Category Archives: Random Blogging

The Real Lesson From Iowa

Robert Hubbell’s Substack analysis of the Iowa Republican caucus focused on a point I keep hammering: turnout–getting out the vote–is far and away the most important imperative of this year’s election cycle.

There is a mountain of social science data confirming that high-turnout elections benefit Democrats. There’s a reason the GOP does everything in its power to suppress the vote. By far the most effective suppression comes from gerrymandering–voters in districts drawn to be “safe” for a party they don’t support feel–not illogically–that their votes won’t count, so why bother? It will be critically important to remind those voters that statewide races and the popular vote for President are not subject to gerrymandering. With the exception of the potential operation of the Electoral College, those votes will absolutely count.

Hubbell makes the argument for the importance of turnout in the context of Iowa’s (weird) caucus system. He begins by looking at the composition of those who did turn out:

Among those who attended the caucuses, most voters hold extremist views. Those views are reprehensible and deserve to be condemned. But those who showed up on Monday were mostly Trump loyalists who represent the slimmest majority possible of voters in Iowa.

Although Hubbell doesn’t mention it, this feature of caucus turnout is equally true of turnout in state primaries. The typically low primary turnout is characterized by votes from the most passionate–and extreme–members of both parties. And those voters do not reflect majority sentiments.

So, as we collectively talk about the results in Iowa, it is important to realize that 49% of those who voted on a bitterly cold night (-3 Fahrenheit) did not support Trump. Most of the voters who opposed Trump do not condone his views about immigrants poisoning the blood of America, or his opponents being “vermin,” or his belief that the 2020 election was “rigged.”…

As we move forward in the 2024 campaign, let’s remember that there are Democrats, Independents, and Republicans in Iowa who will not support Trump. Our job is to convince them to show up for Biden. Lumping them in with MAGA extremists is not an effective way of achieving that goal.

And the same applies to every so-called “red state.” In every state, there are local and statewide offices that can be flipped—something that will help limit and blunt the effect of Republican control of statehouses and governors’ mansions.

So, let’s set aside the notion that red states are a lost cause and do not deserve our attention or support. Not only do they deserve our help, but they are the front line of resistance—just like the Democrats, Independents, and Republicans who chose not to vote for Trump on Monday.

Turnout in Iowa was low— only 110,298 voters participated in the GOP caucuses, amounting to about 19% of the 594,533 “active” registered Republicans . Of those, 51%  voted for Trump (or 52,260). So Trump’s “big” victory in Iowa was “achieved with support from 7% of Iowa Republicans—or 3% of Iowa’s 1,518,280 active voters.”

Trump’s victory on Monday night was decided by the 97% of Iowa voters who “did not vote” in the caucuses. So, before we over-interpret the result on Monday, we must recognize that the potential for a devastating defeat for Trump is within our reach—assuming that we can motivate sufficient turnout. (emphasis mine)

So, as we face the onslaught of polls in the coming primary season predicting doom for Democrats, we must always remember that turnout can beat any poll.

As Hubbell reminds his readers, the Iowa caucus results affirm a fundamental truth: It all comes down to turnout.

Even in dramatically-gerrymandered Indiana, if a significant percentage of the disaffected voters in “safe” districts voted, a number of the districts would no longer be safe. Republican victories in Indiana are increasingly dependent upon low turnout–especially in the more rural areas of the state that have been steadily losing population.

Hubbell is absolutely right when he insists that Democrats cannot afford to write off Red states this year, of all years.

We need to make the strongest possible case– to apathetic and/or disheartened Democrats as well as to Independents and any remaining sane Republicans– that their votes are needed to save the Constitution, protect democracy, and remove the GOP crazies’ stranglehold that currently prevents Congress from functioning.

For those of us who have felt helpless against the drumbeat of depressing news, there is one thing we each can do: we can encourage everyone we know to register and we can follow up to ensure that they actually vote.

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When It REALLY Matters

A few days ago, in a column about Morton Marcus’ recommendations for changes to Indiana’s retrograde legislature, I alluded to a now-forgotten effort–bipartisan, even!–to reduce waste in Indiana’s government.

The Kernan-Shepard Commission, co-chaired by former Democratic Governor Joe Kernan and Republican then-Chief Justice of Indiana’s Supreme Court, Randy Shepard, had issued a report detailing the waste involved in maintaining 1008 townships in the state. The Commission recommended eliminating or consolidating a number of those townships, which–over the years–had been divested of most of the tasks they’d originally been created to perform.

Polling conducted by the Indiana Chamber of Commerce confirmed that a large majority of voters agreed that townships should go–that they wasted tax dollars better used elsewhere.  The problem was that it was a rare individual for whom this was salient–that is, a burning, issue.

