Has U.S. Democracy Been Trumped?

[shyams]

Then we have to discuss or at least figure out what "enemy" means in this context. Perhaprs a poor choice of words. Misguided? Conned? I don't know. I do know, my wife's sister, for example, who, by the way, I like a lot and do not avoid, is an ardent Trump admirer, and these people can justify to themselves that his power as president is their power, and their fervent belief is that the United States was established as a white Christian country and only a return to that dynamic can save us for some unknown and unspecified horrible end. [/i

On the topic of "enemy", the people in power (the mega-rich/donor class & the establishment that kowtows to their every whim) are it.

 

I am going to make a prediction (I may very well turn out wrong on this, but I want to post it anyway). As part of his reelection campaign, Biden will find that donor money is not so forthcoming as it did in the past. He will have to make the necessary adjustment in order to reclaim the donors' largesse.

 

The adjustment? They will "promote" Lina Khan and move her to some non-consequential role; they will also move/promote/fire Jonathan Kanter. Believe me, the actions taken by these two (as Head of the FTC and of the Anti-Trust division of the DoJ respectively) will benefit the average American over long periods of time going forward. That's why the true enemies of the average American will ensure they are stopped in their tracks.

[Winstonm]

On the topic of "enemy", the people in power (the mega-rich/donor class & the establishment that kowtows to their every whim) are it.

 

I am going to make a prediction (I may very well turn out wrong on this, but I want to post it anyway). As part of his reelection campaign, Biden will find that donor money is not so forthcoming as it did in the past. He will have to make the necessary adjustment in order to reclaim the donors' largesse.

 

The adjustment? They will "promote" Lina Khan and move her to some non-consequential role; they will also move/promote/fire Jonathan Kanter. Believe me, the actions taken by these two (as Head of the FTC and of the Anti-Trust division of the DoJ respectively) will benefit the average American over long periods of time going forward. That's why the true enemies of the average American will ensure they are stopped in their tracks.

 

Quite interesting and I will keep my eyes on it. I have long said that the free market promoters of today are scoundrels as Adam Smith’s free market competitors were all localized; he would have abhorred what is praised today as a free market.

[barmar]

Being hopelessly optimistic, I think this budget deal could be a turning point. No doubt there will be Rs who vote against it and Ds who vote against it. But perhaps it will pass. And then perhaps, just perhaps, a large portion of the electorate will see this as some of our leaders can come together, some stick with my way or the highway, and they decide they prefer come together as an approach. This could play a role in the 2024 election.

Well, it did pass the House last night, by an overwhelming majority (about 3 to 1), but there was quite a bit of grumbling (from extreme factions on both sides) leading up to it. Presumably it will pass in the Senate tonight.

 

But it was definitely scary hearing the rhetoric of the Freedom Caucus the last few days, it sounded like they could unravel all the negotiations. It doesn't feel like there was really any ideological movement -- I think most Congressmen simply voted for it because they realized that it's too late to do any better, getting something is better than nothing (remember that Biden originally vowed that there would be no concessions). Firemen don't debate about building codes while trying to save the people in the burning house.

[kenberg]

Well, it seems we will not default.

 

I watched the PBS Newshour last night (Thursday evening) and this was just a little before the bill passed the Senate. It was mentioned, in a worried tone, that senators do not like to work on Friday and of course they do not like to work on Saturday or Sunday. Yep, that was very worrisome. But this can cut both ways. I see that they passed the bill late Thursday. Whew! God forbid that they actually have to work on a Friday or the weekend, but they averted that crisis. Good for them

[johnu]

The adjustment? They will "promote" Lina Khan and move her to some non-consequential role; they will also move/promote/fire Jonathan Kanter. Believe me, the actions taken by these two (as Head of the FTC and of the Anti-Trust division of the DoJ respectively) will benefit the average American over long periods of time going forward.

 

In general, monopolies are the enemy of the US. All these mergers and antitrust actions by some of the biggest companies in the US (and maybe world) are not done for the benefit of the American public. I applaud almost all the actions of Khan and Kanter in working for the American consumers.

[pilowsky]

When did the lurch to the right begin?

1970 according to Robert Reich, with

.

[kenberg]

When did the lurch to the right begin?

1970 according to Robert Reich, with

.

