Court fight makes Biden even less visible

A majority of Americans disapprove of Trump. That may not be relevant.

You can't stop something with nothing. 

Trump looks like the strong guy, and Biden the invisible bystander. That is what is relevant.

The political fight over replacing Ruth Bader Ginsburg changes the focus for this campaign. It is still about COVID, jobs, health care, taxes, race, crime, and Trump's personality, but also one big new thing: the Supreme Court. That last point has one other consequence: it makes Biden 

even less visible. 

Gunsmoke. Showdown

Biden says the right things on protests, on violence, on race. He comes across as a center-left moderate guy who wants everyone to get along and to bring the country together, in part by not being Trump because Trump pours gasoline of the fires of controversy. That is a good message, but it is lost in the hurricane of breaking news. Biden is saying that violence is wrong, period. Sensible, but not particularly memorable.

Meanwhile Trump is saying to cheering crowds, repeated in tweets, shared on Facebook, amplified on Fox and talk radio, that Biden loves violence, loves arson, supports killing police, that Biden will bring mobs of people to your home. He says that Biden will willfully and wantonly destroy your suburb, that Biden means the end of American civilization, that Biden wants revolution, that his supporters should be prosecuted for sedition because they will carry out armed conflict to implement totalitarian rule by socialists who will take away your home, your money, your guns, your religion, your children, your life. Watch out!!! Biden!!!

Who remembers what Biden said?

For voters who don’t follow politics closely—which is a lot of people, and likely the marginal swing voters who will decide whether to vote and for whom to vote—the image of Biden is a near cypher, made worse by his decision to campaign from his basement. (What terrible optics. It makes him look like a cowering shut-in. Crazy.) Biden won the primary quietly, by default. After all, the other rivals dropped out and it was a choice between Biden and Bernie Sanders, the guy with bold ideas that he couldn't sell even to Democrats.

Then, for Biden, especially in comparison with Trump, radio silence.

Of course, there is the consolation that Trump is saying such inflammatory things that he is hanging himself and Biden should stay out of the way. After all, Trump is praising a 17 year old who brings an AR15 to protests and shoots people, and telling people that "herd mentality" will cure the virus. Trump is the target of family members, journalists and former top officials sharing evidence that Trump is a selfish, corrupt, utterly incompetent president. Why get in the way of Trump's immolation?

One big reason, and that is the big, meta message that Trump is out there in the arena  leading, while Biden is in Delaware, at home, in a basement, losing in a battle over the Supreme Court.

It creates an easy-to-understand choice between the Bold Leader vs Weak Wanna-be.  

Republican voters have been taught to care about the courts. The average Democrat has other issues, e.g. health care, income inequality, racial justice. Democrats should care about the courts (and reproductive rights activists do) but the court issue is asymmetrical. Republicans care more than Democrats.  

Biden, amid books, at home

AOC is out there doing her part, with faint praise for Biden but strong advocacy for stopping Trump, which means supporting Biden. This may reduce leftist bleed to the Green Party, which is good for Democrats. But in the era of Trump the focus is on Trump, always, and Trump’s schtick turned off some traditional Republicans. The court fight gives those Republican apostates tangible reason to re-identify as Republicans. Net-net, it helps Republicans.

The marginal voters who will decide this election are in the states of Pennsylvania, Nevada, Florida, and Wisconsin. Those states poll nearly dead even. There are inattentive, undecided, indecisive people in those states. They are deciding: Who is the good guy in the drama? If so, can he win in the fights he will face?

So the quick and dirty image of the two characters emerge. Trump is a knave, sure, a con man and self-promoter, a dishonest salesman, maybe more naughty than actually evil, but he is out there, fighting the DC bureaucrats and the obstructionist Democrats. He isn't trustworthy, but he is present. Meanwhile, Biden is a cypher.

In a tough world, you can't stop something with nothing. So, when casting the vote based on gut feel and impressions, go with the strong guy. Things need to be shaken up. That means you need to be out there on the street, fighting.

