What better way to celebrate the birthday of the Prince of Peace?
‘Tis the season to send colorful holiday cards of the family with shit-eating grins and semi-autos. The New York Times Editorial Board this morning laments the country’s “toxic gun culture.” Exhibits A and B: cards sent last year by the families of Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Lauren Boebert (R-Co.). What could be more American than celebrating the birthday of the Prince of Peace than with an all-in-the-family display of military-style firepower?
Make your family’s season bright this year with gleaming, black AR-15s. Or bring a tear to your little patriot’s eye on Christmas morning with a red, white and blue one tricked-out with a close-combat holographic sight:
These weapons, lightweight and endlessly customizable, aren’t often used in the way their devotees imagine — to defend themselves and their families. (In a recent comprehensive survey, only 13 percent of all defensive use of guns involved any type of rifle.) Nevertheless, in the 18 years since the end of the federal assault weapons ban, the country has been flooded with an estimated 25 million AR-15-style semiautomatic rifles, making them one of the most popular in the United States. When used in mass shootings, the AR-15 makes those acts of violence far more deadly. It has become the gun of choice for mass killers, from Las Vegas to Uvalde, Sandy Hook to Buffalo.
“What’s wrong with these people?”
One imagines the card former Missouri governor Eric Greitens might send of his family (wait, he’s twice divorced and currently unmarried, per Wikipedia). Improvising, the former Navy SEAL might invade Santa’s privacy with a mercenary assault team in ugly Christmas sweaters.
In his recent book “Gunfight: My Battle Against the Industry That Radicalized America,” Ryan Busse, a former firearms company executive, described attending a Black Lives Matter rally with his son in Montana in 2020. At the rally, dozens of armed men, some of them wearing insignia from two paramilitary groups — the 3 Percenters and the Oath Keepers — appeared, carrying assault rifles. After one of the armed men assaulted his 12-year-old son, Mr. Busse had his epiphany.
“For years prior to this protest, advertising executives in the gun industry had been encouraging the ‘tactical lifestyle,’” Mr. Busse wrote. The gun industry created a culture that “glorified weapons of war and encouraged followers to ‘own the libs.’”
The formula is a simple one: More rage, more fear, more gun sales.
A portion of those proceeds are then funneled back into politics through millions of dollars in direct contributions, lobbying and spending on outside groups, most often in support of Republicans.
All told, gun rights groups spent a record $15.8 million on lobbying in 2021 and $2 million in the first quarter of 2022, the transparency group OpenSecrets reported. “From 1989 to 2022, gun rights groups contributed $50.5 million to federal candidates and party committees,” the group found. “Of that, 99 percent of direct contributions went to Republicans.”
The toxic atmosphere in this country and spate of gunfire attacks on electical infrastructure had me this weekend catching up on a couple of films I’d missed over the years: Mississippi Burning (1988) and Hotel Rwanda (2004). Man’s inhumanity to man, Jack Frost shooting off your nose, and all that. The line I can’t get out of my head is from Willem Dafoe in the former, the FBI agent cradling a young black man they’d rescued from lynching: “What’s wrong with these people?“
Being the New York Times, the Board felt the need to soften the criticism with “armed right-wing extremists and those who fetishize AR-15s do not represent typical American gun owners or their beliefs,” etc., while calling for stricter regulations on guns and marketing.
Anything stronger might muzzle-brake the holiday spirit.
It’s time for the obligatory list, culled from the first-run films I reviewed in 2022:
Day by Day – Felix Herngren’s dramedy (scripted by Tapio Leopold) is a delightful, life-affirming road movie from Sweden about…death. Before a terminally ill man (Sven Wallter) can make his getaway for a solo trip to a Swiss assisted-suicide clinic, several of his longtime friends at the retirement home catch wind of his plans, and it turns into a group outing (much to his chagrin). Lovely European travelogue (nicely photographed by Viktor Davidson). Funny and touching (yes …I laughed, I cried). Sadly, Wallter passed away soon after the film wrapped, adding poignancy to his performance.
