Does any American actually care about Afghanistan?

Dispatch from Europe:  Americans should wise up and take note.  The United States is not the good guy.

There is another way to look at things .

Americans assume we are the good guy, the world's honorable policeman taking care of the poor, badly governed, embattled people of the world.    We think our bombs and drone strikes are done for good reasons and that they create peace and stability, while the bombs of others are outrageous acts of cruelty and terror.

We know we are exceptional.  We are good.  We assume we are looked upon by the world with favor, the bright shining light of freedom and justice, a city on the hill, admired.  The few people who dislike us (ISIS, Muslim radicals, Latin American yankee-go-home communists) only prove their own vileness by opposing so obvious a benefactor as we are.  Our motives are pure.  We don't seek cheap oil or rare minerals or cheap tropical crops, not really.  Those might be the accidental side benefits of free markets and American business acumen, but our goal is democracy and world peace.

We understand that the American military to be a rescuer.  We bring candy bars and cigarettes to the starving people we liberate. They toss flowers at our feet.  Young women throw themselves on our troops, in gratitude and secret hope to come to the promised land of America.

The US is King Kong

Barrack Obama understood it was not that simple.   

Trump understood Americans believe the story and want to hear it again and again.  Trump had the more appealing message.

A college classmate, Carlo Christofori, is an Italian national.  He worked with a group set up by the European Parliament, the International Committee for Solidarity with the Afghan Resistance to the Soviet invasion in 1979.  His orientation is to support Afghan self determination.  That positioned him against the Russians back then--and against the US now.    

He likens the US to an uncontrolled King Kong, riding atop a skyscraper.  He warns that the US is causing a great international re-alignment that is destructive to the US but necessary for the world.   The world's great powers are teaming up against the US.  It is happening right now, right under our noses, as Americans look elsewhere, concerned with tweets about low-IQ Mika and low-ratings Joe.

He observes that Europe, Russia, and China understand the threat of a US that carelessly attempts to intervene around the world.  The threat is not new.  After 9-11 the USA became pro-active, looking for trouble spots, making trouble, carelessly disturbing the status quo in the Middle East and world wide.  

USA pushes China and Russia together

Christofori likens American thinking to the attitude of his daughter in young childhood.  She was afraid of tiny spiders.  He told her not to worry.  They are no real danger to her; she is the danger to them.

The election of Donald Trump accelerated the resistance and diplomatic tilt toward a team built around containment of the USA.

Christofori observes that America has become the dangerous adventurer of the world, the country with the means to do great harm and the motives and attitude that enables it: we like having a me-first international bully as president and we think we are the good guys. Cristofori says we are not.  

Americans like the idea of an America with swagger.  It scares others.

Does it matter what others think?  Should we care?  Yes.  

Great alliances with extraordinary consequences grow over decades, not months.  America First-ism combined with American tough talk has consequences later, and now.  China, Russia, and Europe are stable, mature governments.  North Korea is not.   The USA can be wild and unpredictable with the big three confident that they will not over-react.   We know that.   We wonder why China does not intervene more strongly with North Korea.  The answer may be that China and Russia are secretly quite pleased that North Korea is a wild card.  North Korea's unpredictability forces the USA to act carefully.  If 25 million people in Seoul, South Korea, or better yet 25 million people on America's west coast are at risk.  Maybe King Kong will be forced to act with care.

Carlo Christofori Guest Post:  

A European view of America's longest war, Afghanistan 

Afghanistan, 2017

Christofori

After 16 years, the Afghanistan war is still going on. Civilians are still being killed by American bombs, earning the United States more hatred. Civilians are still being swept up in dragnets by murderous US-installed warlords and thugs, and routinely tortured in the vilest ways, all with the connivance of the Americans, and on the dollars of the Americans.
Take a look at the documentary "Taxi to the dark side" and the French 1966 film "The battle of Algiers" to understand what is actually going on. Everyone who's swept up in dragnets is tortured. That's the technique for breaking insurgencies. This means that probably several hundred ​
thousand victims have been tortured in the wars that were started by the US after 9/11, and continue to be tortured on US tax dollars. Talk about Abu Ghraib being "a few bad apples".


In Afghanistan, all elections since the US conquest have been massively rigged. Packs of voting cards are bought and sold by the hundreds. I remember reading at the time that there were 18 million voting cards being traded, in a country with 12 million voters. This has been exhaustively documented, but only for the September, 2009, presidential "election". The Pentagon got wise after that media flop. They no longer let journalists run around election polls, not even in Kabul.

That's right, the Pentagon has been managing not only the war itself, but the news about it as well. The public has been quietly manipulated and bamboozled by secret Pentagon media services who feed news to the media. We all know that the Vietnam war was lost in the hearts and minds of the American public. That's the lesson the Pentagon has drawn.
The way out of Afghanistan is relatively easy. Most commentators admit that the war is going like shit, but opine that it's better than letting the Kabul regime go to hell, and have the Taliban back in power.

