You know what to do.

 

Now that things are headed for what many of us expected and feared and warned about, lots of people have opinions about how we're dealing with the end of our lives as we had known them. After having built careers and homes and families on the trust that the country we learned about in school or the movies or on Schoolhouse Rock was a country of progress and laws and due process and human rights, we are finding out that it was all so fragile that a few very rich people united with a bunch of very craven people and a huge bunch of not very nice people can take what we built and turn it into dust. And we're mad.

So a lot of people are scared now, not of the rich-craven-not very nice people who are blowing everything we built to smithereens--no--they're scared of us being too mad about it. They've got all kinds of ideas about how loud we should be and what kind of flags we should be waving. It's what I call the "Don't make Daddy mad" strategy promoted to soothe the "I've got really nice stuff please don't break anything" anxiety rampant among some very comfortable nervous talkers. 

Once again, Dems and some Progressives either don't really believe in a pluralistic, multiracial democratic republic and are looking for a workaround, or they are kidding themselves into thinking there is something we can do that is nice enough or reasonable enough to keep the bad guys from doing what they want to do. That if we only Good Guys! hard enough, the country will wake up one morning and think, "I've been on the wrong side all along." Best of all, it won't cost or break anything.

Ironically, that's exactly what a lot of frustrated Democrats rejected in 2024 when they stayed home. They knew, as anyone should, that this level of infection does not cure itself; it requires aggressive intervention, and if you're not part of that solution, you're part of the problem.

It is astounding that Democrats still exist who think there is anything we/they can not do that will make Republicans not do something. These squishy Dems and pseudos are not simply timid or ambitious or greedy. They are out of time, living and working in a world that doesn't exist anymore. This is a fighting moment, and it's going to get messy. 

If we're actually going to have the conversation about how to behave at a demonstration of solidarity and resistance, I offer my personal perspective: 

First: Resist. Obstruct. Protest. Lots of folks say "Protest! but peacefully!" and I agree, but it's not only up to us. I say, let the cops supply the violence--they're experts--but be prepared. There are trainings that can help. If you are given a choice, respond in a way that keeps you safe. We have a lot of protests ahead of us, and we're going to need everybody.

Also, in my opinion, if you are dressed in black from head to toe, masked and throwing bottles at the cops or burning cars, you're not helping. You're just another problem for me.

Second: If at any point you can't tell the difference between your protest and a middle school lunchroom on a particularly bad day, check yourself. We're fighting over the future of the world not who talked shit about whose boyfriend. 

Third: Opinions differ, but I say wave whatever the fuck flag you want. Just for reference:

Excited onlookers wave to members of the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing Band during the New York City St. Patrick’s Day parade March 17 (2009).

March for Justice and Community Graham, North Carolina (2020 July)

Anthony Crider, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Chicago Pride Parade 2011

nathanmac87, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

A flag is not going to tip the scales of history or cost you or "the movement" the support of anyone who wasn't already looking for an excuse. If it makes you proud, be proud.

Do the training. Be loud. Be visible. Have some fun if you can. Beyond that, it's not-very-complicated golden rule stuff: Don't be an asshole. 

However, and this is important, don't automatically assume that following these or any other rules will protect you from asshole behavior from them. We may very well get gassed for standing still, or for not standing still. We may be pushed, hit with batons and "less-lethal" rounds for not doing exactly what we're told or in spite of doing what we're told. It's what fascists do. Prepare.

We didn't make the world; we're just trying to make it into something we can live in. And Democratic leaders who are afraid to get their hands dirty should just shut the fuck up and take a vacation. 

And, if they are thinking they can just lay low, or put out press releases trying to hoodwink us into thinking they're actually doing something, and then pop back up once this is "over"-- either to take charge again after we've saved the country or to lead the post-apocalypse resistance after the catastrophe they helped create--they are delusional and fuck them. 

That's it.

Be careful. Take a moment to appreciate the importance of what we are trying to do.

See you out there.

LAUSD

I've written before about Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Alberto Carvalho and the courageous administrators and staff who turned away ICE body snatchers in April. 

That seems like forever ago now as the Trump administration has turned the intimidation up to 11 and, in addition to countless other outrages, has stationed "federal vans" within blocks of schools in an apparent effort to terrorize students and their families into self-disappearing before ICE does it for them.

Against this backdrop of military troops in the streets and new threats seemingly every day coming from the regime, it takes courage to stand up to bullies wielding state power. 

I may disagree with Supt. Carvalho over other aspects of public education, but on this most important element, we agree entirely.

Everybody has the chance to do the right thing. Not everybody will. This is the right thing.

Why is everything so fucked up? revisited

Don't-give-a-fuck Republicans are preparing to cut Medicare, Medicaid, nutrition assistance, education, research, national parks, clean energy, and agencies such as the EPA and BLM and NASA, and programs like USAID (and what else? even Congress hasn't read the damn bill), all in exchange for mass deportations, a bigger defense budget, and humongous tax cuts largely for billionaires (which is cool because the bill also cuts IRS enforcement focused on billionaires!), I thought it would be a good time to re-up this simple Q & A for how everything got so fucked up. Here goes.

                     The answer to all your questions is: Money.

According to teevee host and former sportswriter Tony Kornheiser, television producer and network big shot Don Ohlmeyer once told him, "The answer to all your questions is: Money."

When we try and figure out how we got into this mess, I'm sure many of us can point to our own favorite incident, policy, condition, cause, or villain, as the reason things are so fucked up. When it comes up among friends, individual lists grow and merge into a gigantic trail of crimes and outrages and, of course, they and we are all correct. I don't even have to open my mouth anymore. When it's my turn everyone just shouts "Reagan!" before I can open my mouth. 

