Month: December 2016

Growing up as a military brat is not easy. It’s a nomadic life; not so much by choice as by assignment. In the military, you follow orders, and if you have a family, they follow you. To this day, no matter where I’m living, or how long I have lived there, I feel like a perennial “outsider”.

And so it was, back in the summer of 1968, that my dad received a reassignment from Ft. Wainwright, Alaska (where we had been stationed for 4 ½ years) to Clinton County Air Force Base, Ohio (yes, he was in the Army, but certain Army units were attached there…I could explain why, but if I did, I would then unfortunately have to kill you, and I am a man of peace). Now, understand that Fort Wainwright was a sizable installation; and my family lived on-base. Living in the “family quarters” of a large army base is analogous to living in a dense metropolitan environment. Nobody is “from” the locality where you all happen to be thrown together; consequently there’s a rich diversity in a concentrated area…social, racial, religious, and cultural.

Not so much in the sleepy hamlet of Sabina (also known as “The Eden of Ohio”), which is where my family ended up living “off-base” from 1968-1969. The 2010 census counted 2,564 souls, of which 97.0% were white, 0.9% African American, 0.3% Native American, 0.43% Asian, 0.07% from other races, and 1.12% from one or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 1.15% of the population. I don’t have the town’s ethnic breakdown for 1968, but between my memories and my suspicions, those ratios likely have not deviated much since Sabina was founded in 1830.

You’re probably getting the picture here that Sabina’s populace is the opposite of “diversity”. There is also a tendency (I have found) in your smaller burgs, in your more rural areas, for the locals to be less than welcoming to “outsiders” and somewhat clannish (and since we are talking about Ohio, you could spell that with a “k” and not be historically inaccurate). Now, before y’all get riled up and start to accuse yours truly of “flyover state” stereotyping, or painting with broad strokes (sins of the fathers, and all that), let me say that I am sure 99.9% of the folks currently living in beautiful Sabina, Ohio are good-hearted people…and fine, upstanding citizens.

However, my own personal interactions with some Sabina locals, specifically from autumn of 1968 through late summer of 1969, do not exactly make for pleasant memories. In fact, my 7th grade year was a living fucking hell. Now, I realize that nearly anybody you would care to ask has an anecdote or two about getting “picked on” at school while they were growing up; the law of averages guarantees that you will be bullied at some point in your 12 years of public schooling.

But what I’m talking about here isn’t an isolated incident or two. What I’m talking about is unrelenting harassment, verbal and physical. What I’m talking about is being informed that “we’re going to be waiting for you after school to kick your ass” on a daily basis. I’d been bullied before, but there was an added element to the intimidation unique to my Sabina experience. This was the first (but unfortunately, not the last) time someone ever called me a “kike” while pushing me around. I managed to keep most of this from my folks, until the day one of these bushwhacking yahoos sat behind me on the bus and boxed my ears so hard I had to see a doctor.

Good times.

So what does my personal memoir of woe have to do with this week’s film review? Well, as fate would have it, of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, filmmaker Michael Moore has intuited the Clinton County seat of Wilmington as the perfect microcosm of what he calls “Trumpland” (Wilmington is only about ten miles from my old “stomping” grounds in Sabina).

Michael Moore in TrumpLand (***) was an “October surprise” of sorts; sprung by Moore on an unsuspecting public with no advance hype. The high-concept title of this 73-minute film, (documenting a “one night only” performance piece by Moore) says it all…whether you are a fan or a hater-you know this is going to be a “fish-out-of-water” narrative, layered with irony. First, there’s the venue, the historic Murphy Theater. It’s prime benefactor? Glenn Beck (it burns!). And Moore takes pains to point out he’s in Clinton County, which is antipode to Clinton country.

Aside from an opening montage featuring locals parroting Breitbart memes and reinforcing the more cartoonish stereotypes of the “typical” Trump voter, Moore suppresses any further urges to shoot fish in a barrel. In fact, Moore telegraphed his good intentions not only by making his show admission-free, but requested that “Trump Voters Welcome” be added to the theater’s marquee.

After taking a “show of hands” census to establish how many in the audience support Hillary, how many support Trump, and who is undecided or supporting independent candidates, it appears that he is dealing with a fairly balanced mix. Employing his trademark mix of entertaining shtick and genuine empathy, Moore attempts to build rapport with the Trump supporters, and really seems to get inside their heads. At least for the first 30 minutes…then, he pulls a bait-and-switch.

