Kari Lake's "Outrageous Arrogance" Led To Loss

The Washington Post's Isaac Stanley-Becker and Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, writing in this morning's edition, dissected the failed campaign of extremist cult follower of the Malignant Loser:

"[Kari]Lake burst onto the national political stage this year as perhaps the purest embodiment of Trump’s grievance-fueled brand of politics. Her slash-and-burn campaign operation courted controversy, stoked distrust in the democratic process and earned her mentions as Trump’s possible 2024 vice-presidential pick — or perhaps even a presidential candidate herself.

Then she lost. [snip]

Interviews, internal documents and voting data point to the reasons behind her defeat: The candidate, so focused on parroting Trump and settling personal scores, failed to execute on a plan to court the independents and centrist Republicans who decide elections in Arizona, once a red state that now gleams purple.

As advisers urged her to consolidate GOP support after the primary, Lake remained fixated on a grudge match against people loyal to the legacy of the late Sen. John McCain. In the race’s closing days, she appeared in the suburbs alongside Stephen K. Bannon, the far-right radio host and former Trump strategist who was sentenced in October to four months in prison for contempt of Congress. [snip]

'It was both a collapse and, now in hindsight, it was a failed campaign from the beginning,' said a high-ranking Arizona Republican. 'I don’t really know what to say beyond outrageous arrogance and never getting out of primary mode. This election wasn’t stolen. It was given away.'"  (our emphasis) 

Lake has refused to concede and has nonsensically challenged the results of the Arizona gubernatorial election in court, inserting the usual conspiracy claims into a lengthy suit, and one that is sure to fail. She dismissed all of the calls to "moderate" her Trumpist message to appeal to independents and persuadable Republicans, and instead turned to the likes of Bannon and the Malignant Loser to campaign for her. 

An interesting fact that will be raised by Arizona officials who have to respond to Lake's suit: the Republican candidate for State Treasurer, Kimberly Yee, received nearly 120,000 more votes than her ticket mate Lake. It shows that Arizona voters saw Lake's "outrageous arrogance" and lies and said "no thanks."

(photo: Where's the p*ygrabber's other hand, Kari? Mario Tama / Getty)

 

Rogue AZ Supervisors May Face Prosecution

 

Weeks after the election results determined that Dem Governor-elect Katie Hobbs had won the governorship of Arizona over radical right- wing Trumpist election denier and loser Kari "Fake" Lake, two election-denying Republican county supervisors in Cochise County who refused to certify their county's election results now face investigation and prosecution for violating state election law. The rogue Republican supervisors, Tom Crosby and Peggy Judd, refused to perform their duty in the certification process, and jeopardized not only their county's ballots but the overall certified count for the state:

"Crosby and Judd threw the state certification process into disarray last month when they delayed their official canvassing of the midterm election results in Cochise County, citing bogus claims that electronic tabulators didn’t meet state or federal standards. It was only after a court ordered them to complete their statutorily mandated duties that they did so on Dec. 1, days after the Nov. 28 deadline." (our emphasis)

Hobbs, the current Secretary of State for Arizona, has the statutory responsibility for the state's overall election certification. Ironically, all of the ballots of heavily Republican Cochise County would have been set aside and would have helped to flip some races to the Dems:

"Their actions put the official statewide canvass in jeopardy, as Hobbs must meet a Dec. 5 deadline to certify the results. She can only push that deadline as far as Dec. 8. If she decided to go ahead with the process without the results from Cochise County, a heavily Republican region, more than 47,000 voters could have seen their ballots ignored and a number of races would have flipped in favor of Democratic candidates."

The penalties for Crosby and Judd, if they are prosecuted and found guilty, could range from misdemeanors to felonies. Interestingly, if found guilty of a felony, the two morons would have their right to vote revoked and could lose their elected positions. Sad!

 

The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

 

The good:

The results of the midterm elections may have dampened hopes for additional action on climate change at the federal level, with Republicans expected to take control of the U.S. House of Representatives for the next two years. 