Drunken Birds – Ivan Grbovic’s languidly paced, beautifully photographed culture clash/class war drama (Canada’s 2022 Oscar submission) concerns a Mexican cartel worker who finds migrant work in Quebec while seeking a long-lost love. Grbovic co-wrote with Sara Mishara. Mishara pulls double duty as DP; her painterly cinematography adds to the echoes of Terrence Malick’s Days of Heaven. It also reminded me of Ang Lee’s The Ice Storm; a network narrative about people desperately seeking emotional connection amid a minefield of miscommunication. (Streaming on Prime Video)
Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song – Several years ago, I saw Tom Jones at the Santa Barbara Bowl. Naturally, he did his cavalcade of singalong hits, but an unexpected moment occurred mid-set, when he launched into Leonard Cohen’s “Tower of Song”. Jones’ performance felt so intimate, confessional, and emotionally resonant that you’d think Cohen had tailored it just for him. When Jones sang, I was born like this, I had no choice/I was born with the gift of a golden voice, I “got” it. Why shouldn’t Tom Jones cover a Cohen song? I later learned “Tower of Song” has also been covered by the likes of U2, Nick Cave, and The Jesus and Mary Chain.
A truly great song tends to transcend its composer, taking on a life of its own. The reasons why can be as enigmatic as the act of creation itself. In an archival clip in Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine’s beautifully constructed documentary, the late Cohen muses, “If I knew where songs came from, I’d go there more often.” Using the backstory of his beloved composition “Hallelujah” as a catalyst, the filmmakers take us “there”, rendering a moving, spiritual portrait of a poet, a singer-songwriter, and a seeker. (Streaming on Prime Video)
The Integrity of Joseph Chambers – This psychological thriller has a slow burn, but really gets under your skin. Early one morning, a white-collar father of two (Clayne Crawford) rolls out of his warm bed and readies himself to go deer hunting. His half-awake (and concerned) wife reminds him he has never gone hunting by himself and has limited experience with firearms. Undeterred, he insists that the best way to get experience is to “just go out and do it.” After stopping at a friend’s house to borrow his pickup truck (and a rifle), he heads for the woods. What could possibly go wrong? Anchored by Crawford’s intense performance, writer-director Robert Machoian has fashioned a riveting tale infused with a dash of Dostoevsky and a dollop of Deliverance.
The Man in the Basement (aka L’Homme de la Cave) – There are fifty shades of Chabrol in Philippe Le Guay’s “neighbor from hell” thriller (scripted by Le Guay with Gilles Taurand and Marc Weitzmann). One of my favorite contemporary French actors, François Cluzet (Tell No One) plays a quiet fellow who buys the unused basement of an upper-crust couple’s Parisian apartment, presumably for storage. With the ink barely dry on the deed, the couple realize too late that he clearly intends to live in the cellar (sans plumbing). It gets worse when they find out that his online persona is every liberal’s nightmare. Always check references!
Moonage Daydream – David Bowie invented the idea of “re-invention”. It’s also possible that he invented a working time machine because he was always ahead of the curve (or leading the herd). He was the poster boy for “postmodern”. Space rock? Meet Major Tom. Glam rock? Meet Ziggy Stardust. Doom rock? Meet the Diamond Dog. Neo soul? Meet the Thin White Duke. Electronica? Ich bin ein Berliner. New Romantic? We all know Major Tom’s a junkie…
Of all his personas, “David Jones” is the most enigmatic; perhaps, as suggested in Brett Morgen’s trippy film, even to Bowie himself. More On the Road than on the records, Morgen’s kaleidoscopic thesis is a globe-trotting odyssey of an artist in search of himself. This is anything but a traditional, linear biography. Morgen doesn’t tell you everything about Bowie’s life, he simply shows you. Even if David Jones remains elusive as credits roll, the journey itself is absorbing and ultimately moving. Think of it as theKoyaanisqatsiof rock docs. (Full review) (Streaming on Amazon Prime)
My Love Affair With Marriage – It’s a safe bet that the most oft-asked question throughout history (well, after “Where’s the restroom?”) is “What is love?”. Philosophers, poets, writers, psychologists and even scientists have tackled this age-old query, and come up with just as many disparate explanations. This lack of consensus informs the clever conceit behind Latvian animator Signe Baumane’s mixed-media feature.
