What's Lower Than "Low Information" Voters?

Pretty amazing. And from an impeccable source.

Hard Choice, Easy Choice

My latest newspaper column:

I watched the Democratic debate last week. It compared to Saturday’s Republican debate as Socrates to Eric Cartman. Serious questions were asked, and serious answers were given; and while there were disagreements and challenging of each other, there were no juvenile attacks, no name-calling, no dishonest calumniation of our president, none of the arrant lying that Republican audiences prefer (Trump passingly told the truth, and they booed). 

I don’t love either one of them, Bernie or Hillary. I’m not inspired the way I was – and still am – by Barack Obama. Because of the president’s many successes, the opposition has had to resort mostly to lying about him. Bernie they’ll dismiss as promoting class warfare; Hillary will be attacked for murdering Vince Foster and selling his cattle. 

Sanders is right: The system is rigged in favor of the wealthiest among us (read Judith Miller’s Dark Money if you need convincing); average people no longer have a voice in how we’re governed; changing it requires enough enlightened people (improbably) rising up to vote out of Congress those unwilling to compromise or to reject the demands of the corporations and individuals who’ve bought them. He’s right about the importance of electing representatives willing to change the way campaigns are financed, who accept what science tells us about our climate, who’ll address our costly needs at home. But I have some issues with Bernie. For one, I got tired of watching him finger the air every time he wanted to respond during the debate. 

More importantly, I wish he’d frame his argument without entirely demonizing “millionaires and billionaires and Wall Street.” He does, after all, understand the importance of capitalism to a thriving society. To acknowledge that and to include those entities in the solution in a positive way would strengthen and broaden his message. There’s a point, after all, in this march toward sequestering all capital among a very few, at which it becomes inimical to capitalism itself. If people don’t have money, they don’t buy widgets, and that’s the real danger of where we’re heading. Paying for health care and education beyond high school, and providing a living wage for full-time workers are demonstrably part of the economic solution. It’s the opposite of freeloading: it’s restoring that mythical and secure middle class on whose spending our economy depends. 

Republicans seem to prefer to run against Bernie Sanders. It’s possible they’d come to regret it; my concern, however, is that his support seems especially strong among young people, and why not: it’s their future at stake. Historically, though, they’re the least likely to come out and vote. Trump’s and Cruz’s and Rubio’s base are the sort that do: ethnophobes, nativists, those suffused with religious paranoia, those who don’t want to spend another damn penny on anything for which they see no value to their immediate and singular needs. And because of gerrymandering and well-planned voter suppression (disguised as innocently patriotic voter I.D. laws against practically non-existent in-person voter fraud), it’s become all but impossible to be rid of the deniers and obstructionists, “revolution” notwithstanding. 

It’s hard to imagine that if Hillary Clinton were president Republican electeds would cooperate more than they have with Obama. But, aware of their current earth-scorching policies and methods, she’d be less Pollyannaish than Mr. Obama was for too long. The attacks on her will be ruthless; unlike those on Obama, in some there’ll be a kernel of truth. In the past she’s hedged tough questions. Bernie has forced her off the fence, and she’s come down on the right side of it in most things. Other than, well, touting Henry Kissinger’s words of support. His manipulation of the Vietnam peace talks to help Nixon’s election was tantamount to treason. 

If choosing between Democratic candidates is hard, the choice between the parties isn’t. As Benita Helseth’s recent letter to the editor aptly said, one need only compare Wisconsin and Minnesota (or look at Kansas!) to see the divergent results of governance by each party. Controlling all three branches of government? Having just called Scalia home, even God thinks that’s too much. Meanwhile, patriotic Republicans promise to trash the Constitution and prevent, sight unseen, any Obama-nominated Justice from being approved.

[Image source]

Brilliant

Here's my most brilliant thought, ever. Obama should nominate Hillary Clinton to the Supreme Court. Who wouldn't want to have that job instead of president? And it would put Rs in a bind: they'd much prefer, it seems, to have their candidate run against Bernie Sanders, but if they approved her, it'd lose them the Court.

