A lighter moment that backfired on Don, Jr.

Tweeter-in-training Donald Trump, Jr. sent this out as a snide comment on his take on the Democratic debates:

"@DonaldJTrumpJr:  Comedy Central should really be the host of the next debates.  #DemDebate

"Apparently, DJTJr.  thought his little joke so funny that he sent it out again. 

Then Comedy Central responded, without missing a beat:
"@ComedyCentral:  "Nah.  The last time there was a joke it became president."

Who won night 2 of the second Dem debate?

For those who didn't watch the Wednesday night debate (the second night of the second Democratic debate) with the other 10 candidates (Biden, Harris, Booker, Yang, Castro, Gabbard, Gillibrand, Inslee, Bennett,DeBlasio,), here is a good summary written by Maggis Astor of the New York Times:

*     *     *     *     *

"Tuesday night’s debate belonged to the front-runners, Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. But their counterparts on Wednesday, Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Senator Kamala Harris, couldn’t quite replicate their dominance.

"Neither did badly by any means: There was no doubt that Mr. Biden beat his lackluster performance from the first debate, and Ms. Harris held her own under a barrage of attacks, likely a product of her own strong showing last time.

"But Wednesday’s most memorable performance, the experts seemed to agree, came from Senator Cory Booker — although so many candidates scored at least some points that strategists questioned whether the polls would move much.

"Here is a sampling of responses from some of the people who know the stakes of debates best: veteran campaign strategists and consultants from both parties.

"Mr. Booker went after Mr. Biden fiercely on criminal justice, hammering home Mr. Biden’s role in creating the policies he is now proposing to reverse. Mr. Biden, in turn, attacked Mr. Booker’s record as mayor of Newark, but the consensus among strategists was that Mr. Booker came out on top.

"They also praised Mr. Booker’s argument, early in the debate, that the candidates should focus less on intraparty disagreements on health care and more on their actual opponent, President Trump.

“'Biden fired back on @CoryBooker about Newark policing under his mayoral Administration. But Booker was faster on the draw and came out ahead on style points.' — David Axelrod, former senior adviser to President Barack Obama.

“'. . . .'Think it’s pretty clear @CoryBooker has best night. Made his own case — and did it well.” — Jennifer Palmieri, former spokeswoman for Hillary Clinton and Mr. Obama

"'There was little doubt on Wednesday that Mr. Biden was more prepared and more polished than in the first debate, when he took a drubbing from Ms. Harris. He came armed with opposition research on her and Mr. Booker, and generally appeared more confident than last time.

"His performance was uneven at times — and as several commentators noted, he was the only candidate to abruptly cut himself off, sometimes midsentence, when the moderators signaled he was out of time — but he easily cleared the low bar set by his last appearance. . . . 

“'Biden wobbling between strong moments — far better than Miami — and awkward stumbling.' — Mike Murphy, Republican consultant.

“'Castro’s hit on Biden was a tough hit. But this is a different Biden from the one we saw in the first debate. In Miami, he looked rattled. Not tonight. He’s taking the hits and pushing back.' — Mo Elleithee, former spokesman for Mrs. Clinton and the Democratic National Committee.

"Ms. Harris dominated the first debate from start to finish. That lifted her significantly in the polls, but it also meant that on Wednesday, she was as much a target as Mr. Biden. Where she had been on offense, she now found herself on defense.
Still, while she did not shine as much as last time, she held her own. . . ., 

“'@KamalaHarris is getting a lot of incoming and she’s handling it all well. I do not get what people are seeing who think she is flustered or unsteady. Bizarre to me.' — Ms. Palmieri

“'@KamalaHarris’s closing is chilling. Usually these statements are formulaic. Hers is so powerful. Trump as a predator will ring true to many Democrats.” — Paul Begala, former adviser to Bill Clinton

"'Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand may have had the most memorable line of the night, if not the most substantive: 'The first thing that I’m going to do when I’m president,' she said, 'is I’m going to Clorox the Oval Office.'  She also brought the subjects of gender equality and sexual violence into a debate that had previously skirted them.

"But on what she clearly hoped would be a defining moment — an attack on Mr. Biden for his opposition to an expanded child care credit in 1981 — the reviews were mixed. Some strategists loved it. But within the theater, the applause left little doubt that the audience was with Mr. Biden on this one. . . .