Baumane’s semi-autobiographical study follows “Zelma” as she navigates the various passages of sexual self-awareness from childhood to adulthood…which then presents her with the complexities of love and relationships. Zelma’s vignettes are interspersed with neuroscience/biochemistry analyses done in the style of high school educational films (remember those?), with the odd musical number thrown in. Funny, touching, and insightful.
Nude Tuesday – I must warn you: this film (from New Zealand) is complete gibberish. Literally…the dialog is spoken in a made-up language. Frankly, I was fully prepared to find this gimmick annoying, but thankfully a) there are subtitles and b) the film is nonetheless entertaining.
Writer-director Armagan Ballantyne’s off-the wall dramedy concerns middle-aged couple Laura and Bruno (co-screenwriter Jackie van Beek and Damon Harriman), who have hit a roadblock in their marriage. Bruno’s mother browbeats them into attending a couple’s retreat, to rekindle their passion. The resort is lorded over by a free-spirited sex guru (played with aplomb by Jemaine Clement). Vacillating between riotous cringe comedy and surprising sweetness, the film also pokes gentle fun at “self-actualization” culture (reminiscent of Bill Persky’s 1980 satire Serial).
Sweetheart Deal – Dopesick and finding temporary solace from an RV-dwelling man of means by no means dubbed “The Mayor of Aurora Avenue”, four sex workers (Kristine, Sara, Amy, and Tammy) strive to keep life and soul together as they walk an infamous Seattle strip. With surprising twists and turns, Elisa Levine and Gabriel Miller’s astonishingly intimate portrait is the most intense, heart-wrenching, and compassionate documentary I have seen about Seattle street life since Streetwise.
Polystyrene: I Am A Cliché – I reckon few artists consciously set out to be “groundbreaking” or “influential”, but whether by accident or design, 19-year-old Poly Styrene came out of the gate flying in the face of fashion. She not only fearlessly waded into the male-dominated punk world of the late 70s (which, despite its association with an anti-racist, anti-fascist ethos, was an overtly “laddish” club), but did so as a woman of color (the Anglo-Somali singer-songwriter is credited as the progenitor of the Riot Grrrl and Afro-Punk movements).
If you’ve ever seen X-Ray Spex’s video for “Oh Bondage Up Yours”, you know that Styrene had a charismatic presence and a unique, powerful voice that belied her diminutive stature. With its “fuck you” lyrics and strident vocal, that song is now a feminist punk anthem; but according to this absorbing documentary (co-directed by narrator Celeste Bell and Paul Sng, with additional narration by Ruth Negga) Styrene never really identified as a feminist or a punk. A lovely portrait of a troubled but inspiring artist. (Full review). (Streaming on Hulu)
Honorable mentions:
A couple of 2022 releases that I didn’t review, but heartily recommend:
Kimi– I somehow missed this tight little thriller from Steven Soderbergh when it dropped on HBO Max earlier this year, but stumbled across it recently (so much content, so little time). Zoe Kravitz gives a terrific performance as an agoraphobic tech who works from home for a corporation called Amygdala, monitoring their A-I product “Kimi” (rhymes with “Siri”). When she happens across a digital file that may have captured audio of a woman’s murder, her world gets turned upside down. A clever mash-up of Rear Window, Repulsion, and The Conversation, with a whiff of The Parallax View… updated for the age of pandemic paranoia. David Keopp scripted.
Confess, Fletch – First, my confession that I’ve always had a soft spot for the first Fletch film with Chevy Chase (never saw Fletch Lives). But I was intrigued to see a resurrection of the franchise 33 years after the previous entry, and pleasantly surprised at how entertaining Greg Mottola’s adaptation of Gregory McDonald’s eponymous 1976 comedy-mystery was. I swear Jon Hamm is channeling Cary Grant throughout, and he is ably supported by a delightful cast that includes Marcia Gay Harden, Kyle MacLachlan, and Roy Wood, Jr. Granted, it’s lightweight fare, but I haven’t laughed this hard at a modern comedy for grown-ups in quite some time.