 

RBG death. Big win for Trump

Within hours of the announcement of the death of Ruth Bader Ginzburg, Mitch McConnell announces that the Senate will vote to replace her.

Very Cold. Also strategic.

Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was sending a clear public message to his 53 person caucus. Watch what you say.  Here is the company line. He was getting it in fast, before his members totally committed themselves by saying something contrary. We are going to have a nomination fight, yippee!

This new vacancy is good news for Trump. It may get him re-elected. All of the parties involved are already playing their roles.

First, happening now, an outpouring of praise and public grief over her death. She was a towering figure. Democrats say it; Republican say it. The White House had a lovely statement all ready and it went out within hours. It was utterly insincere, of course, but it someone wrote it and it serves its purpose.

Next Trump will announce a nominee. He will do this soon, really soon. He will probably wait until the day after whatever big national memorial service takes place. I predict it will happen the next day. He will say that critics will call it unseemly, but the vacancy must be filled. Important issues are coming to the court. A case regarding killing Obamacare is pending. More important, there will be cases to examine regarding massive voter fraud and whether to count mail- in ballots. Democrats are de-legitimizing the election, he will say, and we will need a court to assure a fair election. 

Trump's nominee will be someone who fits the political need to shore up the votes of people Trump is losing and who he needs back. Anyone he picks will be conservative, anti-abortion, and thoroughly vetted by The Federalist Society; this is a given. The ideal pick would be a woman, very publicly a practicing Christian, and Latina, ideally all three. He wants that nominee to represent the people Democrats--not Biden, maybe, but Democrats--supposedly hold in contempt. The nominee will symbolize what a great many Americans--more than just his base--like: resistance to the upsetting tide of secularism, demographic diversity, and race-consciousness that changes the role of Whites. He wants a culture war fight. 

The Trump campaign would making a "body language" statement with deeds, not words. The voters who are put off by Trump's tweets and divisiveness and pugnaciousness would not need to ratify Trump personally. They can look past all that and vote for the judges he will fight for. 

Democrats will fall into the trap. They will play their role, doing what they think is morally right and politically sound. The usual suspects are already furious. Some people will be strident. Some people will put abortion front and center. 

Somebody, somewhere, will come forward with a complaint. The Trump campaign is counting on this. It might be a sex complaint, it might be a workplace grievance. It will be something. Nobody gets into middle age without making someone unhappy. The left-oriented media will jump on this and elevate that complaint. We will see the complainant on Rachel Maddow. More important, we will see that person on Fox, presented as an example of the inconsolable, woke, PC, witch-hunting, cancel-culture left. This will create the litmus test choice that Trump needs. Joe Biden himself does not look particularly frightening, so the Trump campaign is running against Bernie Sanders, AOC, Antifa, MSNBC, and cancel-culture--and there they will be, right on cue. 

Donald Trump desperately needs this to be a choice election, not a referendum.  A nomination fight that shows a patriotic Christian being vilified by witch hunting PC Democrats is exactly what Trump needs. I predict he will get it.

It may not be enough, but if Trump wins re-election it won't be because of an October surprise vaccine. He isn't trusted regarding COVID and vaccines. It will be because of judges, and the nomination fight over them. There he is trusted.

 

Working class Biden vs. Park Avenue Trump

Joe Biden took questions at a CNN Town Hall. He looked competent. And moderate.

And appealing.

He didn't come across as an elitist or know-it-all jerk. 

     "Grow up here in Scranton. We're used to guys who look down their noses at us. If you didn't have a college degree, you must be stupid. Who the hell makes you think I have to have an Ivy League degree to be president? I really mean it. I get my back up!"

First of all, the elephant in the room: "Sleepy Joe."  Trump, Republican ads, and Fox have had a drumbeat of messaging that Biden is senile. This has the corollary message that Joe is just a puppet for the job-killing radical woke socialist Democrats who will destroy America while Biden nods off.

I was watching for confirmation. No.

