Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
I don’t know that it’s possible to encapsulate my frustration with the two-party system any better than this. Saving for history (screenshot at right):
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If I were Ocasio-Cortez I'd leak I was invited but unable to attend, then sit here for an hour and appreciate the nice gowns in one message and point out in the next what could be done with the money.
— Richard M. Nixon (@dick_nixon) September 14, 2021
I don’t really need to say anything more about this, do I?
Alexandra Villarreal, “‘Medium is the message’: AOC defends ‘tax the rich’ dress worn to Met Gala,” Guardian, September 14, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/sep/14/aoc-defends-tax-the-rich-dress-met-gala
Critical race theory
Melinda D. Anderson, “‘These are the facts’: Black educators silenced from teaching America’s racist past,” Guardian, September 14, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/education/2021/sep/14/black-us-teachers-critical-race-theory-silenced
Voting rights, apportionment
Speaking of performance, here are the Democrats pretending to care about winning elections:
Yet the new proposal will almost certainly fall well short of the 60 votes needed to break a GOP-led filibuster. Plus Democrats lack the votes to change the rules and weaken the filibuster as many in their party want them to do, meaning the plan is expected to stall when the Senate casts a procedural vote on the matter next week.[1]
Assuming (pretty fucking safely) Joe Manchin fails to find ten Republican votes,[2] the proof will lie in whether they do anything about the filibuster,[3] even as little as Ed Kilgore proposes.[4]
As to the Census, the crucial bit is here:
More evaluations are needed, the task force warns, because its assessment was limited to reviewing how the bureau’s career staffers prepared the congressional apportionment count. The task force’s researchers also inspected certain internal data files about the agency’s operations at the state level, which does not provide a comprehensive picture given that census participation can vary greatly by neighborhood.[5]
The entire controversy over the Census was precisely about participation. Even the citizenship question, ultimately abandoned, was really, whether the Trump administration cared to admit it or not, about whether unauthorized migrants would participate and therefore be counted.[6]
Steve Benen, “As Senate Democrats reach a deal on voting rights, what happens now?” MSNBC, September 14, 2021, https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/senate-dems-reach-deal-voting-rights-what-happens-now-n1279115
Ed Kilgore, “How a Filibuster Reform for Voting Rights Could Happen,” New York, September 14, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/09/how-a-filibuster-reform-for-voting-rights-could-happen.html
Manu Raju, “Democrats cut deal with Manchin to get party behind long-shot voting overhaul bill,” CNN, September 14, 2021, https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/14/politics/democrats-manchin-voting-overhaul-bill/index.html
Hansi Lo Wang, “An Independent Review Of The 1st 2020 Census Results Found No Major Irregularities,” National Public Radio, September 14, 2021, https://www.npr.org/2021/09/14/1035449920/2020-census-results-by-state-data-accuracy-quality-metrics-apportionment
Pandemic
Economy
This, in a pandemic:
The annual findings also showed the proportion of Americans without health coverage rose slightly in 2020, marking the fourth year in a row that the ranks of the uninsured swelled.[7]
Heather Long and Amy Goldstein, “Poverty fell overall in 2020 due to massive stimulus checks and unemployment aid, U.S. Census says,” Washington Post, September 14, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/09/14/us-census-poverty-health-insurance-2020/
National
Paula Aceves, “The Fake Vaxx Card Next to You,” New York, September 14, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/09/nyc-vaccine-mandate-fake-cards-are-booming.html
Donald Trump
2024
Tina Nguyen is probably wiser than I am. She refuses to predict whether Donald Trump will run in 2024.[8] But I read her article and I think he can’t resist.