…and just for giggles
Holy Krampus…have I really been writing reviews here for 16 years?! I was but a child of 50 when I began in November of 2006 (I was much older then, but I’m younger than that now). Here are my “top 10” picks for each year since I began writing for Hullabaloo.
(You may want to bookmark this post as a handy reference for movie night).
Junior says the Biden Admin didn’t free Paul Whelan because he wasn’t woke like Griner: “There’s a level of arrogance Griner had going into Russia .. because in America, as a female celebrity, minority, lesbian she probably felt she could be above the law.” pic.twitter.com/Jf3nDzVuHB
Junior says although he didn’t see his name on the twitter “shadowban” list, he knows that he must be because his engagement has been down for years: “You know how I know that? Because I’ve been doing this a long time. I know what’s gonna go viral. I know how it’s gonna perform.” pic.twitter.com/nkht8ULCKd
Eric says Trump saved christianity from Barack Obama: “Religion would not be what it is right now if not for Donald Trump. He’s a religious guy. He may not have worn it on his shirt sleeve the way that certain politicians do .. for votes.” pic.twitter.com/SlYSrs2QgO
Please stop. Enough with this talk of whether the Republican Party will finally rid itself of Donald Trump. Drop this speculation that the GOP, due to its poor performance in the midterm elections or Trump’s latest outrage (dining with a Nazi, calling for the “termination” of the US Constitution, or whatever), will pull the plug on him. You can call on Republicans to take a courageous stand of principle against Dear Leader—and, of course, they should—but don’t do so expecting that will have any impact on Trump’s standing and his future prospects. The party cannot de-Trumpify by decree. Rep. Kevin McCarthy cannot lead it out of the Trump nightmare. That’s because there is no governing power within the GOP that can push a button and execute a no-Trump reboot. There is no central committee that can make such a decision. It’s up to Republican voters, and many of them remain crazed for Trump. Hey, this is a democracy.
I’ll pursue this point further in a moment. First let me say that I almost—almost!—feel sorry for those conservatives who these days are exhorting the Republican Party to get over Trump. A few days ago, Charles C.W. Cooke, a senior writer for the conservative National Review, reacting to Trump’s phony claim that he had not truly called for tearing up the Constitution, penned a plea titled “Aren’t You All Tired of This Crap?” It seemed to address conservatives and Republicans who have stood by Trump. He wrote:
[F]or some reason, the American Right has decided to spend an inordinate amount of it defending a man who is now serving nothing except for his own boredom and his own ego. At some point, conservative-leaning voters are going to notice that all Trump cares about now is the pretense that he won the election of 2020, and that, in order to push that idea, he will happily destroy anything and everything that gets in his way. Until then, I must ask: Are you not tired of this crap?
In his newsletter, conservative commentator Erick Erickson beseeched Republicans and fellow rightists, “Can we move forward, please?” His advice: “You want to win? Move on from an angry old man with nothing left but a knockoff Twitter feed.”
Trump is a wannabe-autocrat who is a menace—to the nation and to the Republican Party. He has now led the GOP to three lousy elections, in which he lost the House, the Senate, and the White House. (The Rs barely won back the House last month in a historical underperformance.) And while he has generated political failure, he has further caused the party problems by hobnobbing with hate-spreading extremists, embracing QAnon nuttery, and vowing to pardon January 6 rioters (that is, excusing political violence). There’s plenty of cause for party leaders and prominent right-wingers to turn against The Former Guy, including realpolitik calculations.
Yet doing so will not rescue the party—not in and of itself. In the olden days, the party establishment might have been able to gather in a smoke-filled room and bounce a candidate they deemed unpalatable. That was largely because Republican voters, more often than not, followed the lead of the party poohbahs. They tended to vote as the party’s elders wanted. There weren’t too many surprises in presidential primaries. George H.W. Bush won when it was his turn in 1988, ditto Bob Dole (1996), George W. Bush (2000), John McCain (2008), and Mitt Romney (2012).
