i'm rubber, you are glue

       The spectacle of right wing media melting down over NBC's decision to fire Ronna McDaniel after feedback from their on air talent is delicious.   Jesse Watters calling NBC a political operation is particularly rich considering the 787 million dollar judgement his network had to payout to settle a libel judgement against FAUX news.

      McDaniel has been gaslighting the media in general and left leaning outfits like MSNBC in particular for years and she is an unrepenetent purveyor of the big lie.   It was a horrific lapse of judgement by the network.  At least the people that hired her had the grace to admit it was a stupid decision and the backbone to correct themselves.

Trading on the inside

      It seems there is a firestorm brewing at NBC in the wake of the network signing former RNC chairperson Ronna McDaniel as a commenter.   As Chuck Todd put it, after years of gaslighting and character assassination by McDaniel of journalists covering Republicans in the age of tRump, what exactly does she bring to the network?

      It's as if Fox News hired Katie Porter for regular appearances.  The MAGA hordes would rise up in indignation and probably boycott the network.  MSNBC has already said McDaniel is persona non grata on their programs.  This is an own goal on NBC's part,

What's wrong with we the people

        Paul Krugman's lament in the NYT this morning; "What's wrong with Ohio'', can just as easily refer to any state where a majority of working class white people vote for a political party that doesn't even pretend to address their economic interests.  Instead, transgender bathrooms and abortion bans are the order of the day.

       A glance at the House Republican budget is instructive.   Aside from using the word ''woke" 37 times, the document advocates raising the retirement age for social security purposes to 70 years and dismantling Obamacare.   this in the face of evidence the lifespan of the average person without a college degree is actually going down.   Many thousands of people under that scenario will die before ever collecting a dime from Social Security.  I guess they will die happy, knowing SNAP benefits will also be cut under the GOP plan and billionaires will probably snag another tax cut thanks to their sacrifice.

      Meanwhile, they seem to favor a former reality show star who has been judged a rapist, a fraudster and who is being tried as an insurrectionist.  The mind boggles.

A nation of immigrants

        Immigrants, especially the brown skinned ones crossing the southern border, are being vilified by the media, Republicans and some Democrats.  It's the same old same old.  The press plays up the lines at the border as a dire crisis, egged on by the GOP.  Democrats fall into the familiar defensive crouch.  

       The attacks come in two distinctive directions.   In the MAGA worldview, these immigrants are "poisoning the blood" of America and must be stopped.  The more orthodox Republican view is the migrants are taking jobs away from honest, hard working (i.e. white) Americans and must be stopped.

     It turns out neither view is correct.  Many spanish speaking immigrants have political views nearly identical to the MAGA crowd and will probably become reliable conservatives much like the Cubans have  over time.   Also, as Paul Krugman points out in today's NYT, the evidence overwhelmingly indicates that immigrants wind up doing jobs native born Americans won't do.   At the same time, this much younger cohort of foreign workers are contributing to medicare and social security, thereby pushing back the date where benefits will be cut.  

     For the most part, immigration is a win-win situation for Americans..   But as in previous generations, my Italian and Irish ancestors included, immigrants are targets of opportunity for demagogues.

The buying of a president

       For a mere half billion dollars, you too can own a president!   I have no doubt that pitch or something similar is being made to rich men and dictators around the world on behalf of Cheeto Jesus.   The reported addition of Paul Manafort to the tRump campaign is another indicator.  As the NY attorney general prepares to start seizing the tRump organizations assets if it cannot come up with a billion dollars or so to secure a bond for the amount of the judgement against tRump and his minions, the pressure builds on him to do anything to secure his legacy.

     Maybe Elon Musk would like a president who toadies to a rich and famous man.  Or maybe Kim Jong Un would come through for his dear friend.  Or a long list of national security risks who would demand a quid pro quo for any monetary help they might provide.  You get the idea.

Are you kidding me?

