Progressive? Not the Campaign

I hate to agree with a journalist so anti-Israel that on Twitter he occasionally veers into anti-Semitism. However, Mehdi Hasan has heard enough of an emerging narrative and has no more- well, you know- to give. He remarks

Donald Trump winning the election was bad enough. But Democrats and much of our "liberal media" are now trying to blame their defeat on "the left, on prossives, on wokeness is just doing my head in. "Harris defeat is a stining defeatt for the left" was the hadline in the Post. "When will the Democrats learn to say no?" was the headline in the Times. A former Hillary Clinton advisor popped up on CNN to say the Democratic Party is being held hostage by the "far left." That's the new narrative- progressives lost Democrats the White House; Kamala Harris' losing campaign was a left-wing campaign. Are you fucking kidding me? This is gaslighting of Trumpian proportions. There was nothing left-wing about Harris.

Actually, there was one thing left-wing about Harris, who maintained amidst shifting positions that her principles had not changed.. It was her and most resoundingly not her campaign. Hasan continues

I mean, the centrists literally got the presidential candidate they wanted- a tough on crime prosecutor who bragged about owning a gun and spoke about her love for a "lethal" military. A candidate who famously told migrants "don't come" to this country and during the one and only presidential debate, attacked Trump for not backing a biparisan and very draconian border security bill. The idea that progressives got the campaign they wanted and then lost and so the left is now discredited is so ridiculous, so dtached from reality, so demonstrably and obviously false that Ican't believe I'm even having to sit here and rebut it.

The Democratic nominee ran commercials touting her experience as a prosecutor.

 

In the debate with her opponent, she boasted

So I'm the only person on this stage who has prosecuted transnational criminal organizations for the trafficking of guns, drugs, and human beings. And let me say that the United States Congress, including some of the most conservative members of the United States Senate, came up with a border security bill which I supported (but) Donald Trump got on the phone, called up some folks in Congress, and said kill the bill.

And in her closing statement, Harris stated that she was committed to "sustaining America's standing in the world and ensuring we have the respect that we so rightly deserve, including respecting our military and ensuring we have the most lethal fighting force in the world." 

Hasan continued with

"It was the wokeness and it was the cultural stuff." No. Harris barely sid anything about transgender rights. She didn't utter the term "Latinx" during the campaign, either, nor did she ever mention the words" defund the police." Stop lying. And oh, by the way, the year when people were talking about defunding the police was 2020, not 2024, and Democrats won in 2020, just saying.

Even in 2020, very few Democratic officials or politicians uttered the phrase "defund the police," though in the years following, many Democrats (most notably James Carville) would use the term to denounce unnamed Democrats who allegedly had advocated it. Further, criticism of police by the left- and by the center, which joined in- focused on harsher treatment by police of blacks than of whites. And I would bet that at the time- before the pro-police backlash against the left, very few of these currently disparaging "defund the police" progressives even questioned the prevailing narrative that blacks were getting a raw deal.

But times have changed and it's now open season on the progressives whom others, who at the time were on board, claim were all in "defund the police." Finger in the air, anyone?

The "cultural stuff," writ large, did play a role in the outcome of the campaign. However, it is impossible to determine to what extent it mattered, especially because that door swings both ways. Moreover, it was intrinsic to handing the nomination to Kamala Harris, who had the upper hand in getting the party's nod because she had been vice president but faced zero public opposition because had she been elected, she would have "made history" as the first black female president.

After Biden's withdrawal from the race- but before Harris was nominated- the vice-president skipped the speech to Congress of Israeli prime minster Benjamin Netanyahu to address the national convention of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc., a member of the "Divine Nine." Harris herself is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, also an historically black (and apparently currently segregated) sorority. However, this event took place after President Biden had announced that he would not seek another term but before Harris was nominated, thus avoiding most backlash while reinforcing her base. It was a shrewd move by a politician emphasizing her roots in the black community while maintaining a distance from the militaristic and failed Prime Minister.

Yet, Hasan is correct that Harris de-emphasized that cultural stuff  There was very little from the campaign about transgenderism, about the candidate's gender or ethnic background, or a general defense of equity or diversity.  Nor did many- if any- of the suddent, convenient critics of wokeism suggest in 2020 that perhaps designating Kamala Harris as the vice presidential nominee, likely to become almost the heir apparent to Joe Biden, on the basis of her race or sex was unwise.

Harris, female and black or bi-racial, was the living embodiment of wokeism the critics attack. However, that was Kamala Harris, who is what she is. It was  not her campaign, which was pro-institutional, emphasized bipartisanship, and eschewed ideological radicalism.

Hasan continued

Look, it's as clear as day. Harris did not run a left-wing campaign. Shje didn't run on Medicare for All. She did not run on student debt relief. She didn't run on a Green New Deal. And she didn't break with Joe Biden on Gaza.

At the debate, the Vice President declared "well, first of all, I absolutely support and over the last four years as vice president private health care options. But what we need to do is maintain and grow the Affordable Care Act." She commented "and the plan has to be to strengthen the Affordable Care Act, not get rid of it." That's not such a bold stance in favor of a program which as of March was approved by over 60% of the public.  If we were hoping that would be coupled with denunciation of a system in which health care- thus health- is up to the discretion of private insurance companies, well, that would have been a little progressive. Can'thave that.

And Democrats, most notably its recent presidential nominee, no longer utter the term "Green New Deal." That is so 2019, and reference to it is even more uncommon than to "justice," hardly mentioned since the heady days of 2019-2020.