Trump broke that streak in 2016. This came after the party’s electorate had been radicalized by years of hateful rhetoric that demonized Democrats and liberals from Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, Fox News, Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, and the Tea Party. Having been fed a steady diet of red meat, grievance, and conspiracy theories, Republican voters gave their own party the finger in 2016, rejecting all its mainstream candidates (even far-right contenders like Ted Cruz) and anointed Trump Mr. Republican. They took the wheel.
And they haven’t given it back.
In GOP primary contests throughout 2022, Republican voters picked Trump-endorsed extremists and election deniers over sane and better-bet candidates. In recent days, Trump has deservedly received criticism for having pushed lousy candidates, including Dr. Mehmet Oz and Doug Mastriano in Pennsylvania, Don Bolduc in New Hampshire, Blake Masters and Kari Lake in Arizona, and—drumroll, please—Herschel Walker in Georgia. But it was Republican voters who voted for these wingnuts and (eventual) losers. In Wyoming, they sent diehard conservative Liz Cheney packing. Trump foisted, but the base embraced. Just as the party’s leaders could not keep these aspirants off the train, they can’t toss Trump from the locomotive.
Were Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to take to the well of the Senate and deliver a powerful speech denouncing Trump and urging the party to cast him on to the ash heap of history—were he to be joined in that endeavor by dozens of other elected Republicans—that would not guarantee the defenestration of Trump. Trump would respond with a Defcon-1 political attack on these RINOs and apostates and urge millions of Republicans to stand with him against these establishment sellouts. And the voters would get to decide. (Meanwhile, Trump presumably would maintain a lock on many of the low-dollar donors the party continually hits up for money. Breaking with Trump could cost the GOP a lot of cash.)
Though Walker lost and the House Republicans fared less well than expected—largely because some suburban GOP-ish voters have soured on the party—there are no signs that the GOP base, which supported Walker and the other Trumpish candidates, has had a change in heart. That base is not big enough to elect the most extreme candidates in statewide elections. But it can still call the shots in defining the party and in picking its banner carriers.
The conservative movement and the GOP have done too good a job stoking the fears, paranoia, resentments, and hatreds of the Republican electorate. They have generally not pushed back against election denialism nor decried the Trumpian threat to democracy. They have signaled to Republican voters that Trump’s baseless claims are legitimate, that advocating such allegations is not a disqualification for Republican candidates, and that the January 6 insurrection Trump incited was no big deal. (They opposed Trump’s impeachment.) They have bolstered (or not actively challenged) the irrationality and animosity that fuels many Republican voters, and they are stuck with these voters.
Heartfelt pleas—Aren’t you tired of this? Can’t we move on from Trump?—are unlikely to cut it. For the past six years, the party and the right wing have characterized all criticisms of Trump as unpatriotic attacks on America and hoaxes cooked up by a diabolical cabal of liberals, the media, and the Deep State. Stealing documents, tax fraud, conspiring to commit election fraud—it’s all a setup, a partisan attack. Now they expect their voters to believe otherwise? Just because of a few lost elections? Good luck with that.
It’s possible GOP voters might tire of Trump or reach the conclusion he’s too damaged (too indicted?) to win in 2024 and, during the primaries, turn toward another Trumpish choice. That is, if any Republican with a chance chooses to challenge Trump. (I’m not talking Cheney or Larry Hogan.) But GOP insiders and elected leaders are unlikely to mount any rebellion against Trump. Even if a gutsy Republican leader—or a band of Republicans—took a stab at defying Trump and steering the party away from Trumpism, the odds of success would be small. The GOP is now dependent on Americans who have been convinced by the right—including folks like Erickson and writers at National Review, even those who are anti-Trump—that liberals and Democrats are an evil and existential threat to the nation and that Trump’s lies and his assaults on democracy are no big whoop. Many of these grievance-fueled people—who still believe Joe Biden is not the legitimate president, that Barack Obama was born in Kenya, and that Democrats are woke pedophiles plotting to destroy the nation—are not asking to be liberated from Trump. The harsh reality for Republicans—and the rest of us—is that you can’t save a party if its voters do not want to be saved.
They definitely do not want to be saved … they are cult members.