And who knows? Maybe with Hillary out, Joe Biden would toss his hat in the ring. A little late, yes; but it'd be interesting.

Not gonna happen, of course. But it'd be fun to see.

It is, of course, entirely unsurprising that Rs have vowed to block anyone Obama puts forth, sight unseen. And that they're variously using "rules" they've never followed themselves as justification.

It's getting really hard not to hate those people; and I'm more into easy than I used to be.

[Image source]

Ding Dong

My dad, who was on the Oregon Supreme Court, and later, for the rest of his judicial career, was the Chief Judge of the Oregon Court of Appeals (and whose nomination to the Federal bench got caught up in the politics of LBJ's last months in office) used to say Antonin Scalia was the smartest guy on the Supreme Court of the United States. As my dad was, in my view, the perfect example of an impartial judge and smarter than anyone I knew, I took his view seriously. Among the many things I'm sorry I can no longer discuss with him is what his current view of Scalia might have been. Smart, maybe. Still a good judge? I really doubt it.

The gods, I hope, will forgive me for speaking ill of the dead; but if Scalia was ever an impartial interpreter of the Constitution, he gave up even the pretense of it when Barack H. Obama took office. He came to making prior "judicial activism" look like a coma. I've looked: I can't find any place in the Constitution that says corporations are people or that money is speech. Nor is there, in that honored document, any defintion of marriage. (There are, however, ample words referring to equal protection under the law.) And he entirely stopped disguising his inclination to inject his religious views into the law of the land.

The same, of course, can be said of Samuel Alito.

There's no way in hell Republicans will allow President Obama to appoint Scalia's replacement; they'll pin their hopes on getting into the White House. To that end, I'm sure they'd swallow their tongues and support even Trump or Cruz. I doubt they could find anyone worse than Scalia has been in the past seven years. Well, unless it's Cruz and he appoints this piece of work, his favorite.

This is one among many reasons why electing a Republican for president in these times would be an existential disaster. One can only hope that Democrats and whichever candidate on whom they settle will make this obvious case, and make it effectively. Because it's not just the judiciary at stake: it's democracy, it's the environment, it's the planet. Seriously. It is.

Horrifying

How much more horrifying can these guys get? Really. I watched enough of the latest R debate to see, yet again, how far the Republican party has fallen, and to wonder what's become of us as a nation.

Donald Trump would bring back waterboarding "and much worse." Why? What evidence is there that it accomplished anything when the Cheney/Bush administration used it? Why, when experts, including people involved in those war crimes, have said it provided false information (which is, after all, its time-tested purpose: false confessions) and that legal methods of interrogation are much more effective?

Ted Cruz, among his many lies, claimed that waterboarding doesn't meet the widely accepted definition of torture, which, he deceitfully claimed, requires organ failure! (That's based on a memo cooked up by a Cheneyophile, universally condemned by rational humans.)

If there was a positive proposal for any issue we face, I missed it. Rubio got locked into a bizarre looping of his favorite applause line, claiming Obama is deliberately ruining the country. It revealed him to be what I've always thought: a pre-programmed empty suit, nicely cut, but empty. Which raises the question, who picked him as their stalking horse? Who's behind him pulling the strings, or moving his lips with a hand up his, you know? Sheldon Adelson just tossed a bunch of money at him; but someone stood him up first.

By contrast, the NPR debate between Hillary and Bernie was substantive, getting fairly deep into actual issues. Unlike that other display, there were no deliberate lies calculated to get applause and approval from mindless followers. A little pie in the sky, maybe; but proposals based on reality.

However...

