Month: September 2018

Alfred Dreyfus was a Jewish army officer who didn’t do it, told the truth, and was railroaded by a French establishment that desperately needed a scapegoat.  Brett Kavanaugh is the child of privilege who capitalized on his family’s money and connections all his life, lied repeatedly under oath, and felt entitled to lash out at anyone with the temerity to question him because, after all, he had earned that Supreme Court seat by getting good grades at Yale.  And it is very likely that he did do it.

Not exactly the same thing.

 

There is every reason to believe that Ford is telling the truth, but to me, that isn’t decisive.  I still think the statute of limitations has long since run on anything Kavanaugh did in high school.

Kavanaugh lost me for two reasons.  First, he lied repeatedly during his testimony, even on minor items like the meaning of “boofed.”  Second, by giving an interview to Fox News and lashing out at Democrats, he established that he is nothing but a right-wing partisan with little interest in persuading anyone to the contrary.  As a result, confirming him will damage public confidence in the judicial system, which needs to be avoided at all costs.

If the FBI is able to do its job properly, my best guess is that they will find that the episode could have happened as Ford described it, notwithstanding Kavanaugh’s denials, but that they cannot prove that it did happen, due to the passage of time and the effects of alcohol.  Party line politics will take over from that point forward, and the country will be much the worse for it.

Is it Mark or Brett?  You decide.

Life in the time of Trump.

Brett Kavanaugh’s in town.

Chaos erupts;

It’s all corrupt;

The system’s going down.

You think we’re low as we can go

And then it gets much worse.

We live in interesting times.

So goes the Chinese curse.

On the Trump nominee known as Brett.

The hearing’s not quite over yet.

On the issue of “boof”

We just didn’t get proof.

I believe that’s as low as it gets.

Flake has the opportunity to go out in a blaze of bipartisan glory, just like McCain.  Will he take it?  I’m not optimistic, but we will find out today.

Update:  He’s a mouse!  I’m sure you’re surprised.

Update to update:  He changed his position–sort of.  He’s still a mouse to me.

Ford’s testimony was very credible, even according to Fox News commentators.  That left Kavanaugh and the GOP senators with the following choices:  (a) label her a liar in spite of all appearances; (b) change the subject and say, essentially, that neither Ford’s charges nor Kavanaugh’s credibility matter; or (c) hold off on a vote and actually do a real investigation and let the chips fall where they may.

The one they didn’t choose was (c).  Kavanaugh went into Trump/Clarence Thomas mode and lashed out at the Democrats, thereby confirming that he is just a political hack, not the nonpartisan figure he implausibly claimed to be, and the senators became accomplices in Trumpian misogyny.  No one can plausibly maintain now that Trump’s attitudes towards women are an outlier in the GOP;  they are, in fact, the mainstream on the Judiciary Committee.

Will the GOP be punished for it in November?  Very possibly.

Don’t Let the Bitches Get You Down

You worked your butt off all your life.

Your nose was always clean.

You earned your house, your job, your wife.

You know just what I mean.

But now it’s coming off the rails

And they laugh at you uptown.

Don’t let the bitches get you down.

 

What do they want? You never know.

Is it money or just fame?

The fun was fast, but torture’s slow.

It’s tough to clear your name.

They’ll tie you up in silken knots

And treat you like a clown.

Don’t let the bitches get you down.

 

The backlash can’t come soon enough

To save you from this fight.

I know it’s hard, and times are tough

But we both know you’re right.

I’ll stand beside you till the end.

We’re bros, my fellow hound.

Don’t let the bitches get you down.

Donald went to the globalist lion’s den (i.e., the UN) on Tuesday.  His “Bitch, we’re America” speech somehow didn’t go over well with his international audience.  They laughed at him!  Imagine that!  BAD!

Time to order up some new tariffs.  Bet that will stop the laughter.  If that doesn’t work, we still have nukes in reserve.

CBS unveiled a new program called “FBI” this week.  Under ordinary circumstances, nothing could be more banal than a program portraying FBI agents as brilliant, selfless public servants keeping the country safe;  in today’s world, however, any positive picture of the FBI has to be viewed as a political statement.

In light of that, I found myself wondering what kind of programming Fox could run to satisfy Trump’s base.  Here are some thoughts:

1.  Frackin’ Up!  Drama about heroic workers in fossil fuel industries trying to give America energy dominance in spite of government overregulation.

2.  Real American Family:  A family consisting solely of straight white Christians does battle with politically correct neighbors.  Starring Roseanne Barr.

3.  Wall Street Blues:  Young bankers struggle to survive in New York on a salary of only $1 million.

4.  Build That Wall!  Game show in which the best wall builder wins cash and prizes.

5.  My Favorite Russian:  Hilarious comedy about a bromance between purely fictional Russian and American presidents.

6.  ICE:  Heroic federal agents catch and deport Muslim terrorists disguised as Central American women and children.  Starring Chuck Norris.