It’s subtle. After disarmingly confiding he’s never voted for either Clinton, he mentions the chapter “My Forbidden Love for Hillary” from “Downsize This!” to segue into…his forbidden love for Hillary. By the time he’s finished with what morphs into an impassioned summation of the humanity that’s always driven her dedication to public service, obscured and weather-beaten as it may be from enduring years of anti-Hillary vitriol and character assassination, there’s nary a dry eye in the house…Trump supporters included. It is a master class in rhetorical showmanship.

While my description of that rhapsodic interlude could indicate otherwise, the film is not a Hillary hagiography. For example, Moore makes no bones about his disappointment regarding some of Hillary’s voting decisions while she was serving in the Senate; and he promises to hold her feet to the fire on her campaign promises if she wins. But he also waxes hopeful; launching into a speculative Utopian reverie on how things will be once Hillary becomes POTUS (*sigh*).

It was clearly Moore’s intention that Trumpland (filmed October 7 and released a scant 2 weeks afterwards) would ideally be seen by as many people as possible before November 8. However, he was careful to cover all his bases. If there is one consistency about Michael Moore’s films, it is that they are prescient…and already, I can identify at least one nail he hit squarely on the head.

This comes in the form of another speculative scenario Moore lays out, this one for Trump supporters to envision, should the election go their way. Moore assures them that he feels their pain; as a fellow Midwesterner from a manufacturing town in neighboring Michigan, he “gets” the frustrations that have been building up within the ranks of a certain white, working-class demographic, why they are feeling squeezed out, and why Trump might appear to be their savior.

Suddenly, in a wonderfully theatrical flourish, Moore seems to shapeshift into a Trump voter. He talks about how they are going to feel on Election Day, how incredibly empowering it will be to put that “x” in the Trump box on their ballot card. It’s going to be the “…biggest ‘fuck you’ ever recorded in human history” when their boy takes the White House. “It’s going to feel REAL good,” Moore assures them, “for about…a week.” Uh-oh. “A week?” What’s he mean by that?

It will kind of be like Brexit, Moore explains after a suitable dramatic pause to let things soak in. Remember how eager the Brexit supporters were to shake things up in their country, and give a big “fuck you” to Europe? Sure, they “won”. But then, buyer’s regret set in. There was even a desperate stab to petition for a re-vote, spearheaded by many of the very people who supported it!

OK, so maybe Trump voters haven’t quite reached that stage yet, but they will. Their soon-to-be Fearless Leader is sending up oodles of red flags with kleptocratic cabinet appointment after kleptocratic cabinet appointment. Now, that seems to be in direct contradiction to his campaign stance as champion of the working class…d’ya think? So…just give them time (and pitchforks).

That’s what I say about Moore’s film…give it time. And here’s a stock tip: go long on pitchforks.

Michael Moore in TrumpLand is streaming on Amazon.

# # #

BTW here’s a great government website that might not be here after January 20. Better cache it.

More reviews at Den of Cinema

–Dennis Hartley

Swastikas Came to My Block in Manhattan

by tristero

No, that is not hyperbole. This is from my block association today here on the Upper West Side of Manhattan:

You may have heard that we have had a recent graffiti incident on Tuesday, December 13 during the evening or night. The graffiti was noted on buildings *** and *** RSD as well as [***] WEA. It appears the graffiti were swastikas and a letter “A” with a circle around it. 

The police were called to the locations. I am in contact with Police Officer *** of the 24th Precinct Graffiti Squad and will provide you with any progress they make toward apprehending the perpetrators.  

It should be noted that the perpetrators struck on the evening of our block security guard’s day off. Our block security guard works six days a week.

Sure, it was probably drunk young people who had no idea what they were doing. Then again, a lot of those who perpetrated Krisatllnacht were probably drunk young people who had no idea what they were doing.

Adding: I am very afraid, but not personally. I am very afraid for the communities that Trump singled out for the attention of his deplorables.

Fascism is good for ratings

by digby

One scary ad:

Trump’s lunacy is compelling. But the media should be careful about using it as a sales pitch for “the news.”

When Trump threatened to kill people in the streets

by digby

Philippine President Duterte has been bragging that he personally killed people. It’s quite shocking.

Our new president hasn’t said he has done it. But he’s certainly implied that he’d like to. And he celebrated vigilantism too:

I wrote about this psycho fantasy for Salon back in October of 2015:

On the stump last week-end, Donald Trump entertained his followers in the wake of the massacre in Oregon with colorful fantasies of him walking down the street, pulling a gun on a would-be assailant and taking him out right there on the sidewalk. He said, “I have a license to carry in New York, can you believe that? Somebody attacks me, they’re gonna be shocked,” at which point he mimes a quick draw. 