Hasan added

So when you sy she ran left, what on earth are you talking about? This is a presidential candidate swho campaigned way more with Liz Cheney and Mark Cuban than with AOC and Shawn Fain, who listened more to her mother-in-law, the chief legal adviser of Uber, than to Bernie Sanders. The truth is, in 2016 and again in 2020, the Democratic establishment wanted to block Bernie Saners, an actual leftist, from becoming their nominee. And in 2024, due to Joe Biden's stubbornness, they didn't even have a contest- just a coronation. So look, the centrists, the moderates, got their candidate in every election in which the Republicans nominated Donald Trump: 2016 Hillary Clinton, 2020 Joe Biden, 2024 Kamala Harris. And they lost to Tump two of three times. And now they're going to blame the left for that? No fucking way."

Harris promised to appoint a Republican to the Cabinet and form a bipartisan council of advisors on policy. This should be the most enduring representation of the campaign (well, along with this and this). Whatever its net effect (to be determined), this may have been less the Harris-Walz campaign than the Harris-Cheney campaign.

Clinton was more moderate than Sanders, Biden more moderate than Sanders (or Warren), and Harris more moderate than- whom? The Party establishment, as Hasan noted, prefers the moderate candidate. However, even more so, it prefers the establishment candidate. Clinton and Biden were establishment- and so was Harris, loyal vice president to the President, even to the extent of defending Biden, his cognitive ability and overall health when most of the country had serious doubts.

There was another factor, one ignored by everyone, but most significantly by vilifiers of the woke, who would strengthen their case if they didn't elide it. In our more liberal/progressive days labeled "America's original sin," it is now avoided like the plague. Nominees Kamala Harris is a black woman; Joe Biden, pushed forward by Representative James Clyburn; Hillary Clinton, spouse of the individual once only half-jokingly referred to as "the first black President."  (The word "black," recognized a s a color,was not capitalized in those largely pre-politically correct days.)

And the presidential race of 2016. Initially, Hillary Clinto was supported for the nomination by more black Democrats than was Barack Obama. Once Obama won the Iowa primary- thus proving that whites woould vote for a black man for President-  the Illinoisan emerged as the favorite candidate of blacks. The rest, as is often said, is history.

That may seem off the point, but isn't. (Classic John Oliver: "The point is....") The soul-searching goes on, with "progressives" and "progressivism" taking incoming fire. Kamala Harris did not run a progressive campaign,  and had she won, her detractors from the right would have rightly denied that she had. If their beef with the left is that she was defeated because of the identification among voter of the Democratic Party as "woke," then they need to step up and be more specific. That they fail to do so, and refuse to acknowledge that the nominee herself was a bad choice, indicates that Mehdi Hasan is not only right about the nature of the presidential campaign but that the critics will offer no alternative..

"The ‘moderates’ got *their* candidate in every single election in which the Republicans nominated Trump: 2016 Clinton, 2020 Biden, 2024 Harris… and they lost to Trump two out of three times. And now they’re going to blame *the left* for that? No f*cking way."

My rant: pic.twitter.com/VzRcqbm5cT

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) November 27, 2024

                                         HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Share |

Peril

Welcoming November, on Friday Donald Trump said of former US Representative Liz Cheney, a Republican who was a US Representative from Wyoming and now is Kamala Harris' chief surrogate 

She’s a radical war hawk. Let’s put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, okay? Let’s see how she feels about it, you know, when the guns are trained on her face.

Though Bill Maher will vote (or already has) for Harris-Walz on Election Day and weeks ago guaranteed a Harris victory, he criticized individuals who charged that Trump had thereby urged Cheney face a firing squad, On the Overtime segment of Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher, the host began (at 3:06) a brief discussion of Trump's comment and at 5:02 remarked

But just don't lie to me. I don't like Donald Trump. Don't lie to me and tell me he wants her in front of a firing squad. He was saying something that by the way, if it came out of the mouth, some of it- not the stupid part- again, sounds like what hippies used to say about not sending people to....

Guest Michael Moynihan, pointing out that the ex-President had specified that Cheney would possess a rifle, agreed that Trump wasn't referring to a firing squad. That may be the case, though the reference to "nine barrels shooting at her" renders Trump's comment ambiguous. In any case, this is not Trump's first rodeo. Four months ago, CNN reported  

Former President Donald Trump amplified posts on social media calling for a televised military tribunal for former Republican Rep. Liz Cheney and the jailing of top elected officials, including President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

“ELIZABETH LYNNE CHENEY IS GUILTY OF TREASON,” one post created by another user that Trump amplified on his social media website Truth Social on Sunday reads. “RETRUTH IF YOU WANT TELEVISED MILITARY TRIBUNALS.”

Cheney responded on X, “Donald - This is the type of thing that demonstrates yet again that you are not a stable adult—and are not fit for office.”

A separate post Trump amplified on Truth Social Sunday includes photos of 15 former and current elected officials and says, “THEY SHOULD BE GOING TO JAIL ON MONDAY NOT STEVE BANNON!”

In addition to Biden and Harris, the post includes photos of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, former Vice President Mike Pence and members of the House select committee that investigated the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol.

Also, referring to chants of “lock her up,” Trump in early June told a Newsmax host

wouldn’t it be terrible to throw the president’s wife and the former secretary of state– you think of it, the former secretary of state, but the president, the president’s wife into jail. Wouldn’t that be a terrible thing? But they want to do it. So, you know, it’s like it’s, it’s a terrible, terrible path that they’re leading us to. And it’s very possible that it’s gonna have to happen to them.

Not only prosecution, though. In September of 2023

Donald Trump, on his social-media network, Truth Social, wrote that Mark Milley’s phone call to reassure China in the aftermath of the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021, was “an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH.” 

Liz Cheney and Mark Milley, although specified by name, are not alone in so annoying Donald Trump that the ex-President would threaten execution. Helen Lewis of The Atlantic notes that just yesterday, on Sunday November 3, 2024, when at a rally in Lititz, Pennsylvania

Describing how his open-air podium was mostly surrounded by bulletproof glass, the former president noted a gap in that protection, and added: “To get me, somebody would have to shoot through the fake news, and I don’t mind that so much.” And by “fake news,” he meant the members of the press covering his rally.

