Cromwell

Sir Geoffrey Howe had had enough. Margaret Thatcher had treated him with contempt for years and had finally fired him. When he subsequently let loose about her, he was called “The Sheep that Roared.” It was the beginning of the end for the Thatcher government.

Bill Cassidy gave Trump his manhood and received nothing in return. Trump endorsed his primary opponent, who won handily. Cassidy consequently had nothing to lose by doing the right thing and opposing Todd Blanche. Today, he announced that he would cast the deciding vote for a man who has contributed mightily to the wrecking of the DOJ.

Are you surprised? I’m not. I predicted that Susan Collins would vote no, but that Blanche would be confirmed anyway.

In the early years of this blog, I opined that the fundamental split in the blue team revolved around means, not ends; in other words, the left wanted dramatic increases in the size of the welfare state, while the center thought they were not politically or economically possible. I labeled these groups “realos” and “fundis,” the terms used to describe groupings within the German Green Party. Does that analysis hold up today?

It does. The DSA, notwithstanding its name, is really a faction of Social Democrats that is more interested in expanding the welfare state than in nationalizing the means of production. More centrist Democrats have no theoretical objection to this goal but doubt the American electorate will tolerate the large tax increases that would be required to finance it. The obvious example is “Medicare for All;” the left wants it now, while the center, based on the numbers and our experience with Obamacare, thinks it is unattainable for the foreseeable future, whatever its merits.

The division between the two groupings is fairly easy to overcome; the center doesn’t have any fundamental objection to voting for someone who tells them to follow their dreams instead of their fears, and the left will vote for half a loaf rather than nothing. The real practical question is whether the left alienates enough swing voters to lose elections. We’ll get a partial answer to that when we see who wins Michigan in November.

Who would be the ideal nominee? Here are my criteria:

1. It would be a man. I don’t agree that a woman can’t win, but running a woman hurts on the margins.
2. He would have no ties to the Biden administration, so he can’t be associated with Biden’s perceived failures.
3. He is a successful governor.
4. He is young, articulate, and charismatic.
5. He knows how to communicate with social media.
6. He isn’t afraid to take moderate, well-reasoned positions on culture war issues.
7. He doesn’t describe himself as a socialist.
8. He opposes Trump vigorously, but without veering to the left on issues which create vulnerability for Democrats. In other words, he doesn’t think rejecting Trumpism naturally requires defunding the police or throwing open the borders.
9. He understands that the McConnell version of the Constitution doesn’t work and must be changed. I have laid out the kinds of reforms that are possible in previous posts.
10. He will actually promote a balanced form of liberal democracy that moves power away from the executive and the Supreme Court to Congress even if it means limiting his own options for change.

We won’t get this paragon. Let’s hope we get someone close to it.

Michigan is a blue state. As of today, it has a Democratic governor and two Democratic senators. Its automobile industry has been hit hard by Trump’s capriciousness. It has extensive economic ties with Canada that have been jeopardized by the current administration. Inflation is up; real wages are down; and the war is a disaster. Throw in a young, charismatic, media-savvy candidate for the Senate, and you have a walkover–right?

Not exactly, given that candidate’s hard left-wing views on a wide range of issues. Michelle Goldberg is right; this is a litmus test for the left. If El-Sayed does not win this election, given all of the advantages he starts with, it will send a message that the Democrats have to nominate a centrist in 2028 unless the state of the country is so dire that they cannot possibly lose.

I have previously noted that Roy Cooper and Sherrod Brown are saying nothing about Trump in their commercials. Are there Senate races in which Trump is the featured actor?

Yes. In Maine, a blue state, the key issue is the degree to which Susan Collins is genuinely independent of Trump. She has some facts on her side, but she will have to defend plenty of her other votes. Does Maine want someone who believes Trump is right on most of the issues, but not some of the big ones, or someone who opposes him at every turn? We will find out in November.

In the Michigan Senate race, the GOP candidate, Mike Rogers, will portray the newly minted Democratic standard bearer as a wokester, an antisemite, and a socialist. There will be a grain of truth in these allegations. El-Sayed will respond by tying Rogers to Trump at every turn. Will animosity towards Trump be enough to overcome culture war liabilities? Since Michigan is a swing state in presidential elections, this race will tell us a great deal about whether a conspicuously left leaning Democrat has a real chance to win in 2028.

I’ve got those dirty, lowdown, Trump midterm blues.

You have to be aware of it; it’s all over the news.

Progressives keep on beating me; the party’s got to choose.

It’s time for us to unify, or else we’re going to lose.

___________________

We have to get together to take on the New Right.

Good candidates are needed to carry on the fight.

Americans hate socialists; they haven’t seen the light.

If Trump keeps hold of Congress, we can say goodnight.

_______________

I’ve got the blues.

The out of power blues.