Joe Biden looked just fine. He didn't seem senile, weak, or confused. He is not a fast talking glib speaker. The story of his boyhood stutter helps us interpret what we see about his speech. He occasionally has trouble getting words out, especially the very first word or two of an answer. However, once started--for better or worse--he sounds like the cliche of the Irish politician. A talker. 

People tend to see what they are told they will see. This is a mixed blessing for Biden. We are looking for frailty, and Republicans who dislike Biden will undoubtedly find confirmation, but they were never Biden voters anyway. Trump hugely oversold the Biden-senility idea. They said he was nearly brain dead, a vacant-eyed stroke victim. Against that standard, Biden looks great. He looks like a senior senator.

Had Trump prepared people to see a windbag who is disqualified for office because he will tell stories about past lessons, when circumstances demand a quick talker with bold new ideas, then he would have gotten confirmation. Trump sold the wrong product.

Joe Biden seemed politically moderate and safe. Joe Biden isn't far left. Trump ignores that Biden defeated the far left to win the nomination. On fracking in Pennsylvania, Biden says he is OK with it for now while we move toward renewables. On violent protests, Biden again said forcefully that violent behavior is wrong and people doing violence should be prosecuted, period. Biden was asked if he was trying to have everything both ways, friendly to the left but also comfortable to the middle. The question was posed as if this were wrong. Biden's answer was to do exactly as accused, saying both progressives and moderate were right, that we are in transition. Peacemaker.

It won't please inconsolable progressives, but Biden is good enough for Bernie; Biden isn't Trump. Biden is a Democrat who won't scare the political middle.

Joe Biden isn't an elitist snob.  Trump and Fox have created and nurtured a populist mood of resentment over the implied insult offered by coastal elites and Democrats against White people, Christians, working people, rural people, and Republicans generally. They think you are deplorable! They think you are stupid! They don't respect you! They think you are racist!

The most important message built into the Biden presentation last night was that he was the son of a working guy from Scranton and he has respect for people he grew up with, and modest, hard working people everywhere. He said some people in DC think you had to graduate from an Ivy League college to be taken seriously. Well, I did not graduate from an Ivy League college, Biden said, and don't feel ashamed of that. (Trump transferred into Penn and got a degree.) "My dad busted his back, lost his job," Biden said, while Trump inherited and squandered a fortune. I am  Scranton, not Park Avenue and there is nothing wrong with being who we are, Biden said.

"We are as good as anybody else."

Here is a short clip: Click Here

Biden did what he does often, tell a story. He described himself as a brand new young Senator, having endured a tragic event of the auto accident death of his wife and daughter. I got angry, he said, after overhearing a speech by a senator that seemed to me to lack any compassion, and mentioned my indignation to a veteran senator, Mike Mansfield, a man of great integrity. He told me maybe I didn't understand the full story about that senator, that the man I was angry with had seen a troubled orphan boy and took him in and adopted him, an act of generosity and compassion. You never know the full story of others, Senator Mansfield told him, so don't judge harshly. Biden said he learned that important lesson, and was grateful.

CNN

Biden softened his voice and said one should never publicly question another person's motives. Disagree with some actions, yes, but don't question motives. You never know what is truly in a man's heart. Once you question a person's motives you harden that person's heart and you can never find agreement with that person.

The story was well told, with embedded messages that draw a real contrast with Trump. Biden has empathy and respect for others, both high and low. Nobody is "deplorable." Biden communicates, too, his respect traditional authority and the wisdom embedded in institutions and past experience. Trump presents himself as the defender of Christianity, the flag, the National Anthem, but Biden does not concede that emotional ground. Biden is Catholic, he respects tradition and his elders. He has the humility to learn from them and remember the lessons for a lifetime. 

One Town Hall does not make a successful campaign, but Biden showed that can present a powerful, appealing message. He came across as a good person, to my eye, but not a weak one. He passed the fundamental test: he could be president.

Would Trump fudge the truth? Of course.

      "I trust vaccines. I trust scientists. But I don't trust Donald Trump. And at this moment, the American people can't either."

         Joe Biden

Donald Trump was furious. Me, not trustworthy???