Lewis wrote "once again fantasizing about violence against his perceived enemies...."  Fantasizing? Were it only so, Liz Cheney may be thinking.

Share |

Danger Below Deck

It's over! Kamala Harris has been elected President and Donald J. Trump has been shoved into the dustbin of history. We know that because

At a rally Friday in Houston in front of 30,000 people — the biggest crowd of her campaign — the vice president sought to unleash the energy of her first days as a candidate for president.

There was a DJ who kept the crowd on their feet singing and doing the wave for hours. A performance by music legend Willie Nelson. And glowing wrist bracelets distributed to an energetic crowd that included people who waited more than five hours to enter the stadium.

And, amid deafening cheers and applause, arguably the most famous woman in the world introduced Harris to the stage: Beyoncé.

“Is it possible not to feel the energy in this room,” Beyoncé said before quickly switching to a serious tone.

“I’m not here as a celebrity, I’m not here as a politician, I’m here as a mother,” she said. “A mother who cares deeply about the world my children and all of our children live in. A world where we have the freedom to control our bodies.”

(Well, yes, because when I think of Beyonce, it's not as a great pop star or beautiful woman, it's as a "mother.")

There is something happening here, of which this is only a part, which the media neither understands nor is exploring, a strategy targeting Donald Trump, and only Donald Trump. 

The July rollout of the Harris-Walz campaign, which sparked immense enthusiasm and a sharp rise in favorable polls, would eventually hit a brick wall and require a reset. The vice president realized that there are many Independents (and a few Republicans) who believe both parties are committed only to winning elections and the special interests which back them. They believe politicians are addicted to bickering with, and getting an edge on, the opposition while accomplishing nothing.

And so in late August, Kamala Harris told CNN's Dana Bash that she "would" appoint a Republican to the Cabinet. Nominating Adam Kinzinger as Secretary of Veterans Affairs or someone else reasonably characterized as a Republican in Name Only would be reasonable. Nonetheless, the Vice President could have been less explicit, explaining that she would tap the best individual who would reflect the values of her Administration and her determination that government serve the American people effectively.

            

This is only a small item, in which "hope." unveiled at the Democratic National convention, has been replaced with an emphasis on bipartisanship..

On July 21, 2024 President Joe Biden announced that he will not be seeking re-election. On September 4, former US Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming publicly endorsed Kamala Harris for President, stating "because of the danger that Donald Trump poses, not only am I not voting for Donald Trump but I will be voting for Kamala Harris." On October 3, Cheney appeared with Harris at a rally in Ripon, Wisconsin, the birthplace of the Republican Party, and asserted "I have never voted for a Democrat but this year, I am proudly casting my vote for Vice President Kamala Harris."  She noted Donald Trump "is petty, he is vindictive, and he is cruel, and Donald Trump is not fit to lead this good and great nation."

On October 21, Harris and Cheney began a tour of the battleground states of the northern tier, appearing together in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.

It is not by coincidence or oversight that the very conservative Liz Cheney, daughter of the destructive vice President Dick Cheney (who also has endorsed Harris), warns the voting public of the evil of Donald Trump, the lawlessness of Donald Trump, and the danger posed by Donald Trump (all accurate).  Cheney was co-chairperson of the January 6 commission and was vanquished in a House primary by a relatively unknown candidate endorsed by Donald Trump, who has recommended a military tribunal try Cheney for treason. The penalty for treason is death and the former congresswoman takes the threat seriously. Hanging focuses the mind.

 

Cheney is courageous, the evidence being that few other former or current Republican officeholders, have been as definitive or as public as she has in urging the defeat of Donald Trump by Kamala Harris. The current Speaker of the House is only one Republican, albeit a uniquely powerful one, who is enthusiastically supporting  the former President. This comes even (especially) after Trump has attacked the "enemy within" and has been credibly described as a "fascist" by his former Chief of Staff, who reports that President Trump openly lamented that "my generals" weren't as deferential to him as he believes Adolf Hitler's generals were to the Fuehrer.

Amidst the former GOP officials who last month signed a letter supporting Harris and the Trump administration officials who promulgated a letter backing General Kelly's description of Trump, very few Republican officeholders have anything but favorable words for the ex-President. Now on board are Senators Marco Rubio, Lindsay Graham, Mike Lee, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, former governor Nikki Haley, and numerous other prominent Republicans who condemned Trump in the wake of the 1/6/21 insurrection or whom he condemned.

Not a word Liz Cheney- still a Republican- has said nothing about these individuals. Kamala Harris is stunningly quiet.  Add to them the Harris-Walz campaign and the vast majority of Democratic insiders, who have turned mum about members of what many had legitimately termed a "cult."

This appears to have been a conscious choice by a presidential candidate who is not only concerned most about her own campaign, but exclusively on her own campaign. And this is very likely having ramifications for down-ballot Democrats.

It's difficult to determine how much impact there has been from the decision to vilify Donald Trump- as he should be- while pretending no other Republican has stymied the agenda of incumbent Democratic President Joe Biden or added to the toxic atmosphere in Washington or across the nation. But we can get a clue from the changing outlook for one Democrat, Senator Tammy Baldwin, in the swing state of Wisconsin.

When Joe Biden was still the more or less presumed nominee, pundits noted that Democrats would lose the Senate race in West Virginia, with their other most endangered seats in Maryland, Ohio, Montana, and Arizona. Though the Democratic candidate in Pennsylvania, Nevada, and Wisconsin was not a shoo-in, the GOP was seen as unlikely to overcome the odds there.