 

Maybe in '68 or '69 my father visited from Minnesota, I was a young assistant prof in math. I introduced him around the department and one of the secretaries asked him if he was also an academic. He replied "No, I had to work for a living". This was humor. Mayne humor with a point but it was humor. And taken as such. My father could never understand why a guy with at least reasonable physical skills would want to spend so much time with books. We got along just fine and I had and have great respect for him. He had never heard of a quadratic equation and never needed to solve one, but I grew up in a good environment.

 

 

Something has gone terribly wrong.

 

I was never all that much of a Robert Reich fan and I see from Wikipedia I am not alone in this. An excerpt.

 

 

In 1996, between Clinton's re-election and second inauguration, Reich decided to leave the department to spend more time with his sons, then in their teen years.

 

By April 1997, he published his experiences working for the Clinton administration in Locked in the Cabinet. Among those he criticized in the tell-all were Clinton advisor Dick Morris, former AFL-CIO head Lane Kirkland, and Federal Reserve Board chairman Alan Greenspan, a leading deficit hawk whom he considered "the most powerful man in the world."^[29] In the book, Reich criticizes the Democratic Party as "owned by" business and Washington as having two real political parties during his tenure: the "Save the Jobs" party, which wanted to maintain the status quo, and the "Let 'Em Drown" party.^[29]

 

After publication of the book, Reich received criticism for embellishing events with invented dialogue which did not match C-SPAN tapes or official transcripts of meetings.^[40] The paperback release of the memoir revised or omitted the inventions. In one story, members of the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) confronted Reich with curses and shouts of "Go back to Harvard!" In the revised version of the NAM story, Reich is instead hissed at. The foreword to the paperback contained an explanation, in which Reich says that "memory is fallible."^[40]

 

The memoir has since been called "a classic of the pissed-off-secretary genre" by Glenn Thrush.^[41]

 

[Gilithin]

When did the lurch to the right begin?

1970 according to Robert Reich, with

.

The roots are generally regarded as having been laid by Barry Goldwater, although it took a few years before that movement became the dominant faction within the GOP.

[Winstonm]

There strongest lurch to the right in my memory began with Reagan jn 1980. Nixon had injured the party but Reagan put it back together by demonizing Russia and with racist dog whistles like “welfare queens “.

 

His 8 years led into the glorification of Wall Street and the greed of the 90s. The next big lurch came as a backlash against Obama and the idea of a non white president.

[Winstonm]

My state has done it again: tax funded religious charter school approved.

 

To hell with the establishment clause?

[Gilithin]

My state has done it again: tax funded religious charter school approved.

 

To hell with the establishment clause?

Time for every non-Christian school in OK to apply for state funding. If they turn those down, the case for not favouring one faith over another becomes so weak that probably even the discredited SCOTUS cannot justify supporting this.

[Winstonm]

Time for every non-Christian school in OK to apply for state funding. If they turn those down, the case for not favouring one faith over another becomes so weak that probably even the discredited SCOTUS cannot justify supporting this.

The goal is to crush public education and grift off these private schools. You know, teach good Christian values and Noah’s ark as history.

[barmar]

Well, it seems we will not default.

 

I watched the PBS Newshour last night (Thursday evening) and this was just a little before the bill passed the Senate. It was mentioned, in a worried tone, that senators do not like to work on Friday and of course they do not like to work on Saturday or Sunday. Yep, that was very worrisome. But this can cut both ways. I see that they passed the bill late Thursday. Whew! God forbid that they actually have to work on a Friday or the weekend, but they averted that crisis. Good for them

I've been wondering whether the negotiators deliberately dragged things out to the last minute so that the hard-liners in the GOP would realize that there wouldn't be time to hammer out a bunch of amendments.

[Winstonm]

I've been wondering whether the negotiators deliberately dragged things out to the last minute so that the hard-liners in the GOP would realize that there wouldn't be time to hammer out a bunch of amendments.

 

 

Quoted from Greg Sargent:

n promising to restore "the soul of the nation" in the face of this threat, Biden has continually distinguished between MAGA Republicans and more conventional ones. This approach has been criticized by those of us who see much of the GOP as extreme and dangerous — after all, many elected Republicans helped whitewash Trump's insurrection — and think Biden's characterization of non-MAGA Republicans plays down that broader threat.