Turns out I may have a case, of sorts. 

A working paper from RAND released in February examines income inequality among U.S. workers. It builds upon an earlier study, and RAND describes it this way: "This short analysis extends the results from a prior study about the gap between what the majority of workers earned from 1975 to 2018 and what they would have earned with more evenly distributed income growth (Price and Edwards, 2020)." It's a short, clear, easy read and I encourage you to take a look at it here, but the money shot is as follows (emphasis mine):

These values are intended to provide an indication of the scale of rising inequality and its durability over the last nearly five decades. Looking at the net effects of these trends, if we had the income distribution from 1975, the majority of workers (the bottom 90 percent by income) would have made an additional $3.9 trillion dollars in 2023. Cumulatively, the gap between what workers from 1975 to 2023 earned and what they would have earned with the counterfactual income distribution amounts to $79 trillion (in 2023 dollars). Compared to the $47 trillion from the 2020 study, the additional $32 trillion dollars comes from extending the time-period by five years, inflating from 2018 to 2023, and additional growth in inequality.

Seventy-nine trillion dollars is a lot of money. A lot of child care and college educations and homes that could have been passed down to help create generational wealth. Instead, "the bottom 90 percent" did not fully participate in the growth of the American economy they helped produce. You know who did? You know who reaped their own benefits and a giant share of everybody else's? Sure you do. 

And not for nothing, there's this from the RAND paper:

For three decades following the Second World War, incomes for workers across the income distribution grew at the same pace as the broader economy. This changed in the late 1970s, when earnings growth began disproportionately flowing to those with the highest incomes leading to four decades of rising inequality.

Here it is graphically, from the Economic Policy Institute:

The late 1970's. Arthur Laffer. Jack Kemp. William Roth. Voodoo supply-side trickle down "economics." And do you know who endorsed this nonsense, who ran on it and was elected in 1980? Sure you do. 

That is a huge part of how we went from thirteen U.S. billionaires in 1980 to over 900 today (+ around 7000 percent). Since geographical distinctions are not what they used to be, it's also instructive to note that Forbes reports its own count as rising from 140 billionaires worldwide in 1987 to 3,028 today. Up 2162% give or take. It's been a good run if you're a billionaire and/or heir to one. For the rest of us, not so great. 

And that is a big reason why everything is so fucked up.

Thanks for reading. Speak to you soon. 

Addicted to rage

People used to ask of Trump supporters, "How can they vote for this piece of shit?" or something similar. I used to answer, "Because he hates the people they hate." 

Iowa Senator Joni Ernst just blew off questions about Medicaid cuts with "We all are going to die" and everyone thinks her voters might turn on her. Maybe, if--and only if--they see the cuts hurting them more than they can stand and not hurting the people they hate enough. 

But even then it's not likely. As Steve M @stevemnomoremister.bsky.social‬ puts it, "They live in a permanent state of rage against Democrats and every group identified with Democrats, and the rage is their joy. All she has to do is persuade them she's offending us and she's home free."

True, but I think it's even more than that. I think these people are addicted to their hatred, and to the simultaneous feelings of victimhood and superiority that fuel their anger. Now for the standard caveat: It's not all of them. Which is beside the point and which is BS anyway and gives them too much credit for being humans and not enough blame for being rationalizing self-justifying snakes. 

You can't listen to all the racist shit and braggadocious dimwittery that comes out of Trump's mouth and then say, "Yeah, I wouldn't have said it that way" and "I'm not always comfortable with his style," and then come back with "But he's tough!" and "Businessman!" unless a big part of you is okay with all of it.

And you can't listen to him lying about everything and then believe him about anything, not even the things you really really want to be true, unless your whole self is okay with all of that, too.

These people are addicted to rage, so when Joni Ernst says "We're all going to die" or Mike Johnson lies to them about Medicaid cuts or Stephen Miller threatens due process, they don't think he means their due process. And then they imagine and fantasize about the people they think will be hurt, and they get that rush, and the only thing the rage pushers could ever do to lose them would be to not give them the drug.

So if, after Trump's COVID debacle and Jan. 6 and stolen boxes of secrets, and after snatching people off the streets and deporting American citizens and playing tariff roulette with the economy, and after turning the presidency into his own personal ATM and after inviting a drug addict in to take all the data and fire all the people, you're wondering why he's still cool with FORTY-FIVE PERCENT "of those polled," don't wonder.

Whether they are mainlining Trump's lunacy or think of themselves as weekend recreational users, they are addicts obsessed with their next fix. There is nothing Trump & Co can do to lose them. 

Ask yourself, "What would a crack dealer have to do that would be so bad that a crackhead would turn down a free hit?"

Nobody's fooled, just pretending.

They are liars. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson told Jake Tapper Sunday on CNN that he didn't know anything about Trump's crypto-grift bribe banquet last week, hadn't even heard about it. He also lied about the cuts to Medicaid buried in the--and I'm only going to write this one time because I believe words have meanings--One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Variously punctuated, weirdly redundant, and predictably aggrandizing, the Act is so bad that liars have a lot to choose from as they defend it. 

The Congressional Budget Office projects that, if the Act becomes law, it will indeed require a cut of almost a trillion dollars to Medicaid and SNAP. For those keeping score, that's the opposite of what Mike "We are not cutting Medicaid in this package" Johnson lied on air this morning before following up with the hilariously accurate, "There’s a lot of misinformation out there about this.” Johnson is able to tell many lies in a short period of time, but he can't compete with serial liar, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.