I don't love either of the two. Without reservation I'll vote for whoever wins the nod; the consequences of any of those awful R candidates -- Kasich, the "moderate" one included -- winning the White House with an R-majority Congress are just too awful to contemplate. Still, neither Clinton nor Sanders gives me the emotional boost I got from Barack Obama. I got really tired of watching Bernie finger the air when he wanted to talk. Hillary had her best night, I'd say; her competence and depth isn't in question. But there's too much history of hedging her bets. Triangulation, one might call it. Still, I'm pretty sure Rs would much rather run against Bernie than her. I agree with pretty much everything Sanders says, though.

Tough call, other than that thing about imagining Cruz or Trump or Rubio at the helm. It'd be the end of everything important to everyone but the 1%. Maybe 5 or 6%.

Paul Ryan Defends God

Many, including the President (and this guy), have said, in reaction to reactions to gun violence, especially mass murders, that "thoughts and prayers" aren't enough. Now Speaker (really should be with a small "s") Paul Ryan has had a thing or two to say about that little bit of common sense:

This week, Congress’ leading Republican offered his response to the argument. The New York Daily News reported: 

House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Thursday blasted critics who say prayer isn’t an adequate response to mass shootings and defended his rifle-loving party’s do-nothing approach to gun violence.“The attitude in some quarters these days is, ‘Don’t just pray; do something about it,”’ Ryan said at the annual National Prayer Breakfast. “The thing is, when you are praying, you are doing something about it. You are revealing the presence of God.” 

Yep. Good job everyone. Drinks are on me.

As part of the same set of remarks, but outside of the context of gun violence, the Wisconsin congressman added, “It says a lot about our country that people of both parties – and all faiths – will drop everything and pray for their fellow Americans. What it says is, we believe in the dignity of the individual. And that is why prayer should always come first.” 

As for mass shootings, the GOP leader did not elaborate on what should always come second.

Really? No suggestions for real-world action? Are we surprised? Because that, I guess, would be an affront to God.

[Image source]

Salad Words

Given the wide range of choices, it's hard to put them in order; but at or very near the top of the list of outrages today's teabagging Rs attribute to President Obama is the idea that he's been "divisive." It becomes clear that the word, to right-wing screamers, means "saying and doing stuff we don't like. Calling out lies and deceptions. Pointing out consequences. Daring to discuss the stuff we'd prefer to keep under the rug. Like racism. Telling us things we don't want to hear." Ted Cruz, Donald Trump? Not divisive. Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter? Butter wouldn't melt. Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity? Alex Jones? Paragons of inclusiveness. And that emerging hope of "the establishment?" Yeah, how about him?

Marco Rubio's predictable, swift, nasty, and ignorant response to Obama's speech at a mosque showcases perfectly the idiocy of the charge. Watch the president's speech, and find the "pitting of people against one another" to which young Marco refers, in horror. Let me know where it is. Ask yourself which party is pitching Islamophobia. Deny that there've been countless acts against Muslims in the US, or that it's being rhetorically encouraged by the top R candidates.

Today's Republican party (and, yet again, let me emphasize the fact that I say "today's," because it wasn't always so) has made ignoring reality central to its march toward plutocracy. (The theocracy grift, most likely, is less of a goal than a means to the end. And by "end" I mean pretty much the end of everything. And who better to get to ignore the real agenda than people whose religious paranoia goes to eleven, eclipsing all other issues.) That's the case whether it's climate change, science in general, racism, income inequality, public education, energy, and so much more. Because addressing those pressing problems is inimical to the creation of their oligarchical plutocracy. Distractions from what's really important: succoring their wealthy controllers, suckering everyone else.

Imagine a picnic, people drinking beer, having a grand old time, while gulping down potato salad that's been sitting in the sun for two days, getting that greenish sheen. Someone walks by (maybe, you know, someone who knows these things), has a look, and says, Hey people, you better stop eating that salad; it's gonna make you sick. It could even kill you. People look up from the table, pissed, and say, Go away, asshole. You're ruining our picnic. And you're being divisive.

And that's exactly what's going on.

