Ding Dong.....the US Politics Thread (Part 1)

Away End - General Chat
7951

I thought Trump had been left behind by many of the crazier base that was initially loyal to him.

Trump was even framed as being part of the problem for quite a long time, especially after he backed the vaccine.

The media coverage of everything he says and does (not this trial but, for example, the framing of the mid-terms as Trump backed candidates vs everyone else etc.) may be making him seem more popular than he now with those who previously would have died for him. Wouldn’t be the first time mainstream media found themselves a long way behind internet culture.

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7952

It will be interesting to see what prevails. There is plenty of space for old school Republicans. Socially conservative, pro business, small government, strong military, freedom-loving types who want people to get on with, and make their own lives as much as possible.

At that point it’s an ideological battle with others - Democrats, progressive Democrats, and so on - as to what they might put forward as to the best way to serve, and lead the country.

All of that seems in the bounds of normal to me. Make your case. Win your votes. Lead on. ‘‘Twas ever thus. But now?

Well, we’re not in Kansas any more Toto. Times have changed. There is a post truth, conspiratorial, anti-authority, cult like, and vicious element to the Republican Party. It seemed like a lunatic fringe, but I’m not sure I can say that any more. The hypothesis being tested before our eyes is whether that will prove to be a blip, or whether it will become the new normal for the Republican Party.

If it is the new normal, we are in the shit, because when the truth doesn’t matter, and when necessary restraint is cast aside, and people can shrug it off when a President fires up a mob, and muses approvingly out loud over the mob killing the Vice President, then we really are in a bad way.

If this goes unchecked, and my concern is it will, after impeachments 1 and 2 got swept away, then I genuinely fear for the future of politics, and all that flows from that, in the United States.

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7953

The problem is what is presented as Old School republican didn’t really represent the voting base. Small government Chamber of Commerce types represented the conservative thinkers who worked in the mainstream media who got to act like they represented the movement, and because of their platforms in the MSM we were all forced to treat that as true. We then mocked “conservative” voters for their hypocritical support of government programs that benefited them, but that was never hypocrisy. It was just a reflection of how the George Willesque view of what the party and its base valued was a fabrication that only existed in the minds of those entrenched in elite circles.

Government programs for me but not for thee is a far more realistic take on the conservative voter. Likewise, the flip side of the coin…government enforced restriction for thee but not for me. Populism bordering on xenophobia and racism has always driven the movement in the US far more than small government and fiscal conservatism. We were just always forced to hear conservative viewpoints filtered through the lens of those elite conservatives in the MSM. With the decentralizing of news those people have become increasingly irrelevant and they’ve either found themselves on the outside treated as pariahs to the movement (Weekly Standard, Bulwark, Lincoln Project) or hoped on the Maga train to retain clout with the people whose interest they need to keep to keep getting paid (Hugh Hewitt and everyone on Fox).

7954

Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity both had one hour ad-free shows last night to counter-programme the hearings.I didn’t watch them (obviously) but from what I’ve read both shows presented an absolute alternative reality of the events of Jan 6 . These guys have no shame , and no morals , when it comes to monetising resentment and anger , and the station that they represent clearly shares those values.

No prizes for guessing which channel ‘the base’ will have been tuned into last night. Given that ‘the base’ now owns the GOP , and that Fox News is its propaganda arm , where is this poison taking the country ? No matter what the hearings turn up or what referrals it makes , there will remain about 30% of the country that are totally immune to the truth and see nothing wrong in seizing and maintaining power by any means necessary and are in thrall to the authoritarians of the world.

I agree that we have reached a tipping point here , and the fact that we really have no idea which way the scales are about to tip is frightening.

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7955

I was listening to the QAnon Anonymous podcast yesterday, there was an interview with a nurse who ‘lost’ her sister to a particular cult within QAnon. Her sister was also a nurse but she slipped down the rabbit hole after suffering depression after the birth of her third child. Started taking pills and tablets advised through the chan boards, eating horse paste etc.

Long story short she left her kids and husband to go an serve some youtube/4chan guy at the Washington DC “JFK Jr is coming back” rally. The episode was from November so I don’t know how it has turned out. Genuinely scary and heartbreaking to hear the story though, as everything she did couldn’t stop the slide into this particular form of madness.

It’s a real problem and I’m not sure we are set up to counter it.

