Cromwell

Rick Scott is bored stiff in the Senate. He wants to be the CEO of America, LLC, and cut spending to the bone. His decision not to run for president tells us that even he understands that this is not another 2011 Tea Party moment; it is a struggle for power within the Republican Party.

In a way, his decision is a disappointment, because it would be great fun to watch him spend outrageous sums of money to get 2 percent of the vote. Oh, well. We’ll live without it.

Tim Scott, on the other hand, is clearly interested in running. His biggest problem is that his potential lane is already completely filled by Nikki Haley, who has a much larger national profile and a better resume. If he does run, he’s wasting his time, money, and breath.

In this scenario, the Ukrainians drive the Russians completely out of their country. The Russian government obviously doesn’t formalize this in any kind of agreement. The question in this scenario is whether Putin survives, and whether he feels compelled to escalate with NATO. I don’t know the answers to those questions, but nothing can be completely ruled out.

After two weeks of difficult and unpleasant home restoration efforts, we’re not even close to being done, but the internet is back.

The Turkish earthquake has left countless people homeless; some of them have made it clear they blame the government. If you’re Erdogan, why not kill two birds with one stone and put your homeless critics in jail? It’s what comes naturally to him, anyway.

Hurricane Ian left our Florida house a wreck. Against my expectations, it has been improved to the point of being (barely) habitable, so we are going back to finish the job.

I can’t honestly say I know when we will have internet there. Regular posts will resume when we do.

My initial impression was that Biden looked like the proverbial “happy warrior” delivering this speech. Sure enough, that phrase was included in two of the NYT reviews.

For a party that claims to speak for workers, the GOP side of the aisle certainly didn’t applaud much when Biden supported labor over capital.

Ross Douthat opined that the theme of the speech was “What Trump promised, I delivered.” He’s right–including the unapologetic protectionism that I personally oppose. This speech was clearly aimed at the disaffected white workers in red states who always insist that the left is deaf to their cries of pain. Whether they will hear him or not remains to be seen.

The standard of conduct at the SOTU clearly has changed. It is starting to look more like Question Time in the UK Parliament. That’s OK as long as everyone understands the rules. Biden didn’t seem to have a problem with it last night.

This scenario is the status quo ante. On the ground, it looks a lot like Scenario 2, but it means Russia gained absolutely nothing from the war. As a result, it would be much more difficult to sell to the Russian people than Scenario 2, which can be spun as a victory of sorts.

Putin won’t sign anything giving Scenario 3 any kind of permanent status. It would be more of a pause than a Korea-style armistice. Would he survive the failure at home? Probably, because it wasn’t an outright defeat, but the natives would start getting restless.

I have four suggestions:

1. FIGHT FOR OUR RIGHTS–NOT FOR WOKENESS: The more extreme manifestations of wokeness are a wedge issue for the Democratic Party. Fighting right-wing attempts to use government to suppress them are not. Find the happy middle ground and defend the First Amendment against the reactionary censors.
2. THE DEMOCRACY PROJECT VS. THE MCCONNELL PROJECT: The Supreme Court and the filibuster are the two pillars of the McConnell Project. They deny the left power even when it wins elections and holds office. Argue that we need a new round of progressive legislation to bring liberal democracy to full fruition in this country. This would include term limits for the Court and the elimination of the filibuster.
3. CONNECT THE AUTHORITARIAN DOTS: There is a straight line between Putin lovers and supporters of the January 6 rioters. Draw it for the voters in both domestic and foreign policy.
4. SAVE SOCIAL SECURITY; TAX THE RICH: Some elements of the right want to trash Social Security; all of it refuses to fund the program by eliminating or increasing the cap on contributions. The public doesn’t understand that. It should.

At the beginning of 2021, it appeared that the left had a generational opportunity to replace the dollar store economy with something that was much more worker-friendly through a massive increase in the size of the American welfare state. While some progress was made, in the end, the revolution didn’t happen, for two reasons: first, there weren’t enough votes for it in the Senate; and second, the additional federal spending contributed to inflation. It doesn’t make any sense to mandate wage increases if businesses can then just turn around and raise prices by the same amount. So what now?

There is no prospect of enacting any of the left’s agenda in the next two years with a GOP majority in the House. Worse, the Democrats will be defending several vulnerable Senate seats in 2024; their chances of picking up seats will depend solely on Trump’s willingness to split the GOP. As a result, the left will be playing defense for at least the next four years even if it continues to hold the White House.

