thebulwark--2020-08-18--Democrats Have Five Tipping Points

Democrats Have Five Tipping Points

The building blocks , in terms of events intersecting with polling trends , are in place for the Biden-Harris ticket to decisively defeat the Trump-Pence ticket , both in the popular vote and in the Electoral College .
Polling data has consistently favored Biden over Trump since the first theoretical matchup polls were taken .
Today , at the start of the two-week convention period , the RealClear Politics average puts Biden up by 6.9 percent nationally and by 4.3 percent in the battleground states ( with clear Biden leads in Florida , Pennsylvania , Michigan , and Wisconsin ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as to be irreversible .
FiveThirtyEight ’ s polling averages shows Trump ’ s job approval rating stuck at 41.9 percent and his disapproval rating at 54.6 percent .
The milestone for polling will be the week after Labor Day .
By then we can glean how voters see the economy following the August jobs data is reported , how they rate Trump ’ s management of the pandemic after the schools in the South have been reopened for weeks , and the reaction to the conventions .
All of this will start @ @ @ @ @ @ @ week after Labor Day .
There are three tests which will determine if the Democrats have the discipline to win .
First , do the Democrats emerge united from their convention ?
The initial reaction to Biden ’ s selection of Kamala Harris as his running mate should fill the Democrats with hope .
Trump ’ s , nasty reaction to Harris has ensured visceral and enthusiastic support from black as well as South Asian women and probably an approving nod from college-educated suburban white women .
Moreover , Trump ’ s attempt @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be president has muted grumbling about from the progressive left , which views Harris as too moderate .
So unless something unexpected goes very wrong , the Democrats should come out of there convention quite unified as a party .
The second test focuses on race and ideology .
The Democrats lost three presidential races they should have won by foundering upon the intersecting vectors of race and ideology : 1968 , 2000 , and 2016 .
In 1968 , Humphrey , after the disastrous riots at the Chicago convention , was caught @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his right flank—not only in the South but throughout the industrial North , which was chock full of blue collar manufacturing based union voters—and the desertion of young voters—both black and white—who had gotten clean for Gene .
Humphrey ’ s campaign had to fight a two front war to try to claw back union voters in the North from Wallace and anti-War and younger black voters along both coasts and in the Midwest .
The AFL-CIO , led by Secretary Treasurer Lane Kirkland , helped Humphrey drive down Wallace ’ s support @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the non-voting on the left was never quite overcome .
Humphrey staged a late comeback , but fell short by 500,000 votes in the popular vote ( Nixon got 43.4 percent , Humphrey 42.7 percent and Wallace at 13.5 percent ) allowing Nixon to carry the Electoral College 301-191 ( with Wallace getting 46 electoral votes from the Deep South ) .
Nixon ’ s Electoral College majority was due to Humphrey losing four key northern states : Illinois , Ohio , Wisconsin , and Delaware then totaling 67 electoral votes .
In @ @ @ @ @ @ @ party candidacy not only sapped Al Gore of energy and enthusiasm on his left flank , but cost him Florida in the Electoral College , negating Gore ’ s 500,000 popular vote margin .
Then in 2016 , the combination of Jill Stein ’ s vote and a drop in the participation rate of black voters ( from 66 percent in 2012 to 59 percent in 2016 ) swung Pennsylvania , Michigan , and Wisconsin .
Which opened the door to Trump ’ s inside straight in the Electoral College , despite losing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
So will the progressive wing of the Democratic party march enthusiastically behind the Biden-Harris ticket ?
Securing that enthusiasm is a two-way street .
Biden has been smart to reach out to progressive leaders on the platform , but progressive voters have a choice .
Do they want to follow the model of 1968 , 2000 , and 2016 and let their differences with Biden open a door currently closing on Trump ’ s re-election prospects ?
Or do they want to advance their ideas from an alliance within a Biden-Harris administration @ @ @ @ @ @ @ most things over differences on some things is a predicate for victory .
The third test of Democratic discipline is straight political arithmetic .
There are five clear tipping points for a Democratic win .
If the Democrats reach three of these five tipping points they will win the presidency and hold the House .
If they hit or exceed more than three of them , they are likely to take control of the Senate .
If , however , they hit only only one or two of these spots , then Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 1 ) Win 43 percent of the white vote .
To reach this number , Democrats need to carry a clear majority of college educated white men and carry over 45 percent of white women with less than a college education , in addition to splitting the senior vote of seniors , and losing white Catholics by no more than 5 percent to 7 percent .
Hitting or exceeding those targets means Democrats can absorb the loss of white Evangelicals by a landslide and a 20-point loss from non-college white men .
( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the minority vote by at least a 3-to-1 margin .
The aggregate minority vote ( black , Hispanic , Asian and multi-racial voters ) needs to hit a full third of the national electorate and Biden must carry these voters by at least 3-to-1 .
Since 2004 the trend line has showed a 2 percent rise in the share of the total vote cast by non-white voters every presidential cycle .
If that continues to hold then the minority vote would hit 32 percent this year .
It would be helpful if Democrats @ @ @ @ @ @ @ or two .
At the same time , Democrats should be worried about Trump ’ s performance .
In 2016 , he carried 13 percent of black men and 35 percent of middle-aged Hispanic men .
Biden will have to eat into those numbers .
( This is why Republicans are helping Kanye West get on the ballot in key states : they are trying to keep black male votes away from Biden , because they doubt that Trump can get back to double digits again with those voters . )
If you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , here are the targets Biden needs to hit : • None Hispanic vote : 72 percent ( in 2016 , Clinton took 67 percent while Gary Jonson took 5 percent ) ( 3 ) Rebuild the Blue Wall and recapture Florida and North Carolina .
The key to this mark is the total percentage of votes cast by those with some college , but not a four year degree .
Think of these folks as the kids who stayed home in 2016 .
In 2008 , Obama carried this group by 4 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ carried them by 9 percent .
If Biden can carry this group—which makes up a third of the electorate by 4 percent , that will be tipping point for victory .
( 5 ) Never Trump Republicans .
If Biden can keep Trump even a shade under 90 percent support from Republican voters , it would be a big deal .
How could he do it ?
By mining the votes of the quarter of the GOP who are self- described moderates .
( The corollary to this is that Biden needs to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ . )
In 2018 , Democrats were more loyal to their congressional candidates than Republicans .
If that pattern repeats itself—especially in conjunction with independents breaking toward the Democrat—that could open up multiple Senate races for the Democrats .
Not just Maine , Colorado , North Carolina and Arizona , but Montana , Iowa , and perhaps even South Carolina and Texas .
It would also put into play states once thought out of reach in the presidential race : Iowa , Ohio , and Texas .
To those Democrats who scoff at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republican votes I would remind them to study history .
It was key for Lincoln to snare free soil Democrats in 1860 ; for FDR to snag the support of his cousin TR ’ s Bull Moose Republicans in the North and West ; and for JFK to get the votes of Republican Catholics .
Not to mention the Reagan Democrats who created a governing coalition for Republicans for a decade .
To close on victory , Democrats will have to adjust skillfully to surprise events , yet be effective in the logistics @ @ @ @ @ @ @ They will have to message persuasively via virtual campaigning at the top of the ticket , at the same time they are mastering voter contact via social networking .
Each of those challenges would be daunting on its own .
Collectively they represent a Mount Everest-like climb .
Because the polls have been consistently in Biden ’ s favor from the start , some observers may believe that a Democratic victory is already overdetermined .
That is simply not true .
Defeating an incumbent president is never easy and never a sure thing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ going to be tested , multiple times , over the next three months .
And if they fail these tests , Donald Trump will win .

