Category Archives: Elections

Jul 11 2019
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Adrastos, Elections, Fog Of History, Political Crack, R.I.P., Television

The Fog Of History: 1992

When Ross Perot died the other day there was a surge of hits on a post I wrote in 2015, Enough Already With The Perot-Trump Comparisons. Thanks, y’all.

I never voted for Ross Perot but he was much better person than Trump. Perot was a genuine self-made man who had “a very good brain.” Perot also knew his way around a folksy aphorism whereas Trump merely babbles and repeats himself; NO COLLUSION, NO COLLUSION, NO COLLUSION. Additionally, Perot gave freely of his time and money to a variety of good causes and we all know about the Insult Comedian’s stingy ways.

The New York Times obit of Perot is a classic of the genre:

And in 1992 he became one of the most unlikely candidates ever to run for president. He had never held public office, and he seemed all wrong, like a cartoon character sprung to life: an elfin 5 feet 6 inches and 144 pounds, with a 1950s crew cut; a squeaky, nasal country-boy twang; and ears that stuck out like Alfred E. Neuman’s on a Mad magazine cover. Stiff-necked, cantankerous, impetuous, often sentimental, he was given to homespun epigrams: “If you see a snake, just kill it. Don’t appoint a committee on snakes.”

Timesman Robert D. McFadden also described Perot as a “wiry Texas gadfly.” I’m fond of gadflies. I’m one myself.

1992 was one of the most exciting elections of my lifetime. It had everything: sex scandals, a huge Democratic field, and an incumbent president who was good at governing but rotten at campaigning. Poppy Bush was challenged by wingnut gadfly Pat Buchanan whose insurgent campaign damaged the incumbent enough to doom his candidacy. Thanks, Pat.

And then there was Ross Perot. He entered the race on Larry King Live, exited the race during the Democratic Convention, then re-entered the race just in time to debate Bush and Clinton.

The featured image is of my favorite moment in the first debate: Bush checking his watch. Does anybody really know what time it is, does anybody really care?

Perot did well in 1992, winning 19% of the popular vote and his candidacy was the final blow to Poppy Bush’s chances.

Perot was quirky and idiosyncratic. The term eccentric billionaire seemed to have been coined for him. I’d like to thank him at this point for helping to elect the Clinton-Gore ticket thereby breaking the Democrats losing streak in presidential races. It was a helluva campaign y’all.

Perot’s third party candidacy in 1992 showed the utility of such an effort whereas his 1996 campaign showed its futility: he won only 8% of the popular vote and wasn’t invited to debate Clinton and Dole.

I used to do a wicked Ross Perot impression but I lost it after he left center stage. It typically involved the phrase “great sucking sound,” which he used to describe NAFTA but is equally applicable to the Trump Regime.

The last word goes to Patsy Cline with the song Team Perot played as he hit the stage to concede in 1992:

 

 

Jun 26 2019
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Adrastos, Elections, Political Crack, Television

Instant Analysis: Cattle Call Debate Act One

Nothing that happened on that glitzy stage in Miami mattered all that much. Some candidates performed well and others bombed but in the end, a good ground game in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina will matter infinitely more.

Hell, I don’t even think general election debates matter all that much: Hillary and Kerry destroyed their opponents, which is the political equivalent of winning the battle and losing the war.

One jarring thing about the debate was the performative Spanish speaking by several candidates. It started to feel as if it were a Canadian debate where they break into French from time-to-time. You say gracias, I say merci. Let’s call the whole thing off.

I have a few random thoughts about this random group of candidates:

Warren: My candidate performed well as always. There were stretches where she was quiet but she’s the frontrunner in this group so she didn’t need to mix it up with the likes of DeBlasio, Ryan, Delaney, and Gabbard.

Her closing argument was superb. It’s a good example of why I believe she’ll win the nomination and go on to be our first woman president.

Booker: He helped himself. He was strong, forceful, and passionate. He seems to have good chemistry with both Warren and Castro. A good thing since they’re her most likely running mates if she picks within the field of candidates.

Castro: The strongest performance of the night. He’s an impressive guy with a great back story. He’s making a real contribution to the race with his focus on immigration. It’s easy to imagine him cleaning up the Homeland Security Department in the next Democratic administration.

Beto: He’s an outstanding stump speaker but a poor debater. He came off as a nervous windbag who was trying too hard to be a 21st Century Bobby Kennedy.

It finally occurred to me who Beto reminds me of:

Like Walton Goggins as Boyd Crowder, Beto never uses one word when ten are available. And they both have big, scary teeth.

He should reconsider running against Senator Cornhole in Texas. Running for president was a bad Beto…

Klobuchar: I like the Senator from Minnesota, but this was not her best performance. Her closing argument was a dud: I’m electable yadda, yadda, yadda. Why? At this point in time, Trump looks like a stone cold loser unless his pals in the Kremlin bail him out again.

Inslee: In a word, inconsistent. Gave some good answers on climate change but rambled at other times. His makeup was a disaster. It made him look 20 years older than he is.

DeBlasio: Tall, annoying, and loud.

Delaney: Why was this bozo even onstage? He looks like a wrestling coach.  I halfway expected him to apply a Half-Nelson to one of his opponents.

Ryan: He gave a decent answer early on about guns then became increasingly incoherent. He spent much of the second half giving forgettable answers about the forgotten people. I forget exactly what he said.

Gabbard: Ryan was so inept that he gave Gabbard a chance to shine. I hate to say that because she’s awful and should exit the race, stage left.

May 21 2019
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Athenae, Elections

On Nostalgia, Joe Biden, and the ‘Shortcomings’ of the Young

God, it’s such good sport to beat up on Joe:

Don’t misread here: He’s being a tool about a lot of things and if he’d just shut his goddamn trap he could likely coast to a primary victory, but he can’t stop setting his brand on fire in the street. Whether that’s good or not is totally impossible to say, since “electability” is for suckers and national head-to-head polls are stupid as hell.

Nobody knows what’s going to happen next spring. Shit, we barely know what’s going to happen next WEEK, so my enthusiasm for wading into this nonsense at this point is pretty limited. I was a Deaniac and still am a Kerry stan, guys. Once bitten, etc. But there’s something going on with Biden that I think is interesting beyond just the usual “here’s a dude running for president.” I mean, there are lots and lots of dudes running.

(We hear about them constantly because it’s either that or talk about the women, after all.)

So, Biden:

“I know how to make government work,” Biden said. “I’ve worked across the aisle. I’ve worked to reach consensus.” It wasn’t just a call back to his time as Barack Obama’s wingman vice president but also to his days in the Senate when, to hear him tell the tale, politicians ruled in the best interests of everyone, regularly struck bipartisan deals, and didn’t shout at or demonize their opponents in the pursuit of scoring political points.

There is, of course, a hunger for what we think of as normalcy, which is really a return to a time when we were happy. When that was depends hugely on what you look like, where you live, and what you want. I remember the late 1970s/early 1980s as joyous because my grandparents were alive and I was five years old. Every day was sunny and we had enough to eat and my dad was stealing cable from the neighbors. It was excellent, you know?

Iranian-American children might not have had as much fun in those years, just for example. So while I would dearly love to go back to a time when I was totally ignorant of the world’s problems, I can understand that for others the lure is less. If you can legally marry the love of your life now, you might not want to return to a time when you could be jailed for such a thing. Again, just for example.

