TGIF 1/22/21

What a week, eh?

We've said goodbye - sorry, we've said have a good life and we'll see you soon - to one president, and said 'hello' to another. 

We've said goodbye to OrangeVerse, and hello to "there is always light if only we're brave enough to see it, if only we're brave enough to be it."

We've said goodbye to American carnage, and hello to humanity and decency. At least, we've said the words 'humanity and decency,' even if there's not necessarily a lot of acceptance of that idea quite yet. 

We've said goodbye to hundreds of bills going to the Senate to rot on the Grim Reaper's desk, and hello to 'shared' control of the US Senate, if Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell can figure out how to make it work. The fullabluster on the filibuster is currently a huge hang-up - or, at least, it's the excuse for the delay in getting things organized.

We've said goodbye to Executive Orders in lieu of legislation (217 in four years), and hello to Executive Orders in lieu of  legislation (30 in three days).

We've said goodbye to long red ties, and we've fallen in love with a pair of mittens. 

We've said goodbye to the president who won 306 Electoral College votes in 2016, and hello to a president who won 306 Electoral College votes in 2020, one who must abandon his agenda now in order to create unity with the 74.2 million voters who are upset that 81.2 million other voters picked someone else. 

But we also had some pretty cool fireworks, from multiple locations in the nation's capital, and a pretty cool celebration leading up to those fireworks, one that looked like us and sounded like us and was shared by lots of us Americans in a way that inaugural balls never were. 

I'll close with this, which I saw on Twitter earlier today.

TGIF, everyone.

Trump in Transition (v48)

Watching people argue on Twitter about which presidential candidate won more counties - not more votes, more counties - is both comical and disheartening.

The self-proclaimed "proud supporters of the Constitution" seem to believe that counties vote...? And, without irony, they also believe that counties - particularly counties in red states - cheat, make up ballots, and round up dead people to vote against Trump.

The same people believe that wearing a Black Lives Matter t-shirt when observing ballot-counting is both a crime against humanity and indicative of cheating, while wearing a MAGA hat is indicative of patriotism and truthfulness, which is itself untruthful, if the judges who've reviewed the 'evidence' from said 'red heads' are correct.

And, it would seem, many of them apparently think that a mythological Scandinavian sea monster is going to save the Trump presidency. That would appear to be a completely un-American approach, don't you think? An illegal immigrant from a country governed by a monarch swimming in to save the American republic? Stop it.

Donald Trump feeds off the people who idolize him and can't imagine that someone wouldn't; it's impossible for him to believe he is unlikeable. Even in the face of evidence that people dislike him, he denies the possibility.

To sit where he sits - he acts like he's in a booth in the back in the corner in the dark, except he's in the White House, and we can see him - and repeatedly tell us and the world that he won, that he got more votes than Obama!! and more votes than any sitting president ever!!!, and that there's no way anyone could have gotten more votes than him since he got more than anyone before him!!!!! is insane. It's delusional. It's narcissistic.

And, sadly, it's completely consistent with what we have been forced to put up with throughout his presidency. He has not transitioned an inch, not even a hair. He is now who he was then, who he has been and will be forever, except that he was elected president. Once.

He denies my existence, and the existence of millions of people like me, over 81 million of us, who did not vote for him. He denies the existence of people who had the audacity to like someone better, or to dislike his opponent less than they dislike him.

The millions who showed our displeasure, our distaste, our dislike, he cannot or will not comprehend. Our exhaustion, he cannot comprehend. How annoyed we are, how sick we are of his constant self-promoting, the embarrassing tweets, the grifting, the cast of characters by whom he is surrounded, that he foists upon us, that he honors and celebrates, he cannot comprehend.

Equally incomprehensible is that, as he pretends all of this isn't happening, didn't happen, isn't true, he continues to roil the waters in which his devout supporters swim, working them into a frenzy of martial-law supporting, havoc-wreaking, our-country-has-been-stolen fanatics. They are insisting he will be president, he will have his second-term inauguration come January 20th, and they don't care what it takes to make that happen.

• Let's send separate slates of Trump electors. Let's have a nationwide recount - in the states he lost this time that he won last time, because that is the nation, that handful of states. That is the height of the resistance against him, and against which devout rage must be directed.

• Let's have a separate inauguration for him, at noon on January 20, 2021, an online inauguration. It'll be the biggest crowd for any online inauguration in history, it surely will - the zoomiest Zoom call EVER! We'll bring Sean Spicer back, grab him from the studios of Newsmax and have him count all the little faces on the screens to validate the count! Obama never had a zoom inauguration this big - we'll show him, that Muslim race-baiting worst president ever- we'll SHOW HIM!

