosophy.

The Trumpistas worship power whether that power is political, financial or athletic. They relish powerful pickup trucks flying Trump flags, sports bars, football and anything else that represents power and winning. They could care less about what happens to the earth 10 years or 100 years from now. They want their selfish interests to be realized now. They're not interested in doing anything about gloabal warming because it's not in their immediate interests. Wall Street seconds this emotion by only promoting those who can demonstrate short term profits. As in football winning is the only thing that matters, winning by any means necessary. The values of Trumpistas are that people who care for those who are poor or sick or vulnerable are suckers and losers. People who succumb to COVID are weaklings. People like Trump who get over it in a few days are the winners. They want to cull the herd of the losers who get COVID and die.

There are those like Joe Biden and mostly other Democrats who want to take care of those like the elderly and the sick and the weak rather than letting them die and have the herd culled from their prescence. After all they are someone's loved ones too. Nixon had a philosophy of "benign neglect." In other words just let them die. And let the earth die as well if it gets in the way of corporate profits which it does if respect and caring for the environment is taken into consideration. So let's just have another maskless motorcycle rally or campaign event and see who is superior and who is a loser that gets COVID and dies. After Trump's Tulsa rally Herman Cain, former black Presidential candidate and Trump supporter, got COVID and died. In Trump's view probably he was just another loser. Since mostly minorities are doing the dying, this just proves the superiority of the white race. Hitler would seem to be vindicated.

So the opposite philosophy from the philosophy of power and selfishness and winning is the philosophy of caring. It is exemplified by the Hippocratic Oath which all doctors take. It requires doctors and health care professionals to save every life if at all possible. If it were not for this attitude and philosophy, in a Trumpian value system, doctors might make the decision to let people die who couldn't pay for their services or to let people die who weren't of the same race or to let old people die who were going to die shortly anyway or to let people die who they considered to be suckers and losers. Joe Biden and the Democrats generally have the opposite philosophy, the philosophy which the Pope has called a  'preferential option for the poor,' a philosophy of caring for the weakest among us. In a few days we shall see which philosophy will hold sway in America and quite possibly in the rest of the world as America sets the example.

HISTORICAL COMPOSITION OF WHITE, RACIAL, ETHNIC VOTING TRENDS AND 2020 ELECTION TURNOUT FORECAST

by Frank Thomas

Data below will give some "big picture insights" into VOTER TURNOUT in U.S. Presidential Elections and Changing Racial and Ethnic VOTER Mix.

In 2016, there were about 245.5 million of the voting age population of ages 18 and older. Turnout is usually calculated based on estimated voting-age population which was 137.5 million for a 55.7% turnout in the 2016 presidential election. However, political scientists define voter turnout as a share of the voting-eligible citizens after subtracting non-citizens, ineligible felons from the voting-age population and adding eligible overseas voters. This calculation approach gave a 2016 total U.S. turnout result of about 60% in the presidential election of 2016.

That result compared to 70% for the U.S. voting age citizens registered in 2016 - versus 91% in Canada (2015), 96% in UK (2017), 97% in Sweden (2017). Registered voters clearly represent a much smaller share of potential voters in the U.S. than just about any other OECD country. Millions of Americans are not registered millions are registered but do not vote.

CHART I. PEW U.S. TURNOUT DATA BY AGE GROUP – PAST PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS

AGE GROUP            2000            2004           2008           2012            2016

18 - 29                        40.3%         49.0%          51.1%         45.0%         46.1%

30 - 44                        58.5%         62.4%          61.8%         59.5%         58.7%

45 - 64                        67.8%         70.4%          69.2%         67.9%         66.6%

65 and Older             69.6%          71.0%         70.3%          72.0%        70.9%

2016 Actual Turnout = 60%

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Frank Thomas:  2020 WEIGHTED FORECAST OF TOTAL VOTER TURNOUT 

2020 Turnout %     Share of Total Registered Voters  2020 Forecast Voter Turnout

53.0%              x                20%                   =                    10.6% )

64.6%              x                25%                   =                    16.2% ) Weighted

71.9%              x                31%                   =                    22.3% ) Averages

74.4%              x                24%                   =                    17.9% )

  100%                                         67% = 2020 Total Turnout

The 67% FORECAST TOTAL VOTER TURNOUT % for the Nov. 3, 2020 presidential election may well be on the low side and could reach the 70% range! Americans are well aware this is perhaps one of the most important, if not the most important, presidential election in the history of our country. They are very likely coming out in record numbers not seen since WWII.

SOURCE: CHARTS I-IV - PEW Research Center - "The Changing Racial and Ethnic Composition of U.S. Electorate," by Ruth Igienik and Abby Budiman.

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CHART II. U.S. ELIGIBLE VOTERS BY RACE & ETHNICITY

                2000     2010     2018     Eligible Citizen Voter Population     TOTAL 2000-2018     Increase % of Total Increase

WHITE      67%      72%     76%                    157.5 Mil.                                  9.8 Mil.                                    24%

HISPANIC 7%       10%      13%                     29.8 Mil.                                   15.5 Mil.                                  39%

BLACK     12%      12%     13%                     29.2 Mil.                                    6.8 Mil.                                   17%

ASIAN      2%         4%        4%                     10.3 Mil.                                    5.7 Mil.                                   14%

OTHERS  2%         2%        3%                       6.8 Mil.                                    2.4 Mil.                                     6%

TOTAL INCREASE 40.3 Million 100%

The strong 24% increase in White voters is largely due to the sharp increase in women voters who will vote mainly for Joe Biden for president. Same applies to a strong 39% increase in Hispanic voters and high 31% increase in Black and Asian voters who will also vote mainly for Joe Biden. In short, these Race & Ethnicity voter trends benefit the Democrats in coming November 3 elections.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

CHART III. HIGH VOTER TURNOUT OF WHITE AND BLACK IN PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS Percentage of Eligible Voters Who Say They Voted in 2016 - 2020 % Forecast of Voter Turnout

                      2000         2004         2008         2012         2016          NOTE: 2020 F. Thomas Forecast

WHITE          62%           67%           66%         64%         65%                 68%

HISPANIC    45%            47%           50%         48%         48%                 54%

BLACK        57%             60%           65%         67%         60%                71%

ASIAN         43%             44%            47%         47%        49%                 55% ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

CHART IV. ALL RACIAL & ETHNIC VOTER GROUPS FAVOR DEMOCRATS, EXCEPT WHITES

                                 2018/2019                                 1994                             NOTE: 2020 F. Thomas Forecast

                           Democrat Republican           Democrat Republican               Democrat Republican

WHITE                    42%       53%                      39%           51%                           46%       51%

HISPANIC               63%           29%                       57%           29%                           66%       31%

BLACK                   83%           10%                        81%          11%                           84%        11%

ASIAN                    72%           17%                        53%           33%                          75%          19%

---

 

These Racial and Ethnic data trends strengthen the Democrat Voter Turnout much more than they do the Republican Party Voter Turnout base. The White Voter Group is the one notable exception, but current polls show this that this voter group is becoming more equally divided between both parties. This is in no small part due to the powerful Black, Hispanic, Asian Voter Groups, Young and Older Age Groups as well as the fast growing White Woman Voter sector.

These groups have always usually voted mainly for the Democrat Party. The extraordinary social-economic culturally polarized Mess our nation is in on many fronts has Americans coming out now in record droves to vote for MAJOR changes and improvements in our political leadership that will benefit ALL citizens - especially the well-being of the grossly marginalized Average Joe Doe now making up 90% of our working population.

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ADDED EXPLANATION OF HISTORICAL OF WHITE, RACIAL, ETHNIC VOTING TRENDS – 2020 ELECTION TURNOUT FORECAST

The CHART II 24% (2000-2018) increase of White eligible voters is mainly from higher the White women voter turnout for Democrats, thus helping Joe Biden. But White gender partisan preferences differ widely. As noted in Chart IV, partisan preference differences are evident across Racial and Ethnic groups, i.e., Black, Hispanic, Asian groups and the White women group benefit Democrats far more than Republicans do. The Black, Hispanic, Asian groups also benefit Democrats far more than White men do. In 2018/2019, the Democratic Party had a wide advantage with 56% of women identified as Democrats versus 38% of women identified as Republicans. In sharp contrast, 42% of men were identified as Democrats while 50% of men were identified as Republicans.

Since 1994, gender and party identification gaps in voter turnouts have grown, but especially during 2018-2020. This is due to women's greater support than men's for policy priorities associated with the Democratic Party, e.g., handling of Covid-19 pandemic, preserving the Affordable Care Act, fighting climate change, addressing discrimination against Black and LGBTQ Americans, implementing gun controls, protecting women's control of their bodies.

In general, experts say that gender role socialization differences make women sensitive and alert to policy issues involving human vulnerability and care. It would be societally healthy if one day Democrat, Republican, Independent male voters could catch up a bit with women’s social well-being sensitive qualities and concerns.

In CHART IV, I noted that the White Voter Group of men does not strengthen the Democrat Voter Turnout as much as Racial and Ethnic groups do. This is due in part to the historical and 2018-2019 weak 42% of the White Voter Group (from Chart IV) favouring Democrats versus 53% favouring Republicans. In my forecast, I increased the White Voter Group number for Democrats to 46% and lowered the number for Republicans to 51%. This reflects my expected increased women vote for Democrats. Despite this, the White male and female forecast 46% vote for Democrats is still below vote percentages of the Black, Hispanic, Asian voter groups and White women group.

In summary, the vast majority of both men and women voters in all Racial and Ethnic groups and White Voter Group will impressively come out in strong support for Joe Biden.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

NOTE: As already mentioned, given the treacherous new wave the Covid-19 pandemic is on and its impact on the economy , my forecast of a Total Voter Turnout of 67% may (hopefully) be much understated.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Off the Top of My Head

Can American Democracy Survive?

by John Lawrence, October 21, 2020

Democracy is predicated on two things: an educated electorate and an ethical electorate. President Trump exemplifies the demise of both. The Founding Fathers were the most well read and educated people of their time, and also the most ethical despite the fact that a lot of them were Deists. Thomas Jefferson extracted Jesus' ethical principles from the Bible while leaving out everything having to do with belief systems. It's called the Jefferson Bible. Deists believed there was a Supreme Being that created the universe, but didn't interact with it. They also believed in Christian ethics while believing Jesus was only human, not divine. Today the ethos of America, while nominally Christian, is actually based on an extremely selfish version of Freedom. Christian ethics, as Thomas Jefferson believed, has to do with each citizen's responsibility to the demos, not with a solipsistic narrow view that the only thing that matters is yourself. "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Love your neighbor as yourself." This is the essence of Christian ethics that is a fundamental principle of democracy. Today's Americans, as exemplified by Trump, are more followers of Ayn Rand ("The Virtue of Selfishness") than they are followers of Jesus Christ's ethics. Americans have taken the value of freedom and have made it an absolute ideal instead of balancing it with equality and brotherhood as the French did with their slogan: Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite. Americans have totally forgotten about Fraternite.

Consider how American history would have been changed if Jimmy Carter had been elected in 1980 and Al Gore (who actually won) had been elected in 2000. Jimmy Carter put solar panels on the White House. Ronald Reagan took them down. If we had had a Jimmy Carter Presidency, we might have actually gotten a handle on global warming. Instead now it's too late to prevent destruction of the earth's environment even if we do everything right from now on. If Al Gore had been elected in 2000, we would have had a huge lead on dealing with global warming as Al Gore was a champion for an intelligent response to global warming. "An Inconvenient Truth" is a 2006 American concert/documentary film directed by Davis Guggenheim about former United States Vice President Al Gore's campaign to educate people about global warming. The film features a slide show that, by Gore's own estimate, he has presented over 1,000 times to audiences worldwide. Instead we got George W Bush who lied us into war with Iraq and squandered trillions of dollars and countless lives contributing to a world in which there are 80,000 refugees and turmoil in the Middle East.

This is from Time magazine, October 19, 2020 by Justin Worland:

American Presidents typically use their annual U.N. General Assembly speech to argue that U.S. leadership can shape the world for the better. Instead, on Sept. 22, President Donald Trump took the opportunity to condemn the global fight against climate change. "They only want to punish America, and I will not stand for it," he said, addressing the assembly virtually from the White House. The U.N. instead should "focus on the real problems of the world," he added.

Trump's rejection of climate change as a "real problem" is nothing new. But his comments, coming just weeks before Election Day, underscore the threat four more years of his leadership poses to the planet.

The Trump administration has rolled back myriad U.S. environmental regulations, including a rule designed to reduce power-plant emissions, another requiring energy companies to stop methane leaks and yet another mandating that automakers build more efficient vehicles. Internationally, Trump has pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement, a multilateral deal meant to curb climate change; his decision will become official the day after November's election. (His rival, Joe Biden, has promised to undo Trump's environmental deregulation.) Trump has also pushed other countries to invest in fossil fuels. "There has been nothing like [this] Administration on the environment in the last 50 years," says William Reilly, who led the Environmental Protection Agency under President George H.W. Bush.

Climate experts consider the Trump years to be lost time - while also warning that we don't have four more years to waste. Scientists say we need to keep the rise in average global temperature well below 2 degrees C to avoid catastrophe - think collapsing ice sheets that raise sea levels and make many coastal cities uninhabitable, in turn driving mass migration.

What is driving Trump's antipathy to the remediation of climate change is a desire to maximize U.S. economic output, increasing U.S. GDP and making him palatable to his voters who selfishly value short term prosperity over long term habitability of the earth. Those who selfishly value their own perceived immediate well being over that of their children and grandchildren. This is exactly the kind of rejection of Christian values (aside from any actual Christian beliefs which many Trump voters claim to have) that the Founding Fathers and others consider to be necessary to maintain a democracy. A democracy can't exists for long if the ethos is everybody for themselves. If people only consider their own selfish interests and not the well being of the polity, the necessary substrate of democracy is missing. The preamble to the American Constitution, "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, ...", includes the words "to promote the general welfare." It's not just about a radical interpretation of "freedom" which encourages people to ignore the general welfare or to ignore the welfare of the planet earth. This solipsistic interpretation of freedom which encourages people to only consider their own selfish interests and to ignore the general welfare is conducive to the demise of democracy.