The races in the latter states are now, as Dan Rather would put it, "hotter than a Times Square Rolex." On July 21, Baldwin led her GOP challenger, Eric Hovde,, 48.0% to 43.2%, according to the Real Clear Politics average of polls. 

On September 10, with Harris riding high, Baldwin enjoyed a 50.8 to 44.9 lead. However, on September 24, her lead had declined to 50.8 to 46.0 and on October 10, it was 49.4 to 46.0. In the latest numbers, of October 24, the lead had shrunk to 48.0% to 47.2%, less than a one percent advantage. On October 10, it was 49.4 to 46.0 

It is only one state, maybe there was an issue. peculiar to Wisconsin involved, and there is always the margin of error factor. However- again a Ratherism, this race is "tight as the pages in a book." So, too, has the Democratic advantage in Senate races dwindled in Nevada and Ohio, and the Republican challenger to Democrat Jon Testa in Montana has winded.

Once Biden had his infamous, disastrous debate with Trump in early July, Donald Trump was at "first and goal from four yards out" (yes, Rather again). Fortunately, Trump has been driven back and the end zone, while still in his sight, is much further away.

It seems that all the while, the fortunes of Democratic senatorial candidates have been dwindling.  Moreover, the Democratic Party's advantage in the generic preference for the House of Representatives  "has slipped to just +0.5 points over the Republicans, down from a peak of 12.6 in early September.".

The slippage in the possibility that Democrats will fare well in Senate races and regain control in the House should not be surprising. Kamala Harris' campaign of joy relied not on defense of the Biden-Harris record nor ideological principle but primarily on the personal appeal of Kamala Harris as contrasted to the sour, dour, raging anger of Donald Trump. The emphasis in the latter half of the campaign has been on the peril of Donald Trump, and Donald Trump alone, as if he is not faithfully representing the extremist values and divisive strategy of the Republican Party.

Undecided voters, the Vice President hopes, have gotten the message. She can get along with Republicans, and they like her. No more will Washington be a cacophony of quarreling factions, accomplishing nothing. 

Such voters, most of them Independents and presumably all independent-minded, are being called upon to pull the lever (or punch the card, or whatever) for Harris-Walz. Many of them (as Kamala Harris likely realizes) will decide to opt for her, then be faced with a decision on down-ballot candidates. Having- however reluctantly- gone for the less divisive presidential candidate, they will choose to balance out their vote by choosing Republican candidates (bipartisanship, you know).

Most of them believe both parties are generally rancid and that neither party deserves much of an advantage over the other. So they will have little reason not to split the difference, especially because the Democratic Party, as guided by the top of the presidential ticket (the top of the pecking order) now appears to stand for only one thing: Trump bad, Republicans good.

Share |

Eight Years Late, Better than Never

Now anti-Trump, veteran advisor and media figure Mark McKinnon can be seen saying (beginning at 3:30)

Can we just put Liz Cheney on Mount Rushmore? My god,  she's the only Republican who- she's the only Republican left with a backbone to stand up for the Constitution... 

And by the way, unlike me, who's kind of a squish Republican, she's very conservative, super conservative, Wyoming conservative, Dick Cheney conservative. So for he to come out like this, again, it shows she puts principle over party and it's just- I'm so proud of her doing this. And I think it's going to make a big difference- she's saying. It's a big voice for at least the 20% of voters who voted for Nikki Haley and probably lots more to say "you know, listen, the Republican Party under Donald Trump is not one any of us under Bush or Reagan or McCain recognize anymore.

They should, because it's still that party and has been since at least the time of Ronald Reagan with a brief timeout for John McCain. And it may help Kamala Harris- assuming, of course, that Donald Trump is either too stupid (unlikely) or too proud and arrogant (much more likely) to go to Michigan and remind Muslim voter who Ms. Cheney's father is. Charlie Pierce, much more favorable to Harris than am I, writes

It is now the second day, and I think I have had my fill of the Apotheosis Of The Cheneys. It is nice that Liz Cheney is working so hard for the Democratic ticket. But it is goddamn weird that a retired war criminal like Dick Cheney is shouted out at a Democratic rally. As I believe I've said a number of times, this is indeed an all-hands-on-deck moment. However, all-hands-on-deck does not mean all hands on the bridge. The Cheneys get a laurel and hardy handshake from me, and then I'll move along to appreciate the contributions of the people who have spent decades fighting the politics that a) made Trump not only possible, but inevitable, and b) that the Cheneys have represented for their entire public careers.

It's not surprising that Liz Cheney would endorse, even attend a rally, with Harris, given that Cheney was the de jure vice chairperson, arguably de facto chairperson, of the January 6 committee. She not only knows what Donald Trump is all about, but has a stake in his defeat because in early July

Former President Donald Trump amplified posts on social media calling for a televised military tribunal for former Republican Rep. Liz Cheney and the jailing of top elected officials, including President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

“ELIZABETH LYNNE CHENEY IS GUILTY OF TREASON,” one post created by another user that Trump amplified on his social media website Truth Social on Sunday reads. “RETRUTH IF YOU WANT TELEVISED MILITARY TRIBUNALS.”

Still, Cheney deserves credit for going where few others have gone, given that

A separate post Trump amplified on Truth Social Sunday includes photos of 15 former and current elected officials and says, “THEY SHOULD BE GOING TO JAIL ON MONDAY NOT STEVE BANNON!”

In addition to Biden and Harris, the post includes photos of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, former Vice President Mike Pence and members of the House select committee that investigated the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol.

So the former Wyoming congresswoman has at least shown more courage than McConnell, Pence, and other Republicans who have endorsed Trump or merely signaled they will not support the ex-President in November. Nonetheless, as Charlie Pierce wrote a couple of years ago, Republicans who stuck with their party until Trump presented an obvious danger to the survival of the republic are welcome onto the bus but in the driver's seat.