• Let's fight the acceptance of the Electoral College vote! Let's dispute it on the floor during the Joint Session, and make the Vice President deal with that! (Insert Howard Dean scream here.)

And Trump sits in our house, huddling with the China-loving fraudster Steve Bannon; with the indescribable Sidney Powell, the lawyer who's not his lawyer, but who spends an awful lot of time at the White House lately; with Rudy Giuliani, the lawyer who IS his lawyer but who spends a lot of time telling people that Sidney Powell is nuts; with twice-confessed lying pardoned disgraced General Michael Flynn, and his other usual suspects - RINOS one and all - because these folks are not representative of the majority of Republicans. They cannot be.

Trump and his followers would have you believe that Republicans in charge of elections in red states are RINOS for not declaring him the winner, but they are actually Republicans, sharing their disappointment at the outcome of the election (however misplaced that disappointment is, in my opinion) and at the same time supporting the rule of law and the processes that are in place.

They are being turned on (no, not like that), the Republicans are, by the man they chose, the one they said was a lunatic, unstable, a racist, not like them, not good for the country, a con man, and more. He is turning on them, not just privately, but pitting one against the other, pitting the many against the one, whoever the one is that is drawing Trump's ire at any particular moment.

The majority of Republicans don't have the cojones to put themselves in the Stevie-Rudy-Sidney-Mikey crowd, right? They prefer to cower in the face of these folks. Complicitly, most of them silently, but still cowering, instead of using their precious microphone and camera time talking about what their constituents need, regardless of what Trump wants, or heaven forbid, talking about what the country needs.

And they surely don't have the cojones to stand up to Trump, unless it's on their way out of office. That seems to be the time when courage, and cojones, are found aplenty. (Well, a couple, maybe; not really aplenty. I mean, they're not hanging like ornaments on a tree or anything.)

All of this - the ignorance, the insistence, the convincing, the convicted, the complicit, the true believers, the treasonous - all of this creates a giant, flaming bullseye showing us exactly where we are, and how far we need to go.

We don't need a cult leader, raking in money hand over fist from the faithful. We don't need a grifter, enriching his businesses and his family off the taxpayers. We don't need a liar, a tweeter, a shouter, a screamer, a cranky two-year-old having a temper tantrum.

We surely don't need more people coming to the White House wearing their criminal convictions on their sleeves; we need people who have the courage of their convictions, their principles, their ethics, their love of country.

We don't need a person, we need a plan, for the entire country.

The 'real' transition cannot happen soon enough.

Sunday School 12/13/20: Extra Credit

For your Extra Credit this week, let's see if we can ask better questions than Chris Wallace did in his Fox News Sunday interview with House Minority Whip Rep. Steve Scalise, who represents the good people of Louisiana. 

Wallace started the interview asking, after the Electoral College votes for the Biden-Harris ticket, "will you stop contesting this election?" Here's Scalise doing his best to not answer.

Well, Chris, look, there has been a lot of contesting of the election in multiple states. The president's done it, other groups have done it too, and that's because of the concerns people had. When you look at massive vote swings days and weeks after the election, millions of people feel very frustrated with this process. And, look, there -- there's going to ultimately be a conclusion to this, but for now I think, if you just discount the fact that millions of people wonder, why is it that in some states Florida, Texas, large states, they had the results by 10:00 that night and then in other states it was days and weeks. And during those days and weeks you saw massive vote swings that just seed a lot of distrust. That's got to get resolved. We've got to start getting back to the point where we can resolve elections on the night.

At this point, I would have asked Rep. Scalise to name a single state that had a "massive vote swing" in the 'weeks' since the election. Wallace didn't ask that, but he did push back.

But -- but -- but -- but -- but -- but, Congressman Scalise -- Congressman Scalise -- There -- the reason that there were these votes swings was because in a lot of states they weren't able to count the millions of mail-in ballots until election night. And everybody knew that -- and, in fact, it happened in Florida, it went the other way. They were able to count the mail-in ballots early, so it favored Biden early and then it swung to Trump. In Pennsylvania, they had to count the mail-in ballots late, so it started pro-Trump and then it swung to Biden.

Now, that's an opportunity for Scalise to take a deep breath, grab himself by the whatever, and admit that Wallace was right - that yes, everyone knew that the absentee ballots were going to go for Biden and that Election Day voting would favor Trump. Did he do that? Of course he didn't. 

