David Brook's Call To Arms Philosophically

I studied Economics, Math, Political Science and Business, not philosophy.  I am quite sure my liberal arts college tried to introduce me to philosophy, but I was really a here and now kind reality based person in terms of the areas where I could get good grades.  Psychology for example was a GPA killer for me.

But anyway, David Brooks went to the U of C and he has a good base in philosophy.   We are in a philosophical war.  That is where the politicians have to figure out how to win this war and right this government.

"Today’s anti-Enlightenment movements don’t think truth is to be found through skeptical inquiry and debate. They think wisdom and virtue are found in the instincts of the plain people, deep in the mystical core of the nation’s or race’s group consciousness."

"Today’s anti-Enlightenment movements believe less in calm persuasion and evidence-based inquiry than in purity of will. They try to win debates through blunt force and silencing unacceptable speech."

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"They don’t see history as a gradual march toward cooperation. They see history as cataclysmic cycles — a zero-sum endeavor marked by conflict. Nations trying to screw other nations, races inherently trying to oppress other races."

"These movements are hostile to rules-based systems, multilateral organizations, the messy compromises of democratic politics and what Steve Bannon calls the “administrative state.” They prefer the direct rule by one strongman who is the embodiment of the will of the people."

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"When Trump calls the media the “enemy of the people” he is going after the system of conversation, debate and inquiry that is the foundation for the entire Enlightenment project."

Link to Entire Brooks column

The American Police State is a Reality

From a NYT news article.

"In Virginia, Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agents waited outside a church shelter where undocumented immigrants had gone to stay warm.  In Texas and in Colorado, agents went into courthouses, looking for foreigners who had arrived for hearings on other matters."

"At Kennedy International Airport in New York, passengers arriving after a 5 hour flight from San Francisco were asked to show their documents before they were allowed to get off the plane."

I don't fly very much any more, but I can guarantee you that if I am asked to show a document to get off the plane, I will refuse and dial 911 to report a kidnapping if I am made a prisoner.  There is no legal requirement in this country that requires providing documents to get off a means of transportation.

It Would Be LOL if it Were Not Reality

No one has ever had more gall than King Donald.  For years he has been making things up and promulgating them as facts:  His favorite pattern is "people are saying" or "it is possible" or simply saying something that is not true as a fact.

Now he says the news media should always disclose their source by name and position.  Clearly, this is a policy Trump would never follow himself.  Never mind that the established news industry has a universal policy of needing at least two sources to confirm the authencity of a story line before they publicize it.  Never mind that the Supreme Court has upheld the right of the news media to protect sources from being disclosed except in rare circumstances when the reporter goes to jail rather than disclose the source.

Steve Bannon and King Donald are right.  This is a war and since they have declared it, I think it behooves all of us to fight it.  The problem with war's is there are unforeseen consequences and collateral damage.  So here we go, take no prisoners Democratic legislators.

Another Example of Paid Pundits Writing Better Than I Do

Gail Collins:

"Talk about keeping your campaign promises.  The president vowed to get rid of useless regulations, and already he's opened the road for dirty Appalachian water and oil companies bribing other governments.  With mentally deranged gunmen waiting on his desk."


Link to Gail Collins column


And Nicholas Kristoff reminds liberals that they can disagree with Trump with all their fury but do not disrespect Trump voters.  They had a variety of reasons for voting for Trump, many of which were not racist or based upon prejudice.  Democrats need to convert a million or so those 62 mm people to voting for them and insulting them will not be a fruitful path to winning in the future.

Link to Kristoff column

Meanwhile in Kansas we see how the GOP does not respect majority rule if they have a sufficient minority representation to block things they do not want.  Just as we did in the Congress the last 4 years.  This is something the Democrats need to remember.

Link to Kansas GOP legislature upholding a Veto on Tax Increases based by same GOP legislature


Glad I don't live in Kansas.

King Donald Would Enjoy Today's NYTimes

It's all about him.  There is little else written on any other topic.

But I found two items worth noting for my loyal readers review.

The 1st is Frank Bruni's analysis of King Donald's style and how it wears us out so we are too tired to oppose him or remember his most outrageous behavior because there is a new outrageous behavior.  And yes readers, elections have consequences, which is why I ripped John Podesta's column in a comment on it.  No single person is more responsible for the situation Democrats are in than he is. He failed to come up with a winning strategy in the rust belt and for that failure he should rot in hell.

Link to Bruni Column

Meanwhile, some liberals are not reading the tea leaves correctly.  There were a number of Trump voters who are not enamored of him, but want some respect from the Democrat's.  While I know Hillary wanted to run in the middle as a Centrist, her campaign staff felt compelled to tack toward Bernie Sander's and the failure of the Clinton campaign has emboldened those liberals into action which offends these people who are necessary to have as Democrat's in the Rust Belt if Democrats are to win.  These people want economic fairness for their situation and want to be respected for their views that identity politics have been won and don't need to be emphasized as much or they may even disagree with them.

