Month: March 2021

The National Review is unhappy with Joe Biden. Imagine that.

He’s right that he isn’t so centrist. But he didn’t run as a centrist. He ran as a mainstream Democrats which is decidedly center-left, which means that a whole lot of his policies are going to be progressive by definition. No, he’s probably not going to defund the police and abolish ICE and prisons. Those, among others, are left wing positions that will push the Democrats toward reforms but are not going to pass as is. Most of Biden’s agenda is right smack in the mainstream of Democratic — and American — politics.

Sorry wingnuts. That’s where the majority of the country is right now. You cast your lot with a right wing extremist and some sane people started looking at the Dems more closely and realized that they weren’t what the Republicans portrayed them to be.

As for competence? Welp, a lot of people seem to disagree with him::

President Biden is starting his tenure in White House with the approval of 61 percent of voters, according to a new Harvard CAPS-Harris Poll survey released exclusively to The Hill on Monday.

Biden’s initial approval numbers are markedly higher than those of former President Trump when he first took office. The first Harvard CAPS-Harris Poll survey of Trump’s presidency, conducted in February 2017, showed his approval rating at 48 percent.

Only about 39 percent of respondents said they disapprove of the job Biden is doing in the White House, according to the poll. 

Trump never got above 50% in his entire term.

I’m sure Biden’s numbers are going to falter. They always do. But right now, the vast majority of the country are seeing a competent president and they support that.

Fox News announced that it is hiring Donald Trump’s chief liar and propagandist today. There are lots of complaints but this one from a Fox News staffer says it best:

“It’s truly disgusting they fired hard-working journalists who did care about facts and news reporting only to turn around and hire a mini-Goebbels whose incessant lies from the White House helped incite an insurrection on our democracy that got five people killed, including a police officer,” a Fox News insider raged to The Daily Beast. “Post-Trump Fox is quickly becoming a very scary place and quite dangerous for our democracy. It’s not even conservative news anymore. They’ve plunged into an alternate reality where extremist propaganda is the only course on the menu.”

That’s not digby or Atrios talking. That’s a Fox news staffer.

And he or she is right. That’s exactly what it’s becoming because they are terrified they’ve lost their audience to the OAN amateur hour. Pathetic.

Everyone knows what they’re doing:

In voting rights case, Justice Barrett asks GOP lawyer Michael Carvin “what’s the interest” to Republicans in keeping voting restrictions in AZ.

Carvin: “Because it puts us at a competitive disadvantage relative to Democrats. Politics is a zero-sum game.”pic.twitter.com/In7GULkSUb

— The Recount (@therecount) March 2, 2021

The Monkey Cage took a survey:

The Republican Party appears to be at war with itself, split between ex-president Donald Trump’s supporters and establishment Republicans. Consider what happened to Rep. Liz Cheney after she voted to impeach Trump, and Sen. Bill Cassidy when he voted to convict him: Both suffered the wrath of the pro-Trump wings of the party. Is the apparent fissure in the GOP real or imagined?

For answers, we studied the opinions of supporters of the “Make America Great Again” movement. The MAGA movement, often viewed as a divisive force in American politics, includes roughly half of Republican primary voters. Its adherents are Trump’s most committed supporters. Fear of electoral reprisal from the MAGA “base” helps explain why so few Republicans dare cross Trump, even after the Capitol insurrection on Jan. 6.

Our panel study examines the characteristics of MAGA supporters, their beliefs, and what motivates them. We find that at least half of MAGA supporters tend to be White, Christian, male, over 65 years of age, retired, and earn at least $50,000 a year. Further, roughly one-third have at least a college degree. Our data suggests their commitment to Trump is unshakable, motivated by the perception of a threat to their status as the culturally dominant group.

Our panel study tracked the political opinions of MAGA supporters in two waves between Dec. 24 and Jan. 28. We recruited participants by running an ad for the survey on Facebook from Dec. 24 to 31 that targeted users interested in “Make America Great Again” (MAGA). The ad was shown to Facebook users in every state, proportional to population. This approach resulted in the successful recruitment of 1,431 MAGA supporters from all 50 states who completed the first wave of the survey. Out of these respondents, 702 indicated their willingness to participate in a second wave. When emailed invitations to take the second survey, conducted between Jan. 13 and Jan. 28, 295 responded.