While not as slick as Johnson, Leavitt makes up for it in her passion for talking points and ass-kissing. For example, other features-not-bugs in the OBBBA include making 2017 Trump 1 tax cuts "permanent," expanding the deficit by almost four trillion dollars, thus requiring all those cuts and blowing a hole in whatever deficit rhetoric Republicans can still muster. All to give the top 20% of taxpayers a big, beautiful tax break while the bottom 20% gets less than bupkis. 

Nevertheless, when asked about the deficit Leavitt flatly lied, "This bill does not add to the deficit," and cited the president's own Council of Economic Advisors, who fantasize that increased growth will offset the tax cuts. Sound familiar? Leavitt doubled down, asserting that not only was there no increase to the deficit, but "There's $1.6 trillion worth of savings in this bill." 

According to the once-respectable Washington Post, Trump lied over 30,000 times his first go-round, and there are a gazillion more examples of the Trump 2 regime lying to the country. From DHS head Kristi Noem lying about Kilmar Abrego Garcia, to Government lawyers lying to the courts, to Stephen Miller lying about due process and election fraud and a Supreme Court decision, to fill in the blank about fill in the blank. JD Vance lies about what he's told to lie about.  And of course, Trump lies about everything. There are too many to count, let alone list. 

I've written about this before. If they are breathing, they are lying.

Some of them might be fanatics devoted to their MAGA god. For some the lying may be a demonstration of loyalty because they're scared or ambitious. They want to please the boss. It's hard to know whether or not Stephen Miller or Karoline Leavitt really believe the things they're saying, but with others it's clear. In the end, it really doesn't make much difference. These people are lost, either delusionary or corrupted beyond redemption.  

But what about us? What happens to a society, a country, to millions of people when nothing is true anymore? That's not quite right. There are still true things, but they're being rubbed out by the liars. The lies never stop and they hang in the atmosphere like sand in an endless storm. They choke us and stick to our skin as we move through the world and live our lives.

It's starting to get to me. I know they are lying. My friends know they are lying. Even most of them know they're lying. The media has become more forceful in pointing out the lies. But the storm never stops.

We can't get away from it. It's poisoning the air we breathe. But we have to breathe, don't we? We go on with our lives because what else is there to do? We pretend that it will stop, that something will happen. We pretend that someone will make them stop lying and just let us breathe. 

I'm going to stop thinking about the liars. They're easy to figure out. It's the people who are being lied to that I worry about. What is going to happen to us? What should we do? Should we be angrier? Should we ignore it? How can you ignore something when every day you can feel it on your skin and in your throat? 

They know they are lying. We know they are lying. We all know they are lying, but we just go along and pretend. And it's really starting to bug me.

Make Trump break the law.

"Why bother? He'll just ignore the courts." 

I'd say that's dumb, but that used to be me. Okay, it is dumb. And besides, I've changed my mind.

Challenging the Trump regime in court is meaningful even if, when he loses, he goes on to defy the ruling of that court. When courts rule against him, and he does it anyway, he is a criminal breaking the law. If he wants to do crazy shit, the least we can do is make it illegal.

It has been profoundly frustrating to watch as Donald Trump has evaded accountability. From the grifting and self-enrichment of the first Trump administration, to the two impeachment results, to the piles of stolen boxes piled in the loo at Mar-a-Lago, it has felt like he's laughing at the United States and at all of us. Suckers and Losers, I guess.

Now, with the immunity invented by the Supreme Court in Trump v. United States not even a year ago, it sometimes feels as if we've been transported to a different country in a different time, a place it is becoming hard to recognize.

The Supreme Court's decision, which Mark Joseph Stern writing for Slate described as having "no basis in the Constitution as written," was ostensibly in response to Trump's indictment for attempts to subvert the 2020 election. A lot of analysts at the time focused on the impact of the decision on Trump's various indictments, and on the Government's authority to prosecute a former president for conduct while in office. Unfortunately, that is not the problem we have now. 

Others people, beginning with Justice Sotomayor in her razor-sharp dissent, foresaw the world we now inhabit.  In fact, Stern warned in that same article:

The immediate impact of the court’s sweeping decision will be devastating enough, allowing Donald Trump to evade accountability for the most destructive and criminal efforts he took to overturn the 2020 election. But the long-term impact is even more harrowing. It is unclear, after Monday’s decision, what constitutional checks remain to stop any president from assuming dangerous and monarchical powers that are anathema to representative government. As Justice Sonia Sotomayor put it in her terrified and terrifying dissent, “the President is now a king above the law.”

As predicted, the decision has emboldened Trump 2 to enthusiastically expand his power grab. Now we live in a world where people are being illegally abducted off the streets by masked officials and illegally disappeared. Where legally constituted agencies are being illegally demolished. Where legal U.S. citizens are being illegally detained and sometimes deported. For an interactive look at the carnage, you can look in here. Or just watch the news.

It can be depressing. It definitely can be discouraging. Still, I think the lamest take on social media is whatever version of "Why bother? He'll just ignore the courts." 

First, even though he has thus far been able to evade some orders, some damage has been mitigated. Firings have been barred and rehires have been ordered. Funds have been unfrozen. I'm not a lawyer, but there are very good ones fighting Trump and winning: Marc Elias and the Elias Law Group, Lee Gelernt and the lawyers at the ACLU, Norm Eisen and the team at Democracy Defenders Action, the lawyers fighting for Harvard and the ones at Perkins Coie, Jenner & Block, WilmerHale and Susman Godfrey and many others. We're not in this alone.