But wins for Democrats in state legislative and governor races could lay the groundwork for even stronger action on climate change at the state level, which is exactly where a lot of the hard work of reducing greenhouse gas emissions — and spending the federal climate funding made available through landmark legislation over the past two years — needs to happen. 

Tuesday’s election cemented Democratic ​“trifectas,” or control of both the governor’s office and both houses of the state legislature, in Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan and Minnesota, opening the door to more aggressive climate policies in those states. And across the country, 17 governors who support climate policies that could collectively yield an 80 percent reduction in their state greenhouse gas emissions won election or reelection, according to nonprofit advocacy group Evergreen Action. 

“In states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, Pennsylvania [and] New Mexico, voters delivered a clear mandate on climate by electing governors who campaigned on climate action,” Jamal Raad, Evergreen Action’s executive director, said in a Thursday press conference. 

That’s important, because state-level actions could make or break the country’s trajectory toward cutting greenhouse gas emissions quickly enough to forestall the greatest harms of global warming. State lawmakers and regulators are the key actors in setting mandates for utilities to close down fossil-fuel-fired power plants and increase the share of zero-carbon resources such as wind and solar power, for example. That’s a vital step in reducing the carbon-intensity of grid power needed for electric vehicles, heating and cooling in buildings, industrial processes and other fossil-fueled parts of the economy — all sectors where states have their own roles to play as well...

The bad:

House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy served further notice Sunday that his potential speakership will be politically volatile, saying he will try to keep three high-profile Democrats off of certain committees.

Democrats said McCarthy will do whatever his right wing wants him to do because he still lacks the votes to land the speaker's job.

In stumping for the position, McCarthy has targeted Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee; and Reps. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., members of the House Intelligence Committee.

McCarthy and other Republicans have for months said these members' past statements and actions regarding issues like Israel, China and Russia should keep them off these committees.

"I'll keep that promise" to remove them, McCarthy told Fox News' "Sunday Morning Futures."

Schiff and other Democrats said McCarthy is trying to court support from hard-right conservatives like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga. – who was expelled from committees during a 2021 vote of the full House because of her incendiary statements about Democrats.

"I suspect he will do whatever Marjorie Taylor Greene wants him to do," Schiff said on ABC's "This Week." "He is a very weak leader of his conference, meaning that he will adhere to the wishes of the lowest common denominator. And if that lowest common denominator wants to remove people from committees, that’s what they’ll do."...

The ugly:

... The striking absurdity of this World Cup rose along Al Shamal Road, a main highway that cuts out of Doha and through the desert, past rubble and excavators and nothingness, and up to Al Khor. The landscape gets more barren as you go — until, in the distance, a massive Bedouin tent-style structure, the Al Bayt Stadium, appears through miles of smog and dust.

It was built by people, migrants, who aren’t here anymore; and for other people, Qataris, who crawled in SUVs down the highway toward it on Sunday. Which is why this World Cup has been so scandalous. But for better or worse, on a cool, windy evening, it began.  [snip]

There were also the inescapable reminders of the inequality that underpins both Qatar and this World Cup. There were hundreds of migrants, mostly South Asians, standing outside one entrance for hours — as they waited to work concessions. Meanwhile, there were men on camelback and horseback lining another entrance to greet FIFA president Gianni Infantino and the Emir, among others. Saudi leader Mohammed bin Salman joined them in a luxury box.

All around the cavernous stadium, there were probably 40,000 Qataris out of the 67,372 announced in attendance — and they were not at all representative of the nation they came to salute. Spend a week in Doha, in any non-downtown district, and you’ll meet the Indians, Nepalis, Kenyans, Ugandans and more who come to work. Migrants and the children of migrants comprise almost 90% of the Qatari population. The wealthy sliver of Qatar that is actually Qatari — the ones who enjoy the exclusive benefits of citizenship, which is almost impossible for non-natives to obtain — is, compared to most countries in the world, razor thin...

The Qatari team lost it's first game, the first World Cup hosts to lose the opening game.  Meanwhile, we can think of a more appropriate box for Mohammed bin "Bone Saw" Salman.