The building blocks, in terms of events intersecting with polling trends, are in place for the Biden-Harris ticket to decisively defeat the Trump-Pence ticket, both in the popular vote and in the Electoral College.
Polling data has consistently favored Biden over Trump since the first theoretical matchup polls were taken. Today, at the start of the two-week convention period, the RealClear Politics average puts Biden up by 6.9 percent nationally and by 4.3 percent in the battleground states (with clear Biden leads in Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin). These leads are not so prohibitive as to be irreversible.
FiveThirtyEight’s polling averages shows Trump’s job approval rating stuck at 41.9 percent and his disapproval rating at 54.6 percent. The milestone for polling will be the week after Labor Day. By then we can glean how voters see the economy following the August jobs data is reported, how they rate Trump’s management of the pandemic after the schools in the South have been reopened for weeks, and the reaction to the conventions. All of this will start to settle in with voters by the week after Labor Day.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
There are three tests which will determine if the Democrats have the discipline to win.
First, do the Democrats emerge united from their convention? The initial reaction to Biden’s selection of Kamala Harris as his running mate should fill the Democrats with hope.
Trump’s, nasty reaction to Harris has ensured visceral and enthusiastic support from black as well as South Asian women and probably an approving nod from college-educated suburban white women. Moreover, Trump’s attempt to portray Harris as not eligible to be president has muted grumbling about from the progressive left, which views Harris as too moderate.
So unless something unexpected goes very wrong, the Democrats should come out of their convention quite unified as a party.
The second test focuses on race and ideology. The Democrats lost three presidential races they should have won by foundering upon the intersecting vectors of race and ideology: 1968, 2000, and 2016.
In 1968, Humphrey, after the disastrous riots at the Chicago convention, was caught between Wallace’s racist thrust to his right flank—not only in the South but throughout the industrial North, which was chock full of blue collar manufacturing based union voters—and the desertion of young voters—both black and white—who had gotten clean for Gene.
Humphrey’s campaign had to fight a two front war to try to claw back union voters in the North from Wallace and anti-War and younger black voters along both coasts and in the Midwest. The AFL-CIO, led by Secretary Treasurer Lane Kirkland, helped Humphrey drive down Wallace’s support among union households up North, but the non-voting on the left was never quite overcome.
Humphrey staged a late comeback, but fell short by 500,000 votes in the popular vote (Nixon got 43.4 percent, Humphrey 42.7 percent and Wallace at 13.5 percent) allowing Nixon to carry the Electoral College 301-191 (with Wallace getting 46 electoral votes from the Deep South). Nixon’s Electoral College majority was due to Humphrey losing four key northern states: Illinois, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Delaware then totaling 67 electoral votes.
In 2000, Ralph Nader’s third party candidacy not only sapped Al Gore of energy and enthusiasm on his left flank, but cost him Florida in the Electoral College, negating Gore’s 500,000 popular vote margin.
Then in 2016, the combination of Jill Stein’s vote and a drop in the participation rate of black voters (from 66 percent in 2012 to 59 percent in 2016) swung Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Which opened the door to Trump’s inside straight in the Electoral College, despite losing the popular vote by 3 million votes.
So will the progressive wing of the Democratic party march enthusiastically behind the Biden-Harris ticket? Securing that enthusiasm is a two-way street. Biden has been smart to reach out to progressive leaders on the platform, but progressive voters have a choice. Do they want to follow the model of 1968, 2000, and 2016 and let their differences with Biden open a door currently closing on Trump’s re-election prospects? Or do they want to advance their ideas from an alliance within a Biden-Harris administration?
Progressives and Biden puting unity on most things over differences on some things is a predicate for victory.
The third test of Democratic discipline is straight political arithmetic. There are five clear tipping points for a Democratic win. If the Democrats reach three of these five tipping points they will win the presidency and hold the House. If they hit or exceed more than three of them, they are likely to take control of the Senate.
If, however, they hit only only one or two of these spots, then Trump is likely to win reelection.
(1) Win 43 percent of the white vote. To reach this number, Democrats need to carry a clear majority of college educated white men and carry over 45 percent of white women with less than a college education, in addition to splitting the senior vote of seniors, and losing white Catholics by no more than 5 percent to 7 percent.
Hitting or exceeding those targets means Democrats can absorb the loss of white Evangelicals by a landslide and a 20-point loss from non-college white men.
(2) Big minority turnout and win the minority vote by at least a 3-to-1 margin. The aggregate minority vote (black, Hispanic, Asian and multi-racial voters) needs to hit a full third of the national electorate and Biden must carry these voters by at least 3-to-1.
Since 2004 the trend line has showed a 2 percent rise in the share of the total vote cast by non-white voters every presidential cycle. If that continues to hold then the minority vote would hit 32 percent this year. It would be helpful if Democrats could energize that share up another point or two.
At the same time, Democrats should be worried about Trump’s performance. In 2016, he carried 13 percent of black men and 35 percent of middle-aged Hispanic men. Biden will have to eat into those numbers. (This is why Republicans are helping Kanye West get on the ballot in key states: they are trying to keep black male votes away from Biden, because they doubt that Trump can get back to double digits again with those voters.)
If you break the minority vote down by race, here are the targets Biden needs to hit:
Black vote: 93 percent
Hispanic vote: 72 percent (in 2016, Clinton took 67 percent while Gary Jonson took 5 percent)
Asian vote: Greater than 70 percent
(3) Rebuild the Blue Wall and recapture Florida and North Carolina. The key to this mark is the total percentage of votes cast by those with some college, but not a four year degree.
Think of these folks as the kids who stayed home in 2016. In 2008, Obama carried this group by 4 percent, but in 2016, Trump carried them by 9 percent. If Biden can carry this group—which makes up a third of the electorate by 4 percent, that will be tipping point for victory.
(4) Independents. In 2008, Obama carried independents by 7 points. In 2016, Trump carried Independents by 6 points. In 2018 Democrats carried Independents by double digits. If Biden can carry independents by more than 8 percent, it will be the key to carrying states where the Democrats don’t have a registration advantage: Florida, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Georgia, Colorado, and Arizona.)
(5) Never Trump Republicans. If Biden can keep Trump even a shade under 90 percent support from Republican voters, it would be a big deal.
How could he do it? By mining the votes of the quarter of the GOP who are self- described moderates. (The corollary to this is that Biden needs to hold at least 93 percent of Democrats.)
In 2018, Democrats were more loyal to their congressional candidates than Republicans. If that pattern repeats itself—especially in conjunction with independents breaking toward the Democrat—that could open up multiple Senate races for the Democrats. Not just Maine, Colorado, North Carolina and Arizona, but Montana, Iowa, and perhaps even South Carolina and Texas.
It would also put into play states once thought out of reach in the presidential race: Iowa, Ohio, and Texas.
To those Democrats who scoff at wasting the party’s time seeking Republican votes I would remind them to study history. It was key for Lincoln to snare free soil Democrats in 1860; for FDR to snag the support of his cousin TR’s Bull Moose Republicans in the North and West; and for JFK to get the votes of Republican Catholics. Not to mention the Reagan Democrats who created a governing coalition for Republicans for a decade.
To close on victory, Democrats will have to adjust skillfully to surprise events, yet be effective in the logistics of securing turnout amidst a pandemic.
They will have to message persuasively via virtual campaigning at the top of the ticket, at the same time they are mastering voter contact via social networking. Each of those challenges would be daunting on its own. Collectively they represent a Mount Everest-like climb.
Because the polls have been consistently in Biden’s favor from the start, some observers may believe that a Democratic victory is already overdetermined. That is simply not true.
Defeating an incumbent president is never easy and never a sure thing. Joe Biden and the Democrats are going to be tested, multiple times, over the next three months. And if they fail these tests, Donald Trump will win.


thebulwark--2020-08-19--Paying the Bill for the Pandemic-Related Unemployment Benefits

Congress has enacted the largest economic stimulus in history in response to the coronavirus pandemic , providing over $ 2 trillion in federal aid so far .
That includes hundreds of billions of dollars for the now-expired $ 600-per-week federal unemployment bonus .
But almost no attention has been paid to how those unemployment benefits are financed .
Instead of using worker payroll taxes , Congress has tapped unprecedented amounts of federal general revenues , adding to the national debt at an alarming rate .
And unlike Congresses of the past , current policymakers show no intention of ever repaying @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was a common question that tempered Congress ’ s appetite for big benefit increases : How high will federal unemployment taxes have to rise to pay for expanded unemployment benefits ?
Since its inception , the unemployment insurance ( UI ) program has been supported by a state and a federal payroll tax imposed on employers ( though ultimately the cost of these taxes is borne by workers through lower wages and fewer job opportunities ) .
The revenue from those taxes is credited to state and federal trust funds that are normally @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this time is different , both in the suddenness and depth of unemployment resulting from the pandemic and in the extraordinary federal benefits response .
Another difference is that not a single dime of the federal UI trust funds has been used to support the cost of either federal unemployment bonuses or the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance ( PUA ) program .
Instead , Congress tapped federal general revenues , which are typically used for welfare benefits , national security , and everything else aside from the mandatory spending on the nation ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The scale of general revenues flowing through the UI system is unprecedented .
During five months through August 15 , federal spending for the $ 600 bonuses totaled $ 260 billion , while spending on PUA benefits was $ 37 billion .
That already exceeds federal unemployment benefit spending during the six-year response to the Great Recession .
Extending current federal benefits into early 2021 , as the House approved in May , would spend another $ 437 billion—coming almost entirely from general revenues .
If Congress agrees to that , federal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 700 billion , or more than 100 times the $ 7 billion in federal UI payroll tax revenue collected each year .
How will Congress pay for that ?
Its current approach is simply not to , adding these costs to the national debt .
But that is contrary to historic norms of the UI system .
Congress has tapped general revenues before to finance federal unemployment benefits when federal trust funds ran dry .
But a federal unemployment surtax was often levied to finance those costs .
The graphic below shows a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ years ( that is , 60 percent of the years ) since 1957 ( the year when federal extended benefits were first provided ) : Years when a federal unemployment surtax was in effect , 1957-present : If the current Congress followed this practice and levied a surtax to recoup general revenues projected to be spent on federal benefits through early 2021 , today ’ s federal UI tax of typically $ 42 per worker per year would grow to $ 482—a 1,048 percent increase—and stay there for a decade .
The federal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ percent to 6.6 percent , or more than double today ’ s Medicare tax rate ( which is applied over a different wage base ) .
That sharply elevated federal UI tax rate would be on top of state payroll tax hikes already coming to re-build state UI trust funds .
What are the chances of such a federal UI tax hike occurring ?
Almost nil , for several reasons .
Few in Washington today think anything needs to be paid for , least of all stimulus spending in response to the pandemic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ insurance benefits also has long lost any stigma .
And the payroll tax hikes would be so huge both parties simply look the other way .
But , again , that leaves unasked the critical and previously routine question : How high will federal unemployment taxes rise to pay for additional federal unemployment benefits ?
In the past , knowing that increases in current benefits supported by non-UI funds had a downside—future payroll tax hikes—Congress exercised greater discipline .
Now , a Congress unaccustomed even in ordinary times to thinking seriously about deficits @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as Congress and the administration negotiate the next round of unemployment benefit increases , that prior restraint appears gone , probably forever .