Yes, many of these cases will end up before a very Trump-friendly Supreme Court, and rulings will be overturned and orders vacated. And that will be bad, but bad enough to give up trying? Right now there doesn't feel like there's a lot we can do to stop Trump, but one thing we can do is fight him in court for as long as the courts last. If we're going to bitch about Democrats not doing everything conceivable to thwart Trump, we cannot say the courts don't matter.

And if the Supreme Court is going to make shit up in order to give Trump what he wants so they get what they want, make them. Make them do the wrong thing. I'm not saying they're going to pay for it, but at least we continue to recognize the difference. 

Now I get why folks want to withdraw. It comes in waves of outrage and feels overwhelming. But using "It's pointless" as an excuse is the coward's way out. As for me, I'm pissed off that I have to spend the last decades of my life fighting against this asshole and his gallery of goons and hate-trolls. But resistance is never futile, and fighting back is never pointless, and I'm glad I'm still alive to do it. 

 

Back to the courts. Yeah, the Trump regime might end up ignoring court orders. But there is real value in forcing Trump to break the law. When courts rule against him, and he does it anyway, he is a criminal breaking the law. If they don't rule against him, or if no case is brought in the first place because "he'll just ignore the courts anyway," what he's doing becomes the new law. 

And even if he wins at the Supreme Court, even after multiple losses in lower courts, because the Supreme Court is corrupt and hell bent on gambling that we'll probably survive the present disaster as long as they get to rewrite the Constitution and remake the government in their preferred ideological image, there will be a record of the Court aiding and abetting Trump's unconstitutional behavior and criminality. A record on which to rely if we can ever muster the courage to expand the Court and reverse its own very special brand of lawlessness.

I'm not naive enough to believe there must be some kind of reckoning coming, a Truth and Reconciliation Commission or Nuremburg trials. I haven't a clue what will be left of us when this is over. It's just that, if we don't force Trump to break the law, he becomes the law instead of the criminal he is.

Make the Trump regime do the wrong thing. Otherwise we just let them do it and pretend it was right.

Cancer sucks

"No Democrat should ever again answer a single question about Joe Biden except, when the time comes, 'Are you going to the funeral?'"

I wrote those words in a post titled "Biden Derangement Syndrome" which I published on Sunday shortly before the news of former President Biden's cancer diagnosis broke. 

I was referring to Biden's age, but now the sentence in isolation feels gratuitous and cruel. It's not meant to be. That's why I decided not to go back and edit. Cancer sucks and it touches almost all of us in one way or another. My thoughts and sincere sympathy are with the Biden family as they fight this battle.

Of course, Republicans have done what Republicans always do: they ridicule the misfortunes of others and twist those misfortunes into avenues of attack. Thus we get this beauty from number one son:

who responded to pushback with extra more conspiracy.

Meanwhile, Don Sr. was just asking questions--about how long it takes to get to a "stage nine" cancer, about the doctor's honesty and/or competence, and about AUTOPEN!

And of course, afraid they might be left out if they don't loyalty hard enough, the legion of flying monkeys has gotten in on the action. Same as it ever was.

I still think it's important to understand that it's not necessary to answer questions about former President Joe Biden, and it's not smart politics. The media strategy, now that the terrible news has broken, should be well wishes for Biden and his family, then pivot. Don't get caught up in responding to lunatic fantasies of subterfuge. 

And fer gawd's sake don't follow the advice of the same squishy establishment Dems and their army of consulting strategists that got us into this fucking mess. Do not David Axelrod yourselves into "Those conversations are going to happen but they should be more muted and set aside for now." That is an open invitation to ask about "who's to blame for the Biden cover-up?" from now until the end of recorded time, and Bidengate will still be the story as Trump is named emperor for life. 

Again, you don't have to lie like they do, but you don't have to answer every question either. It is a new day in a new kind of world, and we need you to develop a new game plan. Don't get trapped in your reverence for one man or for the political culture he represents and which supported him. Don't look back. Our adversary is right in front of us. 

In his excellent "Voters want Dems to stand up to Trump, not self-flagellate," Noah Berlatsky @nberlat.bsky.social‬ puts it this way:

Should Democrats spend time and energy focusing on the fact that Joe Biden is old?

I think you’ll agree, after some serious thought, that the answer here is NO, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?! STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT!

Biden Derangement Syndrome

Democrats, I am begging you, don't take the Biden bait. It's past time for a new media game plan.

Maybe you've heard that political/media insiders Jake "Tapped Out" Tapper of CNN & Alex Thompson from Axios+ are pimping a new book breathlessly revealing that former President Joseph Biden is old. I haven't read it because I'm old, too, and I don't want to waste any of my remaining minutes. 

Maybe they wrote it because they feel guilty about their coverage of Biden and they're trying to get themselves off the hook. That would be painfully ironic. In her excellent Guardian piece, Margaret Sullivan asks the question: 

As a media critic, I’m always happy to see a good reckoning for the mainstream press. 

But this one makes me wonder. When is the reckoning coming for the failures to cover Trump effectively? 

Maybe Tapper Thompson are trying to juice up their careers. That would be on-brand. Maybe, like eight year olds, they just figured it out and think maybe nobody else knows what they know. Yeah, we know. 

But the book is whatever. The real thing is how it's being used. Yes the Club is bending over frontwards to fluff up a life member, and that's gross, but then the uninterrogated nominal? topic of the book--not just Biden's decline but an alleged "cover-up" of his diminished capacity to be president--is being weaponized and pointed at Dems in a "what did you know and when did you know it and didn't you have a duty to speak out" kind of way.