"Just What Happened?"

Harry Enten asks and answers the subject question:

... Biden and the Democrats are in a position to have one of the four best midterms for the party controlling the White House in the last century.

So just what happened? It’s pretty clear that general election voters punished Republican candidates they saw as too extreme – on issues such as abortion and/or for being too closely tied to former President Donald Trump.

Still, the election results were extremely unusual. I went back through the record books. Since 1922, there have been three previous instances of the president’s party gaining (or losing no) Senate seats and losing fewer than 10 House seats in the president’s first midterm.

All of them – 1934, 1962 and 2002 – are thought to be monumental achievements for the president’s party and major exceptions to rule, which suggests the party controlling the White House usually loses seats in a midterm. 

Democrats’ performance this year has funneled down to the state level as well. We already know, based on projected races, that this will be the first time since 1934 that the president’s party had a net gain of governorships in a president’s first midterm. (1986 is the only other post-1934 midterm, regardless of when it fell in a presidency, when the president’s party had a net gain of governorships, though Ronald Reagan’s GOP had massive losses in the Senate that year.)

Not only did the Democrats make history as noted by Enten above, they made history in critical downballot races:

Overlooked amid frantic punditry about the "red ripple" in Congress: Democrats quietly won and defended majorities in state legislatures across the country, weakening GOP power on issues at the heart of the national political debate.

... State legislative races are on pace to be the highlight of the Democratic ballot. If Democrats hold on to Nevada, this will be the first time the party in power hasn't lost a single chamber in a midterms year since 1934, according to the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee.  [snip]

Democrats defended their state-level majorities in Massachusetts and Maryland and won governor seats left open after Republican retirements, securing a "trifecta" in both states. Helmed by a historic $50M investment from the DLCC, they also kept the Maine legislature, the New Mexico and Colorado state Houses, and secured a supermajority in both chambers in Vermont (which has a GOP governor).

• In Michigan, Democrats flipped the House and Senate to take complete control of the state government for the first time in 40 years. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer won re-election by double-digits, vaulting the rising Democratic star into the national spotlight.
• In Minnesota, Democrats also secured a trifecta after taking the state Senate.
• In Wisconsin, Democrats denied Republicans a supermajority that would have allowed them to override Gov. Tony Evers' veto — the only thing standing in the way of a statewide abortion ban.

Democrats also have a chance to flip the Pennsylvania House and one or both chambers of the Arizona State legislature.  Stay tuned.

Let's pause to thank voters across America for prioritizing democracy and women's rights:  to voters age 18-29 who turned out and voted heavily in favor of Democrats;  to the heart of the Democratic base, women -- especially African-American women -- voting on reproductive rights;  to Latino voters who supported Democrats 2-1 (except the gusanos in Florida); to independents tired of "the crazy";  to all voters who realized American democracy was being tested and who responded with a resounding rebuff to the anti- democracy party.   

It was a good, democracy- defining election for our country.  That's what just happened.

BONUS:

 

Ironic isn’t it? Mitch McConnell stealing a Supreme Court seat cost him his last chance at being Leader McConnell.

— Claire McCaskill (@clairecmc) November 13, 2022

Arizona Election Update -- Kelly And Fontes Win

Not only has Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly won his race in Arizona over Trumpkin shit sandwich Blake Masters, but the critical Secretary of State race has been called for Democrat Adrian Fontes over QAnon election- denying kook Mark Finchem:

Republican Mark Finchem, a prominent election denier, has lost to Democrat Adrian Fontes in the race for Arizona secretary of state race, NBC News projects.

Fontes, a former top elections official for Maricopa County, will succeed Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, the Democratic nominee for governor.

Finchem was among a host of GOP candidates for statewide office who have repeatedly cast doubt over Joe Biden’s presidential victory or falsely claimed that the 2020 election was stolen from former President Donald Trump in Arizona.

Last year, Trump backed Finchem's candidacy and highlighted his record of defending the stolen election claims. “Mark was willing to say what few others had the courage to say” about the 2020 election, Trump said in offering his public support...