      Another weekend, another tRump rally, another head scratching take on a subset of my fellow Americans.   How can any thinking, feeling human being sit through a session of the word salad that makes up most of tRump's stump speech and not come away feeling mentally and emotionally dirty?

      He spews lies and hate the way most of us breathe.   He encourages his cultish followers to wallow in the intolerance he personifies.  He compares migrants to ''animals'' who are "poisoning the blood of America".  He wants to round up tens of millions of people in the country illegally and intern them in giant camps while they await deportation to countries many have not seen since they were toddlers.  He gets rapturous applause for this hateful rhetoric.  What are the rest of us to make of this spectacle?

     He threatens a "bloodbath'' if he is not elected in November and then promises to be dictator for a day upon assuming the presidency.  Meanwhile his many legal teams attempt to delay or derail the criminal trials he faces.    Yet, his followers remain doggedly faithful.  Is it the man or the message?  

Spring

       Although we are still 5 days away from the vernal equinox and the official start of spring, three reliable harbingers of spring occurred yesterday!   The Peru girls' softball team started spring practice, the local golf driving range opened and i planted the first spinach of the season.  Unfortunately, Mother Nature is foreclosing spring activities in the near future, but we have staked a claim for the changing of the seasons.

Fool me three times...

         It's getting hard to make the case the press and the mainstream media are being fooled by the flood of disinformation directed at them by Republicans.  At one time it was thought the media played up any little scandal attached to Democrats to counterbalance the horrific scandal machine that was tRump.  

      In 2016, despite the sleaze surrounding the Republican nominee, the press insisted on flogging Hillary's e-mail practices despite knowing there was no serious irregularities.  Under tRump, the White House became as porous as a sieve with Jared and Ivanka doing the same thing the press excoriated Clinton for.  

      Fast forward to 2024.  tRump is criminally indicted in 4 different jurisdictions, has been named a sexual abuser in the E. Jean Carroll case and convicted of fraud in a civil case in New York.  What is the press obsessing about?   Joe Biden's age and Hunter Biden's laptop.  I rest my case.

Tik Tok, etc.

      I freely admit I know little to nothing about Tik Tok outside the fact it is used as a primary source of information by millions of people.  So is Facebook, instagram and X, formerly known as twitter.  Seemingly, the only difference among these various platforms is possible Chinese government involvement in Tik Tok.  

      Until tRump's lukewarm endorsement of Tik Tok yesterday, the right wing of American politics was beside itself with rage at the possibility the Chinese were polluting the minds and scraping information from American youth.  Let''s see where they land today in light of the Dear Leader's endorsement.

You can't make this stuff up

      Katie Britt's response to the SOTU and Scarlett Johansen's spot on parody on Saturday Night Live could have been run interchangeably as far as I can tell and it says something about today's Republican party.  Not in a good way.   Britt's breathless delivery as she delivered a string of lies about the Biden administration's policies was perfectly captured by Johansen's characterization of the Alabama senator as "the craziest bitch in the Target parking lot".

     After being fact checked on a particularly egregious lie about human trafficking, Britt was forced to walk it back at various right wing media spots over the weekend.  At least she was willing to do that much.  As we all know, tRump would never apologize for lying to the American public.  In fact, his policy is to double down on the issue, the truth by damned.  Welcome to today's Republican party.

Whaddya know, Joe

      the Democratic nominee for president showed up last night at the State of the Union address to Congress and for the most part he wowed the nationwide audience.  Joe Biden looked and sounded invigorated by the spotlight as he pounded tRump and the GOP for an hour and a half while giving the Dems something to cheer about.

      If this is the Biden who hits the campaign trail in the weeks and months to come, he'll be giving the opposition nightmares as November nears.   The president wasn't perfect, but he didn't need to be.  He just had to show that while his body may betray him on occasion, his mind remains sharp and up to the rigors of the campaign trail.