Joe Biden is old and was when he was running for a second term. The best way I've heard it handled is by Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, this morning on NBC's Meet the Press. 

"By 2024, the American people had decided that they wanted somebody new. They wanted somebody younger,” Murphy told NBC News’ “Meet the Press.”

“And it was a mistake,” the senator said. “It was a mistake for Democrats to not listen to the voters earlier and set up a process that would have gotten us in a position where we could have been more competitive that fall.”

Simple. Honest. Contrary to some commenters, I think it would be dumb to deny the obvious. It would just reinforce Democrats as being out of touch or dishonest. 

Instead, when the moderator pivoted from the indisputable to the alleged, from the decline to the story she really wanted to get to-- the scandal! the cover-up!--Senator Murphy simply said, "Well, I haven't read the book and so I don't know what to say about the allegations they make." Granted, he should have stopped there. Instead, when the moderator pushed ever so gently, he reverted to the usual Demsplaining about "my experience" and policy. Lesson learned, I hope.

If this sounds familiar, it is. It's the "swift boat" "but her emails!" playbook that Republicans run like Student Body Right, and scandal-sniffing media dig up and swallow like my dog who eats her own poop. And Dems, desperate to appear reasonable and accommodating, feel compelled to debate the quality of poop and end up covered in it. Every time. 

Not this time, Democrats! I'm begging you to try something different. I agree with Ron Filipkowski in his very good "Dems Must Not Let Media Make 2026/28 About Biden" at www.meidasplus.com  that "This is a trap for Democrats," but I don't agree that "American voters simply don't care." I think American voters largely care about what they are told is important (I almost wrote "sold as important"), and therefore answering Biden questions in every appearance tells voters that Republicans, media, and even Democrats care about it, and that it's important.

Instead, I urge Dems to run a different play from the Republican playbook: The Reverse. No Democrat should ever again answer a single question about Joe Biden except, when the time comes, "Are you going to the funeral?"

Instead, immediately pivot to Donald Trump and Republicans and the damage they're doing and the danger they pose to every single American. 

News Talker: When did you first notice President Biden was slowing down.

Dem: Tariffs 

News Talker: But regarding President Biden--

Dem: Due process

News Talker: Jake Tapper & Alex Thompson in their new book suggest--

Dem: Medicaid is a lifeline for people's grandmas!

It will require Dems to do something hard. They need to ignore opinion, risk looking obstinate, and stay focused on their message. Particularly shaken Dems might use a bridge phrase like "I'm not here for ___, I'm here to talk about Donald Trump and the damage he and Republicans and their DOGE Musk lieutenants are doing to veterans."

Dems, I am begging you, do not take the bait. You don't have to lie like they do, but you don't have to answer every question. Make them talk about what you want to talk about. And don't mind the eyerolls or sour faces or big sighs. You'll be invited back. The Republicans always are. Politics ain't beanbag, and our lives are depending on you.

Otherwise, Biden will still be the story when Trump begins his third term.

*This post has been updated to, among other things, give the indispensable Margaret Sullivan the credit she deserves and which I omitted inadvertently. 

Dems in Disarray!

Democrats are weak! Feckless! Disorganized! The most durable of political narratives, a familiar story that's easy to tell, "Dems in Disarray" scratches that corporate itch, satisfies the need for normal, and puts everyone back in their proper places. When corporate mainstream media--greedy and scared from top to bottom line--face the prospect of disorder, dissent, and threats to the quarterly earnings, they will crumble and escape to their safe spaces as they default to shilling for the Boss. Shills gotta shill, and it's especially effortless when they support the liars and their mission.

Thus, we get this from the Wall Street Journal on Sunday:

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has emerged as one of the Democratic Party’s leading voices. But some worry she will turn off the centrist voters needed to win competitive races.

[image or embed]

— The Wall Street Journal (@wsj.com) May 11, 2025 at 9:30 AM

"Dems in Disarray!" was the title of a David Leonhardt New York Times column in May of 2018. In it, he attributes the birth of this trope to a 2005 episode of The West Wing. Leonhardt then fast forwards to a March 2006 New Yorker piece by Hendrik Hertzberg. In between I found this in PrawfsBlawg, posted by Daniel Solove on July 16, 2005. 

However it started, it has become a potent cudgel as right-wing "sources," thirsty staffers, and hedging pols trying to save their corner offices feed talking points to a hungry press. And the "disarray" has become an article of faith for the compliant media, a convenient narrative for lazy journalists to snark up whenever Democrats disagree with one another (a shocking phenomenon unimaginable in the Republican Party of Marching Penguins). Now, every time the Natural Order of Things gets a little warped, a little out of alignment, the media fires up the machine and runs it at Democrats hoping to get a laugh at the dopes tripping over their shoelaces. And things right now are warped.

Just when it looked like things might go sideways for Mad King Donald and his merry basket of deplorables (Don't get me started on hate-troll Stephen Miller, and what the hell happened to Elon Musk???), just when the story of people being kidnapped and shipped illegally to a torture prison in another country might be a story with legs, just when it began to look like everything might not go to shit quite as fast as we thought, 

• on April 15 we get this gift from Politico: 

In unprecedented move, DNC official to spend big to take down fellow Democrats

Leaders We Deserve, which Hogg co-founded in 2023, announced plans on Tuesday to spend $20 million in safe-blue Democratic primaries against sitting House members by supporting younger opponents.     