The Biden Administration is unlikely to go out of its way to put immigrant children in concentration camps nor attack loving couples whose adopted children were born in the United States. The Biden Administration is unlikely to nominate an actual fascist to replace RBG. The Biden Administration is unlikely, perhaps, to slap its collective dick on China’s dinner table. And if what we face is four more years of Trump cosplaying the Declaration of Independence BUT AS KING GEORGE then I will loudly, enthusiastically, and downright gleefully vote for the Biden Administration in all its dumbass 1950s glory.

I will post memes. I will quit my job and buy a panel van and follow that shit around like the Grateful Dead. My Jackie-O suits will come out of storage.

That’s not the choice yet, though, so here’s my thing with nostalgia. It’s fucking pointless, and it’s sad, and it doesn’t help anything, and its entire function is to let you off the hook for working hard to keep up with the world and being wrong about it as you try to understand.

Do you know, I run in a lot of totebagger circles. I spend SO MUCH TIME listening to people lament division and partisanship and information silo-ing and how we’ve somehow suddenly developed the inability to tell fact from fiction and listen to each other. We need to build bridges, don’t you know. We need to reach out to each other. We need to come together and remember we’re all human!

WE NEED TO STOP KILLING EACH OTHER, is the main thing I want to scream in response, as white supremacists shoot up schools and synagogues week after week after week, as the price of insulin skyrockets, as kids with cancer beg their friends to run lemonade stands for them. Middle- and upper-class white people need civility because then politics can stop distracting us, but everybody else needs to be able to stop dying.

And in order for that to happen we’re going to have to reckon with the world we created in a way that I know our mainstream media sources, the morning shows and quick sports-radio asides that drive the thrust of our national narrative, don’t have the resources or the intelligence or the desire to do.

So to spend the next two years talking about being nice to Republicans, about “reaching across the aisle,” about yearning for the days when things were simpler and kinder … it isn’t just that the prospect doesn’t appeal to me personally (though of course it could). It’s that all it’s going to do is make us smaller, weaker, more powerless, less able to do what needs to be done.

The cultural fracturing isn’t going to stop; too many new stories are being told. Republican malfeasance, criminality and treason aren’t going to stop. And previously marginalized people who are developing the ability to fight back aren’t going to stop, because it’s not the culture or civility or some idea of their childhood they’re fighting for. It’s their lives, right now, right fucking now, today.

In the face of that reality we need someone who can recognize it for what it is, and greet it warmly, arms wide open, enthusiastic for the tumult and the shouting because burning is the only way anything new can be born. More likely it’s not just one person who can bring the energy we see all around us to our politics. More likely it’s dozens, elected by people who aren’t interested in our yesterdays, who can see the waves coming into the shore and not turn their backs.

Who can greet what we have now with strength and courage, and not deplore the lack of what never was, not for all of us, not even once.

A.

May 13 2019
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Adrastos, Campaign Notes, Diary, Elections, Fog Of History, Political Crack, So Called Liberal Media

Memories Of The Muskie Administration

The MSM punditocracy hasn’t learned anything from the 2016 election. They’re still fixated on early polling and “discovering” bright shiny objects instead of reporting the campaign. I *had* hoped they’d learned that insider political journalism was bankrupt as declared by Ben Smith last summer. But they haven’t learned a damn thing and continue to focus on the horse race aspects of the “why not me” campaign. Remember the Avenatti boomlet? I’d prefer to forget it.

After declaring Joe Biden’s candidacy DOA, many in the punditocracy now think that he’s the inevitable nominee. They’re wrong in both instances. Frontrunner status has a way of bringing a candidate crashing to earth, especially in such a large field. Remember President Dean?

I have fond memories of the 2009-2017 Hillary Clinton administration. She was the frontrunner that time around and ended up losing the nomination. Secretary of State was a pretty damn good consolation prize. Thanks, Obama.

The ultimate Democratic frontrunner who failed was Senator Edmund Sixtus Muskie of Maine. 1972 was my formative year as a political junkie. It was the first time I was old enough to pay attention. I supported George McGovern but liked Muskie and didn’t understand why he was torn down by a media that had built him up as the inevitable nominee for two years. I was too young to get it then.

Ed Muskie was Hubert Humphrey’s running mate in 1968. The contrast between him and the man I refuse to claim as my countryman, Spiro Agnew, was stark. Muskie was calm, thoughtful, and qualified. The self-loathing Greek, Ted (Don’t Call Me Spiro) Agnew, was the exact opposite: bombastic, shallow, and unqualified. He was also a crook who took bribes while serving as Veep.

One of the best ads of the 1968 election cycle mocked Agnew:

Back to Ed Muskie. He emerged from the ’68 campaign as a national figure. His calm, reasoned reply to a frenetic midterm broadcast by Tricky Dick in 1970 made him a star and the ’72 frontrunner. The tall Senator was called Lincolnesque by many observers. What candidate wouldn’t want to be compared to Honest Abe?

Muskie led in every Democratic preference poll from that moment on. He was frequently ahead of Nixon in head-to-head polls through the early months of 1972. One of his campaign themes was Trust Muskie, drawing an obvious contrast to a president whose nickname was Tricky Dick.

This button is a good example of Muskie’s message:

Muskie was inevitable, until he wasn’t. His frontrunner status made him a target for Nixon’s dirty tricksters and at 6’4″ he was a big target. Attacks on his wife, Jane, caused Big Ed to snap and cry in public, which in the uber-macho atmosphere of 1972 helped doom his candidacy. Nixon and his lackeys had the opponent they wanted in the general election.

Among the many ironies of Muskie’s doomed campaign is that he actually won the New Hampshire primary, but the punditocracy, unaware of Nixonian dirty tricks, declared McGovern the “winner.” Muskie’s campaign might have come a cropper anyway: he was over reliant on big name endorsements and blurred his strongly liberal political views into blandness on the advice of his advisers.

Muskie was also dogged in 1972 by a bizarre and untrue story concocted by Hunter S. Thompson about his use of a hallucinogenic drug, Ibogaine. Thompson later claimed it was a joke and that nobody believed the story anyway. That just wasn’t so. I think of Ed Muskie every time I hear Hunter Thompson lionized as a voice for fearless independent journalism when, in fact, he was in the bag for Team McGovern. Projection thy name is Hunter S. Thompson.

What lessons can be drawn from my memories of the Muskie administration?

It’s not over until it’s over.

Don’t trust the MSM punditocracy and early polls. They’re both eminently changeable. Just ask former media darling Beto O’Rourke.

Insider political journalism *should* be dead, but it’s not.

The last word goes to Alice Cooper with a hit song from 1972:

May 07 2019
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Athenae, Elections

Tell Me Again How Both Parties Are The Same

Do it. I dare you: 

Can’t transport more than 2 non-family voters unless you fill out a form identifying them and affirming they “are physically unable to enter the polling place without personal assistance or likelihood of injuring their health.”

I dare you:

Texas Sen. Bryan Hughes’ new bill, S. Bill 9, will disallow driving of elderly, disabled, or poor people to the polls. It would ban efforts with vans full of elderly from nursing homes, disabled people, poor people who don’t have cars, would be illegal in Texas.