Off the Top of My Head

Will Conspiracy Theories Determine the Next Election?

by John Lawrence, September 7, 2020

Conspiracy theories are as old as time. Did Moses really get the stone tablets given to him by God on Mount Sinai that contained the Ten Commandments? Or did Moses make the stone tablets containing the commandments himself and make up the story that God gave them to him? Was this a conspiracy theory fashioned to make people believe in the importance of the Ten Commandments? That made it unthinkable to question their validity? Fast forward to today and we see conspiracy theories at the heart of right wing politics, particularly at the heart of Trump's campaigns both for the 2016 and 2020 election cycles. Going back through history we see conspiracy theories at the heart of Republican politics during Senator Joseph McCarthy's investigations of communists in the 1950s. He had a lot of people believing there were communists everywhere until his allegations were eventually proven to be without any basis whatsoever.

More alarmingly, Trump's embracing of conspiracy theories is reminiscent of the days when Hitler had a hold on the minds and hearts of the German people. The Nazi party was comprised of a few old men drinking in a Munich beer hall until Hitler wandered in and started speaking. Very soon the beer hall was too small to hold the crowds that flocked in to hear Hitler speak, and we know the rest of the story. Trump is certainly not as dynamic a speaker as Hitler, but he knows the value of showmanship as Hitler certainly did. Hitler developed the symbols of the Third Reich, the flags, the torchlight parades , the entertainment value of telling the Germans that it wasn't their fault they lost the First World War. It was a Jewish conspiracy. Trump deals in racism as well. He gives his followers a good deal of symbolism and entertainment. His cohorts make up for the fact that Trump is not a great speaker like Hitler since social media amplifies whatever conspiracies anyone comes up with that give comfort and consolation to his followers who seem to need something to believe in even if it is at odds with the truth and with facts. In the process the truth gets distorted or forgotten about altogether. Fiction is so much more entertaining.

While the Ten Commandments have arguably had a constructive effect on history even though the story of how they were obtained may be apocryphal, this is not true of a lot of conspiracy theories including the ones Trump embraces today. The latest is Qanon which seems to be spreading like wildfire on social media. One Republican politician, Marjorie Greene, is getting herself elected to Congress as an upholder of that particular theory. It seems that nothing is too far fetched for right wing conspiracy theory followers to embrace. The most egregious example is that of Pizzagate. Proponents of the Pizzagate conspiracy theory falsely claimed that several high-ranking Democratic Party officials and U.S. restaurants were engaged in a human trafficking and child sex ring. One of the establishments allegedly involved was the Comet Ping Pong pizzeria in Washington, D.C. One true believer in this theory, Edgar Welch, went so far as to drive to Washington, DC, armed to the teeth, in an attempt to put an end to what he believed to be a child sex trafficking ring. He fired some shots into the restaurant, but luckily no one was hurt and Welch is now serving a four year term in prison as part of a plea deal while others are serving much longer sentences for possession of marijuana. This case shows, not only that one armed true believer could have done a lot of damage, but also how many people while enjoying the entertainment value of this conspiracy were not foolhardy enough to actually do something about it.

Don't underestimate the entertainment value of Trump's campaign rallies and symbolism and how that mirrors the entertainment value of Hitler's campaign rallies and symbolism. Trump came to most Americans' attention as an entertainer on a TV show, The Apprentice, and he clearly relishes the rallies he has held regularly during his Presidency until the coronavirus put a cramp in his style. The loss of these in person campaign rallies will probably hurt Trump's chances of reelection. In fact it may be a lucky break for the Biden Harris campaign. Hitler suffered from no such pandemic so he was able to entertain, spin conspiracy theories, console and comfort the German people many of whom came under his sway as true believers.

It is no joke that so many of the conspiracy theory true believers are also gun nuts. They represent the culture in which we find ourselves in which consists almost entirely of guns and criminality portrayed as entertainment in movies and on TV. Immersed in this gun culture some people come to see it as representative of real life in America today. Fortunately, not everyone acts on what for most represents entertainment, but some come to take politics, as espoused by Trump, as necessitating taking things into their own hands by means of a gun. From Timothy McVeigh to Edgar Welch to the Charleston church shooter, Dylan Roof, these people are usually white supremacists to whom Trump has given a dog whistle telling them it's OK to believe what they believe and for some to act on those beliefs.

Can the Democratic Party Landslide the Criminal Tyrant Trump?

Published on Saturday, September 05, 2020

by Common Dreams

Why has the Democratic Party been losing again and again at the federal and state level to the worst, cruelest, soft on corporate corruption, war-mongering, anti-worker Republican Party in history?

by Ralph Nader

 

20 Comments

Former vice-president and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden (L) and Senator from California and Democratic vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris greet supporters outside the Chase Center in Wilmington, Delaware, at the conclusion of the Democratic National Convention, held virtually amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, on August 20, 2020. (Photo: Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images)

Why can't the Democratic Party landslide the serial corporate criminal and government outlaw Donald Trump? He is a servant of Wall Street and, by his deeds favoring the powerful, a proven "enemy of the people."

Why has the Democratic Party been losing again and again at the federal and state level to the worst, cruelest, soft on corporate corruption, war-mongering, anti-worker Republican Party in history?

"Biden should be thirty points ahead in the polls against the delusional, falsifying, lawless, selected occupant of the White House who spends most of his time tweeting insults, lies, and fictional accusations when he isn't watching the Fox News adoring bloviators. Instead, Biden's lead is in single digits."

 

The answers are many. The Democratic Party is indentured to monied interests and is incapable of taking responsibility for its losses and mistakes. Democratic operatives resist organized grassroots pressure and the party excludes/punishes any dissent inside its ranks. The shrinking trade unions that have historically pushed the Democratic Party are increasingly content with crumbs for workers and afraid of union members who have swallowed the Trump lies.

The two-party duopoly and an electoral system that obstructs challengers from smaller parties lets the Democratic Party stagnate. Unfortunately, the fate of the nation and our Constitutional Republic is in its hands. Joe Biden should be thirty points ahead in the polls against the delusional, falsifying, lawless, selected occupant of the White House who spends most of his time tweeting insults, lies, and fictional accusations when he isn't watching the Fox News adoring bloviators. Instead, Biden's lead is in single digits and he is having a hard time getting the offensive Trump on the defense. Here are some suggestions for the Democratic Party's quivering leaders:

1. Organize a mass demand for Trump/Pence to Step Aside and let experienced pandemic scientists and managers run the federal response to Covid-19, saving tens of thousands of lives and allowing the economy to recover. Trump's Virus, spreading daily owing to Trump's bungling, fabricating, quackering, chaos, denials, and grinding government scientists through his ignorant, ego-obsessed shredders, requires such a demand. It will encourage more people and state and local governments to be more assertive and insist on professional management and critical coordination by Washington.

   There are many Republicans in Congress who privately dread how the daily Trump Virus Show is diminishing their own electoral poll numbers.

2. Stop Coddling, Aiding, and Abetting Corporate Crooks who are cheating and endangering the health/safety of red state and blue state Americans alike. Demand Law and Order enforcement and greater funding for the corporate crime police. By massively dismantling government law enforcement, Trump is intensifying the corporate crime wave with subsidies, handouts, bailouts, and huge tax escapes. How's that for putting Big Business over Main Street? Let them steal, let them pollute, let them park their profits in tax havens abroad are elements of the Trumpian mantra which he brazenly applies to his own business interests.
   
   
3. Stop Trump from committing big-time violations of our Constitution and our federal laws in order to deepen his dictatorial regime. Trump illegally uses federal employees and property to promote his political campaign – a federal crime under the Hatch Act. He seizes the "power of the purse" from Congress, spending money for unauthorized domestic and foreign objectives thereby violating the criminal statute known as the Anti-Deficiency Act. He fires prosecutors and Inspectors General closing in on his and his crony's crimes and egregious misdeeds.

   Take on Trump when he declares phony national emergencies to grab more dictatorial powers making him the largest national emergency of them all. Trump makes it easy for the Democrats when he declares "I have an Article II, where I have the right to do whatever I want as president."Nixon was about to be impeached and convicted in 1974, before he resigned, for a tiny fraction of what the Democrats are letting Trump get away with.

4. Announce it is time to Vote Trump Out and Vote in the long-overdue Pay Raise. Ending the freeze on the $7.25 per hour federal minimum wage and raising some 25 million workers' wages to $15 per hour would answer the question: "Whose Side are You On?"  The House of Representatives has passed a $15 an hour minimum wage bill, though with a long implementation schedule. The Republican Senate, however, blocks passage and it has blocked the $600 a week relief payment to many millions of Americans without jobs due to Trump's Virus.
    

   Shouldn't the Democrats make these contrasting, notorious corporate-driven cruelties more vivid, and more front and center? Repetition is what reaches people who are numb to years of empty rhetoric and who want authenticity. Comparing Walmart's CEO making $12,000 an hour while many of his workers languish well under $15 per hour sharpens what should be the authentic contrast between the Republicans and Democrats.

5. Make Mitch McConnell, the self-styled "Grim Reaper" toady of big business, who buries scores of good bills passed by the House, the number two Ogre in the campaign. The evil McConnell is the worst suffocator of necessities for the American people, their children, and retirees in American congressional history. The Democrats have listed scores of bills under McConnell's chokehold – such as protections for poor children, fragile worker and retiree pensions (including those for coal miners in his state of Kentucky), lowering drug prices and expanding health care coverage, controlling climate disasters – to name a few. Yet, once again, they have not made "Moscow Mitch's" record (including blocking safeguards for election security and voter's rights) vocal, vivid, and front of center. The Democrats certainly have the campaign money to do so.

   The arrogant McConnell is up for re-election against a hyper-cautious conservative Democratic opponent. Democrats should take McConnell's pompous boast "The one thing I get to do that the other 99 /Senators/ don't get to do, is decide what we're going to do." and flood Kentucky with the truth about this malicious, destructive tyrant of the Senate and his  200 confirmed right-wing and corporate judges. McConnell's lapdog delivery of the Senate has made possible Trump's monarchical drive to repeal the American Revolution against Kings and for "a new birth of freedom."

6. Last November, 61% of women in a national CNN poll wanted Trump impeached and convicted. Certainly on their minds was Trump's long history of being a publicly bragging sexual predator and a terrible example for boys and young men. Over twenty brave women have come forward with credible accusations of sexual assaults by lying Donald. Why aren't the Democrats making this a campaign issue and making Trump pay a political price for such disgusting outrages? Democrats can turn the Republican Party's campaigns on "values" against Trump and his apologists.
   
   
7. The Democratic Party must choose to stand with the people by presenting a solemn covenant that improves all the livelihoods of all Americans and addresses the widespread anxiety, dread, and fear where they live, work, and raise their families. Help make people's dreams of a secure, fulfilling future a reality. This specific covenant would show that the Democratic Party stands for much more specific changes than not being Trump. Make it vivid and memorable, including empowering the people in distinct ways.

If you like these suggestions, add some of your own, and call or email Democratic National Chairman Tom Perez, Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and the House Democratic Caucus leader Hakeem Jeffries.

To Contact Chairman Tom Perez
Visit: https://democrats.org/contact-us/
or call (202) 863-8000

To Contact Members of Congress, call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121

Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate and the author, most recently, of The Seventeen Solutions: Bold Ideas for Our American Future. His new book, Wrecking America: How Trump’s Lies and Lawbreaking Betray All, co-authored with Mark Green, is out next month.

Off the Top of My Head

Black Lives Ain't A Gonna Matter if Trump Gets Reelected

by John Lawrence, September 5, 2020

Right now peaceful protesters need to get off the streets in the lead up to the election. Why? Because they act as human shields for the rioters, looters, arsonists, gun nuts and counter protesters who come right in behind them and who have more nefarious purposes. Getting the protesters off the streets takes away Trump's law and order issue. People sitting on the fence are going to vote for Trump if they see cities going up in flames. It's as simple as that. We need calmness to prevail in American cities. When people see visuals of burning buildings on nightly news, it plays right into Trump's playbook.

I don't dispute the fact that black people have been treated differently by the police than white people. There is no question that there needs to be police reform, that there should be no choke holds, no 'no knock' warrants, that more social workers need to be dispatched to deal with people with mental health issues. However, it's no secret that at least some of these black men who have been shot and killed by police would be alive today if they had simply obeyed the cops' orders. Resisting arrest, giving the cops verbal back talk, physically struggling, trying to run away - all these things tend to make it more probable that a black person or any person is going to get killed. Rayshard Brooks, the man shot and killed in a Wendy's parking lot in Atlanta, would be alive today if he hadn't struggled with police and then tried to get away. When a situation escalates, things can get out of hand. Cops don't always act in such a way as to deescalate the situation. They should of course, but they are human beings. They can lose their cool. There is no question that police need more training as to how to handle tense situations and how to better control their emotions.

Right now this situation is playing out in Rochester. Mainly peaceful protesters are acting as cover for a relative few to do more dastardly deeds. There are skirmishes with the police. Tear gas spews out. Bottles are thrown. Trump tweets the whole scene. He couldn't be happier. Trump compared the cop's shooting of Jacob Blake to a golfer "choking" over a 3 foot put. While this is a horrible analogy, there is a kernel of truth there. The cop in question probably wishes he had handled the situation differently. However, if Blake had obeyed his orders in the first place, he wouldn't be paralyzed today.

There are 2 sides to every situation, and a lot of people sitting on the fence about who to vote for are people who just want to go about their lives as peacefully as possible. They are not necessarily Trump's base supporters. In battleground states, Trump won in 2016 by just a handful of votes. These fence sitting voters are very important to the outcome of the election. All those concerned that black lives matter have already been convinced and especially by the example of John Lewis who represented non violence and working within the system to vote, take power and get results that way. At this stage of the game it is totally redundant to react with street protests over every questionable situation in which a black man is killed by police. We have seen this movie many times before. And Trump's counter protesters are getting very active because they know that the more violence that occurs, the more this is only going to help Trump's chances of being reelected.