Creating chaos, not peace

 
In fact, the Kabul regime is rotten to the core, and would better be jettisoned as soon as possible. It was created with the warlords that helped destroy the Taliban in 2001. They are all bloody profiteers who should be mostly put on trial for war crimes.
The regime, as I mentioned, is based on the 2001 warlords, plus a ridiculous US puppet as president, US-Afghan citizen Ashraf Ghani, whose power derives from having the gift of large American resources. He's just a puppet and has no Afghan political base. The country is run by the Americans through the warlords, who in 2001 took over the security services, army, police, everything.

There is a major ethnic side to the war, in that the country's largest ethnic group, the Pashtuns, have been oppressed since 2001, when some ethnic minorities (the "warlords") took over with US support. The Pashtuns are not going to tolerate being under the thumb of the Tajiks. And the Taliban have become the only vehicle that is available to the Pashtuns to protest and fight against this oppression. Resisting the oppression that the Pashtun tribes have been placed under is a matter of honor for them. They'd rather drop dead than submit.
It's sufficient to take a look at a map of the insurgency to see that it is practically the same as an ethnic map of Pashtun areas.

As long as the US is willing to get rid of the warlords (which should not be difficult, as they have grown fat with 16 years of gorging) the Pashtuns should be given the option of returning to the country's traditional system, i.e. a tribal monarchy, under someone from the former royal family, who should be presented for approval to the representatives of the people convened in a Loya Jirga or national assembly.

At the same time, the US should withdraw most of its troops, and Nato should withdraw all of them.

Real power should be placed in the hands of the head of state selected by the Jirga. The model for the operation should be the successful agreement negotiated by the Brits to install Abdur Rahman Khan as Amir of Afghanistan, in 1880. 

Carlo Cristofori

CARLO CRISTOFORI was Secretary of the International Committee for Solidarity with the Afghan Resistance, set up by members of the European Parliament following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. In that capacity, he worked closely with a number of Afghan resistance organizations, becoming personally familiar with many Afghan political figures. He has analyzed Afghan politics for thirty years.

A Fourth of July Comment: Minority Rule

"Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed."

The Declaration of Independence spoke to the rights of the majority of people to create new government that pleases them. The Constitution worked to create stability and guarantee the rights and power of individuals and minorities against those majorities.

Minorities can rule. And right now Trump's minority rules.

Today, July 4, we celebrate an act of rebellion in the name of democracy. But we are not governed under the Declaration of Independence. We are governed under the Constitution, which was written in large part to thwart democracy, thereby protecting us from the tyranny of the majority.

Trump has a governing plurality. Not a majority, but a plurality with governing power. Two days ago I wrote that Trump had the scornful opposition of 60% of the people but he had a solid "governing plurality" of 40%. Let me explain that.

Under the Constitution minorities have rights. The Constitution-writers distrusted democracy. Therefore, they created undemocratic chambers of power.

In the Senate all have 2 Senators. The rule protected frightened Delaware from the power of Virginia. It was a check on popular majorities dominating the small states.

Click Here

The House is undemocratic, somewhat by accident. Democrats cluster in cities. It means that Congressional Districts tend to pack Democrats into Districts they win with huge majorities, thus wasting votes. Republicans win more districts, with narrower majorities because their voters are spread more effeciently. A college classmate, political scientist Peter Lemieux, just calculated that Democrats would need to win a little over 53% of the congressional vote in order to win back a majority of the House of Representatives.

Presidency. The electoral college intentionally weights states unevenly and Trump won election notwithstanding Hillary Clinton winning 3 million more votes. Senate, House, Presidency: all undemocratic--on purpose.

The current informal but very robust system of political parties--factions, as described by James Madison in Federalist Number Ten--further serve to empower minorities and leverage their power, which is part of why they exist. Americans have settled into partisan camps. Republicans vote for Republicans, even while what the party stands for might shift dramatically. People are brand loyal, not policy loyal. A great many Americans don't vote and a great many who do are only lightly engaged. Voting for the party is a quick and easy way to synthesize how you feel. Brands are a mental shortcut, and Americans increasingly are taking it.  

Trump won some 90% of the Republican vote in November and he has consolidated that support. The 40% of the public who support Donald Trump are mostly Republicans. That is why he has a "governing plurality."

Keep "the base" happy.

He is hanging on to it.  His supporters and detractors both observe that he feeds "red meat to his base."  Trump's nomination of Neal Gorsuch, his rollback of financial and environmental regulations, his Muslim-country travel bans, his efforts to end Obamacare, his attacks on the media, and his provocative tweets all have all had a single message: I am keeping my promises to you to govern as a fearless populist conservative, as a red meat Republican, against the admonitions of the media and the politically correct expert class to be more centrist.