I dare you: 

A bill currently making its way through the Tennessee legislature would impose new restrictions on groups that hold voter registration drives and subject them to potential jail time and massive fines.
Under one of the provisions, individuals or organizations that submit 100 to 500 “deficient” voter registration applications, meaning forms that are incomplete or contain incorrect information, could be hit with a $150 to $2,000 fine. Submitting more than 500 “deficient” forms could result in a fine of up to $10,000.

When the 2020 elections are a nonstop shitshow we’re going to see a lot of griping about black turnout not being where it should be and “fuck the South” and all that other nonsense, and every internet bro lamenting that the American people just will not RISE UP will have no idea that any of this happened at all.

I was not angry since I came to France (that isn’t true, I’m angry all the time) but motherfucking fucking FUCK these people. People who drive people to the polls or register them to vote take time away from their work and their homes and their kids to make sure people can exercise pretty much the only right they have left and

And not for nothing but if you’re driving busloads of old people from nursing homes to the polls it’s a better than even chance they’re voting Republican or not for the super-liberal Democrat anyway so talk about some counterproductive shitass bullshit.

When this starts disallowing busloads of voters from the megachurch to turn out for whatever regressive chicken-fried cornpone motherfucker as is currently humping Jesus’s leg, look for a real quick reversal and a “we certainly didn’t mean WHITE people” sort of denial.

A.

Apr 29 2019
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Adrastos, Campaign Notes, Elections, Fog Of History, Music, The Darnold

Quote Of The Day: Bill Weld On Trump

I’m a hardcore Democrat so I’m not supporting Bill Weld, BUT I got a kick out of that slogan when I saw it on the book of faces. As a longtime observer of presidential politics, I’m keeping an eye on Weld’s nascent challenge to the Insult Comedian. In the primary era, presidents who face a serious intra-party challenge lose re-election. By serious, I mean someone who can poll enough votes early on to inflict political damage such as Pat Buchanan or Gene McCarthy neither of whom expected to win the nomination. But Poppy Bush lost and LBJ withdrew. Mission accomplished.

Weld is something of an anachronism: a moderate New England Republican. They used to be plentiful but now they’re as rare as the dodo bird. Weld, however, is no dodo.

Massachusetts pols have traditionally done well in the New Hampshire primary. It’s also one of twenty states where unenrolled voters can vote in a party primary, which gives Weld a chance to bloody Trump’s nose with the help of  independents. And they’re plentiful in the Granite State.

Weld sat down for an extended interview with the NYT’s Jeremy W. Peters. I got a kick out of this exchange:

There’s conservatism and Trumpism. One is an ideology, the other is more of an attitude. But increasingly a lot of conservatives worry that the two have become inseparably linked. Are they?

They shouldn’t be. Trumpism is frankly devotion to Mr. Trump’s megalomania. I mean, he’s got a lot going on in his head. The man is so angry so much of the time. It’s hard for me to see how one single head could contain so much anger, so much wrath.

He says, “I’m a counterpuncher.” He is not a counterpuncher. He will take off with tweets or action after any slight, real or imagined. My read is the guy is terrified maybe he’s a loser, which is why he lashes out at anybody. I don’t know everything that’s going on there. But I do know that I would not want to have the president’s demons. I feel for the guy in a way. They’re not normal.

That reminds me of some venerable Neil Finn lyrics:

There’s closets in my head where dirty things are kept
That never see the light of day
I want to drag them out, go for a walk
Just to see the look that’s on your face
Sometimes I can’t be straight I don’t want to hurt you
So forgive me if I tell a lie
Sometimes I come on cold but don’t believe it
I will love you till the day I die

I guess the last line could be the president* referring to his true love, himself. Hell, the next couplet fits as well:

I believe in doing things backwards
Take heed, start doing things in reverse

That concludes what one could call the sub-quote of the day. I believe I just did.

The last word goes to Crowded House:

Apr 25 2019
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Adrastos, Campaign Notes, Comedy, Elections, Fog Of History, Political Crack, Race, Television

Great White Hopes Or Killer Bees?

Everybody’s running for president; every Democrat, that is. Former Veep Joe Biden disregarded my unsolicited advice and threw his shades in the ring. Why not? He’s the polling frontrunner, which is a meaningless distinction at this point, Just ask Ed Muskie, Howard Dean, and Rudy Giuliani. That’s right, the artist formerly known as Mayor Combover was the early GOP frontrunner in 2008. In 2019,  the artist formerly known as America’s Mayor is reduced to being Trump’s mouthpiece. Where’s that rebuttal report, Rudy? Or was it just another lie?

I’m still undecided in the race. I like four candidates and consider them plausible presidents: Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, and Amy Klobuchar. Note that none of them is a white dude and three aren’t dudes at all. They haven’t received the level of media attention that four white dudes have: Bernie, Biden, Beto, and Buttigieg. I’m uncertain whether to call them the Great White Hopes or the Killer Bees so I gave the two labels equal billing in the post title.

Here’s the deal: I understand the attention paid to Bernie and Biden. The former was the 2016 runner-up and the latter has run twice before and was Barack Obama’s veep for 8 years. They have the name recognition to go along with the white hair of which Bernie has much more than Joey the Shark. They have another thing in common: they’re both septuagenarians, which is not disqualifying but gives me pause.

Mayor Pete seems to have supplanted Beto as the MSM’s darling. They both have slender resumes for putative presidents but it’s the Why Not Me election so they’re running. My preference is to have a nominee who has run and won statewide, which rules out the young gun set of the Killer Bees.

I will support anyone against Trump but the mayor of a  college town with a population of 109K? Really? Julian Castro also has not run and won a statewide race but at least he was a big city mayor and cabinet secretary. What’s the difference between him and Mayor Pete? Ethnicity. The campaign press corps has a hard time identifying with a Latino; even one with such an amazing Horatio Alger-type back story. Julian is just as cute as Pete and would also make history. Beto would simply be the latest white dude to be nominated albeit a white dude who used to be in a band. I was too. Perhaps I should run.

There’s another difference between Castro and the other young guns: he’s running a substantive campaign. He’s thought a lot about immigration and how the system can be changed and reformed. It’s badly needed after the chainsaw tactics of Trump and Miller. Castro is a longshot but he’s making a contribution to the dialogue in a way that neither Beto nor Buttigieg is. Frankly, I hope that Castro and/or Beto will drop out and run against John Cornyn back home in Texas. Winning the senate is every bit as important as retaking the White House. Democrats have been fixated on the latter way too long. We need to multi-task.

It’s still early and anything can happen in the Democratic field. There are two qualities that are being underestimated by observers thus far. First, the 2020 nominee has to be tough: Team Trump’s only path to victory is total annihilation of their opponent. Second, many voters want a restoration of what Gamaliel called “normalcy” and Adrastos calls normality. They are quite simply exhausted by the endless Trump scandals. I’m convinced that many 2016 Trump voters will pull the lever for peace and quiet in 2020.

The post title is, of course, wry and sardonic. None of the Killer Bees thinks of themselves as a Great White Hope although both Bernie and Biden need to do a better job explaining themselves to people of color, especially black women who are tired of being taken for granted. They should be: they’re the backbone of the Democratic base. That’s why the clips of yesterday’s She The People forum were so much fun to watch. Warren killed it. Bernie struggled. So it goes.

