Democrats doomed in 2022

benfell

Migration

When I first returned to school in 2003, I chose a Mass Communication major on the theory that if everything else fell through, I could at least be a reporter.

It was a horrendous mistake. I was much more interested in the academic side than the journalistic side of my studies and, as to the latter, because my now retired mother was a reporter, I rapidly developed a wholly unjustified sense of having been there, done that. I even recognized at the time that that sense was wholly unjustified, but I couldn’t help it. It felt too much like a return to previously trodden ground.

And it absolutely did not help that as a beginning journalist I could look forward to a beginning salary of around, as I recall, $14,000 per year. This, after four years in college. Now, I understand a four-year degree is insufficient. You need a Master’s to qualify for such a spectacular salary.

It would also have been a mistake for another reason. Anthony Faiola bravely delves in where I doubt I could bear to, summarizing the current horror of European migration and pointing as well to U.S. malice.[1]

Words cannot express how utterly reprehensible this all is.

Anthony Faiola to Today’s WorldView list, “Belarus is the latest country to use migrants as pawns. The West is guilty too,” Washington Post, November 15, 2021, https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=5a39652eae7e8a58807f9446&s=6191e9839d2fdab56b8c3c9b&linknum=4&linktot=87

Cryptocurrencies


Geoffrey Mak, “Exclusive clubs called ‘DAOs’ are popping up online. What’s it all about?” Guardian, November 14, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/nov/14/exclusive-clubs-called-daos-are-popping-up-online-whats-it-all-about

Joe Biden

Here’s that list again:

Of these, only the evictions issue seems to be fading, mainly because it hasn’t been as bad as anticipated, apparently because more rental assistance money is finally being distributed.[2] The bipartisan infrastructure framework passed,[3] but in a way that leaves an even further watered-down reconciliation package, now dubbed “Build Back Better” and priced at under $2 trillion, in serious doubt as to whether it will pass.[4]

My reading is that the Supreme Court will likely overturn the Texas law that outsources an abortion ban to private civil suits,[5] but overturn Roe v. Wade with the Mississippi case.[6] Contraception may well be next.[7]

The other issues are simply where they were: Dead in the water due both to Democratic Party divisions and Republican intransigence. All this certainly isn’t a record I’d want to run on. But it turns out Joe Biden’s administration now appears simply to have been flatly wrong on a number of issues.[8] A lot of folks are saying this leads to a blowout in 2022, probably with Donald Trump resurgent in 2024. I’ve tried to be more optimistic, but I really don’t have a defense for that optimism.

Some Democrats, including within the administration, are still trying to resuscitate that optimism, mostly with spin and hope that next year will be different.[9] But I look at that list and I see way too many disappointments. They’re really going to fix all this in an election year?

Tyler Pager, “Biden has underestimated problems facing the country — and Democrats fear that has become a political problem,” Washington Post, November 14, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/biden-promises-politics/2021/11/14/45a7817a-43f9-11ec-a3aa-0255edc02eb7_story.html

Donald Trump

Miscellaneous

If indeed Donald Trump returns to office in 2025, he’ll have to find his emoluments elsewhere.[10]

Ben Protess and Eric Lipton, “Trump to Sell Marquee Washington Hotel for at Least $375 Million,” New York Times, November 15, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/14/us/politics/trump-hotel-sale.html

  1. [1]Anthony Faiola to Today’s WorldView list, “Belarus is the latest country to use migrants as pawns. The West is guilty too,” Washington Post, November 15, 2021, https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=5a39652eae7e8a58807f9446&s=6191e9839d2fdab56b8c3c9b&linknum=4&linktot=87↩
  2. [2]Chris Arnold, “Evictions rising even as rental help from Congress reaches millions of people,” National Public Radio, November 11, 2021, https://www.npr.org/2021/11/11/1053540080/evictions-rising-even-as-rental-help-from-congress-reaches-millions-of-people↩
  3. [3]Tony Romm, Marianna Sotomayor, and Mike DeBonis, “Congress approves $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill, sending measure to Biden for enactment,” Washington Post, November 6, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2021/11/05/house-infrastructure-reconciliation-vote/↩
  4. [4]Robert P. Baird, “Inside the Democrats’ Battle to Build Back Better,” New Yorker, November 8, 2021, https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-political-scene/inside-the-democrats-battle-to-build-back-better↩
  5. [5]Robert Barnes, “Supreme Court seems willing to allow challenge of Texas’s restrictive abortion law,” Washington Post, November 1, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/texas-abortion-supreme-court/2021/11/01/548c7ea2-3b0c-11ec-bfad-8283439871ec_story.html; John Bowden, “Kavanaugh flags a major catch in Texas anti-abortion law for conservative gun owners,” Independent, November 2, 2021, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/kavanaugh-supreme-court-texas-abortion-b1949460.html; Irin Carmon, “The Texas Abortion Ban Could Lose at the Supreme Court,” New York, November 1, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/11/texas-abortion-ban-could-lose-at-the-supreme-court.html; Jordan Smith, “Texas Admits Its Abortion Law Puts All Rights Up for Grabs,” Intercept, November 2, 2021, https://theintercept.com/2021/11/02/abortion-texas-sb8-supreme-court/↩
  6. [6]Ariane de Vogue, “Mississippi asks US Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade,” CNN, July 22, 2021, https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/22/politics/mississippi-roe-v-wade-abortion/index.html; Ed Kilgore, “Is Roe v. Wade Now Doomed?” New York, May 17, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/05/is-roe-v-wade-now-doomed.html; Adam Liptak, “Mississippi asks the Supreme Court to overrule Roe v. Wade,” New York Times, July 22, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/22/us/politics/mississippi-supreme-court-abortion.html; Nia Prater, “Supreme Court to Hear Case That Threatens Roe v. Wade,” New York, May 17, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/05/supreme-court-to-hear-case-that-threatens-roe-v-wade.html; David G. Savage, “Supreme Court agrees to hear major abortion case challenging Roe vs. Wade,” Los Angeles Times, May 17, 2021, https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2021-05-17/supreme-court-agrees-to-hear-abortion-case↩
  7. [7]Molly Jong-Fast, “The Anti–Birth Control Movement Is the New Anti-Abortion Movement,” Vogue, July 1, 2021, https://www.vogue.com/article/anti-birth-control-movement↩
  8. [8]Tyler Pager, “Biden has underestimated problems facing the country — and Democrats fear that has become a political problem,” Washington Post, November 14, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/biden-promises-politics/2021/11/14/45a7817a-43f9-11ec-a3aa-0255edc02eb7_story.html↩
  9. [9]Tyler Pager, “Biden has underestimated problems facing the country — and Democrats fear that has become a political problem,” Washington Post, November 14, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/biden-promises-politics/2021/11/14/45a7817a-43f9-11ec-a3aa-0255edc02eb7_story.html↩
  10. [10]Ben Protess and Eric Lipton, “Trump to Sell Marquee Washington Hotel for at Least $375 Million,” New York Times, November 15, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/14/us/politics/trump-hotel-sale.html↩

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