That explainer about the same-sex marriage law passed this week lays out the nuances in the bill that makes it all a little bit less of a slam dunk for LGBTQ rights than we are being led to believe. Essentially, what they did was overturn the odious Defense of Marriage Act which allowed states not to recognize same sex and interracial marriages from other states. The Court had already banned it but this law needed to be removed from the books in order to prevent this new majority from overturning their previous ruling as they did with Roe this year and having that law still in place. But it doesn’t “codify” same sex marriage because congress doesn’t have the power to do that. It’s a state thing so if the MAGA majority decided to overturn Obergefell, it would “go back to the states” just like Roe did and some states have laws on the books banning same sex marriage or they could pass new ones.
Anyway, that little video lays it all out well.
No one should rest on their laurels. We are dealing with a far right supreme court majority that could easily overturn anything. They clearly care nothing for precedent. As we know, they are heavily influenced by right wing media and religious extremists who systematically infiltrate their social circle so don’t assume that it can’t happen. I would hope that people would be working at the state level to get those laws off the books just in case. There’s no sense in making it easy for them.
Former President Donald Trump is the only Republican so far who has announced a 2024 presidential run, but numerous others are signaling that they’re toying with the same idea.
They’re doing all the things they’re supposed to do to test their chances: Visiting early primary states, writing books, showing up on the Sunday shows, campaigning with other Republicans ahead of the 2022 midterms, and weighing in publicly on President Joe Biden’s policies — and even Trump’s latest controversies.
The next step will be hiring teams in Iowa and New Hampshire, Doug Heye, a longtime GOP aide and strategist, told Insider.
“You have got a stable of people who are essentially putting themselves all in the starting gates and all have their own timetable about when and if they decide to run,” he said.
December would be a “frustrating month” for political watchers because “no one is going to move that much,” said Kristin Davison, vice president and general consultant at Axiom Strategies. But hopefuls would be floating what she called “trial balloons” — in which they publicly raise the prospect of a run to see how donors and the press will react.
Whoever seizes the nomination will likely face Biden, though he has yet to formally declare his candidacy. But, Heye said, “it’s a real possibility” that the GOP lineup will be large like it was in 2016.
The stakes for losing the nomination aren’t all bad, even if Republicans might come out of it with an unforgettable Trump nickname. After all, one of the people running for president could end up getting chosen as running mate or get a seat on the new president’s Cabinet.
And there are other perks to formally seeking the White House, such as raising one’s profile and having a better shot at the presidency during a future cycle. Candidates could also wind up selling a lot more books or leave politics to get a prime TV or radio show.
“It’s a long, difficult process,” Heye said, “and you’re more likely to lose than not.”
Trump’s legal, political, and personal liabilities have been piling up in the last month, leading many in the GOP to say the party needs not just a fresh face but to be led by a candidate who can actually win.
Insider identified 17 people who could seek the Republican nomination in 2024, including Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas, Josh Hawley of Missouri, and Tim Scott of South Carolina who are up for re-election this cycle and will therefore be in campaign mode anyway. Each will have to effectively answer the “why I’m running for president” question and find their lane in the party — which will inevitably include defining, or redefining, their relationship with Trump.
“I don’t think you can discount any of them at this point,” Heye said. “It’s too early to determine who outside of Trump is a frontrunner.”
There are two main reasons why this is so treacherous for the GOP. First of all, the primaries are mostly winner take all which means that, like 2016, Trump could win the nomination without getting a majority of the primary votes. So it’s a very high bar for any competitor in a crowded field. But more importantly, they will have to contend with Trump not just giving them stupid nicknames but threatening to take his base and go home if he doesn’t win. He will not unify the party behind any winner that isn’t him.
It’s always possible that Trump might be so embroiled in legal troubles that he can’t run. (I’d bet that he’ll run even if he’s in jail, but there’s always a chance he might realize that’s a bad idea.) And nobody knows what his cult will do. A lot of them really hate the Republican establishment and have transferred their loyalty to him alone. And he’s brought in new people who think politics is just Trump.
But let a thousand flowers bloom. It will be entertaining anyway — sort of. The idea of Trump as president again is so chilling it will be very hard to enjoy the circus.