Sorry to put it this way, but that's the truth as I see it. I am totally in favor of police reform, economic reform, universal health care and a Green New Deal. But first Joe Biden has to get elected. I would have preferred Bernie Sanders, but he would have been an easier target for Trump to take down. The importance of this election is not only for the future of America. It is important for the whole world. The US and China are the world's 2 leading greenhouse gas emitters, responsible for about 40% of total world emissions. If these 2 countries don't cooperate to reduce GHGs and get the world using renewables, nothing else will matter. If Trump is reelected, not only will the US go up in flames, the entire earth will burn and very soon. The tension that the Trump administration is creating with China makes it less likely that GHGs will be reduced especially in light of the fact that Trump does not even believe in global warming and is telling the fossil fuel industry, in effect "Full steam ahead!"

In short street protests are counter productive at this time. Someone other than me needs to tell the protesters that.

Off the Top of My Head

Mainly Old People Are Doing the Dying

by John Lawrence

In Trump world this means big savings on social security and Medicare. That means that the government can fund more huge tax breaks for the rich. Other than old people it's mainly the poor, the undocumented and non-whites that are kicking the bucket. So the WPP (the White Peoples Party) figures that the ones that are dying off wouldn't vote for them anyway. So it's a win-win. The essential workers are mainly black, brown and poor so by not giving them an extra $600 in unemployment benefits, that means that they will be forced to go back to work. Teachers too are being coerced or forced back into the classrooms. Those whose husbands or wives also work may have the choice of quitting their jobs and staying home to ride out the pandemic. Single Moms won't have that choice.

Of course the wealthy always have the choice of not working and not exposing themselves to the virus. Only the poor and some financially stressed members of the middle class are forced to work if unemployment benefits are inadequate to put food on the table and pay rent. The fact that Congress is not coming up with another bail out package for poor and middle class reflects the fact that the WPP wants everyone to get back in the work force so that the economy doesn't become more of a shambles than it already is. Those forced to work in close quarters with others will suffer the most, but the WPP considers that this is only collateral damage. They won't vote for the WPP anyway.

So why in the midst of this pandemic, amid near depression rates of economic activity, is the stock market not plummeting? In fact it keeps rising higher and higher. In the Great Depression the bottom fell out of the stock market. Isn't this what we should expect to happen in the current Great Great Recession? The fact is that the stock market has become completed disengaged from the real economy. It only exists as a free floating asset class where rich people park their money. As such the Fed will do whatever it takes to keep the stock market from tanking. The money that the Fed has injected into the economy in the last decade has been, with the exception of the first pandemic bailout which benefited all of the American people, mainly for the benefit of the rich. That money didn't produce inflation as inflation is currently defined. However, it did inflate the asset classes consisting of the stock market and real estate. That's why rents and house prices are so high. The current pandemic quasi-Depression will continue that trend with the result that rents will rise even higher forcing more people into homelessness. Eventually, only hedge funds will own real estate and almost everyone will become renters.

The antidote to this horrible dystopia is for Joe and Kamala to displace Trump in the November election. To think it's a democratic election is a fallacy. The WPP will do everything it can to make sure that Democratic votes are not counted. They have considerable means at their disposal. Defunding the Post Office is just their latest trick. The next thing is that, because of the electoral college, most votes will not be counted. The electoral college determines that each state is winner take all. That means, if the WPP wins by only one vote in a particular state, all the votes for the candidate of the other party are not even counted in the final vote tally. Some democracy. That's why in recent elections the person who won the popular vote was not elected.

The only hope for America is that the WPP loses and loses big in the coming election. Democrats need to win the Presidency and both Houses of Congress or else nothing will get done of any help to most of the American people.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Off the Top of My Head

The Death of the Republican Party

by John Lawrence

The Republican  party has been an odd and awkward assemblage of rich white northerners and poor white southerners. About all they have in common is - you guessed it - they're all white. That's why, if we enforce truth in advertising, it should be called the White People's Party (WPP). The rich have gone along with Trump's foolishness because he's delivered what they really want - tax cuts and deregulation. As conservatives they also want to "drown government in the bathtub" as Grover Norquist so famously said. But now the BS that got Trump elected has been stripped away by the "novel" coronavirus - novel because it's not the first coronavirus to come to the world's attention. SARS and MERS were also coronaviruses. It seems that the coronavirus has found a successful niche for itself - successful from the coronavirus' point of view, that is.

Now that it is evident that Trump has totally screwed up the response to COBID-19, tantamount to letting it run freely amok among the American people while denying any responsibility, his attempts to rally his venerable "base" have become a mockery of American greatness. Instead of making American Great Again, he's done his best to make America a pariah nation for the first time. He's turned his back on - even sanctioned - America's allies. He's withdrawn from international treaties. He's gloried in being the champion of anti-intellectualism, anti-science and anti-rationalism, squeezing the entertainment value out of being opposed to these traditions of Western Civilization. While entertaining his base, more mature conservatives have been holding their collective noses. They've gone along with him because they haven't got any other choice. After all, the way the American political system is set up, you can't have more than two parties. For principled conservatives splitting off from Trump's wahoo base and forming a third party would be committing political suicide. After all there is only so much you can do with gerrymandering and suppressing the vote.

I'm sure many Republicans have pondered the possibilities of splitting into a principled conservative party and leaving their wahoo base to form their version of the White People's Party. Problem is there are growing numbers of people who don't identify with the WPP. In addition to recent immigrants of every stripe, black people and native Americans, there are numerous poor people who actually think for themselves and whose notion of political participation is not limited to shouting USA, USA at campaign rallies orchestrated by Donald Trump.

So the probable outcome of this year's elections is that Democrats will have a sweeping victory at all levels of government. It will become obvious that Emperor Trump's new MAGA clothes are nothing but a birthday suit, that he is a fraud who has not only mismanaged the response to the coronavirus but has made a mockery of the rule of law and led the American people down the primrose path of a failed state. Trump will undoubtedly come up with an October surprise, but principled Republicans, who have been holding their noses, won't be able to stand it any more and will turn on Trump in an effort to try and salvage some vestige of respectability by repudiating the wahoos and trying to reestablish the Republican party along more reasonable and responsible lines.

Off the Top of My Head

Republican Conservative Paul Weyrich: "I don't want everybody to vote."

by John Lawrence, July 1, 2020

To continue with Weyrich"s quote: " Elections are not won by a majority of the people. They never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down." Pretty good reason why Trump doesn't want widespread use of #MailinBallots. Weyrich was an American religious conservative political activist and commentator, most notable as a figurehead of the New Right. He co-founded the conservative think tanks The Heritage Foundation, the Free Congress Foundation, and the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). He coined the term "moral majority," the name of the political action group Moral Majority that he co-founded in 1979 with Jerry Falwell. So much for his bonafides.

The Department of Motor Vehicles has no problem with identifying every licensed driver and every registered vehicle in the state. They also use the mails to inform drivers when their registration is due and when their license has expired. You never hear anything about driver fraud, so how hard is it to locate every registered voter by mail? Republicans have notoriously used voter suppression techniques to make sure that blacks and Latinx are discouraged from voting. Just having to take a day off from work and stand in a long line at distant polling places is discouragement enough. But there's more. The Atlantic reports:

A new poll conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) and The Atlantic has uncovered evidence of deep structural barriers to the ballot for black and Latino voters, specifically in the 2016 election. More than that, the survey finds that the deep wounds of Jim Crow endure, leaving America’s democratic promise unfulfilled.

The real extent of voter suppression in the United States is contested. As was the case for poll taxes and literacy tests long ago, restrictive election laws are often, on their face, racially neutral, giving them a sheen of legitimacy. But the new data from PRRI and The Atlantic suggest that the outcomes of these laws are in no way racially neutral. The poll, conducted in June, surveyed Americans about their experiences with voting, their assessments of the country’s political system, and their interfaces with civics. The results, especially when analyzed by race, are troublesome. They indicate that voter suppression is commonplace, and that voting is routinely harder for people of color than for their white counterparts.

In some places voting is a luxury poor people can hardly afford. So making voting easier would allow more poor people and people of color to vote. For sure they would probably vote Democratic. That's why Republicans, who are the party of the rich, want to make it as difficult as possible for them to vote. In addition to that gerrymandering has made it almost impossible to get a fair outcome in many elections. In many states the party in power gets to draw the voting districts any way they want so they draw them in such a way that minorities or candidates that minorities favor can never win. Incumbents are reelected time after time.

Gerrymandering is a practice intended to establish an unfair political advantage for a particular party or group by manipulating district boundaries. Two principal tactics are used in gerrymandering: "cracking" (i.e. diluting the voting power of the opposing party's supporters across many districts) and "packing" (concentrating the opposing party's voting power in one district to reduce their voting power in other districts). A third is homogenization of all districts (essentially a form of cracking where the majority party uses its superior numbers to guarantee the minority party never attains a majority in any district).

Several states are considering independent redistricting commissions taking the power to draw district lines away from the party in power. This would guarantee a fairer distribution of districts and that district lines were drawn in a neutral manner not favoring either party.

America Self-Destructing From the Malignant Neuroses of its President & Republicans Gone Inhumanely Conservative

by Frank Thomas

A year ago, Trump told a crowd that he might remain in office “at least for 10-14 years.” He tweeted, “After serving two terms, do you think the people would demand that I stay longer?” Trump, the Great Divider, Liar, Egoist, revels in his megalomaniac illusions of being the Great Saviour who fits the footsteps of Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, even Churchill.

As crazy as Trump’s question and his self-proclaimed greatness are, the craziness gets wilder with a question addressed by Daniel Block of Washington Monthly: “How Could Trump Lose the Presidential Election and Remain President?” What would it look like if Trump refused to concede to a loss? Such a maddening prospect is scary as would also be his election to a second term. Daniel Block’s analysis obviously concludes the likelihood of that happening is NIL. (https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/april-may-june-2019)

Whatever happens, the above dramatizes the absolute necessity the Democrat Party captures the maximum registered and unregistered voter potential in November. In the 2016 presidential election, total voter turnout was 60.1%. As I noted in an earlier analysis, if the total voter turnout is in +65% range in November, Joe Biden will win the election for president. The Independent vote is well over 25% of the total voter turnout today. And at least 60% of that share (hopefully far more), will likely vote Democrat. The 18 to 34 and over 65 voter age groups are strongly behind Joe Biden as are the non-white Black/Latino voters, women voters, and white college-educated working class voters. The GOP’s suburban white non-college voters are shrinking; Trump has alienated Hispanic and minority voters in a number of states where the non-white share of the vote is growing. In states like Texas, Colorado, Virginia, Georgia, Arizona, Republicans are doing poorly in urban-suburban districts with growing non-white and white college educated voters. However, the Democrats must do a much better job of winning the loyalty of the white non-college educated working class voters.

Current polls show that in the race to win the Senate back, the Democrats have women candidates with good leads over the Republican opposition. And 3 or 4 other Senate races can go either way. Current polls show Biden to be nationally ahead in all swing states except North Carolina. In 2016, Trump won 30 out of 50 states, by a slim vote margin in some key states like Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida, Ohio, Iowa – all won by Obama in 2008 and 2012. Here are Trump’s winning popular vote margins:

	Winning Vote	Margin %	Electoral Votes
Pennsylvania	44,292	0.72%	20
Michigan	10,704	0.23%	16
Wisconsin	22,748	0.77%	10
Florida	112,911	1.20%	29
Ohio	446,841	8.13%	18
Iowa	147,314	9.41%	6
Arizona	91,234	3.54%	11
North Carolina	173,315	3.66%	15
Margin 50 States	2,868,686	2.09%
(Won By Hillary)
TOTAL VOTES
Hillary	65,853,514	48.17%	227 =42.8%
Trump	62,984,828	46.09%	304 =57.2%
			531

If Biden wins any four of above key states, he will win the presidency. Each state has as many electors in the Electoral College as it has Representatives and Senators in the Congress. (The District of Columbia has three electors). Given how well the Democrats won back the House of Representatives in 2018 and will likely maintain that margin in 2020 and possibly win at least 2 more Senate seats (or 49 Senate seats in total), this will help the Democrats win the Senate electoral majority vote in November.

With a sinking economy made worse by Trump’s late response to and mismanagement of the Covid-19 pandemic and the George Floyd protest movement, it’s no surprise his campaign strategy is hell-bent focused on suppressing voter turnout – e.g., by demonizing Joe Biden and by falsely discrediting mail-in voting as inherently fraudulent. He’s now repeating that mail-in voting is responsible for “thousands and thousands (later increasing that to millions and millions) of fake ballots.” When asked what’s the evidence, his deceitful reply was, “I think just common sense would tell you that massive manipulation can take place.”

This outrageous charge has led Trump to threaten to withhold government support funds from Michigan and Nevada – if they go ahead with plans to send absentee ballots to voters to help avoid the Covid-19 crisis. In his words: “People cheat … mail-in ballots are a very dangerous thing for this country because they (the voters) are cheaters.” Reckless, lying remarks like this now are now also being made in his calling Governors weak in controlling protesters and his pushing Governors to put protesters in prison for 10 years.

Stunningly, Republican Party members remain dead, dumb, and blind to all of Trump’s neuroses and deranged, misleading tweets. Once upon a time after WWII up to 1980, there were traditional moderate, pragmatic Republican norms that balanced individual and community interests. That supported prosperity and opportunities that raise all ships equitably. There was a spirit of mutual cooperation and plain decency in the country. That constructive, moderate relatively egalitarian period was uprooted by an army of angry men who rose to power through pure politics. Their ultra-conservative spokesman, Grover Norquest summed this up: “Bipartisanship is another term for date rape. I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.” Conservatives call it “starving the beast”, ^i.e.shrinking government by huge tax cuts for corporations and the Top 10% - ultimately causing net federal tax revenue losses offset by cuts in government spending, including basic social programs like Medicare, Medicade, Social Security, Welfare Support, etc. 