Trump's brand is win at all costs.

Republican voters understand and appreciate Trump for who he is. 

Trump plays to win. He doesn't pretend to be fair, or a good sport, or to see and respect the other person's point of view. He is a fighter. A salesman with a product to sell who will say what he needs to say to get the sale. 

Republicans understand that when he wins, his team wins. They get the judges they think they want, the affirmation that they are OK, and the assurance snobby elitist Democrats who call them racist are losing. So what, if a player with that winner-mentality throws spitballs, or deflates a football?  This is politics and government. Everyone cheats, don't they? Obama was maybe a Kenyan, Hillary had her emails, and Hunter Biden. Since the game is crooked and distasteful, and government is the problem, then only a sap would play it straight, and Trump is no sap.

So Trump played down the virus, and said so on tape, although now he says he played it up. And he played up the hydroxychloroquine--which might have worked, even though Democrats hoped it wouldn't so more people would die and they could blame Trump. He said cool weather would take care of it. And a miracle. And that it was just the flu, then worse than the flu, then not. And he said Republican governors were doing it right and Democratic governors doing it wrong. And not to wear a mask, then to wear a mask, then not to wear a mask, then go out and protest Democratic governors who promoted masks. And say that Biden was a wimp for wearing a mask, then that he himself didn't need a mask because he was away from others and it was the audience, not him, at risk, no problem. And say that Dr. Fauci was right, then not right, now right again, but let's hear from others who contradict Fauci and who might be more right. 

This week he is saying maybe people are going to get the virus anyway, so take your chances, you'll probably be OK and the country will build "herd mentality," meaning "herd immunity."  And meanwhile, that a vaccine is in the works and will be here "warp speed" thanks to his unrelenting pressure and focus, just in time for the election, what a coincidence.

Donald Trump sounds like a salesman, desperate for a sale, willing to say or do anything. He has amped up the accusations against Biden, and now he can become "really vicious," he said, to the cheers of the crowd.

There is a lot of trust and credibility built into a vaccination. We are accustomed to putting new, strange things in our mouths, but a vaccination involves a needle and putting a disease inside oneself. Needles hurt a little, and getting a shot is a noteworthy event. We know we are doing something and taking a chance. That sense of risk is doubly powerful if we are vaccinating our child, someone putting trust in us. Not only do we need to trust, we need to trust enough to share the trust with someone who trusts us.

Trust

Americans are wary of the vaccine. Trump is clearly, openly, rushing it for political reasons. The question is whether the drug companies were influenced by profit and reputation to rush it; whether the FDA is influenced by political pressure, amid Attorney General Bill Barr saying that "deep state" opponents are actively trying to impede the president, shame on them; whether the scientists were influenced by professional pride: whether the whole system of checks, balances, care, protocol, and procedure to protect us is working, even in the face of a president who is talking warp speed and making promises.

The Kaiser Family Foundation released a poll this week.  Click: KFF poll Sixty-two percent of Americans are very worried or somewhat worried that the FDA will rush things, bowing to political pressure. Democrats and Independents poll similarly. Republican voters are the outliers. 

Trust in institutions has declined across the board, the CDC in particular. Sixteen percent fewer people trust it now compared with April. Ten percent fewer people trust Dr. Andrew Fauci. Trust in the institutions involved with vaccinations have become partisan. Eighty-six percent of Republicans trust Trump; a similar eighty-six percent of Democrats trust Dr. Fauci. Independents are going along with Democrats, trusting Dr. Fauci, not Trump, and, again, Republicans the outliers.

Trump dug a hole for himself. He is the salesman, not the scientist. He is the partisan warrior, not the president of all the people. The vaccination question makes this about trust.  Do you trust--really trust--Donald Trump to play fair.

Kamala Harris raised the point a few days ago, and luckily for her caught flack. The criticism meant that her comments got noticed and that Republican critics planted their flag. She said she was dubious about the vaccine, that maybe Trump was rushing things. Republicans asked, how dare she?

Now Biden said the same thing. Trust scientists, not Trump. 