Michelle Goldberg’s take on Kirsten Sinema is very interesting. She sees her as a sort of goo-goo type whose political career is all about self-actualization. That rings true. She’s hugely ambitious and thinks her self-actualization will lead her to exalted heights of power. In that sense it’s really just Trumpian narcissism — she just follows her instincts which she is sure are infallible
Anyway:
In the self-congratulatory video that Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona made to announce that she was leaving the Democratic Party and becoming an independent, she didn’t mention any disagreements with her former caucus about issues. Instead, she framed the move as a step toward self-actualization. “Registering as an independent, and showing up to work with the title of independent, is a reflection of who I’ve always been,” she said.
It’s true: This is who she’s always been. The content of Sinema’s politics has changed over time, from Green Party progressivism to pro-corporate centrism. Her approach to elected office as a vehicle for the refinement of the self has not.
In Sinema’s 2009 book “Unite and Conquer: How to Build Coalitions That Win — and Last,” she described giving up shrill partisanship, which was making her unhappy, for a vaguely New Age ethos that prized inner tranquillity. One chapter was called “Letting Go of the Bear and Picking Up the Buddha,” with the bear representing fear and anger. “Picking up the Buddha (becoming a super centered political actor) makes you a stronger, more effective you,” she wrote. “To be your most fabulous political self, you’ll need to learn to recognize the bear and learn to let go of it in your work.”
Transcending fear and anger is an excellent spiritual goal. But becoming a more centered and fabulous person is a political project only when it’s directed toward aims beyond oneself. With Sinema, it’s not remotely clear what those aims might be, or if they exist. (Another chapter in her book is “Letting Go of Outcomes.”) Announcing her new independent status, Sinema wrote an essay in The Arizona Republic and gave interviews to outlets including Politico and CNN. Nowhere have I seen her articulate substantive differences with the Democrats, aside from her opposition to tax increases. Instead, she spoke about not fitting into a box, being true to herself, and wanting to work, as she told Politico, without the “pressures or the poles of a party structure.”
Until recently, Sinema has seemed to delight in the power an evenly split Senate gave her, which she used to benefit the financial and pharmaceutical industries. Negotiating the Inflation Reduction Act, she single-handedly stopped Democrats from closing the carried interest loophole, a provision that significantly cuts the tax bills of Wall Street investors. And Sinema insisted on narrowing the part of the law meant to bring down prescription drug prices, earning criticism even from Joe Manchin, the centrist West Virginia Democrat with whom she is frequently aligned.
“One of her deep flaws is that she doesn’t realize our actions have impacts every day on people who need our help,” said Ruben Gallego, a Democratic Arizona congressman who’d been considering a primary campaign against Sinema.
For much of this year, Sinema appeared to be preparing for a future in a Senate run by the Republican Mitch McConnell. In September, at a cozy appearance with McConnell in Kentucky, she said, “As you all know, control changes between the House and the Senate every couple of years. It’s likely to change again in just a few weeks.” She described McConnell as a friend, and he praised her as the “most effective first-term senator” he’d seen in his career.
Had Republicans won the Senate, Sinema could have become an independent who caucused with Republicans, preserving her place in the majority. A red wave might have seemed to vindicate her aggressive centrism, especially if Senator Mark Kelly, an Arizona Democrat far more loyal to his party, had lost. But Kelly won and Democrats picked up a Senate seat. That meant Sinema could no longer hold the rest of the Democratic caucus hostage, or argue that only Democrats who defy their base are electable in her state. She was about to become a lot less relevant. Now she’s center stage again.
For the immediate future, Sinema’s move is unlikely to have major national political consequences. She has refused to directly say whether she will caucus with the Democrats. Speaking to CNN’s Jake Tapper, she shrugged off a question about the balance of power in the Senate, saying, “That’s kind of a D.C. thing to worry about.” Her answer was an insult to all the Arizonans who care very much which party controls the Senate, but it was also a deflection. Sinema ruled out caucusing with Republicans and said she intends to keep her committee assignments, which she can do only by aligning with Democrats. However much she values her own uniqueness, there are no parties of one in the Senate.