Our respondents are committed to making their views known. For example, at least 50 percent of these MAGA supporters have been politically active — signing petitions, contacting their representatives, participating in boycotts or donating to campaigns. Beyond that, roughly 45 percent report they’ve attended political meetings, 35 percent attended rallies, and 30 percent volunteered for campaigns.

Further, MAGA supporters overwhelmingly believe Trump’s election misinformation, as well as other conspiracy theories. Nearly 100 percent of MAGA supporters believe Trump’s claims that the election was stolen, and 70 percent support Trump remaining in office beyond the allowed two terms. Their distrust extends to other areas as well. They overwhelmingly agree, in proportions of 80 percent or higher, with statements suggesting that unknown elites control America and with conspiracy theories about covid-19.

MAGA supporters are also biased against Blacks, immigrants and women. They fully accept Trump’s rhetoric on these groups, downplay any obstacles faced by Black Americans, view immigration as a threat to U.S. laws and culture and agree women are seeking special favors, or worse, are trying to control men.

What explains MAGA supporters’ commitment to Trump and his conspiratorial and racist views? The answer is “status threat,” or the belief that one’s way of life or status is undermined by social and cultural change. As we’ve shown elsewhere, those who are attracted to reactionary movements like MAGA are often motivated by anxiety about possible cultural dispossession — seeing their social and cultural dominance eclipsed by other groups.

That White Christian men feel under siege is nothing new. We need only look at the Know Nothing Party of the 1850s, the Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s, the John Birch Society of the 1960s, and the tea party of the Obama years to see how often a slice of this demographic slides into bigotry. Perhaps this explains MAGA movement’s close association with racism, sexism and nativism. What’s more, more than half are middle class by income, earning over $50,000 a year; almost a third graduated college, making them middle class by that educational standard. Moreover, MAGA’s demography reflects the profile of people who invaded the Capitol in January.

MAGA supporters see Trump as their protector, the barrier between themselves and communities of color, feminists, and immigrants from what Trump called “shithole” countries, whom they perceive as threats. Perhaps this explains why they refuse to accept the election results. This may also be the reason only 4 percent of them thought Trump should have been impeached.

MAGA nation’s loyalty to Trump and commitment to a Trump-led GOP makes it hard for the Republican Party to break away from the former president.Since the 2016 presidential election, this group’s commitment to the GOP is hard to deny. In Trump’s initial run for office in 2016, roughly 90 percent of MAGA supporters voted for him. In the 2018 midterm and since, MAGA voted for Republican candidates without exception. Although Trump lost in 2020, MAGA supporters’ political commitment suggests he had coattails, narrowing Democrats’ advantage in the House.

Understanding why MAGA, also known as the Republican base, supports Trump, reveals why the GOP can’t break away from him: They are intensely loyal to Trump, motivated by status threat, and convert their anxiety and commitment into votes. If any Republican tries to do disavow Trump, they will face a primary challenge. Even those sure they would survive such a primary know that their political ambitions will need Trump’s blessing.

For now, the party will remain in the hands of Trump and his acolytes. That’s likely to increase polarization, with Trump supporters’ passion for the former president matched only by his opponents’ revulsion. And MAGA supporters’ willingness to reject facts that do not reflect well on their leader is likely to continue to destabilize U.S. democracy.

Basically, they are having a tantrum and are willing to take down the country if they don’t get their way.

Whatever the Trump administration did with the massive sums of money being spent on COVID has to be looked at very carefully. And it’s not because they shouldn’t have spent it. It’s who benefitted from it.

Check this out:

The Trump administration quietly took around $10 billion from a fund meant to help hospitals and health care providers affected by Covid-19 and used the money to bankroll Operation Warp Speed contracts, four former Trump administration officials told STAT.

The Department of Health and Human Services appears to have used a financial maneuver that allowed officials to spend the money without telling Congress, and the agency got permission from its top lawyer to do so. Now, the Biden administration is refusing to say whether the outlay means there will be less money available for hospitals, physicians, nursing homes, and other providers.