One reason I chose the featured Killer Bee image was the sign in the background: Swine Flu Inoculation Center. The executive branch is loaded with swines. We need to stop the disease called Trumpism in its tracks.  Additionally, the Insult Comedian has pandered  to the anti-vaxxers who have brought back measles.  Thanks, Trumpy. We need inoculation from these swines. If it takes the Great White Hopes or the Killer Bees, so be it. Just win, baby.

The last word goes to the original Killer Bees led by the great Elliot Gould:

https://thisdayinsnlhistory.tumblr.com/post/107805140974/january-10-1976-the-killer-bees-make-their

I’m caught in another last word lie. Does that qualify me for a Trump regime cabinet job?

Let’s shut things down with the musical stylings of the Blues Brothers; some of whom were also Killer Bees:

Apr 07 2019
3 Comments
Athenae, Congress, Elections

Mitch Mitch Mitch, OUT OUT OUT

I wrote this back in 2016 and I’m still on that shit, as the kids say. 

In fact, I’ll go one further: The entire Resistance ™ should focus much less on ousting Trump and throw its entire weight behind ruining Mitch McConnell’s existence into and through the afterlife. 

Without Mitch, Trump couldn’t do jack dick.

Without Mitch and his pets in the howler monkey sanctuary we call the Senate, we wouldn’t have Gorsuch and Kavanaugh. We’d have Merrick Garland and yeah, probably some borderline fascist but COME ON.

Get rid of this turtle fuck and a few of his circle-jerking fascist-curious Klan buddies and suddenly Trump’s a neutered dillhole yelling at the TV instead of all that plus an imminent threat to the Republic.

We are spending all of our time yelling at Bernie and Joe Biden and Mayor Pete and I’m not saying who they are, and the media biases inherent in raising them above Kamala and Professor Zero Fucks, should be irrelevant, but Mitch McConnell is the problem.

Defeat Trump and leave Mitch in place and you have Obama’s second term which, in case anyone has blocked it out, sucked second-hand donkey sack.

With Mitch around nothing gets solved. We should be throwing ourselves at him like White Walkers at the fucking Wall. Who’s running against him? WHO YOU GOT? We’ll take anybody. They’re problematic as shit and too conservative? OKAY, HERE’S SOME MONEY THEN.

And like this is nice but I want to see party money, celebrity money, dirty sexy money, not just spent on ads for another celebrity but on voter registration and ground volunteers and GOTV and like-minded issue-oriented efforts like LET’S HAVE A DEMOCRACY AGAIN and I KNOW THIS IS KENTUCKY BUT CAN WE PLEASE TAKE SOME OF THE GUNS and OUR ROADS AND BRIDGES ARE ALL FUCKED UP. I want this fight fought like it matters.

We can spend the next year all of us having yelly angry high dudgeon about Bernie and Kamala and shit, or we can focus for once in our party’s lives and send this foreskin-headed hijo de Putin into retirement or indictment.

I’m not picky. It’s all fine so long as at the end of the day he’s gone.

A.

Mar 27 2019
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Adrastos, Elections, Political Crack, Stupid Republican Tricks, The Darnold

A Gift From The President*

I knew that Trump would overreach after his “total exoneration” by his hand-picked Attorney General but I didn’t think it would happen so quickly and stupidly. This Daily Beast headline sums it up quite well: “WTF Is Wrong With Them’: Republicans Horrified As Trump Goes After Obamacare Again.

I like it when Republicans are horrified. They’ve been horrifying me for years.

The first four paragraphs of the piece are equally delightful:

Over the past 24 hours, Republican officials have watched in horror as the Trump administration once again fully embraced the repeal of Obamacare, just over a year after the issue proved toxic for the party at the ballot box.

The embrace came in two steps: with the Department of Justice siding with a lower court ruling that declared the health care law invalid in toto, and with the president tweeting that the Republican Party would become the party of health-care reform. And it quickly complicated what had been widely viewed as one of the best weeks of Trump’s presidency. Ebullient over a four-page summary of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s meddling—a summary that said the president was not guilty of collusion—Trump suddenly found himself back in a debate that has vexed his administration.

GOP officials couldn’t help but marvel at Trump’s inability to enjoy a rare grace period. “They are completely tone deaf,” texted one of the party’s top strategists. “How bout a few more victory laps on Mueller while you can get away with it? WTF is wrong with them?”

But seasoned Trump hands were hardly surprised at the rake Trump had placed his foot on. “And there’s something unusual about him stepping on a good message?” one former administration official said, laughing when asked about the timing of the announcement.

The policy shift was opposed by the two officials in charge of implementing it: the epistolary Attorney General, William Barr, and HHS secretary Alex Azar who, as far as we know, hasn’t written a letter in “total exoneration” of the Insult Comedian.

I’d like to thank the president* for this gift. He seems to have forgotten that health care was the issue that drove the Blue Wave in the midterms. There’s no cure for Trump’s own pre-existing condition, stupidity.

My hunch is that the decision was made after a long day of fuming over John McCain’s “treachery” on the ACA. Policy making by tantrum is a bad idea. I’m not a fan of it. I am, however, a fan of self-inflicted wounds by my political enemies.

It’s good to know that Trump’s Razor is still in effect. I’m glad he used it to slit his own political throat. Thanks Trumpy.

Mar 14 2019
6 Comments
Adrastos, Campaign Notes, Elections, Film, Fog Of History, Political Crack

Beto’s Big Getaway

It took longer than usual to come up with a title for this post. I seem to have used up all my Beto puns last year and was reluctant to Beto the ranch on a new one. I consulted with Mr. Google and learned that Sam Peckinpah’s 1972 film of The Getaway was filmed in O’Rourke’s native El Paso. The book on which it’s based was written by pulp icon Jim Thompson and it’s Pulp Fiction Thursday hence the post title.

Another reason The Getaway provides a perfect title for a post about Beto’s belated campaign announcement is that its premise seems to be “vote for the cool kid” and nobody was cooler than Steve McQueen whose nickname just happened to be The King of Cool. Destiny or a fluke? You decide.

I just finished reading Joe Hagan’s ode to Beto in Vanity Fair. Both Hagan and the candidate think O’Rourke is a man of destiny:”I want to be in it. Man, I was born to be in it.”

I’m less certain. As to the tone of the piece itself, I’m inclined to agree with this tweet from Gambit editor and Adrastos crony Kevin Allman:

The puff piece article compares O’Rourke to Obama and JFK. It even hints at a “LBJ only cuter” analogy with an extended discussion of Beto’s father Pat, a failed politician, with whom the candidate had a contentious relationship as did Lyndon and Sam Johnson. It was the most interesting part of Hagan’s hagiography piece and included this bit of myth making:

One night in July 2001 the two had what Beto O’Rourke says was “the best conversation we ever had,” ranging over family, politics, personal history. “We just ate leftovers and drank a bottle of wine in the backyard,” he recalls. The next morning, his father was cycling along a quiet route outside El Paso when he was struck by a car and thrown 70 feet to his death. “I was at work and my mom called me and I just knew,” he says. “Because her voice was shaken and said, ‘Something’s happened with your dad. You should come to the store.’”

Neither Jim Thompson nor Sam Peckinpah could have concocted a more mythic end to this father-son relationship.