Wages and prices

      Wages for the bottom 20% of American workers have increased in real terms faster than any other segment over the past 4 years.  In large part this is because in many states, the minimum wage has risen to over $15./hr.  This has in turn put pressure on prices which leads to apocryphal stories of $18. Big Mac meals (our local McDonalds is at $12.19 for that deal).

     Fast food prices have always been a source of discontent for consumers who have counted on cheap food to boost their spending power.  Any rise in prices is seen as an affront.  Wages typically make up the biggest single factor in fast food pricing, so, rising wages affect pricing more directly than other inputs such as rent and food pricing.

     Ironically, as lower income workers wages increase, middle income workers resent the gains, feeling they come at their expense.  Overall, reductions in wage inequality are good for the economy.  However, long run gains come at the cost of short term pain.  In other words, a $12. Big Mac may be the price we all pay for worker dignity.

Same as it ever was

        Having read Evan Osnos' 11,000 word essay on Joe Biden's quest for a second term I was torn between two responses.   The 72 year old me on the one hand wants to cheer the 81 year old president for his surprising stamina, while at the same time being horrified by the toll he is inviting on himself.  As with many of us, the spirit is willing, but will the flesh respond?

      Osnos gently grilled the president on issues both domestic and foreign and Biden responded with alacrity.  You may not agree with all of his solutions, but you have to respect his reasoning.  His Achilles heel is his age.  He really can't do much about it.   Running the country while campaigning non stop for months is something new for him.  Cheeto Jesus has no such impediments.  It will be a photo finish, but as Rachel Maddow pointed out on Monday night, it is a binary choice.

It ain't over til, etc.

            The most recent polls of the presidential race have Democrats doomscrolling and reading a spate of articles suggesting the party dump Joe Biden in favor of "Johnny Unbeatable" or whoever is the flavor of the moment.   Let me just say the time for Biden to step aside would have been a year ago at the very least.   Despite talk of a brokered convention, there is no way short of a health emergency that Biden will not be the nominee.   It is time to think positive.

         The race is now in a statistical tie.   A sizable majority of the population has no idea who the nominees will be at this point.  In the first tRump-Biden matchup, the more people saw the unhinged GOP candidate, the less they liked him.   There is no reason to think it will be different this time around, especially as tRump exhibits more and more symptoms of dementia.

      The economy continues to do well and more and more people are buying into Bidenomics.  The only other issues people continue to harp on are crime and immigration.  Statistics say violent crime is at a 50 year low.  Meanwhile an immigration bill designed to address border concerns was blocked by tRump.  The Dems have 8 months to change minds on these issues.  All in all, I would rather be a Democratic strategist than a Republican at this point in the race.

Hot tubs and frogs

     We set a couple of new record high temperatures last week and it looks like another record will fall today as we get into the upper 50s to lower 60s here in New York's north country.  Most of us will be glad to shed our winter coats for the day and I'm sure some kids will be wearing flip flops to school, but, (play ominous music), this is not just a freak thaw.  It is a continuation of long term trends.  I feel like a frog in a hot tub with the temperature set too high.  It feels good right now, but... 

Always be lying

       As I have said before, unlike political junkies such as myself, the vast majority of Americans don't pay attention to politics until a couple of months before the election.  The latest Supreme Court ruling doesn't play in Peoria since understanding it would require more effort than most people are willing to expend. A sizable minority probably can't name their congressional representatives. 

    A political economy such as this is ripe for a congenital liar to exploit.  tRump lies as naturally as breathing and most of us allow the lies to slide, creating a slippery slope to believability.  This is especially pernicious with the "I'm rubber, you're glue" type of argument at which he excels.  He has managed to convince a fair number of people that Biden is an abortion opponent moments after bragging he is responsible for the demise of Roe vs. Wade.

    It is going to be a long eight months to the 2024 elections.  We are in for a tsunami of lies and misleading statements from Republicans in general and tRump in particular.  Keep your BS detectors on.