"'Strong case by @SenGillibrand on how she looks at impossible odds, with a good mix of her own accomplishments and the fight she’ll take to Trump.' — Christina Reynolds, spokeswoman for EMILY’s List

“I think @SenGillibrand is having a good night. Better than I expected: . . . staying on brand, elevating women in the policy conversations on healthcare and immigration.” — Emily Farris, political scientist at Texas Christian University.

“'Whoa. @JoeBiden calls out @SenGillibrand for accusing him of opposing women working outside the home. You can criticize Biden for a lot of things, but this attack smells crassly, political, and Joe unmasked it as such. The audience cheers.' — Mr. Begala. . . . 

"Gabbard, Inslee and Yang scored a few points.  While not at the top of the pack, several lower-polling candidates managed to break through the noise at least once. Representative Tulsi Gabbard, in particular, attacked Ms. Harris on her prosecutorial record in a way other candidates had chosen not to or been unable to do. Andrew Yang and Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington also had their moments.

“'@TulsiGabbard brought up all the points against @KamalaHarris that Internet commenters having been pointing out for several months. … If @JoeBiden could deliver a takedown as effectively as @TulsiGabbard just did, he’d be the nominee already.'   Frank Luntz, Republican pollster and consultant.

“'So Gabbard is the one who finally had the real courage to come for Kamala on her criminal justice record. It was FIERCE. Been waiting for this... Kamala is leaning in to her record, and she’s FIERCER. Just saying. Powerful back and forth.' — Aisha Moodie-Mills, Democratic strategist

“'Yang is having a very good debate. It’s not just that he’s gotten more comfortable. It’s also that he sounds different than the other candidates without sounding loopy. It’s the Williamson role, but played by an analytical AI obsessive.” — Ezra Klein, editor of Vox

“'I also think @JayInslee has had a very good night. Not flashy, but earnest. And on climate change, quite strong.' — Mr. Axelrod

"Takeaways: Biden dramatically improved; Kamala and Booker had strong performances. Gillibrand and Bennett had some memorable moments but does it matter? My guess is 5 people @ most on tonight’s stage make it to third debate. Oddly last night felt more energetic. #DemocratDebate' — Adrienne Elrod, MSNBC, NBC contributor.

"'I don’t pretend to know which ones will get a bump, and how big the bumps are. I will say that not enough happened in this debate to dramatically shuffle the deck. Biden was battered for two hours but it reinforced his frontrunner status. #DemDebate' — Larry Sabato, director, University of Virginia Center for Politics."

*     *     *     *     *

So that's sort of what happened.   All 10 were better than they were in the initial debates in June -- except perhaps Harris, who was such a stand-out in that one and had to play defense most of this one.  And defense is a harder position to shine in.

To me, the significant difference in this one was that all 10 stood out in some way more than has happened in any other of the other debates thus far.   One thing that puzzles me:   Julian Castro I notice time and again, gets very little press coverage after a debate -- less, I think, than he deserves.   It's been the same both times now.   First,he doesn't get called on by moderators as much, then when commentators write their impressions, they rarely mention him.

As was mentioned here, though even Yang, Bennett, and Inslee made some good points in this debate.

One final comment:   Yes, Biden was very much better prepared, he was more energetic than the first debate;   but he still seems to me to be old, tired, and not as sharp mentally as we need our president to be    Compare him to Bernie Sanders on those qualities -- Bernie's a dynamo by comparison.

In the end, I agree that Cory Booker was probably the stand-out of the evening in that he did the most to improve his previous lackluster standing in the polls.  That's my prediction.

For the third set of debates, the criteria will be much more stringent in terms of poll standings and numbers of individual donors.   Some are predicting it might be down to as few as five by the September date.

Ralph

More about Tuesday's debate, round #1

I'm writing this before the Wednesday night, round #2 of the second (July) debate.  I found it on Vox.com, written by Ezra Klein, the super-smart guy who left MSNBC as a political analyst to help found the new online Vox news site.

Ezra's article is titled:  "Pete Buttigieg had the most important answer at the Democratic debate."

*     *     *     *     *

"South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg gave the single most important answer at Tuesday's Democratic debate.

"It came after a lengthy section in which the assembled candidates debated different health care plans that have no chance of passing given the composition of the US Senate and then debated decriminalizing unauthorized border crossings, which they also don't have the votes to do, and then debated a series of gun control ideas that would swiftly fall to a filibuster and, even if they didn't, would plausibly be overturned by the Supreme Court's conservative majority.