Hopefully, the Arizona Governor and AG races will follow suit.

The Kelly win puts the Democrats at 49 seats, with the Nevada race still un- called (though Nevada guru Jon Ralston believes the Cortez Masto/ Laxalt race could be called today or tomorrow, with a recount likely).   If Sen. Cortez Masto can hold on for the win, Democrats maintain Senate control regardless of the December 6 runoff in Georgia between Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and the lump.  

BONUS:  Democrats are also killing it in the all- important State legislative elections, in Arizona and elsewhere, the best off- year showing since 1934!

(Image:  All hat, no cattle Finchem and Secretary of State- elect Adrian Fontes)

A "Crisp Nut Punch" To The GQP

 

Stephen Colbert had his take on the mid- term elections last night, the poor quality Republican candidates, and the "red wave" that became the "little pink wash."

A Good Day For Dems, A Bad One For Deniers, Pollsters, And Trump

There was no "red wave."

It was an historic night, and this morning, and for the next few days if not weeks, the entrails of the 2022 mid-term elections will be examined.  But this morning, this seems to be the consensus:

An election that Republicans hyped as a red wave is turning out to be anything but, with Democrats over-performing the expectations of many in House and Senate races.

The results are not final and control of both the House and Senate remain up for grabs, despite Democrats going into the election with wafer-thin majorities. Expectations of widespread GOP gains have not been realized, even though the party retains a chance at winning the Senate, and a plausible shot at the House.

The linked analysis makes the points that:

There was no Biden backlash;

The red-to-blue suburbs stayed blue;

Inflation wasn't as big a factor as Republicans hoped;

The abortion issue was potent;  and

Gun control is a winner for Dems.

We would also add that democracy was on the ballot, and it seemed to be decisive in swinging elections away from Trumpist election deniers across the country.  With that, and with the defeat of high- profile Malignant Loser- endorsed candidates, voters decided that, even with the strong economic headwinds faced by Democrats, they wanted to affirm that democracy matters, that elections should be respected, and political violence needed to stop.

And the Republican- wired, closed system media and pollsters with their incessant horse- race treatment of the mid- terms, including understating the impact of abortion as as issue, their overuse of Republican-sponsored polls in their aggregate polls, and underestimating the "youth vote"?   They blew their their narrative that there would be a "red wave" sweeping Democrats from power.  In a year Republicans should have won 40 or more seats in the House, they may end up with less than a 10 seat advantage -- may.  Democrats have a solid chance to hold the Senate, with John Fetterman flipping a Senate seat in Pennsylvania and incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock leading the lump in Georgia (which likely will go to a runoff in December).  A media that's used a narrative of "it's always bad news for Democrats" got its comeuppance last night.

More later.

BONUS: Digby's assessment of the Republican media strategy was spot on.

The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

 

The good:

President Biden and former president Barack Obama have spent 14 years as the twin guardians of their party’s coalition, each drawing on the other’s strengths to balance his weaknesses.

Biden brought to Obama’s campaigns and presidency decades of experience that the dynamic political upstart did not have — and a connection to White working-class Democrats that Obama needed in 2008. Twelve years later, Obama brought to Biden the energy of his eloquence, the youthful appeal of ironic detachment and reinforcement among Black voters who were key to Biden’s victory over Donald Trump.

Now, Biden finds himself confronting an onslaught from Republicans similar to the fury Obama faced in the 2010 midterm elections: a potentially unforgiving electorate focused far more on new problems, especially inflation, than on those Biden was elected to solve: unemployment and the pandemic.

Obama got no credit with 2010’s midterm voters for preventing economic collapse, a real possibility at the time, and now Biden is getting little love for mass vaccinations, millions of new jobs, big investments in infrastructure and technology, and an unemployment rate that in most other times would be the envy of incumbents.