And now we have Trump carrying on the purest-ideology, survival-of-the-fittest, right-of-center Republican transformation – with his 24-hour tweeter drumbeat of warnings, alarms, insults, sudden policy switches, and personal harassments. All to keep the public uneasy, divided and distracted from his latest failing or deception.

We have a politically authoritarian and fundamentalist bully who wants to jail whistle blowers, journalists and protesters. A nihilist in golf pants who governs by surrounding himself with boot licking sycophants – many ending up in jail or fired for criminal acts or insubordination to their omnipotent RULER. To Hell with everyone who opposes him! Welcome to our DISUNITED democracy at work, thanks to Trump Inc.!

CONCLUSION:

Trump’s form of leadership is by nature a pernicious disuniting force – always adding oil to the endemic societal fires and problems stemming from the rampant tribalism, anger, inequality and racism tearing our nation apart. Empathy, mutual respect, harmony, common sense cooperation, plain decency amongst politicians, supporters, the public are becoming harder and harder to find. This is a great nation that wasn’t made so by an angry, shockingly divided people who felt that their country’s opportunities and prosperity weren’t raising the well-being of all equitably. In this regard, what a relief to hear now our esteemed Military Generals speaking up on our built-up SOCIETAL MESS, DIVISIONS & The CONSEQUENCES for our constitutional democracy that Trump’s dis-unifying, disarrayed, disingenuous leadership is only making worse.

Garrison Keiller had some ‘right-on-the-mark slams’ of conservative politics in past times that still apply to what’s happening now under Trump’s presidency:

“Lies pop up like toad stools in the forest! Wild swine crowd round the public through! Outrageous gerrymandering! Pocket lining on a massive scale! Paid lobbyists sit in committee rooms and write legislation to alleviate the suffering of billionaires! Hypocrises shine like cat turds in the moonlight! O Mark Twain, where art thou at this hour? Arise and behold the Gilded Age, reincarnated gaudier than ever, upholding great wealth as the sure sign of DIVINE GRACE. The wealth and power in the hands of the few is the death knell of democracy. No republic in the history of humanity has survived this!

ADDENDUM: My and The Economist’s Similar Forecast Conclusions: Biden Will Defeat Trump in Electoral College By Winning Key States

The Economist has just reported its study results, citing 9 key swing states for Biden to reach the minimum required 270 electoral votes (and more) to win the presidency in November. The Economist’s June 11th list of swing states is exactly the same as my June 3rd list above from my independent study, except for the addition of Georgia. Here’s the Economist’s ‘Big Picture’ conclusion on Biden’s chances of winning key swing states:

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Key Swing States	Probability Biden Wins	Probability %	2016 Electoral Votes
Pennsylvania	LIKELY	65-85%	20
Michigan	VERY LIKELY	85-99%	16
Wisconsin	LIKELY	65-85%	10
Florida	LIKELY	65-85%	29
Ohio	UNCERTAIN	50-65%	18
Iowa	UNLIKELY	WELL BELOW 65%	6
Arizona	UNCERTAIN	50-65%	11
North Carolina	UNCERTAIN	50-65%	15
Georgia	UNCERTAIN	50-65%	16

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As stated in my June 3rd writing, if Biden wins any 4 of the first 8 states above or any 4 of the Economist’s 9 states, he will win the required minimum of 270 electoral votes to become president. Most polls now show Biden ahead in the first 5 states and is moving closer to Trump in the Iowa race with its very small electoral votes. These are the very same six states Obama won in 2008 and 2012! Overall, Biden has an average polling margin lead of 6.7 percentage points. Races in Arizona, North Carolina and Georgia are also now getting closer between Biden and Trump.

The Economist predicts Biden will LIKELY WIN Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Florida and is VERY LIKELY to WIN Michigan. My study of these states concludes the same, especially if there is a +65% total voter TURNOUT compared to 60.1% in the 2016 presidential election. If total voter TURNOUT is in the +65% range, my analysis indicates Biden will win at least 1, perhaps 2 , of the last 5 swing states, namely Ohio, Iowa, Arizona, North Carolina, or Georgia. That scenario will surely bring Biden well over the minimum 270 electoral votes required to win the presidency (although Iowa and North Carolina are still ‘long shots’).

NOTE – Study Details 

The Economist: “Meet Our US 2020 Election-Forecasting Model,“ June 11, 2020.

https://www.economist.com/united-states/2020/06/11/meet-our-us-2020-election-forecasting-model

https://projects.economist.com/united-states/2020/06/11/meet-our-us-2020-election-forecasting-model

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-latest-swing-state-polls-look-good-for-biden    

Frank Thomas, The Netherlands, June 3, 2020

Off the Top of My Head

Joe Biden's Approach to a Carbon Free Infrastructure

by John Lawrence

I guess you could say Joe Biden is a railfan. I remember that he always rode the Amtrak from Washington to his home in Delaware. Now at joebiden.com I read about some of his innovative ideas for revolutionizing the transportation system in this country starting with a national network of recharging stations for electric cars. He'll also invest in a national high speed rail network for moving people and goods. These are good ideas. We need to completely electrify transportation in the next few years as automobile emissions are the greatest contributor to greenhouse gasses right now. The transportation system is much in need of revitalizing including roads and bridges. Research in carbon neutral propulsion systems for ships and planes also needs to be part of it. The more that goods and people can be moved by train, the more the streets and roads will be made available for car traffic cutting down on the need to build more and more freeways or toll roads.

Power generating plants need to be converted to 100% renewable energy ASAP. Joe is intending to do that too. Good news! "As president, Biden will partner with utilities and regulators around the country to build a 21st-century power grid, able to distribute clean energy reliably and safely to households and businesses across the United States. Specifically, he will appoint commissioners to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission who will drive market reforms, like expanding regional electric markets, integrating renewables, building in demand-response, and promoting long-term infrastructure planning to achieve a 100% clean energy economy and net-zero emissions by 2050. " Well, Joe, we need this long before 2050 when we'll both be pushing up daisies.

Biden's plans to have community colleges launch new Apprenticeship Readiness Programs is a great idea. Not everyone needs to attend university per se. Programs that enable people to do actual work rather than sitting behind a computer screen all day will give incentives to people to train for more meaningful jobs. Those who want to become true professionals like doctors, lawyers, professors etc. need to go to college. There should be no stigma attached to those who want to work with their hands, not sit at a desk all day, and actually build something.

Joe's plans for infrastructure development are excellent. More money needs to be put behind them though and they need to be accelerated time wise. Joe has also said he would support Elizabeth Warren's plan to allow student loan debtors to discharge their debt in bankruptcy court. This is a major step for Joe since he was instrumental in changing the law in 2006 which prevented students from discharging their student loan debt in bankruptcy. Let's hope that Joe Biden will now be the former Senator from MBNA.

Off the Top of My Head

The Fed Keeps On Bailing Out Failing Businesses

by John Lawrence, March 17, 2020

The Fed announced recently that it would cut interest rates to zero. It has also promised to insert $1.5 trillion of "liquidity" into the markets. It's clear that the US is a society that runs on debt, and the biggest non profit producing industry that has gorged itself on humungus amounts of debt is fracking. But investors are getting weary. S&P Global Ratings this month cut credit ratings of six shale gas producers citing the outlook for natural gas prices. "We are particularly concerned about some of the issuers' ability to access the capital markets given investor aversion to the space," S&P said. But no worries. A Fed bailout is on the way. Zero percent interest. Free money. Whoopee. Frack away.

Just a few days ago, CNBC host Jim Cramer exclaimed, "I'm done with fossil fuel," after disappointing earnings reports from Dow Jones energy giants Chevron and Exxon Mobil. "We're in the death knell phase," he warned. The fracking industry is deathly afraid that, if Bernie Sanders is elected, the gravy train will be over. Fracking has provided a lot of jobs for a lot of people, but it is not profitable if the world oil price is less than $40 a barrel. Right now, thanks to Russia and Saudi Arabia, the price of oil is $30 a barrel. A Green New Deal would have to provide jobs for all those workers in the fracking industry who have been making pretty good money even though the industry as a whole is unprofitable.

The Fed is doing its job to create another tower of debt in the US. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has pointed out that the $1.5 trillion the Fed has injected into the system for "liquidity" could wipe out all the student loan debt in the US which now stands at $1.5 trillion. But the Fed insists that any stimulus to the economy which would actually help working people as opposed to investors has to come from the fiscal side meaning that Congress would have to appropriate the money. The Fed's job is to make sure that no major business player in the US economy goes bankrupt including the US government itself which is wallowing in debt to the tune of $1 trillion a year thanks to Trump's tax cuts for the rich similar to Ronald Reagan's tax cuts for the rich which quintupled the national debt. It took a Democrat, poor old Clinton, to reduce the deficit to zero.

The question naturally arises of why can't the Fed bail out American workers to the tune of $1000 a month as Andrew Yang has suggested especially now that the coronavirus has put a huge damper on consumption which is 70% of the economy. The Fed says, "Not my job. That's Congress' job." The Fed as it turns out is a wholly owned subsidiary of Wall Street. It is not a publicly owned entity. Congress will do nothing to bail out the American people because of the Republican controlled Senate led by Mitch McConnell. Even if Democrats were to attain a majority in the Senate, the filibuster would prevent them from doing anything. So Joe Biden, even if elected, will get nothing substantial done including building on Obamacare. The only reason Obamacare was even passed in the first place was that Democrats had a majority in both Houses and a filibusterproof majority in the Senate (60 votes) for a very short period of time (4 months) during which Obamacare was passed. Good luck Joe.

If the Fed, instead of being privately controlled by Wall Street, were to become a truly public institution controlled by Congress, then maybe it could bail out the general American public instead of failing businesses. According to the rules of capitalism, failing businesses at some point should go bankrupt. The Fed is essentially preventing that from happening thus fueling the stock market. However, the stock market senses that at this point the Fed has used up all its tools and can do nothing further. There is probably too much liquidity in the markets already. Providing more wouldn't do any good. Interest rates are already at zero. The Fed could go to negative interest rates, but that would screw the economy up even more. Perhaps we'll all have to settle for a good old recession after all. But one thing is for certain. About six months from now, Trump will pull out all the stops to get the economy moving again just before the election since he is basing his reelection on a robust economy. However, it all depends on whether or not the coronavirus is under control at that point. If it is, Trump will take credit.

Debating Bernie on Medicare for All and Coronavirus, Biden Declares: 'I Don't Want to Get This Into a Back and Forth in Terms of Our Politics'

Published on Sunday, March 15, 2020

by Common Dreams

"This coronavirus pandemic exposes the incredible weakness and dysfunctionality of our current health care system," said Sanders. "We need Medicare for All."

by Jon Queally, staff writer

 

10 Comments

Democratic presidential hopefuls former US vice president Joe Biden (L) and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders (R) take part in the 11th Democratic Party 2020 presidential debate in a CNN Washington Bureau studio in Washington, DC on March 15, 2020. (Photo: Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

As Democratic presidential candidates Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders debated Sunday night over the failures of the U.S. healthcare system that have been dramatically exposed by the current coronavirus pandemic rattling the nation, Biden argued against the need for Medicare for All, defended the private insurance industry, and said now was not the time to debate key ideological differences.

"This coronavirus pandemic exposes the incredible weakness and dysfunctionality of our current health care system," Sanders said during an exchange early in the debate as he advocated for his Medicare for All plan in the context of the current crisis.

Watch:

This coronavirus pandemic exposes the incredible weakness and dysfunctionality of our current health care system.

We are the only major country not to guarantee health care to all our people.

We need Medicare for All. #DemDebate pic.twitter.com/ifuI79NoDu

— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) March 16, 2020

Biden argued coronavirus testing and treatment should be free to all Americans to combat the current outbreak, but continued to espouse his belief that such a policy should not be extended for other diseases or illnesses.

"Look, this is a national crisis," said Biden. "I don't want to get this into a back and forth in terms of our politics."

During a presidential debate, Democrat Joe Biden says: "I don't want to get this into a back and forth in terms of our politics."

IT'S A DEBATEpic.twitter.com/uKmAj8h1QQ

— Ryan Saavedra (@RealSaavedra) March 16, 2020

"This is like we are being attacked from abroad," Biden said. "This is a war. And in a war, you do whatever it takes to take care of your people."

Strikingly, as Sanders and others noted, the war analogy deployed by Biden does not—in the current for-profit system—extend to people at risk of economic bankruptcy or death from health threats other than COVID-19.

Biden: "We're at war with a virus. It has nothing to do with co-pays or anything."

Bernie says that's not true. There are enormous loopholes, and citizens are going to be stuck with a bill. #DemDebate

— Kevin Gosztola (@kgosztola) March 16, 2020

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Off the Top of My Head

Joe Biden and Amy Klobuchar Would Make a Good Team

by John Lawrence, March 12, 2020

Amy Klobuchar was really running for vice President anyway, and she would bring the midwest rust belt voters along with her neutralizing the influence of Mike Pence's Indiana midwest cred. Pete Buttagieg was just running to raise his profile which he successfully did. Same for Kamala Harris and Cory Booker. Some of the candidates were never serious candidates for the Democratic nomination. Bernie Sanders is still in the thick of it despite Biden's commanding lead, and he will have a lot of influence over the party platform at the convention. The vice Predidential candidate is very important as Biden is basically a placeholder. His advanced age and apparent loss of some mental function means that whoever comes after him is very important. So Joe Biden may win the election, but his influence may wane compared to the resurgent Democrat progressives who will still be a force in waiting.

The main thing at this point in many voters minds is simply to get rid of Donald Trump. A Biden-Klobuchar team could do that. Amy is very proficient and she could make up for Joe's loss of a few marbles. Rejoining the Paris Accords on Day 1 is very important for climate change. Joe's plans for infrastructure are very good. A massive investment in infrastructure and a greening of infrastructure seems to be on his menu. A national infrastructure of electric charging stations, more electric vehicles on the road - these are very important things which Joe seems to have a handle on. He's even into high speed rail.