"That's when Buttigieg spoke up:

     '[This is] the conversation that we have been having for the last 20 years.  Of course, we need to get money out of politics, but when I propose the actual structural democratic reforms that might make a difference -- end the Electoral College, amend the Constitution if necessary to clear up Citizens United, have DC actually be a state, and depoliticize the Supreme Court with structural reform -- people look at me funny, as if this country was incapable of structural reform.

     'This is a country that once changed its Constitution so you couldn't drink and changed it back because we changed our minds, and you're telling me we can't reform our democracy in our time?   We have to or we will be having the same argument 20 years from now.'

Ezra Klein continues:  "So far, I've found Buttigieg's campaign underwhelming on policy.  But where he's clearly leading the field is his emphasis on structural reform.  Buttigieg isn't the only candidate with good ideas on this score -- Elizabeth Warren and Jay Inslee have been strong on this too -- but he's the only candidate who consistently prioritizes the issue.

"The reality is Democrats are debating ever more ambitious policy in a political system ever less capable of passing ambitious policy -- and ever more stacked against their policies, in particular.   Their geographic disadvantage in Congress is only getting worse.  Republicans control the White House and the Senate despite receiving fewer votes for either, and an activist conservative Supreme Court just gutted public sector unions and green-lit partisan gerrymandering.

"Policy isn't Democrats' problem.  They've got plenty of plans.   Some of them are even popular.  What they don't have is a political system in which they can pass and implement those plans.

"Buttigieg, to his credit, has a clear theory on this.  When I interviewed him in April, he argued that 'any decisions that are based on an assumption of good faith by Republicans in the Senate will be defeated.'  The hope that you can pass laws through bipartisan compromise is dead.  And that means governance is consistently, reliably failing to solve people's problems, which is in turn radicalizing them against government itself.

"There's nothing new about a Democratic candidate promising to fix the system.  Obama ran on similar themes in 2008.   House Democrats opened their session by passing a sweeping package of good-government reforms.  But once Democrats take power, concrete policy change, with the immediate benefits it promises, tends to win out over the abstractions of procedural reform.  It's easier to run for reelection bragging about a tax cut than about weakening the Electoral College.

"What's different about Buttigieg is his insistence that he would prioritize political reforms over policy wins.   'This is the difference between somebody who's thinking about 2024 versus somebody who's thinking about 2054,' he said.  'To me, yes, it'w worth it because we're talking about setting the terms of the debate as they will play out for the rest of my life.'

"This is what Buttigieg gets.  To make policy, you have to fix the policy-making process.  Some of the other candidates pay that idea lip service, when they get pushed on it.  But he's the one who places that project at the center of his candidacy."

*     *     *     *     *

This is one of the smartest minds in political analysis (Ezra Klein) speaking about one of the smartest minds anywhere in our political system (Pete Buttigieg).   I don't think he's going to make it to the Oval Office this time --- he's smart enough to run it, be we voters aren't smart enough to put him there, just yet.

But maybe he'll be tapped to stand next in line to a presidential candidate who will get, and make use of, his brilliance.  And then his time will come . . . he's got plenty of time left.   The question is:   do WE have time?

Ralph

Dem debate #2, round 1: better overall

The CNN sponsored Democratic Primary Debate #2, Round #1 last night in Detroit was, overall, characterized by better performances than the June debates.   No one had an embarrassing night, no one made a major blunder -- and yet there was some pretty sharp give and take, some clarifying disagreements.

Maybe it was a bit long at 3 hours instead of 2;  but it didn't seem so rushed and short-changed as the first one.    Half the 20 candidates were on stage;  the other half will have another three hour debate tonight.

Medical care insurance was the biggest topic, with both Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders on stage, plus some more moderates who oppose their "Medicare for All" plan but rather favor a more gradual approach that will not automatically do away with private health insurance.

Compared to the June debates, there was much more discussion on climate change, on systemic racism, on foreign policy and endless wars, on immigration issues, and more in general about radical structural change.   In general, it was a clash between the big change progressives (like Sanders and Warren) vs the pragmatists (Delaney, Hickenlooper,  Klobuchar, Ryan and Bullock) -- with Buttigieg, O'Rourke, and Williamson being after a different kind of radical change in our basic approach to governance and a change in its structure.

