food stamps

Getting Attention, Statistics and Projection


Hey! Over Here!

The New York Times gathered for a discssion Four Opinion Writers on How the G.O.P. Fringe Took Over American Politics. Here’s a comment from Ezra Klein from that discussion.

“Democrats have a lot of theories of policy. They have a lot of theories of politics. They just do not have a theory of attention. And what I would say for the Trumpist Republican Party is it mostly doesn’t have a theory of policy. It has a middling theory of politics, and it is overwhelmed by its own theory of attention. And I don’t think there’s some kind of grand strategic plan happening over there.

“But I think that one way to think about the asymmetry, or maybe the inversion of the two sides right now, is that Republicans know how to get attention, but they don’t know how to be strategic about it. And Democrats know how to be strategic, but they don’t know how to get attention.”

I maintain that messaging from Democrats is uninspiring and commonly submarines their value to Americans. Klein is adding that they don’t know how to get attention, this in the face of Republicans who are experts at getting attention. I’m certain he’s right.

The key tools Republicans use to get attention are:

  1. Stoking fear of “the other”, be they Democrats or Blacks or Mexicans or Muslims – all the usual suspects. Those “others” aren’t real Americans, Republicans would have us believe.
  2. Saying crazy, even stupid things and being outrageous.

Clearly, Democrats aren’t going to stoke racial fears and hatreds in order to get attention and votes. But what about being outrageous? They can:

Call out Republican lies and label them that way – not falsehoods or misstatements: LIES! And ask Americans how they like being lied to.

Many thanks to JN for passing this along.

As the food stamp program is ending they can make headlines saying, “Republicans don’t care if poor kids starve!”

They can go on the Sunday news programs and tell America that Republicans are banning and burning books, just like the Nazis.

Speaking of books, Democrats can proclaim that Republicans want to cut short your kids’ education – leave them ignorant and prepared to be losers. They even want to close your public school.

Beto can tell Texas women that Gov. Abbott wants them to carry their rapist’s baby to term. And carry the babies from incest, too. Even if they’ll likely die in childbirth. Same thing in Mississippi, Oklahoma, Florida and other states.

Declare that new strains of Covid are already here and it’s killing our unvaccinated, but Republicans don’t care if they die.

Speaking of Covid, Republicans are spreading anti-vaccine and anti-mask disinformation, fighting against everything that would help end the pandemic. They’re doing that to attack Democrats over the inflation caused by the pandemic! Clearly, they don’t care if Americans go broke or die. That last sentence is the important one.

You get the picture. It’s how it’s said that gets attention.

One of the reasons so many liked Trump is that he seemed to them to be strong. No politically correct phrasing comes from him. He’s all about groundless accusation and promises of “unbelievable” and “huge” great stuff that never materializes. And he’s about “hit back harder,” as declared by Kellyanne Conway, as though hitting back harder were a good thing. Many see that stuff as strength.

There’s no need for Democrats to mimic Trump’s cruelty and stupidity. All they have to do to appeal to those wanting strong leaders (that’s all of us) is to speak plainly.

For example, when Ted Cruz was abusing Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson over kids’ books, Democrats should have said the same thing publicly as they screamed while watching their TVs: “What a jerk! That guy wouldn’t know the truth if he read it in a children’s book.” I.e., Democrats must speak the outrage plainly.

Instead, we got Dick Durbin doing nothing. When he did speak he seemed to have a mouth full of oatmeal.

He let Lindsay Graham get away with his temper tantrum, false accusations, stealing 50% more time than was his, and then storming off like a 7-year-old brat. We got next to nothing in leadership from the #2 senator at a time when strength was called for. What we should have heard from Durbin was,

“The senator’s time is done – we’re not negotiating more. The senator will silence himself or he will be removed from this chamber. He will not be allowed to come back until he is prepared to apologize for his rude, insulting behavior and write on the board, ‘I will follow the rules, I will follow the rules,’ 100 times.”

That would be outrageous, of course, yet appropriate. And it would have made the 10:00 o’clock news across the nation. The Ds would have gotten some good attention as the strong ones. It would have been clear what they stand for. Instead, it was just another lost opportunity and a show of weakness.

Democrats have managed to disagree with Republicans, but only in nicey-nice Democrat-speak. That gets no attention. But it just isn’t that hard to get attention. The question is whether they have the courage to do what’s necessary.

Must Read

Late find following the writing of this post:

Thom Hartmann writes, “It seems that Democratic leadership is suffering from a serious deficiency of outrage.”

Statistics of the Week

From the Center for American Progress:

“There are 139 elected officials in the 117th Congress [109 representatives and 30 senators] who still deny the scientific consensus of human-caused climate change.”

These Republicans “have received more than $61 million in lifetime contributions from the coal, oil, and gas industries.” [emphasis original]

Projection Speak of the Week

Democracy is failing and authoritarianism is rising because of democracy’s bad moral foundations, said Sergey Karagonov, former advisor to Vladimir Putin, from back in the days when Putin had advisors. Vyacheslav Nikonov, a member of the powerless Russian legislative body, attacked democracy as the evil against which good guy authoritarians fight. Think: Putin as a warrior for all that is good and right in the world.

Somebody please tell me when there has been an authoritarian whose primary motive wasn’t amassing wealth and power for him/herself. For extra points, name one who made the lives of ordinary citizens better. Name even one authoritarian (another word for “dictator”) who wasn’t amoral or immoral and who didn’t descend into some form of debauchery and cruelty.

Oddly, an authoritarian is exactly what our extremist political righties think they want. Set aside whether that is an American thing to do. Focus for the moment on whether you want to be under the thumb of a self-serving, amoral, cruel dictator. See this Sunday’s post for more.