I saw a wonderful piece on PBS about an African American musician who plays honky tonk and country music and has a personal vendetta to reach out to individuals in the KKK and work to convince them that all individuals are human and deserving of respect.  He has some success with this over the last 25 years.  It is something liberals should remember.  It takes a big tent to win Presidential elections.

Link to "How Liberals are Helping Trump"


And, finally, a piece on how the GOP can remove Trump in a hurry if they want to.

Link to Column on Section 4 of the 25th Amendment


So, while Congress would still have to agree with the outcome, the impeachment process would not be necessary.  Of course, Democrats should have no illusion that this would improve policy.  Vice President Pence is a very conservative person who does not see any issue the way Democrats do.

Dear President Trump, You Did Not Inherit a Mess

OK, if you were talking about the Affordable Care Act, I can see how you might have believed it was a mess.  I disagree with the term, but improvements are needed.  It is working well in Massachusetts and New York, but not in some other states.

But everywhere else in Government you did not inherit a mess.  While Congress was dysfunctional, that was by their choice and everything under the direct control of The White House was functioning smoothly on January 19th.

So if things are a mess today, there is only one reason.  Your Administration!!!

The balance the GOP Leadership Wants in Health Insurance Reform

"Now that they’ll be held accountable for the changes they make, Republicans aren’t all sure they want to get rid of all that. Republicans might want to kill the taxes, but that would mean they’re going to have trouble paying for a replacement. Republicans would like to convert those subsidies to refundable tax credits, but it’s not yet clear how Republicans would design them. Many Republican states took the Medicaid expansion — and saw their uninsured rates plunge. They like the flexibility involved in Republican plans to turn Medicaid into a block grant, but they don’t want to give up the money they’re getting from the federal government."

"In short, this stuff is complicated, especially if you want to avoid the enormous public backlash that would increase exponentially if you just repealed the law. There may be no way to avoid that backlash, particularly since everything Republicans are considering is guaranteed to produce more uninsured people, higher out-of-pocket costs, and enormous disruption to the system (and that’s if it works as planned). But Ryan and other GOP leaders are hoping to finesse it all with a carefully constructed Jenga tower of a bill that minimizes the political damage they’ll suffer. Some parts of the ACA (the popular ones) will likely be kept in some form, and the whole thing will be rolled out gradually, perhaps with a delay that pushes the most dangerous parts of the transition past the 2018 midterm elections (or even the 2020 elections). And it’s already clear that Ryan doesn’t want to rush into anything when the political stakes are so high."

From WAPO column by Paul Waldman 

GOP Congressman Afraid to Meet Constituents

It's only been 3 1/2 weeks and already GOP Congressman are canceling meetings where they are supposed to explain themselves to the people they represent and hear their concerns.  Why, because they can't take the heat.  While I think people who attend these should be respectful, their questions can be forthright and direct.

I hope the voters hold them accountable.



Being in charge is not helping GOP cohesion

Might Obama Still Win the Health Care Legacy Fight, It IS NOW Looking Possible

I don't want to jump the gun on this, but after seeing Paul Ryan blabber his way though another interview on many issues and then reading the column I will link to below, I think the headline is true.

I would rather be skiing today in the semi-blizzard that is hitting us right now, but I wasn't up for driving 2 to 3 hours through it both ways to do so.  So here is one day when I would rather be living in BTV.

Anyway, despite Paul Ryan saying the GOP was working on a replacement for ObamaCare, it turns out that are not even talking about it quietly.  I have gone into these reasons ad nauseum in prior posts, but I will do so again for any new readers.

The ACA, aka ObamaCare, was designed by the Heritage Foundation, a right wing think tank.  It was designed to keep the private health insurance market solvent so it would be a viable alternative to Universal Health Insurance provided by the Federal Government, while controlling the aggregate cost of health care in the economy, which in the U.S. is close to 20% of GDP vs 10%-12% of most of the rest of the Industrial World.  And of course, the 1st Governor to implement this design was Gov. Romney the 2012 GOP candidate for President.

So, the ACA is the best design the GOP has for controlling the aggregate cost of health care while not adopting a single payer health insurance plan, or even a public option for people who don't have health insurance through their employer and have too much money to be on Medicaid, the state run national plan for providing health insurance to the poor.

Of course, the key is forcing younger healthy people to buy health insurance so those who get cancer or some other horrible illness can be treated in a timely manner and are covered and older people who have even more go wrong sometime and with frequency can afford to buy health insurance.

And while I think all of this is an argument to offer Medicare for All as an option, the GOP doesn't want to do that and they don't want to require everybody to buy health insurance, except that is the only way the ACA can work.  You have to require that healthy people share in the risk pool financially because they will end up in the risk pool eventually.  It's the same risk sharing principle behind every other kind of insurance and even why we pay taxes to support the public safety system, the judicial system (to protect our rights) and to pay for national defense.