• That was followed on April 16 when California governor and attention junkie Gavin Newsom honked up this phlegm ball, as reported by NBC News from April 18:

         Abrego Garcia's deportation case exposes a rift among Democrats over how to take            on Trump

As California Gov. Gavin Newsom rolled out a lawsuit Wednesday challenging Trump’s sweeping tariffs, he had little to say about the Abrego Garcia case when asked about it.

 "This is the distraction of the day. The art of distraction,” Newsom, a potential 2028 presidential contender, said of Trump invoking MS-13 to justify his actions. “And here, we zig and zag. This is the debate they want. This is their 80-20 issue, as they’ve described it.”

• On April 18, NBC even found a way to stir in a little David Hogg, reporting:

"THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT WE NEED MORE OF," Hogg wrote on X Thursday night. "We have to show people how we are fighting back and are here to protect the American people from [Trump's] reckless agenda."

The "Dems in Disarray" army got to work, aaaand they're off!  

• Daily Kos put it this way, also April 18:Wrongful deportation highlights Democratic split on how to fight Trump 

• Also April 18, Axios felt the need to remind us that "Democratic National Committee vice chair David Hogg's plan to spend $20 million to primary older Democratic incumbents in Congress has sparked intense anger from some lawmakers" under the headline "House Democrats fume at David Hogg's plan to oust lawmakers."

• and on April 21, PBS was still reporting the deportation story this way: Tamara Keith and Amy Walter on Democrats split over how to oppose Trump’s agenda

Turns out, Newsom may not even have said that, exactly. The quote came in answer to a question from Sacramento Bee reporter Lia Russell, who wrote about it on April 22. You can read the article and decide for yourself if the clean-up is any better than the spill. 

What is indisputable is that it was reported this way, and paired with the David Hogg reporting, the rift is the story. As usual.

Meanwhile, Trump remains vulnerable:

• April 24 Courts punch Trump in the nose on elections/voter registration, 
• May 2 Trump has to retreat over trans athletes in Maine (How 'bout that Governor Janet Mills!)
• Trump fake trade deals.
• May 11 Trump gets hammered over his shiny new plane.
• May 12 Trump waves his magic wand and lowers drug prices. Details are... scarce.

He appears increasingly unhinged:

REPORTER: Has Qatar asked for anything in exchange for that $400 million luxury jumbo jet, & how can the American people be so sure that they will not in the future? TRUMP: I think what happens with the plane is that we're very disappointed that it's taking Boeing so long to build a new Air Force 1

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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) May 12, 2025 at 7:41 AM

And he's lost the Pope:

"Trump claims he’s making America stronger; he insists no one can defy him. But here are people defying him, and they seem better off for it, not worse. It makes him look weak — and people are a lot more comfortable defying a president who seems weak than one who seems strong."

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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) May 12, 2025 at 8:50 AM

That means the Disarray drumbeat must go on. 

There's this April 26 article by Kayla Epstein from BBC News. It represents disagreements among Democrats in a typical zero-sum fashion: "But the Fighting Oligarchy tour is only one theory about how the Democratic Party should evolve," and "New guard or old guard?" and "Some Democrats accused their party of falling out of step with more conservative Americans on subjects like transgender rights, or failing to accommodate diverse viewpoints within the party's ideological spectrum." As if you can't be anti-oligarchy and anti-discrimination at the same time. Some Democrats.

Sidebar: I think some Democrats, maybe because of unfamiliarity or embarrassment or prejudice or fear, refuse to address transgender rights from the correct stance. The Republicans have dominated the narrative by focusing on transgender as a scare word and offering slogans and dubious anecdotes to shape opinion. Many Democrats simply shy away from the fight, and it makes them look weak, or complicit. Rather than offer a counterclaim, they leave the field entirely. 

In my opinion, the focus should always be on rights. This is not about sports or bathrooms, and it's clearly not about science. Focus on rights. Human rights are human rights, full stop. Fairly easy to understand and very popular, not to mention having a long, albeit imperfect, history of being the reason we're even a country. 

Republicans will always try to turn it inside out to protect the rights of people who are not transgender, but if Democrats are committed, that rhetorical jiujitsu can be met with a simple example: Did the freedom of enslaved people impair the rights of white slave owners? Yes, it eliminated their right to enslave people. The right to deprive others of their rights is always illegitimate. If Dems can't say that, they should take themselves out of the game. (And it wouldn't hurt to spread around a little actual science as well.) Sorry, this has been on my mind.

And we're back. While the "Dems in Disarray" machine runs best on fuel supplied by insiders, the whole BBC article reads like a premise in search of evidence as it goes door to door for quotes from a medley of dissatisfied "rally attendees," politicians in and out of work, the odd professor, and James Fucking Carville. Picking over the bones of recent and not-so-recent disputes, the article never gets around to weighing the substance of the arguments. It's the argument, Stupid.

Perhaps the perfect mixture of snark and toxic sourcing comes from Politico. "‘It’s time for Joe Biden to go away': Democrats are triggered by Biden’s return to the spotlight" reads the headline, and reporter Brakkton Booker has graciously accepted the gift of Joe Biden's appearance on ABC's The View and taken the time to confirm the Dissaray by talking to a writer, a former special assistant to President Biden, and two journalists with a book coming out about "President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again" with the modest title Original Sin.

You know who else Booker managed to dig up? FOUR! COUNT'EM FOUR! different Democratic strategists. One who worked for Bernie Sanders, one who worked for both Biden and VP Harris before the strategist quit, one who worked on Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, and one who seems to have worked only for Sen. Raphael Warnock for a couple of years in Georgia. I'm not saying these sources were cherry-picked to support the narrative. I'm just saying. 