[Image source] 

The Stakes

I'll admit I have significantly less enthusiasm for Bernie and Hillary than I did for Barack Obama; were either of them to win the presidency, I'm certain there'd be no tears in my eyes on election night the way there were when Obama won. But I'd unreservedly vote for either of them over any of the R candidates. The stakes are simply too high. As Charlie Pierce points out, the water debacle in Flint is the perfect example of why that is; far as I'm concerned, whoever wins the nomination should harp on it nonstop. And connect it, in terms of what would happen were all three branches to go R, to everything else that matters: climate, environment, health care, and on and on.

Every election is claimed to be the one where the very survival of the country is on the line. This time, though, I think it's really true. We've seen the "agenda" of the current R party; that every single one of their prospective nominees (Kasich who has zero chance, excepted maybe) is a flat-out liar says most of what we need to know. Beyond that, imagine where we're headed if climate change is ignored, if income inequality gets any worse, if environmental regulations are removed, if gay rights and women's are rescinded, if Muslims are broad-brush demonized, if the US becomes an overtly Christian nation of the type promoted by Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio (the type that justifies selfishness and hatred, which is a kind it's hard to recognize but there it is), if public education is allowed to wither, if science becomes something to ignore entirely. If voting rights continue to be denied to certain groups of citizens.

Flint. That's the wormhole through which we can see the future. Says Charlie:

As part of the deal that was wrangled out of the Democratic National Committee, there will be more debates, and one of them will be in Flint, Michigan. So here's my tip for the two candidates, and for all their followers currently engaged on Twitter in the Battle of Antietam: 

Knock that shit off for one night. 

The only issues to be debated in Flint involve the failure at all levels of Republican (and conservative) government, and the destruction of the political commonwealth by the same. Just take turns pointing that out for a couple of hours and you may not have to worry about who you're running against. Also, if you can have a big pitcher of lovely yellow water on your podiums for the camera, that would be nice, too...

Seriously. Today's Republican Party, what's left of it, has gone nuts. They're nothing but a bunch of ideological mongers of selfishness and victimhood. And shoot-first war. If they take over, kiss our kids' future goodbye. Well, unless you're one of their oligarchical sponsors. Then you can build a little higher, filter the air a little longer, build your own hospital, and outlast the rest of us. By a few years.

[Image source]

What Gingrichorovism Hath Wrought

My latest newspaper column:

Pop. Sploosh. That sound you DON’T hear is exploding heads of Trump supporters. After decades of purposeful preparation, holding incompatible thoughts has become stress-free, making it effortless to reconcile their love for him with his attacks on their most sanctified source of “news.” If nothing else, the audation of The Donald reveals the cynicism – and undeniable success! – of plans hatched well before the ascendency of Newt Gingrich, furthered by right wing radio and, ironically, perfected by Fox “news.” Decades past, Republican leaders concocted a brilliant way to produce voters who’d elect representatives ready to enact their dream of unregulated plutocracy: distract them with objects of anger, fear, and resentment. Play to religious paranoia. Devalue education and expertise. Bankrolled by the Koch brothers, up sprang the Tea Party as the vehicle for getting there, and now, like Dr. Frankenstein, the power-mad geniuses must contend with their uncontrollable creation. Trump and Cruz, the concepti of Gingrichorovian impregnation of the party, have turned to patricide. To a cynic like me, the rarity of such karmic poetry makes it all the more satisfying. 

But if it’s entertaining, it’s also scary. Whatever else is true of those two vainglorious demagogues, they’re nothing like the thoughtful conservative counterbalance a functioning democracy requires. Neither are their indiscriminately angry adherents. Trump is a thin-skinned egotist given to childish insults and substance-free declarations, having only shallow political ideas like building a wall (illegal immigration has dropped dramatically on Obama’s watch) and banning Muslims. Cruz is an incendiary Bible-thumping claimer of, as his daddy just confirmed, Christ-like martyrdom, which somehow excuses his fabrications from the Mount. Caught being untruthful, Democratic candidates try to wiggle. Republicans high-five. 