This is perfect battlefield for Democrats. Not race. Not the culture war. Not the economy. Not even whether Trump handled the virus response correctly. The issue before Americans is do you trust with your own life, with your children's lives, that Donald Trump did not put his thumb on the scales for political purposes to rush the vaccine?

City Dude says: Rake your leaves.

     “When trees fall down after a short period of time, they become very dry — really like a matchstick. And they can explode. Also leaves. When you have dried leaves on the ground, it’s just fuel for the fires.”

         Donald Trump, in Sacramento

These fires are on federal forests. The "you," with the dried leaves, is him. 

Trump looks like the archetype city guy and absentee landlord, operating in ignorance, flying in to give advice, then leaving. Meanwhile, nothing happens.

Oregon's largest fire is called the Holiday Farm Fire. At this moment is it 165,000 acres. It is burning on the Willamette National Forest, part of the US Department of Agriculture.

Willamette National Forest

Oregon's second largest fire is called the Lionshead Fire. It is 149,000 acres, on land administered by the US Department of the Interior for the Warm Springs Indian Reservation.

Two more Oregon fires are also greater than 100,000 acres, the Riverside Fire, on the Mt. Hood National Forest and the Archie Creek Fire on the Interior Department's Bureau of Land Management. The Slater Fire, at 148,000 acres this morning, is burning on three different national forests on both sides of the Oregon-California border.

For readers not accustomed to thinking about acreage in large numbers, Central Park in New York City is 843 acres. All of Manhattan is 14,600 acres. The City of Cambridge, Mass. is 4,542 acres and all of Boston--including every neighborhood from East Boston to Roxbury, to Dorchester and out to Allston is 57,000 acres. The entire sprawling city of Chicago is 150,000 acres, the size of the second largest of the Oregon fires, except that Chicago isn't growing and the Lionshead Fire is. 

Lionshead: 5% contained

All these fires and others are on federal land, as is 53% of Oregon. I note this not as a complaint about federal ownership, Theoretically the United States would be a good steward of this property--indeed a better one than would be Weyerhaeuser or some other forest products company, or if it were privately owned and purchased by foreign investors.

But irony isn't dead. Donald Trump came to the West Coast to complain and give advice about the lousy management of land under his own management. Forest policy, like health care, is complicated.  Forests are not golf courses, country clubs, or city parks. He looks like a clueless city dude. There is work to be done, but it would not be raking dead leaves. 

The forests are, in fact, in trouble, and Trump inherited a long-standing problem. Congress passed laws protecting endangered species which, in consideration of the spotted owl, dramatically reduced allowable logging and removal of trees. Lawsuits over the adequacy of environmental impacts continue to block timber sales. The net result is that removal of trees from the forests are a fraction--perhaps ten to twenty percent--of the amount of growth that is actually taking place on the forest. Fuel has been accumulating. 

In the past income from timber harvests paid for the management of the forests, supplied an industry, and paid money to the local governments in lieu of taxes that would have been earned had the land been privately owned and taxable. Not anymore. Very reduced harvests created a feedback loop. Less income means less management for forest thinning and for controlled burns outside of fire season. 

Trump has been president for 3 3/4 years, including two with a compliant House and Senate, but his focus was elsewhere. Dealing with a complicated forest problem is a matter of governing, not message signaling. Some of the work to be done----and this will be controversial with some of my environmentalist readers--include cutting and removing more trees for sale. Southern Oregon's Rogue-Siskiyou National Forest grows something around a billion board feet of tree fiber even year. It doesn't--should not--mean that it is all harvested. Some of it is in areas that are set aside as natural areas for other purposes, e.g. stream side shade, wildlife habitat, recreation. When trees there get old they die and rot. Or they will burn up in a fires, as they have been doing forever. There is a cycle of life. Those rotten trees create habitat and, eventually, new soil. But forest fires from lightning are a natural occurrence, too. Those are ripe for burning.