I’m already on the record as a “the more the merrier” pundit. Whoever wants to contend for the 2020 Democratic nomination should run and let the voters decide. I, too, think that the ability to defeat Trump should be an important factor BUT given the slippage in the incumbent’s support and the scandals engulfing him, I think that any plausible Democratic candidate has a good chance of beating him.  I’m concerned about governing: Trump’s successor will have an ungodly number of messes to clean up including the rebuilding of the NATO alliance. Being cool is not enough.

The Beto myth did not start with the Vanity Fair puff piece. After his defeat by Ted Cruz, people started comparing him to another politician who lost a senate election and was elected president in the next cycle. Comparisons to Lincoln, Kennedy, and Obama seem a bit over-the-top and even a trifle overwrought. What’s next? Are they going to trot out the old Todd Rundgren album title: A Wizard, A True Star? Annie Leibovitz took a picture of Beto “jamming” with his kids, maybe they can do their own version of that classic 1973 album.

Here’s the deal: I will support any Democratic nominee against anyone the GOP puts forward. I don’t even dislike Beto in the way I dislike Bernie Sanders who I would also support. I’m just skeptical that the guy who lost to Tailgunner Ted who lost to the Insult Comedian is the right person to become the next president. If you want healing, unity, and love, Cory Booker is already sounding those themes. Thematically, Beto is the white Cory, only the latter’s stage mannerisms are not reminiscent of revival tent preachers. I’ll spare you comparisons to Burt Lancaster as Elmer Gantry. The Steve McQueen shtick is enough for one post.

Beto brings another liability to the race. There’s a hunger in the Democratic base for a woman and/or person of color to top the ticket in 2020. Women and minorities drove the party to victory in 2018 and many believe that we should follow suit in 2020.  I remain undecided but I’m inclined to agree.

This post is not intended as a takedown of Robert O’Rourke. I just think he should be subjected to the same scrutiny as the rest of the field. One important question is whether or not he’s ever eaten salad with a comb a la Amy Klobuchar. Repeat after me: being cool is not enough.

Being urged to run by Oprah Winfrey is not a reason for non-celebrities to support a candidate. Thus far, all we really know about O’Rourke is that he’s an excellent campaigner and that the media and some voters are in love with him. It’s unclear what his raison d’être for running for president is: “Vote for Beto because he’s cool” is not enough.

It’s obvious that Oprah and former president Obama urged him to consider running because timing is everything in politics, and O’Rourke was the brightest and shiniest media object in the 2018 campaign. He also lost his race to Ted Cruz a man who is disliked even by those who agree with him. Moral victories are not enough: the stakes are too high.

While I wish that Beto was running against John Cornyn instead of jumping into the crowded presidential field, I understand that the adage “when you’re hot, you’re hot” applies to politics. The people who ran The Getaway‘s PR campaign understood that too. This alternate poster for that movie gets the last word:

Instant Postscript: I mentioned to a friend that I was doing a Beto post centered around the Steve McQueen version of The Getaway. He reminded me that there was a unnecessary and even gratuitous 1994 remake starring SNL Trump impersonator Alec Baldwin. Betomaniacs could argue that McQueen would kick Baldwin’s ass hence O’Rourke could whip Trump. It’s not a bad argument as fictional arguments go. Repeat after me: being cool is not enough.

Mar 11 2019
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Adrastos, Campaign Notes, Elections, Fog Of Scandal, Law/Justice, Political Crack

The Big Picture

There was outrage and shock over the light sentence given to Paul Manafort by Judge TS Ellis last week. I was unhappy with the 47 month sentence but not shocked because I followed the trial closely. Judge Ellis was biased against the prosecution and in favor of Manafort throughout the trial. Several times during the trial, Ellis expressed the opinion that Manafort was a stand-in for Trump so the expressions of shock were either themselves shocking or naive. The light sentence was predictable. Not desirable but predictable.

Judge Ellis is the personification of a federal judge who has served too long. He’s been on senior status since 2007 and has served a total of 32 years. Federal judges tend to have a high opinion of themselves and their legal acumen. Ellis may be an extreme example but the system is pockmarked with high-handed judges who act like demigods in their courtrooms.

I’m inclined to agree with former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti:

The 47-month sentence imposed on former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort has drawn widespread criticism that Judge T.S. Ellis’s decision to give Manafort a sentence far below the 19.5 to 24.5-year guidelines range was motivated by Manafort’s race and class or by partisan bias. In fact, his flawed decision is a consequence of the vast discretion given to federal judges to issue sentences without real fear of being overturned.

What you might not know is that federal law permitted Judge Ellis to give Manafort a sentence of anywhere between 0 to 80 years in prison. And as long as Ellis did not go above the 24.5-year maximum called for by the sentencing guidelines, an appellate court would almost certainly not reverse his sentence, given the very deferential standard of review.

Some compared Manfort’s 47 month sentence to the 13 year book thrown at my former Congressman Dollar Bill Jefferson by Judge Ellis. One flaw in that reasoning is that was not a tax case but a bribery case. Besides, Dollar Bill’s sentence was reduced to 5 years after a plea bargain in 2017. As I said on the tweeter tube:

Dollar Bill is a corrupt piece of shit who deserved all the jail time he got as I pointed out in a piece I wrote for the Bayou Brief.

The reason I’m more sanguine than many about the Manafort sentence is that I’m a big picture guy. Ellis’ sentence is just the first bite out of the sentencing apple. The DC judge, Amy Berman Jackson, has already taken a hard-line with Manafort by revoking his bail for violating his plea deal with Team Mueller. I expect she’ll throw a heftier book at Manafort with that sentence running consecutively with Ellis’ 47 months, which could be a total of 14+years.

In addition to being a big picture guy, I’m not a fan of hot takes. It’s easier to spout off on social media than it is to think things through before responding to the events of the day. It’s why I’m not a fan of epic “tweet threads.” I’d rather read a coherent discussion of an issue than 25 often disjointed tweets on the same subject. That’s why I’m a blogger, not a tweeter.

In other big picture news, people are obsessing about the 2020 campaign and why certain candidates should or should not run. I think it’s up to the voters to sort things out. Lack of interest is why Mike Bloomberg and Sherrod Brown dropped out, which is a good thing in both cases. Bloomberg will spend his megabucks on issues and Brown will hold on to  a senate seat that would surely tumble to the GOP. The Ohio senator may still end up on the ticket if the nominee is looking for balance: a Harris-Brown ticket could be formidable.

Here’s the deal. I think that Trump and the Republicans will be so consumed with scandal that the Democratic nominee will be a heavy favorite to win the election. For that reason, I think that the ability to govern is just as important as electability, which is why I’m reluctant to support anyone at this point in time. The next Democratic president is going to have an even bigger mess to clean up than the one inherited by Barack Obama, which is why competence and experience are just as important as ideology in 2020.

I’ve seen confident predictions that the Democratic nominee will not be a white man. It’s too soon to tell: who thought an obscure one-term Georgia Governor would be the 1976 nominee? I’d like to make history again BUT we’re the big tent party and need to assemble a coalition that appeals to moderates and independents as well as to the left. Once again, the voters will winnow down the candidates. Whatever happens, the Democratic nominee will be far superior to Trump or anyone else the GOP puts forward.