Pierce added "Thursday's Nicolle Wallace show on MSNBC was an exaltation ceremony with Liz Cheney cast in a role somewhere between Joan of Arc and Wonder Woman. I lasted about 10 minutes." That's generous and as I've implied previously, it's about ten minutes longer than Nicole Wallace deserves. 

 

Share |

Calculated Omission

At the beginning of the "Overtime" segment of Friday evening's Real Time, a viewer asked one of Bill Maher's guests, whistleblower Frances Haugen "why did Congress fail to hold social media companies accountable for their role in the January 6 attack on the Capitol?" Haugen, the data engineer who exposed Facebook documents in 2021, blamed Facebook for its slow response in turning on safety measures on 1/6/21, noted she testified extensively before the Committee. She stated also

I believe none of that was included- the final write-up report, like it wasn't one of the attributable things. I think part of it was cut. The January 5 committee felt it needed to educate the public on a very broad set of issues and that I think they had to pick and choose on, like, how many things are we going to walk people down that road.

The proper answer is "Liz Cheney." However, while Haugen's reply was mildly disappointing, Bill Maher's response was really bad. The host responded

Which was smart. That committee was smart. I mean, it didn't do anything. No, I've seen interviews with the Republicans and nothing changes anybody's mind about anything. But you can't blame the committee. They put on a show and it was a good show. That was a smart decision-  I'm sorry but they had a lot of fish to fry and that one, O.K.

A good show or, when the media was less interested in performance, what would have been called a "cover-up." The National Commission to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the United States Capitol Complex was directed to "investigate the facts, circumstances, and causes relating to the domestic terrorist attack on the Capitol" to include "activities of intelligence agencies, law enforcement agencies, and the Armed Forces, including with respect to intelligence collection, analysis and dissemination and information sharing" within the government. The committee, as led by the de jure chairperson and de facto chairperson, wanted no part of examining these "branches and other instrumentalities of government."

In a PBS report shortly before release of the final report of the committee, correspondent Laura Barron-Lopez seemingly made the case for a September 11- style commission to study the Capitol attack. Having held no person or agency ultimately responsible for the nation being unprepared for the attack on the World Trade Center, that committee itself has been overrated ever since.

Barron-Lopez spoke to two individuals familiar with the nation's intelligence apparatus. Former Secret Service agent Evy Pompouras remarked "you should see this information was passed to this person at this rank, and what did that person do with that information? You do really need to see names and ranks."  Former FBI agent Tracy Walder explained

I think, in the final report, what I would really like to see is accountability.  I think that's the bottom line, whether it's the Secret Service or the FBI or local police, for not taking some of these threats seriously. And they need- either need to have new training in place, in terms of how to understand some of these threats, or we need to look at creating a federal domestic terrorism statute.

There may have been merely a breakdown in communications, as the 9/11 commission found in the period preceding 9/11/01.  However, January 6 committee member Adam Schiff noted "The Secret Service had advance information more than 10 days beforehand regarding the Proud Boys' planning for January 6. We know now, of course, that the Proud Boys and others did lead the assault on our Capitol building."

Donell Harvin, who oversaw the Fusion Security Intelligence Center for the District of Columbia on 1/6/21 and testified thrice before the committee, noted

The committee report surmises that going forward, “the best defense against [the danger to the Capitol] will not come from law enforcement, but from an informed and active citizenry.” This is poetic at best, misleading at worst. The thoughts and actions of those who want to incite or commit violence can’t be controlled, especially when they use the First Amendment as a shield. The “best defense” against that danger is a physical defense posture informed by the intelligence and directed by competent leaders.

Actually, misleading and reprehensible at worst. Harvin concludes

Two years after a deadly assault on our democracy, we are no closer to correcting the system processes and cultures that turned an obscure and mundane day on the electoral calendar into a massive failure of government o be immortalized in the history books.

Liz Cheney is a conservative Republican and institutionalist with a fierce, justified hatred of Donald J. Trump. She did not want the committee to dilute its single-minded focus on the 45th President with an inquiry into the failure of the defense apparatus or of law enforcement, and de jure Chairman Bennie Thompson, no bold progressive he, gladly obliged.  Analysis of financing of the attempted coup was left on the cutting room while Republicans Mike Pence and Bill Barr (the latter a Maher favorite) were favorably treated by the committee. It is its legacy to have exposed the danger posed by one insurrectionist President- and nothing else. Bill Maher and other people of wealth and influence, especially those with friends in high places, must be pleased and satisfied.

Share |

Parallel Mission

She may prove to be the biggest winner of 2022. 

Despite having voted unanimously a month earlier to subpoena Donald J. Trump

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on the Capitol has withdrawn its subpoena of former President Donald Trump, according to a letter from the committee chair to Trump's attorney and obtained by CBS News.

The withdrawal comes as the committee's authority to operate comes to a close when the new Republican-controlled Congress begins in January. The New York Times first reported the committee has withdrawn its outstanding subpoenas, an admission that the committee has run out of time to receive its requested information.

"In light of the imminent end of our investigation, the select committee can no longer pursue the specific information covered by the subpoena," wrote Rep. Bennie Thompson, the committee chair, in a Tuesday letter to Trump attorney David Warrington. "Therefore, through this letter, I hereby formally withdraw the subpoena issued to former President Trump, and notify you that he is no longer obligated to comply or produce records in response to said subpoena."

The panel "sunsets" in January and goes out of business unless the new House of Representatives revives it which, being controlled by Republicans, it will not do.

Print media has reported that the subpoena has been withdrawn while CNN & MSNBC largely have ignored the news, and even print media is light on explaining the alternative to withdrawal by the Democratic-majority committee of the subpoena.

