#and he lived through the AIDS crisis and all 3 Bush presidential terms and

[closetoyou1970]

the thing is that I think that even jaded mean old late-seasons dean has a real capacity for growth and recovery. while he's alive. and I want that for him.

[reading-writing-revolution]

August 3, 2021

Heather Cox Richardson

Aug 4

First, let’s get the obvious out of the way: former president Trump has raised $102 million since he left office, but aside from a recent donation of $100,000 to his chosen candidate in a Texas race which is not yet in the public disclosures (she lost), has spent none of it on anything or anyone but himself. Since January, he has convinced donors to fund his challenge to Biden’s election and to fund Trump-like candidates in the midterm elections. But election filings and a release of donors to the Arizona “audit” show he has not put any money toward either. So far, about $8 million has gone to the former president’s legal fees, while funds have also gone to aides.

The second piece of news that is surprising and yet not surprising is an ABC story revealing that on December 28, 2020, the then-acting pro-Trump head of the civil division of the Department of Justice, Jeffrey Clark, tried to get then–acting attorney general Jeffrey Rosen and acting deputy attorney general Richard Donoghue to sign a letter saying: “The Department of Justice is investigating various irregularities in the 2020 election for President of the United States. The Department will update you as we are able on investigatory progress, but at this time we have identified significant concerns that may have impacted the outcome of the election in multiple States, including the State of Georgia.”

It went on to say, “While the Department of Justice believe[s] the Governor of Georgia should immediately call a special session to consider this important and urgent matter, if he declines to do so, we share with you our view that the Georgia General Assembly has implied authority under the Constitution of the United States to call itself into special session for [t]he limited purpose of considering issues pertaining to the appointment of Presidential Electors.”

The letter then made the point clearer, saying the Georgia legislature could ignore the popular vote and appoint its own presidential electors.

This is classic Trump: try to salt the media with the idea of an “investigation,” and then wait for the following frenzy to convince voters that the election was fraudulent. Such a scheme was at the heart of Trump’s demand that Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky announce an investigation into Hunter Biden, and the discrediting of 2016 Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton over an investigation into her use of a private email server.

In this case, Donoghue and Rosen wanted no part of this antidemocratic scheme. Donoghue told Clark that there was no evidence of fraud that would have changed the outcome of the election and wrote: “There is no chance that I would sign this letter or anything remotely like this.” Rosen agreed, saying “I am not prepared to sign such a letter.”

The less obvious story today is the more interesting one.

Trump and his loyalists feed off Americans who have been dispossessed economically since the Reagan revolution that began in 1981 started the massive redistribution of wealth upward. Those disaffected people, slipping away from the secure middle-class life their parents lived, are the natural supporters of authoritarians who assure them their problems come not from the systems leaders have put in place, but rather from Black people, people of color, and feminist women.

President Joe Biden appears to be trying to combat this dangerous dynamic not by trying to peel disaffected Americans away from Trump and his party by arguing against the former president, but by reducing the pressure on those who support him.

A study from the Niskanen Center think tank shows that the expanded Child Tax Credit, which last month began to put up to $300 per child per month into the bank accounts of most U.S. households with children, will primarily benefit rural Americans and will give a disproportionately large relative boost to their local economies. According to the Washington Post’s Greg Sargent, “the...nine states that will gain the most per capita from the expanded child allowance are all red states.”

The White House noted today that the bipartisan infrastructure deal it has pushed so hard not only will bring high-speed internet to every household in the U.S., but also has within it $3.5 billion to reduce energy costs for more than 700,000 low-income households.

Also today, after pressure from progressive Democrats, especially Representative Cori Bush (D-MO), who led a sit-in at the Capitol to call for eviction relief, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that in counties experiencing high levels of community transmission of Covid-19, it is extending until October 3 the federal moratorium on evictions that ended this weekend. It is doing so as a public health measure, but it is also an economic one. It should help about 90% of renters—11 million adults—until the government helps to clear the backlog of payments missed during the pandemic by disbursing more of the $46 billion Congress allocated for that purpose.