Trump, with his 40% and his overwhelming visibility, maintains dominance of the GOP base and brand. Ambitious Republicans who are skeptical or opposed to Trump (Kaisich, McCain, Graham, Sasse, Cruz, Rubio and many more) are careful not to cross him. Trump showed he has the power to destroy Republicans. Trump has the support of the conservative media channels that are essential to Republicans. By controlling Republicans he controls the government. Republicans have majorities, given the undemocratic makeup of those chambers.

The weak spot for Trump would be if Democrats unify as a party and create an alternative force, one that would repair the Sanders/Hillary split and then pick up the middle consisting of people offended by Trump. There is a potential majority there--anti Trumpers united--but it is a risk for Trump, not a reality. Democrats are mired in division and their only area of consensus is to "resist", a weak position. It keeps Trump on offense, it allows Trump to set the agenda, and it reaffirms the notion that everything important revolves around Trump. Democrats are nowhere near an alternative majority.

The other would be if Republicans fracture. This is the greater danger, which is why Trump is leaving no room for a Republican to challenge him. Trump is not "moving to the center" nor "becoming more presidential" nor conceding one inch that the media, or the CBO, or panels of experts are anything but discredited fakes. Skeptical Republicans with ambitions of their own are sitting back, taking tiny potshots, but not challenging Trump on anything except minor points of style. Even their criticisms of Trump's tweets go nowhere among the base. The Trump 40% love Trump's tweets just as they are because he insults people the base enjoys seeing insulted: Hollywood, MSNBC, CNN, Democrats. Trump is governing as a Republican. He is keeping that base happy.

Donald Trump is the center of attention and he leverages this to maintain a governing plurality: a solid 40% that controls a majority, which then controls a majority of the government.

Some readers will find the above commentary insufficiently upbeat and honorific for the Fourth of July. So I solicited some inspiring words by a blog reader, author and political observer Peter Rice, to serve that purpose. He is an acknowledged liberal and his most recent book is an advice book on how liberals should talk to conservatives. (Spoiler: "stop being obnoxious.") As long as Democrats and progressives generally are stuck doing "the resistance" at least they ought to do it in a way that seizes a unifying symbol, the flag.

A patriotic Fourth of July Guest Comment, by Peter Rice

"The Resistance needs a symbol. Use the flag."

It may seem like the Trump Administration has been dragging on since the beginning of time, but in fact it is still quite young, as are the organized efforts to oppose its many hard and sadistic edges.

Rice

This resistance (or whatever you wish to call it) is so young that it still operates without a uniting symbol, an easily overlooked yet very important part of any group effort for the greater good. Done right, symbols sum up the mood, and serve as a focal point around which people rally and focus attention.  

The color orange did this during the revolution in Ukraine. In 2008, it was the Obama “hope” poster. And last year, so many people rallied around a red hat that today, millions wonder if they’ll be able to afford a doctor next year. These symbol things can be powerful in an under-the-radar sort of way.

Clearly, those in the business or resisting the president’s various and sundry attacks on American values are going to need a symbol of their own. Pussy hats and clenched fists don’t quite seem unifying enough, so allow me to suggest something else: The American flag.

Alas, my fellow liberals often take a turn for the neurotic when this subject comes up. As Peter Sage pointed out over the weekend, the flag has been co-opted by some rather unsavory sorts (Republicans, mostly), and used as a focal point of needless war, militarism, and blind obedience. It’s a complicated history, but the upshot is that a good chunk of America isn’t comfortable with that uniquely American symbol.

We should get over it, if only because resisting under the flag carries some very practical benefits. Firstly, it isn’t going anywhere. You’re going to see it all the time on every street, at every school, and at every ballgame, and it would be a real shame if you identified it only with conservative causes for the rest of your life. (Think of the subtle mental health boost you would enjoy by retraining your pavlovian mind.) Secondly, nothing will bother conservatives more than to have to share the symbol with us, not least because they will be hard pressed to argue against it.

But the best reason to use the flag is that it is the perfect summation of imperfect, and yet more perfect, America. Yes, Native Americans were massacred and Japanese Americans were interned under that flag. But concentration camps were also liberated under it. Schools were forcibly integrated by people who wore it on their shoulders. We even marked one our greatest triumphs by putting a flag on the moon.

That’s us, all right - our American reality and fate. Like every flawed human being who lives in this great land, we as a people have done great harm to ourselves and to others. And for our penance, we must keep trying to make this land more free, more prosperous, more peaceful, and more united. We must dwell on our mistakes just long enough to heal and learn from them, and we must not harp on our victories so long that we lose sight of the problems yet to be solved. We are a work in progress, and if we do this right, we always will be.