Biden's plans for Medicare and Social Security don't make many changes to these programs which are already available other than protecting them from assault by Republicans, not a piddling undertaking. I did notice one advantage for older Americans though. The Biden Plan will provide the oldest beneficiaries – those who have been receiving retirement benefits for at least 20 years – with a higher monthly check to help protect retirees from the pain of dwindling retirement savings. Huzzah! I will qualify for that in about 3 years so maybe finally, I'll get a monthly check which will be more than about one third of what you need to rent an apartment. Fortunately, I have other income, but I'm still in the situation of working, paying 15.3% of what I earn as social security and Medicare tax, while collecting a pitifully small amount of social security. I like this too: "The Biden Plan will revolutionize the Social Security’s minimum benefit, which has deteriorated over time to the point of being entirely ineffective. Under the Biden Plan, workers who spent 30 years working will get a benefit of at least 125% of the poverty level." The poverty level for one person is $12,490. 125% of that is $15,612.50. I've been working for about 50 years so I should qualify for that. That would double my monthly social security check. Huzzah!

Well, that's a good start. Unfortunately, no Medicare for All under Joe's plan, but maybe that will come later.

'In a Dark Time, the Eye Begins to See': The 2020 Bernie Campaign Represents a Fight That Must Continue

Published on Wednesday, March 11, 2020

by Common Dreams

Corporate media and corporate Democrats want the Bernie 2020 campaign—and the grassroots energy behind it—to melt away. That's not going to happen.

by Norman Solomon

 

47 Comments

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Democratic Presidential Candidate, speaks to thousands of supporters during a rally at the Boston Common on Saturday, February 29, 2020 in Boston, MA. (Photo: Salwan Georges/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

“In a dark time,” poet Theodore Roethke wrote, “the eye begins to see.”

No matter who wins the Democratic presidential nomination, many millions of people will refuse to unsee what has become all too clear. On the verge of spring 2020, we can see what we’re up against:

•A crowing media establishment, eager to relegate the Bernie Sanders campaign to the political margins.

•A gloating Democratic Party establishment, glad to rally around Potemkin candidate Joe Biden and extol his carefully crafted façade.

•Overall, interlocking systems based on greed and corporate power instead of shared resources and genuine democracy.

On Tuesday night, there was no mistaking the smug joy of studio pundits and Democratic Party operatives on networks like AT&T-owned CNN and Comcast-owned MSNBC. Meanwhile, the New York Times rushed into print yet another all-out attack piece masquerading as a “news” article about Sanders.

Dominant media have routinely slanted coverage to make Sanders look bad, often bypassing context and skewing facts. It was just another day at the office last week when the Times front-paged a flagrant smear of Sanders as a supposed propaganda tool of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s. A former U.S. ambassador to Moscow quickly denounced the story as a “distortion of history.”

Such regular deceptions from a range of corporate media shouldn’t surprise us, but they should never cease to outrage us. The same is true of the rampant corporate sleaziness in the upper reaches of the Democratic National Committee.

Corporate media and corporate Democrats want the Bernie 2020 campaign—and the grassroots energy behind it—to melt away. That’s not going to happen.

Movements that have been propelling the Sanders campaign are here for the long haul—as determined to keep fighting for social justice as top corporate executives are determined to keep collecting huge paychecks. (And that’s saying something.)

The chances of Bernie winning the nomination have sharply diminished, but it’s still possible. And no matter what: movements for basic social change and democracy will vitally persist with long-term struggles to wrest power out of the hands of oligarchs and their functionaries.

Candidates who rushed to endorse Biden after his big victory in South Carolina—Michael Bloomberg, Amy Klobuchar, Pete Buttigieg, Beto O’Rourke, Kamala Harris, and Cory Booker—each personify, in their own way, what’s so corrosive about standard-issue Democratic Party leaders. Their backgrounds and personalities vary widely, but they share a political space of opportunism and ultra-coziness with corporate power. (Meanwhile, during the crucial aftermath of her withdrawal from the race after Super Tuesday, Elizabeth Warren shed new light on her political character when she decided not to endorse Sanders.)

The antidote to anti-democratic poisons has nothing to do with cynicism, passivity or defeatism. The solutions will come from realism, activism and ongoing insistence that a better world is possible—if we’re willing to keep fighting for it.

Norman Solomon is co-founder and national coordinator of RootsAction.org. His books include "War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death" and "Made Love, Got War: Close Encounters with America's Warfare State." He is the founder and executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy.

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Trump vs. Sanders: A Concise Comparison for Voters (and Why Bernie Wins Hands Down)

Published on Friday, March 06, 2020

by Common Dreams

When there is a conflict between big business and the public good, on labor rights, consumer rights, small taxpayer respect, and environmental protections, Bernie has stood with the people.

by Ralph Nader

 

8 Comments

Bernie Sanders, unlike other potential 2020 Democratic presidential candidates, has a message that resonates with a wide variety of people. (Photo: Paul Weaver / Flickr)

It isn’t un-American for voters to do some homework before voting. Here’s a “concise guide” for the voter with limited time who might want more information.

The corporate Democratic Partiers keep questioning the electability of candidates they do not like, namely Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Really? These leading progressives are absurdly presumed to be “unelectable” compared to Trump?

Consider an election where Bernie is up against Trump. The differences are night and day. Start with the all-important issue of character. Trump lies every day, tweeting misinformation and falsifying what is and what is not going on in our country. Just as bad, Trump’s tactics rely entirely on lying about or misrepresenting what he is doing to handle large and small problems. Trump has made over 16,000 false or misleading claims since January 2017. Bernie bluntly tells the truth.

Trump is a bigot/racist who uses dog whistles to promote, implement, and enforce racist policies. Bernie is a civil rights fighter going back to the nineteen sixties.

Bernie respects women and champions their causes. Donald is a savage sexual predator, has boasted about his sexual conquests, and was a serial adulterer.

Bernie talks of peace and rule of law. Donald incites violence and believes in the rule of raw power by a president who is lawless and daily violates our Constitution. Recall his ominous declaration that “I have an Article 2 where I have the right to do whatever I want as president.”

Compare what Trump and Sanders do in public office. When there is a conflict between big business and the public good, on labor rights, consumer rights, small taxpayer respect, and environmental protections, Bernie has stood with the people. Bernie has the best Congressional record of fighting corporate abuses. Meanwhile, Trump, really a corporation masquerading as a human being, works to line the pockets of corporate fat cats. Bernie fights for unions, living wages, and workplace safety; Donald hates unions, and has no problem freezing the $7.25 per hour minimum wage and dismantling serious worker health and safety protections.

Bernie is a consumer champion who wants to cancel crushing student loan debt and reverse the dangerous outsourcing of production of medicine to China, leaving us defenseless. Trump is close to shutting down the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and other consumer safety agencies such as National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. For three years he crazily pushed cuts for health and pandemic research. It took a spreading coronavirus for him to face reality and his response has been too little, too late.

Trump was a corporate welfare king with a failed gambling business who used, in his brazen words, “bankruptcy as a competitive advantage.” He’s busy shoveling all kinds of subsidies, giveaways, bailouts, and giant tax escapes to profitable big companies, at the expense of smaller taxpayers. Bernie is strongly against most of this corporate “socialism for the rich.”

On the environment, Bernie has a good, though not perfect, record. Trump has no problem with deadly corporate pollution—such as coal ash, mercury, methane, diesel particulates degrading your health. Trump is preventing federal efforts from combating climate disruptions, talks about “clean, beautiful coal,” and even forbids the use of the term “climate change” (which he believes is a hoax). Bernie campaigns all over the country talking about public investments in climate preparedness—paid for by restoration of corporate taxes that Trump would like to further cut. Only by using all available resources can the U.S. contain immensely costly runaway fires, floods, tornadoes, droughts, and already rising sea levels caused by climate disruption.

Bernie releases his tax returns while Trump hides them and gets a major tax cut for his family through Congress.

Donald says he’s never done anything wrong and never needs to apologize. Bernie recognizes his mistakes when he is wrong. Donald breaks promises—on lower drug prices, on cleaner air and water, on more manufacturing jobs, and on expanded health care insurance.  Trump has, in fact, actively damaged the environment and hurt these workers and consumers.

Bernie and Trump have superficial similarities. Both rarely smile. Both can be gruff and have trouble taking advice. But Bernie reads, thinks, and empathizes with people who desperately need universal healthcare and endure daily poverty. Frantically tweeting Donald doesn’t read or think, and is devoid of empathy, preferring to use his office to enrich Trump family businesses. Instead of spending his time working to understand the problems of working people, thin-skinned Donald spends his time blaming others and viciously nick-naming political opponents.

Bernie is a “democratic socialist,” advocating for improvements that western European counties have had for decades as well as ones we had decades ago—like nearly tuition free higher education after World War II at state universities from California to New York and even an early sales tax on Wall Street trading.

Donald is a corporate socialist and a champion of the dictatorial, corporate state (Wall Street owning Washington) that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt called “fascism” in a message to Congress in 1938.

Bernie is a good, crisp debater. Donald is a shouter, stage liar, and evader-in-chief. Bernie refuses corporate PAC money and has millions of people funding the campaign with small donations. Trump goes for the zillionaires. I could go on. For more usable information, read the new book, Fake President, by Mark Green and me.

According to the number one Democrat, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Trump is “a crook, a thief, a liar. He should be in prison.” Can anybody think honest Bernie is not electable against corrupt Donald?

Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer, and author. His latest books include: To the Ramparts: How Bush and Obama Paved the Way for the Trump Presidency, and Why It Isn’t Too Late to Reverse Course, How the Rats Re-Formed the Congress, Breaking Through Power: It's easier than we think, and Animal Envy: A Fable

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Our work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. Feel free to republish and share widely.

Bernie vs. Biden

by Robert Reich

Wednesday, March 4, 2020

As the Democratic Party’s “moderate” (or shall we say “establishment”) wing coalesces around Joe Biden to stop Bernie, the primary contest is starting to look a lot like 2016, when the same wing rallied around Hillary Clinton. 

Today, Mike Bloomberg quite the race and endorsed Biden – as has Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg. As the New York Times’s David Leonhardt put it, “if you’re a Democrat who doesn’t want Bernie Sanders to be the party’s nominee, your choice is now clear: you should vote for Joe Biden.”

But suppose you’re a Democrat who doesn’t want Donald Trump to have a second term? Suppose you’re a Democrat who suspects that Trump got elected in the first place because he exploited a deep sense of betrayal felt by tens of millions of Americans whose wages haven’t budged in 40 years and who know the system is rigged for the benefit of those at the top? Do you really vote for Joe Biden?

Tuesday, March 3, 2020

Mitch McConnell’s Do-Nothing Republicans.

Led by the self-proclaimed Grim Reaper, the Republican-controlled Senate has refused to take up nearly 400 bills passed by the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives.

Here are just some of the bills dying in McConnell’s legislative graveyard:

House Democrats’ first major legislative initiative, the For the People Act, has been languishing on McConnell’s desk since March 2019. The bill tackles a host of corrupting influences in our democracy. It aims to reform campaign finance laws to curb the influence of big money, strengthen ethics laws for federal officials, and bolster voting rights by enacting automatic voter registration and ending partisan gerrymandering.

Before the bill even passed the House, McConnell declared he would not take it up in the Senate, decrying it as a “power grab that’s smelling more and more like exactly what it is.” It is a power grab — it grabs power back for the people. But McConnell is the one grabbing power away from the majority of voters, who elected members of the House to tackle real issues.

Here’s another: The Bipartisan Background Checks Act has been wasting away in McConnell’s graveyard for almost a year now. It tightens background checks on all gun sales, including private firearm purchases, online purchases, and purchases made at gun shows. McConnell also pronounced this bill dead on arrival in the Senate. Since passed in the House in February 2019, there were 371 more mass shootings that year alone. Mitch McConnell and his spineless Republican colleagues are too afraid to stand up to their NRA backers, and it’s costing Americans their lives. This is in spite of the measures having support of a vast majority of the American public.

A third item in the McConnell graveyard: House Democrats passed the Raise the Wage Act, which would lift the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, phasing in increases over seven years. This would raise the pay of 27 million Americans and lift 1.3 million households out of poverty. But as soon as the bill was passed, Mitch McConnell took to Fox News to declare, “We’re not going to be doing that in the Senate,” claiming that raising the minimum wage would hurt jobs and businesses.

Mitch McConnell and his gang of do-nothing Republican senators have also blocked legislation on climate change, the Dream Act, net neutrality, protections for the LGBTQIA community, tribal sovereignty, AND election security — the list goes on and on. 

Even the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act is stalled in the Senate. 

They do all this without even a debate. Remember how you learned in school that one house passes legislation and the other considers it? McConnell is throwing those civics lessons out the window.

So what is McConnell really doing in the Senate? Ramming through a spate of unqualified, hyperpartisan judges who will shape the courts for decades to come.

Trump has so far installed 187 judges to lifetime positions on the federal bench – many with fringe, extremist views. One in four court of appeals judges are now Trump appointees, and he’s showing no signs of slowing down. Who’s the architect behind this full-blown takeover of the judiciary system? Mitch McConnell, of course.

Let’s not forget that it’s thanks to McConnell that Trump was able to install two Supreme Court justices. McConnell single-handedly blocked Obama’s Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland in 2016, refusing even to hold a confirmation hearing for him and keeping the seat open until Donald Trump took office. McConnell and Senate Republicans then invoked the “nuclear option” – requiring only a simple majority to confirm Supreme Court justices, and steamrolling the Democrats.

Even before Democrats gained control of the House and began passing hundreds of bills to benefit the American people, Congressional Republicans’ only significant achievement was a massive tax cut for the wealthy and corporations. Despite all their claims, their tax cut has not spurred the growth it promised, it’s added to the national debt, business investment is contracting, manufacturing is shrinking, and wages are barely rising. 

