Category: Uncategorized

Reactionaries love tariffs, so in general, red states are more protectionist than blue states. That rule of thumb is not universal, however; states with large agricultural export businesses support free trade, while some blue states (think Michigan here) lean protectionist. In addition, the very notion of individual states imposing tariffs sounds unworkable. How would MTG respond?

I’m afraid she would have to settle for the status quo on this one. The only entity that realistically has the ability to handle trade issues is the federal government.

(Donald Trump is speaking to Conservative Republicans Against Progress, or
“CRAP.” Silence! The man on golf cart is about to start.)

I have a dream! (The audience roars in appreciation.) Do you want to know what it is? (Scattered voices in the audience say they do.)

I’m going to put America in a time machine and take us back 70 years, to 1953. I was around then, so I remember it. Do you know what it was like?

America was Number One. Europe and Japan were down on their knees, asking for handouts. China didn’t count. It was just us and the Russians. That’s the way it should be.

There were no culture wars. We didn’t have drugs or crime. Christians were in charge. No one had ever heard of a trans person. Gay people were in the closet. The South was segregated. A few black people thrived, but mostly, they knew their place and shut up. Women stayed at home and had babies. Lots of real American babies. Feminism didn’t exist.

Men were respected then. They had jobs–good jobs. Jobs for strong men. They worked in mines and steel mills. They made stuff. America was the workshop for the world.

Sure, there were some things that weren’t so great. We didn’t have the internet–just black and white TV with a few channels. Fox News didn’t exist. The cars looked great, but they didn’t run very well. We didn’t know if the Russians would use the bomb or not. Taxes on people like me were way too high. And, of course, it wasn’t too great for women and minorities, but who cares? It’s about real America, not them.

Wouldn’t you rather be there than here? Vote for me, and I’ll take you there. Come home, real America! (The almost exclusively white and elderly audience erupts.)

Crapto is supposed to be a substitute for conventional banking, right? But Signature Bank ultimately collapsed largely due to its involvement in . . . wait for it . . . crapto!

Am I the only one who sees the irony in this? I hope not.

Thanks to a 19th century Supreme Court decision, the authority for the civil rights legislation of the 1960s was ultimately found in the Commerce Clause, not the Fourteenth Amendment. The amendment, however, is continuing evidence of the Union’s hateful (to the right) victory in the Civil War. It provides the authority for gay marriage and other claims based on sex and race that are obnoxious to the right. It incorporates the Bill of Rights, another right-wing grievance. It at least arguably makes the debt ceiling unconstitutional. Finally, it makes children of illegal immigrants who are born on American soil American citizens. Nothing could drive the extreme right crazier than that.

If you’re MTG, it has to go. Period.

The Commerce Clause would present a serious challenge to MTG. On the one hand, the American single market would be unthinkable without it, and even MTG probably wouldn’t want to give up the corresponding economic benefits. If you doubt that, think about the products you consumed today and count the number that were produced locally. On the other hand, the Commerce Clause provided most of the authority for the vast expansion of federal powers over the last century–including the civil rights legislation that is so loathed by the right–and would create an obstacle to state regulation of woke capital. How would MTG deal with this conundrum?

My best guess is that she would keep it in place, but require a stronger nexus between interstate commerce and any new proposed federal legislation. That would make more sense under current conditions than going back to the nineteenth century legal distinction between “commerce” and “production.”

A year ago, a large majority of Republicans supported Ukraine and opposed the Russian invasion. That should hardly come as a surprise; most GOP voters grew up during the Cold War, and they viewed the Russians as the longstanding historical enemy. Today, however, only about half of the GOP thinks we should be sending money and weapons to Ukraine. The reason for that is a single man: Tucker Carlson.

The GOP base is so emotionally tied to Fox News in general, and Carlson in particular, that it is prepared to ignore a lifetime of conditioning and embrace Putin. My observations about this are as follows:

1. While I still think DeSantis has made a tactical error by chasing Trump’s voters instead of the remainder of the Republican electorate, you can understand why he would accept the Trump/Carlson view of the war.
2. You can also understand why Putin won’t give up on the war. Why should he, when Carlson and the GOP right might deliver Ukraine to him on a silver platter in 2025?

The planning of Disney’s Florida facilities is now under the supervision of DeSantis cronies. Some of them apparently have suggested that they will try to squeeze the wokeness out of the company if it asks for new planning and infrastructure approvals.

What kind of demands will they make? Will they insist on reviewing and vetting all new Disney movies? Will they try to fire any LGBTQ park employees? Will they prohibit LGBTQ people from visiting the parks?

Nothing is unthinkable at this point. The sky’s the limit.

Somewhat unusually, our federal government possesses only enumerated powers. This was more a concession to reality than a statement of principle in 1787; given the physical size and population density of the new American nation and the quality of transportation networks, extensive reliance on the existing state and local governments was inevitable. To a large extent, however, the gray area between state and federal authority was filled in by the Elastic Clause, which consequently became the source of most of the disputes between the Federalists and the Republicans. Even Jefferson had to rely on it for authority to consummate the Louisiana Purchase, however.

If you’re MTG, this is a problem. You need to take some of the elasticity out of the Elastic Clause to protect red state autonomy; otherwise, some new Hamilton will undoubtedly try to encroach on the liberties of “real Americans”. While you’re at it, you might as well amend the Constitution to modernize and further limit the enumerated powers. Actually, that wouldn’t be a bad idea even if you don’t believe in Jewish space lasers.