The Japanese flag is the sun, the Canadians have a leaf, and the Mexicans have a classical coat of arms. We have a visual representation of e pluribus unum. The stripes are the story of where we came from, a hopeful enlightenment era kind of place that nonetheless had an obviously small-minded definition of the word “we.” And we don’t pretend otherwise: There is no stripe for the Sioux or the Cherokee.

The stars are the omega to the stripe’s alpha: A brilliant shining collection that has changed quite a bit over the years, and few would be surprised if another star or two joined the club in the coming decades.

So our flag is more than a symbol: It is a refreshingly honest dashboard of human freedom. It is a catalog of our complicated and contradictory history. It knows us. It is us. And as we think of clever ways to get out of this present mess, it would be a true shame to leave this old friend behind. Those stars represent us all today, and they can yet shine brighter.

---

Peter Rice is the author of Liberal for Conservative Reasons: How to stop being obnoxious and start winning elections, which is available on Amazon. Contact him through peterbrice.com.

You have one chance to make a first impression

People are not all that interested in you,  and with luck they will remember one or two things.  Decide what that is.

I take a close look at a candidate announcement.   It was a failure.     

Jamie McLeod-Skinner announced her intention to run for Congress in Oregon's 2nd Congressional District.  The local newspaper ran a Page One story.

Headline in the Mail Tribune:   

The headline included her name and photo.  So far so good.   It could have simply read:  "Greg Walden gets additional opponent," which would have been bad. That headline would have framed her as just another nuisance for Greg Walden.   

Jamie McLeod-Skinner

Candidates do not write their own newspaper articles.  They are written by reporters, with copy reviewed by editors who write a headline.  Below are the first three paragraphs of their article:

Former Phoenix city manager Jamie McLeod-Skinner, a former Santa Clara, California, city councilor whose work ranged from refugee relief to planning for metropolitan governments, will seek the Democratic Party nomination for the 2nd District congressional seat held by Greg Walden, R-Hood River.

McLeod-Skinner has already informed Democratic Party organizations in the district of her intent to run in 2018. A formal announcement with details on her campaign organization will be made next week over the internet, she said.

Walden has not been responsive to local issues and is more focused on Washington, D.C. politics, the candidate said. McLeod-Skinner joins a growing field of candidates who may view Walden as vulnerable due to his involvement in Republican efforts to craft a health care plan to replace the Affordable Care Act.

The candidate got good treatment, given what she gave them.  The lead sentence and paragraph is who she is, defined by her work history, and what she wants, to be elected to congress.  The second sentence explains her plans.   The third sentence offers her campaign rationale: "Walden has not been responsive to local issues and is more focused on Washington, D.C. politics, the candidate said."

The article later gives a sole example of Walden's failure as a representative, quoting her directly: “He has not been supportive of local solutions. Things like the Klamath Basin restoration agreement. That’s a good example of a wide spectrum of interests ... coming to a political solution,” said McLeod-Skinner. “He didn’t support it, and it died in Congress. He would not carry it out.”

There we have it:  her first impression.  I think it is weak and self destructive.

The premise of this blog is that most people are not paying close attention, that most people are not all that interested in most candidates.  For convenience and economy of mental effort people pigeon-hole candidates into a mental brand, some pre-set category they have already created in their minds   It is unfair.  It is demeaning to candidates in how it over-simplifies the rich complexity of a human being.  It jumps to a conclusion.  It stereotypes.

This is, however, how the world works.   A candidate plays by those rules so he or she better understand those rules.     

(I understand that this blog, too, plays by rules.   I try to have an interesting headline, otherwise people delete the blog without reading it.  I recognize that the photo of McLeod-Skinner above means fewer readers than if it showed Melania Trump naked.  I willingly pay that price.)

My impression of Jamie McLeod-Skinner:  "She's probably an Ashland liberal who wants kumbaya cooperation, and she is no threat to Walden."  

What could McLeod-Skinner have done to have improved this?   Some of this is totally unfair and unreasonable, but McLeod-Skinner is not entitled to be in Congress, she is in a competition for it.  She must work with voters as they are, not as the diligent, fair-minded people we all might wish they are.

Catherine Zeta Jones

   1.  Bad name.  I don't have mental shelf space to keep track of all the candidates' names in this race, especially people who want me to remember two names for one person.  Cher and Madonna get by with one name.  Movie stars are a brand and they have easy names to remember.  (I admit that Catherine Zeta Jones tries using three names, but she works very hard to pull it off and "Cathy Jones" is very vanilla.) I know of no actors with hyphenated names, nor any successful politicians. McLeod-Skinner leaves me wondering whether to alphabetize her under McLeod or Skinner.  Her name is confusing and tiresome.  