Before thousands of raucous supporters on Saturday afternoon on the Temple University campus, Biden delivered an especially fiery defense of his record and Obama made clear he knows what his old ally is going through. “I can tell you from experience that midterms matter, a lot,” he said, drawing appreciative laughter from those in the crowd old enough to remember Democratic shellackings in 2010 and 2014, the latter marked by especially low turnout.

Both men begged, coaxed and pleaded with Democrats, especially young ones, to turn out on Tuesday to defend democracy itself by voting for this state’s Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Attorney General Josh Shapiro, and U.S. Senate candidate, Lt. Gov. John Fetterman...

The bad:

Former President Donald Trump called for the release of those arrested in connection with the Capitol riot.

"Start treating the January 6th protestors [sic] fairly. Let them all go now!" Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday.

Trump has previously spoken about what he perceives as the "unfair" treatment of those jailed and has repeatedly suggested that he would pardon them if re-elected.

Earlier this year, Trump revealed that he is "financially supporting" some January 6 defendants.

More than 900 people have so far been charged in connection with the insurrection on January 6, 2021, during which a pro-Trump mob stormed inside the Capitol building in a bid to stop the certification of Joe Biden's election victory.  [snip]

Along with the January 6 rioters, he also called for the release of Catherine Englebrecht and Gregg Phillips, the leaders of the vote-monitoring organization True the Vote, that were arrested this week. 

The pair, who have fuelled debunked conspiracy theories about voter fraud, were jailed after refusing to reveal the identity of a person of interest in a defamation case against them...

The ugly:

Just days after laying off about half of Twitter’s workforce following Elon Musk’s acquisition, the company is now asking dozens of those employees to come back.

On Friday, Musk began mass layoffs at the San Francisco-based company, letting go of roughly 3,700 workers via email. Many Twitter employees expressed learning of their layoff after they were already cut off from accessing company-wide systems.

But according to Platformer and Bloomberg, the company is already trying to reverse course and hire back dozens of employees it just laid off ― continuing the chaos Musk has brought since taking over Twitter.

“sorry to @- everybody on the weekend but I wanted to pass along that we have the opportunity to ask folks that were left off if they will come back. I need to put together names and rationales by 4PM PST Sunday,” still-employed workers read Saturday on Twitter Slack. “I’ll do some research but if any of you who have been in contact with folks who might come back and who we think will help us, please nominate tomorrow before 4.”

Some of those who the company is asking to return were laid off by mistake, sources told Bloomberg, while others were fired before management realized their experience was necessary to build the new features Musk wants for the platform...

The Musk-y Twitter shitshow continues...

The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

 

The good:

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won Brazil’s presidential election on Sunday, defeating far-right President Jair Bolsonaro in a heated contest during which the incumbent repeatedly threatened to dismantle the world’s fourth-largest democracy.

Brazil’s Superior Electoral Tribunal called the race for da Silva just before 7 p.m. Eastern time, with the leftist holding a narrow 50.83% to 48.17% lead with more than 98% of votes counted.

The victory will complete a triumphant return to the top of Brazilian politics for da Silva, the leader of the leftist Workers’ Party who previously served as the country’s president from 2003 to 2010, then spent nearly two years in prison on a corruption conviction that was ultimately annulled.

Four years after Brazilian discontent with a political establishment that da Silva had long represented helped propel Bolsonaro to victory, Brazilians turned back to the man they refer to simply as “Lula” in historic fashion: Bolsonaro is now the first president since Brazil’s return to democracy in the late 1980s to fail to win a second term.

The election did not provide a resounding defeat of Bolsonaro, one of a cadre of right-wing leaders putting democracies at risk worldwide, which da Silva and many of his supporters had once hoped for. But it was still a rejection of a leader who had spent his four years targeting Brazil’s democratic institutions and who seemed likely to use a second term in office to further erode the country’s democracy.

The bad:

In 2010, Republicans launched a “Fire Pelosi” project — complete with a bus tour, a #FIREPELOSI hashtag and images of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) engulfed in Hades-style flames — devoted to retaking the House and demoting Pelosi from her perch as speaker.

