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I was going to say “GOP Convention,” but the GOP is nothing but Donald Trump, and this extravaganza will prove it. Here’s what you can expect to see:

1. PANDEMIC? WHAT PANDEMIC?: It’s an act of God. No one could have done any better. As Mark McGwire once said, “I’m not here to talk about the past.”
2. EVERYONE ELSE IS TO BLAME: Blame Cuomo. Blame Newsom. Blame Pelosi. Blame Fauci. Blame Birx. Blame Schumer. Above all, blame China. They’re at fault for everything. I’m not even sure I like Xi anymore.
3. BIDEN IS A SENILE, WIMPY TROJAN HORSE: Look at me and how smart and virile I am! I’m still young and spry enough to play 36 holes (using a cart, of course) every day! Take that, Biden!
4. TAX CUTS AND CONSERVATIVE JUDGES: You liked the first four years. You ain’t seen nothing yet. The payroll tax and the capital gains tax are going down, America! Giving money to rich people is what makes this country great!
5. THE ENEMY WITHIN: Last time, the arch-villains were illegal immigrants. This time, it’s the rioters and looters. They’re coming for you, America! You’re just lucky that Batman is still here to protect Gotham City.

To the authors of the 1619 Project, America is the Evil Empire. Its history is nothing but a series of crimes against people of color, made even more intolerable by hypocritical cant about equality and democracy. First, of course, was the expropriation of land from Native Americans; then came slavery, which still permeates our Constitution today. Then, after the Civil War, came the failure of Reconstruction and the emergence of Jim Crow. Following that, the New Deal was designed and implemented to create a welfare state that deliberately only helped white people. Segregation, even in the northern states, was reinforced through redlining and restrictive covenants, thereby robbing black* people of opportunities enjoyed widely by whites. Law enforcement and the criminal justice system discriminated against people of color and created what amounted to a new form of slavery through the penal system. Today, the government does its best to keep people of color from voting, and the police kill black people with impunity all over the country. It’s all part of the same ugly story, and it never gets any better. White people are criminals. They need to apologize, and pay up.

*I have decided to follow The Economist on the “Black” vs. “black” issue. I won’t use “Black” until it does.

To reactionaries, the world looks completely different. Slavery was a crime, yes, but that was over 150 years ago. In any event, their ancestors didn’t own any slaves, and they obviously don’t, either. They’ve worked their butts off all their lives, and never asked the government for any assistance. The system doesn’t value their skills much anymore, and they don’t live as well as their parents. They’ve never discriminated against people of color. Why can’t black people just suck it up and work as hard as they do just to survive, instead of calling them racists and trying to pick their pockets? They’re the real victims here, not the whiny black people.

This is the conflict that is tearing our country apart. In the middle, we have people like me who think that the 1619 Project is a seriously incomplete view of American history, and that the reactionaries are just full of crap. How do we get to a middle ground?

We can start by getting both sides to admit to the following inconvenient truths:

On the 1619 Project side:

1. Slavery was hardly unique to the United States, and the progeny of those who gained economic benefits from it live all over the world, including in Africa.
2. Millions of Americans, including plenty of people in the South, received no benefit whatsoever from slavery, whose economic impacts on the United States have been grossly overstated in some recent publications.
3. Hundreds of thousands of Union soldiers died to free the slaves. Millions of people in the Union states suffered personal and economic losses as a result of the Civil War. If slavery was the country’s original sin, it has already been redeemed in blood.
4. The system today is color-blind on its face, with the exception of affirmative action programs. The responsibility for creating wealth inequities rests primarily with our ancestors, not us, so guilt should not really be part of the equation.
5. It is possible to believe in limited government, traditional values, and self-reliance without being a racist.

For the reactionaries:

1. Slavery and Jim Crow were indeed a crime against humanity.
2. The inequities built in to the New Deal welfare state were real, and had significant lingering effects that are still being felt to this day. These are not manifestations of the dead hand of a distant past. There are plenty of people alive today who were involved in them in one way or another.
3. The effects of residential segregation are also being felt today in the form of reduced wealth and opportunities for people of color. The evidence for the wealth gap, which is due primarily to actions taken by our ancestors after the abolition of slavery, is overwhelming.
4. While law enforcement and the criminal justice system may be color-blind on their face, in practice, they are not.
5. There is plenty of evidence which suggests that racial discrimination is still an ongoing problem in employment and housing.

We cannot legislate racism out of existence, but if we can agree on a set of facts and resolve to address inequities in the system as social problems, not crimes committed by the current population, we can actually get to an acceptable Point B.

To the surprise of exactly nobody, Trump has already previewed a major theme of the upcoming convention by telling the world that only he stands between real America and anarchy. This is, of course, an echo of his infamous “I alone” speech from 2016.

If I’m a conservative with a mind that hasn’t atrophied too much, I would ask the following questions:

1. You said that you alone would put an end to violent crime. Why didn’t you do it? What are you waiting for?
2. How can you say that you alone can keep me safe from anarchist violence when you’re not doing anything to stop it now?
3. In fact, isn’t opposition to you a big reason for the protests?

When I start imagining the Republican convention, the first image that comes to mind is a drill team performing a dance number, with half of the participants carrying a cross, and the other half brandishing assault rifles. It is a right-wing response to Beyonce’s “Formation.”

The two icons have equal and complementary meanings to reactionaries. The cross stands for the imagined divine support for a social order in which white Christian men are on top, and everyone else isn’t. The gun means strength, independence, and limited government, as opposed to noisy women and minorities whining about privilege and demanding free stuff from the government.

That’s the message that Trump will be sending next week. He and his allies–the defenders of the cross and the gun–are the only true Americans; everyone else can love it or get out.