Recommendation:  Pick one name, probably Jamie McLeod. 

  2.  Break the cliche.  McLeod-Skinner is female, from Ashland, was a government planner, worked helping refugees, was manager of a small city, and from her photograph appears to have a healthy, natural look.   I am totally prepared, based on her name, her photograph, and her biography to jump to a conclusion and pigeon-hole her as another good hearted Ashland liberal whose orientation is all about getting disparate groups together to cooperate about water, fish, and forests someplace far away, in a collaboration whose details I cannot keep straight.  She is easy to picture as a good candidate for a staff job at the Forest Service, or working for a public radio station.  McLeod-Skinner fits right into my mental stereotype of someone who wants empathetic sharing at evening meetings in conference rooms to create a compromise report that actual decision makers ignore.   Very "Ashland."  I recognize this is totally unfair--which is my point.

Recommendation: surprise me with something in the first impression so I can envision her in the pigeon hole of a 2nd Congressional District decision maker and policy warrior.  

  3. Be memorable as an alternative to the incumbent's weakness.   As this blog has reported, Greg Walden's great vulnerability is that he told voters he wanted inexpensive health care with wider access, yet the bill that came out of his committee reduces health care access to tens of thousands of his constituents.  He is looks and acts embarrassed as he tries to sell an implausible story that spending billions less money actually means more health care.  It speaks well for his ethics that he is uncomfortable with having badly misled his constituents, which he is dealing with by hiding out looking terribly busy with rodeos and dam visits and other local matters, while ignoring the giant sick elephant in the room, the Trumpcare elephant he helped create.   

Voters are barely getting to understand Trumpcare, but they already hate it, but not one voter in a thousand can summarize accurately the Klamath Basin restoration project--and many of the ones who are able actually to summarize it oppose it, which is why it went nowhere.    McLeod-Skinner's case against Walden is 180 degrees misdirected.  She has led off with something few people understand (Klamath restoration) instead of something many people care about (broken promise of health access.)  Worse, she is criticizing him for not doing enough hiding out with small-ball local distractions, when in fact his real vulnerability is Trumpcare, the elephant in the room.

Recommendation:  Criticize Walden for what he did wrong that is unpopular, not for his greatest political virtue, his visible constituent service in the District.

  4.  Lead with something simple and clear and true.  It is objectively true that Trumpcare was written in large part in his committee.  It is objectively true that Trumpcare is complicated and unpopular, being criticized by Republicans and Democrats both.  It is objectively true that tens of thousands of Oregonians will lose health insurance and Medicaid access, as attested to by the CBO.  It is objectively true that Walden assured people constantly that he would protect people with pre-existing conditions and continue healthcare access to the working poor, and there are lots of Republicans officeholders who are loudly saying Trumpcare does neither.
  
Therefore, a candidate has the opportunity to lead with a simple, clear, true reason to replace Walden: that he wrote and voted for a bill that hurts Oregonians after having promised to do the opposite.

Recommendation:  be memorable as the candidate who calls Walden on his vulnerable spot, his authorship and support of Trumpcare.

What might be a memorable first impression?  This message: s "Jamie McLeod announced her candidacy denouncing Walden for writing Trumpcare, an expensive sellout to the insurance industry that breaks his promise to Oregonians."   

That is about as much as a voter can remember: name, link Walden to unpopular Trumpcare, unpopular health insurance companies, and broken promises by politicians.  Of course there are other issues, ones the candidate can discuss one-on-one with people at fundraising receptions.   But 98% of the people will cast their vote based on a couple of simple impressions of who the candidate is and what they represent.  "Jamie McLeod, a Democrat, denouncing Walden for writing Trumpcare, an expensive sellout to the insurance industry, just like a typical congressman" is about what most people will know.

Bad-Trumpcare, greedy-insurance-companies, and congressmen-who-lie are all ideas that are well embedded in the public mind.  A candidate does not need to teach that.  It is already taught and understood.  Go with that flow.  The key for a candidate is to link their own name to the combination of those bad things.  Repeat.  Repeat again.

Trump is Winning

Notice to Progressives in a media bubble:  Trump is Winning

Readers who mostly consume mainstream media assume Trump is on the ropes.  

He isn't.

There is a view of the country that is consistent with the observed facts, is plausible on its face, and is politically palatable for a slight majority of the public.  It is that Trump is in big trouble because:

   

He is extraordinarily unpopular, having offended nearly everyone with bad policies and petty tweets.

Trump is failing legislatively, and even with GOP majorities in the House and Senate he is unable to pass healthcare repeal and replacement.

Trump is too disorganized to appoint people actually to run the agencies he wants to change, leaving key vacancies six months into his term.

What is important is that this does not matter

Trump has lost credibility with foreign governments, with the GOP legislators, with the majority of the voters.