Eleven years later, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) joked that if he becomes the next leader of the House, it will be hard not to hit Pelosi with the speaker’s gavel.

And this year, Pelosi — whom Republicans have long demonized as the face of progressive policies and who was a target of rioters during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol — emerged as the top member of Congress maligned in political ads, with Republicans spending nearly $40 million on ads that mention Pelosi in the final stretch of the campaign, according to AdImpact, which tracks television and digital ad spending.

The years of vilification culminated Friday when Pelosi’s husband, Paul, was attacked with a hammer during an early-morning break-in at the couple’s home in San Francisco by a man searching for the speaker and shouting “Where is Nancy? Where is Nancy?” according to someone briefed on the assault.

The ugly:

I am not a conspiracy theorist, but something strange, perhaps even pernicious, appears to be going on here. On one hand, the Beltway groupthink—which seems wed to the notion that Democrats are doomed—could simply be cheerleading for the outcome most of them have been predicting since the beginning of the year.

That’s what I had started to believe and what University of Florida professor and elections expert Michael McDonald suggested in a tweet Wednesday night. After The Economist data journalist G. Elliot Morris tweeted a meme stating the election “always has been” a referendum on the incumbent party, McDonald subtweeted, “If you want to know why election forecasters are cheering for a Republican victory, it is because their fundamentals forecasting models say it will happen.” [snip]

That overly optimistic assessment of GOP chances could be part of a feedback loop that helps create a self-fulfilling prophecy, as Longwell suggested. But what if Republicans’ goal is an even more nefarious effort to prime GOP base voters into believing they've been cheated if Republicans don’t win big. What if, after all the red-wave hype, Democrats have a decent night and hold the Senate or, god forbid, have a really good night and maintain control of both chambers?

If that were to happen, the same Republican lawmakers and candidates who have spent two years spewing Donald Trump’s baseless stolen election garbage will be perfectly situated to weaponize the anger and dismay of their supporters once again. We’ve already seen this GOP play following 2020. It resulted in a violent coup attempt that took lives, injured more than 140 police officers, exacted longterm mental anguish, and continues to rip at the fabric of our country today. In fact, we haven’t even reached Election Day and already masked and armed vigilantes are harassing and intimidating voters who are merely trying to exercise their constitutional rights.

The potential for violence is real...

Bottom line:  Republican- wired horserace "journalism" is going to get people killed and pave the way for an authoritarian Christofascist government -- unless we ignore them and get out and vote! And get your likeminded family, friends, and neighbors to vote while you're at it.  Institutions like the corporate media won't save us;  only us mobilizing to vote -- and protecting the vote -- will.

Unpleasant Facts About "The American People"

This is Driftglass, listing the first 5 out of his 10 "Unpleasant Facts About The American People."  Be sure to read the full list:

"1.  Other than geographically, there is no such group as 'The American People'.  It is a mirage invented by pundits to elide the stark and irreconcilable differences between various groups of Americans. 

"2.  Republican Americans do not care about democracy.  At all.  They are motivated entirely by their fear of and rage over various imaginary boogieman that the Republican media has spent 30 years implanting in their tiny lizard brains.

"3.  There are no 'Centrists' or 'Independents'.  Instead there are millions and millions of mopes who want to sound smart when they talk about politics, but who are also conflict-averse cowards who would rather pull their own heads off than take sides.  Over anything.  Or bother to learn the details.  Of anything.  So they hide out in the 'Both Side Do It' panic room, hoping that someone, somewhere will fix stuff and make everyone stop shouting.

"4.  There are plenty of Republicans-in-hiding who call themselves Independents currently hiding out in the  'Both Side Do It' panic room too.

"5.  Issues like fascism and voter suppression and civil rights and the fate of democracy and the future of the environment rarely penetrate the thick walls of the 'Both Side Do It' panic room, but stuff that gets reported on local news or in the mainstream media (like crime or inflation) does get in.  Because when the price of milk goes up, panic room denizens see it but when the price of democracy goes up they ignore it." ...