The real significance of her defection will come in 2024, when she is up for re-election. Had she remained a Democrat, Gallego could have been a strong primary challenger. Many of those who supported Sinema four years ago have been enraged by the way she’s obstructed popular liberal priorities, and a recent AARP poll found that only 37 percent of likely Democratic voters in Arizona had a positive opinion of her.
It will be harder for Democrats to challenge her in a general election, where a three-way race would risk a Republican victory. But Gallego, who said he will decide on running next year, insisted that the threat of Sinema acting as a spoiler won’t shape his decision. “No matter what, I’m not going to base my decision off this false threat that she’s trying to put on,” he said, arguing that she doesn’t have enough support “to put together a coalition that will affect the Democratic nominee.”
That might be too optimistic — Sinema wouldn’t need to get that many swing voters to thwart a Democrat. But he’s right that she doesn’t have a winning coalition herself. In the AARP poll, a decisive majority of voters in every demographic group, including independents, viewed her unfavorably. It’s one thing to be independent on behalf of your voters. It’s another to be independent from them.
I think Goldberg is exactly right that Sinema was prepared to declare herself an independent and caucus with the Republicans if they won the majority. That says everything about her.
I don’t think she’ll retain the seat in 24. If she splits the vote with Gallego the Repubicans win and if the Arizona GOP sobers up and nominates a mainstream Republican she doesn’t have a chance. The only way she threads this needle is if a Democrat doesn’t run and the GOP puts up Kari Lake or Blake Masters. That’s an awful lot to bank on. But in her mind, it’s all about her. It’s always all about her.
David Pepper (“Laboratories of Autocracy“) for months has been posting mini-whiteboard chats on Twitter. The former Ohio Democratic Party state chair posted a longer thread on Friday that I urge you to take 10 min. to watch.
Basic premise: Democrats and Republicans are fighting different battles. While Democrats prioritize electing politicians to Washington, D.C., minority Republicans focus on controlling state legislatures where rules for electing them are set.
🚨 🚨 NEW
Gonna try something different.
Call it my TED-style talk on democracy. Longer than a typical whiteboard, so be patient, but frames what’s happening in politics in a way that, I hope, makes sense of what we’re seeing and how it fits together, and also….
Democrats did win control of several state chambers last month. But, Pepper warns, guess who ultimately wins the war if Democrats don’t fight the right fights?
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) once suggested that restaurant workers washing their hands after using the toilet should not be government-regulated. Handwashing policy should be left up to individual businesses, he quipped. Diners could then choose whether to eat at establishments that did not have one. The free Market would do the rest.
Last Thursday, Senators Patty Murray (D-Wash.) and Bob Casey (D-Pa.) asked unimous consent to advance the bipartisan Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) by roll call vote. The legislation would “ensure pregnant workers receive accommodations like water bottles, stools, and bathroom breaks.”
But Tillis objected. The legislation might provide women with “leave to obtain abortions on demand, under the guise of pregnancy-related conditions,” Tillis worried aloud and held up passage of the bipartisan bill.
Kylie Cheung of Jezebel grants Tillis points for creativity. There is nothing in the PWFA about abortion:
Unfortunately, Tillis isn’t the only one spreading misinformation about PWFA. The anti-abortion group CatholicVote has also erroneously claimed it could “force” employers to pay for abortion-related expenses. In the House, Rep. Virginia Foxx of (R-NC) expressed similar concerns, as did Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) in a statement to the anti-abortion publication Catholic News Agency on Wednesday. A spokesperson for Paul claimed the bill “could force religious employers to provide accommodations that arise from an abortion, which could violate the free exercise of their religious beliefs.”
Abortion is the GOP’s new voter fraud, the new commie in the woodpile. Conservatives find it everywhere they look.
Choice is a squishy concept for conservatives. Choices that make the Market work cannot be allowed when women make choices religious conservatives dislike.
But companies that fail to provide accomodations for pregnant women? Well, let the Market decide if that’s a place women choose to work. If it would work for handwashing, it would work for pregnancy. Hey, and for workplace safety. Buh-bye, OSHA.
