Monday Reading

 

As always, please go to the links for the full articles/op eds.

The Philadelphia Inquirer's Will Bunch summarizes the imminent danger posed by the most evil personage ever to appear in American politics, after his most recent rally in Texas:

What happened in Conroe, Texas, on Saturday night was not politics. A politician seeking to regain the White House might craft a narrative around Biden’s struggles with inflation or with COVID-19 and make a case — no matter how absurd, given Trump’s failings on the pandemic and elsewhere — that he could do better for the voters. But increasingly Trump is less a politician and more the leader of a politics-adjacent cult. He does not want to make America great again so much as he wants to keep Donald Trump out of prison, and the most narcissistic POTUS of all time is willing to rip the United States in two to make this happen.

Trump’s chief weapons are fear and intimidation. To save American democracy, the people tasked with getting to the bottom of a former president’s high crimes and misdemeanors — on Capitol Hill and in those key courthouses — must be ready for the violence that Trump is inciting, and must summon the courage to finish their job. My fear is that Trump’s speech in Conroe will live in infamy — but the only reason it happened at all is because we have not held Trump to account for attempting to wreck American democracy on Jan. 6 ... not yet. Now, Trump has told us in no uncertain terms how he plans to break the nation this time. We can act forcefully to stop his new insurrection and punish his past crimes — or we can sit back and let the comet of autocracy strike.

The totality of what the Malignant Loser said in his Texas rally crossed several lines, including dangling pardons for the January 6 insurrectionists, and basically calling for an insurrection in the event of his indictment on any number of charges at the local, State and Federal levels.  A cornered animal like the Malignant Loser is going to use every means available to fight back, and we must be prepared for even more unprecedented, unhinged behavior from him and his cult.

The Malignant Loser's violent rhetoric has already triggered a reaction from a potential target:

The Fulton County, Georgia, district attorney is asking for the FBI's help in providing security for buildings and staff one day after former President Donald Trump called prosecutors investigating him "racists" and said his supporters should hold "the biggest protests we have ever had" in cities like Atlanta if the prosecutors "do anything wrong or illegal."

DA Fani Willis and her office are investigating Trump for his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in Georgia. A special grand jury will be seated as part of that investigation on May 2.

 

At a rally in Conroe, Texas, Saturday night, Trump, without naming them, railed against Willis plus New York Attorney General Letitia James and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg Jr., who are investigating his business empire, calling them "racists." The three are Black. Trump provided no evidence of racial discrimination.

"These prosecutors are vicious, horrible people. They're racists and they're very sick -- they're mentally sick," he said. "They're going after me without any protection of my rights from the Supreme Court or most other courts. In reality, they're not after me, they're after you."

 

No, they're after you, just you, you corrupt piece of rancid, racist shit (well, maybe your corrupt spawn, too). 

 

The Republicans started this redistricting war, now Democrats hope to finish it:

Democratic state legislators in New York released a congressional redistricting map Sunday that redrew House lines to give Democrats as many as three more seats at a time when the party’s majority is in jeopardy.

The New York map is the latest redistricting win for Democrats who had been expected to suffer at the hands of Republican state legislatures that control map-drawing in many more states. But maps in two of those states, Ohio and Alabama, have already been struck down by the courts. In a third Republican state, Texas, the Justice Department has sued over lines it said discriminated against Latinos.

So far, in more than two dozen maps passed around the country, Democrats would net an additional five districts that Joe Biden would have won in 2020. The New York map, which is expected to be voted on this week and signed by Gov. Kathy Hochul (D), would bring that up to eight seats. As redistricting began last year, Republicans hoped to gain at least enough seats to overcome the current 10-member advantage held by Democrats.

Democrats are not guaranteed wins in those districts in November. The party in the White House has historically lost ground in midterm elections and turnout is generally much lower in non-presidential-election years.