Several provider groups said they had not heard that $10 billion for providers was spent on Warp Speed contracts until STAT’s reporting. Congress set aside that money to help health care providers pay for pandemic-related expenses including staffing, personal protective equipment, care for uninsured patients, and vaccine distribution. One of the top hospital lobbyists in D.C., who also did not know about the outlay, emphasized how much some hospitals still need the funding.

“Hospitals in need of the funding would be outraged to know that some of the money was siphoned off, even for important uses, because Congress was clear that this money was for providers and clinicians,” said Chip Kahn, CEO of the Federation of American Hospitals.

Former White House budget office director Russ Vought, one of the key officials involved in the deliberations, defended the decision. He told STAT the expenditure was necessary to support the successful development and purchase of Covid-19 vaccines and therapeutics.

“We had to draw from the Provider Relief Fund and had the authority to do so. It was the right thing to do in order to move as quickly as possible because lives were on the line. Thankfully we did. We would do it again,” Vought said in an email.The Operation Warp Speed program was created by the Trump administration, not Congress, so officials pulled funding from existing pools of money. But by late summer last year, the Warp Speed accounts were running dry, a former senior HHS official said.

Nobody would have denied Operation Warp Speed the money it needed. But the idea that they would surreptitiously take money from other needed programs instead of going to congress says everything. They just could not do anything right.

And now these Republicans are refusing to vote for the COVID relief plan because they are just as bad as the Trump administration.

By the way, that monster Vought is going to hell. He was one of the worst.

I think this is supposed to be some kind of great innovation but it’s … not. It’s the same old stuff that’s done by both sides to try to appeal to swing voters:

House Republicans will reclaim their majority in 2022 by offering candidates who are women, minorities or veterans, a memo obtained by Axios says.

The document, drafted by a super PAC blessed by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, names top Democrats to target — Jared Golden of Maine, Matt Cartwright of Pennsylvania and Ron Kind of Wisconsin — and the type of Republican candidates to beat them.

The Congressional Leadership Fund spent $140 million during the 2020 cycle, helping Republicans defy the odds and come within five seats of winning the House. The group now plans to play a key role in shaping the 2022 contests.

The memo, written by CLF President Dan Conston, singled out Golden, Cartwright and Kind because they live in Trump-friendly rural and working-class districts.

Conston recommends “star Navy SEAL” Derrick Van Orden seek a rematch with Kind but says the GOP needs to find new, “stronger recruits” to take on Golden and Cartwright.

The memo is blunt about candidate recruitment.

“In 2020, all 15 of the seats Republicans flipped were won by a woman, a minority or a veteran,” Conston writes. “Continuing to recruit similar candidates is a foundational building block to the majority in 2022.”

 House Republican candidates performed substantially better than Donald Trump did in suburban districts. The suburbs don’t need to be the GOP killing fields that they were under Trump.

Republicans will benefit in 2022 from “Democrats’ overreach” on policies such as lengthy school closures, curtailment of fracking and pipeline cancellations, Conston writes.

The memo sounds the alarm about insufficient Republican candidate fundraising, calling it the “single biggest threat to Republicans taking back the majority.

“In competitive races, Democrats out-raised half of all Republican incumbents and all but three Republican challengers were out-raised, the memo states.

During the final stretch, Democratic candidates spent $88 million more on television than Republicans.

CLF has deep pockets, but super PACs pay far higher TV ad rates than campaigns. Conston emphasized that candidates will need to “stand on their own two feet” and boost their own digital fundraising, to get CLF support.

 Conston predicts redistricting will bring on “painful member-vs.-member primaries,” but he expects redistricting to ultimately help Republicans pick up seats in Texas, Florida, Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina and Montana.

The Republicans have just a teensy problem. Unless their candidates are batshit insane, whether women, veterans or racial minorities, they can’t get through a primary. Maybe Mccarthy thinks he can finesse that but it’s highly doubtful in a party full of lunatics.

The Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans has decided the Pfizer and Moderna coronavirus vaccines are acceptable to Catholics, but the new Johnson & Johnson single-shot vaccine is “morally compromised.” It was developed using cloned cells derived from fetuses aborted nearly a half a century ago.