Former Veep Joe Biden seems to be edging closer to a decision as to whether or not to run. If Biden were 10 years younger, he’d be a prohibitive favorite for the nomination. In his case, experience and likability could trump (pun intended, it always is) ideology. Joey the shark will have to explain some of his past positions but is viewed with personal affection by most Democrats. He’ll also have to rein in his tendency to praise *everyone* including Republicans if he runs. It’s what happens when you’re an epic schmoozer.

I may be a self-proclaimed big picture guy but I’m out of the prediction business. I hope that Trump will be out of office before January 2021 BUT things have been so crazy for the last three years that I hesitate to dust off my crystal ball. All I’m certain of is that it’s going to be interesting on both the legal and political fronts for the foreseeable future.

Feb 02 2019
3 Comments
Adrastos, Books, Diary, Elections, Fog Of History, Food and Drink, Music, New Orleans, Odds & Sods, Political Crack, Sports

Saturday Odds & Sods: Rainy Night In Georgia

Hummingbirds by Walter Inglis Anderson

The Super Bowl  will be played tomorrow in Atlanta, but ratings in New Orleans will be abysmal because of the infamous blown call. The game is being boycotted by most locals: Dr. A and I are going to two non-watching parties. I’m unsure if NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell will be burnt in effigy at either soiree. One of them is a birthday party so perhaps there will be a Goodell pinata. Probably not: my friends Clay and Candice have a small child and the sight of Goodell is traumatic to most New Orleanians.

New Orleans and Atlanta have a longstanding and intense rivalry. And not just in football. They’ve topped us economically but we have better food as well as charm up the proverbial wazoo. Saints fans are also disappointed not to be Super Bowling in Atlanta because they’re losing out on some trash talking opportunities. So it goes.

This week’s theme song was written in 1967 by Louisiana native Tony Joe White who died last fall at the age of 75. Rainy Night In Georgia is a song that proves the adage that the best songs are sad songs: “looks like it’s raining all over the world.”

We have three versions for your listening pleasure: the songwriter’s original, Brook Benton’s 1970 hit version, and a mournful 2013 interpretation by Boz Scaggs.

Let’s put away our umbrellas and jump to the break. We’ll try not to splash land.

Continue reading →

Jan 23 2019
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Adrastos, Campaign Notes, Elections, Film, Fog Of History, Political Crack

The More The Merrier

Welcome to the latest post wherein I steal the title of an old movie. The More The Merrier was a brilliant 1943 comedy about the wartime housing shortage in Washington D.C. It’s noteworthy as the last comedy directed by George Stevens before going off to war. Stevens was among the first Americans to see a Nazi death camp and stuck to more serious subjects after the war. As much as I love A Place In The Sun, Shane, and Giant, I wish Stevens had done some comedies after the war. Nobody did them better and his post Giant output defined the phrase mixed bag. That concludes the film buff portion of the post.

Let’s turn out attention to the 2020 presidential campaign. There’s some hand wringing among Democrats about the number of candidates who plan to run. I say the more the merrier. A diverse field of candidates shows the strength of our party. And a large field gives us a better chance to pick a candidate who will reflect the nation’s mood in November 2020.

It’s been forgotten what a large field of talented candidates ran for the 2008 Democratic nomination. It quickly boiled down to Obama versus Clinton, but John Edwards was a serious contender early on. We dodged that bullet but we could have found ourselves stuck with Edwards when the National Enquirer baby daddy story hit.

We know what worked in the 2018 midterms: new faces, especially women and minority candidates. That might be the right formula for 2020 as well but an experienced old hand such as Joe Biden might be appealing to voters sick of Trumpian incompetence by the time the election rolls around. Or maybe not. It’s hard to tell this far out from the election. Repeat after me: the more the merrier.

I remain undecided about 2020 but I find much to like in the candidacies of Warren, Harris,  Castro, and Gillibrand as well as the thus far undeclared cohort of Booker, Klobuchar, Brown, Beto, and others who are flirting with running. It’s a veritable cast of thousands: the more the merrier.

As to Mike Bloomberg and Bernie Sanders, I’m a fan of neither but let them run and see how they do. Bloomberg’s wanderings from Democrat to Republican to Independent and back to Democrat gives this hardcore Democrat pause. Similarly, Sanders’ status as a stubborn Independent is vexatious. I’m also unconvinced that a passion candidate like Bernie will do as well the second time around, BUT if both he and Bloomberg want to run, I say the more the merrier. Let the voters decide.

Everyone who is a native-born citizen over the age of 35 has the right to run for president even Tulsi Gabbard. I’m mystified as to why she thinks that running on a platform of compromising with Trump, Obama bashing, and Kremlingate skepticism will appeal to Democratic voters. I’ll skip detailing her anti-LGBT past, which has already crippled her candidacy.

Speaking of the Current Occupant, he’s the elephant in the room. If Trump runs for re-election, he will be the GOP nominee even if he faces a primary challenge. But I remain uncertain that he’ll be on the ballot in 2020. As a partisan Democrat, I hope the Insult Comedian runs because he looks beatable in the wake of the midterms, but as a patriot I hope he’s out of office ASAP.

Democrats need to be prepared to run against another Republican nominee, be it Pence or someone else. That’s another reason to be glad that the Democratic field will be so large. We need options. The more the merrier.

The last word goes to The Mighty Sparrow:

 

Dec 09 2018
2 Comments
Athenae, Elections, Stupid Blue Dog Tricks

Clinton (Consultant) Needs to Go Away

For all the talk about how Hillary and Bill need to exit the stage, I think the real cancer on our politics is everyone they employed. Shut UP, Rahm: 

“I don’t think you can make it to the Oval Office without being a good politician. And whatever you want to say-and I am in violent disagreement with this president-he was a better politician than Hillary.”

He’s also a fascist but let’s respect his SKILLZ, right?

Shut UP, Carville: 

James Carville said the Democrats will not have a wave election in the 8pm hour of MSNBC’s election night coverage. He said there is still a good chance that Democrats win the House but some races will be nail-biters.

40 seats, you lizard-headed asshole.

Shut UP, Begala: 

“It is really impressive, the money and the operation that the Trump folks are putting together,” said Paul Begala, a Democratic strategist. As soon as the midterm election is over, he said, Democrats “had better get about the business of re-arming for the next battle.”

I’M GLAD YOU’RE HERE TO TELL US THESE THINGS NOBODY EVER WOULD HAVE THOUGHT OF OTHERWISE.

Shut UP, Snuffleupagus: 

STEPHANOPOULOS: 2020 jockeying has already begun. And we talk to two contenders from the Buckeye state, Republican Governor John Kasich and Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown.

We’ll break down the politics, smoke out the spin. The facts that matter this week.

The smoke! The fire! The toasted marshmallows!

And STFU forever and ever and ever, Mark Penn & Andrew Stein: 

Penn, a frequent contributor to The Hill, co-wrote a Sunday op-ed for The Wall Street Journal with Andrew Stein, a former Democratic Manhattan borough president and president of the New York City Council.

“True to her name, Mrs. Clinton will fight this out until the last dog dies,” the pair wrote. “She won’t let a little thing like two stunning defeats stand in the way of her claim to the White House.”