One other weird thing. Does anyone out there know the difference between a "strategist" and a "consultant"?

Finally, who is our "Dems in Disarray" champion? The answer may surprise you. We nominate NBC for this thoughtful April 26-27 article by Allan Smith, Alexandra Marquez and Natasha Korecki. It doesn't downplay disagreements among Democrats--over policy differences and leadership preferences, over focus on an economic message or moral/social issues, but the article generally frames the "conversation" as an effort to build something new and responsive to the needs of constituents. It doesn't choose a side or foreclose the possibility that there are more than one right answer.

It includes the voices of several young Democratic leaders and presents the "conversation" as a process of trying to get somewhere rather than a Disarray dead end worthy of a savvy eyeroll. It's our champ precisely because it does the opposite of what you'd expect after reading this headline (emphasis mine):

Democrats want a great new society post-Trump. They just can't agree on what it would look like.

Democrats are increasingly saying that simply unwinding Trump’s policies isn’t enough. But there are still broad disagreements on policy issues and who the next leader should be.

Well, it's a start. Baby steps. 

Thanks for reading. See you soon.

Bring on the Shills

The Narrative Double-Dealers have not stopped lying and they will not stop. It's the way they reshape the world, and that's how they stay alive. If only they could get a little help. 

Bring on the Shills! 

First some good news! We've been lucky (so far) that, at least on the abduction of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the mainstream media have been generally clear-eyed. Here I should insert that I'm not talking about Fox or any of the rest of Rush Limbaugh's evil offspring. I don't know what they do. 

Back to the good news. Corporate mainstream media continue to refer to Trump's actions as lawless and to focus on the fundamental need for due process, aka rule of law. They haven't buckled under the gazillion tons of accumulated lies and, for what it's worth, I think that has been central to polls showing majority support for said "due process" / "rule of law." 

Some refer to this journalistic technique as "reporting the facts" and consider it central to the job. Those people haven't been paying attention. It's rare, and the media's reluctance to shield Trump, Miller & Co and their lawlessness has been notable and mildly encouraging. Corporate mainstream media are in the business of making money. They can be expected to pursue their own financial interests above any theoretical public interest, which they do ferociously.  And they can be expected to hire reporters and writers and news talkers who support that mission or can be convinced to. And they do.

That means mainstream reporters as a species live every day in fear. They are chronically afraid for the future of the industry. They are acutely afraid of losing their access and then their jobs and then their homes and then their kid's private school slot. They are terrified of losing their status as clever Very Important People and getting bounced out of the club. That's a lot to be scared of, and as a result we can almost always expect news talkers to toe the company line, default to conservatism, and make no waves. 

Not a perfect environment for truth to flourish. 

The information ecosphere is full of three-card monte cons, and the media's fear and greed turn them into shills for the narrative Double-Dealers. (There is no better example than this travesty from The Atlantic.) You can read it and witness the debasement first-hand, but take my advice and read this instead, from Steve M. @stevemnomoremister.bsky.social. 

That's why during bumpy periods for the regime when things get a little off-script, life gets awkward for the news folks tasked with keeping the money train on the rails and making sure the narcissistic sociopath-in-chief keeps his clothes on. From tariff whiplash and market slides to Hands Off! to Canada telling Trump No Means No, Trump has been wobbled, and he has especially struggled on immigration as he bellowed and stomped until he turned one of his "strengths" into a real liability. These days, Trump's vincibility is showing.

Lately, Trump has been reduced to "letting the lawyers handle that" and watching hate-troll Stephen Miller write mean tweets and do mean interviews for him. He'll be back. A wounded Trump is a dangerous lunatic. It's also a challenge to the dominant narrative of Trump as colossus, and a perilous and unfamiliar challenge for media as they navigate contradictory narratives. So far, the press has largely defaulted to the truth, with the most notable exception being the Gaza Rule. More on that another time--when I know more and have more courage.

Trump's always been a narcissistic sociopath, but I think his real decline began in March. Yes, the DOGE smash and grab was bubbling and Elon Musk was toxic (whatever happened to that guy?), but for my money, the serious political and cognitive deterioration started with the night flights to San Salvador. Maybe even he can't believe how badly he fucked up and it's driving him crazy. (I know I know... The Supreme Court)

Anyway, this particular rough stretch of road begins with the legal cage match that started as Kilmar Abrego Garcia and more than 200 other prisoners were being disappeared to El Salvador. 

March 15: Judge James Emanuel Boasberg was holding hearings on whether the government could invoke the Alien Enemies Act to deport the prisoners. He issued a Temporary Restraining Order but they did it anyway. He was pissed.  

On March 24, Judge Paula Xinis entered the Octagon in the Kilmar Abrego Garcia case. Then...

March 31 - April 1: There was Senator Cory Booker's filibuster as he quite literally stood against tyranny.  

April 10: Even the Supreme Court took the time to weigh in and wag a finger in the Abrego Garcia case, then firing off a kind of midnight lightning bolt with an Alien Enemies Act order barring our mafia government from--at least for now--doing quite as much depravity as they had on the schedule. Steve Vladeck has a good synopsis here. 

April 12 a few law firms didn't cave and April 14: Harvard pushed back. 