As the crowd applauds and cheers, he goes on to say “somebody attacks me, oh they’re gonna be shocked. Can you imagine? Somebody says, oh there’s Trump, he’s easy pickins…” And then he pantomimes the quick draw again. 

Everybody laughs. And then Trump talks about an old Charles Bronson vigilante movie and they all chanted the name “Death Wish” together. Keep in mind that this sophomoric nonsense took place just two days after a disturbed man went into a classroom and shot 17 people.

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The carbon election

by digby

Ron Brownstein, whom I consider to be the best (and most prescient) of all the electoral analysts, offered up a very interesting observation about the election this week. He comes at the question of polarization from some original perspectives:

For Democrats, the lingering question of whether it was demographic or economic anxiety that primarily motivated Donald Trump’s coalition is a little like poet Robert Frost asking whether the world will end in fire or ice.

The answer may be the same, too. Frost, of course, concluded that either would do the job. “I hold with those who favor fire,” he wrote, before adding: “for destruction ice/Is also great/And would suffice.” Likewise, with Trump, the accumulating evidence suggests his core voters feel eclipsed by both the cultural and economic changes reshaping American life.

Trump’s polarizing appeal has deepened the existing geographic and demographic fault lines in American politics into a chasm so imposing it could mark the border between two countries. On one side, Hillary Clinton routed Trump in the racially and culturally diverse metropolitan centers that are helping forge a globalized, information-based, and low-carbon economy. On the other, Trump posted crushing margins in the places that feel eclipsed, or threatened, by all of those trends.

The latest evidence of this widening divide comes from Trump’s repeated selection of oil-industry allies for key Cabinet positions: Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson for secretary of state, former Texas Governor Rick Perry for secretary of energy, and Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt as the Environmental Protection Agency administrator. Tillerson and Perry have both displayed some nuance in their approach to energy. But, overall, with those choices, Trump has indelibly endorsed the fear that reducing carbon emissions to combat the destabilizing threat of global climate change will undermine economic growth.

Experience simply doesn’t justify that fear. As Mark Muro, policy director at the Brookings Institution’s Metropolitan Policy Program, calculated in an important recent analysis, since 2000 the United States increased its economic output by 30 percent while reducing carbon emissions by 10 percent. Over that period, he reported, fully 33 states grew their economies while reducing their emissions.

Yet despite these reductions, the states most bound to the fossil-fuel economy, like Oklahoma and Texas, still emit vastly more carbon per person than greener states do. And that energy divide now almost perfectly tracks the current political divide.

Comparing the latest federal figures on states’ per capita carbon emissions with the 2016 election results produces a clear pattern. Trump carried all of the 22 states with the most per capita carbon emissions, except for New Mexico, and 27 of the top 32 in all. (Colorado, Illinois, Delaware, and Minnesota were the Clinton-voting exceptions.) The Democratic nominee won 15 of the 18 states with the lowest per capita emissions—with the exception of Florida, North Carolina, and Idaho. 

The Carbon Connection

This divergence sharpened the pattern already evident under President Obama. Among the 18 lowest-emitting states, Clinton lost only one—Florida—that Obama carried in 2012. But among the top 32 emitters, five Rustbelt states that Obama won last time flipped to Trump: Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan.

Energy policy wasn’t the principal reason those states switched. But carbon emissions illuminate a state’s broader economic structure. The high-emitting states, as Muro noted, are either “producers of oil, gas, and coal or big consumers of it, with a heavy manufacturing base across the Midwest.” By contrast, “the bluer, lower-carbon states are much further along in the transition to a post-industrial economy,” he added. “They are dominated by digital and related technology and business services, they are more urban and therefore more [energy] efficient.”American politics seems destined to increasingly align the Democratic Party with voters most comfortable with the nation’s hurtling economic, demographic, and cultural change.

With only a few exceptions, cultural dynamics reinforce these economic contrasts. The high-carbon states—centered on the Plains, the Mountain West, and portions of the South—also tend to be more rural, more religiously traditional, and often less racially diverse than the low-carbon states. Following that trail, American politics seems destined to increasingly align the Democratic Party with voters most comfortable with the nation’s hurtling economic, demographic, and cultural change—and the Republican party with voters most resistant to it.