When I’m not shaking my head in despair, I chuckle over the heartburn Trump is causing Republican Party leaders; at Cruz and his self-righteous religious zeal, I shudder. He’s Elmer Gantry, suffused with Torquemada and Jim Jones. Now that he’s the front-runner out of Iowa, let’s hope he’ll go the way of prior winners there, Huckabee and Bachmann. 

Speaking of laughing while cringing, how about the wildlife at Malheur? I don’t know if the FBI had guidance from the White House, but it seems pretty Obama-like to have refrained from rushing in with guns blazing, waiting instead for the militiamen to become laughing stock over their own ineptitude. (Not that ISIS is as incompetent as they are, or that solving the Middle East is comparable to shutting down a bunch of self-absorbed misunderstanders of the Constitution; the Iraq war inflamed that part of the world for generations. But the initial restraint is familiar.) It was worth the frustration of seeing those guys do their dance without any evident pushback, ultimately to witness their quick capitulation in the face of what appears to be a well-planned trap. I’m sorry for the man who lost his life, no matter his stated intentions. With their hoped-for martyr, the militia movement will live on. Their misdirected fury is as much a part of the fabric woven by the aforementioned right-wing manipulators as are Trump and Cruz and those citizens in their thrall. 

Absent compelling alternatives, “establishment” Republicans seem to be counting on the resurrection of Marco Rubio, who so far hasn’t figured out which persona to inhabit: standard issue religious regressive and political prevaricator, or the hoped-for new voice. Handsome, young, a facile speaker, he seems unable or afraid to try anything but time-tested boilerplate flogging of resentment. Obama has done “incredible damage” to the US, he declared on Fox “news” the other day, to no request for specification. If that isn’t stooping to conquer, what is? And what is this disaster of which he speaks? Employment? Medicaid? The auto industry? Budget deficits, the stock market, energy dependence, gas prices? Corporate profits, the Koch brothers’ wealth? Or is it the carnage in the Middle East uncorked by his predecessor and still confounding containment? Because that, at least, is true. Rubio, though, and Trump, and Cruz and all the other Republican candidates have assured us that they’ll fix it right up, by sending in more troops and pounding the hell out of the region. 

History tells us something about that but I seem to have forgotten what it is.  

[Image source]

Fears For Tears

My latest newspaper column:

I keep trying to write something other than rants about Republican politics, but I can’t. It’s simply too important to point out the dangers of their science denial, their attacks on public education, their clinging to destructive economic policy, their preference for war and fear-mongering, rejection of compromise, desire for theocracy. Abandoning any claim to understanding democracy, much less supporting it, that party has turned to presidential candidates who prefer totalitarian bluster and lies to democracy and truth. Actual conservatism, all but dead now, had ideas that kept a toe grounded in reality; and they recognized our history. Who, for example, would argue for government bigger than it needs to be? Who, for another, would deny that our Constitution was founded on compromise, presumes public civility, and rejects the idea of oligarchy? 

But in their reflexive reactions to everything our president says or doesn’t say, does or doesn’t do, today’s right-wingers have left that all behind. I keep thinking, as yet another line is crossed, that their followers would have enough of it. That at some point followers of Fox “news” and the other conspiracy mongers of the airways would say, okay, that’s beyond the pale. Like they did, say, with the Dixie Chicks and their comparatively mild rebuke of that other president. 

Consider those right-wing screamers’ reactions to President Obama’s announcement that he’ll be strengthening enforcement of existing gun laws. You know, the thing they’ve always demanded in response to calls for more laws: enforce the ones we have. Except when Barack Hussein Obama says it; then, it’s tyrannical tyranny by a tyrannizing tyrant. And when his plans include spending on mental health care, because, as the NRA tells us, mass murders are about that, not guns, it’s economic wastefulness. And now, despite demanding it for years, they’re even angry at how hostages in Iran got released. In their view, unless we get everything we want by dint of bombs and blood, we’re weak. Losers. Yes, say their followers. It’s only war and braggadocio that make us great. 