It was a burning issue, however, for Township Trustees and the members of their Advisory Boards. Eliminating townships would eliminate the livelihoods of the Trustees (and the relatives too many of them employ). It would eliminate the inflated fees paid to many Advisory Board members for attending three or four meetings a year. The trustees and board members focused like lasers on Indiana’s legislators, bringing in people to testify, hiring lobbyists and calling in political favors.

For them, the issue was critically important–i.e., salient. And so Indiana still has 1008 townships.

In the Indiana Statehouse and in Washington, this same scenario plays out over and over. Most Americans disapprove of a number of decisions our lawmakers make or refuse to make–I consistently see comments disapproving of special tax breaks for the wealthy or fossil fuel companies, and Congressional refusal to even consider Medicare for All. How many of those who complain about the tax code and/or healthcare–or anything else– have written or called their lawmakers about these matters? Spent time or money lobbying for repeal or passage? Very few. On the other hand, the people who benefit from these policies–for whom they are salient– certainly have.

People rally to defend their interests, financial or cultural, and when those with lots of resources focus those resources on derailing or passing a proposed bill, the likely result is that the bill will be derailed or passed. So nothing changes.

On those rare occasions when a legislative issue becomes highly salient to a sizable number of voters, however, it’s possible for the “little guys”–the voters– to win these contests.

And that observation brings me to this year’s elections. For the first time in a long time, several partisan issues are highly salient to large numbers of voters. The most obvious of those is abortion. For many years, when Roe v. Wade protected women’s reproductive autonomy, all the passion–all the salience–was on the (misnamed) “pro-life” side. After Dobbs, that is no longer the case. Reproductive rights are suddenly very important, very salient, to huge numbers of voters, and not all of them are female.

It probably doesn’t rival abortion as a vote motivator, but thanks to the daily drumbeat of gun violence, gun safety is another issue that has become important/salient to large numbers of citizens. Several other issue speak forcefully to specific constituencies: the unremitting GOP attacks on trans children (one-half of one percent of American children, and thus a monumental threat) has raised the salience of those issues not just in the gay community but also among its numerous allies. Republican attacks on public schools and universities are deeply resented by educators and a considerable number of parents. Etc.

These issues aren’t just important to lots of people–they have the added benefit of being clear-cut. Tax policy, energy policy, healthcare–these areas give rise to complex and often arcane arguments. A debate about who should get to make reproductive decisions for an individual woman– the government or the woman whose life will be affected–is  far clearer. Whether a man who has been convicted of spousal abuse should be entitled to buy an assault rifle is equally clear.

Call me a Pollyanna, but I am convinced that the dramatically increased salience of these and other issues–together with widespread loathing of  Donald J.Trump and his lunatic cult– will help activists motivate an unprecedented and necessary turnout in November.

I sure hope I’m right….

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Okay, I Give–Let’s Talk About Hunter Biden

Every day, some news item stuns me, because it is either outrageous or ludicrous.

Among those reports, a large number properly land in the “outrageous” category. Numerous media outlets have reported, for example, that armed troops deployed by Texas Governor Greg Abbott prevented federal border agents from saving a woman and two children from drowning. (Abbott has been challenging Ron DeSantis for the title of worst psuedo-human to be Governor of a state, so his efforts to deny the accuracy of that report are–shall we say–unconvincing.)

Between them, Texas and Florida have largely dominated the “outrageous” category. Meanwhile,  however, the Congressional Oversight Committee’s “investigation” of Hunter Biden wins the “ludicrous” category in a walk.

I’ve ignored the continued focus on Hunter Biden, because it’s the rare family that doesn’t have at least one member who struggles. Some drink, some do drugs, some battle mental illness…some just never grow up. In many families, the parents of troubled children wash their hands of them; I find it admirable that Joe Biden has consistently put loving, supportive parenthood above political considerations.

Hunter is clearly a flawed person. But he is and has been a private citizen. He has held no government office, and despite months of efforts, investigators have found zero involvement by his father with any of his business dealings. Lawyer friends who represent clients facing similar charges tell me that if his name wasn’t Biden, a reasonable plea deal would have dispensed with his legal troubles months ago.

But only the word “ludicrous” properly describes the recent confrontation between Hunter Biden and  the GOP members of the Oversight Committee who angrily rejected his offer to testify publicly. Instead, they insist that the Committee should only accept testimony offered behind closed doors.

Hunter Biden showed up unexpectedly Wednesday on Capitol Hill, with a brief but dramatic appearance at a committee hearing as Republicans began the process of holding him in contempt of Congress for violating a subpoena seeking his closed-door testimony…

The committee hearing quickly devolved into a shouting match among committee members, with Republicans railing against Biden and accusing him of performing “a political stunt” as Democrats yelled back that it was Republicans who were playing politics, given that Biden had shown up and was willing to answer questions under oath in a public setting.