That resistance can’t reverse the change—on any front. Kids of color will comprise a majority of the under-18 population soon after 2020. Though Clinton won less than one-sixth of America’s counties, Muro’s research found her counties account for nearly two-thirds of the nation’s total economic output. And even Trump’s greatest exertions aren’t likely to reverse the long-term shift from high- to lower-carbon alternatives in both energy sources—from coal to natural gas and renewables—and economic activities—from manufacturing to services and digital innovation.

This is the important thought about the future:

The Democrats’ challenge is that their coalition has crumbled in states that fear these changes, particularly in the Rustbelt, faster than it has coalesced in the states benefiting from them, which are mostly across the Sunbelt. To recapture the White House in four years, they’ll need recovery on both fronts. But the Democrats’ long-term prospects will likely rely on accelerating their leap across these overlapping economic, cultural, and energy divides.

Though renewable sources are gaining ground in some Midwest states, Democrats face structural challenges in a preponderantly white and older region where manufacturing powered by low-cost, coal-generated electricity looms so large. More promising for them may be racially diversifying Sunbelt states that are also decoupling from fossil fuels as they shift toward both renewable energy sources and post-industrial employment. Already, Georgia, Arizona, North Carolina, and Florida rank in the bottom 20 states for carbon emissions.

Reflected in choices like his oil-drenched Cabinet, Trump’s agenda looks to mid-20th century America as its inspiration—not only culturally, but also in its vision of an economy where manufacturing and fossil fuels play a larger role, and immigrants and imports a smaller one, than they do today. Smart Democrats will recognize that, in the process, he’s leaving them an opening with the industries and regions more likely to propel growth in this century. Against the ice of Trump’s restoration, Democrats may have no choice but to stoke the fire of transformation.

Interesting, no? And with far reaching implications. I think we know that acquiescing to these folks’ desire for a return to their old economy is a losing proposition for everyone, including them.

Brownstein believes that the regional realignment is inevitable and that 2016 was caught in the transition with the GOP’s new rust belt states moving more quickly to the new composition than the Democrats’ move to the sun belt. If he’s correct in his analysis, then Democrats may be fighting the last war. A war they already lost. And in doing so they may lose the big one.  

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http://personality-testing.info/tests/SD3/

About the test:

The dark triad personality traits are three closely related yet independent personality traits that all have a somewhat malevolent connotation. The three traits are machiavellianism (a manipulative attitude), narcissism (excessive self-love), and psychopathy (lack of empathy). The dark triad has traditionally been assessed with three tests different tests, each of which had been developed individually. Most commonly, the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI) was used as the measure of narcissism, the MACH-IV for machiavellianism and the Self-Report Psychopathy Scale (SRP) for psychopathy. Format differences between these (multiple choice versus scale rating) complicated administration and analysis. The Short Dark Triad was developed in 2011 by Delroy Paulhus and Daniel Jones to provide a more uniform assessment and also to trim down the total length.

Procedure: The test consists of twenty seven statements that must be rated on how much you agree with them. The test should not take most people more than five minutes.

He has a good brain

by digby

No he wasn’t trying to be clever.  They went back and fixed it later.

Also, he’s ginning up a war.

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Not the comfy chair!
by Tom Sullivan

The special “get even” session called by Republicans in control of North Carolina’s legislature ended yesterday with the sobering message that the Republicans’ model for all-American governance is heads, we win, tails, you lose. Yesterday’s session included the arrest of 39 protesters and passage of bills to curtail the power of the incoming Democratic governor. It was, to borrow from Churchill, the end of the beginning.

There will be more arrests, more legislative gamesmanship, and more court cases to follow. The problem for Democrats, both in North Carolina and nationwide is who will lead? Responding to President Obama’s Friday press conference, Michelle Goldberg finds his “near-supernatural calm and dispassion” more hindrance than help, leaving his party “leaderless, marching toward the post-inauguration abyss without a fight.”

Jeet Heer at New Republic wishes Democrats had in place an opposition leader position to fill the void. Sen. Elizabeth Warren would be a natural under current circumstances:

Warren would be the go-to person when the media wants the Democratic Party’s response to Trump’s latest words and actions; other politicians and surrogates would take their cues from her. She would take the lead on setting and articulating the party’s talking points, while Pelosi and Schumer work to whip Democrats in Congress. Warren would give the party the tough-but-appealing face, and voice, it so badly needs. And grassroots Democrats could, and would, amplify her voice—they’d have someone to rally around, to point to as their key anti-Trump champion.