About those gun-related executive orders, Charles Krauthammer opined “Obama’s not asleep at the wheel, he’s not at the wheel at all.” Good one, right? But consider this: the man he’s derided as a despotic dictator, when he acknowledges there’s only so much he can do without Congress, is criticized, with a straight face, by Dr K for staying within the law. Alex Jones, of course, saw it differently: the president’s actions will lead to rounding up gun owners and putting them in camps the way Nazis did Jews. Yes, he said it. No doubt his followers believe it, because that’s what passes for policy disagreement nowadays. Even moralistic Rand Paul has turned to Jones for advice. Simply amazing. 

That’s just the sideshow, though, predictable as voting to repeal Obamacare without offering alternatives. The real tell is in their claims that President Obama faked tears as he spoke of children who’ve died from gun violence. Because in their universe, only fetus-Americans deserve tears. Outside the womb, the young are on their own. Empathy and concern for children, deep enough to bring tears to a president who’s had to meet repeatedly with the families of murdered kids, can only be fake. No matter how much you disagree with President Obama, who can defend that level of mendacity and hatefulness? If it’s not enough to make Foxophiles change the channel, what is? 

What does it say about their view of voters that candidates think the path to credibility consists in saying to the president, as Chris Christie did, “We’re gonna kick your butt out of the White House.” Marco Rubio says he bought a gun for protection against ISIS. Does a majority of Republicans think that way? Is that what’s required to win conservatives’ votes nowadays? If so, what hope is there? If not, why their silence? 

Here’s a thought: imagine rational people hearing the words President Obama spoke in his final State of the Union address without knowing the speaker. Which would they find consistent with a person who, as the screamers claim, hates America, who’s deliberately made us weak? At what point will today’s Republicans demand respectful dialogue from their preferred leaders?  

[Image source]

A More Perfect Union: Formed At Last

So Sarah Palin has thrown her considerable weight, backed by her reputation for to commitment to informing herself as deeply as possible on the most complex issues of our time, behind the only other person in modern-day politics with a similar reputation. Depth. Curiosity. Profundity. I can only be speaking of Donald Trump; he, of the most wide-ranging knowledge of our most important problems, and of the most all-encompassing and thoughtful solutions. Or, as Andy Borowitz has put it:

DES MOINES, Iowa —An endorsement from former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is expected to widen Donald J. Trump’s already impressive lead among so-called “idiot voters,” an aide to the billionaire said on Tuesday. 

While Trump was previously thought to have a lock on the idiot vote heading into the Iowa caucuses, a recent surge by Senator Ted Cruz, of Texas, has put the idiots back in play. 

Cruz has worked tirelessly in recent weeks to tailor his message to undecided idiots, even revamping his stump speech to rid it of two-syllable words. 

“That’s why Palin supporting Trump and not Cruz is such a win for us,” the Trump aide said. “She’s been out of politics for awhile, but she still has idiot cred.”...

That anyone still listens to Sarah Palin on any subject (abstinence? family values?) strains understanding to the limits of natural law. OTOH it's entirely unsurprising that she'd be supporting Donald Trump, whose approach to policy is indistinguishable from hers: superficial, sound-bite-based, lazy, attention-hungry. And his Trumpeting of her support is perfectly consistent with his willingness to pander to the basest of the base.

Of course anyone who considers Sarah Palin a hero would feel the same about Trump. What's entirely inexplicable, though, is how easily he's sucked in Evangelicals. His claims to religiosity are as transparently phony as Palin's to reading.

Can they go any lower? Hard to imagine. But this is America, where anything's possible, right?

[Image source]

Militias. Yeah, Right.