Well, Chris, first of all, look at New York, right? The Claudia Tenney race in New York. She's up by 12 votes. Just the other day they found 55 votes in a desk drawer. You know, this kind of stuff – people look at this and go, what is going on? This is the United States of America, it's not Venezuela. That's what gets people irate. You know, why is this still going on?

"Well, Steve, " I would have said, "what on earth does New York's 22nd Congressional District race have to do with the presidential race, the Electoral College, or the ongoing assault on our country by the Republicans? That's what gets people irate. You know, why is this still going on?" 

Wallace waited until after Scalise finished his thought, including bringing in the Georgia runoffs (they all do that, the GOP) in a way that makes no sense. 

Let's have a chain of custody. Let's get back to making sure that everybody can have full confidence in our elections. But just to look the other way and say, hey, look, you know, three weeks later they pulled -- they pulled the corner like -- people are very frustrated with this.

There's still an election in Georgia on January 5th. And three weeks from now, we need to encourage people to go back out, but also to have a system where there's going to be more confidence than what they saw back in November.

"But- but- but- but- but- (I would have said) - Congressman Scalise, wait - wait - what is going to be different in Georgia runoff? Early voting starts tomorrow. There have been hundreds of thousands of absentee ballots requested. Has Georgia changed any rules? What's different now that will give people more confidence in voting again? And what do you say about this tweet from former House Speaker Newt Gingrich?" 

Wallace took a different approach, asking about the "thousands of lawsuits" rejected by state and federal courts, rejected by Trump appointees, and of course the SCOTUS decision to not hear the Texas case. He also noted that Scalise was one of the 125 House Republicans that signed on as 'friends' of the Texas case.

The -- the Supreme Court threw it out without even listening to it. This was a lawsuit that was going to throw out the -- the votes in four swing states, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. I mean you were talking about disenfranchising the 10 million Biden voters who supported the president- elect in those four states. Do feel comfortable throwing out millions of votes of your fellow Americans?

Scalise then pretended he didn't want the outcome he wanted. 

Well, nobody wants any votes thrown out, Chris. And, the fact, the 70 plus million votes that are also at stake for President Trump.

They don't want any votes thrown out, except the ones that went for Biden and not Trump. We know what, and so do they.  Wallace pointed out  "but that's what your lawsuit would have done, sir," even as Scalise tried to pretend that wouldn't be the case.  

Well, no. What -- if you look at the Texas lawsuit, what it was saying if, there are some states that didn't follow the laws that were on their books. The Constitution is very clear that it's state legislatures that set the process for -- for having electors. Some secretary of states changed those rules.

And, he said, the Supremes "don't like getting the the middle of disputes between other branches of government." 

At that point, Wallace went back to his original question, saying

So -- so, bottom line, even though the electors tomorrow are --more than 270 of them are going to say that -- that Joe Biden is the next president of the United States, you're not willing to recognize him as the president-elect, and you're not willing to stop contesting this election?

His response? Let's talk Bush v Gore, and get that wrong.

Well, hold on, Chris. First of all, Joe Biden has been going through a transition that even President Trump supported, while he's also following what the court allows. There are legal challenges allowed. Nobody said back during Bush v Gore, prior to the Supreme Court finally resolving it, and ultimately there -- there was an -- you know, electors met, there was a swearing in. Nobody disputed that. Maybe some of the Democrat side.

But you didn't see people ask prior to that to pass judgment before it was fully resolved. Let the legal process play out. But if you want to restore trust by millions of people who are still very frustrated and angry about what happened, that's why you've got to have the whole system play out. There will be a president sworn in on January 20th, but let's let this legal process play itself out.

I wish at this juncture Wallace had asked Scalise how he'd explain the Supremes ruling in Bush v Gore that no recount could be held in time to satisfy a federal deadline for the selection of state electors - but he didn't. 

They also talked about the fact that AG Bill Barr knew about - but didn't announce - an investigation into Hunter Biden's taxes, because he didn't want to interfere in the election, in accordance with DOJ guidelines. He asked Scalise if that was the right thing to do. No surprise - he went all NY Post and censorship and that the stories that came out were true, and "I think people deserve answers to what really happened here." Which, of course, does not answer the question he was asked, but that's never been a hindrance.

Wallace pointed out that we don't know what truth there is, just that it's being investigated, and then asked "do you trust Joe Biden to  continue this investigation when he becomes president and his attorney general is in charge after January 20th, to continue the investigation of his son?