These things are true.  But what is important is that they are irrelevant.  Trump is winning anyway despite all this, which shows how successful he really is.

Donald Trump leads a governing plurality, a block of voters who are enthusiastic supporters.  Meanwhile, he has disorganized opposition with no real alternative vision for the country.  The GOP is fractured; the Democrats are divided and leaderless both.

Trump has defined the terms of the public discourse:  Trump versus resistance.  Notice that frame and reflect on its implication: Trump is on offense, everywhere.   It is all about Trump.

Democrats are resisting but are not shaping an alternative comprehensive view of the world.       Democrats are winning skirmishes on the edges and thinking those are victories, but they are actually just consolation prizes at the margins as they retreat in a political world defined and dominated by Trump.   

The opposition to Trump is abuzz with supposed Trump flaws.  They aren't flaws.  They are just more iterations of Trump being in the center of things.  Aren't you shocked about what he said about Mika?  Did you see how John McCain scoffed at Trump? Did you hear what Comey said about Trump?   These are just diversions, with Trump in the middle.

From Trump-friendly Washington Examiner

Trump is winning the big war, the war for the minds of a governing plurality.   [A mere plurality can and frequently does has the power to govern.  Trump dominates the communication systems of the Republican party, via his tweets, the Fox/talk radio media, and his domination of the news.  Republicans are afraid of him, as they should be since his condemnation of them might add them to the pile of Republican casualties.  Trump's plurality within the Republican caucus gives him control of Republican thinking.  Trump's 40% gives him control of Republicans.   Republicans control the seats of power, even though those victories, too, represent minority power.  More people vote for Democratic senators than Republican ones, what with California and Idaho having the same number of Senators; same with Congress, thanks to Democrats being concentrated in cities and having wasted votes; same with the electoral college.   This is the way the power leverages up.   If all the Trump skeptics got together in opposition, or especially with a coherent alternative position, then Trump's minority would not govern.   But as it is, Trump controls, or at least intimidates, Republicans, so the 40% (Trump-lovers) controls the majorities in government.] Failure to pass a healthcare bill will be a victory for Trump, because now that he has become somewhat informed about the ACA he doesn't dislike it all that much, and neither do most GOP lawmakers.   They hated that it was Obama's, not that it was all that terrible versus the prior status quo or any realistic alternative.   

This may well sort out as a repeal of "Obamacare", to be replaced with the ACA (the formal name for Obamacare.)  It will just be a re-branding.   Or, maybe they won't repeal Obamacare, and instead will exacerbate its problems, and then campaign against it just like they did in years' past, very successfully.  

Whatever happens, Trump will call it good, very good, and sell it with enthusiasm.

Meanwhile, Trump has gone around the media with his own direct-to-voter media outlet, his twitter account, plus Fox News, the trusted news source for his Republican majority.  His voters believe him--and Fox--not the mainstream media.  The polls that show Trump with an approval rating of 40% also show the general media with an approval rate of 36%.   

Trump is winning.  Trump is on track to remake the Supreme Court, on track sharply to reduce legal and illegal immigration, on track to deport Dreamers, on track to cut taxes and increase the deficit, on track to redirect the energy policy back toward fossil fuels, on track to continue dismantling Obama era regulations of the financial industry and the environment.

Democrats can console themselves, and think they won a big victory, because gays will be able to stay married, which, as it turns out, not very many people object to now that they have gotten used to it. 

Whistleblower attorney Thad Guyer observes that the situation is even more dire for Democrats and progressives than I report:

Thad Guyer Guest Post:  “Trump’s Staggering Momentum vs. the Resistance”

Thad Guyer

Rachel Maddow reminded us Friday night that Trump’s offensive tweets against the MSNBC on-air lovers “Crazy Joe” and “Dumb as a rock Mika” are intentional and strategic, calculated to do exactly what they do:  Dominate a news cycle, undermine media credibility, and feed his base.  With the firing of three CNN journalists for “fake news” about a retracted story on “Russian ties” (WaPo https://goo.gl/dxH5KJ), and now the Associated Press under fire for retracted false reporting of a secret cabinet meeting with Dow Chemical that never happened (NYT https://goo.gl/stmbM4), the liberal media is being brought low. But this was just icing on the Trump cake last week.

First, the Supreme Court reinstated Trump’s Muslim travel ban.  Despite disingenuous pronouncements by the left that “its not all that big of a win”, the aftermath of the State Department’s issuance of rules shows Trump holds all the cards on how that ban is implemented.  Sober legal voices are urging Democrats to wise-up because action is required, not fantasy. See, “Lawyers alone can’t save us from Trump. The Supreme Court just proved it”, WaPo, June 27, 2017 (https://goo.gl/MgfVBi).