In case you ever doubted it, prominent members of the right have recently made it clear that trans people have no right to exist. You also already know that trans people suffer disproportionately from depression and are sometimes driven to suicide as the result of public hostility and discrimination.

If you’re a right-winger, why not combine the two concepts? Support state-assisted suicide for trans people! It’s a logical next step after you ban vaccines.

The MTG version of the Bill of Rights would look very different from the one that has evolved over the centuries. Second Amendment rights would be absolute and unconditional. The First Amendment would only apply to conservative white Christians; the opinions of all others would be subject to strict state government censorship. The Establishment Clause would be read to authorize government support for a range of Christian denominations, and religious tests would be applied to voting and officeholding. The rights of criminal defendants would be curtailed in an effort to reduce crime. Finally, the residual powers of states would be beefed up at the expense of government at higher and lower levels. How would we get from here to there?

The most important part of the puzzle would be a constitutional amendment which explicitly states that the limitations on government in the Bill of Rights, and all of the jurisprudence following its approval, only apply to the federal government. State constitutions, legislatures, and courts would be free to enforce completely new interpretations of these fundamental rights. Red state governments would do so, with a vengeance.

MTG has announced that America needs a “national divorce.” By that, she has made it clear she is not calling for secession; she simply wants a dramatic rollback of the powers of the federal government to permit the red states to be governed exclusively in the interests of conservative white Christians. In effect, she is calling for the repeal of the Constitution, and the return of the Articles of Confederation. Now, that’s old school!

How could this be accomplished? What would MTG’s America look like? What challenges would she face? I will be addressing these questions throughout the week.

We shouldn’t try to sugarcoat it; the Saudi-Iranian agreement is a slap in Joe Biden’s face. Saudi Arabia clearly views America as an unreliable partner and wants to go on its own way. MBS would prefer to hang out with his fellow autocrats–Xi and Putin–than with annoying democrats who hector him on human rights while asking for lower oil prices. Using a Chinese mediator to midwife the deal is proof of that.

But is this such a bad thing for America? Biden clearly wants to disengage in the Middle East and focus on China; this will help. One less potential war in the Middle East is a positive, not a negative, development. America no longer has responsibility for any diplomatic or military mistakes that MBS may make, or for his autocratic rule. If radical Islam makes a comeback, the counterrevolutionaries won’t be able to point to us as the ultimate guarantors of MBS’ government. Finally, it means America is the only game in town for Israel if it wants a war with Iran. That gives us more leverage over Netanyahu and his radical right-wing pals.

You can consequently make a decent argument that we are better off than we were two days ago. The same cannot be said for the Israeli government, which probably believed that the march towards normalization could not be stopped. The security alternative of a Saudi alliance is gone, at least for the moment. It is America or nothing.

In what can only be described as a diplomatic revolution, the Saudis and the Iranians made a deal yesterday. Both sides agreed to reopen their embassies, and the Iranians presumably promised to stop attacking Saudi oil fields and cut their support for the Houthis and other Shiite militant groups. The deal was brokered by the Chinese. In addition, the Saudis named their price for normalization with Israel; the requested concessions were all demanded from, not Israel, but the US, as if we were the chief beneficiary of the deal. These terms will not be accepted by the US government.

For the Iranians, the agreement is a painful concession to reality; the Islamic Republic is overstretched and unpopular at home, and can no longer afford to confront all of Sunni Islam as well as America and Israel. For the Chinese, it is a way of flexing diplomatic muscles and ensuring a stable flow of oil. For the Saudis, it is a declaration of independence from the US, a trend that started in the last phases of the Trump era and has accelerated under Biden. MBS, as I noted in a previous post, shares a number of characteristics with Xi; with Chinese support and no real external security threats, he is free to exercise his autocratic powers to remake his country in any way he likes. The previous subservience for security deal with America is now superfluous–at least, as long as the new agreement holds, which is subject to question.

All three of these nations are the apparent winners of the deal; America and Israel are the losers. Are they, really? I will address that question tomorrow.

“Social Security is on an unsustainable path,” said the experts. The current retirement age was too low to deal with longer lifespans. The system would be bankrupted without substantial change. It was essential to increase the retirement age slowly in order to maintain solvency.

The year was 1983, and the retirement age was, in fact, increased. It is still increasing today and is not particularly generous to American workers, when compared to European pension schemes. But we are once again hearing that the system is unsustainable, and that the retirement age is too low. Is that true? Have there been dramatic increases in lifespans since 1983? Do we need to pile on a second increase?

No. The current demographic issue is the lack of younger taxpayers, not any sweeping change in life expectancy. The obvious way to deal with that problem, as with the issue of unfilled jobs, is to permit more immigration.

Democrats believe that a decent level of health care is a right, not a privilege, in a society such as ours that can afford it. Republicans, by and large, don’t agree. They think health care is a commodity like any other–like a car, or food–that must be earned, and should not be provided by the government. That is why they appear to be determined to cut both Medicaid and Obamacare, even though no specific plans have been released to date.

The GOP concept would work if the workers the party claims to represent could actually afford health care without subsidies. Republicans, unfortunately, oppose all efforts to increase worker power (and thus wages); they also oppose any meaningful attempts to rein in health care costs. So how are average workers–even reactionary white Christian workers–supposed to pay for health care in the GOP universe? They can’t, of course.

Health care is a field in which the Democrats have an inherent advantage under most circumstances. When the GOP is trying to take existing rights away, as opposed to the Democrats increasing the size of programs, the advantage becomes much greater. The left needs to take full advantage of this gift from the right over the next two years.