Democrats are, by nature, rule-followers—and there’s no tradition of having an official role for an opposition leader in one of the major parties. Crafting a position like this for Warren would be a radical move. But radical times call for radical measures. Democrats have to oppose Trump as hard and effectively as they can—and they can’t wait till January 20 to start mounting that opposition. The only way the party can hope to put the brakes on the worst of the Trump agenda is to come together as a cohesive party. And that means rallying around a leader who can help it speak with one voice.

The glue that holds our republic together is in acceptance of norms of democratic behavior. Trump, McConnell, NC Republicans shattering them— Norman Ornstein (@NormOrnstein) December 16, 2016

But radical just makes many Democrats uncomfortable, even when Democrat’s just another word for nothing left to lose. After the losses of November 8 and the legislative coup this week in Raleigh, Democrats ought to be ready to try something new. They won’t. Liberals are supposedly more inclined to trying new things. Yet a party stripped of power still treats its organization, worn and tattered, like the comfortable chair it can’t part with. Rather than trading in “old and busted” for the “new hotness,” party regulars again will be inclined to play it safe, to hunker down and wait out the Trump storm. Radical moves are called for, and just what Democrats from the sitting president on down are disinclined to try.

At New York magazine, Jonathan Chait finds Sen. Chuck Schumer’s strategy for protecting rather than expanding his Senate caucus emblematic of that problem, exacerbated by looking for ways to cooperate with the Trump administration:

Schumer’s idea is a faithful reflection of the way Congress thought about politics years ago, when Schumer was coming up through the system. It’s a totally plausible model, which assumes that vulnerable members of Congress can shore up their standing by proving to their constituents that they can win concrete achievements. That is how Schumer has built a career, and he wants to help Democrats in red states do the same, by finding some bills where they can shake hands with Trump and cut ribbons on some bridges, and so on. Schumer’s idea can be boiled down to:

Senate Democrats work with Trump → Voters conclude Senate Democrats are doing a good job → Senate Democrats win reelection.

Hello? McFly? That’s not how it works anymore. Chait continues:

Under Obama, Schumer logic would have dictated that vulnerable Republicans demonstrate a willingness to work together with the extremely popular new president. Instead, the Republican Party denied any bipartisan support for almost any bill, despite the popularity of both Obama and the proposals at issue. This created a sense of partisan dysfunction that allowed Republicans to make major gains in midterm elections, despite the fact that their party and its agenda remained deeply unpopular. The actual dynamic, then, is:

Senate Democrats work with Trump → Voters conclude Trump is doing a good job → Senate Republicans and Trump win reelection

or:

Senate Democrats don’t work with Trump → Voters conclude Trump is doing a bad job → Senate Democrats win reelection

How’s that first one been working for ya?

North Carolina Democrats will be electing a new state chair about the same time the national party elects a new leader for the DNC. Even in the face of what happened this week, there will be an inclination among party regulars of Jim Hunt vintage to back a safe choice, someone not too radical or confrontational, someone who won’t ruffle any feathers among establishment members or drive off regular donors — as if the party still has something left to lose.

Expect the same dynamic to play out in the race for DNC chair. Howard Dean was once the crazy radical who if elected DNC chair would ruin everything. Instead, he brought to the party a model for raising online millions from small-dollar donors and a 50-state plan that helped Democrats win in districts that had not had seen assistance from the DNC in years. Those helped turn 2006 into a big pickup year for Democrats and paved the way for Barack Obama’s win in 2008. Then Democrats went right back to their comfy chairs. Dean was out. Wasserman Schultz was in.

It’s not enough to have a progressive ideology, of course. It also takes skills. And the right combination for the right time. Plus a party willing to let a new generation of leaders take the reins.

Old and busted or new hotness?

Friday Night Soother

by digby

Kaheem saves Santa!

Kaheem just saved Santa #KaheemSavesDC 😩😩😩😭😭😭❤ pic.twitter.com/wxdTicHxuH

— SUNNI (@SunniAndTheCity) December 16, 2016

Oh heck, here’s a cute kitten and a husky:

Get a kitten they said, it will be fun they said pic.twitter.com/28QRKo0T2N

— Baby Animals (@BabyAnimalPics) December 15, 2016

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Nothing to see here folks, move along

by digby

The media is being very defensive about President Obama’s contention that they were obsessive about Hillary Clinton’s alleged corruption during the campaign. Very defensive.