Second, 24 democrats voted with Paul Ryan and against Nancy Pelosi to adopt Trump’s immigration crackdown on “criminal aliens”.  These weren’t just Bible belt Democrats, but included “statistically notable” Democrats from California, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York etc. “Statistically notable votes” means those that are “most surprising, or least predictable, given how other members of each voter’s party voted” See, GovTrack, H.R. 3004: Kate’s Law (https://goo.gl/juBgQY).

  

Third, ten Republican-led states just threatened to bring a lawsuit against the Trump administration for continuing Obama’s executive order protecting 788,000 "Dreamers". See, “Texas AG leads push to end DACA”, Politico, June 29, 2017 (https://goo.gl/6kPuFL).  This is undoubtedly intended to position Trump to use the Dreamers as legislative bargaining chips sometime this year.  It allows him to simply instruct the Justice Department not to defend the lawsuit, rather than the brutal revoking of Obama’s order himself, as he did with transgender rights in public schools.

And forth, perhaps the most politically potent of all, Democrats are getting maneuvered into a no-win trap of obstructing the bipartisan Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity (with four Democratic members) charged with reassuring Americans of the integrity of our national elections.  While Democrats are spinning it as best they can, the inevitable optics will be refusal to cooperate in turning over publicly available data regularly used by political campaigns of both parties.   See, “Pence-Kobach voting commission alarms states with info request”, CNN, July 1, 2017 (https://goo.gl/xg6bfy).  With the notable exception of a Mississippi Republican with his own agenda in keeping prying eyes out of that state’s notoriously corrupt voting processes, the “hiding of voter data” will be pinned on the Democratic “resistance”. See, “Dem state officials refusing to cooperate with Trump voter fraud probe”, FoxNews, June 30, 2017 (https://goo.gl/1BbSeg).  This resistance, combined with Trump having weakened the liberal media, serves his unsubstantiated assertions of widespread voter fraud. 

So, what’s Trump’s next momentous step?  Off to Europe amid these headline: “Trump effect? Europe's defense spending to rise faster in 2017”, Reuters, June 28, 2017 (https://goo.gl/w4otuq); and “Trump's surprise Paris visit marks shrewd political calculation”, CNN, June 29, 2017 (https://goo.gl/S959eq).

As the 2018 midterms rapidly approach, one thing should be clear to us:  Our rhetorical and diffuse “resistance” is a poor match for this kind of Trump and Republican momentum.

Patriotism and Democrats

Do Democrats get to wave the flag?

The Fourth of July is a patriotic holiday.   Republicans call it theirs.  Democrats should claw it back.

The bi-partisan consensus after World War 2 was that international agreements, especially the UN, UNICEF, the World Health Organization, plus the various multilateral treaty alliances (NATO, SEATO) were all good for America.   The theory was that if we cooperated then we wouldn't have to fight another big war.  

Yes, they were good for the world, but they were unabashedly good for America, too.

Democrat John F. Kennedy said we would bear any burden and pay any price, but post WW2 a partisan division was starting to form, complicated by the fact that there were leaders in both parties on both sides of the divide.  Republicans were taking the position of being more anti-communist than were Democrats.  Joe McCarthy was a Republican but his vigorous anti-communism was essentially bi-partisan, because it focused on presumed leftists and communist spies and sympathizers in the Eisenhower State Department.

Notice what is missing at anti-war rally.   (No American flags)

By 1960 Richard Nixon, then a California Republican Senator, helped identify party with anti-communism.  He won election calling his opponent "soft" on communism.  By the late 1960s the battle lines had begun to form up--but again with crossovers.  Democrats were pursuing the war in Vietnam but the most vigorous dissent to the war was from Democrats.  Republicans were congealing as the pro-war party--but again with exceptions.  Senator Mark Hatfield of Oregon was a Republican and an anti-war dove.  

By the election of 1972 the two political parties had largely jelled into two camps.  Nixon and Republicans were the do-more militarily anti-communist party and George McGovern and Democrats were "do-enough-but give peace a chance" party.  

Republicans began defining patriotism and the military as Republican symbols.  Democrats made a fateful move: they let them do it.

By 1967 and 1968 displays of the flag were associated with being in favor of the war in Vietnam.  I displayed a flag in my dorm room at Harvard.  It drew attention.  People wondered if I were actually a very rare pro-war hawk college student.  I said no, quite the opposite.  So why the flag?  I said that resistance to the war was the patriotic position and that people who pursued a pointless, self destructive war that drove the Vietnamese more firmly into the influence of the Chinese, were the ones hurting America.  

Berkeley Protest.  (No Ameerican flags.)

It was too late.  The flag had become a Republican, pro-war symbol.  Note the lack of American flags in anti-war protest crowd scenes.