Congress has enacted the largest economic stimulus in history in response to the coronavirus pandemic, providing over $2 trillion in federal aid so far. That includes hundreds of billions of dollars for the now-expired $600-per-week federal unemployment bonus. But almost no attention has been paid to how those unemployment benefits are financed. Instead of using worker payroll taxes, Congress has tapped unprecedented amounts of federal general revenues, adding to the national debt at an alarming rate. And unlike Congresses of the past, current policymakers show no intention of ever repaying those funds. That ignores what previously was a common question that tempered Congress’s appetite for big benefit increases: How high will federal unemployment taxes have to rise to pay for expanded unemployment benefits?
Since its inception, the unemployment insurance (UI) program has been supported by a state and a federal payroll tax imposed on employers (though ultimately the cost of these taxes is borne by workers through lower wages and fewer job opportunities). The revenue from those taxes is credited to state and federal trust funds that are normally used to pay UI benefits.
But this time is different, both in the suddenness and depth of unemployment resulting from the pandemic and in the extraordinary federal benefits response. Another difference is that not a single dime of the federal UI trust funds has been used to support the cost of either federal unemployment bonuses or the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) program. Instead, Congress tapped federal general revenues, which are typically used for welfare benefits, national security, and everything else aside from the mandatory spending on the nation’s “social insurance” system for workers.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
The scale of general revenues flowing through the UI system is unprecedented. During five months through August 15, federal spending for the $600 bonuses totaled $260 billion, while spending on PUA benefits was $37 billion. That already exceeds federal unemployment benefit spending during the six-year response to the Great Recession. Extending current federal benefits into early 2021, as the House approved in May, would spend another $437 billion—coming almost entirely from general revenues. If Congress agrees to that, federal unemployment spending would total well over $700 billion, or more than 100 times the $7 billion in federal UI payroll tax revenue collected each year.
How will Congress pay for that? Its current approach is simply not to, adding these costs to the national debt. But that is contrary to historic norms of the UI system. Congress has tapped general revenues before to finance federal unemployment benefits when federal trust funds ran dry. But a federal unemployment surtax was often levied to finance those costs. The graphic below shows a surtax applied in 38 of the 63 years (that is, 60 percent of the years) since 1957 (the year when federal extended benefits were first provided):
Years when a federal unemployment surtax was in effect, 1957-present:
If the current Congress followed this practice and levied a surtax to recoup general revenues projected to be spent on federal benefits through early 2021, today’s federal UI tax of typically $42 per worker per year would grow to $482—a 1,048 percent increase—and stay there for a decade. The federal UI tax rate would skyrocket from 0.6 percent to 6.6 percent, or more than double today’s Medicare tax rate (which is applied over a different wage base). That sharply elevated federal UI tax rate would be on top of state payroll tax hikes already coming to re-build state UI trust funds.
What are the chances of such a federal UI tax hike occurring? Almost nil, for several reasons. Few in Washington today think anything needs to be paid for, least of all stimulus spending in response to the pandemic. Using general revenues to finance social insurance benefits also has long lost any stigma. And the payroll tax hikes would be so huge both parties simply look the other way.
But, again, that leaves unasked the critical and previously routine question: How high will federal unemployment taxes rise to pay for additional federal unemployment benefits? In the past, knowing that increases in current benefits supported by non-UI funds had a downside—future payroll tax hikes—Congress exercised greater discipline. Now, a Congress unaccustomed even in ordinary times to thinking seriously about deficits feels no such restraint. Indeed, as Congress and the administration negotiate the next round of unemployment benefit increases, that prior restraint appears gone, probably forever.


thebulwark--2020-08-19--The Post Office Scandal is Either Stupid or Evil, Your Choice

President Trump has spent months raging against mail-in voting systems calling them “ rigged , ” “ corrupt , ” “ fraudulent , ” and threatening to withhold funding from the Post Office so the Democrats won ’ t “ steal the election ” from him .
And now—surprise !
—a lot of people think Trump may want to prevent people from being able to vote by mail .
I mean , how do people come up with the nutty conspiracy theories ?
As of Tuesday , at least 21 states were planning to sue the Post Office and U.S. @ @ @ @ @ @ @ supporter-cum-government-appointee ) for operational changes made ahead of the election—including the removal of Post Office dropboxes and sorting machines—which have resulted in mail slowdowns .
Oh , and last week the Post Office sent letters to 46 states and the District of Columbia warning that it could not guarantee that ballots cast by mail for the November election will arrive in time to be counted .
But don ’ t worry .
There ’ s nothing to see here .
And to prove it , on Tuesday DeJoy said he would suspend making @ @ @ @ @ @ @ just to “ avoid even the appearance of any impact on election mail.
” So case closed !
Republican National Committee Spokeswoman Liz Harrington said in a Monday email titled “ Debunking the Democrats ’ ( latest ) conspiracy theory ” that anyone who believes Trump might have attempted to tamper with the mail-in voting is “ completely untethered from reality.
” Which is .
.
.
kind of a strange way to characterize the people who take what her boss says seriously .
Or literally .
Or whatever .
In a normal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sitting president denouncing mail-in voting systems , people may have looked at mail slowdowns and drop boxes being hauled away and locked up and not really thought much of it .
But , when Trump tweets things such as “ MAIL-IN VOTING WILL LEAD TO MASSIVE FRAUD AND ABUSE .
IT WILL ALSO LEAD TO THE END OF OUR GREAT REPUBLICAN PARTY .
WE CAN NEVER LET THIS TRAGEDY BEFALL OUR NATION ” it ’ s kind of hard to fault people for thinking the president might up to something .
Because he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s presidential campaign is suing Nevada over its mail-in voting system and trying to invalidate absentee ballot requests in three Iowa counties .
Earlier this summer , Trump ’ s lawyers took Pennsylvania to court for its mail-in system but failed to produce any evidence of vote-by-mail fraud by the Friday deadline the judge imposed .
( Oops . )
Trump ’ s brand of conspiracy theories tend to work better on Facebook and Fox than in court .
A plaintiff typically needs evidence to pursue a claim .
But all you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ soldiers shameless enough to put their faces on the story and go on TV .
Like White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows who sat down with CNN ’ s Jake Tapper on Sunday .
There , Meadows claimed mail-in systems send “ millions ” of ballots to “ empty mailboxes , ” which “ disenfranchises ” voters .
“ But there ’ s no evidence of widespread voter fraud , ” Tapper said .
Meadows replied , “ There ’ s no evidence that there ’ s not , either .
That @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Jake.
” Actually , that ’ s the definition of a smear .
Go ahead .
Prove to me you don ’ t beat your spouse , abuse puppies , commit other various crimes against humanity .
THERE ’ S NO EVIDENCE YOU DON ’ T .
SEE !
?
!
In discussion with Fox Business ’ s Maria Bartiromo earlier this month about why he would not agree to Democratic requests for emergency Post Office funding Trump said , “ They need that money in order to have the Post Office work @ @ @ @ @ @ @ millions and millions of ballots…If they don ’ t get those two items , that means you can ’ t have universal mail-in voting because they ’ re not equipped to have it.
” So : The president says that mail-in voting will destroy his party .
He says that he “ can never let ” mail-in voting happen .
And he then says that by denying the Post Office funding , then they won ’ t have the capability to process mail-in voting .
Boy , it ’ s a real mystery @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Post Office to help him win reelection .
There are only two possible explanations for what is going on with Trump ’ s Postal Service .
( 1 ) All of the disappearing mailboxes and sorting machines are part of routine logistical planning , and ( 1 ) ( b ) The president ’ s words about mail-in voting and the Post Office are meaningless and no reasonable person should take them any more seriously than they do his claims to have done more for African-Americans than Abraham Lincoln or that he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be paid for by Mexico .
He ’ s a child who says whatever comes into his head and no reasonable person should take any of his words as representative of his beliefs , his plans , or his administration ’ s policies and actions .
( 2 ) Trump repeatedly said he believes mail-in voting will cost him the election .
Then the Postal Service suddenly started taking actions that were out of the ordinary .
Because the president wanted it to .
As conspiracies go , this isn ’ t like @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to decode anonymous internet posts and do a whole Pepe Silvia thing .
It ’ s pretty straight forward : Trump say mail-in voting bad .
Mail has problems .
Trump stop mail .
So either Trump is really up to something and the Postal Service is a legitimate point of concern .
Or it ’ s a baseless conspiracy because Trump is so mentally unstable that no one should take his words seriously .