The Religion News Service notes:

The statement is part of a longstanding debate regarding the use of what are referred to as HEK293 cells, which reportedly trace their origins to an aborted fetus from the 1970s. Scholars and ethicists have noted that HEK293 and similar cell lines are clones and are not the original fetal tissue.

From Ed Kilgore comments at New York magazine:

It’s worth noting that another Catholic diocese not far away, in Tyler, Texas, has rejected all three vaccines as having been “produced immorally” because of obscure connections to an abortion in the distant past. But an advisory from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops adjudged otherwise on the two older vaccines, and the Vatican itself is administering the Pfizer vaccine (with Pope Francis and his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, among its recipients). Indeed, the Vatican has threatened to fire employees who do not get vaccinated.

So the faithful in Tyler, Texas, have to decide whether they will insist upon being more Catholic than the pope(s), while those in New Orleans and elsewhere may have to wait for the Church to sort itself out on all things COVID-19. Many, of course, will just follow their own consciences, as American Catholics often do, with relatively little weight placed on guidance from the hierarchy.

Better not tell Catholics in Texas and Louisiana how much U.S. wealth was “produced immorally” from centuries of slave labor.

Possible evidence of the Oath Keepers “quick reaction force” (QRF) mentioned in court documents and hearings on the Jan. 6 insurrection investigation appeared Monday at Arlington, Virginia-based news site ARLnow:

On Jan. 6, a group of ten or so men — at least one of whom was wearing a tactical earpiece — watched the storming of the U.S. Capitol from across the Potomac in Arlington.

Previously unpublished photos taken by ARLnow that day show the men loitering near the Marine Corps War Memorial, with the overrun Capitol in the background. Parked nearby are numerous vehicles, mostly pickup trucks and SUVs with out-of-state license plates.

One pickup truck, with large toolbox in the back, was left running.

The man with the earpiece appears to have been focused on some sort of communications device with an antenna. He was among a group standing outside, in the cold, wearing hooded sweatshirts and other inconspicuous cold weather gear. None were wearing the tactical vests and helmets that militia members who charged into the Capitol that day wore.

Still, the group was deemed suspicious enough that Arlington County police received at least one call from a passerby, concerned about what they were doing there. An officer drove by after the 4 p.m. call but didn’t see anything, according to police department spokesman Ashley Savage.

The federal government’s “working understanding” is that the Oath Keepers had a “quick reaction force” stationed outside the District of Columbia, with weapons, on January 6.https://t.co/svAzVsi51u via @jvgarrison

— George W. Papajohn (@GeorgeWPapajohn) February 26, 2021

The Marine Corps War Memorial is about a 10-minute drive from the Oath Keepers’ U.S. Capitol area of operations (AO).

From Talking Points Memo’s coverage:

According to prosecutors, alleged Capitol conspirator Tom Caldwell wrote about a QRF participant in a text message to Watkins on Dec. 30. The message was subsequently quoted in the federal indictment against several Oath Keepers.

“As we speak he is trying to book a room at Comfort Inn Ballston/Arlington because of its close-in location and easy access to downtown because he feels 1) he’s too broken down to be on the ground all day and 2) he is committed to being the quick reaction force anf [sic] bringing the tools if something goes to hell,” Caldwell allegedly wrote.

“That way the boys don’t have to try and schlep weps on the bus. He’ll bring them in his truck the day before,” Caldwell allegedly added, seemingly referring to weapons.

In an alleged Jan. 2 message to another indicted conspirator, Donovan Crowl, Caldwell referred to someone named “Paul” getting a room at the same hotel. “He will be the quick reaction force,” Caldwell allegedly wrote, adding later: “Paul will have the goodies in case things go bad and we need to get heavy.”

It’s all fun and war games until someone faces indictment for armed insurrection. Walter Einenkel of Daily Kos writes that with possible jail time in their futures, Proud Boys and Oath Keepers are playing contrite in court:

This comes after Proud Boy members trying out the legal defense of, “Whoops, we didn’t know we were breaking the law,” or, “Whoops, we thought Donald Trump was telling us the truth,” or, “Whoops, we didn’t think we could get arrested for breaking the law.” Watkins in particular tried to renounce her involvement in the Oath Keepers and say she was finished playing seditionist, so could she go home and pretend none of this happened? 