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7956

Throwback to something I posted on SM six years ago today

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7957

I think the thing to appreciate is that if you are part of the population who genuinely believed the election was stolen then these actions, both the soft coup and the attempt to stop the counting of the electoral college votes, were actually reasonable actions. They only seem looney tunes to us because we don’t believe that nonsense. That’s why I think what they did last night was so important as they dropped in multiple lines of evidence that Trump knew he was going to lose the election, knew there was no malfeasance in the election itself, and knew he’d lost fair and square.

I think the other thing that is going to be very important is to make this forward looking. Yes, I think everyone involved in the soft coup part should see jail time, but it cannot just be about obtaining justice and punishing people. There is a sizable group who have allowed themselves to be told this was a one off even that amounted to nothing and want to draw a line under it. They will see justice as vengeance. I think for this group they have to see that this was just the trial run for trying again, and the punishments HAVE to be handed out to prevent it happening again.

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7958

The thing is , those who may have believed at the time that the election was stolen because of the frenzy that Trump created , have had eighteen months now to reflect on the absurdity of those claims. Those who still believe the lie do so because they want to. Like I said , they’re not going to be watching the hearings to discover the truth , they are going to be tuned in to Tucker for the usual sensory overload and gaslighting.

It looks like the committee is going to present a prima facie case to the nation , and more importantly to the DOJ. But I’m not convinced in the least that Garland is going to pick this up for fear of the absolute whirlwind that it would unleash.

7959

Yeah, that’s fair, but no mater how much time has passed, if the avenues that were selling the big lie in Jan2021 have not changed message then what capacity would the people who believed it then have for an epiphany? As you pointed out there is a subset who are tuned into the possibility that Trump has or will sell them out, and so if this committee can get put in the historical record that he was playing them for fools and lying to them that could be very powerful.

I don’t recall any of the details, but I have heard compelling cases for why there are procedural advantages to this investigational committee obtaining evidence compared to the DoJ trying to obtain it. Iran Contra showed how not being on top of the procedural difficulties of running both processes simultaneously can actually fuck up a criminal case (individuals were immunized from prosecution in return for their testimony) and the arguments that this is being done in a way that learned those lessons. I don’t recall where I read/heard this…but the fact I recall it as something I accepted as making sense without understanding what it meant suggests maybe Emptywheel.

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7960

You’re right about the dangers of two investigations overlapping , the last thing anyone wants is to see is any of the main protagonists skating à la Oliver North. I remember it being discussed too , I’m not sure it was Marcy Wheeler though , who seems to me to have been too immersed in the minutiae of all the individual prosecutions , although she has been pressing the seditious conspiracy angle too with regards to the Proud Boys , Oath Keepers et al.

I think the dots will be connected (as the committee keeps saying) and that a compelling case will be presented. But still , without that ‘smoking gun’ piece of evidence , either documents or the testimony of someone ‘in the room’ at the time , will it be enough ? Maggie Haberman was making the point last week that without the Mark Meadows’ texts the committee would actually have very little to present that wasn’t already known.

I also think that it would take a far stronger character than Merrick Garland to pick up the baton. He was a bad (but understandable) pick for AG. He’s really a judge not a prosecutor , and we’ve already seen in his refusal to indict Meadows and Scavino , that politics weigh too heavily on his decision-making. Shame would be heaped upon tragedy if these hearings were to result in nothing more than a (disputed) official record.

7961

I’m very aware with this sort of argument, and am generally skeptical of it, but especially in this case. The things that those two could be brought up for at present (comparable to Navarro) are really trivial in the grand scheme of things. When there is a bigger picture, spending time pursuing such trivial indictments only get in the way. And that’s before you even consider the issue of executive privilege that may not hold up but would at least have to be litigated.

And calling him a judge no a prosecutor ignores a significant part of his career where he was in fact a government prosecutor with senior roles in two of the country’s most famous domestic terrorism cases (McVeigh and The Unabomber), cases in which his work is rounded praised

7962

Do you think then that he would be prepared to indict Meadows , and even Trump , if the committee comes up with the goods and makes a criminal referral ?

7963

I honestly dont know and understand and partially share the concern that they may not. I absolutely do not buy though the present lack of indictments for the soft coup point to an answer on that. I am also inclined to lean into that given so many of the most vocal “do something” legal voices on SM so often overlook public records of actions taken by the DoJ pointing to how active they are in taking the steps that are being demanded that they take. Barb McQuade has even gone on the record saying that all indications are that rather than having done nothing, the case they have already built between the riot and the soft coup is strong.