On November 11, Trump filed  a suit in federal court seeking to block enforcement of the subpoena. Upon hearing of the withdrawal, the former President celebrated on his Truth Social platform by boasting the committee" probably did so because they knew I did nothing wrong, or they were about to lose in Court. Perhaps the FBI’s involvement in RIGGING the Election played into their decision. In any event, the Subpoena is DEAD" (no period, unsurprisingly).

There was a nugget of truth in Trump's remark because the committee, notwithstanding the inevitability of its dissolution in early January, 2023, probably was not required to withdraw its subpoena. Instead, it could have allowed it to remain, leaving it to the GOP House to take the affirmative step of withdrawing it.

But it did not do so.. Perhaps for a similar reason, the members chose to limit its report to Donald Trump and closely related issues, rather than to consider: militia and other extremist groups; funding for the attack on the Capitol; or failure of the law enforcement and intelligence community to assess the threat. And now we have this:

 

 

It doesn’t matter. Lying to Congress is a federal crime, so Congressional testimony is not always under oath.

— Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 30, 2022

With all due respect to Renato Mariotti, who seems on his cable news appearances to be a very nice mand, it does matter. Or at least this sort of thing matters to one prominent Democrat because in late June

U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Democratic member of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol, said he found former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson to be a "100% credible witness," and encouraged anyone who disagrees with her to also testify under oath.

"Ms. Hutchinson testified under oath in front of millions of people," Raskin said. "All we've heard is some anonymously sourced reports that someone disagrees with that. We encourage anybody who's got any evidence that's relevant to our investigation to come forward and testify under oath."

Raskin stated that Hutchinson testified under oath and challenged anyone who would challenge her testimony "to come forward and testify under oath." And Ginni Thomas, the election-denying wife of Justice Clarence Thomas, would make any top ten list of individuals who would not be credible sans swearing on a Bible to tell the truth.

Admittedly, the decision by the January 6 committee to withdraw its warrant, which ultimately would not have been enforced, is of little significance, though it would have forced Republicans to take action to prevent the former President's testimony. Moreover, there is a chance Ginni Thomas even under oath would have lied. And maybe the enormity of the crimes committed by Donald Trump and the grave threat he posed to the constitutional republic would have been clouded if other issues were included in the committee's final report.

Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps. But there is no question that the single-minded focus on the (justifiably) despised Donald Trump, protection of a very conservative Republican Justice appointed by a GOP President, and sparing the Republican House of Representatives from controversially withdrawing a subpoena serve the interest of one (and probably only one) member of the committee.

That member clearly appears to have been the de facto chairperson- or at least de facto co-chairperson- of the United States House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Liz Cheney, one of a minority of Republican officials who is definitively appreciate of our democratic republic, nevertheless remains a very conservative Republican, probably the central part of her identity.  This year, she lost her bid for a fourth term in the United States House of Representatives. Nevertheless, with her outsized impact on the Committee, she had a very good year, indeed.

 

 

 

Share |

Cheney and Trump

In an important and largely ignored piece about  the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, on November 23, The Washington Post explained that Representative Liz

Cheney’s influence over the committee’s final report has rankled many current and former committee staff. They are angered and disillusioned by Cheney’s push to focus the report primarily on former president Donald Trump, and have bristled at the committee morphing into what they have come to view as the vehicle for the outgoing Wyoming lawmaker’s political future.

Fifteen former and current staffers, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, expressed concerns that important findings unrelated to Trump will not become available to the American public.

The reporters added

Several committee staff members were floored earlier this month when they were told that a draft report would focus almost entirely on Trump and the work of the committee’s Gold Team, excluding reams of other investigative work.

Potentially left on the cutting room floor, or relegated to an appendix, were many revelations from the Blue Team — the group that dug into the law enforcement and intelligence community’s failure to assess the looming threat and prepare for the well-forecast attack on the Capitol. The proposed report would also cut back on much of the work of the Green Team, which looked at financing for the Jan. 6 attack, and the Purple Team, which examined militia groups and extremism.

The committee now has released its Executive Summary and full report and, as The New York Times notes, it described

in extensive detail how former President Donald J. Trump had carried out what it called “a multipart plan to overturn the 2020 presidential election” and offering recommendations for steps to assure nothing like it could happen again.

It revealed new evidence about Mr. Trump’s conduct, and recommended that Congress consider whether to bar Mr. Trump and his allies from holding office in the future under the 14th Amendment’s ban on insurrectionists.

“The central cause of Jan. 6 was one man, former President Donald Trump, whom many others followed,” the report said. “None of the events of Jan. 6 would have happened without him.”

The report included a few recommendations for legislative action and one for bar associations. Nonetheless, either completely or nearly so, it reflects the work of the Gold Team.  Ron Brownstein recognizes

Both the 154-page executive summary unveiled Monday and the 845-page final report released last night made clear that the committee is focused preponderantly on Trump. The summary in particular read more like a draft criminal indictment than a typical congressional report. It contained breathtaking detail on Trump’s efforts to overturn the election and concluded with an extensive legal analysis recommending that the Justice Department indict Trump on four separate offenses, including obstruction of a government proceeding and providing “aid and comfort” to an insurrection.

Brownstein wishes the committee had not largely ignored that

Thousands of far-right extremists responded to his call to assemble in Washington. Seventeen Republican state attorneys general signed on to a lawsuit to invalidate the election results in key states; 139 Republican House members and eight GOP senators voted to reject the outcome even after the riot on January 6. Nearly three dozen congressional Republicans exchanged ideas with Meadows on how to overturn the result, or exhorted him to do so. Dozens of prominent Republicans across the key battleground states signed on as fake electors. Nearly 300 Republicans who echoed Trump’s lies about the 2020 election were nominated in November—more than half of all GOP candidates, according to The Washington Post. And although many of the highest-profile election deniers were defeated, about 170 deniers won their campaign and now hold office, where they could be in position to threaten the integrity of future elections.