Some environmentalists consider sharply reduced timber cutting a victory for the forest environment--natural is better. There is a consequence of sharply reduced timber harvest, showing up in more insect damage, clearly overcrowded forests,  more fire fuel, and therefore worse fires, especially in this era of hotter, dryer summers. This may change the politics of forests, even in this blue, environmentally conscious region. The fires are killing people quickly, the smoke slowly, and in recent summers there have seen weeks--sometimes months--of unpleasant hazardous air.

People in the Northwest look forward to a relief from the seven months of cool rain. Summer, glorious dry summer! And the beautiful outdoors! Now smoke ruins it.

Dangerously thick growth

If California, Oregon, and Washington were swing states we might see some dramatic initiatives. We aren't and we won't. Still, there is a political opportunity here, for Biden next year, perhaps, and for Trump now, if he were inclined to do it. There is a three part problem of COVID, high unemployment, and the fires and smoke. Public attention is focused and the current situation is intolerable. There is a political window for change. 

Trump could make a big show, announcing a 21st Century Civilian Conservation Corps combined with a bipartisan task force to increase timber harvests to remove diseased and overcrowded forests. It would require cooperation and deal making with Democrats, with environmentalists, with people from timber country and with urban environmentalists who know nothing about forests beyond that they are God's creation and need to be protected from the terrible logging industry. He could make it bigger than anything FDR did, and tell the public he--not FDR and not Biden--is the historic deal maker president, doing something huge and tremendous to solve a forest problem.

It won't happen. Trump's presidency is not about bi-partisan task forces to address complicated issues. Environmentalist are more valuable to Trump as people to mock and accuse. Any plan advanced by Trump would be understood by Democrats as political signaling, not serious potential legislation. They would be deeply suspicious.

So here we are: Trump flies to California and tells Democrats they are at fault for not raking leaves on his forests. Meanwhile, the forests grow, fuel accumulates, for burning later this month, or next year, or the year after.

GOP went downscale populist.

Democrats lost the White working class.  Their Party left them.

Republicans lost the White college educated. Their Party left them, too.

Like a lot of things in American politics, it goes back to the 1960's and the culture war. 

Commentary, including this blog, has examined the dismay of Democrats. In past decades Democrats did not just lose the "Solid South;" they lost the White working class in the North. Youth agitation in opposition to the Vietnam War triggered backlash from blue collar voters of the WW2 generation. It wasn't about money or share of national income. Economically, this was the best of times for America's blue collar workers. Working class Americans were angry about style and attitude. It was hardhats vs. hippies and anti-war protesters. It was the opening salvos of a culture war that is still going on.

Marketers labeled it the "Generation Gap." Jefferson Airplane sang "One generation got old; One generation got soul." The young seemed disrespectful, unpatriotic, rebellious--and it was intentional. Jefferson Airplane, again:

     "We are obscene, lawless, hideous, dangerous, dirty, violent----and young."

Those "hardhat" Democrats felt out of place in the Democratic Party. Bill Clinton was a clean cut establishment version of the unpatriotic, disrespectful youth generation, but he was one of them. Non-college construction workers and truck drivers and blue collar workers, especially the men, didn't like the company Democrats kept inside the party--Blacks, women, gays, the unchurched all calling for social change--and somehow accusing those White men for being part of the problem. Democratic officeholders didn't call them out for condemnation, not well enough. Oh, there was a Sister Soulja moment here and there, but day in and day out, Democratic leaders seemed actually to agree with the aspirations of those groups. The White working class wanted out.

Meanwhile, Republicans.

"Hardhat" counterdemonstration

Nixon succeeded politically by choosing the side of the "Silent Majority" in that fight, but the real spokesman for culture war was George Wallace. His political heir was Republican Pat Buchanan, who lost to George HW Bush, but whose cause of old fashioned patriotic and cultural indignation festered. John McCain used Joe the Plumber as the symbol of the resentment, but it was Sarah Palin who exemplified working class populism fully. She did not know much, but she was proudly who she was, and she knew that she disliked experts and liberal, latte-sipping snobs. That led to Donald Trump.