7964

It’s all speculation of course , no-one really knows what they already have nor how they are disposed towards a prosecution. The mantra is always that no-one is above the law , except for the fact that when it comes to Trump he invariably is. There is also Garland’s mission statement when he became AG , saying that never again would the DOJ be used for political prosecutions and would remain truly independent. I suppose this was admirable after the aberration that was Bill Barr but I can’t help but think he has effectively tied his own hands , as that will obviously be the charge levelled at him were he to pursue Trump.

7965

A pretty good assessment of where we’re at and the likelihood and implications of a potential prosecution in today’s NYT. It concludes ;

"Should the Justice Department indict Mr. Trump, a trial would be vastly different from House hearings in ways that affect the scope and pace of any inquiry. Investigators would have to scour thousands of hours of video footage and the full contents of devices and online accounts they have accessed for evidence bolstering their case, as well as anything that a defense lawyer could use to knock it down. Federal prosecutors would probably also have to convince appeals court judges and a majority of Supreme Court justices of the validity of their case.

For all of the pressure that the House committee has put on the Justice Department to act, it has resisted sharing information. In April, the department asked the committee for transcripts of witness interviews but the panel has not agreed to turn over the documents because its work is continuing.

Although critics have faulted Mr. Garland, attorneys general do not generally drive the day-to-day work of investigations. Mr. Garland is briefed nearly every day on the inquiry’s progress, but it is being led by Matthew M. Graves, the U.S. attorney in Washington, who is working with national security and criminal division officials. Lisa O. Monaco, the deputy attorney general, broadly oversees the investigation.

"Whether fair or not, Garland’s tenure will be defined by whether or not he indicts Trump,” Mr. Miller said. “The Justice Department may not indict Trump. Prosecutors may not believe they have the evidence to secure a conviction. But that will now be interpreted as a choice by Garland, not as a reality that was forced upon him by the facts of the investigation.”

7966

The mighty Gary Younge tells the truth about gun violence in the USA

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7967

That’s utterly brilliant, thanks for sharing :+1:

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7968

Younge was living in Chicago but relocated back to London.

I would do exactly the same, tbh, and I loved Chicago.

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7969

Yesterday’s trumpeting of a bipartisan agreement on gun control measures as something of a landmark step is close to laughable. They are saying it’s the most significant movement on gun safety legislation in 26 years but really it is astonishing in its timidity. Once again they are dancing around the single most important issue ; assault rifles should be banned or , failing that , then they should not be easily accesible to an 18yr old. The agreement is being spun as an important first step to more meaningful gun control when in reality it is probably the absolute limit of what Republican Senators will be willing to stomach.

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7970

So much of the opposition to any reform over the past 10-15 years has been rooted in a dumb fuck argument about what the constitution says. Even Scalia’s written opinion in the Heller case that precipitated so much of the modern gun situation explicitly states that regulation is consistent with the 2A, yet the pretending that any talk of regulation is a violation of the 2A is what the GOP have fallen back on in this time. So I think part of the perspective here is many of the Dems are treating this as a rhetorical win - no matter how trivial the restrictions this bill adds, the fact you have Republicans voting yes on it removes this “regulation is a constitutional violation” argument from the discourse. Of course, it absolutely does not because we have a bad faith party across the aisle who are simply not held accountable by the press for it. So the idea this backs them into a corner on further debate is infuriatingly stupid.

As for the bill itself, it’s not just weak sauce, but I think has potential to make some aspects worse. As you rightly say, this does little to address the events that precipitated it. To cover this they way its being covered, as a big win for gun safety advocates is the perfect illustration of how bad out politics coverage is. We ONLY have political coverage. We don’t have policy coverage. As such, the contents of a bill really dont matter to the coverage, only what people are saying about, and what the over self-important talking heads can project this will mean for political debate down the line. While I understand all the argument about politics being an exercise in hitting singles not home runs, this is the sort of policy that demonstrates to middle of the road so called swing voters that government is NOT the solution. It shows they are inclined to pass a bill that doesn’t solve the problem they like talking about and then are content to go home thinking they’ve done their job. It is this sort of ineffectual policy making that mostly explains why Dems struggle to retain power.

So while I get this is the only bill that was available, my bigger frustration is how Dems will not celebrate this and message it. They will be happy about getting something to pass, lionize their colleagues across the aisle, and talk about the prospects of additional bills as if those discussions will be had in good faith. Moving forward, it’s really hard to argue people are arguing in bad faith about additional debate when you’ve spent a whole news cycle celebrating their willingness to debate and find agreements.

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