All are significant: fake electors; state attorneys general trying to overthrow the election; members of Congress keen on working with the President's Chief of Staff to overturn the results; 170 Republicans who were elected in November with the potential power to undermine elections.

But even more important were the issues addressed by the Blue Team and the Green Team.  Unsurprisingly, they were ignored by the committee members.

The role the Secret Service and Chris Wray's FBI may have played in the insurrection has been unexplored by the media. Any role played by either- worse yet, possibly in concert- strikes at the very heart of American government and democracy. If the committee had not chosen to bury the work of its Blue Team staffers, we may have learned of the existence of a "Deep State"- not  the one Donald Trump and his acolytes periodically have bleated about for seven years, but one actually existing in reality.

In his "All the President's Men," author/journalist Bob Woodward said to Watergate committee chairperson Sam Ervin (D-NC) "The key was the secret campaign cash and it should all be traced," a line simplified as "follow the money." Instead, the January 6th committee decided to turn a blind eye to the financial backing of the insurrection, whatever it was and whomever it may have led to. The Green Team, like the Blue Team, was neutered.

It's not hard to determine why.  According to the Post, a "former committee staffer" maintained

We all came from prestigious jobs, dropping what we were doing because we were told this would be an important fact-finding investigation that would inform the public. But when [the committee] became a Cheney 2024 campaign, many of us became discouraged.

It's hard to believe that Liz Cheney is sufficiently deluded to believe that she has any chance to be the next GOP presidential nominee. More likely, as a lifelong, traditional Republican, she didn't want the report to reflect badly on conservative institutions, such as federal law enforcement agencies,  nor on the web of financing which might include Turning Point USA/Action, American Legislative Exchange Council, the Heritage Foundation, Charles Koch, or whomever.

Now, we'll never know about this, nor what institutions ignored the threat of an attempted coup or even facilitated it.   Hats off to the remarkably focused Liz Cheney, who has a special hatred of Donald Trump and is leading us down the road to something better, or not nearly to where we might have been. He's her special project and with it, she wielded more influence this year than any other woman (save the Speaker of the House) in American politics.

                     HAPPY BELATED CHANUKAH and MERRY CHRISTMAS

 

Share |

Tweet of the Day- Not So Fast, Liz

Liz Cheney was defeated in the GOP primary in her bid for a to represent Wyoming for a fourth bid in the US House of Representatives because she voted for the impeachment of President Trump and is vice chairperson on the January 6 commission. Adam Kinzinger also voted to impeach President Trump and opted out of seeking re-election to the House of Representatives from Illinois.

Nonetheless, they are not the same person.  We know that one wants the report of the insurrection to be about three things: Donald Trump, Donald Trump, and Donald Trump. We don't know of the preference of the other Republican congressman on the committee, but he clearly believes there is something rotten about the GOP that goes beyond the former President.

Hey @Liz_Cheney, has @GOPLeader condemned this yet?

Or nah? https://t.co/mAyzQWlxm4

— Adam Kinzinger #fella (@AdamKinzinger) November 26, 2022

Cheney and Kinzinger were responding to news that

Former President Donald Trump had dinner Tuesday at his Mar-a-Lago estate with white nationalist Nick Fuentes and rapper Kanye West, a Trump adviser confirmed to CBS News on Friday….

Fuentes is a leading figure on the far-right, having attended the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville in 2017 and the "Stop the Steal" rally on Jan. 6. Fuentes, who has spread antisemitic conspiracies, is considered a white supremacist by the Anti-Defamation League. According to the ADL, "Fuentes 'jokingly' denied the Holocaust and compared Jews burnt in concentration camps to cookies in an oven."

I don't know Adam Kinzinger's mind. However, when someone says "or nah," it's a rhetorical question and a little snide, for which we should agree: good on Adam. Kinzinger. He already knew the answer, and it's an emphatic "no."

It's a reminder that if Kevin McCarthy does become Speaker of the House, it will be only as the de jure Speaker. We all know the de facto Speaker will be the greatest liar in American political history, the man who has retired the award.

 

Share |

Both Sides Now

Liz Cheney is not an enigma. We know who she is and has been; also, what she wants. It's not quite Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, yet:

Liz Cheney has made this her moment. Not sure how she lives this duality--the J6C Liz Cheney is stellar. The Liz Cheney who voted for Trump twice and with him 96%, who voted against the Voting Rights Act, Equality Act and more--hard to reconcile they are the same person.

— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) July 22, 2022

In her concession speech Wednesday night, Cheney stated "I believe deeply in the principles and the ideals on which my party was founded. I love its history. And I love what our party has stood for. But I love my country more." For the prosecution, Charlie Pierce responded

Really? Its whole history, especially since 1965 or so? Did you love your party's Southern strategy? Did you love the Gingrich days? Did you love its turn toward voter suppression, crackpot economics, and the waterboard? Did you love it during the Schiavo fiasco, when GOP members of Congress threatened judges the way that so seems to bother you now? Did you love all the tactics employed in Florida, which included the possibility of fake electors, that put your Pops into the vice presidency so he’d be there to turn the country into a country that tortures? Or is it only Cheneys who can traduce the Constitution?

Well, O.K.  However, Cheney can remain the conservative she prides herself in being and yet be no hypocrite. Pierce challenges her to prove her mettle by supporting Democrats in critical races in Ohio, Wisconsin, Georgia, or Pennsylvania.  (My vote would be Ohio.) But that's expecting a little much for Cheney who, after all, is still a Republican. Whatever credibility she has left as a Republican- or even as a small "i" independent voice- would be erased.