President Trump has spent months raging against mail-in voting systems calling them “rigged,”“corrupt,”“fraudulent,” and threatening to withhold funding from the Post Office so the Democrats won’t “steal the election” from him.
And now—surprise!—a lot of people think Trump may want to prevent people from being able to vote by mail.
I mean, how do people come up with the nutty conspiracy theories?
As of Tuesday, at least 21 states were planning to sue the Post Office and U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy (a Trump supporter-cum-government-appointee) for operational changes made ahead of the election—including the removal of Post Office dropboxes and sorting machines—which have resulted in mail slowdowns. Oh, and last week the Post Office sent letters to 46 states and the District of Columbia warning that it could not guarantee that ballots cast by mail for the November election will arrive in time to be counted.
But don’t worry. There’s nothing to see here. And to prove it, on Tuesday DeJoy said he would suspend making even more changes until after the election just to “avoid even the appearance of any impact on election mail.”
So case closed! Republican National Committee Spokeswoman Liz Harrington said in a Monday email titled “Debunking the Democrats’ (latest) conspiracy theory” that anyone who believes Trump might have attempted to tamper with the mail-in voting is “completely untethered from reality.” Which is . . . kind of a strange way to characterize the people who take what her boss says seriously. Or literally. Or whatever.
In a normal election year, without coronavirus and a sitting president denouncing mail-in voting systems, people may have looked at mail slowdowns and drop boxes being hauled away and locked up and not really thought much of it. But, when Trump tweets things such as “MAIL-IN VOTING WILL LEAD TO MASSIVE FRAUD AND ABUSE. IT WILL ALSO LEAD TO THE END OF OUR GREAT REPUBLICAN PARTY. WE CAN NEVER LET THIS TRAGEDY BEFALL OUR NATION” it’s kind of hard to fault people for thinking the president might up to something.
Because he is.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
Behind the scenes, Trump’s presidential campaign is suing Nevada over its mail-in voting system and trying to invalidate absentee ballot requests in three Iowa counties. Earlier this summer, Trump’s lawyers took Pennsylvania to court for its mail-in system but failed to produce any evidence of vote-by-mail fraud by the Friday deadline the judge imposed. (Oops.)
Trump’s brand of conspiracy theories tend to work better on Facebook and Fox than in court. A plaintiff typically needs evidence to pursue a claim. But all you need to go viral are some foot soldiers shameless enough to put their faces on the story and go on TV. Like White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows who sat down with CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday.
There, Meadows claimed mail-in systems send “millions” of ballots to “empty mailboxes,” which “disenfranchises” voters.
“But there’s no evidence of widespread voter fraud,” Tapper said.
Meadows replied, “There’s no evidence that there’s not, either. That’s the definition of fraud, Jake.”
Actually, that’s the definition of a smear. Go ahead. Prove to me you don’t beat your spouse, abuse puppies, commit other various crimes against humanity. THERE’S NO EVIDENCE YOU DON’T. SEE!?!
In discussion with Fox Business’s Maria Bartiromo earlier this month about why he would not agree to Democratic requests for emergency Post Office funding Trump said, “They need that money in order to have the Post Office work so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots…If they don’t get those two items, that means you can’t have universal mail-in voting because they’re not equipped to have it.”
So: The president says that mail-in voting will destroy his party. He says that he “can never let” mail-in voting happen. And he then says that by denying the Post Office funding, then they won’t have the capability to process mail-in voting.
Boy, it’s a real mystery why people think Trump might shut down the Post Office to help him win reelection.
There are only two possible explanations for what is going on with Trump’s Postal Service.
(1) All of the disappearing mailboxes and sorting machines are part of routine logistical planning, and
(1)(b) The president’s words about mail-in voting and the Post Office are meaningless and no reasonable person should take them any more seriously than they do his claims to have done more for African-Americans than Abraham Lincoln or that he would build a border wall that would be paid for by Mexico. He’s a child who says whatever comes into his head and no reasonable person should take any of his words as representative of his beliefs, his plans, or his administration’s policies and actions.
Or:
(2) Trump repeatedly said he believes mail-in voting will cost him the election. Then the Postal Service suddenly started taking actions that were out of the ordinary. Because the president wanted it to.
As conspiracies go, this isn’t like QAnon. You don’t have to decode anonymous internet posts and do a whole Pepe Silvia thing. It’s pretty straight forward: Trump say mail-in voting bad. Mail has problems. Trump stop mail.
So either Trump is really up to something and the Postal Service is a legitimate point of concern. Or it’s a baseless conspiracy because Trump is so mentally unstable that no one should take his words seriously.
Pick one.


thebulwark--2020-08-19--What If Donald Trump Is What America Needed?

In 2016 , Americans were asked to pick their poison .
On the one hand a highly competent , highly qualified mainstream pro-Wall Street pro-corporate candidate who would in most regards hold the Reagan-Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama trajectory—while entirely missing the desperation working Americans were feeling .
On the other hand a corrupt businessman calling bullshit on the entire system , willing to burn everything down to Make America Great Again—meaning give working people back the dignity ( and manufacturing jobs ) that had been stolen from them by the evil cabal of globalist elites .
The fact that he was lying was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
And many Americans were willing to live with his exploiting of resentments and divisions to get anything that wasn ’ t business as usual .
What was business as usual ?
• Real wages for American workers were exactly the same as they had been in 1980 .
Upward mobility was a distant memory for most .
• There were 1.68 million African-American men under state and federal criminal justice supervision , and they were receiving sentences 19 percent longer than white male convicted of the same charges .
• The purchasing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ falling since 1968 .
• 40 percent of Americans could not handle a $ 400 emergency .
• 71 percent of young Americans would be unfit to serve in the military if they enlisted because they ’ d either fail the physical or be unable to read at a sixth-grade level .
• Our students ranked 26th out of the 34 wealthiest countries in math , despite the fact that we spent the 5th most on education .
• The prevalence of lobbyists in Washington meant that the percentage of Americans who supported @ @ @ @ @ @ @ whether that law would pass .
Citizens ’ impact on public policy was statistically non-significant .
• Lawmakers in Washington spent 70 percent of their time raising money for reelection .
In some Senate races candidates had to raise $ 45,000 a day , 365 days a year , for 6 years in order to have a shot at winning .
• America had the most expensive—and infuriating—health care system in the world .
Because Trump was lying , as soon as he won he set about doing the opposite of what he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to make money and helping his friends and relations loot the country even more spectacularly than his predecessors .
Jobs continued to bleed out of the country , and after Trump cut taxes on corporations and the rich , he didn ’ t care that those corporations bought back stock and lavished bonuses on their executives instead of raising worker salaries and investing in new production .
Ironically , all this may be why he was exactly what we needed .
Because it wasn ’ t just Hillary Clinton who missed how angry @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders , everyone missed it .
And missed it big : missed the opioid epidemic , the deaths of despair , the disintegration of families and the local institutions that had supported them .
It took Donald Trump to give one last shove to our societal infrastructure before its rotten foundations started to collapse .
And what was revealed was not just that America didn ’ t work anymore , but that the people at the top—the lawmakers and the wealthy who patronized them—either didn ’ t know @ @ @ @ @ @ @ work .
They were utterly insulated from its not-working because capitalism had long since morphed into something that insulated them , something ugly and toxic : oligarchy .
In America , hard work and talent should be rewarded , but let ’ s not pretend that in the past 40 years everyone in the top hundredth of a point got that much more brilliant and productive .
Let ’ s not pretend that bail-outs and stock buy backs and venal corporatism entrenched by $ 3.47 billion in annual lobbying is a “ free @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that the people engineering mergers and acquisitions were doing so to enhance the competition necessary for capitalism to thrive .
As Rick Wilson has said , If liberals like us can agree this bigly with Rick Wilson , then perhaps this is where we can all meet .
Perhaps anyone not irredeemably corrupt can be made to care about this kind of unfair , rigged-game corruption , from Bernie Bros to suburban women to Obama-Trump voters to Never Trumpers to libertarians to country-club Republicans to diner-dwelling coal miners who are no doubt exhausted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of morning joe .
And we are seeing surprising opportunities for agreement , from Marco Rubio to Bernie Sanders , from Josh Hawley to Cory Booker , that the way business and government interact must be changed .
They might have different opinions about how we got here , who is to blame , and what we need to do now , but many of their ends are the same : enforce competition in the marketplace , protect the small against the large , end corporate welfare , and reestablish the principle that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and the next quarter ’ s bottom line .
Now let ’ s ponder this : If we were in year 3.5 of a Hillary Clinton presidency , where would be in our discussions of income injustice ?
Corruption in government ?
Dignity of work ?
Maybe all the pain and division and loss and fear of these kidney-stone-excruciating years brought us an opportunity for insight and actual change .
Maybe we had to see all this barely-beneath-the-surface hideousness in such undeniable fashion to make sure none of us would be willing to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ before .
If we do set course on this incremental journey back to wholeness , then Donald Trump ultimately—paradoxically—will have MAGA because the greatness of America will be in its repudiation not just of him but all the toxicity he forced to the surface .
In 2016 , America picked its poison , a poison that forced a national reckoning .
Whether that proves to have been the right poison is up to us now .
And what we do next .
We might not recover from a second dose .