There are so many good writers out there who say the things I've said, or want to say, so much better than me. Jim Wright is one of them, and this article should be read in its entirety; for the history, for the writing, and for the truth of it. Those delusional buffoons currently occupying Malhuer Wildlife Refuge, and those who defend them and/or aspire to be them, are the furthest thing from patriots:

... Those men, those men who led the Continental Army and fought for our freedom, those men knew exactly what they were doing when they included the words “well-regulated militia” in the Second Amendment.And they for damned sure weren’t talking about giving Americans the right to shoot down their own government – because those Founders were the government.

There are few things professional soldiers despise more than some fake wannabe warrior.
Professional military personnel look upon militias and paramilitaries the same way cops regard amateur security guards.
And for good reason.
Irregular militias, paramilitaries, are worse than useless when it comes to defense of a nation. Literally worse than useless. They are untrained, undisciplined, undependable, and too often belligerently unaware of their own pitiful state. They take up resources and risk the security of real soldiers. Irregular militias are often indistinguishable from an armed mob. Like those currently occupying Malheur Wildlife Refuge in Oregon, militias are almost always composed of misfits and rejects, wannabe soldiers and pretend Marines puffed up with stolen valor, disaffected braggarts, belligerent drunkards, criminals, the dangerously mentally ill, conspiracy theorists, and angry losers of every stripe.
... 

They’re in it for themselves and only for themselves and make no mistake about it.
These are Sovereign Citizens – an oxymoron if ever there was one. These are people who have declared themselves a nation unto themselves and have rejected the obligations of civilization. They are citizens of nothing, an army of one, defenders of mob rule and rights by force. 
They believe freedom comes at the muzzle of a gun and only at the muzzle of a gun, and they believe in their freedom not yours.
They literally believe a gun gives them the right to do anything they want...

As I said, it's worth a comparatively (these days) long read. It won't, of course, be read by those who need it most.

[Image source]

Heeeeeere's Donny

Hold Onto Your Seats

It's an amusing -- and informative -- part of any State of the Union Address, watching which party's people stand, or don't, for what statements. In the case of last night's episode, I only wish the president had spent some time pointing it out, because it's such a clear demonstration of what the Republican Party has been during his presidency, and of what will happen were the next president to be one of them. So here's a partial list of those things that kept Rs glued to their seats:

• Nearly 15 million new jobs and the unemployment rate being cut in half.
• Equality for all Americans.
• Cutting pollution levels.
• A good education for our children.
• Fighting terrorism.
• The idea that America is the strongest nation on earth.
• Avoiding war.
• Making it easier to vote.

And—drumroll, please—saving the best for last …

• Curing cancer! 

And think about this: if the president's speech were somehow given anonymously, with listeners not knowing who spoke the words, which would they find objectionable, and why?

[Image from the linked article]

Potted?

The estimable Charlie Pierce went to a Trump rally and wrote about it. The usual buttons were pushed, the proclamations of Trump's brilliance, the lack of actual policy: it was all there. But one thing CPP wrote hadn't occurred to me before: is the regular appearance and removal of protestors part of the performance? Will we someday find out they're plants?

... The crowds are edged with a startling amount of security, both public and private. There were cops from several towns on duty in Lowell, and a remarkable number of people in suits, wearing earplugs, but not wearing any Secret Service insignia. By my count, the event was interrupted five times by protesters. The protesters were curiously able to infiltrate the tight security, and their conspicuous removal became an integral part of the show. Their expulsion never failed to give He, Trump another rhetorical launching pad for some of the high-flown, winking contempt he shares for the Other with his crowd. It is what binds them to each other. "Get them out," he says, and everybody cheers...

It'd be perfect, wouldn't it? He's already bamboozled his followers with complete egotistical bullshit, lying prolifically, rambling about his own greatness, producing "policy" an inch wide and an inch deep. They love it. It's pretty much like pro-wrestling; so why not bring in the fake villains, too?

[Image source]