Voting rights, however, is an issue inextricably- and for Cheney thus far, inconveniently- intertwined with her effort to prevent the triumph of authoritarianism at home.   Cheney needs to signal her support either for reconsideration of the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act or opposition to the independent state legislative doctrine the High Court has taken up in Moore vs. Harper.  Sometimes, "the Supreme Court follows the election returns."

That may not happen, but it's hard to overestimate the congresswoman's contribution to the destruction of Donald J. Trump and the threat he poses to democracy.  The past couple of weeks, we applaud Attorney General Merrick Garland for his decision to order the search of Mar-a-Lago. As far as is known, this had nothing to do with the attempted coup of January 6, 2021.

Nonetheless, it was related to the investigation into that coup.   Neither Garland nor anyone else in his department is unaware of the hearings into the insurrection, nor the further doubts it has raised about commitment of the former President to the Great American Experiment. to survival of the nation as a republic. Donald Trump has been wounded, slightly or significantly.

The betting here is that wound would not have been inflicted without Lynne Ann Cheney. She gave the committee bipartisan credibility it would have lacked if Adam Kinzinger were its lone Republican.  There is real doubt that sans Cheney there would have been any Democrat (nor Kinzinger) willing to play the attack dog- and if there were, that she or he would have been as effective. There would have been Democratic members satisfied to send the Democratic street the message that Donald Trump is a very bad man- and to leave it at that.

LIz Cheney won't leave it at that. This isn't to suggest that she's a friend to Democrats or even that her commitment to a fully Democratic society is complete.  For Democrats, retention of both congressional chambers is primary, defeat of Donald Trump secondary. Cheney wants to destroy Donald Trump. And that's why, at the moment, this tweeter has it right:

The best piece I've read on Liz Cheney hasn't been written yet. It's about where she goes from here. It doesn't get stuck in the devil/saint trap.

— Susanna J. Sturgis (@HagwindMV) August 19, 2022

 

Share |

In An Upset, I Disagree With Bill Maher

Can someone, somewhere, please introduce Bill Maher to the concept of the Overton Window? In what was only a small portion of Friday evening's Overtime- a sitcom episode better named "Three Men Without a Clue," the conversation among Maher, journalist Sam Stein, and linguist John McWhorter turned to the benefit the guys believe the third party of Andrew Yang would be. Maher argued (at 4:28 of the video below)

Well, I think what would happen= my prediction is you could have it like a sensible middle party. And then what would happen is it would force the Democrats to go back to being the sensible middle party. And they would because they would see that's where- you know, Biden reminds me of some grandfather and when AOC and the woke people come into his office, he just goes along. He doesn't really understand it. It's like "grandpa, can we have money to go play Fortnite? And he's like "I don't know what Fortnite is. I don't know what Tik-Tok is, just get out of my hair."

The only good part of that is that, as Maher prepared to say "because they would see that's where most people are politically," he stopped himself, perhaps aware that would be inaccurate. Instead of trying to emulate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez or Cori Bush, President Biden has tried to emulate Lyndon B. Johnson and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Instead of trotting out his public relations team to excoriate Joe Manchin, Krysten Sinema or any Republican, he oversaw White House communications director Kate Bedingfield remarking "Joe Biden's goal in responding to Dobbs is not to satisfy some activists who have been consistently out of step with the mainstream of the Democratic Party."

And that is where Joe Biden is: the mainstream of the Democratic Party, and not only the mainstream of the Democratic Party today, which Maher believes has gone dangerously left, but the mainstream of FDR, LBJ, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama.  The President recently struck (but not enacted) a deal on climate, taxes, and health care, the deal was struck not with the dreaded "AOC' of New York City but with centrist Joe Manchin of robustly conservative West Virginia.  The Biden Administration confirms the critique "Republicans refer to their most involved voters as 'the base,' and deliver for them, while Democrats refer to theirs as 'some activists' and ignore them. That is why they lose."

That "breakthrough" deal includes a 15% minimum corporate tax, when most Americans pay more in federal income tax; environmental reform with little resemblance to the Green New Deal; and severely limited health care reform in a nation whose ongoing coronavirus pandemic has laid bare the need for universal health care.  That's not nothing but it is not sweeping, historical change, and nothing which will set Alexandria Ocasio Cortez's heart atwitter. 

Democrats seem liberal, even progressive; but that is only because Republican Party officials have lurched rightward.  Now, Democrats hail the daughter of Dick Cheney for her integrity, seemingly accepting a congressional voting record 92.9% in support of President Trump.

When President Biden proposed the ambitious Build Back Better plan, it included the following:  universal and free pre-school; investments in child care and eldercare; expansion of Child Tax Credit; promotion of clean energy, especially in disadvantaged communities; initiatives to combat climate change; reduction of prescription drug costs; strengthening the Affordable Care Act; expansion of Medicaid; promotion of affordable housing; extending the Earned Income Tax Credit; increasing access to higher education, academic and vocational; immigration reform. 

That was the President's major, arguably only, bold initiative. And yet, Bill Maher and other liberal or center-left individuals unnerved by what they perceive as a rush to the left were noticeably silent on components of Build Back Better. Often, they failed to identify even one component of the proposal with which they disagreed. And yet, they're apoplectic that Joe Biden is morphing into Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez or, in Maher's case, unwilling to resist any of the congresswoman's demands.

Nuances, details, even sometimes mere facts are to be avoided in favor of the broad, sweeping generalization. Honest and thoughtful disagreement should be encouraged, but has become unfamiliar territory for individuals criticizing Joe Biden from the right.  Nuance, detail, sometimes mere facts are avoided in favor of the broad, seeping generalization. We should expect more from our professors of linguistics, journalists, and comedians.

 

  

Share |