Well, I'm sure whoever would be put up for attorney general would be heavily scrutinized by the United States Senate. That is the advise and consent role that they would play. But, again, these are concerns that were laid out during the campaign, including yourself, other people in the media expressed concerns about that story and Twitter blocked the distribution of the story and it turns out there's a lot of merit to it. Whether it's completely true or not, we're going to find out, but it's being much -- much more widely reported now after the election and it's another reason that people have real distrust in -- in the mainstream media.

The last question was about California Rep. Eric Swalwell, who we learned had some contact with a woman believed to be a Chinese spy. (Wallace didn't mention that, back in 2015 when the FBI advised him that a fundraiser, Christine Fang, was a "allegedly a Chinese spy," Swalwell immediately severed all contact and fully cooperated with the FBI investigation.)

Referencing comments from House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy saying that Swalwell shouldn't be on the House Intelligence Committee, Wallace asked Scalise if he or McCarthy "have any evidence, hard evidence, that Eric Swalwell gave -- did anything wrong in his relationship with this woman, knew that she was a spy before he was warned about it and ever gave her sensitive information?"

His answer? If you want hard evidence from me, ask him. Ask Swalwell - "these are questions that Eric Swalwell himself needs to answer."

Maybe Wallace can have him on to answer all of the other questions Scalise didn't answer, too.

See you around campus.

OrangeVerse XXV: Mar-a-Lago Musings (pt 1)

The president had a chat with Michael S. Schmidt, a NY Times reporter, last week in the Grill Room at Mar-a-Lago, one of the president's business ventures.

In the interview, the president was unattended - no staff members, none of His Generals, none of his family members - in effect, no one who would put a restraining hand on his arm in case he went off on a tangent or something. Which is probably a good thing, because we were able to capture some interesting, if fractured, poetry.

Let us begin where the interview did -- with the president talking about Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, who eternally irked the president by recusing himself from the Russia investigation. And how the investigation is strengthening his base.

My Base

My base is stronger

than it's ever been.

Great Congressmen,

in particular, some

of the Congressmen

have been unbelievable

in pointing out

what a witch hunt

the whole thing is

So, I think

it's proven there is

no collusion.

There was more conversation on how Trump won, on the Russia investigation, and no collusion, and Democratic collusion, and Clinton emails and John Podesta and no collusion (did I say there was no collusion?)

I Don't Know Him

He's been amazing.

And he's a liberal Democrat

I don't know him.

He's a liberal Democrat.

I watched Alan Dershowitz 

the other day he said, 

No.1, there is no collusion.

No. 2, collusion is not a crime

but even if there was a crime

there was no collusion.

And he said that

very strongly.

He said there was

no collusion. 

And he has studied

this thing

very closely.

I've seen him 

a number of times.

There is no collusion,

and even if there was

it's not a crime. 

But there's no collusion.

They talked some more about winning, and the Electoral College, and Russia, and collusion, and how the whole thing that didn't occur is a sham to make up for losing the election, and loyalty. And then the topic turned to bipartisanship.

Bullshit

So...we started taxes.

And we don't hear 

from the Democrats.

You know we hear

bullshit from 

the Democrats. 

Like Joe Manchin.

Joe's a nice guy...

But he talks.

But he doesn't 

do anything.

He doesn't do.

Well, alrighty then!

There's more, a LOT more, in the interview, which we'll get to later on. They covered a lot of ground, on taxes, and health insurance, and immigration.  And winning, for there's always winning. 

Get ready for a  rollicking good time in 2018 - and beyond!

My Middle-aged White Lady Perspective: Winning and Losing

On the eve of the Electoral College almost certainly finalizing the outcome of the 2016 presidential election - I mean, there's about a one-in-a-Trumpzillion chance that they'll overturn the outcome we learned a few weeks ago - I'm going to toss my middle-aged white lady perspective out there one last time this year.

Folks, Russian hackers did not steal the election from Hillary Clinton, or give the election to Donald Trump. The FBI did not take the election from her, and she did not steal the nomination from Bernie Sanders. Green and Libertarian voters did not yank victory from her hands, either.

Fake news had less to do with the outcome of the election than did Fox News, CNN, and the nightly newscasts of the major television networks.

And finally, corporations and SuperPACS and Citizens United did not collectively make this outcome happen. Heck, Jeb! Bush had what, around $100,000,000 lined up before a single primary vote was cast?  Ask him how much good that did.