Once again, some voters are uncomfortable with the company they are keeping--this time Republicans. College classmate Jeffrey Lauranti drew my attention to the political cost of the GOP becoming a populist party. The people up for grabs in 2020 aren't really those "suburban housewives" afraid that Cory Booker might move into their neighborhoods. It is the nonvoters among the White working class. They are Trump's people, which means those college educated suburbanites are not.

After college, Jeff Laurenti studied international relations and public policy at Princeton and then had a long career doing foreign policy analysis and advocacy. He was a Senior Fellow at The Century Foundation.

Guest Post by Jeffrey Laurenti

"There are surely a number of factors whose confluence has produced the suddenly yawning gap after 2012 in voting preferences between white college graduates and non-graduates. Looking at the Pew data, the decisive lurch toward Republicans among white voters without a college degree occurred in 2000, at the end of the Clinton administration -- certainly not a time of great economic distress. Indeed, in Democratic circles there was much self-congratulation about having successfully turned the tables on the old Republican issue of fiscal deficits, since Clinton was running federal budget surpluses.

College educated White voters are Democrats now

One might conclude that this large chunk of the electorate, however, was unimpressed by "New Democrat" economics: Democrats have made little headway among whites without a college degree in any of the 21st century presidential elections, losing this demographic by some 20 to 25 percentage points each time around after holding a narrow lead in the 1990s. Or maybe it had nothing to do with economics at all.

Perhaps this headlong rush of the non-college educated into the open arms of the Republican Party perversely may itself have contributed to the astonishing spike in Democratic voting preferences among the college-educated since 2015. I have long thought that John McCain's 2008 selection of Sarah Palin as his choice for vice-president, plus his elevation of "Joe the Plumber" in October of that year as the totem of his target voter, would prove the watershed moment in the re-branding of the Republican Party. Till then it had been the party of successful people, of people the upwardly aspiring college-educated middle classes could admire and want to emulate--people like George Bush, John McCain, and even Richard Cheney.

Joe the Plumber and Sarah the Veep were not cut from this cloth. Their face of the Republican Party became more visible in the 2010 "Tea Party" insurgency, and while old-school Mitt Romney contained them in 2012, they were still stewing in their own bile waiting for their moment. The GOP's post-Romney "autopsy" identified an urgent need to reach out to the new demographics if the Party was not to be consigned nationally to the dustbin of history the way it had been in California and the Northeast; the Party's low-education base would have none of it, and found its champion in Donald Trump.

While Trump has largely placated the plutocratic imperatives of the Party's donor class, there is no doubt that he has embraced the Party's lower-education voters as its core. You have to wonder whether the gun-carrying, MAGA-cap wearing brawlers whom the public sees flocking to Trump rallies have become the know-nothing face of today's Republican Party -- and whether they are not themselves a big part of what is propelling the college-educated middle classes to the Democrats."

Medford air quality

 You can see the air. You can smell it. You have no choice but to breathe it.

There are at least two websites to measure what we are experiencing. 

This website uses data from the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality--DEQ: https://www.airnow.gov/?city=Central%20Point&state=OR&country=USA   

Another website uses data from the US Environmental Protection Agency--EPA: https://www.purpleair.com/map?opt=1/mAQI/a10/cC0#11/42.4489/-122.917

The DEQ website shows Medford's air to be "Hazardous" at 317. A user can compare us with other places around the state by punching in zip codes.

The EPA website shows a higher number, 468. This is measured from a residential street above the Medford city center, which has approximately the same hazard level, in the 460 range. Another sensor, at elevation 2,000 feet, has a lower reading at this moment 160--merely "unhealthy," although all morning that monitoring station showed a 460. Maybe it got a whiff of better air for a moment. 

Local readers do not need an explanation about what air quality this bad feels like. Go outside a moment. Out of town readers can liken it to being immediately downwind of a campfire. Ones eyes sting, it hurts to breathe, and one's instinct is to turn away immediately, except that here there is no place to turn.

Scroll down to see today's political comment on Trump, Biden, and the politics of outrage.