Meanwhile, we often refer to people who vote Republican as knuckle-draggers, mouth-breathers, sub-morons, seditionists, gun nuts, etc., tribal labels that may soon be reinforced in the upcoming election, when they (and untold misinformed voters) willfully and happily ignore appeals to "save democracy," because, as Driftglass points out, they don't care about it at all.  But gas prices?  Hoo- boy! 

 

Forewarned is forearmed.

The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

 

The good:

The number of online donors to the Republican Party unexpectedly dropped in the first half of 2022, according to a POLITICO analysis of campaign finance data — one in a series of setbacks that have tempered expectations of a red wave in November.

Online fundraising usually ramps up dramatically and predictably over the course of an election cycle. But campaign finance data show that in the first half of this year, the number of people giving federal contributions to Republican candidates and committees through WinRed — the GOP’s widely used donation processing platform — fell to around 913,000 down from roughly 956,000 contributors during the six months prior.

The surprising dip illustrates broader fundraising difficulties that have plagued GOP candidates in key races across the country this summer, even amid hopes that the party could retake control of Congress. It reflects the party’s long-standing challenges in building donor lists to power its campaigns.

The bad:

Former President Donald Trump repeatedly told aides in the days following his 2020 election loss that he would remain in the White House rather than let incoming President Joe Biden take over, according to reporting provided to CNN from a forthcoming book by New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman.

"I'm just not going to leave," Trump told one aide, according to Haberman.

"We're never leaving," Trump told another. "How can you leave when you won an election?"

Trump's insistence that he would not be leaving the White House, which has not been previously reported, adds new detail to the chaotic post-election period in which Trump's refusal to accept his defeat and numerous efforts to overturn the election result led to the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol by pro-Trump rioters. [snip]

Haberman writes that in the immediate aftermath of the November 3 elections, Trump seemed to recognize he had lost to Biden. He asked advisers to tell him what had gone wrong. He comforted one adviser, saying, "We did our best." Trump told junior press aides,"I thought we had it," seemingly almost embarrassed by the outcome, according to Haberman. 

But at some point, Trump's mood changed, Haberman writes, and he abruptly informed aides he had no intention of departing the White House in late January 2021 for Biden to move in.

He was even overheard asking the chair of the Republican National Committee, Ronna McDaniel, "Why should I leave if they stole it from me?"

 

The ugly:

... Two days after the launch of the failed invasion of Kyiv, the Russian state-news agency accidentally published, and then retracted, an article prematurely declaring success. “Russia,” it declared, “is restoring its unity.” The dissolution of the U.S.S.R.—the “tragedy of 1991, this terrible catastrophe in our history”—had been overcome. A “new era” had begun.

That original mission has already failed. There will be no such “new era.” The Soviet Union will not be revived. And when Russian elites finally realize that Putin’s imperial project was not just a failure for Putin personally but also a moral, political, and economic disaster for the entire country, themselves included, then his claim to be the legitimate ruler of Russia melts away. When I write that Americans and Europeans need to prepare for a Ukrainian victory, this is what I mean: We must expect that a Ukrainian victory, and certainly a victory in Ukraine’s understanding of the term, also brings about the end of Putin’s regime.

To be clear: This is not a prediction; it’s a warning. Many things about the current Russian political system are strange, and one of the strangest is the total absence of a mechanism for succession. Not only do we have no idea who would or could replace Putin; we have no idea who would or could choose that person. In the Soviet Union there was a Politburo, a group of people that could theoretically make such a decision, and very occasionally did. By contrast, there is no transition mechanism in Russia. There is no dauphin. Putin has refused even to allow Russians to contemplate an alternative to his seedy and corrupt brand of kleptocratic power. Nevertheless, I repeat: It is inconceivable that he can continue to rule if the centerpiece of his claim to legitimacy—his promise to put the Soviet Union back together again—proves not just impossible but laughable.

As the article's headline says, it's time to prepare for a Ukrainian victory.  The consequences of that hoped- for conclusion could also bring greater danger as the Putin regime is consigned to the dustbin of history.  The West and the world must be prepared.