Sadly, our home grown authoritarian lovers don’t even get to the point of thinking about such things. They get a short-lived jolt of power from their tirades as they demand non-democracy, but they’re left powerless immediately after the power rush fades.

The science is well known about how anger short circuits logic and reason and it is that short circuit that we have to confront if we are to avoid a Vladimir Putin wannabee in power over the United States of America. For more, read this from Heather Cox-Richardson.

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  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
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Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

A View From The Other Side


Reading time – 5:01; Viewing time – 6:41 .  .  .

Kevin Dowd

Maureen Dowd is a liberal opinion writer for the New York Times. Her brother Kevin is a Trump supporter. She gives him her column space every Thanksgiving and I urge you to read his current piece. I have tried to explain Trump voters several times, but Dowd does a better job by declaring his views, so let’s let him provide the clarity.

As you read his essay, think about whether his views and attitudes seem familiar, perhaps similar to what you’re seeing in Congress as they wrestle with impeachment.* And consider where leadership for this comes from. My notion is that it’s all of a piece.

Here are a dozen of Dowd’s claims (in plain text) and my comments (in italics). I’ve done my best to stick to naming Trumpian reality, rather than demonizing it. If I’ve failed, it’s on me.

  1. Dowd says that Trump is better than the alternative (Hillary). That is (or at least was) a reasonable view for nearly half of all voting Americans.
  2. He claims that liberals sneer at religious conservatives. That’s a profound and completely unsubstantiated, victim-y claim.
  3. He gives all credit for the improved economy to Trump, even though it was set up by 8 years of continuous economic expansion under Obama.
  4. In a “support the police” context, he says that Michael Bloomberg should stop apologizing for his stop-and-frisk policy when he was Mayor of New York. In doing so, Dowd unmasks his attitude of white privilege, which doesn’t sound too good to those who live with black privilege.
  5. He thinks Trump has done a great job with North Korea and Iran, this offered in a sweeping, unsupported claim. Note that Trump has done so well with those countries that Iran is now preparing to enrich uranium again and North Korea is set to test fire its first intercontinental ballistic missile that could reach the U.S. mainland.
  6. He likes Trump’s court picks, especially for the Supreme Court. Fair enough. Except for the long list of district court judges who were determined to be profoundly unqualified by the American Bar Association and who now have an appointment to the bench for life.
  7. He defends Trump by claiming no harm, no foul because the military aid for Ukraine was released without a Ukrainian investigation of the Bidens or a search for the fantasy Ukrainian/Crowdstrike 2016 server. This defense ignores the salient facts, such as that the release of aid only happened after Trump was caught and publicly outed. And it ignores the facts that the months long withholding of aid was illegal and using it to pressure Ukraine to smear the Bidens was illegal and soliciting foreign interference in our upcoming election was illegal.
  8. He baselessly attacks Adam Schiff solely with snark. He attacks yet others solely with snark – no facts. Then he attacks all of the Democratic presidential candidates with – you guessed it – snark. It’s playground bully name calling used as a political tool to smear opponents. I think I know where he learned that.
  9. Dowd claims the House Intelligence Committee impeachment hearings were full of second- and third-hand information. He ignores the mountain of firsthand testimony and the stonewalling by Trump to prevent still more firsthand testimony.
  10. He hopes the I.G. report is devastating to Comey, McCabe, Brennan and Clapper; i.e., he wants Trump opponents to face legal prosecution. That reminds me of an acquaintance who, shortly after Obama was elected said, “I hope he fails.” That’s deeply disturbing and can reasonably be called unpatriotic. How come Kevin Dowd and other Trump supporters wish for such things?
  11. He’s clearly anti-abortion. Okay, that’s where he’s at.
  12. He attacks the press, although his claims are almost entirely fact-free. Because of the enormous reach and impact of demeaning the press, I can think of few things as unpatriotic.
Short Summary:

Some of Dowd’s views are legitimate, since we’re all entitled to our opinions on such issues as abortion, judicial appointments and political preferences. Some of this is just plain meanness, treating those who disagree as though they’re sub-human. Some of this is corrosive to democracy itself.

Specifically, there are sweeping assertions that are absent of fact. There is attacking of our basic institutions. Victim-hood is interlaced with almost everything and there are unwarranted assaults, both verbal and legal, on political opponents.

Life must be simpler in that stridently black-and-white, exclusionary world. The only problem is that a lot of people get hurt in it and so does our country.

Here’s what is most important about this right now: some members of Congress, Trump supporters and some independents will be judging the impeachment proceedings through this alternate reality, victim attitude lens.* That doesn’t bode well for America.

Finally, a Snark Thing Of my Own  .  .  .

Sonny Perdue, Secretary of Hunger

Once more the Trump administration has cut food stamps from nearly a million people. Apparently, we’ve become lax and allowed a lot of lazy freeloaders and welfare queens to stick a hand in our wallets. Well, that stops right now.

This bold new program should teach those seasonal workers, impoverished rural people and their lazy children a lesson. And the really good news is that this will eventually stick it to two million more of those losers. The really fun part is that we’re effectively using the billions these cuts will save to increase welfare payments to corporate farms.

Three cheers for Sonny Perdue, Secretary of Agriculture, one cheer for each million people he makes go hungry!


* President Trump has been offered the opportunity to take part in the House Judiciary Committee hearings. Counsel to the President Pat Cipollone sent a rant of a letter in response that apparently means that the offer is rejected. What’s important to see is his string of fact-less claims and accusations. It is typical of Trump and Trump supporters. Download it here and see for yourself.

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NOTES:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling or punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

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