In 2016, Americans were asked to pick their poison.
On the one hand a highly competent, highly qualified mainstream pro-Wall Street pro-corporate candidate who would in most regards hold the Reagan-Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama trajectory—while entirely missing the desperation working Americans were feeling.
On the other hand a corrupt businessman calling bullshit on the entire system, willing to burn everything down to Make America Great Again—meaning give working people back the dignity (and manufacturing jobs) that had been stolen from them by the evil cabal of globalist elites. The fact that he was lying was entirely beside the point for his supporters.
And many Americans were willing to live with his exploiting of resentments and divisions to get anything that wasn’t business as usual.
What was business as usual?
Real wages for American workers were exactly the same as they had been in 1980. Upward mobility was a distant memory for most.
49 million Americans experienced food insecurity daily.
There were 1.68 million African-American men under state and federal criminal justice supervision, and they were receiving sentences 19 percent longer than white male convicted of the same charges.
The purchasing power of the minimum wage had been falling since 1968.
40 percent of Americans could not handle a $400 emergency.
71 percent of young Americans would be unfit to serve in the military if they enlisted because they’d either fail the physical or be unable to read at a sixth-grade level.
Our students ranked 26th out of the 34 wealthiest countries in math, despite the fact that we spent the 5th most on education.
The prevalence of lobbyists in Washington meant that the percentage of Americans who supported a law had 0 percent bearing on whether that law would pass. Citizens’ impact on public policy was statistically non-significant.
Lawmakers in Washington spent 70 percent of their time raising money for reelection. In some Senate races candidates had to raise $45,000 a day, 365 days a year, for 6 years in order to have a shot at winning.
America had the most expensive—and infuriating—health care system in the world.
Not good.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
Because Trump was lying, as soon as he won he set about doing the opposite of what he’d promised: exploiting the presidency to make money and helping his friends and relations loot the country even more spectacularly than his predecessors.
Jobs continued to bleed out of the country, and after Trump cut taxes on corporations and the rich, he didn’t care that those corporations bought back stock and lavished bonuses on their executives instead of raising worker salaries and investing in new production.
Ironically, all this may be why he was exactly what we needed. Because it wasn’t just Hillary Clinton who missed how angry Americans had become. With the exception of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, everyone missed it. And missed it big: missed the opioid epidemic, the deaths of despair, the disintegration of families and the local institutions that had supported them.
It took Donald Trump to give one last shove to our societal infrastructure before its rotten foundations started to collapse. And what was revealed was not just that America didn’t work anymore, but that the people at the top—the lawmakers and the wealthy who patronized them—either didn’t know or care that it didn’t work. They were utterly insulated from its not-working because capitalism had long since morphed into something that insulated them, something ugly and toxic: oligarchy.
In America, hard work and talent should be rewarded, but let’s not pretend that in the past 40 years everyone in the top hundredth of a point got that much more brilliant and productive. Let’s not pretend that bail-outs and stock buy backs and venal corporatism entrenched by $3.47 billion in annual lobbying is a “free market.” Let’s not pretend that the people engineering mergers and acquisitions were doing so to enhance the competition necessary for capitalism to thrive.
As Rick Wilson has said,
Once corporations discovered it was cheaper to lobby than to compete and innovate, the game was over. It was permanently rigged. I was having a drink with a lobbyist for the financial industry who looked me in the eye and said, “If America had any fucking idea what we do to them, they’d burn this fucking city to the ground and kill every one of us.”
If liberals like us can agree this bigly with Rick Wilson, then perhaps this is where we can all meet. Perhaps anyone not irredeemably corrupt can be made to care about this kind of unfair, rigged-game corruption, from Bernie Bros to suburban women to Obama-Trump voters to Never Trumpers to libertarians to country-club Republicans to diner-dwelling coal miners who are no doubt exhausted of being anthropologically studied over their cup of morning joe.
And we are seeing surprising opportunities for agreement, from Marco Rubio to Bernie Sanders, from Josh Hawley to Cory Booker, that the way business and government interact must be changed. They might have different opinions about how we got here, who is to blame, and what we need to do now, but many of their ends are the same: enforce competition in the marketplace, protect the small against the large, end corporate welfare, and reestablish the principle that corporations have a responsibility beyond their shareholders and the next quarter’s bottom line.
Now let’s ponder this: If we were in year 3.5 of a Hillary Clinton presidency, where would be in our discussions of income injustice? Corruption in government? Dignity of work?
Maybe all the pain and division and loss and fear of these kidney-stone-excruciating years brought us an opportunity for insight and actual change. Maybe we had to see all this barely-beneath-the-surface hideousness in such undeniable fashion to make sure none of us would be willing to go back to the way things were before.
If we do set course on this incremental journey back to wholeness, then Donald Trump ultimately—paradoxically—will have MAGA because the greatness of America will be in its repudiation not just of him but all the toxicity he forced to the surface.
In 2016, America picked its poison, a poison that forced a national reckoning.
Whether that proves to have been the right poison is up to us now. And what we do next.
We might not recover from a second dose.


thebulwark--2020-08-19--Government Must Not Assign a Coronavirus Vaccine By Race

A federal advisory committee recommending priorities for the eventual distribution of a COVID-19 vaccine has floated a very bad idea : according priority to some beneficiaries over others because of their race .
If implemented , the regime would very likely be struck down by courts as unconstitutional .
But even aside from that , racial preferences on this question would constitute a dangerous betrayal of the neutrality and impartiality citizens have a right to expect from government .
The Centers for Disease Control ’ s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices ( ACIP ) has been examining vaccine priority issues @ @ @ @ @ @ @ New York Times reported that ACIP ’ s members were weighing what the Times called the “ contentious option ” of “ putting Black and Latino people , who have disproportionately fallen victim to COVID-19 , ahead of others in the population.
” A more recent Washington Post report confirms that the idea is still under consideration .
It ’ s coming from some well-placed players , too .
One is Dr. José R. Romero , who chairs the committee and is one of the four members detailed to examine the priority issue @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the Arkansas Department of Health .
The Times quotes him as saying , “ They are groups that need to be moved to the forefront , in my opinion.
” The same article quotes “ Dayna Bowen Matthew , dean of the George Washington University Law School , who has focused on racial inequality in health care ” and is a consultant for ACIP on the prioritization issue .
Matthews claims that social inequality “ produced the underlying diseases , ” and “ it ’ s that inequality that requires us to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s worth pausing here to note a set of issues that are not the controversy : • COVID-19 is especially dangerous to persons with predisposing conditions , such as diabetes , obesity , and cardiovascular disease , and some of these predisposing conditions are found at higher rates in minority populations .
• In addition , some occupations that place workers at elevated risk of contagion , both in healthcare and in public-facing jobs such as bus driving , are filled disproportionately by minorities .
• Persons who live in crowded and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ seen as being at higher risk , and these situations , too , sometimes correlate with minority status .
It ’ s a straightforward application of public health principles , and not greatly controversial , to give many groups in these categories earlier access to vaccines .
Priority for those with pre-existing conditions may reduce overall mortality , priority for those in highly connected social situations pays off in intercepting contagion , and so forth .
As a result , many wholly sensible priority rules would incidentally protect relatively more minority persons—which would @ @ @ @ @ @ @ these grounds are the basis for the decision .
On the other hand , going beyond these appropriate prioritizations—which by themselves would assist many minority members who have valid reasons to want to stand further ahead in line—in favor of explicit racial preferences in the distribution of a potentially life-saving vaccine would be improper and unlikely to withstand court challenge .
As attorney Hans Bader notes , the Supreme Court in cases such as Richmond v. J.A .
Croson Co. ( 1989 ) has generally disapproved of government use of such racial preferences @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the government produced the inequality through its own recent , widespread , intentional discrimination.
” Public health outrages of decades past , such as the notorious Tuskegee experiment , do not create some general overhang of racial/medical guilt for which the government may impose disadvantage on blameless citizens today .
It is astounding that a racial preference scheme of this sort has gotten as far as it has .
The federal government should move to repudiate it , promptly and in full .

A federal advisory committee recommending priorities for the eventual distribution of a COVID-19 vaccine has floated a very bad idea: according priority to some beneficiaries over others because of their race. If implemented, the regime would very likely be struck down by courts as unconstitutional. But even aside from that, racial preferences on this question would constitute a dangerous betrayal of the neutrality and impartiality citizens have a right to expect from government.
The Centers for Disease Control’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) has been examining vaccine priority issues since the spring. Last month the New York Times reported that ACIP’s members were weighing what the Times called the “contentious option” of “putting Black and Latino people, who have disproportionately fallen victim to COVID-19, ahead of others in the population.” A more recent Washington Post report confirms that the idea is still under consideration.
It’s coming from some well-placed players, too. One is Dr. José R. Romero, who chairs the committee and is one of the four members detailed to examine the priority issue; he is also chief medical officer of the Arkansas Department of Health. The Times quotes him as saying, “They are groups that need to be moved to the forefront, in my opinion.”
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
The same article quotes “Dayna Bowen Matthew, dean of the George Washington University Law School, who has focused on racial inequality in health care” and is a consultant for ACIP on the prioritization issue. Matthews claims that social inequality “produced the underlying diseases,” and “it’s that inequality that requires us to prioritize by race and ethnicity.”
It’s worth pausing here to note a set of issues that are not the controversy:
COVID-19 is especially dangerous to persons with predisposing conditions, such as diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular disease, and some of these predisposing conditions are found at higher rates in minority populations.
In addition, some occupations that place workers at elevated risk of contagion, both in healthcare and in public-facing jobs such as bus driving, are filled disproportionately by minorities.
Persons who live in crowded and multi-generational living situations are a third group seen as being at higher risk, and these situations, too, sometimes correlate with minority status.
It’s a straightforward application of public health principles, and not greatly controversial, to give many groups in these categories earlier access to vaccines. Priority for those with pre-existing conditions may reduce overall mortality, priority for those in highly connected social situations pays off in intercepting contagion, and so forth. As a result, many wholly sensible priority rules would incidentally protect relatively more minority persons—which would be perfectly proper, so long as these grounds are the basis for the decision.
On the other hand, going beyond these appropriate prioritizations—which by themselves would assist many minority members who have valid reasons to want to stand further ahead in line—in favor of explicit racial preferences in the distribution of a potentially life-saving vaccine would be improper and unlikely to withstand court challenge.
As attorney Hans Bader notes, the Supreme Court in cases such as Richmond v. J.A. Croson Co. (1989) has generally disapproved of government use of such racial preferences to fix inequality, except when “the government produced the inequality through its own recent, widespread, intentional discrimination.” Public health outrages of decades past, such as the notorious Tuskegee experiment, do not create some general overhang of racial/medical guilt for which the government may impose disadvantage on blameless citizens today.
It is astounding that a racial preference scheme of this sort has gotten as far as it has. The federal government should move to repudiate it, promptly and in full.