Link to WAPO column that prompted this

Trump Get's a Bit Closer to Impeachment

As I wrote a week ago, I don't know what will put the House GOP and Senate GOP over the edge, but I do believe we are heading there.

Yesterday, in court, one of Trump's lawyers was asked by a  Judge,

"Are you arguing, then, that the president's decision in that regard is unreviewable?"

The lawyer paused, then he said "Yes"

So when Trump's lawyers are arguing in court that the President is above the law and beyond the judgement of the court, then we know that King Donald is getting advice from his lawyers that he is above the law and it is just a matter of time until he does something so outrageous (I know, he has done plenty of outrageous things already) that impeachment will be the result.

Democrat's should not cheer this although many will, Mike Pence has no liberal instincts and will slash things that they care about using many of those King Donald has already appointed as Cabinet Members.

Fighting Trump and the GOP policies will not be easy

3 Columns today highlight the difficulty in opposing King Donald and the necessity of doing so.

The 1st column, written by a former conservative radio talk show host, highlights the success and danger of the successful delegitimization of main stream media by conservative media.  Many Trump supporters believe the truth and facts are fabrications and only alternative facts and King Donald's beliefs are the truth.  The writer regrets participating in this, but it stills highlights the need for a focused Democratic effort on the policy front to convince Trump supporters who still read main stream media that they have a coherent economic message.

Why Trump Supporter's Don't Care That He Lies

The danger of this is the fact that some of these Trump supporters think 9/11 and Sandy Hook were executed by agents of the U.S. Government because that is what Alternative Media like the Drudge Report and Breitbart News are telling them.  Unless those sites change their ways, which they will not because they make their money off the clicks on their website and giving the reader what they want to read is the way to keep them coming back.  They are the media equivalent of the Tobacco and Alcohol Industries.  Not to mention that most of them think President Obama is a muslim born in Kenya and who rode that falsehood to the pinnacle of power.

The 2nd column is written by Ross Douthat and simply highlights the fact that the country is split 50/50 and the rhetoric that the Democrat's both need to use to combat Trump and and keep their base motivated turns off the other 50% and makes it difficult to get them to listen to what else the Democrats have to say.  Crafting something that will make sense to potential swing voters in the Rust Belt and N.H./N.C./Florida is essential but how you communicate that is a challenge that must be meet for the Democrats to have success in 2018/2020.

Douthat "The Counternarrative ...Excludes too much of America"


Meanwhile, there is the issue of the courts and they are the last obstacle to holding King Donald somewhat in check.  And the key issue that Democrats must focus on is not Roe v Wade, other Social issues, or gun control, it is basic civil liberties and the separation of powers.  The courts are last barrier between President Trump and King Donald.  And how Supreme Courts nominee Judge Gorsuch answers questions about those issues should determine how Democrats vote on his nomination.

Link to Linda Greenhouse column

What Democrat Candidates Need to Do

I have been trying to figure out how the Democratic candidates almost uniformly across the entire range of office running lost their economic message.  Today David Brooks wrote a wonderful column that points the way.  I will provide the link later.

I have recognized that Democrat's did not offer an economic message to anyone other than those involved in the global economy, but their platform and basic instincts certainly pointed at realistic solutions involving training, better education and access to both education and healthcare that would help those in rural areas.  Combine that with some sensible tax reform, some rethink of regulation (not wholesale like Trump wants to do, I mean who wants coal waste in streams), and you would have an economic platform to run on.

But the really distressing part of this past election was that King Donald had a snappy saying, Make America Great Again, that conveyed an upbeat economic message that the Democrats could not counter running their negative campaign against Dangerous Donald.  While the Democratic message worked on the Coasts, it did not work in rural dominated states who were looking for a positive message.

What Brooks highlighted is something I have felt but couldn't find the words for.

America was founded and has endured through the two centuries on the unifying myth that America is a country that "embraces strangers and seizes possibilities".  "That the physical stuff in front of us is also a manifestation of something eternal".

That myth has been battered in rural America and the Democrats had no answer for them. So they gravitated to an alternative myth promised by Donald Trump that the world is a zero sum game:  if someone else wins, we lose and if they lose, we win.  It's a very Russian view that a country is "bound by its nostalgia, not its common future and the pure folk, who live in the heartland embody the pure soul of the country and are threatened by the cosmopolitan elites."

So before your read Brook's more evolved summation of this, I propose that Democratic candidates need to jump shift their rhetoric, combined with some rational policies to encourage job creation in rural areas.  I believe the GOP's policies will just encourage job creation in urban areas and thus rural voters are bound to be open to new ideas by the Democrats.  The rhetoric has to be focused on an upbeat revival of our unifying myth with a focus on including those rural people in the vision and having policies that will bring concrete evidence to them that the myth is reality.  People want to have hope.

Link to David Brooks "A Return to National Greatness"

Jennifer Rubin Nails King Donald Again

"America elected someone entirely unfit for the job. Now the world knows it, too."

Link to Rubin's column King Donald's phone calls are worse than his tweets