Today, the president called out Republican governors who have taken a stand against mask wearing and vaccine mandates even as Covid-19 is burning across the country again. Currently, Florida and Texas account for one third of all new Covid cases in the entire country, and yet their Republican governors, Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott, are signing legislation to keep Floridians and Texans unmasked and to prevent vaccine mandates. Biden said that he asks “these governors, ‘Please, help.’ But if you aren’t going to help, at least get out of the way of the people who are trying to do the right thing. Use your power to save lives.”

At a Democratic National Committee fundraiser last night, Biden told attendees that Democrats “have to keep making our case,” while Republicans offer “nothing but fear, lies, and broken promises.” “We have to keep cutting through the Republican fog,” he said, “that the government isn't the problem and show that we the people are always the solution.” He continued, “We've got to demonstrate that democracies can work and protect.”

—-

Notes:

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/08/03/trump-spending-millions-gop-candidates-502233

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-backed-candidate-ballot-us-house-runoff-texas-2021-07-27/

https://abcnews.go.com/US/doj-officials-rejected-colleagues-request-intervene-georgias-election/story

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/08/02/gop-scamming-rural-trump-voters-continues-new-study-shows-latest/

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/08/03/fact-sheet-top-10-programs-in-the-bipartisan-infrastructure-investment-and-jobs-act-that-you-may-not-have-heard-about/

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/08/03/remarks-by-president-biden-on-fighting-the-covid-19-pandemic/

https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2021/s0803-cdc-eviction-order.html

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/03/cdc-will-extend-the-federal-eviction-moratorium-through-oct-3.html

https://news.yahoo.com/dnc-fundraiser-biden-accuses-gop-123000070.html

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/08/02/remarks-by-president-biden-at-a-virtual-fundraising-reception-for-the-democratic-national-committee/

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/08/03/cori-bush-eviction-crisis-502313

Cheryl

Aug 4

Just two things. I live in a rural red county in Virginia. I have always been astounded that folks here predominantly vote Republican against their best interests.

To get votes here, Democrats HAVE to make two things clear. First and foremost - that Democrats are not "coming to take people's guns away." That is the biggest fear out here in red country - the predominant reason folks vote Republican. Gun control is a vote killer and will be until Democrats out maneuver the NRA - and make crystal clear that great-granddaddy's hunting rifle is not at risk.

Second. ALL of the folks here benefiting from social welfare DO NOT associate that money as coming from programs supported by Democrats. That is "my govamint check" - and the government in their minds is Republican. The Democrats must inundate rural areas with advertising that clearly links child care money and internet services with Biden and the Democratic Party in conjunction with exposing Republicans who vote against the bill. Persistent Hard Ball is the only thing that is going to work here.

The former president will continue to “run” for president as long as the money keeps rolling in. Doubtless, as far as he’s concerned, the money is his to do as he pleases. The accounts should be closely monitored by DoJ and charges should be filed for any improper use of the funds.

Just now the thought came to mind that any of the donated funds spent on personal expenses, including legal defense fees, qualifies as income and should be subject to income taxes. Those taxes would be yet more personal expenses that could not be paid from political donations.

The tax man is going to be the one that gets him.

© 2021 Heather Cox Richardson. See privacy, terms and information collection notice

[evilelitest2]

Did Hillary Clinton Lose because of Russia, Sexism, or because she was too centrist?

...Can I take all three for 700? 

Ok so one of the core divides in the Democratic Party right now is ‘who is to blame for 2016″ and the fact is there are multiple reasons.  Basically in terms of how much we can judge hillary clinton, I think there are 6 types of issues, but let me make this clear, Clinton won the popular vote by 3 million votes. Also 2016 was our election to win, and by all rights we should have crushed the Republicans, so something went wrong

1) Structural Advantages the Republicans always have.  This would have affected any democratic candidate regardless of who got the job, but we should have been able to over come this 

Basically Republicans have a few advantages in Presidential elections due to undemocratic measures they constantly support.  This includes

The Damned Electoral College 

Citizens United gives a fundraising advantage to Republicans, especially regarding international donors 

Old people always vote, young people rarely do

wide spread voter suppression, ID Laws, limited polling stations, reduced polling hours, election day not being a holiday etc 

The media being generally useless 

2) Things that were not Hillary Clinton’s fault, totally blameless, utterly unfair.  This includes

Sexism, which was a major factor in 2016

The fact that Obamacare prices went up in the last weeks of the election

The Fact that for 4 year before hand everybody had been prepping for Jeb Bush vs. Hillary Clinton which just made everybody exhausted

The Fact that Trump was given between 2-5 billion dollars of free media attention because he was good for ratings, and to make sure he would come back most of them only asked him softball questions and he got to host Saturday Night live.  