 

But Biden's reading served him well in the debt limit standoff. Contrary to much criticism, Bidenworld believes that refusing to negotiate at the outset was key: It forced Republicans to offer their own budget, which created an opening to attack the savage spending cuts in it.

 

Notably, Biden and other Democrats relentlessly characterized those cuts as destructive and dangerous in the MAGA vein. Bidenworld did believe that some MAGA Republicans were willing to default and force global economic cataclysm to harm the president's reelection, a senior Biden adviser tells me, but also that many non-MAGA Republicans ultimately could be induced not to go that far.

 

 

 

 

A critical time for our nation and I hope Biden is right, that there are more realistic Republicans than nut jobs. And all we can really do is trust he is right. On the bright side, he's been there and knows more than I do about the way Washington works, but trusting a politician is no something that is in our DNA, so it is hard to do.

[pilowsky]

Finally. Indicted.

[Winstonm]

Finally. Indicted.

 

Grab 'em by the Grand Jury. When you're a special prosecutor, they let you do that.

[pilowsky]

Grab 'em by the Grand Jury. When you're a special prosecutor, they let you do that.

 

Because you're a star?

[Winstonm]

Because you're a star?

Exactly.

[thepossum]

Watching the news the other day Pence 2024 has me sold already - apropos of me not having a clue about the USA

[barmar]

Finally. Indicted.

I was annoyed that they didn't remand him. Seems to me that anyone with their own jet is a flight risk.

 

The judge sais that he couldn't discuss the case with his co-defendant or witnesses. Wouldn't it have been great if he'd imposed a gag order, so he couldn't talk about it in his rallies?

[shyams]

During the GOP primaries in the 2022 Senate (and Governor) races, the Democratic Party was reported to have spent money on the "crazy" GOP candidates so that their Dem rivals eventually have a better chance of winning the actual seat against a "crazy" opponent rather than a traditional GOP opponent. It was considered a very risky strategy, but clearly that strategy worked quite well.

 

Maybe there are covert efforts underway in the Dem establishment in the belief that defeating Trump will be much easier than defeating anyone less crazy.

Edited June 15, 2023 by shyams

[pilowsky]

I was annoyed that they didn't remand him. Seems to me that anyone with their own jet is a flight risk.

 

The judge sais that he couldn't discuss the case with his co-defendant or witnesses. Wouldn't it have been great if he'd imposed a gag order, so he couldn't talk about it in his rallies?

 

If Trump were to hop on Trump force 1 and seek refuge in the Cayman islands - would anybody care?

He can never go to prison so the best that can be hoped for is that he is forced to withdraw from the races and peters out rant and raving at the rising sea levels in southern Florida.

 

548 has him winning the GOP primaries with a crushing margin and neck and neck with Biden.

With the economy booming and COVID quiescent there's a very high likelihood he'll be back.

 

I'm expecting boatloads of US refugees in Australia in 2024.

Mexico might decide to finish the wall after all.

 

 

[johnu]

If Trump were to hop on Trump force 1 and seek refuge in the Cayman islands - would anybody care?

He can never go to prison so the best that can be hoped for is that he is forced to withdraw from the races and peters out rant and raving at the rising sea levels in southern Florida.

My suggestion is that Trump reach a plea deal with DOJ to surrender his passport, renounce US citizenship, liquidate his US assets, pay off all of his lawsuits and other debts, and permanently move to another country without extradition with no possibility of returning. In return, no Federal jail time, and since he is in a country without extradition, state charges are unenforceable.

 

Why do you say Trump can't go to prison? Because the judge won't send him to prison (actually a likely possibility if alleged judge cannon is not removed), or because Trump will flee the country.

[johnu]

The judge sais that he couldn't discuss the case with his co-defendant or witnesses.

Actually that order is pretty ridiculous and unenforceable, since co-defendant Nauta is Trump's personal valet and they are together most working hours and are easily together in a room with no witnesses.

 

There was a funny comment by somebody, can't remember the name, that claimed Trump usually only said about a dozen words to Nauta in any given day, and "Thank you" wasn't among those words.

[Winstonm]

Jack Smith can still bring more charges where other crimes were committed (Bedminster golf club is in New Jersey), and some of those charges disqualify Trump from holding office. I would not be surprised to see an eventual plea bargain of no prison time but disqualified from holding office.