And, of course,

7.  Deep State:  Brilliant political outsider is elected president and takes on the smug, corrupt elite.  Guest appearances by Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and James Comey.  Special guest appearance by Bob Mueller.  Starring Brad Pitt.

Well, in his dreams, anyway.

So, are you nauseous yet?

The confirmation hearings have been everything I predicted–and worse.  Here is a list of what I consider to be the errors on both sides:

1.  Trump shouldn’t have nominated such an obvious GOP partisan, but he did.
2.  Kavanaugh should have been willing to answer reasonable questions about his judicial philosophy, but he wasn’t.
3.  If it was even appropriate to go down that road, the Ford information should have been introduced earlier, but it wasn’t.
4.  The senators who expressed opinions about the credibility of the parties should have kept quiet until the hearing was over.
5.  The FBI should have been called in to do a proper investigation, but it wasn’t.
6.  Kavanaugh should have been less smarmy and more forthcoming about his hard-partying youth, but he wasn’t.
7.  Kavanaugh never, never, never should have given an interview to Fox News.
8.  The final vote should have been delayed until a real investigation was done and all of the parties interviewed, but it won’t be.

And so, the likely outcome is that somehow, magically, all the Republicans find Kavanaugh credible, all of the Democrats find him incredible, he is ultimately confirmed, the GOP loses moderate female votes in November, Kavanaugh is remembered for the rest of his life as a Bill Cosby in waiting by half the population, and the Supreme Court’s reputation for fairness and probity is damaged substantially.

Somewhere, Vladimir Putin is laughing, and not just at Trump.

 

In the past, when American presidents have imposed tariffs, it has been done for narrow and well-defined purposes.  American and Chinese commentators alike have noted that Trump’s tariffs are different;  they don’t come with a clear wish list, and no one knows exactly what they are intended to accomplish.  What does Trump want?

When he took office, I was fairly certain that his objective was 80’s style managed trade in the interests of reducing the deficit, which is, of course, a weird obsession of his.  Today, I’m not so sure.  I think he has two other purposes:

1. To force the Chinese to openly acknowledge his supreme power over them and the rest of the world; and
2.  What amounts to regime change–China must evolve into a genuine market economy and stop challenging American economic and military superiority.

What is the likelihood of this happening?  As to #1, the Chinese are probably willing to make cosmetic concessions to the barbarian–they have been doing that for thousands of years–but nothing more than that.  As to #2, forget it;  the regime isn’t going to commit suicide just to maintain access to the American market.

And so, unless Trump changes course and makes a fairly meaningless deal in the interests of chalking up an ego-driven “win,” which is a reasonable possibility, the trade war will go on indefinitely.

Kavanaugh took the extremely unusual step of doing an interview on Fox News last night.  The contents of the interview are of less interest than the choice of forum.  It would appear that Kavanaugh is trying to rally the GOP base to support his nomination, which would make perfect sense if he were a politician, but he isn’t, at least in theory.  He is supposed to be above politics.

The principal objection to Kavanaugh in my eyes is not his sex life as a teenager, but that he will just be a stooge for Trump and the GOP agenda.  His record as a partisan political figure prior to serving on the DC Circuit was always of some concern in that regard.  The interview with a channel known for its GOP affiliations has only made things worse, and will damage the image of the Supreme Court in the likely event that he is ultimately confirmed, because no one is going to believe he has any interest in giving his political opponents a fair hearing, no matter what he said during the confirmation process.

For Trump, the entire notion of an apolitical judicial system is just so much sentimental hooey, so he probably thinks destroying our illusions is a good thing.  It isn’t.  Like the markets, the judicial system runs on public trust, not just raw power.  If that trust ultimately disappears as the result of overtly partisan judicial behavior, either tyranny or anarchy will follow.

 

Reactionaries, by definition, revere a mythical past in which traditional values and authorities were uniformly respected, and the country was great as a result of it.  Reactionary thought is consequently romantic in nature.  It is not based on cold economic self-interest.

For that reason, it is frequently impossible to “reason” with a Reactionary, as we typically use that term.  In most cases, appealing to their economic interests, and complaining when they ignore them, is useless.  The Democrats may be able to pick off a few here and there, particularly by employing the old labor solidarity narrative with union members, but most of their votes are out of reach, and chasing them won’t be cost-effective.

No, I won’t back down.

No, I won’t back down.

You can stand me up at the gates of hell

Gonna stand my ground.

And I won’t back down.

—–Tom Petty

Commentators from all over the political spectrum have noted that conservative judges are plentiful and fairly fungible, so Trump could withdraw the Kavanaugh nomination and still wind up with a very similar result.  The question for today is, will he?

Of course not.  Trump has to personally identify with the poor entitled frat boy swatting at the pesky #MeToo monsters like an embattled King Kong.  In addition, he learned long ago that backing down just betrays weakness, and weakness is to be avoided at all costs.  Be on the attack 24/7/365.  That’s what made America great.  At least, it’s what made him great.

And so, we’re heading for some awful theater that will combine features of both comedy and tragedy.  It will be must see TV.  But then, the OJ chase was, too.