Again, Warren was probably the standout.  Buttigieg, because he was less aggressive, got less airtime -- but, when he spoke, the room quieted and people listened;  and he got great applause to some of his lines, especially when he talked about ending our endless wars and requiring Congress to authorize any future ones.

In his rather aggressive style, with a touch of arrogance that says "I know better than you," former congressman John Delaney was going after, in particular, Warren's big, give-away plans, as pie in the sky.   She drew him up short and got crowd approval from the catchiest line of the night:

Warren put it like this:   "I don't understand why someone would go to all the trouble to run for president just to talk about what we can't do and shouldn't fight for."

But other pragmatist/centrists, like Klobuchar, Hickenlooper, Ryan, and Bullock -- the geographic (midwest) centrists as well as philosophical centrists -- tend to agree more with Delaney even if not his style.

Despite the small differences in how we get there, it was an impressive group of governing knowledge displayed on the stage, all obviously with very similar goals but differences in how fast to push for change more than anything else.

Even self-help author Maryanne Williamson began to make sense and to talk more like a person with some governing ideas instead of just feel-good pieties.   If they keep up this approach to sharpening their ideas through hammering out the small differences, without making enemies of each other -- then they can still come back together at the end and unite into one party that will be necessary to defeat Donald Trump.

Ralph

Speaking truth to Trump is the ticket to termination

I ended yesterday's post about President Trump doing nothing to defend us against another Russian cyberattack in 2020 with this:

     "Fortunately, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats is doing something, forming a coalition of representatives from a number of counterintelligence agencies to coordinate their efforts."

Whereupon, Trump released the statement (via tweet, of course) that Coats is leaving his position as Director of National Intelligence.

Here's how Vox's Alex Ward put it:

"President Donald Trump's Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats will soon be replaced because he kept doing the one thing Trump couldn't stand:  telling the truth."

Trump also announced his intention to nominate for the central counterintelligence position Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-TX), who most recently was in the spotlight in the Mueller hearings where he "fiercely sided with the president" (All quotes will be from Alex Ward unless otherwise stated.)

Coats has obviously, and sometimes publicly, deviated from the president's preferred version of truth, most notably in regard to Russian interference in our elections -- and their obvious plan to do it again in 2020.   In fact, during the Mueller hearings, Mueller was at his most animated when talking about the Russian ongoing threat to our upcoming election.   "They're doing it now as we speak," Mueller said.

Ward:  "The likely reason Trump was so disappointed in his intelligence chief isn't that he did his job badly -- it's that he did it well."

"The job of the director of national intelligence is to oversee the entire US intelligence community -- a sprawling collection of agencies that includes the FBI, the CIA, and the NSA as well as offices within the Pentagon, State Department, and even the Department of Energy.

"The DNI is also meant to serve as 'the principal adviser' to the president on all 'intelligence matters related to national security.'  And it's in that capacity that he seems to have run afoul of the president."


In other words, he told the president what he didn't want to hear and even, at times, contradicted what the president was saying in public.

The surprising thing is that Coats kept his job as long as he did.   But now he is to be replaced by Rep. Ratcliff, who some characterize as having few qualifications for the job -- but who is a complete Trump loyalist.

In other, frightening words:   Trump now has a toady as Attorney General heading the Justice Department;   and, if confirmed by the Senate, he will have a Director of National Intelligence who will tell him, not necessarily the truth, but what Trump wants to hear.

Which means that now we cannot trust what is reported as the findings of our intelligence community.   And how long with the CIA and FBI Directors stay around if they have to answer to someone like Ratcliff?

Ralph

Potential bumper sticker for Dems

The gang on Nicolle Wallace's "Destination White House" was having a discussion about how the Republicans are so much better than the Democrats at crafting their message into a bumper sticker (even though they are often lies, especially when they come from Trump himself).

Joyce Vance, former federal prosecutor and MSNBC legal analyst, was asked to take a stab at coming up with a Democratic bumper sticker for this whole Muller investigation outcome.

She first said, "Well, I guess you could say:   'The president is a crook.'"

But then she tried again and came up with:  "The Russians attacked our country, and the president did nothing about it."

The reference of course is to the Russians interfering in our 2016 election and the fact that Trump still does not accept that they did, nor has he given any support to the counterintelligence agencies' efforts to counter the inevitable repeat, and worse, that the Russians are certainly planning for 2020.

Fortunately, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats is doing something, forming a coalition of representatives from a number of counterintelligence agencies to coordinate their efforts.

Ralph