And of course Russian hackers actively trying to help Trump win the election.  

3) Things that weren’t Clinton’s fault, but she responded badly too them.  Basically she was actually blameless, but she wasn’t able to handle the situation well. 

The ultimate example of this was the whole Pneumonia issue.  On September 11th, 2016, less than a month before the election, Clinton goes to a 9/11 reception and seems to collapse part way through and has to be rushed out.  People aren’t told what happened and then initial reporting is that she suffered Heat Stroke.  The story swirls until a few days later it is revealed that she had Pneumonia and got sick.  Now Clinton getting Pneumonia is not a big deal and obviously not her fault, she got sick, that happens.  But the fact that her staff responded to the whole thing with such an unclear manner allowed the whole thing to come off as a bigger deal than it was.  Now obviously the conservatives are going to be like “Clinton is too sick to be president, unlike...donald Trump” no matter what you do, but because of this bad response the story gained more traction with real media outlets when it shouldn’t have.  

There are plenty of other examples of this type of behavior from Clinton 

4) Things that were Clinton’s fault, but she got blamed for it more than other politicians.  You see this doubly when the media focused more time on Clinton than things Trump also did.  

The most obvious example of this is the Email Scandals.  Clinton did fuck up with how she handled the emails, but it was no way near worth the level of attention given to them at the time, I mean that was a bloody nightmare.  

The panama Papers break up hurt her as well.

Voting for the Iraq war is a much more dramatic example of this, because that was one of her worse moves 

5) Things that were 100% her fault and she messed up terribly

One of the most obvious example of this was when Clinton was like ‘OMG Nancy Reagan was so good on the AIDS crisis which...nobody made you do that Hillary Clinton, why would you say something like that?

Or when she ignored the Sanders team in Wisconson and Michigan warning her that those states needed more attention

Or....not giving any damn press conferences which yeah, of course Trump controls the media narrative if you don’t bother to push your own

Or not even really bothering to try to heal the wounds of the 2016 primary (compare this to Obama after the 2008 Primary) 

Or not really having a good answer for the Wall Street speeches

The list goes on, Clinton ran a bad campaign and was a very bad candidate.  

6) Finally, a specific subset of mistakes that Clinton made which were all based on the premise that “There is no way Clinton could ever lose to Donald Trump”  Which lead to her and her campaign making a lot of decisions which in hindsight were really bad idea.  Now if that assumption had been correct, they would have been good ideas, its just that they were based on a lie.  

For example, picking TIm Kaine as VP was a terrible choice.  You don’t pick a VP from your part of the Party, you pick a VP to make up for your own deficiencies.  Even Trump knew this, he picked a mild manner fundamentalist nutjob to get the religious right, who didn’t like him, to come around (and man did they come around, they are his base now). Tim Kaine is a terrible choice if you want to win an election and need to maximize your own turn out....

But he is a great choice if you already ‘know’ you are gonna win 2016, and thus you are trying to pick a VP to support you once you are in office.  Because he is loyal, he has the same interests as you, and understands your perspective.  

Same with the choice not to co opt Sanders folk into the Cabinet.  Why get people you don’t agree with when you are going to win anyways and get people who you actually like

Or making a play for Georgia rather than focus on holding your own base. Obviously clinton is going to win so might as well make our victory even bigger 

This....backfired.

In conclusion, Clinton lost for a variety reasons, some of them her fault, some not her fault, but rememeber she barely lost in 4 states.  If clinton had made all the same mistakes but the email scandal didn’t happen, she likely wins anyways.  If the Email Scandal and Russian hacking happen but she picked a better VP, she likely wins anyways.  If she ran the same campaign but Russian didn’t involve itself, or America was less sexist, she wins anyways.  You needed all of these factors to come together and even then trump barley wins...while losing the popular vote by 3 million.  

Also to be clear, my opinion on Clinton a politician (mostly negative) doesn’t actually effect whether she could have one, lots of people I don’t like win (Trump).  Its just that she was extremely bad at PR which is kinda..important if you are running for president.  

@mel-esprit you might enjoy this