Democrats need not "move to the center and become conservative" to deserve and identify with the flag symbol.  Democrats can become more like themselves, holding actual progressive values.

It had been a foundation of liberal, progressive thinking that international cooperation via multilateral organizations served America's interests.   As the great international peacekeeper, whose navy keeps the oceans free for international trade for all countries, it is objectively true that it is in America's interest that ideological and border disputes not grow into regional or world war.  A Democrat seeking national prominence can assert this clearly and vigorously.  The UN is not here simply to help Latvia or Ghana.  It is here to help America.

He or she need not argue for sentimental values of "give peace a chance."  There is noting wrong with giving peace a chance but progressive liberals who established the UN argued for it entirely on the basis of American interests.   A Democrat can assert that world trade is better for American jobs than are trade wars and tariffs.  A liberal can accept the Trump's premise that the goal should be American interests and American jobs, but then argue that the best way to accomplish this includes world trade.   Accept the goal, not the means.

One need not accept Trump's belligerence and pugnaciousness to recognize the appeal to American of his goal: American jobs and peace.  Jobs and peace are liberal values. That goal is not "selling out."  It is restoring original principles.

Hillary, and Democrats, did not see this as a problem.

Democrats became the party of anti-Trump instead of the party that represents their own interests.  Theybecame afraid that doing so would look like they "went Republican", so they switched to saying that we were all better off if Mexican workers were better off, asserting the value of sharing (a liberal value) but not the value to us of sharing (a conservative value.)  They said to ignore our immigration laws, in part because Trump said with such rancor that we should enforce them.


Auto manufacturing near the southern border means goods go back and forth, bringing jobs to America.  Democrats can make a good, pro-American argument for active trade with Mexico.   We need not fight with China an do aggressive posturing to assert what is good for American jobs and workers.   I-phones by Apple get final assembly in China but some 95% of the value-added margin takes place in America.  That final assembly is the least profitable part of the whole process of making an I-phone and the part least appropriate for Americans to covet.  It would be as if growing coconuts were a barely-break-even commodity crop in Hawaii, but the state of Alaska decided that Alaska had a coconut trade imbalance with Hawaii and fought to regain coconut parity with the least valuable commodity Hawaii grew.

Values of Order, Discipline, Respect, Patriotism

The aggressive "no apology exceptionalism" voted by Republicans caused Democrats to push to the opposite side, apparently uncomfortable asserting national interest and patriotism.  A great many Americans are reflexively patriotic.  They want affiliation.  Their hearts swell with notions of our team, our people, our interests, our country.   Jonathan Haigt has written about the moral values of liberals and the moral values of conservatives.  Liberals and conservatives both value the need for Caring and Fairness.  But Loyalty, Respect for Authority, and Sanctity are values particularly associated with conservatives.

Five moral values.  Everyone accepts the first two; conservatives all five.

Respect for elders, authority, country.

Progressive/liberal politics need not be disloyal, disrespectful, or favor disgusting things.   Cosmopolitan urbanites might have bumper strips that say "Coexist" and they might eat snails at French restaurants but they would not be offended by expressions of loyalty, authority and purity.   It would be a political "freebie" for Democrats.  They can announce their patriotism, their respect for people of faith, their love of their parents, and their dislike of lead and coal dust poisoning their children.  It would not be phony.  Those are liberal values, too,  and there is no offense between these values and the policies of liberals.    Isn't clean air and water a liberal value?  Don't liberals teach their children to be kind, to respect their teachers, to love America?

Teaching Respect, Obedience, Identity

What liberals must not do is sneer or shame conservatives for being flag wavers or for being superstitiously religious or for being small minded by thinking that some foreign customs are unappealing.  It is not a liberal value to sneer at others. A great many good, progressive things in America were asserted by liberals acting out of faith and patriotism.  Martin Luther King asserted exactly that idea: America fulfilling its own great and good destiny, through liberal policies.  Liberals are not compromising or selling out or "moving to the center" by acknowledging fully and without hesitation the legitimacy of asserting loyal, patriotic values.  After all, liberal policies are, in fact, in America's interests, as liberals evaluate them.  They need not change policies. They need to accept that those policies are patriotic.

Some of this is a re-adjustment of symbolism.  Democrats and liberals need to understand and integrate into their minds that the three color photos above, showing soldier, a senior, and a boy saluting the flag are images that evoke genuine feelings of identity and affection in a great many people.   Some liberals may consider them "hokey" or "cliched".  Those liberals misunderstand their own country and their attitudes are toxic to the success of liberalism.  A great many voters, in whose interest it is to vote for Democrats, do not do so because they feel that hostility, and they resent it.

Democrats should stop doing that.

A Democrat who will re-unify the party will be one who better understands Americans, and he or she can start by reviewing the photographs in this blog and absorb what appeals to Americans and what does not.