thebulwark--2020-08-20--Bill Clinton: The Lion in Summer

Bill Clinton: The Lion in Summer

The gap between what he said and where he was—physically and politically—was a chasm .
Bill Clinton ’ s message to the country on Tuesday night was of a piece with his ability to frame a political argument in clear simple language .
“ If you want a president who defines the job as spending hours a day watching TV and zapping people on social media , he ’ s your man , ” Clinton said of Donald Trump .
“ The Oval Office should be a command center .
Instead , it ’ s a storm center .
There @ @ @ @ @ @ @ thing never changes—his determination to deny responsibility and shift the blame .
The buck never stops there.
” But the setting was all wrong .
Clinton in a quiet room , without a crowd delighting in his presence , tormenting the teleprompter technician and the convention managers , like a jazz musician riffing off a tune with endless variations on a theme ?
OK , blame the pandemic for that .
But Clinton speaking for only five minutes—and well before the broadcast networks turned on their cameras ?
How much more of a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the first Democrat since FDR to win two terms , to the candidate who smashed the Republican party ’ s “ electoral lock ” on the White House by redefining what his party stood for ?
Some of the explanation is flatly personal .
In the # MeToo age , the excuses for Clinton ’ s transgressions ring hollow .
If Harvey Weinstein is in prison for deeds committed decades ago , then what ’ s the statute of limitations for Clinton ; if “ believe all women ” is the standard , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s and Juanita Broaddrick ’ s stories about predatory sexual behavior ?
( This is not a uniform outlook among Democrats ; just after Clinton admitted to lying to his supporters about Monica Lewinsky in 1998 , one of his top aides told me : “ I ’ ll never go on TV to defend Clinton again.
” He ’ s spent much of the last two decades doing precisely that . )
And there ’ s a broader explanation , one that involves a party that believes that the very arguments @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the White House are now to be consigned to the dustbin of history .
Clinton campaigned in 1992 as a “ different kind of Democrat , ” openly challenging the “ brain-dead politics ” of his party .
America , he argued , trusted us Democrats with neither their safety nor their money .
He campaigned often with law-enforcement officials ; back then , the “ blue wall ” referred not to the states that always voted Democratic but to the uniformed police officers behind him .
As president , he supported @ @ @ @ @ @ @ penalty .
Today , Democrats—including Hillary Clinton—have been apologizing for mass incarceration , and their convention includes families of black men and women killed by the police .
Clinton famously told the country in a State of the Union that the “ the era of big government is over , ” and helped push through a federal law that did indeed “ end welfare as we know it.
” His administration ’ s economic gurus enthusiastically embraced deregulation and the widespread use of “ creative ” financial instruments like derivatives that helped crash @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Today , the hunger to bring Wall Street and the financial masters of the universe to heel is a staple of the Democratic party .
The health care plan designed by Hillary Clinton— a design of Rube Goldberg complexity—crashed and burned and helped cost the Democrats the Congress in 1994 .
In retrospect , the party would have preferred Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan ’ s idea to cut the Gordian knot—just take out “ over 65 ” from the Medicare law .
For all of this , there remains a picture of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ figure , one whose blend of cognitive smarts and street smarts is unequaled .
( Some years after he left the White House , I ran into him at a restaurant in Atlanta ; he looked around the room and gave detailed biographical accounts of virtually every diner . )
He had the intellectual skills to navigate insanely complex issues like the Mexican peso crisis , for which he got no credit at all .
And he had the political skills to survive scandals that would have crippled any other political figure .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ principal reason why Al Gore and George W. Bush battled to a tie in a time of peace and prosperity .
Had Clinton resigned in 1998 , it ’ s more than plausible that a President Al Gore would have comfortably won the 2000 election .
It ’ s also plausible that , had Clinton been eligible for a third term , he would have won , just as he survived the draft-dodging and Gennifer Flowers stories of 1992 .
( As columnist Mark Shields put it at the time , “ If @ @ @ @ @ @ @ top down through a car wash , Al Gore would get wet.
” ) And as late as 2016 , Bill Clinton ’ s conduct was a powerful reason why Donald Trump was able to survive his own far worse transgressions .
Still , it was hard to watch Clinton Tuesday night , the eve of his 74th birthday , without remembering how compelling his sheer presence was in our political life ; how the blend of his talents , his ambition , and his survival skills took his party out of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ would have been like had his character matched his talents .

The gap between what he said and where he was—physically and politically—was a chasm.
Bill Clinton’s message to the country on Tuesday night was of a piece with his ability to frame a political argument in clear simple language.
“If you want a president who defines the job as spending hours a day watching TV and zapping people on social media, he’s your man,” Clinton said of Donald Trump. “The Oval Office should be a command center. Instead, it’s a storm center. There’s only chaos. Just one thing never changes—his determination to deny responsibility and shift the blame. The buck never stops there.”
But the setting was all wrong. Clinton in a quiet room, without a crowd delighting in his presence, tormenting the teleprompter technician and the convention managers, like a jazz musician riffing off a tune with endless variations on a theme? OK, blame the pandemic for that.
But Clinton speaking for only five minutes—and well before the broadcast networks turned on their cameras? How much more of a message could the convention have delivered to the first Democrat since FDR to win two terms, to the candidate who smashed the Republican party’s “electoral lock” on the White House by redefining what his party stood for?
Some of the explanation is flatly personal. In the #MeToo age, the excuses for Clinton’s transgressions ring hollow. If Harvey Weinstein is in prison for deeds committed decades ago, then what’s the statute of limitations for Clinton; if “believe all women” is the standard, then do we not believe Paula Jones’s and Juanita Broaddrick’s stories about predatory sexual behavior? (This is not a uniform outlook among Democrats; just after Clinton admitted to lying to his supporters about Monica Lewinsky in 1998, one of his top aides told me: “I’ll never go on TV to defend Clinton again.” He’s spent much of the last two decades doing precisely that.)
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
And there’s a broader explanation, one that involves a party that believes that the very arguments Bill Clinton made in his successful pursuit of the White House are now to be consigned to the dustbin of history.
Clinton campaigned in 1992 as a “different kind of Democrat,” openly challenging the “brain-dead politics” of his party. America, he argued, trusted us Democrats with neither their safety nor their money. He campaigned often with law-enforcement officials; back then, the “blue wall” referred not to the states that always voted Democratic but to the uniformed police officers behind him. As president, he supported an expanded use of the federal death penalty. Today, Democrats—including Hillary Clinton—have been apologizing for mass incarceration, and their convention includes families of black men and women killed by the police.
Clinton famously told the country in a State of the Union that the “the era of big government is over,” and helped push through a federal law that did indeed “end welfare as we know it.” His administration’s economic gurus enthusiastically embraced deregulation and the widespread use of “creative” financial instruments like derivatives that helped crash the economy a decade or so later. Today, the hunger to bring Wall Street and the financial masters of the universe to heel is a staple of the Democratic party. The health care plan designed by Hillary Clinton— a design of Rube Goldberg complexity—crashed and burned and helped cost the Democrats the Congress in 1994. In retrospect, the party would have preferred Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s idea to cut the Gordian knot—just take out “over 65” from the Medicare law.
For all of this, there remains a picture of Bill Clinton as a uniquely gifted political figure, one whose blend of cognitive smarts and street smarts is unequaled. (Some years after he left the White House, I ran into him at a restaurant in Atlanta; he looked around the room and gave detailed biographical accounts of virtually every diner.) He had the intellectual skills to navigate insanely complex issues like the Mexican peso crisis, for which he got no credit at all.
And he had the political skills to survive scandals that would have crippled any other political figure. In 2000, his behavior was the principal reason why Al Gore and George W. Bush battled to a tie in a time of peace and prosperity. Had Clinton resigned in 1998, it’s more than plausible that a President Al Gore would have comfortably won the 2000 election. It’s also plausible that, had Clinton been eligible for a third term, he would have won, just as he survived the draft-dodging and Gennifer Flowers stories of 1992. (As columnist Mark Shields put it at the time, “If Bill Clinton drove a convertible with the top down through a car wash, Al Gore would get wet.”) And as late as 2016, Bill Clinton’s conduct was a powerful reason why Donald Trump was able to survive his own far worse transgressions.
Still, it was hard to watch Clinton Tuesday night, the eve of his 74th birthday, without remembering how compelling his sheer presence was in our political life; how the blend of his talents, his ambition, and his survival skills took his party out of the wilderness; and what our political history would have been like had his character matched his talents.