Oh, sure, fingers can be pointed, and will be pointed, and probably should be pointed in a whole lot of directions: at the powers that be in the CIA and FBI, the DNC and the RNC, the shadowy halls of  PACville, and in the rooms where media poobahs poo and bah. Everyone is trying to figure out what happened, trying to attach blame, and pointing at everyone other than themselves.

The reality is, "what happened" is that voters voted.

This election had the lowest turnout of eligible voters in presidential elections since 1996 - only about 55% of those who could vote, did vote. But the ones who did could have had any number of reasons for voting, and for voting the way they did:

• out of a sense of duty or obligation, or because they were strong supporters of a candidate, or strong detractors of one, or
• because they were angry, the "mad as hell and not going to take it any more" kind of people, or
• because they felt their values or their jobs or their futures slipping through their fingers, or
• because they thought it was fun, finally, to have someone to vote for who really didn't give a damn about what he said, who he said it about, or why, or
• because they liked baseball caps that could hold an entire campaign vision on the front, or
• because they liked the guy who was nothing like them but acted like he was, more than they liked the woman who was nothing like them, and acted like she wasn't, or
• because they liked the one who seemed like someone they know from the corner bar more than the one who seemed like it would take her forever to order a drink, or
• because they didn't care about the lies one of them told, but they believed that everything the other one said was a lie, even when it wasn't, or
• because they thought that it would be fun to have a star in the White House, or
• because they didn't want another Bush or Clinton, and the Bush had already been vanquished, or
• because they really believed all of the conspiracy theories they heard about the other candidate but not the ones they heard about their own, or
• because they were protesting the status quo, or
• because they liked him, they really really liked him and they didn't like her, they really really didn't like her, or
• because we already had that token Black president, and they were in no mood to follow up with a woman just because she's a woman, or 
• because it won't matter because he won't be running the show, or
• because, because, because, because, because----because of the wonderful Wiz he was, the wonderful Wiz he was.

The bottom line is, Trump's campaign managed to get the right votes in the right places to get enough Electoral College votes (barring us somehow entering an alternate universe for a few hours tomorrow) to win the election.  The Trump campaign managed to turn blue states red, and purple states red, and that is what it takes to win an election: have more states with at least 270 electoral college votes Red than Blue, or conversely.

I'm not discounting the fact that Trump lost the popular vote - I'm really not. We know the score, and so does he.

I'll be watching for the results tomorrow, to see if we end up with any faithless electors, Hamilton electors, whatever you want to call them -- and I fully expect we'll see Trump end up with more than 270 votes, and we'll see him inaugurated on January 20, 2017 as has been the expectation since November 8th.

For the duration of the Trump administration (also called here the Goldfoxbart administration or the Apprentice Administration), #NeverTrump people and #ImWithHer people and Blue people of all shades, shapes, stripes and sizes should maintain a relentless focus on four things.

First, we must hold the new administration, and particularly the President himself, to the normal standard to which all Presidents are held. There can be no 'lowering of the bar' and there can be no 'this is uncharted territory' or 'we've never seen anything like this' -- we saw that throughout the primaries, and we've seen that throughout this most unusual transition. We must do whatever we can to raise our voices when we see a lowering of the bar, whether it's writing and commenting intelligently on social media, or having heartfelt discussions with friends, or writing our local media, or reaching out to our representatives in Congress -- whatever it takes, we must do, fearlessly. Period.

Second, there must be a vision for our party - a true vision - that everyone can relate to, in some way, shape or form, whether they're urban, suburban, rural or somewhere in between. We did not have that this time, and the other side did. Period. We don't know for sure how that vision will come out legislatively, or whether we will see a Trump vision, a Ryan vision, a McConnell vision, or something else entirely, but whatever they had was relatable, whether we like it or not.

Third, we need to support intelligent, articulate, qualified candidates who excel at sharing the vision, and who are horrible at shooting down the other guy -- because we learned this go-round for sure that "I'm not the other guy" is not a successful, winning strategy, at any level. If our best message is how bad the other guy is, we are not going to win. Period.

And finally, we need to work to change the system. Not because if we change it we win - that's what the other side does. We need to change the system because it will be better for everyone. Because that's what we do - try and make things better for everyone.

Do not give up, do not lose hope, do not stop talking about what you see, how you feel, what you want, and what you want to do. If we do that, we're doomed. Continue the fight, knowing that it's not Hillary Clinton's fight anymore, it's our fight.

We can win if we're smart, and we can win if we're prepared.

Oh -- I'll talk about a key change we can make in an upcoming post. And it's not the electoral college.