Where should progressives focus their energy under these circumstances? I will post on that tomorrow.

Scenario 2 is, essentially, the status quo. The front line is frozen more or less where it is today. Neither the Ukrainians nor the Russians have the men and the firepower sufficient to win a major victory.

The most likely outcome here is a resolution similar to that of the Korean War; a negotiated armistice, but no peace treaty. Neither side pretends that the conflict has gone away. Both sides remain vigilant and hope for better things in the future.

Since the Russians have taken a tiny bit of territory, Putin has the opportunity to tell his people that they have won a great victory. His rule at home is unchallenged. But sanctions remain, a disproportionate percentage of the country’s GDP is being used for defense spending, and the Russian economy is in tatters. The future for the Russian people is looking grim, indeed. Ukraine, on the other hand, is being rebuilt by huge amounts of aid from America and the EU. Its future looks pretty bright.

Who is the Chinese head of intelligence–Jules Verne? Don’t they have satellites? That was absolutely ridiculous!

Scenario 1 is an apparently complete Russian victory. Putin uses better tactics and a huge manpower advantage to achieve a breakthrough. The Russians take Kyiv and occupy virtually all of the country. Putin installs a puppet in Kyiv and holds a parade in Moscow. His casualties were enormous, but it was worth it, right?

The “victory” is illusory, because he doesn’t control the western border of the country, and he can’t go into Poland without causing a NATO response. He doesn’t have enough troops to effectively occupy Ukraine, even though hundreds of thousands of them are still there. Russia has the equivalent of an Iraq insurgency on its hands, with no end in sight, and no end to sanctions.

The fact of the matter is that Putin’s dream of controlling Ukraine died when his initial attack failed. The entire Ukrainian nation hates him now. It will never give up. As a result, the campaign wasn’t worth it, even under the best case scenario.

Donald Trump is a colossus; if you don’t believe it, just ask him. He’s a superman. He can’t be judged by the standards that are applied to the rest of us. But Trump is a hobbled giant, brought low by a million pinpricks from the snooty, self-satisfied liberal establishment. He’s Gulliver, restrained by Lilliputians.

Why does this apparently contradictory image appeal to the base? Largely because reactionaries see themselves in the same light. They made America great, and now they are unjustly despised by a country that no longer appreciates their values and their skills. Someone has to pay for that.

We know that Trump is rooting for a debt ceiling meltdown and will do everything in his power to create one. This is partly simple vengeance on Biden and partly the result of his belief that the public will look for a strongman in a time of crisis. But what about DeSantis? What is he going to say?

My guess is that he will mostly stay out of it. If he wants establishment support in the primaries–and he is definitely going to need it–pushing for a catastrophe is not a good way to get it. He will make a few vague statements about the importance of bringing spending under control, and that will be that, unless we fall off the cliff, in which case he will blame Biden.

It’s June. Thanks mostly to disunity within the GOP ranks, there has been no progress on resolving the debt ceiling crisis. Disaster looms.

Kevin McCarthy calls ten GOP House members from Biden districts into his office and asks them to file a discharge petition. He tells them he will have to be bitterly critical of them in public to retain his credibility with the Chaos Caucus, but he will make sure there is no retribution afterwards–no lost committee assignments and no support for primary opponents. The members trust him and go forward as planned. The country is saved.

Does McCarthy keep his word in the aftermath? Probably, but only because he doesn’t want to start telling different lies to different people. That’s a really good way to embarrass yourself and lose credibility with everyone. He should know that better than anyone.

To date, McCarthy and the GOP House members have refused to provide Biden with a debt ceiling ransom note. This is undoubtedly due to two facts: demands for specific spending cuts will be unpopular with the public; and the volatile GOP caucus predictably can’t agree on a plan–at least, not yet.

But what if this is actually a tactic? What if McCarthy never intends to deliver the ransom note? What if he plans to force Biden to negotiate with himself? That way, he can avoid dividing his caucus in the short run (thereby incurring the wrath of the minority) and leave responsibility for dealing with any given offer from Biden to the caucus as a whole. In other words, he would be abdicating the leadership responsibilities of his job in order to keep his title.

It would be an incredibly irresponsible thing to do, and it would look terrible to the public. The GOP would undoubtedly pay for it in 2024. But it would help save his job for the foreseeable future, and as we know, that’s what really matters.