Tina Nguyen, “To Be or Not to Be: Trump’s Big 2024 Question,” Puck, September 13, 2021, https://puck.news/trumps-2024-question/
- [1]Manu Raju, “Democrats cut deal with Manchin to get party behind long-shot voting overhaul bill,” CNN, September 14, 2021, https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/14/politics/democrats-manchin-voting-overhaul-bill/index.html↩
- [2]Steve Benen, “As Senate Democrats reach a deal on voting rights, what happens now?” MSNBC, September 14, 2021, https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/senate-dems-reach-deal-voting-rights-what-happens-now-n1279115↩
- [3]Steve Benen, “As Senate Democrats reach a deal on voting rights, what happens now?” MSNBC, September 14, 2021, https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/senate-dems-reach-deal-voting-rights-what-happens-now-n1279115; Ed Kilgore, “How a Filibuster Reform for Voting Rights Could Happen,” New York, September 14, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/09/how-a-filibuster-reform-for-voting-rights-could-happen.html↩
- [4]Ed Kilgore, “How a Filibuster Reform for Voting Rights Could Happen,” New York, September 14, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/09/how-a-filibuster-reform-for-voting-rights-could-happen.html↩
- [5]Hansi Lo Wang, “An Independent Review Of The 1st 2020 Census Results Found No Major Irregularities,” National Public Radio, September 14, 2021, https://www.npr.org/2021/09/14/1035449920/2020-census-results-by-state-data-accuracy-quality-metrics-apportionment↩
- [6]Avery Anapol, “Judge orders Trump admin to explain how it decided to add citizenship question to census,” Hill, July 3, 2018, http://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/395400-federal-judge-says-trump-admin-acted-in-bad-faith-with-citizenship; Tara Bahrampour and Robert Barnes, “Despite Trump administration denials, new evidence suggests census citizenship question was crafted to benefit white Republicans,” Washington Post, May 30, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/despite-trump-administration-denials-new-evidence-suggests-census-citizenship-question-was-crafted-to-benefit-white-republicans/2019/05/30/ca188dea-82eb-11e9-933d-7501070ee669_story.html; Tara Bahrampour et al., “Trump administration scrambles to save citizenship question on census,” Washington Post, July 4, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-administration-scrambles-to-save-citizenship-question-on-census/2019/07/04/238fe3fa-9e85-11e9-9ed4-c9089972ad5a_story.html; Tara Bahrampour and John Wagner, “Government lawyers step up effort to get a citizenship question on 2020 Census, court filing shows, ” Washington Post, July 5, 2019, source; Tara Bahrampour, Matt Zapotosky, and Josh Dawsey, “Reversing course, Trump administration will look for a way to add citizenship question to 2020 Census,” Washington Post, July 3, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-appears-to-contradict-his-own-administration-on-census-citizenship-question/2019/07/03/b720bb94-9da4-11e9-b27f-ed2942f73d70_story.html; Robert Barnes, “On Census citizenship question, Supreme Court’s conservatives appear to be united,” Boston Globe, April 23, 2019, https://www2.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2019/04/23/census-citizenship-question-supreme-court-conservatives-appear-united/tB1KUI3oACQAIAjQxVyXRL/story.html; Noah Bierman and David G. Savage, “Trump administration abruptly gives up fight over citizenship question on the census,” Los Angeles Times, July 2, 2019, https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-census-trump-citizenship-20190702-story.html; Noah Bierman and David G. Savage, “Citizen question may be back on 2020 census as Trump administration reverses course again,” Los Angeles Times, July 3, 2019, https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-trump-census-immigration-tweet-supreme-court-20190703-story.html; Aaron Blake, “Trump just admitted something he probably shouldn’t have about the census citizenship question,” Washington Post, July 5, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/07/05/trump-just-admitted-something-he-probably-shouldnt-have-about-census-citizenship-question/; Aaron Blake, “The Justice Department just pulled its lawyers from the census case. That could signal something ugly ahead,” Washington Post, July 8, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/07/08/justice-department-just-pulled-its-lawyers-census-case-that-could-signal-something-ugly-ahead/; Mike