As usual, nothing has trickled down. The only winners are people who were already winners. Everyone else has been shafted. But none of that matters to McConnell and his do-nothing Republicans as long as Trump and the Party’s billionaire donors and corporate backers stay happy.

Oh, and McConnell’s do-nothing Senate Republicans refused to hold a fair and impartial impeachment trial for Trump. McConnell – who is supposed to act in the role of impartial jury foreman for the Senate – said, “And everything I do during this I’m coordinating with White House Counsel.” While Trump continues to break the law and seize power from Congress, the Senate refuses to serve as a check on his power.

America used to have a Senate that served the people. But under Mitch McConnell’s leadership, what was once the world’s greatest deliberative body has become a partisan circus. He and his Republican colleagues have done nothing to benefit the American people, ignoring the voices of their constituents to serve the will of Donald Trump and Republican fat cats. History will not be kind to them. Hopefully, come November, American voters won’t either.

Off the Top of My Head

Sanders/Warren Will Forgive Student Loan Debt by Executive Action; Biden Voted to Take Away Bankruptcy Protection for Student Loan Debtors

by John Lawrence, May 3, 2020

It's clear. If you want student loans forgiven, vote Sanders/Warren. If you want to be in debt for the rest of your life, vote Biden. If you want an economy dominated by Wall Street, vote Biden. If you want an economy that works for the average person, vote Sanders/Warren. Biden was a key architect of and whip for the 2005 Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act, which made it impossible for student loan debtors to declare bankruptcy. He's not middle class Joe; he's Wall Street Joe.

Lenders like Citigroup, Bank of America, JP Morgan, Chase and Wells Fargo aggressively lobbied for changes to the bankruptcy code. Delaware-based credit card company MBNA, which Bank of America acquired in 2006, was one of the most ardent supporters of the bill.Joe Biden got most of his campaign contributions from MBNA. He is even known as the Senator from MBNA. So if you want Wall Street to continue to dominate the economy and fuel economic inequality, vote for Joe. If you want the economy to work for average Americans, vote for Sanders/Warren. Biden will continue to support neoliberal Wall Street policies which means that you can forget about universal health care, an end to foreign nonwinning wars, trillion dollar budgets for the military-industrial complex, significant inroads into the global warming problem.

The Washington Examiner reported:

Biden’s senate campaign committees received $208,175 from MBNA employees from 1989 through 2010, the second-largest source of contributions, according to the Center for Responsive Politics’ OpenSecrets.org. In the 2006 election cycle, employees from Citigroup employees donated $18,825, those from Bear Stearns donated $15,000 and from Goldman Sachs donated $10,500.

In total, Biden received $1,126,375 from those in the securities and investment industry, $304,475 from finance and credit company workers, and $295,900 from commercial bank employees.

Biden’s ties to MBNA and banks span beyond political contributions from its employees. Home sales, family jobs, and free trips caused critics to dub him “the senator from MBNA.”

Why African Americans are supporting Biden is beyond me. They are the ones most likely to have crippling student loan debt. They are the ones likely to be most indebted to Wall Street credit card companies. The Fed lets Wall Street borrow money at zero percent interest while credit card companies charge 30-40% or more. Payday loan companies charge 300-400% interest, and African Americans are the most likely users of them. African Americans are most likely to have single parent families, and they represent those who need free child care and pre-K the most. They are the ones who could profit from Medicare for All the most. They are the ones who could profit from the jobs created by the Green New Deal the most.

Bloomberg is just as bad as Biden. He's part and parcel of Wall Street. The Bloomberg terminal is all about Wall Street. He made his fortune selling his terminal to Wall Street. He's making billions more each year from his privately held company - all the money comes from Wall Street. Bloomberg LP had $9.9 billion in revenue in 2018 - most  of it going directly into Bloomberg's pockets. He's a poster child for economic inequality to the tune of $8 to $10 billion dollars a year. You want runaway economic inequality - vote for Bloomberg.

It may be necessary t give up some of the 70% share of GDP going to consumption because consumption especially of airplane, car and ship travel increases global warming. This means that a recession would probably be salubrious for the planet earth if it means a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions while retooling for a green economy in which consumption could again increase without the consequent damage that the current oil based economy is doing.

Buying the Presidency

by Robert Reich

Friday, February 14, 2020

Bad enough that a tyrant is destroying American democracy. Now an oligarch is trying to buy the presidency. 

Michael Bloomberg’s net worth is over $60 billion. The yearly return on $60 billion is at least $2 billion – which is what Bloomberg says he’ll pour into buying the highest office in the land. 

I’m not saying that great wealth should disqualify you from becoming president. America has had some talented and capable presidents who were enormously wealthy – Franklin D. Roosevelt, Teddy Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, for example. 

The problem lies at the nexus of wealth and power, where those with great wealth use it to gain great power. This is how oligarchy destroys democracy.

So far, Bloomberg spent over $380 million on campaign advertising. That’s more than Hillary Clinton spent on advertising during her entire presidential run. It’s multiples of what all other Democratic candidates have spent, including billionaire Tom Steyer.

Encouraged by the murky outcome from the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primaries, Bloomberg has doubled his spending on TV commercials in every market where he is currently advertising and is expanding his campaign’s field staff to more than 2,000.

That’s not the only way he’s using his billions to co-opt the election. He’s been endorsed by House Democrats and Democratic mayors who were the beneficiaries of his fortune during their campaigns. He’s also paying social-media “influencers” with large followings to promote his campaign. 

His paid staff is already three times as large as Trump’s, five times Joe Biden’s. He’s using his fortune to woo staffers away from other campaigns. 

Meanwhile, the Democratic National Committee is putting Bloomberg onto the debate stage by abandoning the individual-donor threshold that it used for the first eight debates, presumably because Bloomberg – the self-funded billionaire – doesn’t take donations.

To participate in the Feb. 19 debate in Las Vegas, Democratic candidates need to show at least 10 percent support in four national polls. Bloomberg’s wall-to-wall advertising makes that pretty much inevitable. He recently came in third place in a Morning Consult tracking poll, behind just Sanders and Biden. And he’s in the top four in many Super Tuesday states. 

Bloomberg has some attractive policy ideas about gun control, the environment, and a more progressive tax. 

But he’s also a champion of Wall Street. He fought against the reforms following the near meltdown of the Street in 2008. His personal fortune is every bit as opaque as Trump’s. Through his dozen years as mayor of New York he refused to disclose his federal taxes. Even as a candidate for president, he still hasn’t given a date for their release.

And because he hasn’t taken individual donations, hasn’t appeared on the debate stage, and bases his entire campaign on TV advertising, he isn’t being held accountable for his despicable record on race and criminal justice – the discriminatory stop-and-frisk policy he implemented when he was mayor, or his defense of red-lining.

And, remember, he’s trying to buy the presidency. 

The word “oligarchy” comes from the Greek word oligarkhes, meaning “few to rule or command.” It refers to a government of and by a few exceedingly rich people.

Since 1980, the share of America’s wealth owned by the richest four hundred Americans has quadrupled while the share owned by the entire bottom half of America has declined. 

The richest 130,000 families now own nearly as much as the bottom 90 percent – 117 million families – combined. The three richest Americans own as much as the bottom half. Michael Bloomberg is the eighth richest. 

Big money inevitably engulfs politics, which is why a handful of extremely rich people like Bloomberg have more influence than any comparable group since the robber barons of the early 20th century. 

Unlike income or wealth, power is a zero-sum game. The more of it at the top, the less of it anywhere else. And as power and wealth have moved to the top, everyone else has become dis-empowered. Today the great divide is not between left and right. It’s between democracy and oligarchy. 

Bloomberg is indubitably part of that oligarchy.

If the only way we can get rid of a sociopathic tyrant named Trump is with an oligarch named Bloomberg, we will be forced to choose the oligarch.

But let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. Oligarchy is better than tyranny. But neither is as good as democracy.

Off the Top of My Head

Caucus, Schmaucus

by John Lawrence, February 5, 2020

One wonders why people in Iowa even employ this arcane process known as a caucus. It requires people to spend an inordinate amount of time cooped up in some gymnasium while they go through some elaborate ceremony with the result that the candidates come out with a vote count. Why don't they just vote in the first place? This is supposed to be about some hands on demonstration of what democracy is all about. I say it is an exercise in futility. I just check some boxes on a mail-in ballot; I don't even need to go to a "polling place" and waste a whole bunch of my time. Why don't they do this everywhere? Certainly, many more people would vote that way. The reason why so many don't vote is that they don't have time for all this monkey business, especially caucuses. Iowans must feel that, if there's no pain involved, people aren't really being patriotic in exercising their right to vote. I say caucuses are ridiculous, and who needs them?.

Furthermore, I feel sorry for all the people who assiduously watched CNN and Wolf Blitzer and all the pundits go on and on about nothing while waiting for the final vote tallies which never came. CNN's coverage was ridiculous. All those commercials which pepole had to wade through on and on by the hour. Fortunately, I record everything just so I can fast forward through the commercials, and it sure came in handy during the Iowa caucus. All I really wanted to know is how the candidates came in so I kept fast forwarding and fast forwarding, and, after 3 hours of fast forwarding, I still didn't know. Due to a Democratic party screwup, no one knew the outcome till a day later if then. This makes the whole caucus thing look doubly ridiculous. They really know how to take a simple process and make it 100 times more complicated.

That said, it doesn't look like Joe Biden has much of a chance. The pundits say he's very low on money. The Iowa results won't do anything to convince his donors to give him more money. No one wants to bet on the wrong horse. It's too bad in a way, but there is a new generation of voters. The Democratic constituency is not the same old constituency that held sway for most of the time Biden was in office. I feel sorry for all the heartbreak and tragedy he's had to go through in his life, but his time has come and gone, politically. Bernie Sanders appears to have taken the lead, and he has plenty of money from small donors, not Wall Street big wigs like Hillary milked. Elizabeth Warren represents about the same constituency as does Bernie, but she doesn't have quite the same authentic appeal having been a Republican at one point in her life. Bernie has stayed the same political course his entire political life, and now finally it's bearing fruit because finally his message is getting through to people, young people especially.

Pete Buttigieg made a good showing, but I don't think he will end up in the final running. He is extremely eloquent and articulate, but inexperienced, and I don't think, unfortunately, that the US is ready to accept as a President someone with his sexual orientation. The other candidates including the billionaires are not gaining traction despite their ubiquitous ad campaigns. Are Americans finally proving that they're not susceptible to mass marketing campaigns? This will totally upset the apple cart of conventional wisdom regarding advertising. The net result is that the billionaires will have lost a minute percentage of their money buying unlimited amounts of TV commercials.

Polls have shown that 70% of millennials don't have a negative view of socialism. Since Bernie is open about the fact that he is a democratic socialist, this opens the door for someone with his views. Besides he has promised to eliminate student loan debt which most young people are suffering under. Young people are getting more sophisticated in their knowledge of how other democratic countries do business in the fact that no one has any student loan debt in Europe. It's unthinkable. Colleges and universities are essentially free. If this is what socialism is all about, then they're all for it. Every other European country also has some version of Medicare for All. In most young people's minds, the US is just lagging the standards in these and other regards that are totally acceptable in other advanced democratic countries. So if you want to call France or Britain or Germany socialist - all of which are American allies - then what's the big deal? We'll be socialist too if it means our student loan debt gets forgiven, and we and our parents don't have to deal with an antiquated medical system when our neighbors to the north just show a card and they get taken care of and never get sent a bill. Information is powerful, and when  people finally learn how well education and medical care works to the peoples' advantage in other parts of the world, well they want the same things here as well, and they don't care what you want to call it. The socialist bugaboo is ancient history to them.

Off the Top of My Head

How My Conservative Friends Were Duped by Russian Bots

by John Lawrence

During the buildup to the 2016 election some of my conservative friends sent me cartoons that were downright derogatory towards Hillary Clinton. Russian bots created hundreds if not thousands of ads for Facebook, Twitter and Instagram that were then circulated all over the internet and sent by email to people like me. I now ask my conservative friends, "How does it feel to have been duped by Russian bots?" Ads depicting Hillary as a servant of the devil, ads depicting her as being unpatriotic, not caring about dead US veterans, ads vilifying the Clinton Foundation. The following is a sampler:

I'm not Hillary's greatest fan. There's a lot I can find to criticize about her support for wars in the Middle East, her taking big donations from Wall Street bankers etc. But compared to Trump's turpitude, Hillary is a paragon of moral righteousness. Compared to Trump's knowledge of and experience with government in all its aspects, Hillary is a veritable genius.

Should Facebook, Twitter et al ban these kinds of cartoons and ads? Absolutely. They are meant simply to emotionally inflame the situation. At the very least the person or organization which placed the ad should be identified. But more to the point, any respectable news outlet shouldn't traffic in this rubbish. Any demeaning image should be suspect. Whether or not a Russian bot created it or a red blooded American, stuff like this should not be published and circulated around on the internet. If you want to call this censorship, so be it. First of all, the First Amendment only forbids government from suppressing free speech. Any private entity can censor all they want. If you don't believe it, try handing out politically motivated pamphlets in a shopping mall. You will be asked to leave the premises.

Material on social media or any media regarding political elections or issues should be home grown or clearly labeled by the foreign entity that created it. That way if someone in some other country wants to have an opinion about American politics or issues, it can be taken with a grain of salt if it is clearly labeled where it came from.

The Myth of Voter Fraud – And the Truth About What’s Threatening Our Elections

by Robert Reich

Friday, November 22, 2019

 Donald Trump and his enablers have been making claims of widespread voter fraud, alleging millions of people are voting illegally in order to rig our elections.

Baloney. Let’s look at the facts and debunk their myths once and for all.

They claim millions of Americans are voting twice, using multiple registrations in different districts.  

So how often does double voting really occur? An analysis of the 2012 presidential election found that out of 129 million votes cast, 0.02% – that’s two one hundredths of one percent – were double votes – which were likely the result of measurement error. This is a far cry from Donald Trump’s claims that millions of people were registered in two different states in the 2016 presidential election.