You know, I don’t care one way or another if Hillary wants to run again (yes, or Bernie, god you’re all exhausting), but I do wish the people who won two elections on her husband’s back and have been dining out on it ever since would GO TAKE UP KNITTING.

A.

Dec 04 2018
1 Comment
Athenae, Elections, On Wisconsin, Scott Walker's Horcruxes, So Called Liberal Media

The GOP, in Wisconsin and Elsewhere, is Anti-Democracy

This is by design: 

The bill includes plans to lower voter turnout by adding a third statewide election in the spring of 2020, even though it will cost taxpayers millions of additional dollars and local election officials have come out strongly against it. They want to make it harder to vote early, which will cost taxpayers millions more in legal costs. They want to take control of state economic development away from the governor’s office. They want to replace the elected attorney general with private attorneys hired by the legislative branch at additional expense to taxpayers.

Is this democracy at work?

I mean, technically, yeah, in that they only have the power they have because we gave it to them. Look, for the last two years we’ve had lots of conversations about norms versus laws, about what we really consider important in government versus what is actually required. Half the shit the Trump crime family does is not illegal (like ghost the sexist shitshow that is the White House Christmas decoration reveal party, Melania, that thing sounds like hell on earth) but we act like our imaginary expectations are supposed to carry weight.

We shouldn’t run a country based on everybody being sensible and having manners. That’s not how anything should function. If you tell me that I am required to do X and Y, and in your own head you expect me to do Z, you can’t throw me in jail for not doing Z if only X and Y are mandatory.

Republicans in Wisconsin CAN do this. Should they? Shit no. But we’re well past trusting motherfuckers not to fuck mothers. If we want them to keep their dicks to themselves we have to strap on political chastity belts.

This editorial starts strong and then gets real, real stupid:

Remember in 2015 when these same three politicians – Vos, Fitzgerald and Walker – tried to gut the state’s open records law before the Fourth of July holiday?  They sneaked it into a budget bill, hoping no one would notice on the holiday weekend.

Wait, you mean to tell us, newspaper that FUCKIN ENDORSED THOSE POLITICIANS, that they turned out to be scumsucking suckers of scum? You mean they did this before? Why, it’s almost like this is WHAT THEY DO. I do declare, Miss Scarlett. See also gambling, shocked, and this establishment.

The modern GOP is designed to pursue power and subvert voting. Especially in Wisconsin. I pay attention to this shit as my side hustle and I’ve noticed that it’s not some kind of weird accident that these people are authoritarian tailpipe tumors who keep pulling underhanded crap. How can people who make a living being knowledgeable knowers of knowledge not pick this up?

We haven’t mentioned political party because this isn’t about party platforms – that’s what elections should be about.

This is about keeping the citizens in charge of their government.

It doesn’t matter which party is coming in and going out of office — we would say the exact same thing. In fact, we would shout it — just as we are now.

ARGHGGHHHH I mean name for me please the equivalent Democratic subversion of power that has occurred, that would warrant this sort of imaginary both-siderism. “We haven’t mentioned political party” so definitely please don’t call us the enemy of the people or get mad at us! Pretty please!

I give up.

A.

Nov 26 2018
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Adrastos, Bigotry, Campaign Notes, Elections, Political Crack, Race, Stupid Republican Tricks, Teabaggery, Twitter

Mississippi Goddam

Source: Cindy Hyde-Smith’s Facebook page via the Bayou Brief.

I feel like an interloper to this story. Athenae wrote a slam-bang post about it yesterday and my friend and Bayou Brief publisher, Lamar White Jr. broke the story of Cindy Hyde-Smith’s bigoted comments. I also could not resist using the Nina Simone song for the post title. I know I’m not the first to do so, my friend Kat did it at Sky Dancing. I am a derivative motherfucker. I do, however, have talented friends.

While I’m giving credit where it’s due, there’s a remarkable piece in the Jackson Free Press by Ashton Pittman (names don’t get more Southern than that) that fills in many of the blanks about Cindy Hyde-Smith aka the Racist Lady. Nobody should be shocked that, not only did the appointed senator attend a “segregation academy,” she sent her daughter there. And yes, she was an elected official when her daughter matriculated. It doesn’t matter to prosperous white Mississippians. It’s what they do, y’all. Cannot mix with “those people.”

Another note about Lamar’s reporting. He tells us exactly who and what, Greg Stewart, the guy in the Facebook pictures with the Racist Lady, is:

In the early 2000s, Stewart was specifically identified as a leader of a recognized hate group- Free Mississippi- by the Southern Poverty Law Center. The group went defunct, and as a result, it was de-listed by the SPLC. But you can still find his name on their database. He  served as the group’s “parliamentarian.”

You can also still easily find him on Facebook, where he makes it abundantly clear that he is very much still involved in the business of the Lost Cause. (Stewart enthusiastically supported Chris McDaniel in the general election and is now cheering on Hyde-Smith).

McDaniel is the arch teabagger and Lost Causer who opposed Thad Cochran in 2014. He’s also the creep whose supporter harassed the Senator’s elderly wife in her nursing home. I am not making this up.

Back to Cindy Hyde-Smith. I wish I could say that her racist remarks and inept campaign will defeat her but I don’t think they will. Her Democratic opponent, Mike Espy, is infinitely more intelligent and qualified to serve in the Senate. He’s also black and the vast majority of white Mississippians will never vote for a Democrat let alone a black Democrat. It’s the party of “those people.”

I’ve watched with amusement people who know nothing about the South opine on cable news about the Mississippi runoff. I saw one otherwise intelligent person say on AM JOY that Espy will win because there was not supposed to be a runoff in this race. Wrong. Chris McDaniel nearly unseated an incumbent Senator in the 2014 GOP primary. He only got 17% of the vote this time, in part, because Trump supported the Racist Lady in the first round. He’s still popular with white voters in the Magnolia state, alas.

What Cindy Hyde-Smith’s bigoted bumbling has done is to make the runoff closer than it should be. Republican political pros are nervous about the race but think she’ll pull it out after Trump rallies the peckerwoods later today. Their mantra is: “We don’t want an Alabama.”

They’re referring to Senator Doug Jones’ thrilling win last year in his race against Judge Pervert. I think that’s unlikely for reasons stated on the tweeter tube:

Alabama is NOT a progressive paradise but it has some big cities, a major medical research hub in Birmingham, and the rocket eggheads in Huntsville to partially offset the rural peckerwoods and rednecks. Also, Doug Jones is white. An African American candidate would not have beaten Judge Pervert, alas. The Bradley effect remains in effect in the South, as we saw in Florida where many white voters could not bring themselves to vote for Andrew Gillum.

I think Mike Espy has a good chance to get 45% of the vote if his GOTV effort is strong, otherwise he’ll hover at around 40%. If it’s the former, it’s a Beto-style moral victory. I hope I’m wrong and we wake up to an upset victory on Wednesday morning.

One thing that national Democrats seem to have learned this year is to CONTEST every race even those that look difficult. You never know when an inept candidate will talk about hanging or disenfranchising their opponents. In another state, those comments would have destroyed the appointed senator’s campaign. It’s a sign of progress that they damaged it severely. And in Mississippi of all places. Goddam.