DeBonis, “Stepping up Trump clash, House votes to enforce Barr and McGahn subpoenas,” Washington Post, June 11, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/stepping-up-trump-clash-house-to-vote-to-enforce-barr-and-mcgahn-subpoenas/2019/06/11/a1343cea-8c4f-11e9-b6f4-033356502dce_story.html; Garrett Epps, “Is the Citizenship Question Dead?” Atlantic, June 27, 2019, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/06/court-wants-real-reason-citizenship-question/592864/; Garrett Epps, “The Census Case Could Provoke a Constitutional Crisis,” Atlantic, July 8, 2019, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/07/census-case-could-provoke-constitutional-crisis/593425/; Josh Gerstein, “Justice Department replaces attorneys in census citizenship-question battle,” Politico, July 8, 2019, https://www.politico.com/story/2019/07/08/justice-department-census-citizenship-question-battle-1399523; Ted Hesson and Josh Gerstein, “Why Trump will likely lose the census citizenship fight,” Politico, July 8, 2019, https://www.politico.com/story/2019/07/08/trump-census-citizenship-2020-1573574; Lawrence Hurley and Andrew Chung, “Trump fumes as Supreme Court blocks census citizenship question,” Reuters, June 27, 2019, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-census/trump-fumes-as-supreme-court-blocks-census-citizenship-question-idUSKCN1TS1BL; Seung Min Kim, Tara Bahrampour, and John Wagner, “Trump retreats on adding citizenship question to 2020 Census,” Washington Post, July 11, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-to-hold-news-conference-on-census-as-he-mulls-executive-action-to-add-a-citizenship-question/2019/07/11/c0eb7cb6-a3c8-11e9-b8c8-75dae2607e60_story.html; Ann E. Marimow, Matt Zapotosky, and Tara Bahrampour, “2020 Census will not include citizenship question, Justice Department confirms,” Washington Post, July 2, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/2020-census-will-not-include-citizenship-question-doj-confirms/2019/07/02/0067be4a-9c44-11e9-9ed4-c9089972ad5a_story.html; J. M. Rieger, “The Trump administration has changed its story on the census citizenship question at least 10 times in four months,” Washington Post, July 8, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/07/08/trump-administration-has-changed-its-story-census-citizenship-question-least-times-four-months/; Jessica Schneider, “Federal judge permanently blocks Trump admin from adding citizenship question to 2020 census,” CNN, July 16, 2019, https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/16/politics/judge-permanently-blocks-citizenship-question-2020-census/index.html; Jessica Schneider, “2nd federal judge blocks Trump admin from adding citizenship question to census,” CNN, July 17, 2019, https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/17/politics/2020-census-citizenship/index.html; Ariane de Vogue and Maegan Vazquez, “Trump faces ‘limited paths forward’ on census citizenship question,” CNN, July 4, 2019, https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/04/politics/census-path-forward-white-house/index.html; Eugene Volokh, “Is the Government Required to Count the Number of Citizens in Each State?” Reason, April 25, 2019, https://reason.com/2019/04/25/is-the-government-required-to-count-the-number-of-citizens-in-each-state/; Hansi Lo Wang, “Trump Administration’s Census Citizenship Question Plans Halted By 3rd Judge,” National Public Radio, April 5, 2019, https://www.npr.org/2019/04/05/700982993/trump-administrations-census-citizenship-question-plans-halted-by-third-judge; Michael Wines, “Reopened Legal Challenge to Census Citizenship Question Throws Case Into Chaos,” New York Times, June 25, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/25/us/census-citizenship-question.html; Matt Zapotosky and John Wagner, “Trump asserts executive privilege to shield documents on census citizenship question,” Washington Post, June 12, 2019, copy in possession of author↩
- [7]Heather Long and Amy Goldstein, “Poverty fell overall in 2020 due to massive stimulus checks and unemployment aid, U.S. Census says,” Washington Post, September 14, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/09/14/us-census-poverty-health-insurance-2020/↩
- [8]Tina Nguyen, “To Be or Not to Be: Trump’s Big 2024 Question,” Puck, September 13, 2021, https://puck.news/trumps-2024-question/↩