Think about that. The target of an investigation appears at a meeting of the Oversight Committee  and says, in effect: “okay. I’ll answer your questions, but only in public, because members of this committee have been caught in numerous misrepresentations of testimony given behind closed doors. I will testify in public so that my testimony cannot be twisted and mischaracterized.”

The GOP members of the committee went berserk.

“You are the epitome of White privilege coming into the Oversight Committee, spitting in our face, ignoring a congressional subpoena to be deposed,” said Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), addressing Biden directly. “What are you afraid of?”

Mace is White, and what “White privilege” has to do with this situation utterly escapes me, but Hunter Biden was very clear about what he was “afraid of.” He was afraid that people like Mace and Comer–the Committee chair– would lie about “closed door” testimony. It is an eminently justifiable fear based upon past performance.

Lowell told reporters outside the hearing room that his client was willing to testify in a public setting. The president’s son has refused to answer Republican House members’ questions behind closed doors, citing a concern that they would selectively leak his remarks to make him look bad.

“Hunter Biden was and is a private citizen,” Lowell said. “Despite this, Republicans have sought to use him as a surrogate to attack his father. And, despite their improper partisan motives, on six different occasions since February of 2023, we have offered to work with the House committees to see what and how relevant information to any legitimate inquiry could be provided.” …

His attendance at the hearing came one month after he made another surprise appearance, this one outside the Capitol to deliver remarks to reporters about the ongoing Republican attacks on him.

“For six years, I have been the target of the unrelenting Trump attack machine, shouting, ‘Where’s Hunter?’” he said on Dec. 13. “Well, here’s my answer: I am here.”

If this episode had played out in a television show or film, critics would pan it as over the top unbelievable– a clumsy effort to paint the GOP Committee members as dishonest idiots.

Whatever Hunter Biden’s personal deficits, they pale in comparison to the GOP’s effort to shield their dishonest game-playing and clumsy partisanship from public view.

I’d say he called their bluff.

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Don’t Argue With The True Believers

A recent column by Frank Bruni addressed an issue to which I often refer: the growing gap between GOP rhetoric (and presumably, belief) and that fact-based thing we call reality.

Bruni wrote:

When it comes to manipulating the information space, getting inside people’s heads, creating alternative realities and mass confusion — he’s as good as anyone since the 1930s, and you know who I’m talking about,” said Jonathan Rauch, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the author of the 2021 book “The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth.” Rauch characterized the stolen election claims by Trump and his enablers as “the most audacious and Russian-style disinformation attack on the United States that we’ve ever seen” and questioned whether, under a second Trump administration, we’d become a country “completely untethered from reality.”

A post to Daily Kos elaborated on that lack of a tether, quoting Stephen Colbert for the often-repeated line that “Reality has a well-known liberal bias,” and pointing to the myriad ways in which reality deviates from the preferred Republican version.

Trump really did lose in 2020. But it goes far beyond Trump and and his 30,000+ lies. Slavery really was an unredeemable horror for Blacks. Anti-abortion laws really are killing women. Gender dysphoria really exists. Same-sex marriages really work. Racism really is systemic in the United States. Jews really don’t control the world (if we did, we’d do a better job!). The economy really is doing much better under Biden than under Trump. The Earth (which really is 4.5 billion years old, give or take) really does revolve around the sun.

The post also linked to an article in the Atlantic–behind a paywall–in which the author, son of a preacher, told of the congregation’s outrage when his father’s successor preached a sermon about Christians’ obligation to protect ‘God’s creation’ from climate change. Although many Christian denominations acknowledge the reality of climate change and the need to address it, in churches like his father’s, climate change denial is part of being a “real” Christian.

Fundamentalist Christians used to avoid politics. No more. In fact, in a very real sense, for many of them, being Republican has become their version of being Christian.

The reverse is equally true: large numbers of dyed-in-the-wool Republicans have transformed what was formerly a political identity into a quasi-religious one. Political lies and conspiracy theories have morphed into something akin to theological doctrine. The absence of proof–the lack of any empirical or factual support–is irrelevant. (You can’t prove the existence  or non-existence of God in a laboratory, either.)

I asked a psychiatrist friend to tell me what happens when such people come face to face with well-documented evidence debunking their beliefs. Evidently, the four most likely reactions are: denial (true believers simply deny the facts or dismiss them as false or biased); cognitive dissonance (they experience the discomfort that arises when a person holds conflicting beliefs); resort to confirmation bias (true believers seek out information that supports their original beliefs, or provides an excuse to discount the evidence before them); and what is called the “backfire effect,” in which they become even more entrenched in their preferred version of reality.

Least likely is a change of opinion to accord with the evidence.

Instead, these “true believers” perceive the contradictory information as an existential threat to their identities or world-views, a threat that is much more likely to trigger a defensive response than a change of opinion.