John Amato caught Jake Tapper being particularly testy on the subject:

CNN’s Jake Tapper addressed how he felt the media was being unfairly tarred by both the Clinton and Trump campaigns.

He said he didn’t want to draw false equivalencies, but in reality that’s why he actually did. Tapper rightly called out Trump surrogates for attempting to deny Russia’s involvement in cyber espionage on our election process.

He said, “U.S. intelligence agencies are saying very clearly that Russians conducted these hacks of the DNC and John Podesta – some of the e-mails ended up in the public domain through Wikileaks and that may have had an influence on the election, one way or another…And that’s just a fact.”

On the flip side he argued against Clinton and President Obama for claiming that the media focused way too much on Clinton’s emails and the Foundation and not much else.

Tapper said, “We’re hearing this from comments Hillary Clinton made last night and President Obama suggesting “there’s no doubt it contributed [the Russian hacks] to the atmosphere in which the only focus for weeks at a time, months at a time were Hillary’s e-mail, the Clinton Foundation, political gossip surrounding the DNC.”

Tapper claimed, “That didn’t happen. There was no time during the election where the only thing we heard about was Hillary’s e-mail, the Clinton Foundation, political gossip surrounding the DNC.”

He continued, “You can argue we heard about it too much, but I certainly recall a lot of negative coverage of Donald Trump.”

Tapper apparently hasn’t heard or didn’t understand the real critique. It’s not that the press didn’t offer negative coverage of trump, it’s that they pounded on simple story about Clinton allegedly being secretive and corrupt over and over and over again until it took on a life of its own. It got to the point that the word “email” and Clinton added up to Watergate in people’s minds. And it simply was not justified. Clinton’s so-called “corruption” was a pale imitation of what we’re seeing with Trump and I don’t think very many reporters were following his conflicts of interest and the fact that he had no plan to deal with it. It only came up in one primary debate at the very beginning of the cycle — and Maria Bartiromo let trump get away with saying ythat giving his business to his kids is the same thing as a blind trust.

There was no contest between the Clinton email story and the overwhelming number of egregious conflicts, crimes and
grotesque abuses in Donald Trump’s history. To see the press defend their phony need to “balance” that coverage is really depressing.

FWIW, I wrote a piece about the press for Salon last June in which I mentioned a Clinton state department story that Jake Tapper seemed to see as an extremely important example of government malfeasance that played into Clinton’s reputation for secretiveness. This is an excerpt:

Here is an example of false equivalence from just this week. Nobody has done more to probe Donald Trump’s noxious views than CNN’s Jake Tapper. His grilling of the candidate over his bigoted comments about the federal judge overseeing his Trump University lawsuit in California was as good as it gets and he received many kudos for his aggressive journalism.

He continued to report on Trump on his show yesterday but also featured a harsh criticism of Hillary Clinton in which he lambasted the State Department’s stated inability to release emails pertaining to her work on the Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal to reporter David Sirota until after the election. He took on a very aggressive tone, editorializing about the importance of releasing this information when people are deciding whether to vote for Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump.

However, he notes that while Clinton was President Obama’s Secretary of State she openly advocated for the deal in glowing terms, even calling it the “gold standard”, facts which have been known for years and have been well hashed out on the campaign trail and in the debates with Bernie Sanders. Now she says she has changed her mind and is against the deal. Politifact called it a flip-flop.

So what exactly does Tapper think they will learn about her position that they don’t already know? Maybe she was more involved than she says she was, which would be interesting, but somewhat meaningless since we know she advocated strongly for it all over the world. In the end you either believe she’s really changed her mind or you don’t and these documents from years ago will not shed any new light on that.

I don’t mean to pick on Tapper. He’s a great journalist, one of the best on cable news. The temptation to try to “even things out” with this sort of coverage has to be overwhelming when a personality like Trump dominates the coverage the way he does. It must feel to a straight mainstream journalist as if they’re piling on him every day and it looks like they’re being partisan and unfair. Certainly the right wing is accusing them of that non-stop — as they have been for more than 30 years.

But the result of this “distortion toward the middle” as Jay Rosen calls it, has the perverse affect of normalizing Trump and pathologizing Clinton in a way that equalizes them to Trump’s advantage. He is an unqualified, unfit, unhinged authoritarian demagogue and she is a mainstream Democratic party politician. There is no equivalence between them. Let’s hope the press listens to some of these critics and does a serious gut check whenever they are tempted to “balance” the coverage in this election.

This is what happened. And it had an effect. A big one, even if they refuse to admit it.

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