Trump and his enablers claim non-citizens are voting in droves. Trump himself said that thousands of undocumented immigrants voted in 2016.

Another lie. According to the non-partisan Brennan Center for Justice, of 23.5 million votes cast in districts with high populations of non-citizens only 30 – I repeat, thirty – possible incidents of improper non-citizen voting were referred for further investigation.

They claim voter impersonation is rampant at the polls.

False. A 12-year study of election data found only 10 cases of voter impersonation out of 146 million registered voters. Ten.

So if voter fraud really isn’t a problem, why do Trump, Republicans in Congress, and their allies at Fox News keep perpetuating this myth? For one simple reason: To enact restrictive voting laws intended to keep voters from the polls.

Policies established in the name of election security – including voter ID laws, needless registration deadlines, limited access to polling places, and purges of the voter rolls – make it harder for Americans to vote. It is the same tactic that has been used throughout our history to disenfranchise low-income Americans and people of color.

Luckily, many of these laws have been struck down in the courts. In 2016, a district judge in Wisconsin found “utterly no evidence” of widespread voter fraud justifying its voter ID law. In Texas, another judge found their voter ID law violated the Voting Rights Act, making it harder for African-Americans and Latinos to vote.

But many of these laws are still on the books because in 2013 the Supreme Court gutted crucial aspects of the Voting Rights Act.

Congress needs to update the Act to prevent states from suppressing votes.

Meanwhile, Trump and Republicans in Congress are turning a blind eye to the real threats facing our democracy: election fraud, and foreign interference.

In 2018, a Republican operative stole votes from Democrats in a North Carolina congressional race with a quote, “coordinated, unlawful, and substantially resourced absentee ballot scheme.” After the ballots were counted, the Republican candidate appeared to have won by about 900 votes. But the fraud was so glaring that the state board of elections refused to certify the results and called for a special election.

The other real threat is foreign interference in our elections, as Russia did in 2016.

We now know for a fact that Trump is encouraging foreign leaders to interfere in our elections — asking the President of Ukraine to investigate his political opponents in exchange for military aid and publicly calling on Russia and China to also interfere.

In the Senate, Mitch McConnell continues to block common-sense legislation to protect our elections against future foreign interference, such as requiring all voting machines to have backup paper ballots and imposing automatic sanctions for nations that interfere in elections. To have safe and secure elections in 2020 and beyond, we need to pass this legislation.

The next time you hear Trump and his enablers claim widespread voter fraud, know the truth. Their lies are intended to make it harder for millions of Americans to vote, while they ignore the real threats to our democracy.

Can Anyone Stop Facebook from Poisoning Democracy?

Published on

Wednesday, October 16, 2019

by

Common Dreams

While the social media giant wraps itself in the banner of free expression and political speech, it serves more as a scrim to hide its continued spread of political disinformation to tens of millions of voters in advance of the 2020 elections.

by

Timothy Karr

 29 Comments

One hundred cardboard cutouts of Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg stand outside the US Capitol in Washington, DC, April 10, 2018. - Advocacy group Avaaz is calling attention to what the groups says are hundreds of millions of fake accounts still spreading disinformation on Facebook. (Photo: Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images)

Freedom (to lie) isn’t free. For the campaign to re-elect Donald Trump it costs $1.5 million a week. And that’s just last week’s tab.

In exchange, Trump’s team gets to spread false and misleading political ads across Facebook’s social network. This includes a 30-second ad that makes the unsubstantiated claim that former Vice President Biden used his influence to block an investigation of a Ukrainian energy company with ties to his son. CNN rejected the ad, noting it contained inaccuracies. But it passed muster with Facebook, Google, Twitter and YouTube, where it’s been viewed hundreds of thousands of times.

"Those naive enough to expect Facebook to do the right thing are ignoring the company’s long history of doing the exact opposite."

The 2020 election cycle is shaping up to be very lucrative for all the leading tech platforms. Digital political-ad spending is expected to top $2.7 billion before Election Day, according to industry forecasts. Presidential candidates have already spent more than $70 million on Facebook and Google placements, according to data firm Acronym.

Facebook flip flop

All of this cash is great news for online platforms, which are going out of their way to accommodate the rush of campaign ads.

Last month, Facebook changed its policies against misleading ads to give politicians and their campaigns free rein to lie in ads posted on the massive social network. Why bother with fact-checking when there’s easy money in deceptive attack ads?

Under most circumstances, the FCC requires television and radio broadcasters to air political ads by federal candidates; they can’t make decisions based on the content of those candidate ads, whether they’re truthful or not.

Like TV and radio stations, online platforms have no obligation to truth-test political advertising. Yet Facebook once promised to do more than that, pledging that politicians must abide by the same standards as every other advertiser on its site, including the rule that “prohibits ads that include claims debunked by third-party fact checkers.”

That’s changed, and Facebook is painting itself as a champion of First-Amendment freedoms to justify the switch.

“Our approach is grounded in Facebook’s fundamental belief in free expression, respect for the democratic process, and the belief that, in mature democracies with a free press, political speech is already arguably the most scrutinized speech there is,” Facebook’s Katie Harbath explained to the Biden campaign after the company refused to take down the misleading Trump 2020 ad featuring Biden’s son.

But Facebook’s laissez-faire attitude toward political speech has more to do with politics and profits than principle. And it differs dramatically from an earlier commitment by founder Mark Zuckerberg, who told the Senate last year that Facebook wasn't doing enough to prevent its technology “from being used for harm.”

“It's not enough to just give people a voice,” he said. “We need to make sure that people aren't using it to harm other people or to spread misinformation.”

To that end Facebook has deployed A.I. tools that Zuckerberg claims do a better job of identifying accounts that may be trying to interfere in elections. He also pledged to put people first: “My top priority has always been our social mission of connecting people, building community and bringing the world closer together. Advertisers and developers will never take priority over that.”

Until they do, that is.

Facebook’s anti-democracy bias

Zuck’s words aren’t enough for Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who has some of her own: “Facebook has incredible power to affect elections and our national debate,” the presidential candidate tweeted last Monday, noting that the company is taking “deliberate steps to help one candidate intentionally mislead the American people.”

Facebook’s policy change followed a White House meeting between Zuckerberg and Trump in late September. “What did they talk about?” Warren asks. Zuckerberg’s press office won’t say; neither will the White House.

In the meantime, that new and improved A.I. is blocking legitimate news.

Investigative journalist Judd Legum, who first uncovered Facebook’s policy reversal on political ads, last Tuesday reported that Facebook had buried newsworthy posts from a public-radio station in Juneau, Alaska. Facebook claimed that the headline to a post titled “Confused about Juneau's municipal ballot measures? You're not alone,” was clickbait, which it forbids.

Last year, Facebook blocked news reports about a hack of its users’ data. Many users found that they couldn’t share stories from legitimate news outlets including the Guardian, Sacramento Bee, and Associated Press.

Despite the chorus from the right claiming anti-conservative bias at the social network, Facebook has a disturbing habit of content-moderation decisions that disproportionately go against social-justice advocates and vulnerable populations. Last year, it blocked an event page for organizers planning a counter-march against a white-supremacist rally that took place in Washington, D.C. The company also removed a post about racism from a prominent Black Lives Matter activist and journalist, though Facebook later apologized and rescinded the block.

The platform has also helped advertisers discriminate. A 2016 ProPublica investigation found that a Facebook ad-targeting tool allowed realtors to restrict who could see housing-related ads based on their “Ethnic Affinities.”

ProPublica later reported that advertisers could use Facebook’s tools to target ads based on people’s self-reported jobs, even if the job was “Jew hater.”

Facebook claims to have subsequently tweaked its tech to prevent advertisers from targeting groups or individuals in ways that could be considered discriminatory. Still, it has no problem with political-advertising content that targets vulnerable communities.

According to research by Media Matters, the company allowed the Trump campaign’s Facebook page to run more than 2,000 ads describing immigrants of color — particularly people from Central and South America — as an “invasion,” a term that white-supremacist groups in the United States frequently use in this context.

Poisoning the well

If all of this is leaving you angry and confused, you’re not alone.

Facebook’s promises to do better typically amount to little in practice. If things continue at this rate, one thing is certain: Facebook will play a significant role in poisoning the well of our democracy… again.

Sen. Warren has called for a new round of congressional hearings and an investigation so Facebook executives can explain what they’re doing to prevent a repeat of 2016 election interference and disinformation. But it’s difficult to see how this might result in new guidelines to curtail deceptive ads in time for it to matter. And existing legislative proposals, like Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s worthy Honest Ads Act, focus on disclosure of funders and preventing foreign meddling in U.S. elections. They would do little to stem the flood of misleading political ads coming from known, homegrown candidates themselves. 

To date, Congress has advanced no privacy legislation that protects voters from having their online data harvested without their consent for targeting by dishonest political campaigns.

Unless Warren or others plan to introduce new legislation, containing provisions that no one has articulated clearly to this point, there seems very little of legal substance for Congress to discuss at an upcoming hearing with Facebook — certainly nothing that that would effectively bar politicians from peddling lies online.

And while Facebook wraps itself in the banner of free expression and political speech, it serves more as a scrim to hide its continued spread of political disinformation to tens of millions of voters in advance of the 2020 elections.

Those naive enough to expect Facebook to do the right thing are ignoring the company’s long history of doing the exact opposite. Facebook now boasts nearly 2.5 billion active users; these users generate four new petabytes of data every day and click “like” 4 million times every minute. Facebook has become too massive to govern itself, and politicians seem too overwhelmed to step into the maelstrom.

But whether and how lawmakers even can step in without running afoul of other cherished principles and legal protections is debatable. 

Beyond fixing Facebook

The only real solution to Facebook is one that billions of don’t seem ready to commit to: leaving the social platform altogether.

In the interim, we must consider ways to help create its alternative: content-sharing platforms that don’t hammer at the foundations of democracy.

"Silicon Valley is incapable of cleaning up its toxic mess. More democratic media must help improve political participation, deepen discourse and increase voter turnout."Earlier this year, Craig Aaron and I proposed a tax on the targeted-advertising revenues that are the economic engine fueling the most dominant online platforms. Proceeds from this tax, estimated at $2 billion a year, would go to a “public-interest media endowment” to support local, independent and noncommercial journalism. Additional funds would help incubate new ideas for gathering and distributing news content, preferably those that don’t rely on the clickbait economy and political-advertising budgets to survive. 

All of us must think beyond fixing Facebook to a social-media solution of, by and for the people — not one that protects the powerful and spreads their lies. What we accomplish by the end of 2020 will help determine whether the future of our democracy brightens or dims, and whether our media system becomes an agent of civic engagement or alienation.

To do this requires a dramatic change in the way online platforms work today. Silicon Valley is incapable of cleaning up its toxic mess. More democratic media must help improve political participation, deepen discourse and increase voter turnout. Transparency about political ads is a key element of this shift, but so are efforts to return working journalists to civic-minded beats and limit the damaging effects of disinformation.

These changes must be an intrinsic part of the broader movement to restore democratic norms. A part of that is changing business as usual at platforms that profit from deception.

Timothy Karr is the senior director of strategy for Free Press Action Fund, the advocacy organization that fights for everyone’s rights to connect and communicate. Follow him on Twitter: @TimKarr.

Our work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. Feel free to republish and share widely.

Why 2020 Won’t Be Won By Centrists

by Robert Reich

Tuesday, October 8, 2019

I keep hearing that the Democratic primary is coming down to someone who’s “electable” versus someone who has “ideas.”

This is pure nonsense. Beating Donald Trump requires getting out the vote. And in order to get people to turn out and vote, a presidential candidate has to be inspiring. Which means big ideas, a vision of an America that could become a reality if we all got behind it, a sense of where we need to be heading.

Don’t be fooled. This primary is not a contest between someone who’s electable and someone who has big ideas. Big ideas are essential in order to be electable.

Something else I’m hearing is that the contest is between someone who’s a moderate and a candidate who’s on the left.

Well, that’s rubbish. All the babble about moderate or left assumes we’re back in the old politics where the central question was the size of government.

But today the real contest is between the people and the powerful – the vast majority of Americans versus an oligarchy that’s amassed most of the nation’s wealth and power.

That small group of hugely wealthy and powerful people got a giant $2 trillion tax cut from Trump and his Republican enablers, and they want to pay for it by trashing Medicare, Social Security, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act.

The oligarchy would rather we fight among ourselves for the scraps they’ve left behind than see what’s really happening. Divide and conquer: Middle class against poor, white against black, native-born American against immigrant, Christian against Muslim. That way we don’t see that they’ve been looting America.

Trump’s followers don’t see he’s really a tool of the oligarchy, doing their bidding, reorganizing America so they accumulate even more wealth and power. And as long as we fight among ourselves, we don’t join together and reclaim our economy and our democracy.

One final thing I’ve been hearing is that we should go back to the way it was before Trump. That’s baloney.

The way it was before Trump brought us Trump. The way it was before Trump was an economy rigged for the benefit of the few, stagnant wages, socialism for the rich and harsh capitalism for everyone else, a health care system whose co-payments and deductibles were out of control and still didn’t cover 30 million Americans, and big money controlling our politics.

No, we don’t want to go back to the way it was before Trump. We have to go forward.

So don’t accept false choices about who’s electable versus who has ideas, who’s moderate versus who’s on the left, or whether we need to go back to the way it was before Trump.

In reality, what’s going to beat Trump are new ideas that mobilize America, that let Americans see what the wealthy and powerful who bankroll Trump have done to this nation, and get us looking forward to what America should be rather than backward to an America that was never as good as it could be.

9 Ways to Stay Sane During the Primaries

by Robert Reich

Wednesday, August 28, 2019

As the presidential primaries get underway, it’s easy to get burnt out or overwhelmed by all the candidates and their platforms. Here are 9 ways to stay sane through the madness of the presidential primaries.

1. Look for a candidate with the right ingredients to inspire you and others. The next president will have to be someone who can bring together Americans from all walks of life — across race, class, gender, ethnicity, and religion — into a movement against the hatred, bigotry, and cronyism that now pervades Washington.