thebulwark--2020-08-20--Miles Taylor Took Trump Seriously

Miles Taylor Took Trump Seriously

Over the last few weeks , I ’ ve spent a lot more time thinking about Trump ’ s former homeland security chief of staff Miles Taylor than I would have otherwise liked .
Miles filmed a dramatic video testimonial for Republican Voters Against Trump ( RVAT ) .
Wearing one of my other hats , as political director for RVAT , I had a hand in putting that testimonial together .
Miles came to us straight out of Trump apparatchik central casting .
White skin .
Blue blazer .
Boyish with the standard-issue College Republican frat swoop .
Like @ @ @ @ @ @ @ You can imagine him easily on a Heritage Foundation panel .
Or on the early membership track at the Washington Golf & Country Club .
In the video , he ’ s alone in an office left barren by the pandemic that his former boss mismanaged .
He talks about what he saw and heard from Donald Trump .
Miles doesn ’ t reveal much of anything about our president that most of us plebs don ’ t already see with our own two eyes every day .
He offers some juicy new @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gist of his testimony is nothing that we haven ’ t heard before through the reporting of Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan and Ashley Parker .
The picture he paints of Trump is not much different from the ones we got from Jim Mattis and Rex Tillerson and John Bolton .
Or , as Jonathan Chait wrote , “ So many former high-ranking officials who have worked directly with Donald Trump have publicly warned that the president is a dangerous maniac whose authoritarian impulses are constrained only by his incompetence that it hardly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ did register about Miles .
So what was it ?
The answer , I think , lies in not what he said about Donald Trump but what he did about it .
And how his actions expose just how craven and deceitful every single other person around this president and this party have been for the past four years .
What Miles did was something that so many of us have been yearning for , screaming for , pulling our hair out over .
He both spoke the truth about his former boss @ @ @ @ @ @ @ truths .
At long last , a Trumper finally did what we ’ ve all been told we had to do .
He took the president and the job of the presidency seriously ( but not literally ) .
He recognized both the gravity of the job and the recklessness of the man who now holds it , his total and complete lack of competence , his wanton disregard for the people he serves even in times of grave danger , his cruel intolerance , and his indifference to the rule of law @ @ @ @ @ @ @ done about it .
After four years of being gaslit , of being told that we can just ignore the president ’ s words because they don ’ t matter .
After being sold a bill of goods by those who created a bubble of unreality for themselves , one where the president is either a person of no import or someone with secret skills that we just don ’ t recognize .
After letting so-called “ good senators ” stay quiet while a cult leader endorses racist conspiracy after racist conspiracy .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ U.N. ambassadors and pundits and magazine editors whom we once admired pretend that the president is someone he ’ s not—pretend that , yeah , sure , he has a few peccadilloes but he really loves and cares about this country , a story that we know is not true and they know is not true and they know that we know is not true but they tell us anyway .
After all this exhausting and enraging phoniness on the part of so many people , sometimes you begin to wonder if you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
After all that , finally—finally—there is this one person who pops the unreality bubble and simply tells the truth and takes the truth seriously .
He may not be the perfect messenger .
He may be a flawed , slick , D.C. striver who gave Trump far too long of a leash .
But countless other flawed messengers have had their chance and took a pass .
They ’ ve become lobbyists or cashed in on their contacts or sold a book in which Trump is depicted as unconscionable and insane and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ testify against him or say that his standard-issue centrist Democrat opponent is a better bet .
It fell to Miles Taylor to be the first to say in public and under his own name the thing that everyone in this whole damn charade knows is true : That the person in the most serious of jobs is an incompetent madman .
That four more years of an incompetent madman in charge of the most consequential country in the world is terrifying .
And that , in order to prevent that future , he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ another term from happening .
Hopefully people take his word seriously .

Over the last few weeks, I’ve spent a lot more time thinking about Trump’s former homeland security chief of staff Miles Taylor than I would have otherwise liked.
Miles filmed a dramatic video testimonial for Republican Voters Against Trump (RVAT). Wearing one of my other hats, as political director for RVAT, I had a hand in putting that testimonial together.
Miles came to us straight out of Trump apparatchik central casting. White skin. Blue blazer. Boyish with the standard-issue College Republican frat swoop. Like a slightly more grizzled Charlie Kirk. You can imagine him easily on a Heritage Foundation panel. Or on the early membership track at the Washington Golf & Country Club.
In the video, he’s alone in an office left barren by the pandemic that his former boss mismanaged. He talks about what he saw and heard from Donald Trump.
Miles doesn’t reveal much of anything about our president that most of us plebs don’t already see with our own two eyes every day. He offers some juicy new details, of course, but the gist of his testimony is nothing that we haven’t heard before through the reporting of Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan and Ashley Parker. The picture he paints of Trump is not much different from the ones we got from Jim Mattis and Rex Tillerson and John Bolton.
Or, as Jonathan Chait wrote, “So many former high-ranking officials who have worked directly with Donald Trump have publicly warned that the president is a dangerous maniac whose authoritarian impulses are constrained only by his incompetence that it hardly registers as news anymore.”
But something did register about Miles. So what was it?
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
The answer, I think, lies in not what he said about Donald Trump but what he did about it. And how his actions expose just how craven and deceitful every single other person around this president and this party have been for the past four years.
What Miles did was something that so many of us have been yearning for, screaming for, pulling our hair out over.
He both spoke the truth about his former boss and acted on the consequences of those truths.
At long last, a Trumper finally did what we’ve all been told we had to do. He took the president and the job of the presidency seriously (but not literally).
He recognized both the gravity of the job and the recklessness of the man who now holds it, his total and complete lack of competence, his wanton disregard for the people he serves even in times of grave danger, his cruel intolerance, and his indifference to the rule of law. He recognized what needed to be done about it.
After four years of being gaslit, of being told that we can just ignore the president’s words because they don’t matter.
After being sold a bill of goods by those who created a bubble of unreality for themselves, one where the president is either a person of no import or someone with secret skills that we just don’t recognize. After letting so-called “good senators” stay quiet while a cult leader endorses racist conspiracy after racist conspiracy.
After having to listen to politicians and U.N. ambassadors and pundits and magazine editors whom we once admired pretend that the president is someone he’s not—pretend that, yeah, sure, he has a few peccadilloes but he really loves and cares about this country, a story that we know is not true and they know is not true and they know that we know is not true but they tell us anyway.
After all this exhausting and enraging phoniness on the part of so many people, sometimes you begin to wonder if you are the one who has gone insane.
After all that, finally—finally—there is this one person who pops the unreality bubble and simply tells the truth and takes the truth seriously.
He may not be the perfect messenger. He may be a flawed, slick, D.C. striver who gave Trump far too long of a leash. But countless other flawed messengers have had their chance and took a pass. They’ve become lobbyists or cashed in on their contacts or sold a book in which Trump is depicted as unconscionable and insane and corrupt but yet still wouldn’t testify against him or say that his standard-issue centrist Democrat opponent is a better bet.
It fell to Miles Taylor to be the first to say in public and under his own name the thing that everyone in this whole damn charade knows is true: That the person in the most serious of jobs is an incompetent madman. That four more years of an incompetent madman in charge of the most consequential country in the world is terrifying. And that, in order to prevent that future, he felt compelled to come forward to prevent another term from happening.
Hopefully people take his word seriously.