Recent headlines report that some 25% of Americans now believe that the FBI was responsible for the January 6th insurrection. Those Americans are the true believers;  I would characterize such a political opinion–a conviction so divorced from reality and contrary to all available evidence– as quasi-religious. However we characterize such departures from reality, however, we need to understand that those who cling to these beliefs are unmovable. Time spent arguing with them, or showing them evidence to the contrary, is time wasted.

The only way Democrats will win elections in 2024 is by voting in sufficiently large numbers. Poll after poll shows that large majorities of voters agree with Democratic policy positions, and that rational Americans outnumber the true believers.  The problem is: far too many of the inhabitants of the real world–for one reason or another–fail to vote.

We don’t need to waste time trying to convert the denizens of never-never land. We need to put all of our efforts into getting out the vote.

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The Rest Of The Story

Yesterday, I linked to this essay in the American Prospect, written by historian Rick Perlstein. It identified the three sides of an “Infernal triangle,” which it identified as “authoritarian Republicans, ineffectual Democrats and a clueless media.” The essay was pithy–and in my opinion, perceptive enough–to warrant additional citation.

I was especially struck by Perlstein’s analysis of media bias toward the GOP. That bias is not ideological, at least not in the political sense; it arises from deeply-seated notions of what constitutes “proper” political journalism. As he writes,

A political journalism adequate to this moment must throw so many of our received notions about how politics works into question. For one thing, it has to treat the dissemination of conventional but structurally distorting journalistic narratives as a crucial part of the story of how we got to this point.

 For instance, the way mainstream American political journalism has built in a structural bias toward Republicans. If one side in a two-sided fight is perfectly willing to lie, cheat, steal, and intimidate without remorse in order to win, and journalists, as a matter of genre convention, must “balance” the ledger between “both sides,” in the interest of “fairness,” that is systematically unfair to the side less willing to lie, cheat, steal, and intimidate. Journalism that feels compelled to adjudge both “sides” as equally vicious, when they are anything but, works like one of those booster seats you give a toddler in a restaurant so that they can sit eye to eye with the grown-ups. It is a systematic distortion of reality built into mainstream political journalism’s very operating system.

A recent example was one of NBC News’s articles in response to Donald Trump’s new turn of phrase in describing immigration. It was headlined: “Trump Sparks Republican Backlash After Saying Immigrants Are ‘Poisoning the Blood’ of the U.S.”

It took exceptional ingenuity for someone at NBC to figure out how to wrench one side’s embrace of race science into the consensus frame, where “both sides” “agree” that major presidential candidates should not imitate Nazis. That frame squeezes out any understanding of how Trump’s provocations rest along a continuum of Republican demonization of immigrants going back decades (“Build the dang fence,” as John McCain put it in 2010), and that most Republicans nonetheless support Trump (or candidates who say much the same things) down the line.

Pravda stuff, in its way. Imagine the headache for historians of the United States a hundred years from now, if there is a United States a hundred years from now, seeking to disentangle from journalism like that what the Republican Party of 2024 is actually like.

The inadequacy of the Democratic response adds to the cluelessness of our current media environment. In the face of a truly enormous threat to America’s constitutional democracy, Perlstein points to

Democratic “counterprogramming”: actions actively signaling contempt for the party’s core non-elite and anti-elitist base of support. That’s a term of art from the Clinton years, but it has its origins as far back as the early 1950s, when Adlai Stevenson Sister Souljah’ed a meeting with party liberals by announcing himself opposed to Truman’s goal of a national health care program, derided federal funding of public housing, and came out in favor of the anti-union Taft-Hartley Act.

Another Democratic tradition associates political surrender with moral nobility. Al Gore, for example, had wanted to concede on Election Night 2000, based merely on network projections that had Bush up by 4,600 votes in Florida—and not even wait for the actual initial count, which ending up having Bush ahead by only a few hundred.

This is the infernal triangle that structures American politics.

In one corner, a party consistently ratcheting toward authoritarianism, refusing as a matter of bedrock principle—otherwise they are “Republicans in Name Only”—to compromise with adversaries they frame as ineluctably evil and seek literally to destroy.

In the second corner, a party that says that, in a political culture where there is not enough compromise, the self-evident solution is to offer more compromise—because those guys’ extremist fever, surely, is soon to break …

And in the third corner, those agenda-setting elite political journalists, who frame the Democrats as one of the “sides” in a tragic folie à deux destroying a nation otherwise united and at peace with itself because both sides stubbornly … refuse to compromise.

And here we are.

I would frame the sides a bit differently. Today’s GOP is a fascist cult that must be defeated if American democracy is to survive. Democrats are feckless, true–but it’s hard to  message to a “big tent” that includes everyone from rational folks fleeing the GOP to voters to the left of Bernie Sanders.

It’s the journalism that normalizes the fascism and highlights the fecklessness that will destroy us.

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