2. Don’t get distracted by the horserace, who’s up or who’s down in the polls. Focus on the substance: What their vision is for the country and how it will affect all of our lives.

3. Reach out to independents. Avoid political labels, and talk kitchen table issues like the rising cost of health care, housing and education. Focus on solutions rather than slogans or what you hear on cable news.

4. Get involved. Devote your time and energy to getting others organized and mobilized. It’s going to take a grassroots movement of Americans to take our country back from those who seek to divide us.

5. Study up on the candidates and their positions on issues you care about and see if they align. Visit their websites to explore their policy positions, read independent analyses of their proposals, dig deeper into their records in elected office.

6. Take a deep breath. The most important goal is to reclaim our democracy and forge an economy that works for all. Don’t succumb to divisiveness or carping criticism of other primary candidates. And remember that you can stay centered, mentally, regardless of how close you are to the political center.

7. Make sure you’re registered to vote, and know when and where to vote. The work you put into learning about the candidates means little if you don’t actually show up on Election Day. Once you’re registered, make sure your friends and family are too.

8. Follow the money. Some candidates have already pledged not to take money from wealthy donors or corporate political action committees. Make sure all of them follow suit.

9. Lastly, don’t lose faith in America. We’ve been through dark times before, but we have come out stronger on the other side. We will do so again.

Off the Top of My Head

Elections in the US and China

by John Lawrence, August 23, 2019

At the local level elections in the US and China are similar. Local officials are elected directly by the people in both countries. At the regional level officials are elected indirectly in China by the officials at the local level. In the US state officials are elected from districts. For instance, there are 40 Senate districts and 80 Assembly districts in California. California has a bicameral legislature so each citizen of California is represented by one state Senator and one Assembly person at the state level. That means an individual citizen is represented by 1/40 of the state Senate and 1/80 of the state Assembly in terms of the legislature. A citizen of California does not get to vote on 39/40 of the state Senate and 79/80 of the state Assembly. Since each state legislator is supposed to represent their district, most of the state legislature does not democratically represent most of the state's citizens.

According to Wikipedia, People's Congresses of cities that are not divided into districts are directly elected. In most US cities, councilpersons are elected by district. This means that a citizen of a particular city is only represented by one councilperson. In San Diego there are 9 districts so each San Diegan is represented by 1/9 of the city council. It would seem that there is more democracy in China at the local level which is always the case in a districtless election in which citizens get to vote on the entire council rather than to elect just one councilperson.

At the regional level, it depends on how exactly the local Chinese officials vote for the regional People's Congress. If they do so in a districtless way, then the regional People's Congress would be a form of representative government which could be considered more democratic than US elections by district. In the US at state and national levels there is not direct democracy but representative democracy as well, but elections are undertaken by district. So in both countries there is a form of representative democracy. It just depends how you measure democracy.

There are 435 congressional districts in the United States House of Representatives, so each citizen is represented by 1/435 of Congress. You could argue that China's way of electing representatives at the national level is more democratic than the US' method because it is not based on districts. Since in the US each representative and Senator is supposed to represent only their district, this leads to a lot of contentiousness, gridlock and getting nothing done. In China their system leads to more consensus than the US system so they are able to proceed without constant wrangling.

At the national level the US bicameral legislature has produced nothing but gridlock for years. In the Senate there are 100 senators, 2 from each state so each US citizen is represented by 1/50 of the Senate. China has a unicameral National People's Congress made up of 2980 people. The indirect way in which it is elected might just make it more representative of each individual citizen than is the US bicameral legislature. Democracy can be measured in different ways, but essentially the question is how much each representative represents each individual citizen. The further question is how much consensus is there vs how much gridlock. At the present time, China seems to be moving ahead with a high degree of consensus while the US is mired in gridlock not able to get anything done. This has led to the ineffectiveness of the US Congress which has ceded much of its power to the President especially in terms of starting and carrying on wars.

America Rejects Trumpism

by Robert Reich

Wednesday, November 7, 2018

Make no mistake: America has rejected Trumpism.

No one seriously expected the Senate to flip, because Democrats had to defend 26 seats in that chamber, compared with only nine held by Republicans.

The real battleground was the House, where Democrats had to achieve a net gain of 23 seats to get the 218 needed for a majority.

They did.

Trump wasn’t on the ballot but he made the election into a referendum on himself.

So Americans turned against House Republicans, who should have acted as a check on him but did nothing – in many cases magnifying his vileness.

The nation has repudiated Trump, but do not believe for a moment that our national nightmare is over.

Trump still occupies the White House and in all likelihood will be there for two more years.

The Republican Party remains in control of the Senate.

Fox News is still Trump’s propaganda ministry. (The line between Fox and Trump, already blurred, vanished completely at his last pre-election rally when Fox hosts Sean Hannity and Jeannine Pirro joined him on stage.)

The American people will be subject to more of Trump’s lies and hate, as amplified by Senate Republicans and Fox News.

Trump can be expected to scapegoat House Democrats for anything that goes wrong. American politics will almost certainly become even meaner, coarser, and uglier. We will remain deeply and angrily divided.

Most worrisome, America still won’t respond to real threats that continue to grow, which Trump and his enablers have worsened – climate change; the suppression of votes, and foreign intrusions into our elections; the most expensive and least efficient healthcare system in the world; and, not least, widening inequalities of income, wealth, and political power.

America will eventually overcome and reverse Trumpism. The harder challenge will be to reverse the reasons Trump and his Republican lapdogs gained power in the first place.

Some blame racism and nativism. But these toxins have poisoned America since the founding of the Republic.

What’s new has been the interaction between them and the long economic slide of tens of millions of working Americans, most of them white and lacking college degrees.

They used to be the bedrock of the Democratic Party, many of them members of trade unions whose strength in numbers gave them an increasing share of the gains from economic growth.

Their long economic slide has generated the kind of frustrations that demagogues throughout history have twisted into rage at “them.”

Meanwhile, most economic gains have gone to the top 1 percent, whose wealth is now greater than the combined wealth of the bottom 90 percent – giving them enough political muscle to demand and get tax cuts, Wall Street bailouts, corporate subsidies, and regulatory rollbacks. These in turn have created even more wealth at the top.

All were trends before Trump. Yet Democrats failed to reverse them, even though Democrats occupied the White House most of these years (and during four of them controlled both houses of Congress).

Trump has worsened them by slashing taxes on the wealthy and corporations, whittling back the Affordable Care Act, and loosening restrictions on Wall Street.

Jobs may be back but they pay squat, especially compared with the rising costs of housing, healthcare, and education. And they’re less secure than ever. One in five is now held by a worker under contract without any unemployment insurance, sick leave, or retirement savings.

Which presumably is why Trump decided to focus the midterms on hate and fear rather than the economy.

He thereby created a large opening for Democrats aiming for 2020. They can become the party of the bottom 90 percent by creating a multi-racial, multi-ethnic coalition to wrest back control of our economy and democracy.

They would focus on two big things: First, raise the purchasing power of the bottom 90 percent through stronger unions, a larger wage subsidy (starting with a bigger Earned Income Tax Credit), and Medicare for All.

Second, get big money out of politics through public financing of elections, full disclosure of all sources of political funding, an end to the revolving door between business and government.

Democrats shouldn’t try moving to the “center.” The center no longer exists because most Americans are no longer on the traditional “right” or “left.”

The vast majority of Americans are now anti-establishment, and understandably so.

The practical choice is either Trump’s authoritarian populism backed by the moneyed interests, or a new democratic populism backed by the rest of us.

The direction couldn’t be clearer. It should be the Democrat’s hour.

America's Wars Are Completely Ignored in the Midterm Elections

by Maj. Danny Sjursen, truthdig, November 7, 2018

This piece originally appeared on antiwar.org.

The United States military is actively fighting in seven Muslim-majority countries; and no one cares. As Americans go to the polls today in a ritual pretense of democracy, they will vote for one of the two major political parties on issues ranging from healthcare to immigration to the basic personality of President Donald Trump. The three mainstream networks – from “liberal” MSNBC to “conservative” Fox News – have reported on little else for the last several months. The whole charade is little more than politics-as-entertainment, like some popular sporting event in which the opposing sides wave the flag for the blue team or the red team.

For weeks now, my television, and yours, has been saturated with political commercials for and against local legislative candidates. Some are attack ads focused on corruption and the supposed left or right-wing extremism of the opposing candidate. Others center on taxes, healthcare, and the ostensible “hordes” of immigrants approaching the U.S. in a troublesome caravan. But none, I repeat, none, say a thing about American foreign policy, the nation’s ongoing wars, or the exploding, record defense budget. You see, in 2018, despite being engrossed in the longest war in US history, the citizenry – both on Main Street and Wall Street – display nothing but apathy on the subject of America’s clearly faltering foreign policy.

The reasons are fairly simple: while the populace reflexively (over) adulates our “heroes” in uniform, it has been programmed to ignore the actual travails of our troopers. So long as there is no conscription of Americans’ sons and daughters, and so long as taxes don’t rise (we simply put our wars on the national credit card), the people are quite content to allow less than 1% of the population fight the nation’s failing wars – with no questions asked. Both mainstream wings of the Republicans and Democrats like it that way. They practice the politics of distraction and go on tacitly supporting one indecisive intervention after another, all the while basking in the embarrassment of riches bestowed upon them by the corporate military industrial complex. Everyone wins, except, that is, the soldiers doing multiple tours of combat duty, and – dare I say – the people of the Greater Middle East, who live in an utterly destabilized nightmare of a region.

Why should we be surprised? The de facto “leaders” of both parties – the Chuck Schumers, Joe Bidens, Hillary Clintons and Mitch McConnells of the world – all voted for the 2002 Iraq War resolution, one of the worst foreign policy adventures in American History. Sure, on domestic issues – taxes, healthcare, immigration – there may be some distinction between Republican and Democratic policies; but on the profound issues of war and peace, there is precious little daylight between the two parties. That, right there, is a formula for perpetual war.

To find the few brave voices willing to dissent against the foreign policy consensus, one must look to the political margins of the libertarian right (i.e. Rand Paul) and the democratic socialist left (i.e. Bernie Sanders). This is a sad state of affairs on an election day that both Donald Trump and Barack Obama have assured us is the “most consequential” of our lifetimes. You see on this point I actually agree with these two polar political opposites. This is a vital election, only not for the reasons we’re told. This November 6th is profound because it demonstrates, once and for all, the utter vacuousness of American politics.

So where does the U.S. currently stand on foreign policy today? Well, it is actively bombing seven countries, has up to 800 military bases in 80 countries, has combat troops, special forces, drones and/or advisors on the ground in (or in the skies above) Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Yemen, West Africa, Libya and Pakistan, among others. Occasionally, American service-members are still dying across the Middle East – often in treacherous insider attacks, in which the very people we “advise and assist” turn their weapons on our troops.

Furthermore, it is unclear that the US is either “winning” – whatever that means anymore – or accomplishing anything of note in any of these locales. For example, in the longest conflict of the lot, Afghanistan, all the key metrics indicate that the US is losing, both politically and militarily. As for the other ongoing wars in the region, no one – not the generals or the civilian policymakers – seems capable of articulating an exit strategy. Maybe there just isn’t any.

Still, none of that will be on the ballot today, when Americans queue up to vote for their favorite teams. They’ll be casting ballots based on the illusion of differentiation between two highly corporate political entities that are squarely in the pocket of the weapons’ industry and their Wall Street financiers. And, tonight, when the media outlets dazzle their viewers with holograms, charts, and other neat toys depicting the day’s winners and losers – not one station will even utter that naughty word: Afghanistan.

What all this illustrates, in sum, is that the citizenry doesn’t really care about the troops, and neither do their elected leaders. Soldiers are political props and little else – meant to be “thanked,” paraded at sporting events, and then effectively ignored – the new American way.

The republic, or, more accurately, the empire, is in real trouble when – in the midst of its longest conflicts ever – war is not even on the agenda at the polls today. Pity the nation…

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Maj. Danny Sjursen is a U.S. Army officer and former history instructor at West Point. He served tours with reconnaissance units in Iraq and Afghanistan... 

Off the Top of My Head

Trump's Goose is Almost Cooked

by John Lawrence, November7, 2018

Now that the Democrats have taken over the House, they will be able to subpoena Trump's tax returns. That and the upcoming Mueller report should be enough to cook Trump's goose. Trump's goose is roasting nicely in the oven and should be done presently. So what if the Republicans picked up two Senators. It won't make a bit of difference in the Senate. Hundreds of women headed to the House. That's a good thing. 75 veterans elected. I hope they don't go there to represent the military-industrial complex.

Getting rid of Scott Walker in Wisconsin is a fantastically good thing. That guy was a horror. Totally destroyed the unions in that state. It looks like Camp-in-a-jar was not able to defeat Huncan Dunter Jr. in the 50th Congressional District. Too bad. If he had less of a tongue twister for a name, he might have done the trick. They need to register more Democrats in this district. Hopefully, next time they will pull it out.

I suppose now Trump will forget all about "the caravan." If you eliminated gerrymandering, Democrats would have taken the Senate as well. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortex from New York is the youngest person ever elected. More power to her. An openly gay man was elected Governor. 30 women flipped Republican seats. Fantastic!

I think the Republican party is doomed if enough young people get active and involved and find out what really is going on in this country. Student loan debt surpasses all other forms of debt except mortgage debt. That means it surpasses credit card debt. Republicans have totally biased the nation against young people and women and used their power to benefit themselves and the military-industrial complex. The deplorables in the rural districts will always vote for a minuscule tax break for themselves while giving a gargantuan one to the wealthy. They don't care about the fact they are running up the national debt in order to get a few crumbs from the table while contributing to the inequality gap.

All in all a promising election night for sanity being reintroduced to the nation. Divided government will produce nothing of benefit to the people EXCEPT Trump's goose will be cooked, and perhaps we'll get a decent President in 2020 - only two years away!