The map made public Sunday would result in lines that would give Democrats 22 seats to four Republican ones. The New York delegation is currently 19 Democratic seats to eight seats for Republicans. The state lost a seat because of slow growth over the past 10 years.

As the article points out, nothing is guaranteed due to the redistricting, so Democrats still need to out strategize, out organize and out vote the party of sedition in every Congressional district and every Senate race in November.

Vox's Ellen Ioanes writes about Russian thug Vladimir Putin's myth-making about Ukraine and its ties to Russia:

As Russian troops mass on the Ukrainian border and worries of an invasion grow, Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to push a familiar Russian line about the conflict: that Ukraine belongs to Russia and that the two are “one people — a single whole.”

Specifically, much of Russia’s political positioning to launch an incursion into Ukrainian territory is based on Putin’s claim that Ukraine — like Russia, a former Soviet state — is an extension of Russia, the “little brother” that has been led astray by the West and must be reincorporated into the family. Thus, he sees Ukraine’s increasing westward turn as a provocation, by both Ukraine and NATO.

In reality, however, Ukraine has long been distinct from Russia, experts told Vox, and Putin’s current mythologizing of the Russia-Ukraine relationship fits a pattern of falsehoods designed to reconstitute imperial glory, and more importantly, to shield Putin from the threat of democracy in former Soviet republics — and possibly in Russia itself.

Finally, please make a visit to Infidel 753's link round-up for the most comprehensive, interesting collection of links from the Internet.  He also offers thoughtful essays on a regular basis, so it's always worthwhile to check in over there to see what's new.

Monday Reading

 

As always, please go to the links for the full articles/op eds.

This is going to be an historical week in Congress, for good or bad.  Ellen Ioanes describes what's at stake:

On Monday, Democrats will start one of the most chaotic legislative sprints in recent memory. With a potential government shutdown looming, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said on Saturday that three key bills, including President Joe Biden’s $3.5 trillion reconciliation package, “must pass” in the coming week.

That timeline means the next week could be make-or-break for Biden’s legislative agenda, but all three bills face a complicated road ahead in Congress.

“The next few days will be a time of intensity,” Pelosi said in a letter to her caucus on Saturday. “We sent a CR to the Senate and are awaiting their action to avoid a shutdown. We must pass the BIF to avoid the expiration of the surface transportation funding on September 30. And we must stay on schedule to pass the reconciliation bill so that we can Build Back Better.”

The proposed continuing resolution, or CR, would fund the government until December, heading off a shutdown in the midst of an ongoing pandemic. Democrats have also attached a crucial measure to increase the debt ceiling to that resolution.

The bipartisan infrastructure bill, or BIF, which passed the Senate last month with the support of 19 Republicans and every Democrat, includes $550 billion in new spending and would direct much-needed funding to roads, public transit, rural broadband, and other areas. And a $3.5 trillion reconciliation package, which Democrats have branded the Build Back Better Act, includes major parts of the Biden agenda that were dropped from the bipartisan deal. If passed in its proposed form, the bill would fund new social programs like universal pre-kindergarten, create green jobs to help combat climate change, and expand a child tax credit that has already lifted millions out of poverty.

Deals will be cut because this is the sausage- making phase of the legislative process.  We all must be prepared for "haircuts" on some our favorite elements and must not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

On that subject, Harold Meyerson reminds Democrats that implementing major legislation requires a timing reality check:

This means that Democrats won’t have a lot they can point to before the midterm elections.

For context, when the Democrats originally enacted Medicare in 1965—a much bigger undertaking than any of these programs—it was up and running within one year.

There’s no mystery why major infrastructure projects and policy expansions take time, of course. The expansion of child care and creation of universal pre-K in the reconciliation legislation, for example, will require the recruitment and training of a new workforce and the upskilling of many in the existing workforce. The recruitment part requires setting pay and benefits at a level commensurate with the needs and expectations of millions of workers, which is certainly not the case today. The training and upskilling of workers also requires a significant expansion of the teacher training workforce and facilities.