After Trump, which Republican would you most like to see go crashing to an ignominious defeat? Lindsey Graham? Mitch McConnell? Someone else?

I’ll give you my opinion (I admit, I’m struggling with it), along with anyone else’s, next Friday.

At 10:30 last night, if you had asked me, I would have settled for barely competent. Instead, Biden’s speech was . . . terrific.

It fit right in with the taped introduction. It didn’t have any pablum or filler. It immediately reassured the reactionary right, albeit in language that could have been a little more explicit. It was delivered clearly and forcefully. It was consistent with the themes that ran throughout the convention. It contained just enough policy to be meaningful. Finally, it made the contrast between the personalities and programs of the two candidates as stark as it could possibly be. I couldn’t possibly want more than that.

Kudos, too, to Julia-Louis Dreyfus, who was perfect. I wish she had been on all four nights.

Next week, Trump will try to make the case that Biden is too old and mentally slow to be our president. Good luck with that.

On the ex-president named Barack.

He put Donald Trump in the dock.

He called him unfit.

That’s true, where I sit.

He’s a shepherd who preys on his flock.

Reactionary political figures typically succeed by persuading their followers to believe them instead of their lying eyes. If you’re greedy, the logical next step in the process is to sell worthless products and services instead of ideas to the faithful.

Just ask Steve Bannon. And he’s not the only one. Imagine what Trump could do with that market once he leaves office. It boggles the mind.

The unacknowledged elephant in the room at the convention thus far has been the roughly 30 percent of Americans who unconditionally support Trump because they believe they are threatened with extinction by liberal elites who hate white Christians. Trump himself is only important because they stand behind him. They are the force that potentially opposes liberal democracy in this country.

It will be up to Biden to reassure them if he really wants to bring the country together and protect the system. Will he try? I don’t know, but I certainly hope so.

Ladies Night!

The Harris speech was OK, but here’s what I will remember from last night:

1. The tape of Obama giving Biden the medal was genuinely touching.
2. Warren wasn’t on the screen very long, but she made it count. She looked like a hungry predator going after Trump.
3. Mostly, I will remember the Obama speech. The gravity and brutal candor of its delivery made me think of something from the Roman Republic. It was both impressive and genuinely chilling, which was undoubtedly the effect he wanted. Cicero or Cato the Elder would have been proud.

Trump delenda est!

Fox News is obviously the mouthpiece for the Reactionary faction of the GOP, but it is far more than that. Its hosts identify issues and shape opinions, even in the White House. It transmits and gives legitimacy to conspiracy theories. It also makes lots and lots of money.

Two questions for the future are pertinent:

1. Tucker Carlson is the country’s leading “national conservative,” which essentially means that he thinks the GOP should ditch its Reagan era economic policies and regulate business in favor of white Christian workers. Will Fox as a whole follow that line, or stick with the status quo?
2. Millions of reactionaries have made it clear that they value their conservative social ideas far more than our liberal democratic system. Fox supports them and thereby damages public support for the system, but push has not come to shove yet. Would the Murdochs rather own the house broadcaster for an American Orban than one of several networks in a free democratic system? I’m not sure even they know the answer to that question.

Do you remember 2009-2010? The Democrats had what appeared to be a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, but it didn’t feel that way, largely because Joe Lieberman was always threatening to derail important legislation. It was very annoying, and so was he.

Even if the Democrats succeed in scraping out a tiny majority on paper in the Senate this year, they will have a similar problem; this one is named Joe Manchin. Manchin is 51 percent Democrat and 49 percent Republican. Given the state of opinion in West Virginia, he has to be. His vote can never be taken for granted, particularly on energy issues. A nominal majority may well not be an effective one.

If we get the reasonable best case scenario, expect lots of money to be flowing to West Virginia in the next two years. There is no plausible alternative if the Biden agenda is to stay on track.

Empathy rules, and the roll call is still tiresome. But here’s a question for you: who testifies that Trump is a great guy during the Republican convention, and who would be stupid enough to believe it?

The left has correctly identified the filibuster as a major obstacle to its agenda. Biden has been equivocal. Why?

For three interconnected reasons. First of all, the filibuster isn’t even an issue unless the Democrats win an effective (as opposed to a nominal–I will post on this tomorrow) majority in the Senate, which is a toss-up at this point. Second, Biden has great respect for the traditions of the Senate; there is no point in making clear statements that you’re in favor of blowing something up if it won’t do any good. Third, unity is Biden’s brand; it would be a mistake to jeopardize it unless it is absolutely necessary.

I suspect Biden, as president, will initially attempt to make deals with GOP senators, using the potential abolition of the filibuster as leverage if he plausibly has a Democratic majority in his favor. He would only campaign for its abolition if it is feasible and necessary to get his agenda through, and if GOP senators prove to be beyond redemption, which seems pretty likely.

Due to the conflicts among the four ideological factions, the GOP has a schizophrenic view of the state. It is as libertarian as can be with regard to business interests, but authoritarian on social issues, because the impacts of the cudgel are felt by Democrats, not Republicans. Freedom for me, but the smack of authority for thee, in other words.

This paradigm doesn’t work in a pandemic, because GOP voters can suffer from and spread the virus just as easily as Democrats. The only way you can stop a pandemic is through action, whether voluntary or mandated, which includes everyone. So how does the GOP deal with this clear conceptual failure? By pretending that the pandemic doesn’t exist, talking about other issues, and waiting for better days.

It is just like 2008, when it was obvious to the public that the GOP standard formula of tax cuts and deregulation was not a plausible solution to a financial crisis. Let’s hope for the same electoral result.