Jessica Watkins had told an Oath Keeper recruit, “I’m no doctor. I’m a soldier. A medic with a rifle, maybe, but a solider. I will hurt/kill those who try to hurt/kill me or others.”

https://twitter.com/jsrailton/status/1366451768150945801?s=20

“Don’t plan an insurrection on Facebook,” Macy Wheeler warned Oath Keepers Sunday. FBI filings make it plain “how hard it is to delete evidence in an age of social media while conspiring with dozens of other co-conspirators.” Filings also show the FBI plan to get sealed warrants against many alleged conspirators “who are obviously obstructing the investigation,” but may hold them in reserve while obtaining more evidence against them and immediate co-conspirators. 

Wheeler reviews the state of several investigations against a team of Oathkeepers in Washington, D.C. on Jan. 6. Some of their planning they shared over social media and in texts. Whoops again.

[h/t DC]

I know that will shock you:

Though the Capitol Hill insurrection was inspired by former president Donald Trump’s lies about the 2020 election and mounted by his followers, some Republicans have tried to pin the blame elsewhere. One prominent target is House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), as this tweet indicates.

We were convinced by House Republican staff to hold off on fact-checking this tweet before last week’s testimony by key figures in the Capitol Hill security during the Jan. 6 events. But if anything, that testimony further undermined Jordan’s widely circulated tweet.

(Jordan also tweeted it “took over an hour” to get approval on Jan. 6 for National Guard support from “Pelosi’s team” after a request was made. We will hold off on fact-checking that, because there continues to be a gap between phone records and individual recollections of the calls. But the New York Times reported that video indicates Pelosi approved the request on the spot once the request was passed to her.)

The Facts:

There are three key players here: Steven A. Sund, the U.S. Capitol Police chief; Paul D. Irving, the House sergeant-at-arms, and Michael C. Stenger, the Senate sergeant-at-arms. All three resigned under pressure after the Jan. 6 insurrection.AD

At issue is what they discussed on Jan. 4, two days before the Capitol riot. Jordan refers to Irving as “her Sergeant at Arms,” but Irving, a former Secret Service supervisor, had been appointed in 2012 by then-House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio).

In a Feb. 1 letter to Pelosi, Sund wrote he “approached the two Sergeants at Arms to request the assistance of the National Guard, as I had no authority to do so without an Emergency Declaration by the Capitol Police Board (CPB).” He said he spoke first to Irving, who “stated that he was concerned about the ‘optics’ and didn’t feel that the intelligence supported it.” Irving suggested Sund check in with Stenger, at the time chair of the CPB and get his thoughts. “Instead of approving the use of the National Guard, however, Mr. Stenger suggested I ask them how quickly we could get support if needed and to ‘lean forward’ in case we had to request assistance on January 6,” Sund wrote.

Sund said he then contacted Gen. William Walker, commanding officer of the D.C. National Guard. Walker “advised that he could repurpose 125 National Guard and have them to me fairly quickly, once approved. I asked General Walker to be prepared in the event that we requested them.”

That was the state of play when Jordan tweeted. Note that there is no indication that Pelosi was at all involved. Irving supposedly had made a vague reference to “optics,” but there is no indication what that means. Moreover, Stenger, the Senate sergeant-at-arms, was also reluctant to support an immediate dispatch of National Guard troops. So there is little reason to suggest Irving, acting under Pelosi’s direction, only was responsible. It appeared to have been a joint decision.

When we asked for the evidence for the tweet, a spokesman for the minority staff of the House Judiciary Committee, where Jordan is the top Republican, at the time referred us to a Feb. 15 letter to Pelosi from a group of Republicans that referred to the “optics” statement by Irving. The letter suggested that Irving’s stance had been dictated by Pelosi and asked a series of questions:

“When then-Chief Sund made a request for National Guard support on January 4th, why was that request denied?”

“Did Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving get permission or instruction from your staff on January 4th prior to denying Chief Sund’s request for the National Guard?”