As for infrastructure, progressives need to grapple with their own handiwork. The expansion of government frequently collides head-on with the procedures of clean government that hears out the concerns of stakeholders. This was not the case during the New Deal, when Franklin Roosevelt’s administration managed to put millions to work on public projects in a matter of weeks.

ICYMI, neocon former Republican Robert Kagan had a long, widely discussed essay in the Washington Post, "Our Constitutional Crisis is Already Here."   In it, he distills most of the critiques and analyses of the malignant loser and his "zombie" cult/ party only to come to the conclusion that Democrats need to "give anti-Trump Republicans a chance to do the right thing" to form a "national unity coalition." Yes, because we know what spines Republicans have, we expect that any day now.  Regardless of the prescription he ultimately botches, Kagan makes some clarifying points along the way:

First, Donald Trump will be the Republican candidate for president in 2024. The hope and expectation that he would fade in visibility and influence have been delusional. He enjoys mammoth leads in the polls; he is building a massive campaign war chest; and at this moment the Democratic ticket looks vulnerable. Barring health problems, he is running.

Second, Trump and his Republican allies are actively preparing to ensure his victory by whatever means necessary. Trump’s charges of fraud in the 2020 election are now primarily aimed at establishing the predicate to challenge future election results that do not go his way. Some Republican candidates have already begun preparing to declare fraud in 2022, just as Larry Elder tried meekly to do in the California recall contest.

Meanwhile, the amateurish “stop the steal” efforts of 2020 have given way to an organized nationwide campaign to ensure that Trump and his supporters will have the control over state and local election officials that they lacked in 2020. Those recalcitrant Republican state officials who effectively saved the country from calamity by refusing to falsely declare fraud or to “find” more votes for Trump are being systematically removed or hounded from office. Republican legislatures are giving themselves greater control over the election certification process. As of this spring, Republicans have proposed or passed measures in at least 16 states that would shift certain election authorities from the purview of the governor, secretary of state or other executive-branch officers to the legislature. An Arizona bill flatly states that the legislature may “revoke the secretary of state’s issuance or certification of a presidential elector’s certificate of election” by a simple majority vote. Some state legislatures seek to impose criminal penalties on local election officials alleged to have committed “technical infractions,” including obstructing the view of poll watchers.

Kagan agrees that reforming the filibuster and passing voting rights legislation is the process solution to this existential problem.  But the problem of his cult will continue:

It would be foolish to imagine that the violence of Jan. 6 was an aberration that will not be repeated. Because Trump supporters see those events as a patriotic defense of the nation, there is every reason to expect more such episodes. Trump has returned to the explosive rhetoric of that day, insisting that he won in a “landslide,” that the “radical left Democrat communist party” stole the presidency in the “most corrupt, dishonest, and unfair election in the history of our country” and that they have to give it back. He has targeted for defeat those Republicans who voted for his impeachment — or criticized him for his role in the riot. Already, there have been threats to bomb polling sites, kidnap officials and attack state capitols. “You and your family will be killed very slowly,” the wife of Georgia’s top election official was texted earlier this year. Nor can one assume that the Three Percenters and Oath Keepers would again play a subordinate role when the next riot unfolds. Veterans who assaulted the Capitol told police officers that they had fought for their country before and were fighting for it again. Looking ahead to 2022 and 2024, Trump insists “there is no way they win elections without cheating. There’s no way.” So, if the results come in showing another Democratic victory, Trump’s supporters will know what to do. Just as “generations of patriots” gave “their sweat, their blood and even their very lives” to build America, Trump tells them, so today “we have no choice. We have to fight” to restore “our American birthright.”

It's a long read, but take some time and judge for yourselves.

Every week, Infidel 753 has the most comprehensive, intelligent round-up of links to interesting Internet posts, and this week is no exception.  There are lots of links to non- political posts if you just want to be otherwise challenged, amused or enlightened.  Bookmark his blog, if you haven't already, so you can check out his essays on a regular basis.