thebulwark--2020-08-20--The American Dream Is Not Dead

The American Dream Is Not Dead

The Biden campaign deserves praise for introducing , at the Democratic National Convention , something we haven ’ t seen a lot of lately—smiles .
They ’ ve showcased grins and joyful , dancing eyes on the faces of all sorts of Americans .
Sure , it ’ s corny .
Yes , it ’ s a little manipulative .
I don ’ t care .
I almost want to shout , “ That !
I ’ ll vote for that.
” Enough of snarls , insults , denigration , and lies .
Please just lift this pall of poisonous @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of what I want .
Of course , we didn ’ t arrive at this moment of bitter polarization overnight , and we won ’ t be able to transcend it with one election .
But the Biden team seems to be betting that many of us are yearning for a giant step toward decency .
As much as I long for national reconciliation and the pacification of our politics , I ’ m worried about something else—the flip side of polarization .
As shrill and vicious as the discourse has become in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a curious consensus emerging .
And this new consensus is neither accurate nor healthy .
On both the left and the right , you find striking agreement that the past several decades have been a time of economic decline .
Our economy , they say , is broken .
“ The American Dream , ” says Tucker Carlson of Fox News , “ is dead.
” We ’ ve been told by Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders on the left , and by Donald Trump and Sen. Josh Hawley on the right @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ hollowed out , ” that the wealth gains of recent years have gone entirely to the top one percent of earners , that real wages for the middle class have stagnated , and that the “ game is rigged.
” Warren blames Washington , D.C. , for the “ plight ” of the middle class .
Sanders rails against millionaires and billionaires , constantly asserting that all of the gains of the past several decades have accrued only to them , leaving everyone else behind .
Hawley often sounds as if he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ Elites , ” he charged , have conspired with “ multinational corporations ” to “ hollow out the middle class.
” Using a phrase redolent of communist propagandists during the Cold War , Hawley thundered that it was “ no coincidence ” that we were experiencing “ the breakdown of community ” and the “ rise of oligarchy.
” It was a plan by “ internationalists ” who have “ embroiled America in one foreign war after another… sent American production overseas , compromised American supply chains , and cost American @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” Sen. Marco Rubio has been sounding similar notes , suggesting that capitalism isn ’ t all it ’ s cracked up to be .
“ What the markets determine , ” he said , “ may not be best for America.
” Is the middle class in trouble ?
Only if you think it ’ s bad news that since 1967 , more Americans have joined the upper middle class .
In a study published by the Brookings Institution , Stephen Rose found that the number of Americans in the upper middle @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of three with a yearly income between $ 108,500 and $ 380,500 in constant 2018 dollars ) increased from 6 percent in 1967 to 33 percent in 2016 .
Among African-Americans , the share jumped from 1 percent to 14 percent over the same period .
Michael Strain ’ s new book , The American Dream is Not Dead ( But Populism Could Kill It ) is chock full of myth-busting statistics .
Has the American middle class seen its wages stagnate for 30 years ?
No .
Since 1990 , the wages @ @ @ @ @ @ @ supervisors ) have increased by 33 percent .
Maybe that ’ s not enough , but it ’ s not stagnation .
And wages are only one form of compensation .
As Strain notes , if you include taxes and government transfers to inflation-adjusted income , the median household saw its income increase by 44 percent since 1990 .
What about rising inequality ?
Income numbers alone don ’ t give the whole picture .
Strain shows , again , that when you add taxes and transfers to income data , you find @ @ @ @ @ @ @ percent between 2007 and 2016 .
Besides , there are some things that can not be captured by statistics .
How do you measure the improvement in quality of life that drugs like Prilosec have delivered ?
People used to undergo surgery and be sidelined for months with stomach ulcers .
Now , most can be treated with a 14-day dose available over the counter .
Single and working mothers today spend more time with their children than stay-at-home mothers were able to in 1965 .
And more than 90 percent of homes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ percent in 1980 .
There ’ s another fabulous resource for information on these matters : It ’ s PolicyEd.org .
There you can find a series of easy-to-follow videos by economist Russ Roberts .
He addresses the tricks numbers can play .
Over time , the share of households containing adults over 65 has steadily risen .
Naturally , if you compare a sample of middle-class households from 1980 with a sample from 2016 and fail to account for the larger number of retirees , it ’ s going to look like @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Even more critical is the fact that marriage and family patterns have changed dramatically over the past several decades .
There are many more single adult households than in times past .
So “ household income ” can appear lower , when the income of individuals has actually increased .
And echoing the point that Strain made , Roberts notes the problem of taking snapshots of “ quintiles ” in time rather than following actual individuals over the course of their careers .
When you examine actual individuals , you find that the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ respectable gains over the past several decades .
There ’ s lots more where that came from .
The children of people in the bottom quintile turn out to make twice as much , on average , as their parents , while those born to parents in the highest quintile wound up with the same income as their parents .
Upward mobility is real .
The populists of right and left have agreed on something that just isn ’ t so .
The death of the American Dream has been vastly exaggerated .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ ve persuaded large numbers of Americans that our problems are those of foreigners taking our jobs or greedy one percenters hoarding all the gains for themselves , we are diverted from addressing our true challenges .
Male labor force participation has been dropping for many years .
The nature of middle class jobs is changing , from industrial to service sector , posing retraining challenges for some .
The way we price health care is opaque and frankly , borderline insane .
Business startups have been in decline .
Child poverty is rising @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of single-parent families .
Our schools are inadequate , deaths of despair are on the rise , racial discrimination remains a problem , and our national debt is out of control .
And all of that antedates the spiraling health , governance , cultural , and racial challenges we must confront .
We have enough on our national plate without talking ourselves into a false belief in a broken economy that benefits only the rich .

The Biden campaign deserves praise for introducing, at the Democratic National Convention, something we haven’t seen a lot of lately—smiles. They’ve showcased grins and joyful, dancing eyes on the faces of all sorts of Americans. Sure, it’s corny. Yes, it’s a little manipulative. I don’t care. I almost want to shout, “That! I’ll vote for that.” Enough of snarls, insults, denigration, and lies. Please just lift this pall of poisonous hatred. That’s 80 percent of what I want.
Of course, we didn’t arrive at this moment of bitter polarization overnight, and we won’t be able to transcend it with one election. But the Biden team seems to be betting that many of us are yearning for a giant step toward decency.
As much as I long for national reconciliation and the pacification of our politics, I’m worried about something else—the flip side of polarization. As shrill and vicious as the discourse has become in recent years, there has also been a curious consensus emerging. And this new consensus is neither accurate nor healthy.
On both the left and the right, you find striking agreement that the past several decades have been a time of economic decline. Our economy, they say, is broken. “The American Dream,” says Tucker Carlson of Fox News, “is dead.” We’ve been told by Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders on the left, and by Donald Trump and Sen. Josh Hawley on the right, that the middle class is being “hollowed out,” that the wealth gains of recent years have gone entirely to the top one percent of earners, that real wages for the middle class have stagnated, and that the “game is rigged.”
Warren blames Washington, D.C., for the “plight” of the middle class. Sanders rails against millionaires and billionaires, constantly asserting that all of the gains of the past several decades have accrued only to them, leaving everyone else behind. Hawley often sounds as if he’s cribbing from both of them. “Elites,” he charged, have conspired with “multinational corporations” to “hollow out the middle class.” Using a phrase redolent of communist propagandists during the Cold War, Hawley thundered that it was “no coincidence” that we were experiencing “the breakdown of community” and the “rise of oligarchy.” It was a plan by “internationalists” who have “embroiled America in one foreign war after another… sent American production overseas, compromised American supply chains, and cost American jobs, all while enriching Communist China.” Sen. Marco Rubio has been sounding similar notes, suggesting that capitalism isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. “What the markets determine,” he said, “may not be best for America.”
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
Is the middle class in trouble? Only if you think it’s bad news that since 1967, more Americans have joined the upper middle class. In a study published by the Brookings Institution, Stephen Rose found that the number of Americans in the upper middle class (defined here as a family of three with a yearly income between $108,500 and $380,500 in constant 2018 dollars) increased from 6 percent in 1967 to 33 percent in 2016. Among African-Americans, the share jumped from 1 percent to 14 percent over the same period.
Michael Strain’s new book, The American Dream is Not Dead (But Populism Could Kill It) is chock full of myth-busting statistics. Has the American middle class seen its wages stagnate for 30 years? No. Since 1990, the wages of typical workers (not managers or supervisors) have increased by 33 percent. Maybe that’s not enough, but it’s not stagnation. And wages are only one form of compensation. As Strain notes, if you include taxes and government transfers to inflation-adjusted income, the median household saw its income increase by 44 percent since 1990.
What about rising inequality? Income numbers alone don’t give the whole picture. Strain shows, again, that when you add taxes and transfers to income data, you find that inequality has actually decreased by 7 percent between 2007 and 2016.
Besides, there are some things that cannot be captured by statistics. How do you measure the improvement in quality of life that drugs like Prilosec have delivered? People used to undergo surgery and be sidelined for months with stomach ulcers. Now, most can be treated with a 14-day dose available over the counter. Single and working mothers today spend more time with their children than stay-at-home mothers were able to in 1965. And more than 90 percent of homes have air conditioning today compared with 60 percent in 1980.
There’s another fabulous resource for information on these matters: It’s PolicyEd.org. There you can find a series of easy-to-follow videos by economist Russ Roberts. He addresses the tricks numbers can play. Over time, the share of households containing adults over 65 has steadily risen. Naturally, if you compare a sample of middle-class households from 1980 with a sample from 2016 and fail to account for the larger number of retirees, it’s going to look like the middle class is losing ground. Even more critical is the fact that marriage and family patterns have changed dramatically over the past several decades. There are many more single adult households than in times past. So “household income” can appear lower, when the income of individuals has actually increased. And echoing the point that Strain made, Roberts notes the problem of taking snapshots of “quintiles” in time rather than following actual individuals over the course of their careers. When you examine actual individuals, you find that the poor and the middle class have seen respectable gains over the past several decades.
There’s lots more where that came from. The children of people in the bottom quintile turn out to make twice as much, on average, as their parents, while those born to parents in the highest quintile wound up with the same income as their parents. Upward mobility is real.
The populists of right and left have agreed on something that just isn’t so. The death of the American Dream has been vastly exaggerated. And to the extent that they’ve persuaded large numbers of Americans that our problems are those of foreigners taking our jobs or greedy one percenters hoarding all the gains for themselves, we are diverted from addressing our true challenges. Male labor force participation has been dropping for many years. The nature of middle class jobs is changing, from industrial to service sector, posing retraining challenges for some. The way we price health care is opaque and frankly, borderline insane. Business startups have been in decline. Child poverty is rising, in part due to the rise of single-parent families. Our schools are inadequate, deaths of despair are on the rise, racial discrimination remains a problem, and our national debt is out of control.
And all of that antedates the spiraling health, governance, cultural, and racial challenges we must confront. We have enough on our national plate without talking ourselves into a false belief in a broken economy that benefits only the rich.