“What conversations and what guidance did you and your staff give the Sergeant at Arms leading up to January 6th specific to the security posture of the campus?”

Interesting questions. But that also means at the time there was no evidence to support the tweet, just speculation. Still, we decided to wait for the Senate hearing on Feb. 23 to see if more information could be gleaned. It was the first time Irving spoke in public about the Jan. 6 events.AD

At the hearing, Irving said that the proposed National Guard troops were to be unarmed and only to “work traffic control near the Capitol.” He included an explanation of the term optics: “My use of the word optics has been mischaracterized in the media. Let me be clear. Optics as portrayed in the media played no role whatsoever in my decisions about security. And any suggestion to the contrary is false. Safety was always paramount when making security plans for January 6th.”

In his questioning, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) tried to drill down deeper in the conversations among Sund, Irving and Stenger. He asked Irving: “Were you concerned that having the Guard present would look like it was to militarize? Were you concerned about the criticism of the Guard being deployed in Washington … earlier this summer?”

In this question, Hawley was getting at the heart of the question about “optics” — the belief among some Republicans that Pelosi somehow had communicated to Irving that she did not want images of National Guard troops at the Capitol, given what had happened during the criminal justice protests after the George Floyd killing.

“Senator, I was not concerned about appearance whatsoever. It was all about safety and security,” Irving responded. “Any reference would have been related to appropriate use of force, display of force. And ultimately, the question on the table, when we look at any security asset, is: does the intelligence warrant it? Is the security plan match with the intelligence? And again, the collective answer was yes.”

Later in the hearing, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) asked whether Irving or Stenger had communicated the Jan. 4 decision on National Guard troops to congressional leadership.

“On Jan. 4, no, I had no follow-up conversations,” Irving said. “And it was not until the 6th that I alerted leadership that we might be making a request. And that was the end of the discussion.”

“For myself, it was Jan. 6 that I mentioned it to Leader [Mitch] McConnell’s staff,” Stenger said.

Drew Hammill, a spokesman for Pelosi, said there had been no discussions between Irving and either Pelosi or her staff about National Guard deployment before Jan. 6. “We are not involved in the day-to-day operations of that office at all,” he said. “We expect security professionals to make secu

The Pinocchio test

Without evidence, Jordan asserted that House Speaker Pelosi had denied a request for National Guard troops two days before the insurrection. Instead, public testimony shows she did not even hear about the request until two days later. Jordan also tried to pin the blame on the House sergeant-at-arms, but testimony shows the Senate sergeant-at-arms also was not keen about the idea.

We will keep an eye on this issue in case new information emerges that would result in a new rating. But for the moment, Jordan earns Four Pinocchios for his tweet. Speculation is not the same as evidence.

It’s ridiculous on its face, of course. Nancy Pelosi had no reason to deny National Guard protection from Donald Trump’s rabid mob, which had already rampaged through DC on a couple of earlier post-election events. But sure, blame Pelosi for the thugs who rampaged through the Capitol screaming ” tell that bitch Pelosi we’re coming for her!”

I guess she was asking for it.

Great leadership here:

Former President Donald Trump and former first lady Melania Trump received the Covid-19 vaccine at the White House in January, a Trump adviser told CNN on Monday. It was not immediately clear which vaccine or how many doses each had received.

The revelation comes after the former President urged his followers to get vaccinated for the virus during his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando, Florida, on Sunday, telling the audience, “How unpainful that vaccine shot is, so everybody go get your shot.”

That encouragement marked a notable shift as Trump, during his time in office, had long dismissed the gravity of the virus and eschewed practices like social distancing and mask wearing.

CNN previously reported that a White House official had said in mid-December that Trump wouldn’t be administered a coronavirus vaccine until it was recommended by the White House medical team.

The official said at the time that Trump was still receiving the benefits of the monoclonal antibody cocktail he was given during his recovery from Covid-19 earlier in the fall, when both he and the first lady had tested positive for the virus.

Again, his unwillingness to admit the virus existed (“all they talk about is covid, covid,covid!!!”) made him refuse to be a leader and show the world that he was getting the vaccine and tell his cult that they should get it too.

Now that he wants credit for Biden’s successful rollout he’s touting them.

What a monster.