The last word goes to the great Nina Simone:

Nov 25 2018
2 Comments
Athenae, Bigotry, Congress, Elections

The Last Gasps

This woman: 

The 2007 resolution wasn’t the only legislation Hyde-Smith backed that would elevate Mississippi’s Confederate history. The Washington Post reported that in 2001, Hyde-Smith introduced a bill as a state senator to rename a stretch of highway to what it had been called in the 1930s: the Jefferson Davis Memorial Highway, after the president of the Confederacy.

And in photos posted to her Facebook account in 2014, Hyde-Smith was pictured posing with Confederate artifacts during a visit to Beauvoir, the home and library of Davis. The caption on the post read, “Mississippi history at its best!”

Not long after Trump’s election someone described his campaign as the Going Out of Business Sale for White Baby Boomers and, with the exception of the Freedom Riders, yeah, pretty much. This angry old bat is a Type. I know ten of her, they all go to church every Sunday and while they’d never refuse to shake a black person’s hand they have no qualms about saying things that come straight out of Jesse Helms’ mouth when they’re amongst their own.

Jesse Helms was in recent memory. As were Strom Thurmond, Trent Lott, Tom DeLay, and Barbara Bush saying Katrina victims made out like bandits after the hurricane because they were poor anyway. They’re not leaving us fast enough to change at the pace we need. There are people are living, who screamed at children going to school because they were black children. They still write letters to the newspaper about “welfare” and “busing” and would tell you their neighborhood was fine until “those people” “ruined” it. They still vote.

This rictus-grinning standard-bearer for white American power has gotta be the last one we’ve gotta fight, right? Every year of the past 20 I’ve hoped it’s the last time we have to have an election about the 1970s but every year it’s become more clear that the elections of the 1970s were about the 1870s and if we’re not over THAT, the Earth will collapse into the sun before we get over Vietnam.

Can the store just go out of business already? They’re down to the screws that held the fixtures on the walls. Pretty soon they’ll be selling off the linoleum. Can we please just lock the doors and board it up and walk away?

A.

Nov 21 2018
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Adrastos, Congress, Elections, Political Crack, Stupid Blue Dog Tricks, Teabaggery, Twitter

Tweet Of The Day: Nancy Smash Challenge Edition

It’s no secret that we’re Nancy Pelosi fans here at First Draft. The first female speaker was also one of the most effective. It’s why she was targeted by Republicans in the 2010 teabagger wave election and in every subsequent campaign. It’s best when your boogieman (boogiewoman in this instance) can really boogie.

Pelosi just led Democrats to their biggest gains in the House since the post-Watergate wave election way back in 1974. Instead of meeting with acclaim, she’s facing a challenge led by the #FiveWhiteGuys with support from the cats and kittens at Politico.

Since none of them has the balls to stand for leader, Seth Moulton, Tim Ryan, and the other #FiveWhiteGuys thought they’d found the perfect stalking horse in African American Congressperson Marcia Fudge. They were outmaneuvered by the wily Pelosi who cut a deal with Fudge yesterday. It’s why she’s been House Democratic leader longer than anyone since Sam Rayburn.

That brings us to the tweet of the day. It’s a joke I considered stealing outright but decided not to. Without further adieu, here it is:

Nov 12 2018
3 Comments
Elections, Free Republic, Stupid Republican Tricks, Tommy T

Today on Tommy T’s Obsession with the Freeperati – election night thread !

OK – airlocks SHUT!

Exhaust fans at 120%!

Let’s go!

OFFICIAL (Live) MIDTERM ELECTION RETURNS THREAD, 2018
All of us, and God too. | 11/6/2018 | All of us

Posted on 11/6/2018, 10:01:19 AM by Lazamataz

It is my birthday today, so I get to post the live thread. 🙂

Lucky you.

Give me a good birthday present today! Giftwrap me a Republican House and Senate,
BoxOfShit
and a Republican GA Governor.And if you recall last time, the more I complained about random things, the better we did. Perhaps I shall do that today.

And most of all, PRAY. Prayer works.

1 posted on 11/6/2018, 10:01:19 AM by Lazamataz
Of course it does.
EmoBicycle
To: CatOwner

 

Early indications favor GOP. It’s a new world. Even the MSM is having trouble spinning.

669 posted on 11/6/2018, 5:38:40 PM by jjotto (Next week, BOOM!, for sure!)

And then…
To: glenduh

 

Drudge has this link up on top-

“Democrats flip Republicans in first result of night…

Drudge is full of Sh##!

818 posted on 11/6/2018, 6:05:06 PM by Gasshog ( Fight climate change – Try beating the air and scream at the sky)

To: Ravi

 

I need to see some good news for Red or i am going to loose(sic) my lunch

821 posted on 11/6/2018, 6:05:27 PM by Texas4ever

Somebody hand that boy a barf bucket….
To: spacejunkie2001

 

Now DeSantis down. What happened?

1,057 posted on 11/6/2018, 6:36:41 PM by MayflowerMadam (“Do not discount anything in which Donald Trump is involved.” – Rush Limbaugh)

Reality?
To: newfreep

 

Bill Mitchell
@mitchellvii
·
Oct 30
Republicans keep the House and grow their majority in the Senate.

100% guaranteed.

1,143 posted on 11/6/2018, 6:47:42 PM by rainee (Her)

(John Cleese voice) “IS IT?”
To: wardaddy

 

Dade county isn’t voting for Hillary today. They are voting for a magic negro who graduated from Florida A&M.

1,302 posted on 11/6/2018, 7:08:14 PM by lodi90

Sho’ nuff?
.
And then…
To: Helicondelta

 

Fox and NBC both saying it is all over. Dems take the House!! Are you kidding me????

34 posted on 11/6/2018, 8:38:25 PM by SW6906 (6 things you can’t have too much of: sex, money, firewood, horsepower, guns and ammunition.)

Click on the thingy for the slow-mo car wreck, including gratuitous FOX-bashing, and a-house-is-not-a-home tears.

Continue reading →

Tagged , , , , , , , ,
Nov 10 2018
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Adrastos, Elections, Fog Of History, Music, Odds & Sods, So Called Liberal Media, Sports, Television

Saturday Odds & Sods: Too Close For Comfort

Think Flag by William N. Copley

I’m keeping this week’s outing snappy because the time change has messed me up. My sleep patterns have been disrupted, as a result I’ve been groggier than hell. Additionally, Della and Paul do not respect day light savings time and demand to be fed at odd hours. Oddly enough, such oddity will inevitably impact Odds & Sods.

A quick note on the featured image. I cheated on Jasper Johns with a 1961 flag painting by William N. Copley aka CPLY. I think the think flag fits this moment eerily well. The country needs more thinking and fewer hot takes right now. Why are people bleating over Tucker Carlson when there are babies in cages?

This week’s theme song was written in 1956 for the musical Mr. Wonderful by Larry Bock, George David Weiss, and Larry Holofcener. I selected Too Close For Comfort because of all the votes that are still being counted, especially in Florida, Arizona, and California.

We have two versions for your listening pleasure: Frank Sinatra with the Billy May Orchestra, and a fabulous Ella Fitzgerald-Joe Williams duet with the Count Basie Orchestra. You know that I love me some Bill Basie.

Now we’ve gotten way too close for comfort, it’s time to jump to the break but first a reminder that Too Close For Comfort was also the title of a long-running Ted Knight sitcom that I watched only once.

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