And... Even though both cases have already made a trip to the Supreme Court, litigation continues right up to today in Judge Xinis's court, where they are still wrestling over discovery, and in Judge Boasburg's court where, I think, the judge is still trying to get to the bottom of who sent the prisoners to El Salvador in defiance of his order. In any event, it's been a rough stretch of road, and there's more.

Throw in Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen's courageous, potentially game-changing trip to El Salvador to visit Kilmar Abrego Garcia and press for his release, and add in the subsequent trip U.S. Reps. Maxwell Frost of Florida, Yassamin Ansari of Arizona, Maxine Dexter of Oregon and Robert Garcia of California are taking to maintain pressure and attention on the issue, and lately it's been a little rougher for the Bad Guys and a little-less-terrible for the Good Guys.

Because the regime hasn't got its own way every single minute of every day, news folks have been scrambling for a way to report the blunders and outrages without making the monster mad, and to their credit they have generally reported fairly. But pressure has been building for a market correction.

And you know what that means! That's right! You loved it in the 2000s and you love it now! In fact, your great-grandparents loved it in the thirties!

                                            

It's time once again to play "Dems in Disarray!" the periodic cavalcade of attention junkies and access whores hooking up to savvy each other to orgasm and restore the Natural Order. 

Please come back next week to find out who our champion will be!

Thanks for reading. See you soon.

Beware the Narrative Double Dealers

and the shills who make their livings off the marks.

I love stories, but what I'm talking about are made-up narratives created to advance a political agenda by obscuring and replacing the truth. Often these narratives are born as basic lies--noun, verb, adjective--repeated over and over again until they become a story, then the story. They ravage the body politic like tumors growing and metastasizing.

Some are niche, like Pizzagate or "Hillary is sick and falling down." Some are all too familiar: Obama was not born in the U.S.! The election was stolen! Joe Biden is a dictator and a criminal mastermind! Trump is the greatest deal-maker in the history of the world! They're eating the pets!!

There are obviously too many of these weaponized narratives to count, much less list. Most never have gotten much traction in my neighborhood, but they are very popular in some places and they do get a lot of attention. Which is a big part of the point.

Just because my friends and I don't believe the firehose of nonsense, that doesn't mean we don't hear it or that the lies don't work. First, the narratives give true believers confirmation of what they already suspect or believe or want to believe. Second, there may be some people persuaded that the lie is true or possibly true, especially if they hear it often enough from sources they trust. Finally, for people not really paying attention or the people in my neighborhood (who, admittedly, are paying too close attention), listening to incessant lying that doesn't comport with the reality we're living is disgusting and extremely discouraging.

And that, too, is success. The lies work. And they work their very best when picked up and disseminated by media that does get traction in my neighborhood. 

Whenever a Sunday show panel host asks an official to respond to a charge leveled in bad faith (aka "a lie")

"What do you say to that?"

or a news talker reports a claim without providing crucial context

or a reporter mindlessly assigns false equivalence to things that are anything but

or an interviewer fails to hold a liar to account by being unprepared or unwilling to ask the question again

So, are we headed for a recession?

The president is the best dealmaker I've seen in my lifetime.

We're going to have to leave it there and move on.

corporate media releases these poison narratives directly into the atmosphere and makes constructive communication impossible. They act as shills for the con. These narratives have changed the world, and whether we're talking about the liars who actually develop and deal the lies or the media who ropes the marks, they are killing us. 

On March 15, against the orders of Judge James E. Boasberg, Chief Judge of the District Court of DC, the Trump regime took three planeloads of prisoners and smuggled them out of the country in the middle of the night, sending them to torture prison in El Salvador. (Here's a link to the timeline of proceedings in the case so far). The regime hit the ground lying, about the flights, about what they knew, and about what they could or were required to share with the Court, and most especially about the prisoners they had deported. 

One of those prisoners, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, has become a victim of both the denial of due process and the general lawlessness of this administration, and of the lying they will do to divert attention and re-set the narrative. Almost immediately the MAGA regime started lying about Abrego Garcia. They lied on teevee. They lied in front of microphones. They lied in court. 

On March 24, Abrego Garcia and members of his family filed a complaint before Judge Paula Xinis of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland seeking Abrego Garcia's return. The result was a messy back-and-forth with the Government's lawyers doing everything they could to stall and stonewall. 

They lost, and the case ended up before the Supreme Court (you may have heard) which issued a messy "in part in part" ruling that directed the Government to "facilitate" Abrego Garcia's release from torture prison in El Salvador and return to the U.S. The Government continues to lie about the order when not ignoring it entirely. They lie to break reality, to break the world we see around us, to break us.

They lie because they have to. They don't exist separate from the lying. Abrego Garcia was a gang member. He was a terrorist. A human trafficker. He was in the custody of El Salvador and there's nothing the U.S. can do about it. A  convicted criminal and bad father. They dug up old court records and characterized Abrego Garcia as a "wife beater." And the on and on. Now they're lying about something their own lawyers filed. This was yesterday. This was today. 

Those are the official statements by the regime. Of course, the right-wing propaganda machine has been doing its part to promote and amplify the disinformation. Through outlets across platforms, they reinforce the multiverse of conflicting narratives: Kilmar Abrego was deported in "error." Then, "No error! No error!" We actually won the Supreme Court case 9-0! But, the courts have no jurisdiction over this! America is GREAT AGAIN! But we're powerless against El Salvador. Immigrants should come legally. Oh, you are legal? Not anymore! Kilmar Abrego Garcia is a bad guy. Democrats love terrorists. 

They have not stopped lying and they will not stop. It's the way they reshape the world, and that's how they stay alive. 

They will not stop. They can only be stopped.

You know what to do.