I know the left dislikes me

But I’ve paid my dues.

Republicans are vulnerable;

We could have a blue wave.

We have to make it happen

Or the nation can’t be saved.

Iran is apparently hacking into the municipal water systems of towns in Minnesota and Michigan. Why?

The Iranian leadership apparently doesn’t know the difference between red and blue states. If they really wanted Trump to feel some pain, their targets would be in Texas.

Unlike Trump, MBS has learned from his mistakes. He didn’t encourage Trump to start the war, because he now prefers a stable to a volatile Middle East. Trump followed Bibi’s advice rather than his, however, and the current chaos ensued.

Over the past few months, Trump has bounced like a ping-pong ball between MBS and Bibi. He made a deal to sell nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia but then added an unacceptable condition the next day at the behest of the Israelis. He repeatedly threatens to escalate to appease Bibi but then backs down and promises to negotiate in order to satisfy American public opinion and the Saudis.

Has MBS figured out that, for all of Trump’s admiration of his political style and his aesthetic, the current administration simply cannot be trusted? Probably.

The root cause of the smoke from Canadian wildfires that plagued us last week is climate change. Donald Trump doesn’t accept that, of course; he maintains that climate change is a Chinese hoax. He says he plans to punish the Canadians for imposing their smoke on us in some as yet undetermined way. It is fair to assume it will include tariffs.

Personally, I think Trump’s ambitions are way too limited here. What about the cold fronts from Canada that make our lives miserable in the winter? Don’t they deserve a tariff, too?

According to the NYT, Trump is angry at the oil companies because they haven’t given him enough credit for their record profits. At the same time, he is annoyed that they haven’t reduced prices for consumers.

Makes sense to me. I can’t imagine why the oil companies won’t express their gratitude to Trump for enriching them by starting his stupid war. That would certainly go over well with the public.

Both Governor DeWine and Senator Husted say they have been promised there won’t be a massive immigration raid in Springfield. That answers one of the questions I raised in a previous post.

For now, at least. Minneapolis showed Trump that shows of force to demonstrate dominance don’t appeal to swing voters. They do, however, make the base happy, so don’t be surprised if the Springfield Haitians are targeted shortly after the election.

Rubio and Ratcliffe told Trump that Bibi’s plan to force regime change through bombing alone was ridiculous. J.D. never supported the war. Even Hegseth just followed orders. No, the responsibility for the unsuccessful war rests solely on the president’s shoulders, which makes him a loser. Since he can’t tolerate being viewed as a loser, someone will have to pay for his mistakes. Who will it be?

To fire any of his principal advisers would be an admission of failure, so I don’t see that happening. Trump will be concerned that his domestic political opponents–even the lukewarm members of his own party–will get the message from the Iranians that it is possible to stand up to him. He can’t permit that, so you can expect him to become even more capricious and autocratic at home.

J.D. likes to tie “Heritage American” status to the Civil War, which raises a question: how does he feel about the Confederacy?

From the reviews of his latest book, the answer is pretty clear. He will concede that slavery was wrong and that the Confederacy was fighting for a bad cause. Individual Confederate soldiers, on the other hand, were as brave and noble as those fighting for the Union. After the war, they came together to inhabit and develop the West and to build the country we know and love today. They consequently bear no blame for slavery or the war. Whatever sins they might have committed have long since been redeemed.

Really? They actually built a new South that was as close to the old one as possible. It was a backward, Third World land with a plantation economy premised on cheap labor, low taxes on landowners, the denial of political rights to black people, agriculture, and the extraction of natural resources. As I’ve noted before, that economy still exists in some areas of the former Confederacy today.

The Civil War, regardless of what J.D. thinks, was about treason and slavery, and he is siding with the traitors for reasons of political expediency. Were they really better Americans than today’s immigrants? Not by any reasonable standard.

For decades, the Republican brand has been built on distrust of government. If the electorate thinks the government is corrupt and inept, the thinking goes, they will vote to limit its powers and return money and freedom to the people. In practice, of course, the primary beneficiaries of this were wealthy businessmen, who welcome the tax cuts and the deregulation.

The problem now is that populists from both the left and the right are opposed to Trump’s dream of data centers from sea to sea. How can the GOP leadership turn off the public’s cynicism just in this particular field? So far, by making backroom deals to avoid public scrutiny until the last possible moment and by running bait-and-switch campaign commercials about AI regulation, it seems.

In the long run, that will only make the problem worse. It also presents an opportunity for the Democrats, if they can figure out how to use it.

He was a charismatic, larger than life figure with a childlike enthusiasm for war. He was an open and passionate imperialist who believed the world was the beneficiary if his country expanded its political and cultural influence. The media adored him, as did some of the public; the rest saw him as volatile and dangerous.

Is it TR or Churchill? It’s both, of course.